Grateful for Aramis's timely intervention, she withdraws slightly to her Co-Captains sides to help the assault from the cave behind them, though it seems the slash from the grindylow has made her grip on her weapon slippery - she misses horribly.
The dwarf swims a bit closer to the grindylow in front of him and decides to cut it down with teeth and blade
"Can't aff'rd a slowdown from ya runts!"
Diabolito's axe fails to find anything to hit, but his teeth...he tears the throat out of one of the little goblinoid-like creatures.
One last grindylow remains afloat in the pool and he looks terrified, but won't stop his assault.
The creature's jaws clamp shut...around nothing and both fear and frustration fill his face as he suspects he knows his fate all too well.
The creature in front of Maera runs, as he withdraws, there is just enough space to prevent him from taking a hit...thanks to a wall. Then a splash follows and he is gone.
At the grindylows sudden disappearance Maera's lovely face twists with rage, striking at the water where she last saw her target despite knowing he's probably no longer there. She shouts something in a language that sounds almost like drowning gasps.
Seeing that even the worst of insults does not draw them back she quickly stows away her anger, and goes cold as she formulates a plan of action.
"Let's tend to our injuries best we can with haste," she says, noting that they all seem to be in less than ideal repair. "There's blood in the water, and they won't wait long to return if they find better numbers." She nods for them to move forward, taking point down the right path, and begins drawing strength from the water to heal her own wounds.
Aramis growls as she lowers her musket, making to spit on the ground before remembering she's knee-deep in water. "A'right, cap'n," she mutters, clearly not happy about the lack of shooting going on in the immediate vicinity. "Report, men! 'Oo among us is in less 'n perfect condition?"
He grins and chuckles, cracking his knuckles as his teeth return to normal. "Well, that was a nice warmup." The dwarf spits chunks of creature from his lips, his grin disappearing for just a moment.
"Gotta find our friends out there, though."
Doc gives himself a once over and seems satisfied. "All in one piece here, we'd definitely best get a move on. I'm sure our fleeing fishy hosts here will be rounding up a welcoming party for us."
Seeing just a nick in his flesh, he shrugs. "Still whole. Got a few cuts, but we'd best hurry if we want to catch up."
"Let's go!"
With that said, Nissa darts down the hallway and a splash can be heard.
"You heard her, we've got a crew to rescue!" he calls out to the others. Not wasting any further time, Doc takes a deep breath and dives in behind Nissa.
Aramis takes a moment to wrap her guns and powder in her coat again, muttering something about waterproofing. "Well, cap'n's gotta lead by example," she shrugs, before following Doc and Nissa.
As the group comes around the corner, they see tunnels heading off and Nissa's blade is wrapped around one of the creature's necks. As she cracks the blade, the creature's neck is sliced open and it falls, gurgling, leaving the combat over, but at least one of the escapees unaccounted for and a few different directions the group can take.
"No time ta waste, men!" Aramis barks, sparing only a quick nod to Nissa in acknowledgement of the killing blow. "We follow this path. 'Less anyone wants ta split up, bu' yer Cap'n advises 'gainst it!" With that, she begins waving people down the path the grindylow was trying to take.
"North perhaps? I'm not sure which way the other grindylow took off." Doc offers to Aramis.
"Aye, Doc. Seems 's good a place ta start 's any," the gunslinger shrugs, taking the lead herself.
"Onwards! To bloodshed! To pillaging! And freeing our friends!" the dwarf seem ecstatic in moving through all the blood and slaughter.
As the cave branches northward, it becomes clear to the group that at each branch is circling back to an area they have already been.
Occasionally a narrow area drops down a bit deeper. After several side tunnels, it feels as if the group isn't having luck when an small water filled area opens up, the broad cave filled with seaweed fronds that sway gently with the current.
Aramis frowns at the cave, peering into the gloom. "Now we're gettin' somewhere," she mutters, making her way forward.
"Guess it would've been too much to expect the slimy buggers to just put a single path to the hostages," Doc says with frustration as they wander around. When they finally find their way through the soggy labyrinth Doc wastes no time, moving in quickly behind Aramis without saying a further word.
The water is about 8 to 9 feet deep in this cavern.
"I am afraid not, Doc. They are low cunning, Grindylows, but cunning none the less."
Maera judges the depth, and worries over how many of their foes got away to regroup.
"I should test the waters, first- if this be a trap, and they seek to drag one of us down, at least they cannot drown me."
As Maera moves forward into the water, a large iron grille drops from above and traps her beneath the water.
Because Maera was already swimming beneath the water, the grille didn't hit with it's full strength, but as the group sees it fall, they realize that if it had fallen on them, it would have likely down twice as much damage if it had hit them at the top of the water.
Unfortunately, now Maera is captured beneath the water, trapped by this mechanism.
Aramis nods at Maera's wise suggestion, keeping her musket ready. When the grille falls, she yells out in alarm, taking a surprised step back. "'Old these!" she yells at Nissa, throwing her guns to the Vudrani woman and diving into the water after Maera.
Holding her breath, she struggles to lift the iron grille, cursing her own lack of upper-body strength.
Diabolito stows his axe and dives in as well, trying his best to lift the heavy piece of metal off.
The trap still does its job, knocking into the undine with a nasty blow to the back and head that's just shy of lethal. She swirls in the water, dazed and disoriented, and ultimately saved by the virtue of her blood.
Able to breathe water, she cannot be drowned when she cries out in pain nor panic at the prospect of being trapped in the steel tomb, and years of squeezing in and out of shipwrecks slowly come to her aid.
When she finally surfaces opposite her dark hair is growing thick with her blood, and the blue of her skin is already starting to go black with bruises, but she is still alive. And angry.
"Gods, I hate freakin' grindylows," she spits hatefully, holding at the rock wall for support. Blearily she looks to Diabolito, who holds the Wand of Cure Light Wounds. "Don't suppose I could get a little triage from our new toy?"
"Bessie's bloomers, lass!" Aramis laughs shakily, surfacing from the water and wiping the muck from her eyes, "Ah thought ye were done fer!" She retrieves her guns from Nissa and throws them across the deep water to the undine, swimming across to the shallows and strapping the belts back on before embracing her co-captain fiercely. "Scared tha life outta me, ye did," she mutters, her face flushing slightly as she pulls back and busies herself with checking her powder. For all her bluster and bravado, the gunslinger's clearly shaken, and not doing the best job of hiding it.
Nissa pipes up, "I think everyone expected it to me to run head long into some major dangers. I see they were wrong," she says with a holier than thou grin.
Nothing can be found in the room except the trap.
The wet caves head South outside this area.
"We keep runnin' into dangers like this and we might not be rescuing anyone. I reckon that wand is going to be seeing some heavy use before we're through here," he says with a sigh.
"There's still time for that," Maera says dryly, gingerly testing her head wound. "By all means, take point the next time the waters would rise above your head, and see how well you fare." One thing was for certain, one of the first things Maera was going to do as a Captain was find them a trapmonkey at their next port.
Feeling slightly better, she gives a nod for them to press onward.
Nissa huffs, "Your wounds are still rather purple...or is that your skin? At this point, I'm not exactly clear, but if you are still heavily injured, perhaps you should take another use out of the wand. It does us no good if you fall in combat." With that she begins to trudge South through the water.
"An' it'll do us n' good if ye barge off wit'out us," Aramis growls, stopping Nissa with a hand on her shoulder. "Ye'll wait fer yer cap'n t' be good an' ready, aye?" Aramis waits long enough for Maera to make more use of the healing source, if she needs it, before heading south herself, muttering under her breath the whole time.
At Nissa's childishness the undine gives a sigh and a roll of her eyes, but she does give another consideration to her injuries. Another use of the wand would probably not be too selfish...
Satisfied, she tosses it back to Diabolito for safekeeping, and follows after Aramis.
"No time to waste, the tide may start coming in at any time. I've a feeling our short, slimy friends will not be letting us swim out of here if that happens," Doc quips as he pushes everyone along.
The group follows the path and as they do so, the tunnel opens into a wider cavern decorated with hundreds of leering skeletal parts, wriggling with worms. Four dark circular openings exit the chamber.
As they walk into the cavern, Doc takes note of the skeletons. "Skeletons, we saw some recently... where was that?" he says quietly, thinking aloud.
"The skeletons in the water as we arrived on the island, that was it!" He tries to take a closer look to see if these skeletons have gnaw marks he had spied on the those tethered out in the water.
"All chewed up, weren't they?" Aramis mutters, wading into the water and jabbing one of the skeletons with the butt of her musket. "Well, no sense standin' 'ere with our timbers shiverin'. Best we keep moving." She heads for the southern exit.
"Chewed on an' likely marked somehow, if I remember right." The salty dwarf says, quietly pulling his axe free again.
"Time to be crackin' some skulls and breaking some bones."
As they move forward, it becomes apparent that the water drops off quickly, but suddenly any chances of seeing the bottom are impossible as the water fills with what appears to be blood.
Something beneath the water is moving.
Maera makes a sweeping gesture from Nissa towards the swirling water, and the trap that surely waits for them, but Maera is certain that the Vudrani woman is not so foolish as that. For lack of anything to attack, Maera draws her weapon and goes to a full defensive action.
Aramis keeps her loaded musket trained on the water, ready to fire on the first thing that emerges from it.
Deciding that now would be a great time to prepare for whatever is coming to attempt to eat them, Doc decides to dig out one of his extracts.
Downing it quickly, he readies his dagger and moves up to protect Maera and Aramis.
The dwarf just grins and pulls his axe out, readying it for the first enemy to leap out.
As the party moves in, the creature makes it's attack, swimming through the water, a large, purple skinned creature appears from out of nowhere and swats at the dwarf with a tentacle.
The creature easily grabs the dwarf, but has exposed itself, getting shot and beginning to bleed from the gunslinger's planned attack, having been missed by the dwarf's axe before the tentacle grabbed him.