Help in the Nick of Time

Ersatz sat and watched the pair leave after their conversation, the large forms moving far more swiftly through the water than their size should permit. It had been a fun and yet eye opening chat about each side. The Garochs got a good view in to at least Ersatz's perspective of things and Ersatz gathered more information that she could, if she wanted to, pass onto Kartha. She hadn't decided yet if she would, though. She wanted to approach these rediscovered cousins with the utmost care and respect and she wasn't entirely certain that Kartha had that same view yet.

The black kadin busied herself with donning her diving gear, she had already lost a good portion of the early daylight with her discussion with Vackhalee and Raspoie and the dive could be put off no longer. Settling the heavy oxygen tanks on her back, Ersatz dove into the black waters of Paschmahaa once more. Even in the bright afternoon sun it was tough to see once one got low enough. For a short while, her breath fogged her mask, making it even tougher to see and navigate.

The deeper she swam, the more she saw of the unique life forms that inhabited the dark, their bioluminescence aiding them in navigating the pits and spires of their home. Something moved off to one side of Ersatz, causing her to quickly spin to face it. The shape was larger than the animal species she had seen down here so far, could this be Chayandhal that Kartha spoke about? As she paddled backward to keep the growing shadow in her sight, she bumped her back against one of the many spires of rock and earth that jutted up from the ocean floor. She blinked a moment, shaking off the surprise before realizing that she'd lost the shadow she had been following.

Within moments, something had grabbed her and was swimming with her. The water rushed through her feathers and the force threatened to loosen the seal of the mask around her muzzle. Suddenly, she felt a chill. Blinking and looking around her as best as she could, Ersatz found herself back on her boat with two more new faces.

One was a pale blue green with soft brown on their armored scaling. The other, who looked as though they were about to bolt back into the water from fright, was a deep blue, their back speckled with lighter blue from head to tail. Both were Garochs, Ersatz realized just from their size alone.

"Goodness me! Please be careful down there!" gasped the pale one, their horns arching smoothly over their head dripping. "If we hadn't shown up when we did..."

The blue one, keeping a bit of distance from the boat, shook their head. "I don't know why you had to drag me along with this, Amlin. You handled it perfectly fine."

The pale one looked at their companion, a hurt expression on their muzzle. "Don't be like that, Phora. This one needed our help."

Ersatz looked between the pair, who struck an odd, mismatched scene in her mind. The one called Phora clearly didn't want to be with anyone they didn't know, not that she could blame them, yet still followed the other in getting her to the surface. She pulled the mask off of her face and offered a reassuring smile. "I appreciate the assistance, I'm Ersatz. I'd love to hear about what it was that was coming after me."

The pale one looked at Ersatz with an eager smile while the blue one simply sighed and rolled their eyes. It was time for lunch anyway, no harm in gathering more intel from the locals, Ersatz thought as the pale one, Amlin, began explaining.