"It won't matter if we end up dead with them," Lero growls. "We need to inform the Renegades of what's going on here, not run in to the rescue like it's a suicide mission. We're here for the Dark Site... not an Elven Village that's fallen on hard times." Maintaining his hushed tones, "We'll have to find another way of determining where the Dark Site is." He looks back at the village, the image of the red aetherborn dragging off the elven corpses burned in his mind. Almost reassuring himself, "The mission comes first."  

"How can we continue the mission if we ditch the only lead we have? Ditching the survivors is detrimental to our goals, because we need their knowledge, and therefore out of the question. We need to think as to where they would be likely to be, the survivors."

Flux is perplexed by the description of the red aether-beast. Red aether again. Why did it seem so familiar, yet they knew they had never heard of it before? They reach to their book, and start flipping through it, mostly for the comfort it brings them to see the strange words. They stop at the section of the book that is missing pages. Perhaps those pageshad held the answer, but they were gone long before Flux had claimed it.

Suddenly, an idea came to Flux. They thought of the servo they had crafted earlier that day, and started more actively controlling it. At the site of the crash, the servo moved to Elto, and started speaking in Flux's voice.

"I don't suppose we missed the elves did we? Their village is devastated, it was indeed attacked as we thought. However, we heard that there were some survivors. It would save us trouble trying to find them if they decided to run to our crash site."

Not knowing what a Chaxaxeuduhm, is didn't disturb Duncan. "What about the people?! We can't just leave them here without trying to help them." It was hard to not catch the urgency I'm his voice but he was still able to keep his voice down....barely.

Kraithee joined the party during their rest on the beach while they had some tea but kept to itself for it still blamed itself for not having killed the creature before Azsixin died and missing their opportunity to learn how was behind the betrayal.

During the feast provided by Namura and the funeral, Kraithee could not stop thinking that the dead crew were the lucky ones for wherever they are now there are no traitors or pain, the Aether is pure, is energy and to rejoin with it is to be free of the evil of the Consulate.

During the travel from the ship to the village Kraithee can't help itself but be impressed with the tracking abilities of Namura that brought them right to the village without harm or going in circles.

Up on the wall with the rest of the group, Kraithee waits the return of Lero and when he says that they should leave the elves for their on luck it says: I agree weith Flux, we cannot abandon our lead to the Dark Sight. Even though we have Namura, she would appreciate all the information she can have to get us there as quickly as possible, and also, we cannot let this "red aethers" destroy the lives of young children and we might as well try to learn what they are since the animals that attacked us look a lot similar to them. My vote is to go into the village and ask questions.

"Assuming they aren't just members of the Consulate we could request a parlay, but seeing as they so easily killed their own I doubt we'll have much more success than making them aware of our presence." He looks around, "We can't stay up here. Decide... we either fortify ourselves in a building to continue this or we continue this on the journey back to the ship." He signs to Arial, what do you suggest we do? I would rather we help as well, but it may be in vain.

"We need to take position in one of the buildings, we can hold that for as long as need be. Numbers will not be an isue if we can provide a choke point to off them at." It was clear that Duncan was willing to stay, damn the odds.

Listening to Lero and Ducan, Kraithee says: I think we should try scouting first to gauge the number and locations of the possible enemies. I don't want to enter a building without knowing if the enemy can throw chemical fire after chemical fire flasks at us and burn us without ever getting close. But I will follow your decision, I just don't think we can take long in deciding.

Lero nods at Kraithee, "If they preferred fire we'd see burning buildings. This looks more like an occupation or a coup de grace." He signs to Arial, Can you send your thopter out to scout around while they make up their minds? Numbers and armaments if possible?

Arial is silent as she listens to her companions hash out their course of action. In truth, there was no easy choice to make. Over the years, lines had been blurred in her morality, with killing so many Consulate soldiers who truly believed they were doing the right thing. She knew saving the villagers was the right thing to do, and yet she felt dragged into this conflict. If they didn't have a guide or better directions to the darksite, she'd leave the elves to their own fate. For her own morality's sake, she was almost grateful that she was forced to go find the elves, hoping one of them knew the way to the darksite. Jukette. This was suppose to be a simple operation. Fly in, dispose of any threats, and fly out. She shakes her head, visibly frustrated, as the stress of everything takes its toll.

Lero signed to her, a fact she almost missed in her self-reflection... suggest we do? I would rather we help as well, but it may be in vain. She hated being the ground. Things were always complicated on the ground. The sky was simple and so free. She caught him signing to her again. She kept the anger and frustration down, refusing to let it boil up and burst. Be calm and collected. Anger will only get you killed. Can you send your thopter out to scout around while they make up their minds? Numbers and armaments if possible? 

She can only muster up the strength of a nod, her emotions too great to bring into either verbal or hand communication. Pulling out a black powder, she dusts the thopter, removing any gleam the metal carapace might reflect from the lights beneath. The thopter silently whizzes off into the air, as Arial sits on the cold stone of the wall, focusing her senses on that of the thopter. A few minutes pass, as she suddenly comes to. "They have thopters of their own. We need to move... now." She leaps up and begins heading for the stairs. "We'll be fortunate if their thopters haven't spotted us along the wall. There's a sizeable building we should be able to hide out in just up ahead."

Lero gestures to the others, "Stay low and stay quiet." He then follows Arial down the stairs, through the town, and to the building she scouted out.

Seeing  a path being laid for it Kraithee falls in line after Lero, attent to any threat.

Namura's eyes darted around the ghost city, searching for any clues. The tracks on the ground were scuffed and hard to piece together, the forest-dweller would often complain that city tracks were much more difficult than ones in the fresh mud of the wild. But from what she could gather, the search parties had already passed through this area. "I doubt there's anyone left alive here," the ranger murmured to those closest to her. "The ones responsible for this slaughter have already been through here." 

The city is dark, with most of the lampposts shattered and broken. Using this to your advantage, Arial guides the the party through Fhestrynn under the cover of darkness. Making your way through the streets, tracks of flame-scorched footprints dot the streets, akin to the aetherbeasts you fought in the forest. Streaks of blood are clearly visible, stretched out sling various parts of the ground. Arial grimaces at the blood. "Are they collecting bodies?" She shudders at the thought of what the Consulate would need corpses for. The party is quick to hear oncoming patrols, and nimbly move to avoid them, remaining undetected.

Within a few short minutes, Arial ushers the party into an inconspicuous building located at the edge of Fhestrynn. The building is haunting, with nothing disturbed within. While bright colors of brass normally would give off a feeling of warmth and light, they only remind you of the innocent lost and massacred by whatever forces are at work. You notice stairs spiraling down to a sublevel of the building, and quickly make your way into the basement. As the last party member makes their way through the basement door, Arial quickly closes it. "We should be safe and secure here. Namura was right: they've swept through this part of the city looking for survivors, and I don't know why they would turn back." The basement has several ovens and tables, with a couple of loafs on bread in the pantry. The ovens have stacks which rise through the main floor and out of the roof: large enough for a thopter to fit through.

The building, a baker's home, felt eerily familiar to the ranger. Of course, she had never set foot in Fhestrynn before, but it was familiar in the way all Plastered Dragon taverns looked the same. Whether you went to a Plasted Dragon in Freejam, Kujar, or Bomat, they always felt like you were walking into the same building. This particular house did not remind her of a chain tavern. It did, however, evoke memories of her time being civilized. Apparently, all towns in Peema shared a similar architecture and airy feel in their homes.

"We should be safe and secure here," Namura began to wander as the captain spoke. Following her nose, she began to rummage through the pantry. She found her prize in the back corner of the lowest shelf: a batch of gooey cinnamon rolls. The elf nicked one, and began to eat it as she rejoined the group. While there weren't many things civilization did better than the wild, cinnamon rolls were definitely towards the top of that list.

"If they're coming back this way," she mused with her mouth full of pastry. "That means they think that they missed something. Perhaps we're not far from that group of survivors they're looking for."

Elto sounds startled. "Elves? No elves. We haven't seen anything. Most of the crew are asleep, and I'm on top looking around, but it's too dark to see anything clearly."

Well drat. It looks like the group has to continue in this dangerous territory. Flux stops actively controlling their servo, and turns to the group, now in a bakery.

"Well, the survivors didn't go to our crash site, or at least, if they did go that way, they didn't make it. Chances are that they are still in this town, since the attackers are still looking here."

Buama didn't feel all that helpful on any part of the trip to the village. She struggled on both ropes, even with a harness to use over the chasm. Once on the wall she had a lot of things blocking her thunder cannon from good shots. Nothing she hears on the report from the scouting of Lero and Arial improves what she is feeling. What makes it worse is the telling of red aether beasts and some long name she can't wrap her mind around. She prided herself in being good at remembering things, but that was definitely not one of them.

Once in the basement looking about a bakery, having just followed the leaders, she snags one of the other cinnamon buns off the shelf. She takes a bite finding it quite tasty and having not to expect to find such a thing in Peema. Actually the village impressed her with the layout though some of it could have been set to defend it better.

"It would be nice if there was some higher spot I could get into with a good view of the main part of the village, but not be out in the open. Some place where I can get to give you cover fire when we wind up in a fight. I just don't like the layout of the buildings to really use the range of my thunder cannon better to be out of sight, but still able to give covering fire. I really don't want to be up on the roofs where a thopter can find me."

She said that more as thinking aloud before taking another bite of her cinnamon roll.

Lero leans against one of the ovens as he thinks. After a few moments he says, "I assume we're going to need to look for survivors. To do that we're going to have to go from building to building."

He sits atop the oven, looking around at all of the bake-ware in the room. "If we're going to do this right, we'll need lookouts on top of the buildings. The rest will have to go from one building to the next. I believe Namura and Buama should act as lookouts. Namura can take down any thopters that wonder too close and Buama can sound the alarm with her cannon if shit goes down-hill."

He looks around at the renegades, "Whatever we do we have to do it now. We have surprise and the cover of darkness. I suggest we always have at least one other person with us as we do this, so stay in pairs or more." He points down to the ground, "If Buama sounds the alarm we should all meet back here. If we find any survivors, we take them here." He points towards the wall, "If all aether breaks loose, we meet outside the wall. Buama and Numara should be watching us at all times."

"Any objections?" He hops down from his perch and lets out an audible sigh, "You all want to save these people, so lets see what we've wondered in to."

"Sounds good to me." Buama grins. 

She finishes off the cinnamon bun and licks her fingers clean. It was time to start finding survivors and any clues about what was really going on. She double checks her thunder cannon to make sure she was ready. She had a full supply of ammo since she had made sure of that when she packed it for the flight to Peema.

"None here," Namura replied, licking icing off of her fingers. "One thing though, I want your nightvision goggles. If I'm going to be the lookout, I need to be able to see as far as possible."

"Buama, I'll shoot a fire arrow your way if I see things are going south, and then you can sound the alarm," the elf got straight to business. "The search parties will have to figure out a way of signaling us."

Lero laughs at Namura as she asks for his goggles, but after seeing her eyes narrow he pales and says, "Oh... you were serious?" Something inside of him struggles as he reaches for his goggles, "But I though elves could already see in the dark."

It takes an unnecessarily long time for him to pull them off and when he does everything in the basement goes dark. For him... 

*Click*  *Click* 

A small light sprouts in the darkness and Lero is holding a small hooded lantern. He closes the shield to let only a sliver of light out; enough for him to make out the shadows of the Renegades.

"I'm going to want it back," he whines, giving the goggles over to Namura.