The Third Power: TTS AU

Chapter Twenty-Three

A quiet had fallen upon the travellers in the submarine. It was uncomfortable, to say the least.

Lance had taken to just staring blankly out of the window, no longer curious and excited about the mysterious creatures swimming by, not even the giant shadowy thing with tentacles that he had noticed had been lurking not too far away from the sub for a while now.

Kiera and Catalina were nestled at the far end, away from everyone else, playing games like noughts and crossed and hangman with the parchment and pencil that Catalina had brought along.

Eugene was on the other side of the vessel of Lance. Of all of them, he seemed the most tense and unsettled. He had taken to chewing on his lip and drumming on the window sill, making sure it was the tip of his nails landing on the cold metal for that weirdly reassuring, just audible clink. His eyes were darting from one thing in the dark blue abyss to the next.

Finally, the former thief let out a long, groaning sigh and turned away from the window, grabbing the attention from everyone else on board.

"Ok, I can't take this," he said, his voice that bit higher it usually was when he was uncomfortable. "What are we doing?"

Rapunzel, though not turning her eyes away from the wheel, said, "What do you mean?"

"I mean what are we doing with-" He gestured wildly to the metal that surrounded them. "This?!"

The silence resumed as Lance, Kiera and Catalina just stared at him blankly.

"Buddy," Lance started, offering a small smile. "If you're that uncomfortable being trapped underwater-"

"No, it's not that," Eugene told him. He brushed a loose hair out of his face and took a breath. "I mean I think this was stupid."

Rapunzel did turn for a moment just to offer a confused and kinda cold glance.

"What does that mean?" the princess asked. "We're saving Varian and the kingdom. How is that stupid?"

"That's not but-"

"Ooooh, Eugene, still got some traitor in you?" Kiera said with a sly grin that earned her an eye roll.

"No," he said firmly. "I've just been thinking while we've been going. What actually is our plan?"

"Well that should be obvious," Rapunzel laughed. "We're getting to Varian before he can get to the Seastone."

An angry laugh through gritted teeth from Eugene.

"No, Sunshine, that's a goal. As someone who has achieved multiple goals in life just know that, unless someone has been thinking up a plan as we've been going, we're probably just gonna end up sitting outside Atlantis. And while we do that Goggles will have the stone and then ta-daaaa-" He said with jazz hands "We'll be in danger, Corona will be in danger, a lot of people are gonna be in danger." He let his arms drop as he finished and took in a breath, having said basically all of that in one breath.

The stares turned into everyone awkwardly glancing anywhere but at Eugene or each other as the realisation of how unprepared they were started to sink in.

Rapunzel turned over her shoulder again to see their now distressed faces. She sighed and turned back to the wheel, looked around for a moment then parked the submarine in the shelter of two flat rocks holding each other up like a tent.

"Ok, Eugene," the princess said as she walked over to her boyfriend. "Maybe we did jump into this a little too fast. We were all just worried about Varian getting the stone." She gave him a soft smile. "Do you have any ideas? We can spend a bit of time brainstorming."

"But what if V gets the stone while we're sitting here talking?" Keira asked, Catalina nodding at her sister's question.

"Then... we'll brainstorm an idea in case that happens," the princess told her. She then sat down on the floor and patted the spot next to her. "Eugene, you wanna start?"

Eugene smiled and sat down next to her. Lance and the girls joined them. Keira and Catalina cleared their parchment of their games and offered it and the pencil to Eugene who took them gratefully and, after only a second's hesitation, began jotting ideas.

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Varian couldn't quite understand the strange heaviness he felt practically encasing him. It made his limbs feel slightly numb and breathing was a bit harder than he knew it should be. It was like the ocean was sitting on top of him.

Oh, wait, they'd made it to Atlantis hadn't they? He definitely remembered the gates - tall and white, and... what else? Fish? They'd been greeted by fish at the gates?

No, that's not right.

What was he remembering? It had something to do with fish, that much he was certain of, but what?

He tried to move. Maybe if he could get up he could find some answers to these broken memories. He cracked an eye open to find himself staring up at white. A lot of white. He could also swear there was teal in the corner of his eye. He turned in that direction and saw...

"Cassandra?"

His voice alerted the warrior sat in the bed next to his. She turned her head so fast Varian was almost certain he'd heard it crack, and she stared wide-eyed and smiling at the sight of the alchemist being awake.

"Varian!" she said, relieved, and swung her legs out of the bed. She helped him sit up as she noticed his stiff movements.

"You ok?" she asked.

"Yeah," the alchemist told her, rolling his shoulder to try and ease the discomfort. "I think using that much power without having the Seastone might have messed me up a bit," he said with laugh.

Cass relaxed a little into her own blankets, visibly un-tensing with the knowledge that her friend was ok.

It was then that Mari and Eclipse walked in and Cassandra immediately knew something wasn't right. The mermaid looked shaken; Her face looked as if she'd seen something die and rot and her posture was stiff. She wasn't fluttering around like she had not too long ago.

"Hey," Cass said softly. "Everything ok?"

Mari looked up at the sound of her voice. Everything changed when she saw the sight of Varian awake. Brighter, bubbly, almost flying over to the beds and a sparkle returning to her eyes.

"Varian!" she said gleefully as she stopped next to him. "You're alright!"

"Uh, yeah," Varian mumbled, a little taken aback by this stranger- No, she wasn't a stranger. He knew her. From where, though?

They'd met at the gates! It was mermen who had been at the gates and this girl who had taken them inside. What was her name?

"You're Mari right?" he asked quietly.

Mari nodded enthusiastically and a smile began to spread across her face.

"At least your memory isn't messy. That's happened too many time to explorers who have almost drowned down here," the mermaid explained with her smile slipping ever so slightly. "But at least you're ok. Just another day or so in here to make sure you don't have any problems after taking in so much sea water and I can take you to collect the Seastone."

Varian's interest and excitement was immediately peaked. Everything was finally paying off.

Cass watched their interaction with a smile before turning to Eclipse, who was stood a little away.

"So what did you two talk about?" the warrior asked.

Eclipse eyed her for a moment before offering a smile.

"Oh, nothing important," she said casually. "Just a talk between guardians, you know."

Cass didn't know but didn't push the topic. After all, why did it matter? They'd reached their goal and would soon be completing step four of Demanitus' instructions. They could relax for now.