Entering the Labyrinth

The Fourth Hour

Alexis takes a deep breath in and starts choking as she returns to consciousness. She turns over to her side to help relieve her airway and tries to examine her surroundings through the force of her hacking. She sees many pools of water that almost seem to be glowing through the cavern's darkness, seeing the ripples reflecting off the stone above. The visual and sound of trickling water helps to calm Alexis' nerves a bit, but seeing the sets of webbed claws behind her causes her heart to jump through her chest and a scream to erupt.

"Who are you all? Where am I?" Alexis shouts while quickly sitting up. The creatures all mimic her scream, extending their fins and showing their sharp teeth, causing Alexis to scoot as far away from them as she can. But the ferocious image she has of them doesn't quite add up as she watches them scream for longer than she did and slowly trail off one by one. Then they return to their blank, beady staring, showing Alexis not dominance but mindlessness. Now, instead of staring at them in fear, she stares in confusion.

The webbed claws are paired with fins on the sides of their arms, along with fins on their backs and down their bellies. Their limbs down to their fingers are long and gangly looking, but their bodies are small and stout. Alexis can't tell if those beady eyes blink because they all just are standing there staring at her with blank expressions. They reminded her of the Ahuiztol she had read stories about, but these creatures don't have hands at the ends of their tails. 

"Um... what are you all?" she tries asking. Alexis can barely make out the word "Watata" with all the voices saying the repeating syllables over each other. She swears she hears a couple of names thrown in there, like "Steve" and "Jerry". Or maybe some of them are giving extra syllables, adding to the vibe Alexis is getting that these creatures aren't the brightest. Looking over them, she remembers her companion and scans the cavern to see another group of these rodents circling around the griffin.

"Cleo!" Alexis shouts and runs over to the unconscious griffin, with the squeaky voices repeating the word after her. Alexis pushes the creatures aside to examine Cleo- not seeing any outward signs of injury and a normal breathing rate. She sighs in relief but tenses up once she feels the creatures crowding in around them. She turns to face the hoard around her, met by hundreds of beady eyes and wide smiles with sharp teeth, muttering in awe of the new company in the cave. 

Well, these guys are invasive and creepy, but at least not trying to kill them.

"You guys wouldn't know how to get to the castle, would you?" she asks in a long shot. They all collectively look at each other, murmuring about directions to the castle, some directions nonsensical. Then, they all turn back to Alexis and give an animated "No!" and a few tappering "No clue"s. And the complete confidence in their lack of knowledge is believable to her, not feeling like it is a trick. 

"Well, thank you," she offers. She looks at Cleo and sees the Griffin show no signs of waking up soon. She hopes they are in a safe place to wait for Cleo to wake up and recuperate. She turns back to the little ones and asks, "Is it alright if we stay for a bit?" Their sharp smiles grow even wider and more feral as they all exclaim, "Stay!" in glee. Now Alexis feels off-put by their unsettling enthusiasm. 

"Well...thanks. You can just ignore us, go about your... usual business," she says to them. They echo her words, in a more jumbled order and more blissfully unaware tone, wandering off to the different pools around the cave. Once they are all dispersed, Alexis turns back to Cleo. She imagines shaking or yelling into the ear of a giant unconscious beast won't work to wake it. Or it will find Alexis on the receiving end of those big claws Cleo has. Alexis opts to gently pet Cleo, just watching over until the griffin wakes up. 

Alexis looks around the cavern a bit more closely now that she has a moment. While there is no light source in the cavern around them, the cavern is alight with flowing blue lights dancing across the walls from the pools. The pools are separated on multiple levels in front of Alexis. Behind her is a dark corridor that she can't tell where it leads to, and doesn't care to find out. In another life, another story, Alexis could just sit back and enjoy the sound of splashing water and flowing lights like a tranquil oasis. But as Cleo begins to stir, the peace disappears, and Alexis anxiously checks on the baby griffin.