The Fire and the Storm - Metric Pro Edition: Fiction, Dragons, Elves, Unicorns, Magic (72 page)

“So, I suggest you make sure to use a spell that can protect you from the pressure, or simply Translocate in up at the water’s surface.”

“Ah.” Val noted.  “I’d planned on using our Void Survival spell, since it maintains normal pressure and breathable air.  But I hadn’t considered the extreme pressure at this depth, and it’s meant to protect from the
lack
of pressure, so we’ll just have to use a good Force Shield as well.

“I imagine you could just become energy if you wanted, that would work too.”

“I suppose I could.”  Visinniria smiled.  “Being a goddess is pretty handy.  But it’s easier to just decide that I won’t be affected by the pressure and that I don’t have to breathe.”

“Ah.  You know, we’re on Father’s list, and he could make us gods.  And I’m kind of tempted.  But I feel the same way he does, and moreso.  We’ve developed really quickly, but I’m still only seven, and I’m just not done with being a mortal yet.  Besides, like Fire said, if we can do almost everything that gods can do, I don’t see that it’s really necessary.”

“I’ve checked the conditions and done the math.” Six announced.  “The pressure right on the other side of the wall right here is seventeen point six two five four times air pressure at sea level.  I could just Translocate to the other side of the wall right now, except I’d have to achieve displacement, which would Translocate the high pressure water in the shape of me to this side of the wall, which would probably soak all of you.”

“The portal’s almost finished cycling anyway.” Visinniria pointed out, and a moment later the four Selkies emerged from the blue dome by walking through the side of it.  They bowed to Mark’s party and moved off.

Suddenly Val Translocated through the wall and appeared in the water on the other side with a bubble of air around her head and a very thin layer of air held against her body by her form-fitting Shielding.  She rose a few centimeters, then stabilized.

“I just did a double displacement.”
she announced both verbally and psionicly, though they couldn’t hear her voice through the water and the barrier that contained it. 
“I sent the water from my displacement to Hiliani, just off the coast, and sent the displacement air from there back to where I just was.  You have to compensate for buoyancy too.  Pretty neat, huh?”

“Yah!”
Fire agreed as
she, Six and Karz duplicated her trick, followed by the rest of their party an instant later.

“This void spell, how does it maintain breathable air here?” Nemia asked.  Now that they were all in the water together it was easy to hear her, though it sounded a bit strange.

“It’s a constant Translocation.” Kragorram explained.  “As you breath out, that amount of air is Translocated out of the head bubble from just in front of your mouth and nose to a location over Hiliani, and when you breath in, the reverse occurs.  We have to remember to change the location of the Translocation point before the Hiliani time-bubble is resumed.”

A Selkie and a Mer swam up to them and began to converse using a very clever translation spell that read their sign languages of gestures and body movements and sent out a short-range Speaking in Trade Common.

“Greetings, honored citizens.”
the Selkie announced. 
“I am Prime Wisdom Gloz of the Banodez river, and this is Guide Leader Bubniiiilduptiii of The Mer of The North Xervian Ocean.  We know of your desire to meet citizens of the aquatic races.  As most of the land dwellers have done out there, the aquatic people here are largely gathered with others of their own race.  We would be happy to introduce you around.”

“Thank you, Prime Wisdom.” Mark responded with  bit of a bow.  “And we are very glad to meet you,
Guide Leader Bubniiiilduptiii.  The only other citizen of your race we’ve met was Zubzubweeeet, the goddess who opened the Hiliani time-bubble.”

“As I am glad to meet you.”
Bubniiiilduptiii returned with the same slight bow, then continued ‘speaking’ as he turned and led the way over the floor while Mark’s party followed with a combination of swimming and Movement techniques. 
“Of the land peoples, I have only met citizens of the unicorn and gargoyle races before today, so this is my first time meeting most of your races as well.

“Until the gods joined The Just Alliance, most ocean people had avoided land people since you first learned to hunt on the seas, and none of our races were affected by the first war with the demons, those millions of years ago.  Still, at the request of our gods, we have joined The Just Alliance, and we are ready to help defend our world.”

“That’s very admirable, and we thank you with great sincerity.” Mark told him.

They approached a group of a few hundred beings gathered on the bottom.  They were many-tentacled mollusks who carried pearlescent shells on their backs shaped like blunt cones.  At first glance, their skins all appeared to be different colors, then it was seen that all of their colors were slowly and gradually changing.  As Mark’s group came near with the Mer and Selkie leaders, all the mollusk people turned toward them and considered them with pairs of huge eyes that changed color as much as their skin, and all of their color changes became faster.  The largest of them had a tentacle span of about two meters when fully extended, and it’s shell was about sixty centimeters wide.

“These are the people called the Mogitar by the giants of south-eastern Felion, who have the only spoken word for these people.”
Gloz announced. 
“They live in the waters surrounding Felion, and are concentrated in the two great bays on the east and west sides of that continent.  Until recently, no other race was capable of communicating with them, but now we all have the translation spells supplied by the gods.  In their language, their motion conveys information, and their coloring conveys emotion.  We’ve always known they were intelligent though.  Those who thought otherwise and hunted them for food in our distant past found themselves at war with a formidable adversary.”

“We greet you.”
one of the creatures stated with a wave of it’s arms and a shift to a dull red. 
“We share fear of the coming demons, and prepare.

“Also, now we can talk with you; we can trade with you.  Our god says the best place to make a place of trade and diplomacy is at Hilia, in the waters down-slope from your present deepest constructions.  We ask to do that.”

“You’re very welcome to do so, and we welcome you to Hilia, and to The Just Alliance!” Mark replied in surprise.  “The Selkies of Hilia can introduce your people to First Minister Sheramiv, who’s in charge of such things.”

“Thank you.”
the being acknowledged as it turned bright pink. 
“That is all the communication we have prepared for today.”

“Ah.  Well it’s been a pleasure meeting you all.  You’re beautiful and fascinating.” Mark stated with a bow and a smile.

Bubniiiilduptiii and Gloz led them away, and they had similarly brief but interesting encounters with two other new races as they swam a seemingly-random route that led them gradually toward the surface.

They met a race who were obviously distantly related to the Mogitar, since they appeared very similar to them, with the exceptions that they lacked the spiral shells of the Mogitar, and that they were much larger.  They formed their bodies into long and slim shapes up to six and a half meters long with their bunched tentacles forming a tapering tail when they swam with a rippling sinuous motion, and seemed capable of contorting themselves into almost any conceivable shape.  They had never been encountered by any other race before their gods bade them to join The Just Alliance, since they lived near the south pole in the Great Southern Ocean; one of the most inhospitable regions on the planet due to its isolation, extreme weather, and violent sea conditions.  Since there had never been a word for them in any other race’s language, they had chosen to be called simply The Southernmost.

The Kag were great sleek fish up to five meters in length with shimmering coppery scales and hundreds of twenty-five centimeter long tentacles around their mouths, which were filled with hundreds of jagged teeth.  They were well-known to every sea-faring race, since they roamed the oceans of the world in great hunting packs hundreds strong, and any vessel that foundered when they were in the vicinity was sure to have few survivors.  They were known to sink smaller vessels in rough seas and consume everyone and everything edible aboard in minutes.  What hadn’t been known about them was their great intelligence and their thriving civilization on a vast underwater plateau beneath the tropical waters of The North Kletiuk Ocean.

They cast magical pictures in the water to show their delicate artistic architecture, and their sculptures of all manner of sea creatures, some of which were fanciful, some extremely realistic.

Then the group were introduced to the Mer, who lived in the oceans around Xervia.  While Bubniiiilduptiii provided proud commentary, the Mer demonstrated a beautiful underwater ballet involving hundreds of dancers swimming in intricate patterns.  It was accompanied by hundreds of voices in wordless humming song, which the Mer accomplished underwater and while holding their breath by keeping the exhalations of their singing in their mouths until their mouths were full, then breathing it back in.

Finally they visited a great crowd of Selkies playing on the surface.  They stayed there longer than they had with the other aquatic peoples, simply because the Selkies were the most fun.  From the youngest to the oldest, they played together like giddy children; chasing each other about, making great leaps out of the water, and playing team games.

Karz commented on the amazing athleticism of the Selkies, and Prime Wisdom Gloz proudly mentioned that a greater proportion of Selkies regularly played in organized sports leagues than any other race on Kellaran.

Mark’s party joined in on the fun with laughter and abandon. 

It was so much fun, and the participation of Mark’s party was so novel, that a great many Mer, Kag, and Southernmost joined in.  Even a few of the Mogitar filled part of their shells with air and floated up to join the gathering.

A Selkie news-sharer had been surreptitiously transmitting their aquatic experience to the great Revealing out in the dry part of the great hall since they’d entered the water, so many other land-dwellers from almost every race in the alliance were inspired to join the party at the water’s surface, many of them using magic to improve their swimming and underwater endurance.  The translation spells of the gods seemed capable of allowing anyone to converse with anyone else, even when there were people of several races talking together, since they affected the listener, not the speaker.  Everyone who wasn’t playing and had breath for it were chatting with everyone else around them.  Soon it was the most inclusive and multi-racial celebration that had ever occurred. 

By the time they took their leave of the aquatic people, Mark’s group had been in the water for over three hours.  They Translocated out together, leaving bubbles in the water that were momentarily shaped exactly like their bodies.

Then Alilia noticed that her daughter wasn’t with them, and turned to Six. “Val?” She simply inquired.

“She’ll be out in a moment.” Six assured her.

“I’m out, but I’m over here.  There’s more room here.”
Val told them in a Speaking, and gave them her location, which was near the wall at the edge of the hall, halfway between the Sylvan and The Hidden Nation’s woods.

They joined her there, and found that she’d found the biggest open floorspace left in the hall, and she wasn’t alone.

“This is my friend Inventive Wizard.” Val stated, indicating the young Southernmost floating in the air beside her.  “All their names are really literal.  She’s only eleven, and she’s one of her people’s best wizards already.  She helped me figure out the spell she’s using that gives her comfortable pressure and the right water and air mix for her skin, and slow-speed flight that works like swimming.  She helped me make versions of it for the other races as well, as you can see.”

As she’d been speaking, aquatic citizens from all the newly-known races began appearing all around them.

“She can’t talk right now, ‘cause we’re guiding most of these people’s Translocations.” Val continued, then waved to a Mer that appeared six meters away.  “Tiiiilta!  Over here!” she called, then continued.  “It was so much fun with all of us in the water, we thought this would be a good idea.  This is really gonna be the strangest party ever pretty soon!”

And it was.  By the time Val and Inventive Wizard had guided most of the Translocations and passed the task to others, and the party had wandered over to a Staff Only Translocation circle to talk to some servers about snacks and drinks, there were aquatics ‘swimming’ around all over the room; conversing, showing magic views of their homes, showing off unique spells, and even dancing on the huge dancefloor areas.  A few of the Kag even swam over to the Sylvan area, and after talking and observing for a few minutes, some joined the line for the challenge circle nearest them.  One of them won his bout, and held the circle for seven challenges before being bested by an aggressive young giant.

The groups of races blended with each other more and more as the evening wore on, and by the time Mark announced that he was getting tired, some seven hours after they’d arrived, it was a very strange party indeed.

“Let’s see The Hidden Nation’s woods before we go!” Fire proposed.  “We haven’t done that yet, and I’d sure like to!”

Sure, I’d like that too.” Mark grinned at her enthusiasm.  “I’ll take us over there.”

He cast a mass Translocate that brought them all to the edge of the woods, about half-way along the strip of artificial forest.  An instant later they were joined by a sprite, and it was immediately obvious that she was a goddess.  Her pretty, fifteen centimeter tall form struck a proud pose in mid-air, and she flashed her wings a few times, seemingly reflexively.

“Hello, I am Bitbitta, Goddess of Hiding.