The Rockaverse

"What a crock of elbow deep mole shit," Caressa spat at the Sudean as she puffed her chest out, not heeding Seru's lead. "Ravi ain't ever gonna trade with that prickle prick. Not since he started that whole deal that led us to where we are."

Horik raised an eyebrow at this as she raised her hands, hearing the low rumble of the worm that had emerged from the water. It stayed low however as it seemed to sense the danger the group was in. Noticing how close it was to their boats, she scooted back an inch at a time until she was near the edge, the worm within reach.

"PSST," Horik said, trying to get Caressa's attention but the woman was focused on the Sudeans. Focused on their insults but not on the sheer number of them.

"We just lookin' for a way on yonder through," Caressa did grumble however as she heard the clink of approaching metal. She was sulking. "We ain't even got weapons out this time!"

"You don't need weapons to trespass, Skylanders!" The Sudean shouted back, beginning to clasp irons around the wrists of all traveling across the river. "Have an armed guard question the holy ones," He nodded to the two Sudeans with the trespassers, already chained. "Detain them fast," he told a contingent of his troops. "And question them thoroughly."

"Yeah, yeah, thoroughly," one of the dirtiest Sudeans, in both body and mind, chuckled, his hands making weird wriggling motions in the air.

"Argent, you say?" The old man hummed, flexing old muscles beneath his suspenders. He cracked a smile, his breath visible in the air of cold ship. "You certainly sound like... a milk drinker to me." His wrinkled fists clenched, cracking his knuckles. "You got a job lined up once we arrive, Mister Argent?"

***

Night swept over the desert, the inferno that baked the planet from above briefly beyond the rim of the land and replaced instead by a most magnificent sea of stars. The desert winds were as furious as night as they were during the day, but instead of burns they delivered shivers. The sky always felt larger than the earth here, be it blue or be it black. Girthfield blinked as he stared up at the glistening expanse above. He three-dimensional geography of space had always been tricky for him, a weakness in his otherwise worldly survivalist mind. But somewhere out there, in a cluster of stars, was his home.

"This is a bad idea. How many times do I have ta' tell ya'll, you don't mess with a dirty dward!" White Hat said, holding the brim of his hat down as they crouched in the shadow of a hard rock hill. Beyond their hill was the expansive wall Otis had seen earlier that day, stretching before them left to right. "They have ore needed to fix Cruise's antennae, unless you want to wait for a starship to handily deliver that ore to you this is the only place on the rock that has it..." Girthfield said, looking down from the stars to the walls before them. "The Dward stronghold."

"If what you two," He began, referring to White Hat and Tackle, "-Are saying is true... that antennae may hold the only records of any communication sent to or from the Meritocrat before it's crash landing, and lead us to the culprit behind who sent that gun to the Rock." Girthfield clicked his tongue before looking to his apprentice. "If this is Dwarden work they're quite industrious. You see any way in other than... over?"

***

Lucky, who'd huddled in on themselves in the freezing wind, slowed as the desert winds revealed a castle in the distance, it's outline stark and black in the night. "You don't see that everyday..." They murmured.

M'kama led the group on, toward the shelter found in the sheet of the night. Eventually the group had pushed open it's ancient doors, sand falling as they entered. "This place is amazing!" Thellani called to M'kama as he walked down the ruined hall, the castle creaking from the sand-storm outside. "It's older than I am!" The elderly man's laugh echoed. "Whatever was out there we're surely safe here," He said, turning to the group. "We must stay! We must- we must explore, this is a new discovery in the field of rocktology!"

***

"Okay, okay," Qunith muttered, hands in the air as the Sudeans surrounded them and the cultists both. "I didn't want to pull this card but... we're divines," Qunith gave a cheesy grin as a Sudean approached them and Talideth to bind their hands. "I mean, I'm a divine, and Talideth's... sort of a divine, depending on... how heretical we're being, but we're... we don't even know these people!" Qunith swallowed as the Sudean archers made no moves to stop. "I'm serious, I can- I can recite so much religious text!"