OK I admit this one was kinda my fault, it HAS been a month, but CAEK I NEED YOUR ACTION.

I'm not actually sure what I can do in this situation. There's the real risk of friendly fire if I launch an attack, and my abilities can't be used to speed things up or to move quicker. In addition, I've got no out-of-combat utility that can be applied here, so...

Skip action, I guess.

8 10 5 9 1 8 9, and 7 6.
Unexpected turnaround!

caekdaemon - Al-Aris and Li-Rala [8, 10]:
Li-Rala: "I hate running."
Al-Aris: "Agreed."

Appearance: A big and bulky man that appears to be middle aged, with a full head of black hair and surprisingly dark eyes. He claims to be Middle Eastern in origin, but to an observer he would seem to be a little...pale.


Seraphimo - Dunrim [5]:
Dunrim: "This might go terribly wrong, but here I go!"
You gather up the nearby kinetic energy, stilling the air and ground, then apply it to your feet and make a burst of horizontal movement, like your Rabbit Jumper. This time, you keep gathering kinetic energy mid jump, letting you give another jump the moment your feet touch down. You almost stumble a few times but manage to save it, and your jump-run stabilizes into a sort of long jump gallop, like a stone skipping across water, except the stone is you and the water is a forest.
Speaking of forests, you're having several close calls with trees. Nothing bad, but more than once you only barely dodge a tree trunk, a few times your head brushes against some low branches, and once you even glance off a tree, knocking some bark off and almost sending you spinning to the ground.
Despite the troubles, you keep up rather well, and manage to maintain your high speed with Wassily, and after a few minutes of chasing without any luck, you see a bright red figure in the distance. You give a cry of triumph, and you hear a faint girl's cry of distress.

Appearance: His face is full of soot and he looks a bit pale but otherwise he looks like a normal human. He is a little shorter than the average human and he likes to wear fully protective clothing. His origin is claimed to be somewhere inside Europe though he's not telling where.


TheKebbit - Wassily Nuñez [9]:
Determined to not lose them, you bring up your Chart again and push yourself to your feet. Not even looking where you're going this time, you rely on your Chart for navigation, paving a line of Sea where you intend to go and pushing yourself faster with a Tailwind. You quickly find yourself zooming over the ground, giving small dodges to the left and right as your finger traces the top of your chart to mark a shallow channel of Sea in front of you.
Between Tailwind and Embark, you manage to reach a terrific speed, easily outpacing what Wan Wan was running earlier. More impressive, Dunrim is managing to keep up with only his kinetic jumps. You almost give him a Tailwind as well, but decide against it after he almost collides with several trees. He probably doesn't need any more speed...
Suddenly, up ahead you see a red figure running away. Dunrim gives a happy shout, and you hear a distressed one from the witch riding on the red figure's shoulder.
You raise up your flare gun.



CaveCricket48 - Linna [1]:
You cancel the Light of Faith on the mace you just used as a projectile, then recast on yourself as Wassily and Dunrim both shoot off towards the escaped witch and warrior. Then, you give chase yourself, running at full tilt as your two teammates head into the forest after your targets.
And you keep running for a bit.
And a bit longer.
And... uh... ♥♥♥♥. No, there's not any catching up at this point. Maybe if you had a Castle chain available or something, but aside from that you aren't really known for fast movement. Damn.
Hope they others caught up fine.

Appearance: A young woman that seems a bit thin but stands on a sturdy pair of legs. Her short dark hair is still long enough to nearly cover her eyes that are already concealed behind thick glasses, making it difficult to read her expression.


maart3n - Mikey/Heph [8]:
Mikey: "BUILD FASTER......AND BIGGER!"
Matt hears you, but seems to ignore you for a moment, instead trying to calm his fist. Ok, you can wait.
He then begins making a golem to bond with his fist! Much better!

Oh. Well, hm. The golem he made...
Mikey: "Well Matt you at least got the Faster part down pat. Though, the Bigger could use some work."
It's barely up to your knee. More like a small dog made of dirt than a golem. Though shaped NOTHING like a dog. Well, it's something you suppose. You set your hand on the golem's head and breathe life into it. It quickly snaps to attention, looking around and 'blinking' its stone eyes, before tottering over to Matt and setting a fist onto his pant leg like a small child.
Hm. THAT'S new. They usually stick to you.



CrazyMLC - Matt Sterling [9]:
After a bit of work, you manage to pry the arm off your face. It ceases its flailing, but still seems to be shifting around and facing different directions, as though looking around nervously.
Matt: "Hey, I wasn't trying to take you off, buddy. Here, my name's Matt."
You gently reach for the hand and grab it with your, uh... other hand, and give it a firm handshake. The stone gauntlet panics somewhat, giving you an uncomfortably tight squeeze, but after a moment it seems to relax its grip a bit.
Matt: "I like to build stuff. Like this."
You look around for material but really, there's only dirt. You could do stone, but you're not sure how the gauntlet would react, being made of stone and all. Plus, trying to use Stonecarving abilities with the gauntlet on could have bad consequences. So, for now, dirt!
You take some larger rocks and dirt, and with the influence of your Masonry, force it to hold shape, despite being held up in the air with not nearly enough support. Moving quickly but with purpose, you shape a stout pair of legs, a thin torso topped with a wide chest, and two club fisted arms. Topping it off with a small dome head, you're satisfied with the golem.
I mean, it looks like crap, but that's besides the point. Your gauntlet seems to be significantly less panicky now, having been half of your efforts in molding and shaping this little dirt man, and to a certain point you can even control it! It's a bit jerky and the responses are slightly delayed, but the gauntlet is going along with your movements now!

You feel something on your leg, and looking down you find your small dirt golem, now looking up at you! Oh yeah, Mikey can animate stuff. Guess he brought this little fella to life.



Events: Refusing to accept their target getting away, Dunrim and Wassily give chase, managing to catch up within a few minutes. Wassily, seeing a chance, raises his flare gun and fires. A bright red shot, though not very dangerous, flies straight for the two fleeing enemies. The witch squeals in fear, deploying her strange ripple shield once again, deflecting the flare into the dirt and thankfully not causing a forest fire.
If Wassily or Dunrim had been where Wan Wan is, right next to Laeh, they might have heard her muttering something.
"Der kleine vogel fliegt, fliegt weit weg, wo nichts es kann weh tun, in der höchsten bäume..."
Then, she looks up at them, and then starts speaking again. This time, loud enough that her pursuers CAN hear her.
"Abrufen. Auspacken. Dekodieren. Komplett. Montage ... Komplett. Erwerben Ziel. Die Entfernung ... Einstellung bestätigt. Größe ... bestätigt. Direktionalität ... Intensität ... bestätigt. Parameter gesperrt. Alle Werte klar. Initiieren, Räumliches Zittern."
Wassily: "Is that Germ-"

Everything explodes. The ground tears itself apart as huge blocks of earth are forced to shake to and fro, smashing against each other and spraying dirt everywhere. Trees splinter in half, sending branches and trunks flying, while a deafening roar fills the air. Even the air itself is breaking, violent booms resounding from both the land being rent asunder and as large sheets of atmosphere are thrown apart and crashed together. The world itself seems to be tearing itself to pieces, though only in a strangely confined area, directly behind where Laeh and Wan Wan were.
Wassily and Dunrim are both a bit ahead of this massive affront to nature, and end up running into the small bubble of cataclysm before they can stop. Immediately, both are assaulted with a heavy wave of nausea, and Dunrim nearly crushed by a falling tree trunk. Both of them stagger back the way they came, and after a few moments manage to leave the area of whatever the girl did, after which their nausea fades. Both stare in wonder at the huge scene, a dozen meter wide and hundred meter long swath of earth and air simply destroying itself in a violent tumult. Wassily checks his Chart, then does a double take in shock. The entirety of the affected area has become an undulating mass of interspersed Land and Sea, with the area changing status and depth moment to moment, even some unknown symbols showing up on the Chart. Utterly uncrossable.
Eventually, the commotion dies down; the air stops smashing itself together in imitation of thunderclaps, and the earth stops lurching and rising as though it were a raging river. In the area beyond, the two enemy agents are long gone, for sure this time.
Dunrim thinks he sees something on the ground over beyond the ruined land.

Dunrim walks forward now that the ground has stopped self destructing, and checks what the thing on the ground is. It's red, and... metal? A small fragment of a metal plate, with a red paint or lacquer covering it. And then, a few feet away, more fragments. And a few feet past that, even more. And some blood splatters.
Dunrim follows the trail of red for 20 feet or so, eventually coming to the end of the metal while the blood continues on for quite a ways. More interesting though, nestled among a particularly large cluster of the fragments, sits the beaded talisman that formed Urstrig! Perhaps Wan Wan's hand holding the talisman got caught in Laeh's attack? Well, their loss is the team's gain! Dunrim picks up the talisman.

The body is a wooden disk, about the size of his palm, with what seems like a long, winding constellation carved into the surface. On the reverse side is a very stylized bear head facing the left, with a stylized owl forming the rear side of the bear head, facing the right. Probably represents Urstrig. All around the rim of the disk are carved small letters or symbols, though not any Dunrim has ever seen. Several small clay beads are embedded on the edge of the talisman as well, also covered in the small symbols.
A long string runs through the talisman, forming a loop that makes it just about right for wearing it around the neck. About 1/3 up the string on both sides is a small wooden cylinder bead, with several carved... spikes? Fins? Closer to a fin than a spike or tooth.
Turning on his Energy Sense, carefully this time, Dunrim examines the Talisman with a different set of eyes. It seems as though a great amount of Forest Energy is swirling around the Talisman, though in an odd way. It's all being repulsed before it can get close, but new energy is drawn in like streams after the old is pushed away. Or maybe it's being pulled in, but it chooses to turn away? It's unclear. It would be pretty easy for Dunrim to guide a stream all the way into the talisman, or even just a small piece of forest energy.


Wassily checks his Chart for the area again, but sadly all the errant symbols are gone. Just a mess of Land and Sea now.
Odd. There were two things that stood out. One was a different kind of area; where Sea was light blue and Land was light brown, the new type was... black. Worrying. Along with that, there inverted triangles with an X inside them that appeared and vanished several times. Sadly, he wasn't able to see enough to pin either of the new phenomena to anything in the hyper-chaotic area of destruction.


Matt continues to calm his gauntlet and greets his new golem friend, giving both of them a name steeped in Greek mythology. Eric for the golem, and Atlas for the gauntlet. They seem... happy? He's not sure, really, the gauntlet just clicked its fingers together repeatedly and the golem clapped its dirt... fists over its head. Well, those seem like excited responses, so it's probably fine. After that, Matt heads to where the ruckus and loud noise occurred, along with Al, Li, and Mikey. On the way over, they catch up with Linna, who has slowed to a walk after she initially gave chase at a run.


All the team meets up at the site of the sundered earth, and Dunrim holds the talisman forward for everyone to see.
Dunrim: "So... mission accomplished?"