World Tree MUSH

    Thankfully, the fire watch tower has plenty of space and spare sleeping bags for the search party. Or for those just arriving, like Dante, there's the lovely four hour scenic hike into the Shoshone forest, but nevertheless, everyone meets up bright and early the next day after finding the young boy that had gone missing well over a year ago.
    Castiel still seems to be in low spirits about that.
    But that doesn't stop the approach of one of the fire watchers, who looks quite pensive. He's holding something in his hand.
    "This is..." Castiel murmurs, knotting her brow as she goes through the pages.
    "It's a transcript of everything we spoke about over radio yesterday, and everything you and your friends said since y'all arrived and started your search." The fire watcher says frowning. "Everything."
    Castiel frowns equally as deeply as she pores over the pages.
    "Who... Wrote this?"
    "We don't know." The fire watcher replies. "But whoever it is has been spying on you since you got here. It was tacked to the tower door this morning waiting for someone to find it."
    Rubbing her face, the little angel huffs. "This explains nothing... But we'll continue our search for the source today. We still didn't check by the lake like we had planned, yesterday."

>> SUMMARY[Castiel] >> SOMEONE has been spying on the group and it's SUPER CREEPY.

    Stelle, stoic and quiet as she is, rests a hand gently on Castiel's shoulder when she notices the angel looking pensive and downtrodden. "..."

    The reveal of the transcript of EVERYTHING THEY SAID... that gets an emotion out of the Trailblazer. Her brows knit and her eyes narrow slightly.

>> SUMMARY[Stelle] >> Spying on us? Careful you might make me emote.

Itana didn't sleep all that much. She's been resting much of the time with one eye open, allowing herself to slip off into brief periods of dreaming only when she's sure someone else is standing watch. In the wilderness, the most dangerous fauna come out when the sun dies.

When the fire watcher does approach, Itana's picked out a spot near the fire. The smell of something hearty wafts through the area: She's heating up breakfast, mixing a pot of spicy beans and toasting some corn rolls. A few chunks of bacon and some eggs are sizzling away. As she cooks, she looks up to listen to the conversation.

Her eyes narrow ever so slightly before she exhales through her teeth. "Eat now," she urges with a nod towards the fire. "There will be time to find our snoop on a full stomach."

    Dante is a bit better prepared and behaved for a four hour hike this time around. Hiking boots, a proper jacket, some strong cargo pants, he looks like a mysterious anime protagonist especially with that rucksack. But he won't be here to camp out, that's for sure.

    When he gets there, he knocks back some coffee from the firepit, and also delicious bacon and eggs. "She's right. You better fill up." Dante says to Castiel.

    Tyrael doesn't seem interested in the food, and it's also not exactly evident where he had been last night, either. He just kind of...disappeared and returned in the morning. But he frowns when the transcript is presented. "Someone is spying on us, but wants us to know this fact?" That...seemed to defeat the purpose of spying, didn't it? Not that he's an expert on this kind of thing.

    There's Dante. You know, for a half-devil, there's just something about how the demon hunter is pretty staunchly reliable and good natured and legitimately trustworthy, that gives Castiel some sense of relief to see him. But then she shakes her head as Stelle rests that hand on her shoulder and Tyrael returns.
    "While I do not know much of such things, I do know an intimidation tactic when I see one." Castiel murmurs. "Someone does not want us investigating this forest." She explains with a sigh.
    So, once Castiel has taken the time to help herself to breakfast, courtesy of Itana, and everyone else has eaten their fill, the small blonde picks up her rucksack of borrowed gear; it's got rope, pitons, flashlight, batteries, radio. That kind of stuff.
    "Shall we get going?" She asks the party before they start making their way towards the lake.
    It's a lovely hike with crisp, cool, morning weather, though it takes about an hour to reach the water.
    It looks like someone else has been here though. There's a brightly colored tent, a cooler of drinks, and what looks like spent fireworks strewn about the little campsite by the water. There's a small pier for canoes and rafts, but no sight of anyone around at the moment. For the time being.

Itana eats light. She takes some beans and bread and a bit of bacon, but doesn't go nuts. The rest is offered up to the party without complaint. It is not service with a smile because Itana isn't a smiler.

Once the meal's tucked away, she forms up and continues on ahead. The beautiful weather prompts her to push her hood down and shake her cloak off, comfortable enough to feel no need to shield herself from the wind.

The camp ahead seems peaceful enough. Itana rests a hand on the arch of one hip before moving off to one side, taking stock of the colourful tent from a distance. Then her gaze tracks towards the water. "Perhaps nobody is home," she murmurs, half to the group, half to herself.

She begins to move again, making her way towards the pier as if to check for any watercraft there, or out on the water.

    Stelle lets the others fill up from Itana's cooking. She, herself, pulls a (somehow) steaming bowl of rice from somewhere, and starts eating that. It has bits of vegetables in it, or at least, vegetable-style pieces mixed into the golden rice grains. The bowl is red with a stylized bowl-full-of-rice stamped onto it in white.

    Maybe Dante overcompensates for his demonic heritage a bit, despite looking like an apathetic murder junkie who's in it for the action and little else. He waves a hand at Castiel when he settles by the fire and offers a gentle (surprisingly) smile.

    "Well, in my experience threats like these are issued out by paper tigers. So I ain't backin' out."

    He gets equipped with Rebellion and his pistols, following Castiel along toward the lake. "That a campsite? Think someone else is here." Dante says, jogging toward the campsite and beginning to poke about.

    Duncan did that dark knight thing the previous night, and kinda... disappeared. He doesn't 'disappear' into the shadows in a supernatural or magical way, but he tends to feel more at home there. Doesn't seem like he's there yet, either...

    Though as the group ends up at the lake, the soft, muted click of his armor can be heard approaching. "Pray forgive my sudden taking off," he offers, by way of apology. "But I thought it best that I keep watch from another vantage point."

    He's also not alone. But it's not another person. No, it's a giant, angry-looking, red-eyed, white bird much like an ostrich.

    Ah there's Duncan. The Dark Knight's return- now in armor draws Castiel's attention while the others begin to examine the campground. Though there are no signs of watercraft at the pier there is a SPLASH nearby that says... Someone is in the water.
    While the other examine things, Castiel... Can't quite help herself as she curiously attempts to pet the albino chocobo gently.
    There's another splash though and two teen girls poke their heads up from the water.
    "Hey! What are you weirdos doing with our campsite?" One barks.
    "Yeah, weirdos! Did you come from that fenced off part of the forest?!" The other snaps. "Who fences off a forest!?"
    That's when Castiels's radio pipes up... It's a fire watcher. "We... don't fence off any part of the forest." The fire watcher says.
    "Just go back to your freaky alien zone or whatever! It's over that way!" The girls grouse pointing toward the west.
    Castiel is, meanwhile, busy petting the massive birdbeast while this goes on. Very gently.

    The cobra chicken is watched very closely for a moment by Dante when Duncan and Nemesis show up. "...who the fuck brought an emu here?" He asks in disbelief for a moment, before he's distracted by the teenagers. "Oh. Oops! Our bad, we thought...y'know what, nevermind." He waves a hand before he watches Castiel petting the Murderbird. "Hey, Cas, maybe don't pet the killer ostritch!"

There is a chocobo. Itana seems at ease with it. She likes chocobos but does at least know better than to try and touch it. Terror birds are huffy.

There are, indeed, people in the water. Itana sinks to one knee and narrows her eyes, a sassy retort on the edge of her tongue as she scowls across the water at the pair of swimmers.

She reins in the impulse. These are clearly immature people with no experience in anything but the most comfortable form of wilderness survival: Camping in a nicely manicured parkland. She leaves it to people more eloquent than her to say something clever. As Castiel's radio chitters, though, the archer looks over with a frown.

Without bothering to reply, Itana begins moving towards the west. She's covering ground at a decent clip, too.

    Stelle is investigating, while still munching through her bowl-of-rice... she looks at the girls with a quirked brow, and reaches into her jacket.

    Two clear packets of Trick Snacks are produced and set next to the girls stuff. She then resumes eating her ricebowl as she follows the others toward the new destination.

    The big white birb earns a look from those golden eyes... clearly she wants to pet, but her hands are full stuffing her face.

>> SUMMARY[Stelle] >> I know how to fix this. Behold! Candies!

    Duncan notices that Castiel's aiming to pet Nemesis, and begins, "Oh, be careful, she's ---" The pale-feathered bird whirls at Castiel, feathers fluffing as if preparing to bite... but then just... doesn't. She pauses, as if considering Castiel, and then just... allows the petting. Ruffles feathers. Warks in a grumpy but not at all mean way.

    The bird does seem put ill at ease by the shouting teenagers, but whatever Castiel's doing that makes this possible seems to keep her calm. Duncan also seems more surprised by this than the teens' words. "...I should warn that she's not usually this calm," he notes.

    Dante's words get a chuckle. "Not quite an emu." He's familiar with the word, being in the World Tree long enough to have Nemesis compared to a lot of things. "A chocobo. They're trained as steeds in my world. Her name is Nemesis. Between her temperament and her sight problems, she was destined for the kitchens before I picked her up. I thought that it might be better to bring her, since the figure we've been following seems able to move very quickly to evade pursuit."

    Hm, so the fences weren't placed there by the forest rangers. That was definitely suspicious. Tyrael ignores the teenagers insults and starts off west after Itana, intent upon investigating the mysteriously barricaded area.

    Castiel continues for a moment longer, just a few beats until the shouting makes Nemesis feel uncomfortable. She knows when to not push her luck, even with her ability to pacify animals.
    So it's off to the west after Stelle leaves some candy for the irritable teens to find later. Really though those girls probably couldn't survive their way out of a wet paper bag, unlike Itana.
    Heading through some dense brush and a few deer trails that seem rarely travelled, it's not too long before the party walks smack into a chain link fence. It looks like it was put up pretty recently too.
    "Huh..." Castiel murmurs, rubbing her head thoughtfully.
    Circling the perimeter finds it to be... A solid fence too, with a single gate locked by padlock and chain.
    "If the park rangers did not put this here... Who did?" She muses before considering further... "And how do we get in?"
    It's a tall fence but can probably be climbed or cut, or lockpicked or--... There's nothing really stopping THIS group from getting in, so the rest of this pose will assume the party has already found a means to get through!
    The other side of the fence is a clearing, and there's a large white tent. The tent is open, and there are several tables of electronic gear and equipment laid out on it.
    But... Is that the smell of smoke on the wind?
    Nah, it's probably nothing and--
    Castiel's radio pips up again...
    Whatever you guys have found, you better investigate quickly. We're seeing smoke further out west, and the winds are eastbound today." The fire watch team reports. "Which means you're going to have a blaze bearing down your way fast."

    "Huh. So instead of horses you guys ride raptors. Nuts." Dante says, but who's he to judge? In any case, he seems to pick up and head towards the fences after Itana and Tyrael. Once he gets there he unceremoniously chops the fence down with Rebellion. None of this, thank you!

    He notices smoke on the horizon and begins to pick up the pace, heading for the tent in the clearing. "Wait...is that-"

    He begins to pick around with the equipment, having zero clue what to do with this. "Fuck if I know what most of this stuff does." Dante says.

The girls couldn't survive their way out of a wet paper bag. Itana could survive her way into Fort Knox.

Soon enough, the group discovers the fence - and the locked gate. Itana looks at the gate for a few seconds.

She promptly takes a few steps back, shrugs, and springs into a high, flipping jump over the fence, casually landing inside the perimeter.

There is a new problem: What's inside the tent is Itana's bane. Technology.

Scowling, Itana stands at the mouth of the tent flap. It's as if she could glare a hole in the pile of electronics. "These devices do /something,/" she says, feeling entirely too stupid about this kind of thing.

She nudges one of the devices with her boot before looking up towards the west.

    Stelle approaches the fence. She looks at the fence. She looks at her bowl, now empty. She shrugs, tucking the bowl into her coat somehow, and bringing her bat out in the return motion...

    And then Dante cuts the fence open before she can do what she was going to do.

    "..." :<

    The greynette slips into the perimeter and approaches the technology laid out, picking up a few bits and checking them over.

    Tyrael follows the rest of the group past the fence once Dante just chops it down with his big sword. Since he also doesn't really know what to do with technology, he starts to head off in the direction of the fire. Perhaps he could find a way to stop it before it could bring harm to any of this world's denizens.

    A fence is little match for... well, most of the weaponry the group has on-hand, yeah. Duncan will wait until he sees whether the rest of the group has it dealt with before making his own way through. Fortunately Dante has it handled, and he offers a nod in his direction. "Thank you," he offers, before heading through with the others.

    The smell of smoke has Nemesis edgy. She warks quietly, a low, threatened noise, and claws at the ground with her large talons. Duncan pauses a moment to calm her before finally heading in to look at the electronics.

    Now... he's got a degree of understanding of technology -- just enough to get by, mind you. Electronic doors, light switches, easily-used technology. But he's also curious enough to examine some of the devices, to see if he can find anything out. Carefully, of course...

    Thus the way in becomes apparent. 
    "Thank you, Dante." Castiel says as the way is made clear.
    To tell the truth even Castiel is looking a little befuddled at all the equipment here, though, brow knotting as blue eyes drift over doohickeys and bobs and gubbins. Though when Tyrael starts heading west, she frowns further.
    "Brother, we'd best not split up. Not with the fire coming from that direction.
    Itana, hating to read, likely wouldn't notice it, but there is another notepad with a horrifyingly detailed transcript of everything the group has said since striking out this morning. Everything. Every little utterance, side conversation amongst themselves while walking, down to who said what.
    Anyone can pick that up, and just as interesting; between Stelle and Duncan, the two should be able to figure out what's going on here.
    Most of this equipment is radio equipment. And equipment for hijacking radio signals. Which means whoever has been listening to the group has been doing so from this very spot.
    IN FACT, Stelle can probably even pick up that a lot of this stuff is custom made.
    "Hey guys?" The fire watcher calls over radio again. "The blaze is spreading quicker than we thought, you probably have a few minutes before you need to get back here. We're having choppers come in to evacuate everyone at the fire watch tower."
    Thing is. The call can he beard over both Castiel's radio AND the equipment here.
    "..."
    Well now the party knows where the spy was working from. But where is--
    It is Duncan who probably notices the hollow THUNK under his boot, as he steps over a cleverly hidden trapdoor in the ground. On opening it, a set of stairs lead down into the darkness... Thus prompts the question... Does the party investigate, or do they return to evacuate?

    "Radio equipment." states Stelle in her dour tone. "Custom builds, looks like." she adds, waving one of the pieces over her shoulder without looking up.

    She quirks a brow as the radio message comes over the piece in her hands, fiddling with it to turn it off with a solid sounding click. "Signal monitors... probably some microphones set up around the forest too." she muses, looking pensively around at the campsite, then toward where the smoke can be seen billowing up from the oncoming wildfire.

    Duncan frowns as he notes the double signal -- hopefully it doesn't cause any of that annoying whine that happens when double signals happen. But as he's looking through the stuff, he notes, "That explains how we were heard, at least..."

    Thunk. Wait... hollow? Before he examines why that hollow noise, he notes quietly, "Don't announce it over the radio. Just tell them we're heading back now. If this was the spy's spot, it's likely they have another listening device."

    That's when he'll open the hollow thing. And it's probably a good idea that they all get down there soon, if the fire's spreading fast. Being underground will probably protect them at least a little.

    But, well. Nemesis cannot go down there, no doubt. So he'll look at the bird and nod. "Leave the forest quickly," he instructs. She'll offer a loud WARK! And then the pale bird will TAKE OFF, in the opposite direction the fire's coming from.

    "Not a problem." Dante nods to both Duncan and Castiel, flashing them a cheeky fingerguns gesture in the process. What's spooky is how thorough the spy's findings are. This is super weird, enough to make him think twice about dismissing the spy now. "Jeez...what a stalker."

    When Duncan finds the trapdoor, Dante looks to him before inspecting the trapdoor. "If I was a bettin' man, and I am, I'd say this fire was just a convenient cover-up. Hide the evidence."

    "Guess we go investigate later! C'mon, no time like the present to run!"

Itana spots the notebook but doesn't grasp what it is. It looks like meaningless scribbles to her. She glances at it before nudging another piece of radio equipment with her boot, moving aside to collect it. "Hm," is all she says, as if she grasps what's written.

More important is what Duncan has spotted. With a frown, she kneels by the hollow spot, then looks up at Duncan with a pensive nod. "Let's head back," she says more openly, catching on to how these radios work despite her limited understanding of text. She has picked up /some/ knowledge wandering the Tree.

Then Dante speaks up.

    'Guess we go-'

Itana promptly grabs Dante and pulls him face-first into her chest. She holds him there for a moment, scowling and ensuring he's not able to blab their plans in the middle of a room full of listening gear.

"Hush, child," she murmurs as she steps back, attempting to drag Dante with her as she hops down the trapdoor.

    When Castiel calls him back, Tyrael stops and turns around, just in time for Duncan to discover a hidden trapdoor. Well it looks like they'd found the next piece of the trail. So he follows Itana down into it.

    In fact, Dante doesn't protest at all. He was kinda hoping nobody would want to leave in fact. The part where Itana pulled him toward her tits doesn't hurt either. Dante just nuzzles his new pillows.

    Down the trapdoor.
    Castiel is the last to follow down, red in the face for some reason, and barely making any noise as she comes down the stairwell that leads into a bunker under the ground. With concrete floors, walls, and ceiling.
    The lights are dim and flicker, but the room is full of junk; clearly a lot of spare parts from this room were used in the making of the outpost above, because there's a tone of batteries, arcane technological diagrams and spare bits and gubbins.
    There's a door on the opposite end of the room from the stairs but...
    Among the mechanical detritus present, there is a tape player with a tape in it, and... Several comic books and video game looking accessories as well.

Itana regrets her decision tremendously. Once they're down there, she promptly spins away and pushes Dante back into one of the concrete walls. "You would have blabbered everything to the machines," she hisses, her scowl framed by a blush almost as fierce as Castiel's.

Her embarrassment doesn't take away from the heaps of technological detritus strewn about here. Still scowling like a thundercloud, Itana reaches for her bow, but stops herself upon taking stock of how closed the quarters in here are. She settles for her hunting knife, holding it blade-down as she prowls forward towards the door.

The comic books are barely recognized, but she does look back towards Castiel, then Duncan. "Those look like more of the... childish toys we saw in the cave yesterday. Surely this cannot all be the work of one lost youth."

    *SHHHHHHHOP*

    Dante just smirks smugly. "I am kinda the blabbermouth type. Don't ask me to do any spy shit, I'm terrible at secrets." He says with a cheeky wink before he draws Ebony and advances down into the lair. There's a lotta stuff here, it looks as if people have been out here for a while. There may even be a go-bag or two for a quick extract.

    "Looks like this place has been here for a while." He sniffs. "Ugh. So dusty down here."

    Down into the secret base they go. Stelle rests her bat over her shoulder, looking around at the chaos down here.

    She strides over toward the door on the far side, and unceremoniously attempts to kick it open... "IPC Open up!" she says dourly.

>> SUMMARY[Stelle] >> FBI--- wait no IPC Open up!

    Duncan's eyes go a little wide when he sees how Itana's dealing with Dante. He's wearing his helmet though, so it's not so easy to see. But he notes wryly, "We thank you for your sacrifice." Whether he means Dante or Itana is anybody's guess. Either way, he just heads down the trapdoor with the rest of the group.

    The stuff in the bunker gets a thoughtful frown. And he nods at Itana's words. "Besides, did we not find the son back in the ravine?" There had been a body that had fallen from a great height. Then something occurs to him. "...Unless that snapped rope was intentional... After a full year, it would be hard to tell whether the rope broke of its own volition or whether it was... 'helped'."

    Stelle gets a surprised look. But, well. Duncan draws his sword here, just in case her provocation draws some kind of retaliation. The quarters are tight, but he can probably manage. Definitely no Fire spells, though... there's enough trouble with that on the surface right now...

    Tyrael notes the toys that look like they may have belonged to the boy who had set up in that other cave they'd investigated. But, they'd found the body, hadn't they? Unless...that wasn't the boy's body. It had been rather decayed, after all. He nods at Duncan's speculation. "Indeed, and neither do we have any proof that the body we found belongs to the missing child."

    He also tenses a bit, preparing for a potential confrontation when Stelle bangs on the door and demands whoever is within to open it.

    Stelle kicks the door open. On the other side is a room with no light. But there's no missing the figure seated at the desk there. He sits waiting patiently; a middle aged man with a year's worth of beard growth, rugged outdoor clothes for camping, and a contemplative look on his face.
    "So you found me." He says.
    As Dante suspects there ARE two go-bags.
    But then. There's a click as Castiel presses the button on the tape player.
    At first it has a recording of a father and son having fun on an outdoor outing. Giggling. Laughter. That kind of thing. Before it cuts off suddenly. There's the sound of a ragged breath.
    "Brian... Fell today. I found him in the cave by his favorite hiding spot. I couldn't bring myself to move him. I don't know what to do. I can't report this, they'll think I did it. I can't let anyone find him. Not like that... Not like that..."
    It puts a frown on the angel's face. As the man stares intently.
    "Forest's burnin'. What're y'all gonna do?" He says, awaiting judgment.

    Stelle steps forward into the room. She shrugs off her bat, and with the momentum of it falling, swings it around and just SMASHES the man's head to the side, the bat glowing brilliantly with the strike. "Coward." she states, then turns away to let the others deal with him.

    Dante rushes into the room with Stelle, covering her with Ebony. The pistol clicks loudly as he takes aim...only for an old man to be greeting them. "Seriously?" After all the theatrics this is all they get?

    Dante lets out a sigh before he picks the man up after Stelle delivers a fearsome bonk, checking to make sure she didn't kill him outright with that hit. "We're takin' him with us. Doubt it'll be an issue. He needs to see justice anyways."

    Duncan nods to Tyrael's observation. "That occurred to me as well," he admits, quietly. Though when the door opens, he's poised to strike! Until he sees... probably the father. The tape playing in the background fills in the rest. Which was... about what he'd thought.

    Still, the father's words hang in the air for the brief moment before Stelle's strike likely at least knocks the poor guy out. Duncan sighs. To the others, he notes, "That is a valid point. We may still need to wait out the fire above. In the meantime, do we have the ability to call to the watch tower? Is there anything to do that here?"

    Upon seeing the man and hearing the recording, Tyrael ponders the outcomes briefly. However, before he can act, Stelle just knocks the man out. It was possible he had been lying on the recording, but...

    "He should face justice according to the laws of his own people. I can protect us from the fire." he states.

The door bangs open. The recording plays. Itana is left to listen as the distant echo of a mourning father tells his sad story.

Perhaps not so distant. She looks up towards the exposed... office? Bunker? The figure in there isn't one she could recognize by face, but the voice is clear enough.

Until Stelle tries to hit him in the head.

"Are you fucking stupid?" Itana snaps acidly, fixing the greynette with a dagger glare. With a swift movement, she darts in to try and kneel by the man, taking a moment to check if he's still alive after being clobbered in the head.

"You sad fool," she mutters, the anger in her voice giving way to something more obscure. It's the most emotion she can muster. "You let your guilt drive you mad, didn't you. You could not have stopped it. To seek vengeance on nature...."

Itana trails off. She stares at a spot in midair, not really seeing anything. Only the shadows of another place wrapped in fire.

    Only the phantoms of another history.
        Another loss she couldn't stop.
            Another revenge out of reach.
    Motionless heaps of aching memory.

Duncan's voice cuts into Itana's thoughts. It's agonizingly familiar - almost lost in the memories, but present enough that she snaps back out of her thoughts and exhales. She draws a salve from her hip and sets to work trying to tend the worst of what she presumes is a head wound.

"...We take him with us," she says, finally. "What becomes of him and his grief will be for this world's lawgivers to decide. But to kill him here would only add to the tragedy."

    Bonk.
    The man goes down without another sound, thought the blow makes Castiel cringe at the sight. He's still alive, just out cold, and she will see to it that any damage isn't lasting beyond the headache he's going to have when he wakes up in jail somewhere.
    The little angel sighs, though.
    "It's likely best we not wait here. If we move fast we should still be able to beat the fire back to the watchtower. They will be waiting for us." She does point out.
    It is when Itana stares off into the middle ground though that...
    A pair of slender arms suddenly wrap around her shoulders from behind, tightly.
    "Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted." Castiel whispers gently in an ear while holding on tightly for a moment. She will, in fact, hold Itana for as long as she needs to before... Uh...
    Well the party should get going.
    The skies are red and smokey by the time they emerge from the bunker, and the air is dangerously warmer.
    But between a fast hike back to the tower and Tyrael and Castiel's protection over the group, they should make it back just in time to be picked up by the helicopter evac.

    Dante scoops the old man over his shoulder before nodding. "No argument here." He says, stowing Ebony before they ascend out of the hidey hole. It's a bit of an awkward climb with the old man, but Dante manages it with a leap out of the trapdoor hatch, landing deftly on his feet.

    He says nothing when Castiel tries to comfort Itana. He lets them have that moment.

    It'll be a swift and somewhat tense hike back to the tower, but thankfully not one but two angels are looking after them. After that, it's easy street.

    As they emerge from the bunker, the golden glowing shield that had appeared earlier to protect them from the rockslide materializes again, shielding the group from any fire or smoke that might threaten their lives or health. He could also carry them in it and fly should the fire catch up to them faster than expected.

    Stelle looks at Itana. "..." her profound retort delivered, the greynette heads back up out of the base area, and checks to see how close the smoke-wall is.

Itana is not one to share the weight. She has brought few into her life, and certainly none into the darker places of it. The pain is hers to nurse into a horrible seed of bleak determination and constrained fury. It's had ample time to take root, but not to be given words.

An angel does not need them. Small arms encircle her. Itana's eyes go wide for a second at the gentle and familiar voice.

There is a tension, when she's touched like that - like the resistance of a firmly locked door to a key. After a moment, though, she closes her eyes and bows her head, bringing both hands to rest over Castiel's. She says nothing.

She simply shares, without a word.

The moment, in truth, lasts less than a minute. It feels to her like much longer. Soon, the blades of the rescue helicopter roar overhead, stirring treetops and pushing the grass into yielding waves. The trapdoor opens once again.

Itana climbs out of the basement. With Dante taking the burden of the old man in hand, Itana has taken another one.

She waits for the helicopter, Castiel scooped up in her arms and cradled in a princess carry. The rotor wash blows her hair out and around her face like a silver halo. The wind of it dashes away any evidence of the unshed tears that stood in her eyes. They were Castiel's to see and hers alone.

    "It would," Duncan agrees to Itana's words. "The family has lost the boy. To lose his father as well?" He doesn't speak on the culpability of the father for what happened. He's never been one to try to pass a judgment on another -- it's not his place to do so.

    And don't worry, Duncan's armor isn't heavy enough -- and he's not THAT big of a dude -- to make the helicopter any heavier. He gets into the helicopter easy enough, too; his armor's not keeping him from moving.

    And the bird will have made it too. Naturally attracted to areas where people are, Nemesis would have seen the evac drop-off point, since that's where people were gathering.

    So it's not exactly 'all's well that ends well', but nobody had to die that didn't already, so there's that.