Try Ep. 1 Pt. 2
Pt. 1
~*~*~
The next day was bright, the sky a vivid blue marked only with a few high cirrus clouds. The proceedings for the official peace delegation from Seyruun to the Outer World were soon to be complete. Zelgadiss, hood up and face mostly covered, stood in the crowd with Lina and Gourry, listening to the speeches being made. Admittedly Zel was watching Amelia, standing beside her father, more than watching Prince Phil give his speech.
"Fellow inhabitants of this land! For the first time in a thousand years," proclaimed Prince Philionel of Seyruun to the crowds, "we will set foot into the outer world! At the moment, we cannot know what is going on out there."
He motioned then to the large globe at his side before raising his considerable fist. "Will we be greeted with good will? Or will it be just the opposite? Countless dangers may await us there! But, equal in number to the dangers... no, in greater number," he slapped his hand down onto the globe in emphasis, "are new possibilities! And so, now we take that first step out to find them!"
Zel saw Amelia step forward, saying, "Bring forth the map!"
A great map was unfurled, showing their part of the world and the route south that the fleet would take. "To avoid the desert that stretches to the south of us," Amelia went on, "our fleet will be sailing south from this coast. Our flagship will be the Ceiphied from the holy kingdom of Seyruun. The second ship..."
And on it went.
~*~*~
"What do you know!" Gourry said, smiling. "The guy who put this delegation together was Phil!"
"Hey, isn't that Amelia over there?" Lina said, excitedly, and grabbed Zel's arm. "Look, Zel! It's Amelia!"
...As if he hadn't noticed her right away...
Not really noticing Zel's eyeroll, Lina quickly turned to shout: "Amelia! Amelia! It's me! It's me!"
Zel watched as Amelia went stiff, then looked around as if nervously searching for who was calling her. She must have convinced herself that it was just her imagination, because eventually Lina gave up, panting in exertion.
"Looks like she can't hear us," Gourry remarked, idly.
"Fine!" Lina said, stubbornly. "We'll just catch up with her later, and when we do..."
"I suppose," shrugged Zelgadiss, arms crossed, "but what about that girl, Filia, from yesterday?" The thought of unfinished business made him uneasy. "Things have gotten hazy since then."
"I'm right here, if you want me," said a serene voice, suddenly, making them all jump and turn around to see Filia stepping towards them. Zelgadiss hadn't heard her arrive, which was surprising, if not outright suspicious.
"Filia?" Lina asked, followed directly by Gourry's confused, "The tail woman?"
Today, Filia's serene demeanor was marked with embarrassment. "Look, about yesterday... I'm terribly sorry."
"This girl is definitely someone special," Zel heard Lina remark as she turned to Gourry. "Hey, there's no tail on her!"
"She definitely had one when I saw her!" He whispered back, earnest.
"You aren't lying are you?" Lina replied, suspicious.
"Um... excuse me?" Filia broke in, looking hesitant. "I believe I forgot something when I left yesterday. Might you still have it?"
"You mean this thing?" replied Zelgadiss, dryly, offering back the spiked mace.
Filia clutched it, happily, "Oh, thank you so much! For a while, I didn't know what I'd do! Oh thank goodness!" Putting it... away, she grew more serious. "Anyway, might we continue our talk from yesterday?"
"Sure," Lina replied. "It's about a job that paid a special guarantee, right?"
"A favor beyond just finding out how powerful we are," Zelgadiss clarified, crossing his arms.
"Yes," said Filia, smiling, "That's why I'm going to have to test all of your power." Before any of them could react, Filia became encased in a golden light, and disappeared, leaving them staring after her.
"Huh? Huh? Hold it! What???" Lina cried.
Behind them, the proceedings for the fleet's embarkation had completed, marked with fireworks and gongs, and loud cheering from the crowds.
"She disappeared!" exclaimed Gourry.
"Test our powers?" Zelgadiss raised an eyebrow, suspicious. "What is she planning?"
Lina facepalmed, tiredly. "I guess she really is someone special."
~*~*~
When the first ships had begun pulling out of the harbor, Lina and the others finally caught up to Amelia. Zel, hanging back, noticed that she... didn't seem to happy to see Lina.
"Yoo-hoo, Amelia!" Lina shouted cheerfully, "Long time, no see!"
Amelia considered, at first, pretending not to recognize her, but was sadly thwarted when her father came up to offer greetings. "Oh, Miss Lina!"
"Prince Phil!" Lina greeted, loudly and cheerfully, leaving Amelia to hide her face in chagrin.
~*~*~
"Um, Miss Lina," Amelia tried to ward Lina off, much to the consternation of her father and to the bruised pride of Lina. "I'm doing official business here. Can we talk later?"
"Why so unfriendly, all of a sudden?" Lina demanded, but they were both interrupted by a loud roar from the direction of the town.
A large, golden dragon swooped at them out of nowhere, leaving a trail of wind-wrecked damage. Over their heads and out into the harbor, damaging the rigging of some of the ships in its wake, before it pulled up to make another pass.
"A golden dragon!"
"Why now of all times???"
"HOLD IT!" Lina shouted. "This is the test of our powers?!"
"What???" Amelia looked at her accusingly, "You mean this is your fault?!"
"Yes," Zelgadiss admitted. "It seems there's no doubt about it."
The dragon came at them a second time, leaving Zel and Gourry only a split second in which to react. Gourry yelled "Look out!" and leaped in front of Lina as Zel leaped in front of Amelia.
Left in the wreckage, the very specifically aimed wreckage, they all pulled themselves to their feet. "I'm... pretty certain we're the dragon's targets," Zel remarked, flatly.
"What's it thinking?" Lina slammed her fist on a chunk of stone from a nearby building. "Doing this with so many people around!"
"What'll we do?" Gourry managed.
Lina grinned in return. "There's only one thing to do!" She then leaped onto one of the ropes tying a ship to the harbor. "Let's go, Gourry! Zel! Amelia!"
"Of course! The ship!" Zel nodded, leaping after her. The others were quick to follow... though Amelia had a hard time of it, in her dress and high-heels. Soon the ship was cut free from the harbor and was headed out into open water.
"We'll lead that thing out to the open sea! Gourry, take the wheel!"
"Right!"
"Hold it!" interrupted the ship's captain. "This is my ship! My ship is like a part of my own body! You can't just take it!"
The ship was then rocked by another pass by the golden dragon, leaving everything in disarray.
"She's all yours!" called the captain from one of the life boats, rowing hurriedly back to shore.
"Man," Lina remarked, watching them. "Now those guys are honest with themselves."
Gourry concurred. "Seyruun sailors aren't that tough, huh?"
"Let me," Amelia said, climbing over the side of the ship at last. "Let me take command!"
Zel was... vaguely surprised by how quickly Amelia rallied the fleet into order, calling aloud quick, decisive orders to speed the ships out onto open sea and call forth the ship's sorcerers.
"Fire!" she called as the golden dragon dipped into another pass, coming quickly into range. Along the starboard side of each ship in the fleet, twenty mages simultaneously cast Fireball, sending them at the speeding dragon.
But the dragon kept coming. It seemed that it was all for naught as the unscathed dragon opened its mouth and sent a bolt of its Laser Breath at the ships, but, thinking quickly, Zel and Amelia sent simultaneous Burst Flares out from the ship to intercept the attack. The fleet rocked wildly with the force of the impact, the seas in turmoil and the deck in chaotic disarray. The force of the wind carried by the passing dragon snapped the top of the ship's mainmast, sending rigging down on deck and leaving most of the ship's mages flailing in the water.
Holding onto the stunned Amelia, Zelgadiss quickly threw liferings to the mages-overboard. "Golden dragons are as tough as I've heard!" he says, jaw clenched.
His frustration, however, was nothing compared to Lina's. One could practically hear her teeth grinding together. "It's making a fool of me!" she growled, fists tight.
Heroically, Gourry drew his sword, the Sword of Light. "Is that my cue?" With a mighty swing of the blade, he called out, "LIGHT, COME FORTH!" and sent a large blast of light at the dragon as it turned to make another pass at the ship.
The dragon dodged easily, letting the beam from Gourry's blade hit the ship that happened to be behind it with a loud explosion.
Gourry stared in horror at where the ship had been.
"WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING?" Lina cried in horror, just before the dragon sent another beam of its Laser Breath at them.
"AH! It's coming straight for us!" Amelia cried out, but no one had time to react any further before the beam hit them with a great crash, sending debris every which way. Luckily, though, the ship was left mostly intact. Lina recovered first, glaring fiercely up at the dragon. "It's not playing around."
She set her jaw. "Okay. Fine," she ground out, running for the bowsprit. "Then I'm not going to pull any punches, either!"
Balanced on the beam, she spread her hands, "RUNE FLARE!" Lances of fire flew from her hands like missiles, speeding up into the air towards the dragon. All of them on the ship saw the flares hit the dragon, which caught fire. "All right, it worked!" Lina says, clenching a fist.
But just as soon as she had spoken, the dragon turned, the flames leaving its body unmarked as it began another pass towards the ship. "Miss Lina!" Amelia called, pointing as the dragon sent another beam of its Laser Breath at the ship.
"Leave this to me," she said, looking over her shoulder. "Gourry! Hard to port!"
...Gourry, the poor thing, was having difficulty with the ship's wheel. "Um! Which... which way is port?" he called back, turning the wheel.
"No! Other way! Other way!" Lina cried furiously as she fell off the bowsprit to be dragged through the water, holding onto a rope. Managing to clear her sight, she saw the dragon coming for them. "SEA BLAST!" she called, plunging her hand into the waves. A great rush of seawater rose up in a plume to deflect the incoming blast of Laser Breath, and instead of continuing its pass, the dragon turned and began flying away from them, out to sea.
"Look!" Amelia looked hopeful. "It's running away!"
But Lina wasn't satisfied, sprinting back to the bowsprit. "Oh no you don't! After it! HARD TO PORT!"
"AYE AYE, SIR!" called Gourry with confidence, spinning the wheel as Zelgadiss held up helpful arrows for him.
Lina stood at the bow of the ship, eyes closed, balanced perfectly as she recited the incantation, a dark red haze growing up around her.
"Darkness beyond twilight,
Crimson beyond blood that flows,
Buried in the flow of time...
In thy great name, I pledge myself to darkness!"
Zelgadiss, Amelia and Gourry knew what was coming. They kept their sunglasses for just such an eventuality.
"Let all the fools who stand before us be destroyed...
...by the power you and I possess!"
Lina opened her eyes. She was smiling. Drawing back her hands as one might do before throwing something, she send the ultimate black magic spell at the dragon.
"Dragon Slave!!!" In a furious whirl of energy, the large, dark-red beam of the spell shot forth from her hands, straight at the fleeing dragon.
The explosion it caused was immense, enough to take out a decently-sized town. The backlash of sea-water filling the space left by the flashboiled ocean was a dim roar in the distance.
"Victory!" Lina called, grinning, as everyone left on board finally relaxed.
"You did it, Miss Lina!" Amelia beamed.
Gourry clapped Zel on the back, grinning, as Zel smiled wryly at the black magic sorceress. "Lina won't even lose face to a golden dragon..."
Then he and Gourry froze in sudden horror, staring.
Lina turned to them, cheerfully, "Anyway! Let's get back to port fast, so I can find that Filia girl and really make her pay for this!" Then she blinked, noticing the stricken looks on her friends' faces.
They stared past her, trying to force out the word: "Tsuna- tsuna- tsuna- tsuna-!"
"Tsuna?" Lina blinked at them, completely confused, and turned around.
"TSUNAMIIIII!"
~*~*~
The ship was a wreck, barely staying afloat. Seagulls soared above it and the now-calm sea.
"...All I can see is ocean," said Amelia as she looked through the spyglass, sounding forlorn, before a note of horror entered her voice. "All the other ships must have been sunk!"
"Dammit!" spat Zelgadiss as he kicked the ruined ship's wheel. "There's nothing to be done." The rudder wasn't responding; with the sails in such disarray and most of the rigging lost, there wasn't any real way of steering the ship.
Amelia leaned forward with a startled noise, still peering through the spyglass.
"Now what?" muttered Lina.
"L-look," she said faintly and handed the glass to Lina.
Apparently the view through the spyglass was... rather disheartening. "Th-that's the port we just left?" Lina said, not really wanting an answer.
"I think the tsunami your Dragon Slave caused must have..." started Amelia.
"It's a total mess," laughed Lina with a sinking feeling in her stomach.
"What do we do, Miss Lina?"
Very slowly, Lina put down the spyglass. Squaring her jaw, the old fierce look entered her eyes again and she raised a fist. "All right! It's decided! We run- uh, I mean we set sail for the outer world!"
"WHAT?" exclaimed Amelia in shock.
"The ship's destination hasn't changed!" Lina explained cheerfully. "We shall carry on and take our first step into an unknown world!"
"Are you sure about this?" asked Gourry, rubbing his head doubtfully.
"We could still Ray Wing our way back, you know!" Amelia cried, her sense of justice and duty and her desire not to get in trouble all conflicted.
"Oh, quit whining!" Lina snapped, waving protests aside.
"You guys want to see the outer world, too, right? Ameliaaaa," Lina's look turned rather... predatory. "you want to spread justice and fight evil there, right?"
Amelia looked rather frightened. "Uh... yeah..."
Zel looked terribly amused, chin in hand. "Zelgadiss," Lina coaxed, "I know you want to go."
"Yes," he said, smirking, "I'm the sort who's always chasing his dreams."
"And you, Gourry?" Lina looked over at him. Gourry shrugged, smiling, and replied. "Hm... well, I guess I'll tag along."
"Okay!" Lina yelled, fist raised high. "Now the world's our stage as we set off on a new journey! Let's gooooo!"
"Miss Linaaaa," Amelia said, her guilt surfacing again as the ship drifted on across the trackless sea, "What're we going to do?"
Lina's enthusiasm didn't waver. "Didn't you hear me? A new journey! LET'S GOOOOOOOOOOOOO! Say it louder!"
~*~*~
The next day was bright, the sky a vivid blue marked only with a few high cirrus clouds. The proceedings for the official peace delegation from Seyruun to the Outer World were soon to be complete. Zelgadiss, hood up and face mostly covered, stood in the crowd with Lina and Gourry, listening to the speeches being made. Admittedly Zel was watching Amelia, standing beside her father, more than watching Prince Phil give his speech.
"Fellow inhabitants of this land! For the first time in a thousand years," proclaimed Prince Philionel of Seyruun to the crowds, "we will set foot into the outer world! At the moment, we cannot know what is going on out there."
He motioned then to the large globe at his side before raising his considerable fist. "Will we be greeted with good will? Or will it be just the opposite? Countless dangers may await us there! But, equal in number to the dangers... no, in greater number," he slapped his hand down onto the globe in emphasis, "are new possibilities! And so, now we take that first step out to find them!"
Zel saw Amelia step forward, saying, "Bring forth the map!"
A great map was unfurled, showing their part of the world and the route south that the fleet would take. "To avoid the desert that stretches to the south of us," Amelia went on, "our fleet will be sailing south from this coast. Our flagship will be the Ceiphied from the holy kingdom of Seyruun. The second ship..."
And on it went.
~*~*~
"What do you know!" Gourry said, smiling. "The guy who put this delegation together was Phil!"
"Hey, isn't that Amelia over there?" Lina said, excitedly, and grabbed Zel's arm. "Look, Zel! It's Amelia!"
...As if he hadn't noticed her right away...
Not really noticing Zel's eyeroll, Lina quickly turned to shout: "Amelia! Amelia! It's me! It's me!"
Zel watched as Amelia went stiff, then looked around as if nervously searching for who was calling her. She must have convinced herself that it was just her imagination, because eventually Lina gave up, panting in exertion.
"Looks like she can't hear us," Gourry remarked, idly.
"Fine!" Lina said, stubbornly. "We'll just catch up with her later, and when we do..."
"I suppose," shrugged Zelgadiss, arms crossed, "but what about that girl, Filia, from yesterday?" The thought of unfinished business made him uneasy. "Things have gotten hazy since then."
"I'm right here, if you want me," said a serene voice, suddenly, making them all jump and turn around to see Filia stepping towards them. Zelgadiss hadn't heard her arrive, which was surprising, if not outright suspicious.
"Filia?" Lina asked, followed directly by Gourry's confused, "The tail woman?"
Today, Filia's serene demeanor was marked with embarrassment. "Look, about yesterday... I'm terribly sorry."
"This girl is definitely someone special," Zel heard Lina remark as she turned to Gourry. "Hey, there's no tail on her!"
"She definitely had one when I saw her!" He whispered back, earnest.
"You aren't lying are you?" Lina replied, suspicious.
"Um... excuse me?" Filia broke in, looking hesitant. "I believe I forgot something when I left yesterday. Might you still have it?"
"You mean this thing?" replied Zelgadiss, dryly, offering back the spiked mace.
Filia clutched it, happily, "Oh, thank you so much! For a while, I didn't know what I'd do! Oh thank goodness!" Putting it... away, she grew more serious. "Anyway, might we continue our talk from yesterday?"
"Sure," Lina replied. "It's about a job that paid a special guarantee, right?"
"A favor beyond just finding out how powerful we are," Zelgadiss clarified, crossing his arms.
"Yes," said Filia, smiling, "That's why I'm going to have to test all of your power." Before any of them could react, Filia became encased in a golden light, and disappeared, leaving them staring after her.
"Huh? Huh? Hold it! What???" Lina cried.
Behind them, the proceedings for the fleet's embarkation had completed, marked with fireworks and gongs, and loud cheering from the crowds.
"She disappeared!" exclaimed Gourry.
"Test our powers?" Zelgadiss raised an eyebrow, suspicious. "What is she planning?"
Lina facepalmed, tiredly. "I guess she really is someone special."
~*~*~
When the first ships had begun pulling out of the harbor, Lina and the others finally caught up to Amelia. Zel, hanging back, noticed that she... didn't seem to happy to see Lina.
"Yoo-hoo, Amelia!" Lina shouted cheerfully, "Long time, no see!"
Amelia considered, at first, pretending not to recognize her, but was sadly thwarted when her father came up to offer greetings. "Oh, Miss Lina!"
"Prince Phil!" Lina greeted, loudly and cheerfully, leaving Amelia to hide her face in chagrin.
~*~*~
"Um, Miss Lina," Amelia tried to ward Lina off, much to the consternation of her father and to the bruised pride of Lina. "I'm doing official business here. Can we talk later?"
"Why so unfriendly, all of a sudden?" Lina demanded, but they were both interrupted by a loud roar from the direction of the town.
A large, golden dragon swooped at them out of nowhere, leaving a trail of wind-wrecked damage. Over their heads and out into the harbor, damaging the rigging of some of the ships in its wake, before it pulled up to make another pass.
"A golden dragon!"
"Why now of all times???"
"HOLD IT!" Lina shouted. "This is the test of our powers?!"
"What???" Amelia looked at her accusingly, "You mean this is your fault?!"
"Yes," Zelgadiss admitted. "It seems there's no doubt about it."
The dragon came at them a second time, leaving Zel and Gourry only a split second in which to react. Gourry yelled "Look out!" and leaped in front of Lina as Zel leaped in front of Amelia.
Left in the wreckage, the very specifically aimed wreckage, they all pulled themselves to their feet. "I'm... pretty certain we're the dragon's targets," Zel remarked, flatly.
"What's it thinking?" Lina slammed her fist on a chunk of stone from a nearby building. "Doing this with so many people around!"
"What'll we do?" Gourry managed.
Lina grinned in return. "There's only one thing to do!" She then leaped onto one of the ropes tying a ship to the harbor. "Let's go, Gourry! Zel! Amelia!"
"Of course! The ship!" Zel nodded, leaping after her. The others were quick to follow... though Amelia had a hard time of it, in her dress and high-heels. Soon the ship was cut free from the harbor and was headed out into open water.
"We'll lead that thing out to the open sea! Gourry, take the wheel!"
"Right!"
"Hold it!" interrupted the ship's captain. "This is my ship! My ship is like a part of my own body! You can't just take it!"
The ship was then rocked by another pass by the golden dragon, leaving everything in disarray.
"She's all yours!" called the captain from one of the life boats, rowing hurriedly back to shore.
"Man," Lina remarked, watching them. "Now those guys are honest with themselves."
Gourry concurred. "Seyruun sailors aren't that tough, huh?"
"Let me," Amelia said, climbing over the side of the ship at last. "Let me take command!"
Zel was... vaguely surprised by how quickly Amelia rallied the fleet into order, calling aloud quick, decisive orders to speed the ships out onto open sea and call forth the ship's sorcerers.
"Fire!" she called as the golden dragon dipped into another pass, coming quickly into range. Along the starboard side of each ship in the fleet, twenty mages simultaneously cast Fireball, sending them at the speeding dragon.
But the dragon kept coming. It seemed that it was all for naught as the unscathed dragon opened its mouth and sent a bolt of its Laser Breath at the ships, but, thinking quickly, Zel and Amelia sent simultaneous Burst Flares out from the ship to intercept the attack. The fleet rocked wildly with the force of the impact, the seas in turmoil and the deck in chaotic disarray. The force of the wind carried by the passing dragon snapped the top of the ship's mainmast, sending rigging down on deck and leaving most of the ship's mages flailing in the water.
Holding onto the stunned Amelia, Zelgadiss quickly threw liferings to the mages-overboard. "Golden dragons are as tough as I've heard!" he says, jaw clenched.
His frustration, however, was nothing compared to Lina's. One could practically hear her teeth grinding together. "It's making a fool of me!" she growled, fists tight.
Heroically, Gourry drew his sword, the Sword of Light. "Is that my cue?" With a mighty swing of the blade, he called out, "LIGHT, COME FORTH!" and sent a large blast of light at the dragon as it turned to make another pass at the ship.
The dragon dodged easily, letting the beam from Gourry's blade hit the ship that happened to be behind it with a loud explosion.
Gourry stared in horror at where the ship had been.
"WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING?" Lina cried in horror, just before the dragon sent another beam of its Laser Breath at them.
"AH! It's coming straight for us!" Amelia cried out, but no one had time to react any further before the beam hit them with a great crash, sending debris every which way. Luckily, though, the ship was left mostly intact. Lina recovered first, glaring fiercely up at the dragon. "It's not playing around."
She set her jaw. "Okay. Fine," she ground out, running for the bowsprit. "Then I'm not going to pull any punches, either!"
Balanced on the beam, she spread her hands, "RUNE FLARE!" Lances of fire flew from her hands like missiles, speeding up into the air towards the dragon. All of them on the ship saw the flares hit the dragon, which caught fire. "All right, it worked!" Lina says, clenching a fist.
But just as soon as she had spoken, the dragon turned, the flames leaving its body unmarked as it began another pass towards the ship. "Miss Lina!" Amelia called, pointing as the dragon sent another beam of its Laser Breath at the ship.
"Leave this to me," she said, looking over her shoulder. "Gourry! Hard to port!"
...Gourry, the poor thing, was having difficulty with the ship's wheel. "Um! Which... which way is port?" he called back, turning the wheel.
"No! Other way! Other way!" Lina cried furiously as she fell off the bowsprit to be dragged through the water, holding onto a rope. Managing to clear her sight, she saw the dragon coming for them. "SEA BLAST!" she called, plunging her hand into the waves. A great rush of seawater rose up in a plume to deflect the incoming blast of Laser Breath, and instead of continuing its pass, the dragon turned and began flying away from them, out to sea.
"Look!" Amelia looked hopeful. "It's running away!"
But Lina wasn't satisfied, sprinting back to the bowsprit. "Oh no you don't! After it! HARD TO PORT!"
"AYE AYE, SIR!" called Gourry with confidence, spinning the wheel as Zelgadiss held up helpful arrows for him.
Lina stood at the bow of the ship, eyes closed, balanced perfectly as she recited the incantation, a dark red haze growing up around her.
"Darkness beyond twilight,
Crimson beyond blood that flows,
Buried in the flow of time...
In thy great name, I pledge myself to darkness!"
Zelgadiss, Amelia and Gourry knew what was coming. They kept their sunglasses for just such an eventuality.
"Let all the fools who stand before us be destroyed...
...by the power you and I possess!"
Lina opened her eyes. She was smiling. Drawing back her hands as one might do before throwing something, she send the ultimate black magic spell at the dragon.
"Dragon Slave!!!" In a furious whirl of energy, the large, dark-red beam of the spell shot forth from her hands, straight at the fleeing dragon.
The explosion it caused was immense, enough to take out a decently-sized town. The backlash of sea-water filling the space left by the flashboiled ocean was a dim roar in the distance.
"Victory!" Lina called, grinning, as everyone left on board finally relaxed.
"You did it, Miss Lina!" Amelia beamed.
Gourry clapped Zel on the back, grinning, as Zel smiled wryly at the black magic sorceress. "Lina won't even lose face to a golden dragon..."
Then he and Gourry froze in sudden horror, staring.
Lina turned to them, cheerfully, "Anyway! Let's get back to port fast, so I can find that Filia girl and really make her pay for this!" Then she blinked, noticing the stricken looks on her friends' faces.
They stared past her, trying to force out the word: "Tsuna- tsuna- tsuna- tsuna-!"
"Tsuna?" Lina blinked at them, completely confused, and turned around.
"TSUNAMIIIII!"
~*~*~
The ship was a wreck, barely staying afloat. Seagulls soared above it and the now-calm sea.
"...All I can see is ocean," said Amelia as she looked through the spyglass, sounding forlorn, before a note of horror entered her voice. "All the other ships must have been sunk!"
"Dammit!" spat Zelgadiss as he kicked the ruined ship's wheel. "There's nothing to be done." The rudder wasn't responding; with the sails in such disarray and most of the rigging lost, there wasn't any real way of steering the ship.
Amelia leaned forward with a startled noise, still peering through the spyglass.
"Now what?" muttered Lina.
"L-look," she said faintly and handed the glass to Lina.
Apparently the view through the spyglass was... rather disheartening. "Th-that's the port we just left?" Lina said, not really wanting an answer.
"I think the tsunami your Dragon Slave caused must have..." started Amelia.
"It's a total mess," laughed Lina with a sinking feeling in her stomach.
"What do we do, Miss Lina?"
Very slowly, Lina put down the spyglass. Squaring her jaw, the old fierce look entered her eyes again and she raised a fist. "All right! It's decided! We run- uh, I mean we set sail for the outer world!"
"WHAT?" exclaimed Amelia in shock.
"The ship's destination hasn't changed!" Lina explained cheerfully. "We shall carry on and take our first step into an unknown world!"
"Are you sure about this?" asked Gourry, rubbing his head doubtfully.
"We could still Ray Wing our way back, you know!" Amelia cried, her sense of justice and duty and her desire not to get in trouble all conflicted.
"Oh, quit whining!" Lina snapped, waving protests aside.
"You guys want to see the outer world, too, right? Ameliaaaa," Lina's look turned rather... predatory. "you want to spread justice and fight evil there, right?"
Amelia looked rather frightened. "Uh... yeah..."
Zel looked terribly amused, chin in hand. "Zelgadiss," Lina coaxed, "I know you want to go."
"Yes," he said, smirking, "I'm the sort who's always chasing his dreams."
"And you, Gourry?" Lina looked over at him. Gourry shrugged, smiling, and replied. "Hm... well, I guess I'll tag along."
"Okay!" Lina yelled, fist raised high. "Now the world's our stage as we set off on a new journey! Let's gooooo!"
"Miss Linaaaa," Amelia said, her guilt surfacing again as the ship drifted on across the trackless sea, "What're we going to do?"
Lina's enthusiasm didn't waver. "Didn't you hear me? A new journey! LET'S GOOOOOOOOOOOOO! Say it louder!"