Demonprist squeezed the last of the sticky juice-water out of her hair, muttering curses. She should never have given it time to dry. At least the water here was still relatively clean and she could shoo away what little mud there was. Kith lay sprawled on a rare patch of solid ground and panted. "Aren't you even tired?" he asked when he'd caught his breath.

"Not particularly," replied the Avatar, flipping her wet hair over her shoulder and climbing back up onto the bank. Her decision to stop chasing the elf was the result of boredom rather than fatigue. She scrounged aroundin her pack for a brush, found only a comb, and sighed. "How am I going to get this flimsy thing through my hair? It's so woolly, Whiddaw'd mistake me for a sheep."

"Never seen a red sheep," managed Kith between breaths.

"That's 'cause red-heads aren't much for following orders," explained Demonprist, hissing as the comb caught in a snarl. She snarled back.

Kith slapped at a bug on his arm. "We must be heading right into the swamp...the mosquitoes are getting thicker." He called up the map and had a quick look. "We should go West a little more...stay on the fringe of the place. Less bugs and we'll get back to the river just as quickly. Maybe even faster than cutting across...if this is what the fringe is like I'd hate to see the heart..."

"EW!" lamented Demonpriest. "I just cleaned these sandals! I was not MADE for this environment! I demand to see my agent!"

"What agent?" smirked Kith. Naturally, he had boots.

"Whoever designs these Avatar costumes then!" ranted Demonprist.

"I think you look appropriately Egyptian..."

"Shut-up!"

"Why don't you just turn into a giant snake or Naga-person?" suggested the elf. "Snakes live in swamps."

Demonprist paused to reflect on this. "That's not a bad idea," she admitted, shifting briskly. From the waist down she was a serpent, the golden scales also covering the front of her torso, creaping up under her armour. The rest of her was human in full to better carry her backpack. "Oh yeah...that's the stuff," she sighed contentedly, wriggling the end of her tail in the mud. "That'll wash *right* off. Can I pick my morphing animals or what?"

"Er...Demon? Where do your sandals and skirt go when you wear your snake butt?"

"Shut-up! I have a perfectly nice butt!" scowled Demonprist, looking down. Kith was right, she wore neither sandals nor skirt. "Probably the same place as my sword," she said with a shrug. "Just as long as they come back."

"I dunno...I could live with them being...OW!" shouted Kith as the tip of a serpentine tail whipped across his arm.

"Serves you right, pig. I'm the only perversion of nature around here!"declared Demonprist in a huff.

Kith fumed a little at the abuse, but had to admit - if only to himself -that he was prodding at her. She was fun to irritate. Still, the tail-whip*had* stung and he decided to give himself a break, turning his attention instead to the surrounding landscape. Most of it looked alike. He began to wonder if they were heading in the right direction. The map had a sort of'you are here' function, but it was a very general guide with a limited amount of zoom and detail. They could wander half-way into the swamp before it registered electronically. Odd that such a realistic game had such a primitive map feature.

"Hey, Demon, hold up a second. I want to try something," said Kith,stopping to slip his bag off his back. He attempted to balance on one foot so that he could prop it on his knee and keep it out of the mud. Demonprist grudgingly stopped and turned to watch him. From his back he pulled a sphere of crystal about the size of a honeydew melon.

"What the hell is that?" asked the Avatar, wrinkling her nose.

"A View-Master," replied the elf sarcastically although the description wasn't all that far off. "I thought we could record our progress, then if we go off-course we could review it and see what went wrong."

"It records things?" said Demonprist with some surprise. "But wait...how'sit going to record anything other than what we can already see?"

"Er," mumbled Kith, "I think I'm supposed to use Air powers to keep it in the sky."

"But you have Earth powers...your Air powers aren't developed yet."

"Well, I know that," replied the elf peevishly.

"And I have Water powers...and a Fire staff."

"I know that too..."

"I don't see anything having to do with Air in there, do you?"

Kith sighed. "Look, I thought we were both magic users...between the both of us we *should* be able to find a way to do it," his eyes narrowed with teasing humour, "or are you too much of a wimp?"

"So you *do* have a death wish," replied Demonprist sourly, brandishing her staff."You *know* what I mean," sighed Kith.

"You know, you were a lot more fun a few minutes ago."

"Well I've got this feeling, okay? It's starting to bug me," said the Avatar, coiling and uncoiling in an anticipatory gesture.

"Don't they have...appliances...for that kind of thing now?" grinned Kith.

There was a pregnant pause as Demonpriest stared at him as though deciding whether to dismember him quickly or slowly. Then her gaze shifted elsewhere, eyes narrowing in suspicion. "Did you hear that?" she whispered.

"No...should I've?" asked Kith, confused.

"Shhh!" hissed Demonpriest waving at him. "Just listen."

"Demon," whispered the elf after a few moments, "I don't hear anyTHIIIIIIING!"

A long tentacle snaked out and wrapped itself around Kith's leg, dragging him down. The elf flailed, his crystal sphere flying into the slime and mud. Kicking and struggling, he managed to pull out his rapier and tried to jab it into the glistinging green appendage. He wanted to shout at Demonprist to help him, but he was out of breath and often underwater.

It wouldn't have mattered, the Avatar was having problems of her own. She'd barely had time to armour the rest of her body in scales, her hands growing small reptilian claws, her face elongating to accomodate her viper's fangs.She hissed violently as tentacles rose to wrap around her waist and tail and pulled her sword from the air. Swinging furiously, she sliced through her bonds which dissolved and pooled back into the swamp. Then, they surged up again, grasping not only her waist, but her sword arm. Demonprist writhed and struggled, then, with a quick contortion, plunged her fangs deep into the green flesh.

By this time, Kith had become nearly engulfed with bands of solid slime. He only barely managed to keep his head above water by focussing long enoughto call a clump of solid earth beneath his skull...he might be nearly immobilized by swamp rot and mud, but he refused to be drowned. An attemptat invisibility proved futile...apperantly the creature attacked by sensing movement in the water, and now that it had him, it was not about to let go.

"DEMON!" he screamed. "DO SOMETHING!"

Demonprist spat out a festering mouthful of rancid slime. Venom could not affect the thing...blades could not affect the thing...she tried to fuse the water around the tentacles, but they merely slithered over the surface. Enraged, the Avatar gripped her staff and with its help caused the water to boil and steam around her. This did nothing but add solidity to the appendages. They seemed to be part of the swamp rather than the limbs of an entity. Frustrated, Demonprist uttered a scream of pure hate at the things and focussed through the gem on her staff. A streak of firey lightening exploded from the tip and struck a rearing tentacle which burst into flame and crumbled to ash on the surface of the swamp. There was the smell of burnt vegetation and more tentacles rose up to seize and cover the deadl yweapon though the Avatar did her best to hold it up out of the way.

"Kith, they're plant-like!" she spat through her snake's mouth. "Just bend them away from you!"

Kith, just managing to materialize enough solid ground to keep from going under, tried to do as she suggested, but failed."Not...connected...to...ground," he managed between breaths as waves of swamp water broke over his face. His hair...where it wasn't covered in slime...had changed radically in his state of heightened emotion, flashing streaks of silvery red and white. *Great,* he thought, as he caught sight of Demonprist struggling out of the corner of his eye. She thrashed wildly, frying tentacles left and right with her staff, but it was barely enough to keep her own arm free. *I only just started the game and I'm going to die.*

Just when he thought he was going to be dragged off his one solid perch,there was an earth-shattering roar and another figure of leonine appearancecame charging into the swamp. The tentacles rose to engulf the newcomer as well, but he was already thrashing so furiously that they couldn't get a grip and were scattered more quickly than they could reform. Clawing and swinging his mace in this manner, he managed to free Demonprist's other arm, and...now knowing what she was up agaist...the Avatar managed to stay free, joining the lion in his destructive frenzy. She slashed, thrashed,coiled, and uncoiled, blasting fiercely with her staff and spitting venom all the while.

Kith opened his mouth to call attention to his increasingly dire situation when he heard a voice from the bank yell, "Dammit, Thunderwolf, I told youto wait!" From the corner of his eye he could see Lady Bast stamp her foot on the bank, oddly cold in her impatience. Intent on dragging him off his little elf-made island, more tentacles rose to wrap themselves around him and he only had time to see the cat-woman raise her arms before being dragged down into a world of brown and green.

*Whaddaya know...the cat came back,* he thought insanely as his burning lungs failed and the world went dark.

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