Beneath the Surface (Adventure, slight Gore)

Ician shrugs at Ruby. "Whenever everypony's ready. We're waiting on Storm and Stream now."

He turns to Griff. "There's probably some water in the supplies tent. Which is next to the armoury." He gazes around the encampment. "If I can take the map's detail at face value, that is. It's probably right around..." Ician extends a hoof towards the west end of the encampment. "There. I think."

"Alright." Griff says and starts walking towards the supplies tent.

Ician nods to Ruby. "I'll be right back." He sets off in the same direction as Griff.

She shrugs and returned to Divine, nuzzling her gently.

The armoury.

The flaps of the tent fly open and Ician strides in. He stops and stares.

Unlike the command tent, this one is very clean, neat, and tidy. But that was only because there wasn't anything to mess the place up. The only things in the tent were accumulated in a small heap at the far end.

Ician moves up to it and inspects it. A bow, a quiver with arrows, some scout's armour, and...

Yes. He reaches out with his magic and pulls three standard-issue shortswords from the pile. "Perfect."

He hooks them all on his armour's belt and strides back out towards Ruby and Divine.

Divine nuzzles her back, her ears perking up as she hears Ician approach. "Hello Ician~ How are you? I see you're armed."

"Oh yes, I most certainly am." Ician chuckles. His horn ignites, and all four of his swords swing out into the air in different poses. He winces. "Ow. ow. Okay, bad choice. No." He concentrates. The swords align themselves perfectly in the air and hang motionless. He sighs in relief. "That's better. It's so much easier to synchronise their motions than it is to diversify."

Griff slowly comes back, holding a few water bottles. "That should be enough for everyone..." he says "unless you want more."

"I think I'm fine." Ician says cheerfully, turning to Griff with his swords in the air and almost cutting the latter's head off. "Um. Oops?" He quickly sheathes the swords in a smooth, synchronised motion. "Sorry."

Griff managed to dodge the swords "You should really practice more before you even try doing that."

"Um... right." Ician looks down at his weapons. "Well, at least if I keep the pointy end away from me I won't impale myself, right?" He looks around. "And, uh, you might all want to stand behind me, too."

"You can't hit me. Don't worry." Divine replied, yawning as she slid her helm on.

"Don't worry, I'll stay as far away as possible." Griff says, putting some water bottles in his saddlebags.

"I've had so little experience with consistently wielding four weapons at once, so I doubt I'll be able to hit anything." He coughs. "On purpose, that is. So... yes. If I'm doing that again you should probably all keep your distance. Or be good at dodging."

"Well, I am ready to leave now. I wonder where the other two guys are.." Griff starts wondering.

Ician shrugs. "They'll probably be here. Eventually. But just in case..."

"TEAM!" He shouts, loudly. "STORM! STREAM! ASSEMBLE AT THE COMMAND TENT, WE'RE LEAVING SOON!"

He shuts his mouth. "That should do it. Could I have some water, Griff?"

Divine flinched, her ears flattening against her head. Ruby patted her head. "Ummm... Ician, could you not shout please? I don't think Divine can take it."

Divine growled. "I can take it. Let's go."

"Oh, um." Ician looks at Divine apologetically. "Sorry. I'd... forgotten that... some senses are boosted when others are absent." He glances away. "My bad."

Griff nods. "Sure" and gives Ician a bottle of cold water.

"Thank you." Ician's magic takes ahold of the bottle. It floats over to him, and he gulps down the water gratefully. "Ah... that's a lot better."

Divine made no noise as she walked to the command tent, Ruby trailing behind her happily. "Oh," Ruby spun. "Can I have a few of those water bottles?"

"I hope that by 'few' you don't mean too many.." Griff says as he gives 2 water bottles to Ruby. "Conserve water, it's rather hard to find here in the desert. We're lucky that Sky's airship also brought some supplies here."

Ruby smiled and thanked him, running off to Divine, who smiled and took the bottle happily, sipping it gently.

Ician glances down at his own bottle in silence. He puts it away into the saddlebags on his armour and trudges silently to his command tent.

Ruby whispered something in Divine's ear and she snorted, shaking her head. She whispered back and Ruby stopped and stared at her, jaw hanging low. She continued to stare as Divine slid into the command tent.