"I can't beleive Uncle Tim got wrapped up in this. He always looked out for other pirates, and they respected him for it. Where did these aztecosaurs come from?" Donna said to no one in particular. She was pacing the deck of the Jolly Roger, occasionally throwing a knife at an empty barrel near the mainmast. remembering her sister had said something about an aztecosaur in the brig, she headed below decks, bringing her throwing knife.
"So," she said. approaching the cell. She recognized the prisoner. "What have you been up to, Ek Chan?Nothing to do with the watermoles this time, I hope, for your sake. I might let Nanu run you through this time. Or perhaps I should do it myself?" In a single sudden movement, her knife went from her belt, to firmly wedged in the wood of the wall next to the cell.
Ek Chan merely smirked. "You know you can't do that. Or you'd never find out about just what happened to your brother." He knew she couldn't touch him now, and walked up to the bars. Despite the fact she still glared at him, she could sense the tears and anger behind her stare.
"You're wrong." she said simply, retrived her weapon, and walked quikly away.

Scarlet docked her ship at the Gold Mine docks and the pirates headed into the jungle seeking the Scaly Grotto. Calamity was keeping a close eye on her sister Donna, who'd seemed upset after questioning the prisoner. She'd even asked her some questions to make sure Donna had not been replaced again by the Aztecosaur. It was her sister, but Donna wouldn't say what was on her mind.
The Scaly Grotto wasn't as hard to find as they'd expected. Some mesmerized monkeys just pointed the way when they asked.
Inside the grotto, the walls were covered with strange glowing green marks. An Aztecosaur in feathered robes was bent over a cauldron chanting loudly. He tossed in an ingredient, his chant reaching a climactic shriek, and a fireball and smoke exploded out to the cauldron, knocking the Aztecosaur to the wall, and the pirates to their knees. The green marks on the walls blazed brightly with a pulsing light. Donna was the first on her feet, running to the Aztecosaur and putting her spark shooter to his jaw, "What did you do?", she gritted through her teeth at him. He looked up at her. "We are the Ek Chan, and we have triumphed!" He began to laugh maniacally.

Calamity climbed back to her feet. Donna and Dino seemed to have the aztecosaur well in hand. Dino was beginning some kind of witchdoctor spell, and Donna kept her sparkshooter on the prisoner. The creepy laughing was disturbing, as the prisoner continued gloating to himself.
"Soyala, it feels like we've been behind them every step of the way. I don't know much about your magic, but do you have anything that might help us here? We don't even know what the aztecosaurs are trying to do."
Soyala took a moment to think, then replied, "Perhaps." She removed what looked like a small crystal, or perhaps a chunk of ice, since it was covered in frost, from a hidden pocket in her dress. She breathed a small frozen cloud onto the crystal and made several passes with her hand over it. Inside the crystal, images of the cave appeared. Calamity could see their group on the ground, then the fireball drawn back into the cauldron, all of them standing, and walking backward out of the cave. The images played events backwards more quickly, the Aztecosaur casting his spell in reverse, then ingredients flying out of the cauldron to his hand, and into a bag. She watched the scene of aztecosaurs moving backward in a blur for what looked like several days or a week's time. When they could see a large group gathered in the cave, with one at the front in a fancy headdress gesturing and addressing the others excitedly, Soyala made another pass with her hand, and sprinkled snowflakes on the crystal. The scene began to play forwards, and this time, they could hear sounds from the scene. Scarlet noticed and came closer to watch too.

While Soyala, Scarlet and Calamity were watching the replay of events in the cave, Dino searched the Aztecosaur for magic ingredients and scrolls, making sure he wasn't hiding anything. Donna kept the creature under close guard. He found a few more cryptic scrolls and a talisman on the Aztecosaur.

Calamity liked working with the witchdoctors she knew, but these plotters seemed to be getting uncomfortably close to major wizardry. She felt out of her depth with all this magic flying around. She found herself strangely longing for a simple job like bumbleoon hunting, not all this confusing magic and evil twisted plots.

When Dino finished casting his spells, the green marks on the walls flared up and fire crept across them, erasing them as if they had never been made. Donna said, "COOL." Soyala quietly informed Dino of what they had seen in her scrying crystal. Calamity was happy to leave her to confer with Dino on how to stop the Ek Chan cabal's major spell. When they were finished discussing it, Calamity asked, "Do you know how to stop the rise of Ek Chan? Do we sail for the volcano or head to Skull Island to seek Madam Vadima's help?"

"When we get to the volcano, be ready. They might have guards. If worst comes to worst, I can teleport you 2 out of there. But the spell has a maximum of 2 people per teleport, and it takes a lot of energy to cast without preparation of a few hard to come by ingredients." Dion stated solemnly. I just hope it won't be needed... he thought, staring as the volcano came into view, dark and foreboding.

OOC: Sorry for short post, I'm posting from a mobile. I just hope we can get this roleplay up again.

"I will need to get close to their main focusing point for the spell, and it will take some time to dispel it. I will be unable to fight whilst doing so, as dispelling a spell of this size and power takes an enormous amount of effort. Soyala, you wouldn't happen to know anything about this would you? More people trying to dispel it will make it easier." Dino said, beckoning them all down into the deck, to the planning room. Once they were there, he continued. "And they will almost certainly have witchdoctors attempting to counteract my spells. Judging by the things Soyala's crystal revealed, they are willing to sacrifice a lot for this."

He then stops, obviously meaning for someone else to add something on.

All the witchdoctors turned to look at Calamity. Now that felt uncomfortable, all that spooky attention focused just on her. Scratch said to her, "Captain, my Captain, best you be letting us handle de tings we know best." Even though he was a good crewman (... crew body ... crew corpse?), when he rolled his eye like that and laid on the extra spooky voice, he could still give her the creeps.
"Um, right, I assume smashing would be one of those very bad things. I'll just let you handle the spooky side of things."
"Land ho!" Gracie called from the crow's nest.
"Battlestations! Prepare for boarding!" yelled Scarlet as she steered them to the volcano's docks. Swaying chanting glaze-eyed watermoles lined the dock accompanied by a few Aztecosaurs further back on the shore.

Dino led them into a hidden lava tunnel and created a small magical light to show the way. It felt even colder here, and they could see their breath, all except Scratch anyway. They reached the end of the tunnel only to find that it dead ended. Dino and the other witchdoctors examined the wall carefully. "Captain, dere be someting here." Dino looked to where Scratch was pointing. It was a subtle magic, invisible to the non magic user, a puzzle or code to break too. "I see it." Dino said. "There is a round symbol, and a sun symbol. Next there is a kind of ... dial ... then a square, a dot and 2 more squares." Dino touched the dial, spun it, a 5 appeared in the first box, and a spark zapped his hand. "First number isn't 5." He and the other witchdoctors took turns spinning the dial and trying to solve the puzzle, with frequent zapped fingers.

Donna offered the others some of the pie. Old Scratch told her, "I and I have no need of pie." The water mole shaman asked, "Is it pineapple?"
Donna sniffed it and said, "No I think it's yum pie." The water mole politely refused. Munching quietly, they entered the new tunnel. The walls had more of the glowing green symbols. When Scratch and the water mole tried to enter, they were zapped again and a glowing green curtain of light filled the door. The crab hermit tried tapping it with his stick and passed through the light easily.
Calamity said. "Looks like refusing pie is not an option." Donna handed a couple of small pieces of pie through the door. The water mole ate his piece with distaste and entered the door. Old Scratch held his piece between his teeth and also was able to enter. He then slipped it into a pouch.
With a blinking wink of his eye said, "I and I like this strong mojo pie."

Donna stuck by Dino, and they headed towards the center of the room, prepared to head in any direction once the main Focus was revealed. Calamity began sneaking to the statue by the North wall. The others fanned out and headed to the others. Calamity was almost there and had carefully manuevered her way through the chanting aztecosaurs, when Old Scratch, across the room, tripped over a mummified Quetzel. His bones made a huge clatter. For a moment , there was silence, as all the aztecosaurs turned to look at him. Calamity hurriedly tipped over the North statue and began a whirlwind attack on the shamans near her, taking advantage of their moment of distraction. The fight was on! As the aztecosaurs focused on Calamity and Scratch, the others ran to the other statues.

As Quinn and Donna struggled to keep the enemy away from Dino, he struggled to unravel the spell of the magical cube. The others were attacking the enemy from behind, but had their hands full when a couple of the shaman summoned a bunch of flying mummified quetzels. He drew on Quinn's magic boosting his power to see deeper into the mechanism of the cube. Intricate wooden slides and pivots were wrapped with tangles of spells. He thought he almost had the solution and began to push the slides, when Calamity shouted, "Look out!" One of the flying quetzels had slipped through the fighters and was headed straight towards him. Donna tried to get a shot at it, but her gun was knocked aside by an aztecosaur with and obsidian sword. He looked into the undead eyes of the quetzel and knew he could not grab his wand in time or let the cube go during the unraveling of spells..., his eyes opened wide in shock as, from a crevice in the roof, Scarlet rappelled down and struck the flying serpent!
"Bon chance! We took the long way and arrive in ze nick of time." Other pirates were sliding down the rope from the ceiling. They were all small or slim. Scarlet was the largest one able to enter through that route. Dino found himself surrounded by a protective ring of Monquistans, batacuda, and skarakeets. One of the monkey's tossed Donna fresh charges for her sparkshooters, which she took in relief. Quinn was glad to let them take over the defense, and began putting her medical bag to it's intended use, healing their fighters.
Dino, now undistracted, was able to turn all his attention to the cube.