Owner	Pose
Diana Prince	Diana and Cassie did what they could for the Dryad back at the stream near the tree house, but they had to make haste toward the Dryad homestead. Their village, amongst the deep woods of the Enchanted Forest. 'It is near where the cavern I showed you is located. The waterfall there, feeds the lake that the Dryads' reside around.' The Princess had explained to the younger woman as they made their trek further in to the woods. Still mounted on their Kangas, the two women progress ever further in to the darkening forest. The mysteries of the Enchanted Forest are never fully explored, it seeming to go on far further than the woods ever should when viewed from far. "We are nearly there." Diana says as the two Kanga mounts carry the women around a large set of old trees, the sound of rushing water echoing through the dark as the forest fauna chipr, buzz, and squeak around the travelers. Diana clutches her bow at her side, a arrow notched within it, as she sweeps her eyes left and right. "I can feel it." She notes quietly. "A chill in the air. Like the chill of a sickness..." She glances back to Cassie then. "This is not normal for this place. This place is meant to ... feel good. Peaceful. Serene."
Cassie Sandsmark	Kangas, ho! Although their journey into the forest had begun as something rather more casual, another tour of Diana's many favorite and 'secret' places on the island, it had taken a clear turn with the discovery of the strange, corrupted dryad in her 'childhood' treehouse (what kind of kid builds something that ridiculous? she must have had help!). Still, even with a heightened wariness, it's hard not to be taken in, to be ENCHANTED even (har har), by the serene, mysterious beauty of the place. Cassie is a city girl at heart, and while she's had a lot of travels, both with her mother as a kid, and now as a world-hopping superheroine, such deep communion with nature is still a somewhat novel part of her lifestyle, and to say that Themyscira takes it to another level would be an understatement. And so it is easy for her mind to wander and drift as they ride, lulled by the predictable hopping rhythm of their mounts, letting her gaze flit between each place where a lance of sunlight illuminates a particular plant or flower against the dark backdrop of the ancient tree-trunks. "It really is beautiful out here," she murmurs. "It'd be terrible if this... uh, undead plague or whatever it is spreads any further." And hence, their mission! "The dryads, normally they protect it, yeah? I remember 'em from one of my mom's books." Finally, they reach their destination. "Yeah?" she echoes Diana's warning, but as she looks around, it's obvious enough that Cassie doesn't quite have the same sense of things as her mentor. Partly, this may be due to her less-trained senses, but it is no doubt also a simple lack of familiarity. All the island, in a way, is Diana's home, all part of her. And Cassie, for as much as she has taken to the place, can still sometimes feel like a visitor. Bringing the kanga a bit closer, to a point where the tree cover begins to thin near the river, she halts and dismounts, making a double check of her own gear: lasso on her hip, sword sheathed, and a javelin taken from a holster on Hoppa's saddle. She's never been good with the bows! "So what if we do if... the whole village is like the one we found?"
Diana Prince	Not long after Cassie dismounts Hoppa, Diana brings Jumpa up along side her, and also swings her foot down to step upon the soil, her white skirt flowing around her upper thighs as she does so. "I believe the Dryads are infected because they felt the corruption enter the forest, and immediately tried to respond to it before it got out of hand." She says as she tends to Jumpa for a moment before she grabs her sword out of the sheath on the side of his saddle, and slips it in to her harness behind her back, with a slick sound of metal on leather. "We can walk from here." Diana says, knowing the Kangas are quite smart, and will keep with them until told otherwise. The benefit of the Kangas over a horse are vast and many, but their intellect is one of the main ones... Diana starts down the river, her eyes looking in to the water before she looks ahead. AS the Princess steps around a felled tree trunk that crosses the river to its other bank, she slows her steps on her sandaled feet. "I can hear them." She tells Cassie. 'Listen. Listen for the sound of the trees. Do you hear it?" she asks of her protege. "The quiet moan, anguish... Come on." She urges then as she starts to jog along the water's edge. Soon the two women will come around a bend in the water, and stare ahead at the lake deep within the heart of the woodlands. The lake is sprawling, and beautiful, with one island at its center, adorned with a towering ancient tree. "The Heart Tree." Diana says then. Cassie will see it first, to the east of the lake, there is a moving of tree limbs, camoflauged against the foliage. It is moving far too animated to be natural, and the 'moaning' seems to be coming from it. It looks like the trees are alive, and swaying drunkenly...
Cassie Sandsmark	"Hmm yeah, that'd make sense. Its their forest, their job to help fix whatever is wrong... so they'd get exposed to it, or maybe even, I don't know, sort of absorb part of what was happening. Some kind of sympathetic or symbiotic kind of thing." Magic, science, whatever! The rules and lines between the two are always pretty vague, in Amazon-world. Another of many adjustments for their young sister! Once Diana starts out, Cassie quickly falls into place some short distance behind her. Like almost everything she does here, even the spacing and pace reflects her training, the way the Amazons march and travel, in loose formations that allow them to watch over their sisters and for threats around them without making themselves too vulnerable or static. Blending in, stalking carefully, rather than bulldozing through. It may have seemed strange, the little ways every part of their lives reflect their warrior nature, but even Cassie has grown into it, takes naturally to it, as they walk. And at Diana's warning, she pauses, her short ways back, crouching a little, just in case. "I..." She quiets, calms, tries to focus and listen. Eventually, she even closes her eyes, which may be a little unwise in their situation. But she really is trying. "I'm not sure. I hear the water. A bit of rustling..." But Diana is already moving again, and this time, Cassie has to make a quickly hustled double-step to catch back up. She's silent as they walk, trying to see if she can't pick up some sign of it, until they finally reach the lake. At that point, her reaction is... well, very Cassie. "Wow." Followed by a quick rustling as she looks around for her phone... But this stops, when there's something she CAN very clearly hear, and then definitely see, in the motion of the trees further up the shoreline. And when she does, all that unecessary fidgetting halts and she again crouches down a bit. When she signals to Diana, it's in an almost silent whisper, knowing that her mentor can hear such things oh-so very easily. "Is that... you guys have ents? Like, did you see Lord of- nevermind. But like, a tree creature?"
Diana Prince	Diana's eyes are quick to look to exactly where Cassie is indicating. She knows what she's talking about too... Lord of the Rings. She read it long before the films were ever a thing. "The Elder Dryads..." She says as she starts to cross the water that flows in to the lake, just going right in to it and stepping across stones that are submerged, leaving the Princess submerged up past her knees in the water now too. "They pre-date the Dryads themselves. They created them to be their children, of sorts." She hastily explains as she works her way across the flowing water to the other shore line. "They do /not/ leave the Heart Tree without reason." Obviously that reason is... the corruption, right? On the other shore line now, Diana starts to jog again around the lake, this time toward the swaying Elder Dryads. She'll stop when they're close, only a couple dozen yards away now. They're just grouped together, standing like a wall over a smaller inlet of mountain water... they're damming it up, and absorbing it inside their open maws. They're drinking it, the black water coming out of the smaller spring stream... Each of the giant Dryad moaning in anguish as they consume the foul smelling black water! Diana takes all of this in, her eyes sweeping over it all before she casts a glance back to Cassie. "Check further up the spring... see if you can tell where the black water is coming from." The Princess tells the young girl as she, herself, starts to walk toward the giant elder Dryads.
Cassie Sandsmark	When Diana just walks into the water, there's a moment where Cassie has to wonder if she's got another power she didn't mention... before she sees the rocks. There's a moment where she seems to consider it with some uncertainty. She can... just fly over the water, right? Yet, after waiting long enough for her mentor to get a few steps ahead, she just shrugs her shoulder and makes a tentative first step herself, dipping a toe, and then finally lowering her whole likewise-sandaled foot into the water and onto the rock beneath. She tests her weight a little, before stepping out properly, toward the next. When in Themyscira! "Must be serious then..." Cassie echoes as she starts to follow, further listening to Diana's explanation. "...or seriously bad." And as turns out, this latter suspicion is quite accurate! Drinking evil goop? "Yeah, that can't be good." While they've carefully lake-walked and jogged to make it that far, when Diana tells Cassie to take a scouting pass, the young woman decides to take the more practical approach, finally lifting into the air. It gives her a wider view, both of Diana as she approaches the creatures, of the terrain around the spring, and hopefully of whatever might be causing all of this!
Diana Prince	Diana approaches the line of living trees that are absorbing the dark water before it can flow in to the lake that their home resides in the center of. As Cassie starts to walk the other direction, she'll hear Diana speaking another language, a strange language, and one that gets a response from the center tree, a towering tree that has greyer bark than the rest. Its voice booms, rumbling the ground, the waters, the foliage of the entire forest... As Cassie proceeds onward up the black spring she'll see the trees that move along side it have begun to lose their natural colors. Their trunks, bark, and branches have begun to turn dark shades of grey, brown, and black. They're leaning over the black water, like they're trying to bend their very bodies down to drink from it, as they create a shadowy tunnel of corruption that leads all the way toward the base of the mountain, and a dark cavern that the water is flowing out of. It's ominous, to say the least, and there's a foul smelling wind coming from it, a couple hundred yards ahead of Cassie's location. Diana soon joins the young blonde, standing to her right now, she exchanges looks with her. "The Centurion Elder... He says they sent an army of their Dryads in to the cave, and they have not come back. They fear sending more, for what may reside within. The scout that we found at the tree house... It came to find the Amazons, but our Rangers were busy... dealing with the invasion from the Doom Gate..." The Princess explains as she looks ahead now. "We must go further." In to the dark cave ahead.
Cassie Sandsmark	Ominous cave of Fairly Obvious Evil... check! It doesn't take Cassie long to make up her mind that this is what she was looking for, and so Cassie turns about midair, immediately starting to head back only to find that Diana is already en route to join her. "You can talk to those guys, huh?" she wonders, sounding a little more impressed than average. It isn't as if she's not always Di's biggest fan, but this definitely has the tone of being a bit of a surprise. Talking to the old tree dudes! Maybe it's not exactly Aegis Blasts or other top tier heroics, but it's still pretty unusual, and thus, cool. "They tell you any- ah. So they're still OK? Damning up and uh, drinking the stuff coming out isn't turning them nuts too?" In fact, it just has to occur to her: "Maybe they want us to go in so they can capture and evil-ify us too!" However, as she casts a suspicious look over her shoulder toward the looming cave mouth, and then quickly back to Diana, her expression is not one of apprehension, but a typical big, stupid grin. "Not like we wouldn't go and do that anyway, huh?" Hero choices are rarely sane and cautious! Rotating about again to face the cave once more, she makes a show of rolling her neck and shoulders as if limbering up for a fight. "Alright! Into the very ominous and clearly not a good place Cave o' Obvious Evil it is, then! What's the worst that could happen?" Of course... she does let Diana go first! It's uh, Amazon Formation Rules, you know?!
Diana Prince	Diana draws in a breath as she hears Cassie's comments. She puts her free hand on the girl's back and walks ahead with her a little more before pauses. "I don't feel I was speaking to 'them' either." The Princess admits. "I feel I was speaking to..." She looks toward the cave. "This has gotten more out of hand than I expected." She says through her teeth as she glances to the sky, then back to the Elder Dryads that are still seemingly keeping the dam up. "I believe it is a trap." She finally admits. Her eyes go back to Cassie then. "But it is a trap we have to spring. Or at least, I do." She says as she reaches her hand back to feel the arrows behind her shoulder, checking the number that she has. "We can split up." She says then, her eyes going back to the other. "You could fly up, and off, to warn the Ranger Unit. I believe they are on the edge of the woods to the south." Would Diana really go at this alone? Probably... "But time is running low..." She adds, with another glance back toward the Elder trees, their moans rumbling the forest around them. "Whatever is happening to them from this corrupted spring, is bound to overwhelm even them if we do not stop it soon."
Cassie Sandsmark	The fact that Cassie's concern might be right isn't exactly reassuring, even if it uh... validates her heroic instincts and tactical thinking, or something! "Right, right. Well, at least we KNOW it's a trap, then. Wouldn't be the first time a villain puts up some pretty obvious ruse and we bust in anyway, just cause... you know!" Hero stuff! "Should we get-" And again, it seems the two of them are of a like mind. SISTER-like, even. "Reinforcements. Well, yeah, might be a good idea. But uh..." Is Diana really making some kind of strategic play herself, here, or is she just giving Cassie a valid excuse to back out of something dangerous? It's hard to be sure. But either way, with Diana apparently so firm in her intention to enter, Cassie's answer is a similarly decided: "No way I'm letting you go by yourself!" It'd be breaking the sidekick code, or something. "But we really should... Hey, lemme borrow that?" 'That' turns out to be Diana's bow, since Cassie didn't bother with one. Next time maybe she should! But once she can get a hand on it, she does a quick little bit of jury-rigging, tearing a scrap of cloth off her Amazonian skirt and wrapping it around the arrow's tip. Then she gives a quick: "Be right back!" and shoots skyward. A moment later, there's a spark (maybe she used her lasso?) and then a quick orange streak as the arrow goes shooooooting off. A second or two later, and woosh! Back she is, offering Di her weapon, minus one arrow. "My aim might be crap but 'south' I can manage. Maybe the Rangers'll see it? Or maybe I'll set a tree on fire and they'll see THAT. Hopefully, gets some attention either way." That done, however, she goes for the proper weapons on her back. "Let's do this."
Diana Prince	Diana relinquishes the bow to Cassie, and watches her prepare her signal fire. It makes her smile softly, briefly, before she watches the arrow go high and far. "Your best shot I have seen you take with one of these." The Princess, and sister, chides the younger one as she accepts it back before showing Cassie a little grin. Her eyes dart forward then, her right eyebrow arching up as she stares in to the cave. "Normally, the Dryads would not be fond of us firing a burning arrow in to their woods. But... they seem to be quite busy today..." She grimly says as they set off. The walk is casual, the smell horrible, but the closer they get to the cavern mouth, the more something reveals itself to them. Glowing eyes. Lots of them. about fifty paces in to the cave. "The Dryads..." Diana says, smelling the foul odor coming from within. "This is their blood..." She finally states as she realizes what's happening. "They're being drained of their blood by this corruption, to the heart of the forest..." As she says this, the two pass in to the cavern mouth, out of the natural light and in to the looming cave.Up ahead, on either side of the black stream, the Dryads stand along it, leaned over it like the old trees outside, but from within their bodies, they're pouring black ichor out in to the spring water, tainting it with their interior poison. What came from the undead Centaurs, now having taken complete control of the Dryads here? Diana's eyes scan over it, as they walk past some of them, the Dryads all watching them, as they continue to just stand and bleed black blood in to the waters. Even the Princess has to momentarily raise her hand up to cover her nose. It smells like a thousand corpses left to rot in the sun. And then something rumbles, deeper in the cavern dark. "HUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUuuuh!" It rumbles, resonating through the thick rock of the mountain, causing Diana to look deeper in to the dark.
Cassie Sandsmark	"Its easy if you don't really have to hit anything!" declares Cassie, with a still-wide grin. And then, onward, into the dark depths of doom! Well, a few paces at least. "Wait so... they got corrupted first, and then it kind of grew in them, and now they're spreading it turn? I guess that makes sense. Maybe the uh, big ones outside, maybe they were even trying to help, to stop it. But drinkin' this stuff, I can't imagine it would turn out well." Of course, she's quite cognizant of the many eyes watching them, and her position reflects the tension of it, her body held poised at that moment right /before/ action, her hands floating ready to draw weapons, ready to leap into the fray. Still, she's not starting it. This holds as they continue forward, the dryads increasingly coming to surround them as they're allowed to pass deeper. And still Cassie holds... ...until she gets a whiff of that stuff. "Ugh, oh, gross. That's totally," she makes a horking sound, "just totally gross." This means that for at least that moment, she is not standing there in her heroically poised fashion, a young warioress ready to leap into battle. Instead, she looks like a college girl who partied a bit too hard, leaning over like she's ready to throw up. "Di, if I barf, get my hair..." Ah, tradition! Still, that great bumbling groan causes her to look up, and shakily pull herself back upright. "Yeah, that sounds bad." Side to side, she warily regards the dryads, in case they take the signal as cause to finally start shit. "Guess- guess we gotta see what's making that noise, yeah?"
Diana Prince	"The Dryads are resilient.." Diana quietly says back to Cassie. "If we can find the source, we can potentially save these..." She motions to the Dryads that are just pouring their tainted black blood in to the spring water. One of them, a larger one, is close to Cassie and it even reaches a gnarled branchy hand out toward the girl's face, trying to touch her skin! But Diana's eyes are forward, so she doesn't notice this. She's looking in to the dark. "That may be the source, whatever that was..." She says in her smoky toned voice, while her right hand grabs another of her arrows, this one she afixes something to it before she raises her bow, her body going straight, as she draws the arrow back to let the feathers brush against her cheek... she holds her pose for a moment before releasing it. The bow *thwangs* and sends the arrow in to the dark! The oxygen strikes the arrow-tip that she afixed to it, and suddenly the cave grows bright blue! The arrow-head reacts to the oxygen, showing the two Amazons the dark cave ahead. The arrow splashes against a wall, just as something rounds a corner... A massive red-eyed bear! Diana stares at it. "A Bristle Bear..." She breathes, just before it sees the two women and suddenly tenses, its mouth opening, and a horrendous roar escaping it's black saliva-dripping lips!
Cassie Sandsmark	Oh good, an overly friendly corrupted tree lady! "Eheheh, hi there, nice to meetcha, yeah uh, flattered but... no touchy..." Cassie looks suitably uncomfortable, backpedaling away from the twig-fingers while still nervously looking around. She's seen this movie, and it doesn't end well. Gotta watch those branches! She keeps on backing away, right up to Diana without turning so that they end up near back-to-back. More formations! And here in the cave, with these things all around them, it seems sensible to keep each other covered. "I kind of hope so. Because at this point I wanna find the problem, stab it, and get the heck out of here." A simple plan! Turned away and wary for other threats around them, she misses some of the process of Diana preparing her own special arrow, but the effect it has is hard not to miss. And as the cave lights up around them in that unusual blue-hued light, she looks back, first over her shoulder, and then quickly turning as that large shape moves into view. "Ooookay. I'm guessing THAT is not good." If it's the source or not, she has no idea. But it's a bear. An Amazonian Super Bear. An EVIL, glowy-eyed Super Bear. And it seems unfriendly. "This what we're looking for?" she asks Di, even as she doesn't hesitate to pull her own sword clear of its sheath, keeping another hand free, though hovering near her hip with the lasso. To her credit, she doesn't charge right at it, or even attack without thinking, but she does swing forward, maneuvering to split from Di and circle the creature. It probably has some funny name that Donna has tried to teach her and she's forgotten, but let's go with what it really is: Amazon Pincer!
Diana Prince	"Cassie!" Diana calls out as she sees her dutiful sidekick make her pincer move to dance around the big burly bear beast! The blue arrow still provides light to the cavern interior, as it lays on a rock at the foot of the wall that Diana fired it in to, which helps provide a strange sky-blue glow to the darkness, and to wash over the big round backside of the dark furred beast! The beast itself roars angrily at Cassie's motion, turning to look at her, dripping that obsidian ichor from its fangs as it takes a big stance, up on to its back legs, before swiping one paw, then the other, then the first again at Cassie! "Do not let the black fluid touch your skin!" Diana's voice can be heard shouting from the other side of the bear, as the golden blowing lasso of Hestia suddenly wraps around the beast's neck! "We do not know what it would do to even our blood!" Diana adds as she has the beast snared, keeping it from getting closer to Wonder Girl... However, now its turning toward Diana, and its powerful body starts to rush at Diana!
Cassie Sandsmark	Cassandra Sandsmark, literally bear baiting! The blonde Amazon moves in a swift arc, very much expecting some kind of reaction from the creature, and thus ready on the defense when it swings one of those big paws after her. She dodges the first, and then outranges the second, landing on her sandaled feet and skidding back slightly before dancing forward to take a swipe with her blade in response, as it lands on the second paw. Of course, there's another thing to worry about, and even as her blade slices at its furry hide, she leaps back again in no shortage of concern. Is it just the saliva? Or is the blood gonna get her too? That's another movie! She's seen all of these! Fortunately, she accomplishes what she's aiming to do as she draws the creature's rage, giving Diana her own opportunity to get her lasso around the critter. "I got it. Let's try and, uh, rope this varmit." Is that the lingo? She has no clue. But when your most iconic weapon is a lasso, everything starts to look like a rodeo... Thus, as the bear turns, Cassie completes their two-pronged strategy, grasping for her own signature weapon. She holds steady, waits for her moment, and then drops to a crouch and hurls her own lasso low. The throw doesn't actually make contact, but it lands the loop on the cave somewhere between them, in the path of the charging bear, and as one of its paws lands in the snare, she yanks back to close the trap. Suddenly, the bear is caught between the TWO WONDERS, with their strength able to pull it in either direction simultaneously... and thus in no direction at all, trapping it at the center! Well, it no doubt THRASHES about a whole bunch, but at least it gives them a moment. "What are we doing with this thing? I zapping, or you uh, truth'in?" She's seen that lasso do some amazing things. So who knows!
Diana Prince	The two lassos do indeed ensnare the big burly beast from either side. Cassie's efforts stop it from advancing further on Diana, and she breathes out a sigh of relief. Not that she couldn't handle the creature, right? But they are in confined quarters afterall! And it is very very big! "I do not know if the bear can be saved!" Diana shouts from the other side of it, as it thrashes and pulls at the lassos, trying to snag Diana's and yank her to its mouth, even if unknowingly, and it very nearly does this a few times. "I think we have to just put it down..." She says then. Diana shouts something else to Cassie, but a noise to Cassie's left will draw her attention, while drown out Diana's words. The blue light from the glow-arrow shines deeper in to the cave, and Cassie will see soemthing laying there in the dark black water. Another bear! Only this one is breathing heavily, groaning loudly, and spewing black blood out of a hole in its side! IT's body is pulsing as it spews the oil-like blood out, and in to the stream. It's not dead, but it is clearly still 'alive'. And its staring right at Cassie as it lays there, bleeding in to the spring water, as it is literally pulling itself toward Wonder Girl with its last functional leg!
Cassie Sandsmark	"Yeah. Alright. Well... sorry about this, I guess." Cassie's response is just a little glum, as are her words of apology directed toward the bear, although she hardens her resolve after a moment. "Di, it's probably safer I do it this way, than cutting it? But you might wanna leggo. I'mma do it in three, two, one..." She's never actually tested it, but if Cassie's lasso can carry the lightning juice, it sort of figures that Diana's might be conductive. So she gives her mentor a good bit of warning, and then finally focuses her will (and thinks that little internal prayer she never says out loud in front of the Amazons), calling a crackling flash of electricity along the length of her own lasso. Whether it's actually enough to kill it... she's not even sure, but she holds the charge for several moments, until the bear collapses, its thrashing at an end and its fur smoking slightly. Naturally, given the corruption, the burned stench isn't precisely pleasant. "Urgh." Given the light show, she doesn't catch the shadow of the other animal cast by Diana's lingering arrow, but the shouting and the groaning do get her attention. Maybe her reaction is slow, with what she was doing, so it's fortunate that the thing is barely alive, barely in one piece, even, as it pulls itself along. At first, when she sees it, Cassie jumps back in a sudden panic. But when she realizes what she's looking at, again it is a bit more sadness that fills her expression, than anything. "That... does not look good," she offers back to Diana. "We gotta get it out of the stream and uh, I guess... same thing. As its mate, probably. Ugh."
Diana Prince	The Bear that Cassie fries with her electric lasso groans, roars, and eventually seizes as it dies... but its not pretty how it dies. there is gushing, even some exploding, but it eventually stops moving, and drops to the ground. On the other side of the bear's body now, the lasso of golden energy is drawn back, having never left, and Diana comes in to view, with her bracers of submission covered in electricity. This is soemthing that Cassie has possibly never seen before, as the swirling whirling electric energy just sizzles and crackles around the Princess' forearms. She walks toward Cassie with her hands pressed together, causing the power to surge over her half-gloved palms, across her fingers, transfering from one hand to the next. She sees the second bear, crawling across the ground, as she comes to stand beside Cassie, about 10 feet away. "Step back." Diana warns Cassie, before her hands push out, palms out... Illuminating Diana's frame, the electricity suddenly surges and rushes away from the Princess' hands, blasting through the air in a straight column of energy that strikes the fallen mighty creature! The bear groans, as Wonder Woman transfers the electricity from her bracers, and hands, to the beast's body! It might be quite the show to see, but it has a similar grusome end as the one Cassie handled moments ago... But what may draw Wonder Girl's attention even more, is that the corrupted Dryad are creeping up behind Diana, their yellow glinting eyes, turning a shade of crimson red!
Cassie Sandsmark	This display is absolutely something new. Cassie at first notes the captive lightning with surprise and then curiousity, shifting more toward the latter as the show continues. With a slightly tilted head, she turns and watches as Diana moves across the cavern, still holding the lightning seemingly captive in her grasp... ...before blasting the bear like some kind of fighting game character! For a moment, Cassie doesn't look like she quite knows what to say. Then she figures it out: "Now you're just showing off." And perhaps that would be that, a bit of mildly I'M TOTALLY NOT JEALOUS quipping, some more bear frying, and a nice trip home. But such things are never quite so simple. Because she is not the one doing the zapping this time, Cassie does have the leeway to look around (amidst eye rolling at Diana's limitless powerz!), and in such a moment spots the creepy critters closing in. "Di! Behind you!" Whatever dryad among the many is closest, Cassie doesn't take much chance with, leaping in and giving it a sandal to the chest to send it back flying and give them some space. And... better than punching, goo wise. "Wasn't this supposed to fix them? Sure looks like they're still creepy, and mad we roasted their evil bear buddies!" After clearing the first, she takes up a bit of a ready fighting stance, but still holds more on the defensive, looking back to the water. "Get the carcass out and... I don't know, we got any way to clean this shit up?"
Diana Prince	Diana had given Cassie a smirk at the notion of showing off... Had she been? Maybe a little... But truly she wanted to keep the bear steady while Cassie zapped it! Wonder Woman is stepping toward the one she blasted when the shout of a threat behind her is issued. She turns to see Wonder Girl diving in to push back the one that had been closest to striking Diana. "Cassie, be careful!" She says back as she has the fried bear gripped by its sizzling fur now. With ease, she just yanks it out of the strap, and tosses it on to a dry corner of the cavern bending corridor! She starts to rush toward Cassie's aid then... Right as a line of arrows come flying in to the cave mouth! Each arrow adorned with white feathery fletching, that wiggles as the pointed tips of the arrows embed themselves in to the backs of the Dryads! But even more than that, each arrow is tied on to by a rope, that is suddenly yanked by the Amazon Ranger that fired them! Each of the Dryads are pulled down, in unison, all splashing down in to the spring water, as the Ranger unit stands at the mouth of the cavern, the line of women, all adorned in hooded cloaks, each with quivers of arrows on their backs, bows in their hands, and leather armor suited to their regiment visible in the glimmering light outside the cave. Diana stands beside Cassie now, seeing the reinforcements have arrived... as the Dryads flail in the water that is running fresh and clean now. Their hands reach up out of it, as they try to crawl out of the fresh water stream. The leader of the Ranger regiment comes bounding in to the cave. A blonde haired woman with her golden hair in a braid, her name 'Saemon.'. "Keep them in the water!" She tells Diana and Cassie. "They need to be cleansed!" And as she says this, she puts her leather armored booted foot down up on one of the Dryads trying to crawl out of the fresh water. She shoves it back under the flowing stream, and looks to the others...
Cassie Sandsmark	Cassie is all ready for a brawl, bouncing toe to toe and then toe to air, her hands up and ready, although the one still holding a sword... well, there is certainly a bit more of a sense of hesitation there, facing the dryads. But she's ready for what comes, lacking any other option... ...until the cavalry arrives! Well, the Rangers. CLOSE ENOUGH. "Woah!" With their impressive, synchronized attack taking the younger Amazon quite by surprise, her reaction is not unlike the one earlier to Diana's lightning-wrangling. Even living here the time she has, her new sisters never fail to keep impressing her. "You made it! Get my arrow?" She's grinning, now, although her sudden ethusiasm evaporates back toward seriousness as she sees that the fight isn't quite done, with some of the dryads fighting to claw their ways back out of the spring. "On it!" With that energy she was building for battle, she moves quickly to the water's edge. And for the second time, those sandal-feet are put to good use in dunking the dryads, pushing one down in, stepping on the barky fingers of another, and so on. "Sorry about this, but you'll thank us later," she offers sheepishly, since there IS something a little weird about it to her, roughing up creatures right out of the picture books her mom used to show her. It's gotta be mildly sacrilegious!
Diana Prince	The cleansing takes about ten minutes. The other Amazon Rangers arrive to help with the process, keeping the Dryads dunked. the water eventually becomes very clean though, and down at the base of the inlet, the Elder Dryads are drinking fresh water now, which has their coloring being restored. As the cleansing helps with the Dryads that Cassie is assisting with comes to a close, the leader of the Rangers steps away, letting the Dryad rise up now, its eyes a natural green hue again. The other Rangers folow suit, and the creatures of the Forest all come up out of the water. One of the Rangers steps over to Cassie, and offers the arrow back, with a smirk. "You finally made a good shot." She chides Cassandra, apparently being an archer familiar with Cassie's training! AS the Dryads start to walk back toward the cavern mouth, the cave lights up as Diana begins to burn the corpses of the two tainted bears. The leader of the Rangers stands beside the Princess, and looks between she and Cassie. "We believe one of the bears was attacked by a Centaur. It must've come back here, and ... preyed upon its mate..." Diana watches the fire engulf the two big tainted bodies, then looks to the blonde archer. "Thank you." She says quietly, then turns to Cassie. "Come on. Let us check on the Elders..."
Cassie Sandsmark	No doubt, its a relief when Cassie can stop half-drowning struggling tree women, and with the last, when the Rangers finally give the A-OK, she even reaches down to offer her hand to help her former dunking victim up out of the stream. In turn, she helps a few more, until they are all on their way out of the cave, leaving the Amazons to their business. Here, as one of the Rangers finds her, Cassie takes the offered arrow and offers a wide but awkward smile in return. "Heheh... thanks." Even if it's praise now, why does she have the sinking feeling she's going to get dragged out for practice on the archery range sometime soon?! And with that, it seems the worst of it is over. Soon they've left the cave, where she pauses only briefly beside the bear pyres, waiting for Diana to finish up, and when she does, to murmur a prayer to Artemis she picked up in one of her many lessons. She's not one hundred percent sure on the theology, but it seems about right. She reaches to put a hand on Diana's shoulder, before they finally start off. It's only a bit further other, after they've had time to leave that more gruesome scene, and are close to finding the place where she started, that she wonders. "So... time to meet Treebeard, huh? Anything I should know? I've never, you know... really talked to a tree."