(ELITE) The DRAGONSPIRAL Team

Drayden huffed a little as he made jump after jump, thinking that perhaps they would be able to cross without a hitch. Iris was spry in her youth and Lorelei tall and capable. Their landings were a little on the louder side, but that was also compared to the deep silence the rest of the room sat in. Hopefully it wouldn't be enough to wake the slumbering giant that slept in the shadows...

He spoke too soon.

With the last jump, his foot landed too close to the platform's edge and it crumpled under his weight, causing him to slip and fall. A short, strangled yelp of surprised tore from him involuntarily as the ground beneath him disappeared. His large, powerful arms snatched the platform's side, leaving his lower half to dangle. With some effort, he managed to hold on, bracing much of his weight onto his elbows, but whatever held the platform aloft was too far away for his legs. Drayden couldn't pull himself up under his own power.

Thankfully, a chill emanated from his back and he felt the cold hands of Lorelei's Froslass pulling up on his shoulders. Unfortunately, her relief was accompanied by rustling and a low growl.

"...Oh no..."

The Beartic burst forth from the shadows, lumbering around them on all fours over the precarious walkway that led to the platforms. Lorelei turned and watched as her Froslass pulled the Dragon master up in a painfully slow fashion. They needed to go. It was going to catch up and they needed to go. Once her ghost was ready, Lorelei pointed at the oncoming beast, who had already made the first jump. "Caille--" she began in a harsh whisper, "Use Blizzard to make the platforms slick. It might slow him down!" The ghost nodded and took her place between her trainer and the oncoming threat, who had jumped and already made a mistake in the maze. It was a start, at least, to give the humans some time.

Drayden cursed at his own ineptitude and quickly recovered, knowing that the best thing he could do was just jump to the next one. He pushed himself, jumping to another and another, and then finally to the other walkway. Only upon landing safely there did he turn, grasping his Flygon's ball. He wouldn't release the pokemon unless it was absolutely necessary since there were still slumbering ghosts about, but how their luck was faring seemed like the dragon would soon be needed.

Iris watched in horror as Grandpa's footing slipped, nearly leaping over herself to grab him as he caught himself on the edge of the platform. Luckily Lorelei's pokemon was right there behind him and was able to help heft his bulk back up onto semi-solid ground. Unluckily, however, as relief filled her heart an icy terror pierced her stomach when a deep growl and the sound of movement echoed from the darkness.

"...Oh no..."

Iris followed the other female's gaze just as a large Beartic emerged from the shadows, stalking them as they stayed just out of reach...for the moment. "Caille--" Lorelei called out to her Froslass, "Use Blizzard to make the platforms slick. It might slow him down!" Iris saw an opportunity to use the slippery slope to have Gau help block the creature's advance as well.

"Gau! Whip up a Razor Wind over the ice, keep it pushed back while we move ahead!" The small Noibat nodded quickly and moved into position above his trainer and her companions. Iris summoned Avevline back into her ball to get across quicker and began to follow Drayden once again. She saw him clutching at one of his pokeballs and only hoped that it wasn't one of the larger beasts because their pathway could be irreparably damaged if an all out brawl ensued this high up.

Lorelei continued to make jump after jump while following Iris' lead, her Froslass soon behind her. The Beartic, regrettably, found some traction on the icy platforms, but it didn't stop the ghost from continuing to keep the platforms hazardous. Suddenly, Iris' voice echoed over the beast's roars and wails, "Gau! Whip up a Razor Wind over the ice, keep it pushed back while we move ahead!"

Razor Wind? Lorelei turned to look straight into the hungry, hateful red eyes that were locked on her. Though the ice caused the occasional slip, would it buy them enough time for the Razor Wind to charge? It was a slower move, after all. Her ghost was locked into Blizzard with her item and there was no room to summon any other pokemon. Shit. She did the only thing she could do-- keep jumping.

Thankfully Gau was quick to respond, his body already glowing seconds after her call. She jumped to the next platform as his wings started to beat rapidly, the air around the small bat beginning to swirl and speed up violently. She could practically see the streams of air as they pulled in the chilled air of the blizzard within them. But she couldn’t risk slowing down to admire the additional beauty to the move because they had to try not dying first so she kept jumping. Following platform after platform after Grandpa.

Gau beat his wings as fast as possible to build the swirling vortexes in front of the great beast, having chosen to stay a few platforms ahead of it to hopefully get them built before the lumbering behemoth caught up. He occasionally shot worried glances out of his peripheral to try and gauge where his trainer and her other humans were at but soon enough the bear was too close to focus on anything but building up wind. As luck would have it, right as the bear landed on the platform he hovered over, the twin twisters fully formed and began cutting away at the creatures face, pushing him back angrily as he couldn’t keep traction on the icy surface of the stone. It wasn’t much, but hopefully it bought the humans a minute or two extra to get out.