[sub][color=9B363B][b]Watchguard Fenn[/b][/color] - [@Deadbeatwalking]
[b]Watcher Cedric[/b] - [@Sloth]
Greenband Bernia - [@Asura]
Greenband Oliver - [@vietmyke]
Greenband Willow - [@Lady Selune]
Greenband Athelstan - [@Inkarnate]
Greenband Erian - [@Superboy][/sub]

The recruits descended through the elevator shaft with a deep rumbling, going past the face of a long stone chasm in complete darkness, and then past torchlit levels of the Redfort, so far numbered up to nine; The Hall of Watchers, The Redwatch Bureaucratic Chamber, The Redfort Maintenance Floor, The Kitchen, and several progressively less well-lit levels after the aging Watchmouse decided he wasn't going to name all of the floors for "a bunch of green-boned recruits". They seemed mostly residential, with varying degrees of affluence. The recruits passed another stone wall, enshrouding them in darkness yet again, before opening up to another level. This one was dark red stone, barely kept lit by the torches along the uncarved cavernous walls. Dripping stalactites hung from the ceiling, shimmering in the torchlight. This was the only floor where the nearby Watchmice bothered to acknowledge them -- Mice in boiled leather helmets, brandishing pickaxes and shovels, waved at the mice as they passed.

[color=9B363B]"Those are the miners of the Redfort. You'll see those smiling faces again if you survive."[/color]

There was a hush of whispered talking at the furthest corners of the elevator platform, which were hushed by the Watchmouse slamming his canetip on the floor with a low [i]thud[/i]

[color=9B363B]"Aye, survive. Here is not the place for questions. You'll be asking them when you reach The Deep."[/color]

The elevator remained surrounded by nothing but stone for some time, longer than the elevator had taken to reach any floor. They continued descending in silence for minutes, until the platform opened up not to another doorway, but a rush of cold air. The elevator platform had descended into a massive, pitch-black cavern -- The untrained ears and adjusting eyes of the recruits were still attuning themselves to their surroundings, though it was the cold, dank cave winds that caused them to instinctively step away from the unfenced platform edge. The recruits who bothered to sniff out their surroundings would notice a faint stench of meat clinging to the air.

The platform slowly descended down, hundreds of feet to the cave floor, where they reached a set of stone steps. At both sides of the platform, there were teams of Greenbands surrounded by several torchwielding Watchmice, all holding onto great wooden cranks like the one the Greenbands in the armory room had turned.

[color=9B363B]"You'll be met by Watcher Cedric at the bottom of the stairs. Best of luck to you, go for the eyes when you can."[/color]

These were the final words of encouragement offered by the Watcher, as the platform began to rise with the turn of the cranks. The recruits descending the stairs, even in the feint torchlight provided by the crank-guarding Watchers, failed to see the end of the stairs in the darkness, or the beast that loomed therein.
[hr]
[sub][color=red][b]Watchguard Myrtle[/b][/color] - [@Lady Selune]
[color=C8C8C8][b]Watcher Flint[/b][/color] - [@Irredeemable][/sub]

True to its name, Stormreach seemed to be the rainiest place the two Watchmice had traveled to, despite it only being a two-day travel up into Westercroft. In lieu of a forest path, as many they traveled were, the path to Stormreach was mostly through cold, swampy meadows. Early that morning, their second day of travel, it had only been drizzling a weak mist of rain, which Flint had assured Myrtle would die off as the day progressed, or remain a drizzle at worst. This was no drizzle, but a downpour that threatened to wash the mice off their feet and into a roadside gulch. Fortunately, they had passed the Stormreach border minutes before, and seemed to be at the end of the dirt road leading up to the village. They reached not a stone wall, or even a wooden border, but a shallow, knee-high moat around the town. From a distance, it looked like someone had simply drawn a line around the town in the soil with a stick. To be fair, the town did not look ripe with resources that would make them want to [i]build[/i] a wall. If the town were any fruit-based descriptor, ripe would be the last. Perhaps low-hanging, or bespoilt, but certainly not ripe.

The village was made up of dozens of dirty looking thatch-roofed cottages, with a sole tower at the other end of the town, visible due to the sharp left curve around a forest of untamed thyme -- The Watchmice assumed it to be the Redwatch outpost, which was their destination. Despite being a bordertown, no guard stopped them at their arrival, nor did a stationed Watchmouse greet them. The luxury of the Spoorwall kept out predators, though it seemed this village's strategy to avoid Gnasher raids was to be, as the mouse who chose to greet them,

[color=wheat]"[i]Shiiiiiiiiit![/i]"[/color] shouted an aging tawny mouse. [color=wheat]"Muck! [i]Scum![/i] [i][b]Bullies and shit-mongers![/b][/i]"[/color] He approached them from around the corner of a cracking building's frame, staring them down with one blind eye, wiggling a cane at the Watchmice. He hurried towards them at a meager pace. [color=wheat]"We have enough Watchers in this town! No more! To hell with the both of you, and bugger the Redwatch!"[/color] By now, he had drawn a small crowd of [i]three[/i], who had poked out of a nearby pub to see the commotion.

[hr]

[sub][color=0072bc][b]Watcher Ramekins[/b][/color] - [@71452K]
[color=B891C1][b]Watcher Aleria[/b][/color] - [@Inkarnate]
[color=seagreen][b]Watcher Godric[/b][/color] - [@Captain Jenno][/sub]

There were few castles more unimpressive than Taproot. It was surrounded by four short walls, just taller than a mouse on a second mouse's shoulders, with two Watchmice guarding its one entrance -- On this day, Watcher Aleria and Watcher Godric. They had been stationed at the gates not to protect the castle, but to properly greet, guide, instruct, and [i]quarantine[/i] the caravan of young mice arriving. These were not the Greenbands the castle was overdue for, but the last of the survivors from a small, plague-ridden village in Westercroft. It was not their place to treat them at least. That duty fell on the furry shoulders of one Watcher Ramekins, who had been hard at work preparing the castle's infirmary for the influx of patients. Along the horizon, the two Watchers saw two lizards emerge over the hill, wrapped in leathery reigns. A few moments later, the wagon they were pulling came into sight over the horizon as well. An orange-cloaked Watchmouse whipped them onward. From the looks of it, the wagon was big enough for a dozen, perhaps even two dozen mice. Soon, the wagon was not a bump on the horizon, but close enough to the castle for the Watchmice to call for the gates to be opened. Lizards, after all, did not pull wagons like beetles or turtles, who each tarried along as if on their way to tea. Lizards pulled wagons like the wagons were chasing them.

[color=orange]"Hail! I am Watcher Edwin of Thatcherton. I have been assigned with the transport of the survivors of Vinehold to the nearest village with a Redwatch outpost. Is this the castle [i]Taproot[/i]?"[/color] He asked, giving the meager fort a befuddled look, as if halfway unsure as to whether or not he stood before a heavily fortified barn. One of his lizards grumbled a disagreeable whine, as if to concur with his master.