In a short few days, the cure for Nessus was delivered across the entire city of Mulapin and it's small impoverished population was back to suffering the injustices of a system meant to oppress them. But at least there was no poison in their food supply masquerading as an illness anymore. Or at least, if there were they could quickly and near immediately cure it. Not that any such poison tried to make it's debut to the well immunized community at this point but the challenge was open if Sirius ever dared to repeat a performance. The rebellion was alive again, their next supply shipment dropped not long after and there was only one problem left.
"Roko, can I make a request of you?" Helena said as their group was busy eating lunch one day.
"What is it?"
"Can we call Corissa over already?"
"Why?"
"Roko, this food sucks." Momo cut in, saying what everybody's been thinking for a while now, "Their signature dish is meat and vegetable soup."
"I did feel like that was coming up a bit too often." Kaguya noted, "But I just figured I was too new here and circumstances had impacted the culinary situation."
"It's not THAT bad..." Roko said not entirely convinced himself.
"Roko, after that grueling gruel period, I want something with real flavor and this meat and vegetable soup is not cutting it."
"I can't just call Corissa over just to cook for us. It needs to be more...pressing..."
"Okay then what are you going to do about the food situation?"
"I bought them spices! It's not my fault they don't use them!"
"Roko, you can hand a sword over to someone but if they don't know how to use it, they aren't exactly 'armed'." Momo explained.
"Oh what, you want me to start giving cooking lessons now?"
"Can you cook?"
"Not especially well."
"Well there we go, we need Corissa right now."
"Look, I'll talk to Azimuth maybe she'll have a solution."
"What's wrong with meat and vegetable soup?" Azimuth frowned, "It's not like we have particularly extravagant ingredients around and we can't exactly afford to spray paint everything in edible gold or something."
"You don't have to start with good ingredients to create a fulfilling meal." Roko muttered.
"What was that?"
"Nothing." Roko replied, "I'll deal with it later."
"Is our food situation that bad to you folks?" Azimuth scoffed.
"I mean, it can certainly be improved."
"Weren't you the one trying to cut back on luxuries?"
"An army marches on their stomach, I don't think it's an unreasonable ask."
"Yeah well that expertise costs money. And shouldn't you be working on our next operation instead of worrying about food quality?"
"You want me to not care about food after all that food poisoning business?"
"Look, the chefs we have are old friends of my husband who are working here for cheap, I don't want to fire them."
"I'm not saying we fire them." Roko sighed, "Look, I'll figure it out later. I've got other things to worry about."
"Like what?"
"Kaguya wants to set up tents and walls to protect her plants from the coming storm. Apparently it's going to be raining for quite a while in the next few days."
"That's true." Azimuth nodded, "It's going to be pretty cloudy the next few days. I don't think we'll be able to launch much operations with the rain in the way."
"No above ground operations anyway." Roko mused, "Our underground options into Muldingirmus is limited as well..."
"Well, the rain should end eventually." Azimuth shrugged, "We can discuss more once that happens."
"Yeah. We'll talk later."
A few days passed and Kaguya's garden protections had been finished with most of her small plants set up inside a hastily built greenhouse, set on tables overs the larger underground plants she was taking care of. There were still some plants left outside but they were hardier according to Kaguya and should brave the storm just fine. In the meantime, Roko spent most of his rainy days in his studies, looking over the files left behind in M83 for any sort of useful information. There wasn't much relevant that Roko could find but looking through these files were one of the things Roko figured he'd do eventually, when he had nothing better to do. And these days cooped up at home with the rain clattering against his window was the perfect time. But...they were coming up on their fourth day of rain already. And no end to the rain was forecasted anytime soon.
"Is it monsoon season or something?" Helena asked.
"Mulapin doesn't get monsoons." Melia said, "This is just unusual weather."
"I mean, a few days of rain makes sense but there's been non-stop constant downpour for days. This is not normal. Right Roko?"
"Helena, can you not sit on the couch like that?"
"But I'm bored~" Helena said, her back laid across the couch's seat, head hanging over the edge and feet just dangling over the backrest.
"There's still plenty of things to do around here."
"Like what, taking care of your daughter for you?"
"Aranea's fine!" Roko frowned as Aranea was sat down on the ground in front of his desk building a puzzle.
"Roko really the type of person to just give his kid an ipad and then fuck off for hours."
"Such a shame." Melia said.
"HOW THE HELL DO YOU KNOW WHAT AN IPAD IS?!"
"Sir." A rebel opened the door politely as he poked his head in, "The resupplies should be arriving at the main base right now."
"That's normal." Roko nodded, "Is there a problem?"
"Well, the main base has gotten a little treacherous to navigate so..."
"You want me to oversee the acquisition?" Roko sighed, "Alright. I'll see what I can do."
With a small group of M83 rebels and Aranea, Roko descended into the sewer depths beneath his base. The air had gotten suffocatingly damp. A result of the harsh rainfall that had been falling for days. The channels had begun overflowing, leaving a growing film of water over the walkways, splashing against their boots.
"Is the sewer going to flood?" Roko frowned.
"The waterways gets like this during heavy rainfall." One of the rebels explained, "It's unusual but we should be pretty prepared for this."
"...Right, then we move on."
Trudging through the soggy water, the group soon finished their small trip to the main base. Only to find it in chaos.
"Hurry! Hurry!"
"Get the boats ready!"
"Women and children first!"
"W-What's going on?!" The rebels from M83 cried as their fellow rebels were frantically moving about.
"Roko!" Momo's voice called out to them from across the cistern, "Good timing! We need help with the evacuations!"
"Evacuations?" Roko frowned.
"Yeah." Azimuth said as she lugged a pair of sandbags past them before stopping to address them, "The base is getting flooded. We need to evacuate. No, we needed to evacuate sooner."
"Flooded?!" the other M83 rebels looked down at water below them, the small film now having grown to nearly ankle height.
"Follow protocol." Roko leaped into commanding immediately, "Help out with the evacuation in anyway you can."
"Yes sir!" The rebels of M83 jumping right into their obvious task, quickly starting to help move people and supplies onto the boats that were rocking wildly in the growing waters.
"The people can take shelter in M83." Roko said, "What else can we help with?"
"We were relying on you to provide shelter." Azimuth nodded, "Thanks for the quick decision. We're still in the early stages of the evacuation, meaning we're moving important supplies and people onto carts and boats before abandoning the base. But if the water level keeps growing at the rate that it is, we'll have to start waterproofing the base ASAP. Seal up any cracks with tapes and place sandbags at the base of the doors."
"Will that be enough?"
"Frankly, I think this flood's going to be historic. We prepared for floods up to maybe knee deep floods at best. But this flood may take the entire base."
"Then we need to start moving the carts first." Roko nodded, "They're going to be useless once the water reaches a certain level so we need to use their high capacity first. Put the most important supplies and the most vulnerable people on them and have them move out fast. Pregnant women, babies and the younger kids first. Make sure the boats are specifically manned so we can have them constantly returning to pick up as much as they can."
"Half of that's already part of our evac plan but good on you for getting into the job." Azimuth smiled as she pat Roko on the shoulder before leaning down to pick up her sandbags again.
"Oh, sorry." Roko said, picking up one of the sandbags as well, "I'm not used to people already being prepared."
"No, it's cool. The wagon stuff is actually a pretty good point."
It was good that Roko had arrived as early as he did. Much of the people were still trying to pack away their important personal belongings. The kids in particular were still crying about their favorite belongings which brought no end of trouble for the parents.
"Here's your doll." Roko gasped, handing a toy over to a young kid, "Now get going!"
"It's not a doll, it's an action figure!" But the kid was already sailing away on the boat with his parents for Roko to care.
"H-Here." Aranea handed a couple a box of diapers for their baby, the two thanking her before Aranea waved them off as their boat departed as well.
"Now to seal off those rooms." Roko gasped, "Aranea, it's getting too dangerous for you to stay here. I want you to take the next boat back and wait for me back at M83."
Aranea looked concerned but the water level had already grown to almost half of their foreleg which meant that it was practically waist level for her. She seemed like she wanted to remain but in the end, quietly nodded in agreement.
"Good." Roko patted her on the head, "Go finish your puzzle until I'm back."
With that, Roko began trudging through water again to pick up a sandbag from a crate. It used to be full of nothing but sandbags but the crate was seeming quite empty now. Momo had begun providing enhancement magic for those remaining but that seemed to do little against the sheer amount of water present. Still, it helped Roko lug this sandbag out to place it at the foot of a door while Momo taped up the edges.
"I sure hope this tape holds." Momo grimaced.
"We've already had to triple up with the sandbags around the lower edges of the door." Roko grimaced, "Hopefully the tape will hold off the rest of the water."
"Well at least the dorms are done." Momo said, "That means the dorms and training rooms have been completed. What's left?"
"The kitchen." Roko scowled, "We're still trying to get as much supplies out before fully evacuating. With the carriages gone, we need to transport them by boat which is more difficult in these rocky waters."
"Azimuth's been heading that right? Let's go."
"Right." Roko nodded.
Returning to the outside of the base, they could see one boat struggling to remain in place as some remaining rebels were carefully balancing crates on the boat so that it wouldn't immediately capsize. Aranea was gone already, having presumably taken an earlier boat. The advantage of their situation was that the currents gave them a fast journey to the M83. The problem was getting back to the base against those same currents. Something that would have been near impossible with just their simple row boats but a rotating cast of rowers meant they could fight the current with as much strength as they could muster. There weren't much humans remaining here. Now it was all a rush to secure their supplies.
"Roko!" Azimuth gasped, "We still need a dozen more supplies! We can't afford to survive for long with so many people with just these supplies!"
"I've already set up a plan." Roko nodded, "There should be a net set up in the middle of the main channel close to the entrance of M83. We can just let the supplies float down the currents and let them get caught in the net for the remaining rebels to fish up."
"That sounds great but what if the supplies get dashed into the walls along the way?!"
"We literally do not have the time to safely transport any more supplies! With this we can try and salvage a little more supplies before we're completely underwater!"
"Ugh, fine!"
"How much more supplies do we have left?"
"Still half a storeroom." Azimuth scowled, "We set up some sandbags to block some of the water to buy us some time but the tide's rising higher and higher. Once the water inside the storeroom starts reaching the bottom-most shelves, we'll seal off the storeroom and start sealing off the kitchen area."
"That seems a bit late for the rest of the kitchen." Roko frowned.
"We can repair the kitchen if we ever come back!" Azimuth snapped, "For now the supplies are more important!"
"Can't disagree but the work's going to be harder than you think." Roko muttered to himself before speaking out loud to the remaining rebels, "All remaining hands, start evacuating as well! Most of the work is done, the three of us will remain to eke out what supplies we can! Start taking the boats back and help the people fishing out the supplies we send down the current for you if you can."
The rebels looked a bit unsure but nodded and began climbing into the boats along with the remaining supplies they could muster as Roko ran off to the supply room.
The water level was starting to reach knee height at this point. Once it reached waist level it would be too difficult to even continue moving in these waters, meaning that was the absolute latest they could remain. And if they did wait til the very last moment, the trip back was going to be the most life threatening thing they would do since Roko arrived here. At this rate, they could very well be completely submerged on the way to M83. Once that happened, they'd be left to swim against the current the best they could to return to the base. A seemingly impossible feat even with magic. Actually they didn't even need to be completely submerged. Once it reached torso level and they're left to do nothing but tread water, the current will be too strong for them to contest. They can try to stay afloat the best they can but at some point they'd have to submerge before their heads were smashed across the ceilings. Once that happens, they'll have limited time to try and escape. From there-
"Roko!"
Azimuth's voice snapped Roko out of his thoughts and the automatic motions that he had left his body to do. As he was preparing for the next steps in their escape, the water had finally reached waist level and the doors to the kitchen had been sealed off. Azimuth was holding out a rope to him that she had tied around her waist along with Momo.
"Wrap this around your waist!"
"Oh! Yeah, good idea." Roko said as he quickly took the rope and tied himself to the two.
"Okay good." Azimuth nodded, "Now let's finally escape!"
The path back to M83 wasn't too long but the water buffeted their progress at every step. For a while they stuck to the wall to try and use it as support but as soon as it reached almost torso level, they started treading water and moving away from the wall to avoid getting thrown against it. From there, it was left to the currents to take them the majority of the way. But as the waters continued rising, a new problem presented itself, one that no one had anticipated despite it's obviousness. The burning torches that had lit up the sewers all day long was soon going to be extinguished, leaving them in complete and utter darkness. It hasn't quite reached that level yet but the last few turns they'd have to make would have to be in complete darkness. This final problem seemed unavoidable at this point. It felt like their only escape was to just let the currents take them out to whatever lake or sea they emptied out to or just...die. Except as the time for their first turn came, Roko could see the net that he had ordered them to set up in the main channel. It had caught a few boxes and it could catch them. But it would provide no footing for them to use to orient themselves. Except just as the water was about take away their light, Roko could see the earth itself rising up and blocking them from getting entangled by the net. Thinking fast, Roko quickly reoriented himself so his legs were underneath him as he slammed against the wall. It felt like his legs were going to break or at the very least force the remaining air out of his lungs. But with Momo's defensive magic, Roko could feel himself slowly standing up in the pure darkness.
It was...frightening. The endless darkness. The water still pressing against him. His burning lungs aching to take one last deadly breath. But there was still time. Roko had oriented himself not just to stand on the wall but to walk straight towards the turn they'd have to make. At least...he thought he did. His slow but steady steps with no direction to guide him drew forth an immense paranoia. He reached out for something. Anything to better get a grasp of where he was. And to his surprise he thought he saw something. Faintly glowing in the dark. Roko grasped at it and found a thread. A thin wire that he used to pull himself along. He didn't know why but he trusted it. Letting it guide him. He even thought he heard the voices of his companions. The ones that had safely escaped and were waiting from him in M83. He couldn't make out too much of what they were saying but he could hear them calling out for him. For them.
The thread lead him to one final turn. One that he knew from his experience with the tunnels. One bright hole glowing with light in the ceiling. Their escape. But the currents were still running. Running past the hole to parts unknown. Roko had one chance. One final jump to grasp their only escape. And he didn't have time to prepare himself. Wrapping this thread around his hand, Roko jumped off the side of the wall. He fell. Fell fast by the gravity of the currents. When he reached out, he could feel his hand catch against something. The edge of their escape. Roko felt himself stop so suddenly he could feel his arm almost popping out of it's socket. But he held on and started to try and pull himself up through the hole, even as the current tried to drag him away. Roko wasn't alone though. He felt several hands grabbing onto his arm and pulling him out with immense strength. The next few parts were a blur. His brain barely able to record information anymore. All he could tell was him finally being pulled out of the water, taking his first breath in what felt like forever and then collapsing onto the ground unconscious.