Role Playing!

[Ranger Melinda]

[glow=red,2,300]Jason - this post is being omitted from the storyline[/glow]

with a dying breath, sarala yelled out "NOOOOO!!!! ERK!!!!!!"
shilim ran to save her, but, because he hadnt been breathing recently, he soon fell over and collapsed, and died as well, trying to save his dear cousin.
erk, seeing that both sarala and shilim had died from suffocating, proceded to fight lucrecia in a full out battle of the powers. lucrecia fought valiantly, but, alas, she died in the fight. erk, now having finished off his duty of avenging sarala and shilim, as well as any others that lucrecia had hurt on earth, and the other places she might have visted, decided to perform the sepuku, a sacred samuri ritual invoving literally spilling your guts and nearly decapitating yourself. see here for any questions
doelcm and alira kept wandering along the river, setting up camps every few days to take a rest and to recouperate. suddenly, the crystal on the dagger went dark, and doelcm got worreid.
"alira, the dagger suddenly went dark, what do you think happened to it?"
"i dont know ma'am. we need it to find whatever it is that we are supposed to find."
"i know, and its not reasurring that it suddenly, without any explanation, went dark. i hope that everyone else is okay."
little did they know that in the bushes beside the river were some towns people from the next village over that wanted to ambush them, and kill them both. out they poped from the bush, and took doelcm hostage, and quickly disposed of her by taking one of the village horses, and tying her to its side and making them run around, with doelcm wearing the red hot shoes on her feet, and suddenly both horse and doelcm spontaniously combusted.
alira, having had to watch her master's death, performed jigai, a different suicide ritual see here for any questions on this one.
Kor had long been sucked into a black hole, having missed a portal in one of the jumps between worlds, and was now nicely combusting.
rachael and emiko, while eating their geezbot dinner, were set upon by huns. attilla the hun, in specific decided that, because they were eating, and the huns had no food, that the should die. he started with emiko, since she had the name that sounded like their arch enemies, the japanese. rachael, meanwhile, was too busy trying to get the huns to take a bath, or to at least wash their face and hair before killing her, and so didnt notice anything that was going on with emiko. emiko was layed down on a bored, tied down, so that she couldnt move, and drawn. next the huns, with their bare hands, tried to quarter her, but they failed. rachael was still trying to get the huns to take a bath, or wash themselves up a bit, so that she could die under sanitary hands, didnt notice emiko being quartered either. emiko was dying quietly, making absolutely no sound, though being completely concious. suddenly, the individual crystals that erk, kor, doelcm, shilm, sarala all realized "hey, no one is looking for us any more. we should spontaniously combust and implode the universe, and every living thing in it with us." and so they did.
only one problem happend though. because emiko and rachael were completely unconnected with anything that had ever happended, didnt belong to this world, werent looking for the crystals, werent even really involved with their "friends" from earth, they somehow didnt spontaniously combust with the rest of the universe. suddenly they realized, "you know, we will probably die soon. intersting thought yes?" they chatted for about another two minutes, rachael just now realized that emiko was slightly hurt, and a bit taller than she had been to begine with. suddenly they up and dissapeared. and so ends the tale of the empowered.

[Jason]

[glow=blue,2,300]Jason - This is the modified, current post to go from.[/glow]


"You rotten witch!"
"Oh, rotten now, am I?" said Lucrecia to Tarak, who had been hurling insults at her for the last five minutes. She seemed more amused than offended.
Lucrecia had stuck Erk and Tarak to trees, keeping them out of the way but in sight. Sarala and Shilm had likewise been bound, held by bands of darkness.
Tarak continued to yell at her for several more minutes, before he finally quieted down, tired from all the activity that night. Erk simply continued to stare into the darkness, showing no expression on his face.
"Well, now that I've caught several of you, what shall I do with you?"
Lucrecia stared at them, but neither Erk nor Tarak offerred a suggestion. Shilm and Sarala were still apparently out, the weight of the darkness being too much for them to handle after spending so much energy in the last few days. However, without any of them noticing, Shilm had roused and was watching, building up his strength.
"Hmm, I think I might slowly kill off the two of you, letting you feel the annoyance you've actually been to me. Or perhaps maybe I'll keep you alive and let you see the destruction of your planets and the death of so many innocents, or maybe . . ."
Lucrecia continued on for some time, thinking of what she might do, enjoying the moment. She wasn't worried, since she had them all bound by the darkness, and there was no way that any of them could break out of it. She was using her powers to stem Erk and Tarak's powers, so they couldn't generate enough energy to break out.
While Lucrecia continued to go on her monologue (which she even admitted out loud that she was), Erk continued to watch the darkness. To most, it would seem he was waiting the inevitable. In truth, some time earlier, he had seen something, what appeared to be eyes, watching them from the shrubs where they had been earlier. Erk continued to watch, wondering if perhaps he was right, hoping that he was.
Suddenly, Erk saw a flash of light from the shrubs. Not much, not enough to attract the attention of Lucrecia. It wasn't even light, but merely a reflection of the moonlight off of something shiny. Erk stared hard, watching, making sure to keep his face impassive. Slowly, he picked out a face watching. It was what they had seen earlier, the eyes that had been watching them. Erk stared at them, and they stared at him. Then he saw what it was that had reflected the light. It was something that looked like a bow, being slowly raised. Erk watched intently, following what appeared to be the arrow in it. The eyes slide over to Lurcrecia, and the bow oriented itself on her. Erk quickly glanced at her, but she and Tarak were arguing back and forth, Tarak once again insulting her and she teasing him. Erk looked back, saw the eyes shift to him, and he nodded slightly. The eyes stared a second longer, and then shifted back.
Shilm had also noticed the faces moving around in the bushes, and that Erk had noticed them as well. Preparing with all his might, unleased the blast he had stored up, just after the figures in Lucrecia didn't notice the shaft until it was almost at her, and as she turned towards it, it struck her in the shoulder. Lucrecia staggered and gasped, and Erk felt the power binding him to the tree slacken. Shilm's blast of light also traveled towards Lucrecia, but she had sensed that one coming. However, since the arrow had distracted her, instead of dodging the blast, she pulled Tarak from the tree with her powers and used him as a body shield to block the blast. Tarak screamed in pain as the energy bit into him, but because Shilm was not at full strength, the blast was not enough to overcome Tarak's advanced strength, and instead of disinitigrating him only knocked him out. Taking advantage of the sudden drop in power, as well as the building rage he felt as he watched Tarak drop to the ground, Erk called forth everything he could and blew apart the remaining power holding him to the tree. Several more black darts had flew out of the bushes, one or two striking Lucrecia, but most being blocked by her. Lucrecia sent a shaft of dark energy at Shilm, blasting him back into unconsciousness. Erk joined into the fray, hurtling several fireballs at Lucrecia. Still nimble, despite her injury, Lucrecia dodged them, shooting a few blasts of darkness at both Erk and the dark figures moving around. The figures were no longer in the bushes, but had spread out, firing arrows as they moved. One or two went down with a cry as they were struck by the dark shafts, but most were able to dodge quickly and shoot an arrow in response.
Slowly backing away from all of them, Lucrecia continued to deflect and destroy their projectiles. A strong wind began to blow, and behind Lucrecia a portal began to open.
“You may have beat me this time, but you got lucky. Next time, I will have you all!”
She looked back over at Shilm and Sarala, who were lying unconscious on the ground.
“Let’s see how well you work when you’re split up, and two of you are on Earth!”
Erk yelled in a rage as he realized what Lucrecia was doing, but before he could react further, a portal opened up directly under the two light people and swallowed them, sending them to some place on Earth. Lucrecia laughed, then jumped through her own portal.
The portal closed behind Lucrecia, and Erk stood there, anger burning within him and tears streaming down his face. He had failed. How would he ever find Sarala? She could be anywhere on Earth. Turning to Tarak, Erk worked to heal him as best he could. He was fairly beat up from the blast, but revived after a few minutes, feeling worse for the wear.
Slowly, the dark shapes emerged from the shadows, showing themselves to those they had fought with and for. Erk looked up and saw that they vaguely resembled humans, except that they had luminescent eyes, dark purple skin, and seemed to be rather technologically young. They stared at the two Empowered with a mix of curiosity and suspicion.
“Hi,” Tarak, looking up from the ground.
The natives jumped at the sound of his voice and scurried back into the bushes, disappearing from view. Tarak stared after them, surprised, but then shrugged his shoulders.
“The people we meet just keep getting weirder and weirder.”

[Ranger Melinda]

emiko and rachael were enjoying their dinner of geezbot, when suddenly, they felt an infulx of dark powers.
"i wonder what it is thats going on?"
"eh, know knows. lets just ignore it, enjoy our dinner that we worked so very hard to get, and see if it ignors us?"
"sounds like a good idea emiko."
so, thats what they did. little did they know, it was shadow that had been following them for quite a time, just hadnt gotten close enough for rachael and emiko to feel his presense. until now.
"was it a mistake to get so close. they arent going to do anything. ... should i do what i planned, or should i wait, and see what happens if they feel my presence for a bit longer?"
wait he did, and waited for quite a long time. after a few days of rachael and emiko being suspicious of what was going on, and them finally becomming curious enough to go investigate, they went in search of the source of the dark feelings. thye were wandering along side a river that had many beautiful maple trees (it was fall, so the trees even had really pretty coloured leaves) and many bushes and happend upon none other than shadow.
"shadow, where did you come from? i thought that you were with sarala and the others?"
"emiko, what are you doing away from the rest of the group, and who is this with you?"
after introductions and stories by all, they came to realize that shadow had no one with wich he was traveling and that he had come to see the error of his ways, and so he was slowly transforming into a good guy. so, shadow joined up with rachael and emiko. off they went, into the sunset.

[Ranger Melinda]

(ooc: erick, if you have a problem with this post, please let me know and it can be fixed)

rachael, emiko, and shadow were wandering along, and doing things that they needed to do, or what they thought they needed to do, to get back home. since shadow no longer had a home to go to, he was going with rachael and emiko, to try to get to earth. little did they know that that wouldnt work, and that there was no more earth to go back to. since lucrecia had taken over, it had become so corrupt that it could no longer support any life forces.
"you know, shadow, if your going to be living with us on earth, then your going to have to have a new name, because no one, and i mean _no_one_ no earth is named shadow. would you mind if we renamed you, to have a more proper earth name?"
"uhh... i guess... what would it be?"
"how 'bout torry?"
"uhh... sure... why not?"
so, shadow now became torry, and so rachael, emiko and torry went on their merry way, to where they thought would be earth.

suddenly, as they were wandering along, trying to decide just _how_ they were going to get home, seeing as none of them had any powers to get back to earth, when suddenly, shadow, being the one closest to having any powes, got the impression that the others needed their help. emiko shortly theirafter also felt it, possibly as a returning and a slight strenghening of her powers, but not enough for anyone to really notice.
"they need us" shadow and emiko said in unison. "they are in trouble, i dont know how, i dont know who by, but they need our help" again, still in unison.
"wait"said rachael, "who is they/"
"they" explained emiko, "is kor, erk, sarala, shilim, doelcm, and alira. they need our help, and are in trouble. how can we get to them. shadow, sorry, i mean torry, can you do anythign to help us get to them? anything?"
"well, i might be able to make a small portal to their side, but i dont know how reliable it would be, besides that, i woldnt be able to go anywhere after i made it. it would use almost all the power i have, now that i am no longer serving the queen."
"well, as unreliable as it is, we need to risk it. we need to help save the others. i dont care how, but we need to help save them."
so, risk it they did. they made the interworld jump, and, as torry had suggested, it was small, and it barely got them there, with it collapsing very shortly after torry had gone through on the side they started on. they ended up watching some sort of battle between lucrecia and the rest, with lucrecia seeming to be winning, odd as it was. suddenly, there was some sort of flash of light, and shilim and sarala dissapeared to who knows where. tarak, erk, and kor had all been knocked out.
"well, tarak and erk do okay, but kor, sad as it is, is a lot like i was when i was with the group, and is hardly ever noticed. think it would be okay if we asked him to join us?" emiko asked the group, wanting desperatly to make sure that kor wasnt hurt by being looked over, like she had been so many times in battles, but at the same time, not wanting to do anything that her new group, her accepting group, wouldnt want to do.
"sure, thats okay with us, right rachael?"
"right!" agreed rachael. "if he needs our help, lets give it him, and he can now help us. sides, as you said, he needs the help, and the others dont seem to be giving him any." rachael said this as she noticed that tarak and erk got up, but didnt pay any heed to kor, and just let him be, not even noticing that he was there.
"its almost as though he was invisible to them. sad."
with that, emiko, rachael, and torry went over to kor, and made sure he was okay.
"he took quite the beating" said torry. "he might just be out for a few hours. lets let him rest. he's had an eventful day."

a few hours later, kor woke up. "where am i, who are you all? wait, emiko, is that you? whats going on? who is that strange girl thats with you. i've never seen her before. is she a prisoner, are we in prison?..." on and on he went until emiko stoped him, and wouldnt let him go on any more
"wait a bit kor, let us explaine, and everything will make sense. yes, i'm emiko, as you obvously figured out, and you know shadow, now known as torry. this person here, she's a great friend from earth, and she somehow jumped the portal with us, and we've abandoned the rest of the group. i had gone off to practice fencing, saw rachael, and the rest of the group moved on without me, so we abandonded them. a few weeks later, we met up with shadow, and he's joined us in some escapades that we've been having recently. now, we felt that the rest of the group was in trouble, and it looks like they were, and we noticed that you were being ignored by the rest of the group, and speaking from personal experience, know that its better to abandon them, when they get into all sorts of nasty wars, and have some fun escapades on alter-worlds/universes, then to be involved with them all, and be almost killed every single day, especially when being ignored doing it. we have 'rescued' you from them and you can join us if you want, or it looks like erk and tarak are still over there, you can try you chances with them. we dont especially care either way, just wanted to give you a chance to join a group that shant ignore you, and that shant be almost killed almost every day. its up to you. what do you think"
kor thought over this for a good long while, and finally decided that he would join emiko and her band of outlaws.
"we'll be like robin hood, except for not."
"yeah... kinda..."
with that, kor joined, and they went off in search of more food, having eaten all the geezbot that they had smoked and brought with them.
"kor, do you happen to have any good hunting skills or anything? we've been trying to piece together what it is that everyone can do to help us all so that it all goes smoothly..."
and with that, they wandered off into the sunset, victors for yet another day.

[Rachael]

So, I signed up for the escapades! ;D
So, Emiko and Rachael decided to go for a walk down the street wherever they were and suddenly were set upon by a giant man-eating butterfly. This wouldn't have been a problem before as they were girls and thus not eligible for eating by a man eating butterfly, but they could not just abandon their y-chromosomed friends to be eaten by a pretty yet terrifying insect.

Emiko decided that it would be a good idea if Rachael dressed up as a human sized flower and to put honey in her hair to distract the butterfly while Emiko got Kor and Torry to safety. Kor reminded them that unless Rachael was a blue flower or something like that, the butterfly might think that Rachael was a girl flower, which she would be if she was really a flower, but as she was deceiving the butterfly anyhow, another deception wouldn't hurt.

This worked for a while as Rachael apparantly makes a really great boy flower when she tries really hard. Unfortunately, it was today that Rachael discovered that she had an allergy to butterflies fo the man-eating variety. When she sneezed, the butterfly figured that this was not lunch.

Luckily, Emiko had got Kor and Torry out but this time so it was all a matter now of a honey-haired Rachael running away from a rather large butterfly. She tripped as Rachael generally does but Emiko chose this time to tackle her in a flying leap (which may not make sense as Rachael was down anyways, but nonetheless seemed to work). When they rolled into the bushes and the butterfly decided that it would be lazy today as the girls wouldn't have tasted that good anyway. It flew off in a huff and a bit hungrier than it was before, but no worse for the wear.

"By the way Kor, Emiko didn't really tell you the truth when she said that we don't run into near death experiences everyday. Ours tend to be quite a bit more enjoyable however." Rachael said after the whole butterfly thingy.

Kor agreed enough to stay with them, or maybe the general attitude of sloth that permeated the group caught on and he decided that leaving wouldn't be worth the effort.

[The Honourable Ninja-san]

Hi Rachael!

[Jason]

Erk awoke the next day, tired and sore. Suddenly, he bolted upright as he remembered what had happened the night before. Looking around him, he saw that indeed it had happened, that Shilm and Sarala were indeed gone. A crushing grief slammed into him, a hurt that cut him straight to the core. He folded in on himself, tears flowing freely from his eyes. Starting softly, then getting louder, the sobs rose in his throat. He let them come, expending his grief into the quiet air. Next to him, Tarak shifted, but remained asleep.
Finally, after some time, Erk's tears began to eb and he laid back down. What was he going to do? Sarala was gone. How would he ever find her?
Faintly, something Lucrecia had said before she dropped them in the portal came drifting back. "Let's see how well you work when you're split up, and two of you are on Earth!"
Earth! Erk bolted upright again, realizing that he still had hope. All he had to do was get back to Earth. But how? Without Shilm or Sarala around, and which his crystal currently gone, he couldn't generate enough light energy to open a portal into a realm that dark. When Lucrecia had appeared, he could feel the darkness eminating from the portal she had come through, the sick feeling that something on the other side was terribly wrong.
Frustrated, and knowing it was futile, Erk wandered over to where the portal had appeared that had swallowed Shilm and Sarala. Something Shilm had once taught him, whenever a portal is opened and closed, it leaves behind a residue of where it was going. That residue stuck around forever, a mark on the land, and if someone knew how to use portals right, they could use that residue to track the portal to where it had gone. It was a skill that not many had learned, but Erk had to assume that Lucrecia knew how, seeing as she had found them easily enough.
As he approached the area, Erk reached out with the light energy in him and felt the faint tingle of where the portal had been. Focusing, he could see the path in his mind, showing him where it had gone. He saw where they had been taken. For a minute, he was confused, and then he realized where he was looking. It was at the school he had been attending, up in Idaho. Why had they been taken there? Erk didn't know why, but he knew he had to try. Summoning the remainder of his light power, energized by the fire strength in him, he began to open a portal. It started small, and quickly consumed his energy. The darkness that had taken over the Earth was quickly draining the light energy that he was using to sustain his portal. Erk tried, but the strain became too much, and before he could get the portal big enough to squeeze a rabbit through, he ran out of strength and the portal slammed shut. Erk sighed and sat down, exhausted from the effort. Once again he began to cry, not knowing when he would ever be able to get there. Until Doelcm came back with his crystal . . . Erk sat and cried, hoping that soon he would be able to go and help Sarala, the girl who meant more to him than anyone else he had ever known.

[Lady Jillith]

Sarala gasped and sat up suddenly. Now out of Lucretia's immediate reach, the princess of light could breathe freely. Shilm too awoke.
"What is this place?" he asked. The landscape was like that from a nightmare; brick buildings with busted windows arose out of a barren and snow-covered land. The royal cousins had been dropped in the middle of a circle of small lamp posts. The snow was higher there, as if, when the place was still cared about, the snow from the surrounding area had been cleared, but not this circle. In front of them was a large, squarish, brick building.
"Come on, we've got to get out of this cold wind." Sarala wrapped her arms around herself and ran into the shelter of the building.
The interior was hardly more inviting than outside. With so many windows and glass doors broken, it was still cold inside. Moreover, it was dark and dirty. Rubbish and rubble was strewn everywhere. Broken glass from the windows and elsewhere made walking hazardous. Several couches were in the open space, but they were vandalized so much as to be unusable.
They explored the building, walking close to each other as Sarala at least was afraid of what they might find around each corner. The place seemed deserted, though; they encountered no people. Given the state of the building, this was more comforting than it might otherwise be. But they found no food either. At least water was not problem. In their wandering, they found several rooms with a line of bowls attached to the walls. Over each of these bowls was as spout which spilled water into them when a lever was turned--hot or cold water, depending on the lever.
What little light there was began to fade. As night began to close in, Sarala and Shilm looked for a way to make the uninhabitable wreck of a building livable at least for one night. On the third floor they found small rooms away from outside windows. Shilm cleared a couple out while Sarala poked around looking for something for bedding. In an obscure closet, she found a few tablecloths. Not very warm, but they would have to do.
"I'll be in the next room if anything happens," Shilm said as they prepared to retire for the night. They were too tired to keep a guard, but the little rooms locked, and the building was deserted, after all. Hopefully they could find food in the morning. And a way back to their friends.

OCC--I'm thinking it takes at least a few days, if not a few weeks, for the groups to reunite. In the meantime, the greenhouses were probably relatively unvandalized (not very exciting destroying plants) and some of the plants will be edible. Also, there could be random livestock surviving from surrounding farms. Otherwise, the food has disappeared, along with the vast majority of the area's inhabitants.

[The Honourable Ninja-san]

Shortly after Doelcm and Alira started walking again, Doelcm stopped suddenly, staring at the view in front of her.
"I know why the day's and nights are so sudden--we're in an indoor greenhouse."
Doelcm took a step forward and tapped on the transparent wall separating the jungle from a labyrinth of steel and plastic. She made and opening in the wall and the two women stepped through.

[Jason]

OOC - No way. If that's going where I think it's going . . . this could get interesting.

[The Honourable Ninja-san]

(OOC--I don't have much planned out yet, so I could use some suggestions. Where do you think it's going?)

[Jason]

OOC - Almost sounds like you've dropped them on earth, same location as Sarala and Shilm. Same general area, anyway. Only thing that could be used against that is the river and the time, unless we wanted to make these huge greenhouses. That, and how would Doelcm, not recognize them? Hmm, maybe not. Scratch that idea.

[Lady Jillith]

(OOC--Come on, people, you need to post.)

Sarala woke up cold and stiff. She lay there for a moment, remembering what it had been like when she still lived in a palace, with comfortable furniture, enough to eat, . . . and her family around her. She shook off both the thought and the make-shift blanket.
We need to find some food if we're to survive in this horrible place. Sarala thought. She got up and knocked on Shilm's door. He opened it immediately; apparently he was already awake.
"We need to find something to eat. There's nothing in this building, but maybe we can find something in another." Sarala hated to go back into the frigid outdoors--it was cold inside, but manageable--but there was nothing else to be done.
They tried first the building across from the one they'd spent the night in. This building was probably originally a whitish brick, but something had discolored large patches. Now it seemed more a sickly grey. This building had a large room with many benches and many smaller rooms with chairs and sometimes desks. The cousins began to wonder if this abandoned place had once been a school; no one would want to go to school there now.
The cousins did eventually have some luck. They found several tall, metal boxes with glass fronts; one of them had food in it. If food was the right word, anyway. The plastic covering the one item still in the metal box said "Pop Tart" and the picture looked like a pastry.
"Bleh! There's enough sugar in that, it'll never go bad," Shilm said, choking down the dry pretended pastry.
"Maybe these boxes were for storing emergency food, so it had to stay good for extended periods of time," Sarala suggested.
"And they were certainly used; it's obvious this place went through some kind of emergency. Well, we need to keep looking edibles. That . . . pastry won't hold us for long."

[Jason]

Erk continued to scan the horizon, not sure what to do next. Tarak was currently off to one side, making some kind of sword out of a branch. Not much to go on, but a wooden sword was better than nothing, he guessed. The sun was getting on towards midday, but the temperature was still decent. Erk guessed it was probably towards fall time here, if they even had fall. For all he knew, this could be summer.
Across the plain Erk was observing, small movement appeared. Erk watched, wondering what it could be. Slowly it moved towards him, very slowly resolving itself into two people. It took a minute, but Erk finally recognized them. Syfe and the dark general! Here! Erk turned and ran back to Tarak.
"Looks like we've got company."
Tarak looked up at him, a questioning look on his face.
"Syfe and the dark general."
Tarak's face clouded over.
"What are they doing here?"
"I don't know, but me thinks it can't be good. More'n likely, they're here on Lucrecia's orders to finish us off. It wouldn't surprise me."
"Sounds like we'd best be getting the jump on them, then."
"Yes, lets."
Quickly the duo moved into some close-by bushes, waiting. Not long after, the other two came within hearing range.
"I tell ya, watching those humans run for cover was about the funniest thing I've ever seen."
Grunt.
"What, you don't agree with me? Especially those guys in the strange blue clothes. Sitting there, shooting those toys at us. Took them quite some time to admit defeat. There's still some of them hiding around, taking shots at us at our new little servant guys. Lucrecia's done quite the number on that planet, turning most of the poplulation into her servants and either enslaving or killing the rest."
Grunt.
"Gee, you're really sociable. I bet I could get more conversation out of one of Lucrecia's new minions."
The dark general held up a hand and stopped.
"What is it now? You've been jumping at things this whole time."
The dark general slapped a hand over Syfe's mouth.
"Quiet, fool. They've been here, I can feel it. The power of light was used in this area."
Erk and Tarak crouched, ready to react to whatever came their way.

[Lady Jillith]

ooc--I was thinking that either Syfe or the dark general (does he have a name?) were in charge of Earth right now, probably Syfe. So if they're on the same planet as you guys, maybe that's why Shilm and Sarala aren't having problems. But Lucretia probably sent S&S to Earth for a reason, so maybe Syfe or Mr. Dark were supposed to be there to finish us off.
Anyway, that's just my take on the situation.