The first few of the Caymen were already emerging from the goop and waking up, after a lot of convincing, a little cajoling, some bribery, and a few threats the locals were hard at work heating up tubs, containers, vats, pots, pans, basins, anything they could get their hands on with warm water. As new Caymen emerged they were carefully plopped into the containers of water, separate from each other for their own safety. (After all there is no flavour little gators like more than other little gators. So it seemed that the wisest course of action was to keep them all apart until they were in a habitat where the fish they had been preserved with could be reintroduced so as not to start off a plan to prevent extinction by accidentally starting off a cannibalistic extinction.

The field that had held them in suspense for so long was just about holding together, but if it went down fully too soon then there was absolutely no way they could ever save them all. As a stopgap measure though it was a start, though Mibbet had to use a guilt trip over the fact that the machine restoring water to the town was a causative factor in the unfolding catastrophe, and the promise that helping them would result in a brand new tourist attraction for the town to encourage them to help out.

Currently almost half the floor of the chamber was covered in tiny little gator people who would one day grow to about six foot something on average. It was making them nervous, and that was making negotiations extra tricky. In the end Mibbet had to point out that these creatures would be raised alongside humans, and existed literally nowhere else in the world. If nobody else that sort of phenomenon would definitely attract the nerd crowd.

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Grark burst onto the scene, this may have caused some concern amongst the locals. Screaming, fleeing typical drama queen stuff really. It took a little while to calm everybody down and round them all up. Especially since Grark tried to help. As you would expect that made them run a little faster, and definitely did not accelerate the roundup.

“It’s OK people,” Mibbet bellowed once she had everybody together again “Grark is a dragon and an ally, they’re here to deliver the rock we need for the hot springs, they won’t eat anybody. Also I’m paying so nobody needs to run away from the bill”

“What makes you so sure about that Princess? They’re a massive flaming dragon.”

This confused Grark, Grark was not on fire, as the posters say fire bad, Grark not do fire, poster say do fire you get into ash, Grark not want to get into ash, whatever ash was it sounded not good.

“Well for starters he’s an undead with granite for internals, he doesn’t have a working digestive system.”

“So you mean to tell me we’re safe because the massive rock dragon is a zombie, and that’s meant to reassure us?”

“Hey Dave, relax, if it’s a zombie it’ll be after brains so you’re definitely safe” another voice from the crowd heckled, as the crowd joined in the ribbing. It seemed joking around and offering to buy everybody drinks was definitely settling things down. (Having tasted beer the fact that such a bribe worked was truly mystifying to her, she would have pegged the misery-water down as a punishment rather than a reward.)

“Now we need to spread these stones as far out over that water as we can, but the current for now is a bit much even for Grark, anybody have any suggestions? Oh before anybody suggests it throwing it is not an option, it’s really really hot stuff.”

“Umm Grark is offering to throw.” Addy said after getting a message over the network.

“How can Grark throw?” Mibbet asked “I don’t think those arms are much use for throwing.”

Addy pondered for a moment then started lining up the rocks along the waterside. “They already have a plan,” she explained “just stand a good distance away and watch the show.”

Grark watched the rocks with a gleam in their eye. Silly rocks send Grark to big sleep, now Grark get to help and teach the rocks a lesson? This was perfect. He stood beside a sun crystal as big as a horse and lined it up with his tail, then WHACK. The stone went tumbling off at terrifying speeds, hitting the water with a hiss as it churned and roiled. Ha stupid rocks hit Grark, now Grark hit rocks, he hit good. Silly rocks learn not to mess with Grark. Another tail swing and another crystal was sent flying, smacking across the trees and ricocheting into the pool, while the locals formed bucket chains with the few remaining buckets for damage control purposes. Addy joined in with the smaller rocks shot putting them into the water with terrifying force. They could have been gentle, but it was best they were well and truly hammered in to prevent looting.

Mibbet watched with a mixture of awe and terror as rocks bigger than the carriage were hurled with ruthless efficiency into the water. Once things started to settle a bit and the big rocks needed breaking down Grark started to use spells, pummelling the large crystals into pieces with well placed rock blasts, as a section was cordoned off and the fish introduced.

The fish seemed largely unperturbed by their long temporal suspension, or maybe they just didn’t remember it for long, but they soon started to perk up as the water approached the right temperature. Plus a few constructs offered to bring extra fish to help supplement the numbers until the Caymen could survive without worrying about starvation.

Deep at the heart of the facility, Genesis watched the...... no her children return to the world once more, she had fulfilled her function, but she wasn’t about to shut down so easily. Her children had a long struggle for survival ahead of them, and she would be there to guide and help them every step of the way, and with no need to hold the temporal stasis anymore she had a long time to do it. After all she was free to decide her own worth.