Hope

[Lily]

Oh my gawd. The question: "Why am I still a mod?" comes to mind. I decided to write again, temporarily. But seriously. Why am I still a mod? Oh well. Came back to see the OLLLLD contest results. <3







Hope






He came in, quietly and discreetly. Were these plants he smelled? And what of the miraculously refurnished roof? Thin rays of sunlight started to leak in and he noticed the new window on the wall. The once dying place seemed to liven up, little by little, with each passing observation.

"Hello, there!"

Slowly he turned around. She was an uncommonly pretty girl, wide blue eyes immediately brightening up the room. Behind her was a back door he had failed to recognize earlier.

"I've never had a visitor before, so I'm happy, but please feel free to lo-"

"So the rumors are true," he interrupted, murmuring wistfully, staring at her. She merely tilted her head.

"Rumors?"

"I've been hearing something about someone sneaking in here. Were you the one who did all this?" He gestured to the roughly patched up wall, the roof, and the potted plants meekly decorating the corners.

"Yep!"

"Why?"

"Why?" She repeated the question with genuine curiosity, eyes getting bigger. "Why…why…"

"You know trespassing on unauthorized property is strictly forbidden, especially this place."

"What's wrong with this place?"

The man quirked an eyebrow, commenting, "Surely you must know the stories." When the girl shook her head, he sighed.

"Then you must be new around this parts, or a visitor. Briefly summarizing, this place used to be the bane of all mankind. A disgrace. Our ancestors used to store creatures here." He shuddered, as if the very notion was tangible.

"What do you mean, creatures?" the girl asked with a hint of uncertainty.

"Evil creatures. Creatures with abnormal powers—creatures defying God Himself. You wouldn't understand it," the man said, shaking his head. "It was a horrible period, one we are not proud of."

The girl was silent for a while. She absentmindedly fingered one of the leaves on the plants, before blinking back tears. The man was startled.

"Oh, no, I'm sure you had good intentions for this place," he quickly reassured her, "Just that our townspeople generally disapproves of touching tainted groun-"

"That's not it."

Now the man stared with curiosity, asking her, "Then what's wrong?"

She avoided his intent gaze for several seconds, and then quickly looked up, plastering on that smile again.

"Well, don't you wonder sometimes? About the creatures, how they lived, how we interacted...about everything." She seemed to shrug helplessly, laughing.

"Not really," the man answered coolly. "And you'd do well enough to stay out of that business. Those were dark times, times a girl like you could never understand. It is a despictable yet indelible part of our history." He frowned at her lingering, saddened smile.

"What if they weren't bad at all?" she asked softly.

"Unthinkable. There are records to prove their terrible deeds."

"Records? What records?"

"None of your business. It's stored safely in a place, protected from the general populace. I don't see why you'd want to read it; really, don't try to poke into a unknown affairs," he sniffed.

The girl hesitated. The man checked his watch, wishing to end this talk.

"So you've never wondere-"

"No, I have not," he said briskly, heading toward the front entrance. The conversation was disturbing him. "And please," he added, "stay away from this place before I report you. It's senseless to revive a lost cause. Touching, but senseless."

"But...but the creatures!...how could you never ask yourself the truth? How will anyone know?" the girl was asking behind him, but he ignored her as he walked away.

All senseless, he thought. Really, I ought to inform the council about this...and what of the girl?

He frowned, half glancing back.

What of the girl?



-



From behind, she watched his disappearing figure. Vaguely she felt the plants, touched the leaves, and knew her own sadness. Behind one of the pots a moving leaf swayed back and forth, and she smiled, because she knew how to speak the lost language.

"Come on..." she happily coaxed, bending down. The leaf timidly touched her forefinger, sending kindness, radiance, and a small creature waddled out, unsure.

"There you go," she was saying. "Wasn't that hard, was it?"

"Oddish," the creature let out a single word in a soft voice.

Her brilliant blue eyes smiled sadly.

"You and I...you and I," she whispered.

"We'll bring them all back together. I promise."

 

[Quackerdrill]

Yep.

Simple, elegant, and direct- I absolutely love your writing. I like the idea portrayed here too-- I'm not completely sure as of yet why the Pokemon period of time is looked down upon in this bleak future, but the mild foreshadowing you give is effective. I love how you can describe so simply and yet get the point across so well. If more stuff like this hits these boards, I might have to visit more often.

Lily, you're brilliant-- please tell me you will be writing something chaptered. It would make my day/week/month.

Your writing here is almost like the girl in this story... hopeful, innocent, and unique in its goal.

~

 

[Lily]

Ahh..thank you. Means a lot, as always. u_u" And I've been trying to write something chaptered for four years now..

By the way, a question: why does SPPf lag? A lot?

 

[Sike Saner]

Ooh. Now, that gave me something to think about, which I love. I wonder what could have happened to turn Pokémon into “evil creatures” in the eyes of the people there—although the fact that information about the times before Pokémon were viewed in such a negative light is being so closely guarded by the likes of that man does raise suspicions in me.

Specifically, I’m very much inclined to suspect that perhaps someone (this “council” of which the man spoke, maybe?) decided for some secret reasons to bring about an end to lifestyles involving Pokémon—going so far as to exterminate Pokémon, it would seem—while the general public has been made to believe that Pokémon needed to be done away with due to their being wicked abominations. That people are discouraged from looking into the matter of what life with Pokémon was really like and what Pokémon could have actually, specifically done to require that way of life to end definitely raises red flags in my mind.

Then there’s this tiny little faction of my mind (and I do mean tiny) that wonders if perhaps something terrible did come about as a result of keeping, training, and otherwise interacting with Pokémon, and that secrecy is in place to prevent the people from reopening Pandora’s Box, as that girl would seem to be doing if such were the case. o.o

Whatever the truth behind the circumstances of the story may be, that was quite a fascinating read. I really enjoyed it. ^^

Now, as for the matter of the forums’ constant lagging… I wish I had the exact answer to that to give, but I’m afraid I don’t. I just hope that things will return to a healthy state of order around here sometime soon.

 

[Lily]

It takes me ten minutes to load a page. *sigh*

It's not so much of the blame of a single person. Rather, I purposely made the council and the whole reason why pokemon is 'evil' very, very vague. I wanted ...ignorance. Who knows if the council even exists?

Anyway, thank you, Sike. Your review itself was a fascinating read. XD

 

[Sireath]

Wow, this kind of stuff is so why I came to these boards. I love the way you can portray the characters throughout the scene. And the story you have introduced is very intriguing. Pokemon vanished from the earth, and thought of as evil on top of it. A delight to read even though it was just a taste.

 

[LinksOcarina]

wow......

I thought that was phenomenal.

The story was well written, great dialouge and I like the premise, and it adds a lot of mystery as well as making you think. Wonderful piece of work.