Red Genesis (rpg thread)

[Unicorn]

((my goodness. What a long post!))

Goldenrod City- central square

Li stood about ten feet from a collapsed building. His jaw had dropped in awe and tinge of fear. There was rubble everywhere, and bodies lying motionless on the ground. Things were burning or smoking on every corner. Dust lingered like fog around his ankles. He wanted to throw up, or at least avert his gaze. Yet something about this disaster entranced him. He clenched his fists at his sides, shaking uncontrollably. A hand tapped him on the shoulder and he jumped in surprise.

“Woa, easy Li. It’s just me” said a boy about his age.

“Oh, hi Earl,” Li sighed and finally looked away from the scene. Earl was a stocky young man with thick brown hair and baggy clothing. He and Li had been friends since as long as they could remember. They did everything together.

“What a mess,” Earl commented, though his eyes didn’t linger on the square for long.

“Yeah… I don’t know if this was such a good idea anymore,” Li muttered, closing his eyes. He felt dizzy. Another building collapsed on the other side of the square and he heard more screaming and tumbling bricks. An enormous cloud of dust flooded the square again, impairing his vision as he opened his eyes to see what was happening.

“Dude, let’s get out of here!” Earl shouted above the rumbling, but all Li heard was gibberish. He passed it off thinking he just couldn’t hear him above the quaking, but this had happened more than once. Li wasn’t listening anyway. He had just come to the startling realization that the building that had just collapsed was home to the greenhouse he always visited. That old man and his Skiplume were in there! Without waiting to see what Earl would have to say, Li dashed into the fray. Earl coughed as the dust filled his lungs and blinked it out of his eyes. He looked up just in time to see Li disappearing into the cloud of chaos. What on Earth was he doing!?

“Li! Come back! Where are you going!?” He half screamed and half coughed.

He wanted to follow him, but he knew the danger of the situation now. This wasn’t fun anymore. As much as he cared about Li, now was the time to be a coward. He turned tail and ran out of there as fast as he could. This time Li had heard his shouts, but he ignored them just the same. The greenhouse was in danger. Coughing and sputtering, Li covered his face with his shirt to prevent inhaling any more harmful debris. It was difficult to breath and he knew how reckless he was being, but it didn’t matter. He had to find Skiplume and the old man, Mr. Robinson. Li’s eyes were watering with the smoke that filled the air. He shuffled forward toward the greenhouse shop. His legs were shaking when he reached the empty frame of the building that once stood there. There was rubble everywhere and a broken door-frame lay on its side straight in front of him. He staggered forward, ignoring the flames licking at his shoulders.

“Mr. Robinson!” Li coughed and pitched forward. He caught himself against a fallen chunk of the building. It was burning hot and he flinched as he touched it. He hobbled through the wreckage, lifting light pieces of ruin at every opportunity. In the background, sirens wailed and people continued to cry for help or mourn for their lost ones. Every piece he turned over seemed to be hiding nothing but defeated shrubs or broken pots. Li gasped for breath as he lifted another chunk of waste. What he found beneath it made him woozy. It was Mr. Robinson, but his body had been crushed beneath the wreckage of the building. The sight made Li sick. He stumbled away from his friend’s corpse so he could wretch freely. When he was done he cautiously looked at him again.

Mr. Robinson had been clutching his prized begonia when the building collapsed. His other hand was limp but held a small, round, red-and-white ball. It was Skiplume’s pokeball. Li bit back his fear of touching a dead body and reached for it. From what he could tell, the grass Pokemon was still inside. At least this little guy had survived. Li could only wish that Mr. Robinson had a nifty little ball he could go into so that he might have lived as well. But there was nothing to be done. With the pokeball in hand, Li stumbled through the burning wreckage to escape, but just as he was almost free, he heard a rumbling sound to his left. He looked over to see a mound of brick and loose mortar tumbling in his direction. Before he could get out of the way, the debris struck him and knocked him off his feet. Li gasped as the Pokeball flew from his hand. He reached for it but it bounced out of sight, lost among the cracks and crevices.

He tried to move but his legs were trapped beneath the rubble, and it was still coming. Li shouted for help, but his voice was lost among the sirens, the collapsing buildings, and other screaming people. He felt something strike him over the head, a falling brick, and the world went black.

 

[Musical Mayhem]

~Goldenrod City, some distance away from Central Square~

Kate's keen blue eyes watched the boy's moment of indecision before he grabbed her wrist, and Kate flinched at the cold temperature of it. Kate paused to wonder for a second if maybe she had a fever or something. Did explosions cause fevers?

“Come on let’s go,” The boy said, dragging Kate swiftly through the smokey, burning streets of Central Square. Kate's eyes widened at the pure panic that was overcoming the square. There were bodies, bodies everywhere. Some were charred, burnt to a crisp, while others were still more human-looking. Blood was spattered on the streets and shrapnel lay above everything and everyone. Kate gulped as she jogged swiftly behind the shorter boy, wondering why in the world anyone would blow up this place.

Finally they stopped. The boy took finally looked up from the ground, up at Kate, who seemed relieved. She hadn't been sure why the boy would only look at her legs. As he took her tall body in, she looked at him. He was much shorter than her, and appeared to be roughly her age. All she could see clearly of his face were those red eyes. They fascinated her, and she wondered, albeit briefly, if just maybe, he was changing like she was.

The boy's red eyes finally stopped on Kate's slashed arm, “Your arm, I’m sorry I didn’t notice...” He took it gingerly in his own hands, and began looking around for something that could help to clean out Kate's arm. Kate resisted the urge to pull her stained arms out of his hands, that would only complicate things. The boy began rubbing at the cut with his wet sleeve, rubbing a little bit harder when the orange didn't come off as well.

For a moment, Kate thought he was going to rip off his own shirt to bandage her arm, but then his eyes returned slowly to the ground, “There’s a store nearby we should be able to get help there.”

Kate coughed, trying to clear the smoke out of her lungs, "I don't know this area very well, so... I'm gonna need you to help me," She tried to make eye contact with the boy, but his eyes were still low on the ground. Kate had no idea where they were, but there was still smoke in the air, and the fire appeared to be spreading slowly in this direction, "I'm Kate, by the way," she announced quietly, "What's your name?"

Before he could answer, Kate heard something coming from a nearby burning shop. "Help!" The fire sirens and the crackling of the fire had almost drowned it out, but Kate had heard it, "Come on!" she tugged her new companion along, running towards the shop. As she reached the door, her foot caught on something round and she toppled onto her face, catching herself on her already injured arms. She felt gravel get stuck in her hands, cutting them, but she didn't care.

"What the hell?" she asked quietly, reaching for the object she'd slipped on. It was rolling slowly away, but she picked it up in her bloody hands. "A..." she tried to remember what her mother had called it once... "Pok-a-ball?" Was that it? She glanced down at it, but clutched it in her right hand as she pushed slowly into the burning building.

"Is anybody in here?" She yelled, tugging her companion along some more, and they reached two men. On the ground was one man, crushed by rubble. Kate gulped at the sight of the body, "Oh My God, is that guy dead?!" she shrieked, backing away from the corpse, and into her new friend, "Sorry." Then she spotted the other boy, lying on the ground. He appeared to be older than her, and probably heavier too, despite the fact that he was pretty skinny. He had shaggy brown hair that was hanging over his shut eyes, and there appeared to be blood seeping out of his head. Kate wandered over to him, placing her hand on his wrist to search for a pulse, like they did on those crime shows. There was one, so this guy must be alive. At least there wasn't another body... thinking about it made Kate want to gag, so she turned towards her tiny companion instead. He was a guy, and guys were supposed to be strong, right? Kate didn't know that much about boys. But she figured that between the two of them they'd be able to lift the guy out. "Maybe we can get this guy out of here..."

 

[InnerFlame]

~~Goldenrod City~~

About to guide her to somewhere safer and tell her his name when Elliot was grabbed and pulled into a dangerous looking store... Had she heard something; he didn’t hear anything over the racket. The young teen recognize this place, wasn’t this the greenhouse place people talked about and people said a real pokemon lived there. It was a bit difficult to tell since the place was a mess but when Kate tripped over a pokeball that confirm it for him. Covering his mouth in place filled with dusty air, he hoped he wouldn’t get the chance to meet it. They went in deeper, definitely not a wise choice but if ignoring someone in need of assistance wouldn’t be right.

Then they got to the scene, an old guy crushed under large debris, one hand wrapped around a plant while the other seemed to have been holding on to something round. It would be a miracle is he was still alive. It was a sickening thing to see and the impact of explosion finally hit him, he hoped none of his family or friends were witnesses of this or suffer a similar fate. The other person had taken damage to his head and his legs partially buried. The tall girl when over grabbed his hand tried to see if he had a pulse, if had the chance he would have told her it’s better to check for a pulse on the neck. She suddenly turned to him and said, “Maybe we can get this guy out of here...”

“We can try.” Elliot answered it didn’t seem like it would be too hard; the guy appeared skinny, sickly looking and appeared to about his height. Looking up for anything else that seemed like a potential collapsing, before moving to the rubble on his legs; he motion the pink-red haired girl to stay put. As stared at this obstacle, heavy building fragments, he indeed was a boy but he was only fourteen. He began pushing slabs of concrete, or whatever building are made of, the unstable surface helped the moving. Though it sometimes caused a small scale avalanche, one in particular scarped against his leg leaving a small hole and wound little below his knee. The occasional sound of crumpling from other place in the location made him nervously jump and the lack of breath air made this whole task a difficult challenge.

After loosing the grip the debris had on his legs a bit he carefully moved back around Kate had dragged him out, the look on her face made it look like she was struggling with it. It kind of made him wondered but he heard some girls just weren’t upper body strong strength-wise. He quietly looked most because he wasn’t what he was supposed to say especially since they were in a building that could fall on top of them at any moment. Examining quickly again he pray he didn’t have any neck injuries because the moving him would bad but leaving here would be an almost certain death. Slowly moving the man, the red-brown eyed skin wrapped the rather pale looking person’s left arm around his shoulder. ...The guy was heavier than he looked, but that might have been slight fatigue and the lack of oxygen speaking. At this point he tried to breathe very shallowly, which wasn’t helping him as a coughs escaped. He got the guy on his back on him piggyback style since the other methods of carrying someone he knew required the consciousness of the other person. This also was the easiest way to do it most of the time.

“Let’s... hurry... out of here,” The teen boy managed to let out in a little oxygen lacking and straining tone before quickly heading for the exit hoping nothing would stop this rescue attempt. Thank goodness, nothing did; for some people that escape into this gloomy outdoor afternoon would have been the most beautiful thing they have ever seen and that was no exception for Elliot. He just wanted to breathe in the fresher air but instead he got pulled into a coughing fit. His lung has picked too much of the dusty air and then it mixed with the moist in the outside air. His throat hurt from the coughing and slightly curly brown guy was sliding off of his back and he eventually put him down in the middle of the street a fair distance from the building on both side of road. As it coughing calmed a bit he looked back at girl who had the ball in her hand.

“Elliot..... I’m Elliot... by the way.” The short teen finally got the chance to the newly met person his name.

 

[Ysavvryl]

Goldenrod

Although Marvin had managed to get himself free, the rubble on Yuna was just too much. The initial burst of the explosion had been enough to tear up much of her clothes (and his), but oddly enough, she had been wearing a beautifully strange patchwork dress of blue and yellow underneath her clothes. A pink scarf showed on one of her shoulders. Why was she wearing that under her clothes?

But she was alive… she was alive. That was a relief, especially as sirens began to pierce through the dusty haze. He would have liked to free her, or to go find someone who could, but he couldn’t walk right now. Why had the building just exploded? Maybe some bomb? But, why? So many questions… so much pain.

Marvin’s mind tried to figure out everything, from the weird dress to the explosion to what he should do now. Reaching out to grasp Yuna’s hand, he hoped it was just some accident, not a prelude to terrible things to come. It was all too much and all too chaotic, so for the time being, his mind cut out.

Right before he blanked out, Marvin thought he heard someone walking through the rubble towards them.

-+-

“Oh, he’s just like he is on the internet,” Yuna said merrily as she fiddled with one of the pink scarves that hung from her shoulders. “I mean, he was a bit awkward in just talking about things, but it’s kind of endearing that way. And he means well. He has such funny ideas and habits, though, like he fell asleep as we were riding in the taxi! But he says he’s got narcolepsy and looking at a road from a traveling car always makes him drowsy. I suppose I’ll have to learn how to live with him like that, but I think it’ll all be worth it.”

Her mother, who was listening to her while watching television, shook her head. “Yuna dear, if you would please stop twittering like some excited bird and speak sensibly. Honestly, it is so childish and I don’t know what’s come over you lately.”

Feeling her cheeks turn warm in embarrassment, she shrank back in her seat. “Mom, I am not acting like a bird. I’m just talking to you. I know I’m excited, but…”

“You were half-singing a bunch of nonsense words again,” Renee said with a sigh.

“I didn’t realize it…” she looked down at her hands, with those odd blue stripes. The last thing she wanted to do was get her mother mad.

But it wasn’t working too well. “I don’t know if you’re trying to be rebellious later than you should be or what, but you’re not a child, or a teenager. You’re a young woman and you’re not going to get anywhere in society if you keep this up.”

“Sorry,” she murmured. But she didn’t mean to be rebellious! It was rather painful to be embarrassed like that.

And then the pain got worse, as if some monster was crushing her in its grasp. A horrible foreign yet human monster that spread chaos, evil, and filth wherever it went. There were weapons like bombs which did not obey the rules, but it wasn’t that… or was it?

Then the crushing force let her go and she was falling… or rolling? Her head couldn’t figure out where it was or if it was moving. Somewhere between memory and reality… not quite dreams, she would know dreams, she was certain of that. But why was she so certain?

Someone was talking to her. She couldn’t quite focus on it enough to fully understand. “This ...not... lady.”

Yuna opened her eyes and found herself in something like a nightmare. Destruction was all around her, the air was filled with smoke and dust. And the one speaking to her, a young man in a black cloak… he held out a black furry hand to her and for a brief moment, she saw that he had red eyes…

Strangely, she felt a bewildering recognition, a confused conflict, like she should know this one and there was… something about him, and her… but no, it wasn’t... him. Not him. Who was him? Or the one before her? And why was he here at the restaurant, or what had been the restaurant? Why was she here again?

Her date.

"If you want my assistance, I will gladly give it to you." the cloaked man said in kind concern.

Between the unsettling things she couldn’t quite remember, the pain that wasn’t about to let her forget (she thought that one of the crescent barrettes was broken and that hurt way more than anything else), and the sudden panicked concern about Marvin, Yuna wasn’t quite sure how to respond to him.

She did turn her eyes to the ground near her and soon spotted a hand by hers. That was Marvin, still and battered but not buried by the rubble. Although it hurt briefly, she took her fiance's hand and squeezed it. Was that a heartbeat she felt in response? She hoped so; it seemed to be. So he was alive. And there were ambulances sirens in the air and this guy knew they were here and alive, so they’d be okay. It was bad now but things would be okay.

Although still in pain, she calmed down knowing Marvin was there. She even smiled a bit. Her mind soon faded from the waking world again, to block out the pain as much as possible.

(OoC: I mean to have them in the hospital next post, so please don't have the Lucario Jinka run off with her )

 

[Unicorn]

[Goldenrod City- a fair distance from central square]

Li coughed and opened his eyes. His vision was blurred and he couldn’t quite tell where he was, or who was around him. His brain felt muddled and everything was echoing in his ears like he was wearing cheap headphones. Then everything crashed like a tidal wave. He had been half buried in rubble. Mr. Robinson was dead. There was an explosion that he had to investigate. But where was he now? He blinked until his vision cleared and noticed he was propped against a wall, away from the site of the explosion. A boy and a girl stood next to him. They looked like middle schoolers. Li winced as he tried to sit up and then cried out in pain. His legs hurt so much. Pain seared through his body and flopped back down again.

“Who are you guys?” he wheezed, looking at the two kids. Had they rescued him from the rubble? Then another thought occurred to him. “Did you guys happen to find a pokeball?” His head throbbed and he felt faint again. He coughed uncontrollably for what seemed like hours. He tried to ask another question but couldn’t find the strength. Talking was tiring. His eyes fluttered and he felt himself drifting in and out of consciousness before he could get an answer. He thought he heard someone shout his name but had already drifted off again.

“Li!” Earl gasped when he saw his friend. He ran towards the two kids and looked at Li, whose head dropped to his chest. “What happened!?” he demanded of the boy and the girl standing there. He was shaking in his shoes. All that was going through his head was “please don’t be dead…”

 

[greywolf123]

Blackthorn

The streets were quiet. The cars whispered past, the people own voices a dull whisper and one could talk to the person next to you quietly and still be heard clearly. Unless, of course, you weren’t Seiko Jacobson. Then you would probably be complaining of the noise of the cars, and the yammering people surrounding you. To Seiko however, it was just one quiet day among many others. This quiet was nice for him, because he had many other concerns to think about. His mind was in no way shape or form quiet right now, and thoughts were whirling around his head thick and fast, as they normally did, though his mood was darker today leading to deeper, and more morose, thoughts.

Mainly he was thinking about the changes that had come over him in the last few weeks. They trouble him. Troubled him because there was almost no real verifiable reason why they had come over him. Why had his hair changed color? What was with the shift in his birthmark? These were all questions he couldn’t answer. Why had it happened at all? The last question made him smirk, ever so slightly, at the thought. He had faced that question before. Not for the changes, but for his deafness. Why had he become deaf? There was another question he couldn’t answer, and hadn’t been able to for over ten years. He couldn’t even answer what disease had claimed it either.

Of course, the obvious comment was that the two were related. If the disease was unknown, perhaps that was why he was deaf, and why his hair had changed color. It was of course, silly to think the disease had lain dormant, before resurfacing to change his hair color, but that still was possible, and if that really was the reason why, he had a serious risk to his health, and the health of others, on his hands. Still, in all cases, he could do nothing to help others. If he was sick, it would probably have already spread to who knows how many, and if he wasn’t sick from that, then what was the cause of it all? Seiko discarded this line of thinking however. He couldn’t dwell on such things, not if he wanted to be happy.

A sigh worked over him, as he refocused himself on his task. It was simple, and it was to collect his friend who was headed this way. His family had known him for a long while, and he hadn’t gotten to visit much, so the fact that he was coming was a big deal to his parents. He liked the guy as well, so when the topic of who was going to come and pick him up, Seiko offered to do it. Sure, having the deaf guy go and pick up the friend might not have seemed the best, but Seiko knew his way around town well, and could communicate just fine. He could write out on his tablet, which he had on his person. He had paper, should that fail. And if worst came to worse, he could just tell him the directions, plain and simple. He hoped not though.

Things seemed to be going well. He was making good time, and hoped to be there a few minutes early. With any luck, he would be, and could spend a bit of time writing out the simple responses he knew always came up in conversation all the time. At least they would come up in a conversation about directions to his parents’ house. Maybe he knew how to sign even. He doubted that highly though. It wasn’t nearly as widespread as it should have been.

The first sign something was wrong was the faint shaking of the earth underneath his feet. That was never a good sign, as he looked around. The screams of the people around him was the second sign that something was wrong, and it wasn’t just due to him being deaf. Their screams were faint, and nearly indistinguishable, but he knew they were screaming at least. Seemingly Blackthorn would be faced with an earthquake this year indeed. Seiko wasn’t too startled at first. Earthquakes were fairly common around these parts. But this one continued a bit longer, and was quite a bit stronger than he expected. In fact, he saw a building start to crumble, before the shaking ended.

It ended in time that the building wasn’t facing too much damage, but that any damage had happened at all spoke to its strength. Many buildings here were earthquake resistant, merely from how often it happened, so either that building was not up to code, or the earthquake was stronger than predicted. However, none of this concerned Seiko. What concerned him more was the fact that the train might be off schedule. This would really stink for the family friend, and by extension Seiko. Seiko did not relish the idea of having to wait for the train to dock.

His speed increased the last two minutes of his walk, having already been fairly close to the station already. Bustling into the station, which windows were out, but otherwise was still fine, he immediately began to sign calmly at the receptionist. She gave him a blank stare, which he nodded to, and pulled out his tablet. Writing out the next words, he showed it to her, to which she replied no, that the train was probably not going to be in today at all, that the tracks were torn up.

He sighed. Just great. Now what was he to do?

 

[InnerFlame]

~~Goldenrod City: a fair distance from Central Square~~

The guy they had rescue from dangerous area stirred and he was far from okay. He was writhing in pain and coughing like how he did when he was finally outside. Breathing deeply he asked “Who are you guys” and “Did you guys happen to find a pokeball?” It looked like it took everything for him to get those few words out. The guy was barely holding on to consciousness until he blacked out again. Just as that happened another man came running shouting worriedly; he was rather broad fellow with brown hair. Kind of like Elliot his clothes were large on him though the young teen’s wasn’t nearly as baggy as that guy’s. Once he got to the pale guy his head snapped towards them; Elli turned his head away and yanked down on his hood. His eyes planted into the concrete road; he knew it was a strange, suspicious way to react but his eyes... He couldn’t let this unknown guy see them. Though sound of his voice as he demanding an explanation appeared to be the biggest reason for his actions.

“We found him in a building, his legs pinned down by rubble...” He told him all he knew; his voice was a little hoarse from the coughing. “There... there was already a dead guy in there... a-nd we just... want-ed to help.” He was choking up as he thought of that poor old man. He never saw a dead person before and seeing it like that just created a sickening feeling in the pit of his stomach. He couldn’t help but wondered why, why he had to die like that; he just didn’t understand this day. Or what was happening to Goldenrod City. “Your friend needs medical attention. He might have a concussion for that blow to his head.”

 

[Unicorn]

((Since Li is unconscious, I am using Earl's perspective))

[Goldenrod City: a fair distance from Central Square]

The girl kept silent while the boy did all the talking, but half of it sounded like gibberish. The only part he really understood was “Your friend needs medical attention. He might have a concussion for that blow to his head.” Earl stared at the kid for ten whole seconds without saying a word. Was he speaking a different language? Maybe he was a tourist from some far away region, here on vacation. The weird part is that he didn’t look foreign. Although it was strange the way he wouldn't put his hood down or look him in the eye.

It didn’t matter though so Earl shrugged it off. He got the answer he wanted. Li obviously needed medical attention and he didn't want to waste his time questioning some kid's language habits. Li was propped against wall and white as sheet for God’s sake! At first glance you would think he was dead. Earl bent down and patted him on the cheek. All the color had drained from his face. His hands looked a sickly green. That couldn’t be good.

“Hey, buddy. We’re gonna get you some help. Hold on a little longer… stupid ***. Why’d you have to go running off like that?” he said, muttering that last bit. Silently, he regretted not joining Li in his valiant rescue attempt. Li wheezed but made no response that he had heard his friend.

 

[Musical Mayhem]

~Goldenrod City, a fair distance away from Central Square (by the Greenhouse Shop)~

“Let’s... hurry... out of here,” The boy wheezed, the smoke swirling around our tiny group. He drug the other boy out single-handedly, and we burst into the street, coughing and wheezing in the dirty air. Kate took a moment to inhale the sweet, though still smoke scented air of the city. She helped him lower the new boy to the ground and he finally turned to her to introduce himself.

“Elliot..... I’m Elliot... by the way.” Elliot. That was a kind of cute name, Kate though. She wondered how old he was. He didn't look very old, after all, he was very tiny. But it was hard to tell with that hoodie covering him up. Suddenly, the boy on the ground seemed to come to. His coughing overpowered Kate and Elliot's for a moment, and they both looked down at him.

“Who are you guys?” He coughed, squinting up, first at Kate, then at Elliot. Kate's eyes widened as she watched the boy cough and wheeze. He looked really badly injured... "“Did you guys happen to find a pokeball?” He asked painfully, and Kate glanced down at the sooty ball in her hand, which was slippery with her sweat.

Kate bit her lip and nodded, too afraid to say anything. The boy didn't answer, he just screamed in pain before toppling in on himself. The only sound, besides the screaming and sirens, was his wheezing. Kate glanced up at Elliot, her eyes wide and fearful, but a new boy appeared on the scene. What was with all these boys? This one was tall and broad, with floppy brown hair.

“Li!” The brunette gasped, looking at his friend. His body was shaking as he turned to Kate and Elliot, "What happened?!" he demanded. Kate gulped and quaked back, but Elliot handled the situation. He calmly explained what had happened to the unconcious boy, presumably named Li, and finished telling this new boy that Li needed medical attention.

The boy seemed kind of confused, but Kate wasn't sure why. The words had sounded crystal clear to her. She figured it was because Elliot was standing closer to her, so she could hear him more easily. The boy shook off his confusion after staring at Elliot for a solid ten or so seconds.

“Hey, buddy. We’re gonna get you some help. Hold on a little longer… stupid ***. Why’d you have to go running off like that?” He asked his friend tenderly, almost regretfully. Kate wondered how they got medical attention. They were far enough off the beaten path that no one would come looking for them over here, not with the chaos in the square.

Kate glanced over at Elliot, speaking for the first time since the new boy approached, "How do we get help here?" They could try calling nine one one, but she figured that almost everyone in the city was at Central Square. They might have to try to get back.

Kate reached into her pocket, searching for her cell phone. When she pulled it out, she discovered that the plastic covering was warped and blackened, but it looked like the phone would still function. She pressed in the keys 9-1-1, but the phone made a few protesting beeps before announcing, "We're sorry. The number you have reached is not available at this time. You may be out of our service area."

Kate glared angrily at the useless phone before placing it back into her pocket. The phone was all she had left, her field hockey stick and her duffel bag were back in the burning square. Her mother had disappeared, and all she had were a trio of boys she'd never met before and a Pokeball she didn't know how to use. Kate had barely even talked to boys. She had just realized that boys weren't icky...

"I don't know if we can get help over here..." she wheezed, turning to the others, "It's not safe to move him, is it? Cuz we might have to try to get him closer to the square so he can get some help."

 

[Ysavvryl]

OoC: For those of us with injured characters (like me blowing up mine, lol), I’ve got a little pseudo-science to make sure they can get back in action faster. Considering that in the past here, you can poison a Pokemon and knock it unconscious with a lightning bolt then bring it back to full health in a couple of minutes, this should be plausible.

Location: uncertain

It was a dream, Marvin realized. Being that he fell asleep at the most inopportune times due to his condition, he knew when he’d entered a dream like it was a second home. He was on a mountain path, but it wasn’t local. Truthfully, he’d never been on a mountain path before, but it was one of those things that his mind just accepted as real in a dream. Whatever it meant to be real in a dream.

Yuna was ahead of him, higher on the grade. She was wearing that pretty blue and yellow dress, although it seemed less of a patchwork here. And she had two of the pink scarves now. Only, they somehow curled up and around, forming three-quarter crescents behind her. She noticed him and stopped, so he quickened his steps to reach her side.

And then some kind of barrier stopped him in his tracks.

Wasn’t this a dream? He attempted to will away the barrier, but it still stopped his hands from going through when he hit it. Yuna came back and touched the barrier herself.

“It is impossible.”

She looked startled at the voice, but he shook his head. “It’s a dream,” he said to her. “We should be able to break through it.”

For a moment longer, she looked uncertain. But then she nodded and placed her hands where his were touching the barrier. Then their hands touched and clasped. Yuna drew him to her and they kissed.

“You will be drawn apart.”

Location: Goldenrod North Hospital, emergency ward

Yuna felt chills from that voice in her dream. She tried to ignore it and focus on the kiss. While she had been friends with Marvin online for a few years, they hadn’t really met until two weeks ago. Yet, she felt a strong connection to him already. She wanted to be with him… and if her life could just go back to normal, then everything would be wonderful.

Something felt wrong, though. She thought she was mostly awake, just lingering with the memory of the dream. But she didn’t feel anything; she just felt disconnected. The last solid memory, though… well, it wasn’t so sold. The strange young man in the cloak offering her help, the pain and destruction, the memory or not of someone… no, he had blue eyes, didn’t he? What was she thinking off? Trying to shake off that weird subconscious thing, she focused on here, now, where she couldn’t feel much of her body… she felt paralyzed.

Spooked, she opened her eyes and saw a white surface with little bitty bumps. A textured ceiling. There was quite a lot of noise around her, but it all seemed muddled and too quiet. Somewhere, someone called for a nurse. Hospital? That made most sense.

“Hey, you awake?” Marvin asked, from her right.

Finding that she couldn’t turn her head much, she looked as far over there as she could as saw him. He was in a hospital bed, like she was. They were both hooked up to IVs, plastic face masks, and monitoring devices. His brown hair seemed to be caked with gray dust and what she could see otherwise said that he was in bad shape. But since he had more freedom of movement than her, she must be in worse.

“Yeah,” Yuna said, finding her voice weak. “What happened?”

“The restaurant blew up. I don’t know any more than that. Lucky we ended up next to each other in here. I asked them for earpieces so we could talk to each other.”

“Earpieces?” She thought of moving her arm, but couldn’t.

“Careful. We’re both partly deaf, but it’s just a temporary effect from the blast. I’m glad you’re okay.”

She smiled, hoping he could see it. “I’m glad you’re okay.” She thought about her paralysis and asked, “Did I get hurt badly?”

“Yeah. They’ve got you, well, both of us on strong painkillers. And I think they gave you something to restrict your movement, so you didn’t injure yourself further. They should be putting us through transrepair soon.”

Something of that sounded familiar, like she’d heard it elsewhere. But thinking that he might feel better if he could explain something to her, she asked, “through what?”

“Transrepair,” Marvin said. “Teleporting technology has been around for a long time, most familiar in teleporting squares that some buildings use for quick access, or security mazes. Basically, the transporters take a reading of your atomic structure, plus that of anything you may be carrying, then shifts it to another location. At first, it was risky as some accidents ended up in messed up rebuilds or in atomic fusing. They can now teleport people without the mistakes and can even do limited adjusting.

“What the transrepair operation does is take a sample of your DNA along with atomic structure, then makes sure both match. It’s used for patients like us who have multiple broken bones and some internal injuries. It pretty much resets your body to how it’s supposed to be, fixing the breaks and making the organs whole.”

“So we could walk out of here tomorrow?”

Marvin paused. “Possibly, but not likely. It can fix the major stuff, but transrepair hasn’t been refined enough to fix everything. You lost a lot of blood. I did too, but they still need to give you a transfusion after the transrepair. And it can’t remove fine particles from lungs, hence why we have these air filter masks working on that now. Nor can it fix the temporary deafness, but that should fix itself. Also, any breaks that were made will be prone to breaking again for some time. But we should be able to move around tomorrow.”

“That‘s good. You seem to know a lot about this.”

“Well transrepair is the option people have before they have to resort to my specialty. Unless you want me to build you new arms or whatever.”

Yuna laughed briefly, but ended up coughing.

“Sorry,” Marvin said. “You need to be careful.”

Waiting until she thought her lungs were back to regular work, Yuna recalled the voice in the dream. Would they be drawn apart, somehow? No, she didn’t want that to happen! “Marvin?”

“What is it, Yuna?”

“I’m scared, still,” she admitted. “What about our wedding?”

He sighed. “We’ll most likely have to postpone it. We might not be able to stand for the length of time needed for the ceremony. You certainly won’t.”

But that would be too late. Maybe she was being silly... but it didn’t stop her from feeling like delaying the wedding would delay it permanently. “Why don’t we do it here?”

“In the hospital?” Marvin asked, sound a little amused.

“Well, yeah. Why not? I mean, we won’t be able to get all the guests we planned in here, or maybe not any of them. But we could always ask for witness signatures from people around here. It’d make things more cheery and hopeful, anyhow.”

He was quiet for a little while.

“Marvin?”

“Oh, I was just thinking…” she looked as hard as she could without turning her head and thought she saw him smile. “All right. We’ll talk to the doctors after we get out of the transrepair operation and see if they mind, then try to get a hold of who we can.” He yawned. “Sorry, the drugs are making me tired. We should sleep, for now. The doctors will take care of us.”

“Yeah.” She closed her eyes and was soon asleep again.

 

[cdra1617]

((@Ysavvryl: Yes. Pseudoscience fixes EVERYTHING. And besides the fact that what you said makes enough sense in futuristic utopia terms. So you get a thumbs up.

@clump of kids in Goldenrod: I was already planning on having the doctor heading your way, this isn't just me plot-device-ing along. Hooray? Hopefully we can do a small timejump for Goldenrod soon. Blackthorn and Ecruteak are officially in the same time plane (ish) so watch for that. They should also timejump soonish, but not as soon as Goldenrod.

@Blackthorn peeps: I don't have anything direct for you at the moment. Just screw around, and good (or bad) things might happen to you. =D

and, interesting tidbit: this post introduces actual human characters for the first time. with names and sh*t. Whoop whoop!))

Goldenrod City ~ What Remained of Foodie's Restaurant

The bomber watched calmly as the young woman scrambled for the hand sticking out of the rubble. A friend of hers? He looked at the pile of rubble next to her, noticing for the first time an aura glowing weakly from it. Inside was a spark of energy which seemed more than human... that was enough to convince him to throw the largest piece of rubble off of that pile, uncovering a young man who looked completely human. A newbie.

Before he could do anything, though, his ears perked up high. Sirens... they would be here before he could escape with these two. Growling, he arched his back and turned around. A group of EMTs rushed into the building, carrying people out to the ambulance, which contained a portable teleporter for getting patients to the hospital. Being seen by humans was not part of the mission. Knowing that he could not be seen, he pulled his hood back on and deftly leapt onto some rubble, then out of the building through a hole in the back wall. He would not leave this city just yet... they were not the only Jinka here, but they were worthy of his attention, for he had not meant to harm them.

You're a fool, James, the zealot thought, gritting his teeth as he found a new perch atop a different building. You must look more closely next time. For there would be a next time... for he was on a mission, and he would not rest until the world was in the state of chaos from which it was born.

Even so, that wouldn't be any good if he let two of his own kind perish due to his lack of planning. Especially that woman... her aura was strong, far stronger than his own, and commanded his respect... like the Creator's, in a way. James looked one last time at the scene below, now nearly devoid of movement save for the incoming rescue teams, and dashed away into the chaos and uncertainty that had gripped the once-utopian city.

Goldenrod City ~ By WGC's Greenhouse (Northwest of the Square)
(where the four kids are)

As the kids conversed, a woman in a black suit-dress wearing tall heels came running over to the scene. She had her blonde hair pulled back into a bun, adding to her professional look, along with the heavy makeup around her blue eyes. She was clearly aged beyond the four in front of her, likely in her late thirties or early forties. Even so, she looked healthy. Notably, she was carrying duffel bag with a white lab coat poking out of it over her shoulder - the reason for this might have been unclear, but she had just gotten off of her shift at the hospital and was heading home when she heard the commotion coming from the square. She pushed her small, rectangular glasses up as she adjusted her skirt, now standing right next to the group.

"Excuse me," the woman's breath was a bit ragged as she tapped the young girl - who was directly in front of her - on the shoulder. "I'm Dr. Pounds. I can take a look at your friend." The doctor didn't wait for an answer before bending down over the brunette boy on the ground, a little to the left of the boy who was trying to wake his friend. Silently she whipped out a stethoscope from her bag and checked the injured boy's lungs and pulse. "His pulse is fine, but he isn't breathing very well. I suspect he's inhaled some debris." Sarah - for that was the doctor's first name - observed as she put away the instrument.

She stood up slightly, glancing at the boy's head. "He may have a concussion. I feel sure all the ambulances we have are heading for the square... I just heard all the commotion and came this way." Dr. Pounds sighed and looked at the three healthy kids - two looked like they were only middle-school age, and one (along with the injured boy) was a bit older. She reached into the pocket of her jacket and pulled out a small cell phone. "My husband has the car right now, but he isn't far from here." She opened the phone and clicked a few numbers, sending a text to her husband to bring the car so that she could get the boy to the hospital, which was no doubt overflowing... they would probably call her back soon anyway.

That was when the doctor noticed the relatively minor arm injury on the young girl. "Oh! I'm sorry, that must hurt." She closed her phone and put it away, then fished around in her bag for a spool of gauze. "Here, this should help for now." She held out the gauze, ready to bandage up the girl's arm. "Oh, I'm sorry I yammer on so, I'm just a talkative old bird. What are your names?"

Blackthorn City ~ Under the North End

"What's going on out there?" a furious voice came out of the system of loudspeakers. Underground, everyone was scrambling for an answer to that very question. Scientists fiddled with knobs and screens, looking for what anomaly had caused the explosion in one of their generators, and trying to assay the damage. They didn't know that they had caused such havoc on the surface unless they were alerted indirectly; they simply knew that something was going terribly wrong in the underground lab...

A young man, dressed in his full lab coat, sat at one of the displays, his wild black hair swishing about as he searched for something. In fact, he wasn't on task to find out what had caused that explosion, exactly; that was up to the engineers, and some of the other scientists. No, it was this young researcher's job to discover what might have happened to their samples and specimens as a result of the explosion. For while he looked young, he was a prodigy, and had been working in this lab for several years - long enough to become a favorite of the supervisor, who was yelling angrily over the speaker system at the moment.

His personal speaker suddenly lit up green, signifying that his boss was on-line trying to contact him. "Steven, what happened? Report damages on our specimens!"

Steven furrowed his brow. "It doesn't look good, sir. I'm examining the back wing now, but a huge chunk was blown out of the side... I fear something may have escaped."

A tense silence filled the space around him, despite the noise of the chaotic situation. Then the voice came over the speaker again: "If it has, we're in trouble. Find out quickly."

Steven nodded to himself and stated simply: "sir." He continued examining the building, rotating the camera around as he did so. "One way or another, those researchers from Sinnoh don't need to see us in this state. We must notify them of the situation." Before he got a response, however, his eyes went wide. "Sir, we have a problem... some of the containment spaces were damaged. Three of them don't have specimens in them anymore."

"What?!" the boss's voice came angrily through. "I'll get security on it right away! You contact Dr. Higgins in Sinnoh!" With a small click, the light on Steven's panel went out, signifying that his boss was likely getting into contact with security to wrangle down the lost specimens.

How terribly inconvenient that the generator that had exploded was so close to the back wing where they kept their rarest specimens... Steven sighed, holding his head tightly and scrunching his green eyes shut. This wasn't good. He knew better than to think security would catch those three specimens. They were the "humanized" creatures they had discovered... they were not going to be caught by mere humans. There were still a few of those sort of specimens remaining, but with the lab in this state, it was probably smarter just to contact Dr. Jamie Higgins in Sinnoh and get her to cancel her researchers from coming here.

Steven's spindly, pale fingers trembled as he accessed the phone line and put on his headset. He didn't need the whole room hearing what Dr. Higgins might have to say about this situation... not all of them even knew why she was sending researchers all the way across the countries, nor did they have to know. This project was going to be kept secret until more information was uncovered... otherwise it might simply cause mass panic.

On the other end of the line, a distinctly female voice clicked on. "You've reached Draklor Laboratories, Eterna Branch."

"This is Steven Kelly with the Blackthorn Branch. Could you put me through to Dr. Higgins?" He tried not to let his voice waver as he said this.

"Yes, sir. One moment." There was a short bout of elevator music while Steven was on hold, then a new (but also female) voice came on. "This is Dr. Higgins, who am I speaking to again?"

"It's Steven. Steven Kelly."

"Oh, good to hear from you, Mr. Kelly. Have my researchers already arrived? I would have thought Mrs. Robold would flake off more than that."

He gulped. She had already sent them...? "Doctor, there's a bit of a situation in Blackthorn at the moment. One of our underground generators exploded, and we simply cannot accommodate visitors. Is there any way you can cancel their trip?"

A pause. "Tanya already contacted me saying they're in Ecruteak. Are you sure you can't have them, even if they wait a few days? I feel sure they would rather do that than come all the way home."

Steven sighed. "Is there some way I can get in contact with them? The situation is dire here. We simply cannot show them our material with the lab and the city in this state." He did his best to hide the nervousness creeping into his voice. "I apologize for the inconvenience, ma'am."

A small sigh came from the other line, though it was less nervous and more irritated. Jamie quickly gave him the contact information for one "Karen Thames" and "Tanya Robold", though she explained that it would be better to contact the older and more responsible of the two researchers (the former) unless she simply wouldn't respond. Steven nervously thanked her and hung up, still apologizing profusely.

This time, he gave off a long sigh. This situation was messy... and if they didn't recover those specimens, they would be in major trouble...

 

[themightydoof]

Blackthorn City

Ahime had barely started to run when buildings had begun to collapse. He looked around at where he had been standing out of some kind of morbid curiosity, and saw the alleyway being crushed under a building. There was something odd about knowing that you could have very easily just been killed. Actually, there was still quite a possibility that he would die. He doubted that anyone in the city was entirely safe. Then he thought of his homeless friends, most specifically Claudio, a boy a little older than he was. Ahime knew where Claudio usually was at this time of day, so he made with some haste in that direction.

When Ahime finally saw Claudio, he was being pulled out from some rubble by firemen. Ahime rapidly hid himself among the crowd. He did want to see if his friend was alright but thinking logically there was nothing he could do. These men may have only been from the fire service, but he didn't want any contact with any kind of authority so soon after his disappearance. If he was identified as a friend of an injured boy with no ID, the police would of course want to talk to him, ask him a few questions. It would only take one of them to recognise him. He stayed where he was.

 

[Unicorn]

[Goldenrod City, by WGC's Greenhouse (Northwest of the Square)]

Earl was about to mention that moving Li would be dangerous, when a woman came striding over to them. She had an air of professionalism about her, the way her blond hair was pulled back into a tight bun. Earl couldn’t help but stare at her heavy makeup. He thought it made her look uglier, not prettier, and the glasses just weren’t working for her either. Contacts would have suited her much better. Earl shook his head. Why was he thinking about all that when Li needed help? Before he could say anything to her, the woman was on the scene

"Excuse me," She said in a ragged voice. She tapped the young girl - who was directly in front of her - on the shoulder. "I'm Dr. Pounds. I can take a look at your friend." Earl was relieved. That white coat poking out of her duffel back must have been her work scrubs; she was a doctor. He moved aside so that she could reach Li. Silently she whipped out a stethoscope from her bag and checked his friend’s lungs and pulse. "His pulse is fine, but he isn't breathing very well. I suspect he's inhaled some debris."

She stood up slightly, glancing at Li's head. "He may have a concussion. I feel sure all the ambulances we have are heading for the square... I just heard all the commotion and came this way." Dr. Pounds sighed and looked at the three of them before reaching into the pocket of her jacket and pulling out a small cell phone. "My husband has the car right now, but he isn't far from here." She opened the phone and clicked a few numbers, sending a text presumably to her husband. Earl sighed in relief. Good. Li was going to be okay.

Then the doctor looked at th younger girl and saw the injury on her arm, which Earl also noticed for the first time. As Dr. Pounds proceeded to squabble over the middle school girl’s injuries, Earl saw Li stir a little out of the corner of his eye. The kid looked uncomfortable. Earl scooted over next to him and eyed the bump on his head. That must have hurt when it happened. Li opened his eyes for a moment and looked confusedly at his friend. Earl was surprised to see him awake, but managed to maintain his composure.

“It’s ok, man. We’re getting you to the hospital,” Earl whispered. Li didn’t seem to comprehend and opened his mouth to say something but in a split second his head drooped again. He wasn’t conscious for long. Hopefully Dr. Pounds’ husband would get here soon.

 

[Musical Mayhem]

Thanks for the doctor cdra!

~Kate, Goldenrod City, near WGC's Greenhouse~

Kate contemplated her options. Since her phone service wasn't working correctly, most likely due to the fact that her phone was from a different region, she would have to try to find a doctor the old fashioned way. She thought about screaming, but her throat was starting to burn from all the smoke she'd inhaled and her voice was already hoarse. She could make a dangerous run back towards the square, but she would risk hurting herself. Maybe if she ran back towards the square she could find her mother...

Just as she was about to tell the others her barely thought out plan, there was a tap on her shoulder. Kate turned to find a super blond woman standing behind her. Her hair was tied into a neat bun, and she was wearing more make-up than Kate had ever seen an adult wear. Kate was accustomed to the heavy dark make-up that those weird "emo kids" wore, but she'd never seen an adult with so much...

Kate pried her eyes away from the woman's make-up as she huffed, "Excuse me?" Kate turned all the way around, so her body, and not just her upper torso, was facing the new woman, "I'm Dr. Pounds. I can take a look at your friend." The words Kate had been about to say were cut off by Dr. Pounds continuing to do her evaluation. She was glancing at the boy, taking his pulse, and other doctorly things. "His pulse is fine, but he isn't breathing very well. I suspect he's inhaled some debris."

A doctor. Kate was relieved. They would be okay! But on the other hand, she was a little bit worried. Would they take skin samples from the weird patches on her skin? Cut off a little bit of her already cut hair? Kate gulped, but the woman was yapping about the injuries that Li had. She heard the doctor mention a car, before shooting a text to her husband to bring said car. Kate's mother had always told her not to get into a car with strangers, but they did need to get to a hospital. Who knew what the smoke inhalation was doing to Kate's pristine athletic lungs?!

Kate jerked out of her reverie as Dr. Pounds' make-up ringed eyes fell onto her injured arm. "Oh! I'm sorry, that must hurt." The doctor started shuffling around in her bag, producing out a spool of gauze, "Here, this should help for now." She held the gauze out towards Kate's arm, but she stopped short to ask a question, "Oh, I'm sorry I yammer on so, I'm just a talkative old bird. What are your names?"

Kate saw her chance, "My name's Caitlin, but you can call me Kate. The boy with the hoodie is Elliot, the boy who's hurt is Li, and that's his friend Earl," she gestured to each of them in turn, "You should probably check out Li a little more," she mentioned, reaching out to snatch the gauze from the doctor, "I play field hockey, so I can bandage myself up just fine if you need me to," Without waiting for a response, Kate quickly grabbed the spool away from the kindly doctor. She wouldn't see the stained skin. Kate wouldn't get skin sampled! Or... whatever it was they did to arms.

Kate saw Li's eyes flutter open, and she glanced over briefly at him, but he seemed to go unconscious again pretty quickly. Hoping that the doctor was distracted, Kate slowly rolled up the bloodstained sleeve of her now tattered field hockey shirt. She wiped the wound off a little bit with the gauze, but there wasn't a good chance that she'd be able to clean it here. Settling for a semi-clean wound, Kate quickly wrapped the jagged cut with the white fabric, watching as the both the cut and a big patch of pinkish-orange skin disappeared beneath the it.

 

[Slipomatic]

OOC: Since there really isn't much going on in Ecruteak City, I couldn't really think of anything interesting to do aside from watching the dance thing which I didn't go to.

Sherry, Tin Tower, Late Afternoon

Sherry never could figure out why she would wander around looking like she was lost in this city. She had found a random food stall and had their local special for dinner. For some odd reason, when she had finished eating, she was attracted to the Tin Tower and although the crystal bells that used to be there were long gone, replica of the crystal bells were hanging in the four corners of the tower. She felt oddly at peace, being in a building that had a huge statue of Ho-Oh sitting in the middle of the bottom floor. There was a small monument in front of the statue which held an ancient writing that depicted the hope that one day, Ho-Oh would indeed return and make its home here.

Sherry shook her head sadly. Something told her that with the way things were progressing at, Ho-Oh would never make its home in a place where there was so much pollution everywhere. It would have made sense if this place was the only place left that was left pure, untainted by the pollution that plagued almost all the cities around. She was distracted from her thoughts when one of the caretakers of the Tin Tower asked her to leave as they were locking up the building for the night. She didn’t realize that she had zoned off and she thanked the caretaker before leaving the tower.

She heard a soft chime echo in her head and she looked back inside the building before the doors closed and could have sworn that one of the bells had ringed. She shook her head and decided to find a hotel somewhere and turn in for the night. She didn’t feel right as she had visited some strange places that she didn’t really have an interest in, especially since she had visited several cemeteries and stopped at almost an identical urn with an engraving depicting an eevee.

 

[InnerFlame]

~~Goldenrod City- Northwest of the Square near WGC's Greenhouse ~~

Before any of the three of them could devise a plan of getting this guy, Li, help yet another person came. This one was far older and a lady. She was wearing a black dress or skirt and tall heels and he really didn’t venture to get a better look than that. All these people just made him uncomfortable, which was weird because he used to love being around people what seem not too long ago. Though now the insecurity and these changes made him nervous. The lady went up to Kate and began talking to her, “Excuse me, I'm Dr. Pounds. I can take a look at your friend.” She informed her and before anyone could say anything she walk over and examined him... She was a doctor... that was quite fortunate. After checking the most injured person of the group she told him about her husband and about having him coming to pick them up.

Honestly Elliot wasn’t looking forward going to the hospital; he knew it was best to go after inhaling who know how much particle filled air. He remained quiet and a bit to himself as the people around him did whatever. Then when he heard his name, he looked up from ground up at the one that called him, Kate. At first he thought she was calling him but quickly realized that she was introducing everyone. He might have returned his eyes to the road but he instead looked towards the fleeting sunlight. The sun was lower in the sky even though today everything seemed to go by at slow pace.

“It’s getting late” he pointed out an obvious fact that anyone could see, “My parents will be worry.” The young teen didn’t believe it just because it was starting to get dark, but the fact that they probably caught wind of the incident at this point. Removing a phone from his jean pocket he opened and just stared at it... he had forgotten to charge his phone before he left and it was dead at this point. That would explain why he didn’t get any calls or texts asking about where he was. “I should get home.” When the boy said that he looked at Kate maybe because she was the only person he kind of knew or was the closest person to his age. More coughs escaped and it made him wince; his throat was in pain. “But...” Elliot looked a little torn between the decisions that he didn’t vocally mention.

 

[TheSequelReturns]

~ Ecruteak City - Outside the Dance Theater ~

- Aria White -

Aria made her way through the city in the ever dimming light. The sun was all but down, and the street lights and neon signs and such were beginning to light up. Normally, Aria would either be with a group of other people or already back at home by this point in time, and yet she found herself wandering over to the Dance Theater as if some unknown force were motivating her.

What was it about that Tanya woman earlier? Was it what she had said? How she had said it? Why did Aria find herself checking her watch to make sure she had the right time? Why was she so sure that she needed to talk to her again? Why?

There were too many questions that needed to be answered, to many strange things happening, it was all getting to be a bit much. What exactly was happening to her? Her friends had no idea what she was feeling like, they had even said it was crazy that she wanted to ditch out on their plans to go bowling tonight just to try and track that Tanya lady back down. And yet, this was the first real clue that she had as to the true nature of the changes she was going through. She couldn't pass this up.

And before she knew it, she was there, standing outside the Dance Theater. It was only a few minutes before showtime, so she hoped that she wouldn't have to wait through the whole show to speak to Tanya again. Luckily for her, she caught sight of the lady as she entered the theater, as if she had been waiting for her. Did she know that Aria would come, or was she just betting that she would? Either way, it didn't matter, she was here now.

"Tanya?" Aria said as she approached her. "I, um. I'm here to talk to you I guess. You did invite me here, right? Please, if you can tell me anything about what I'm going through, It would mean a lot."

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

~ Blackthorn City - City Outskirts ~

- Poe Shadel -

The quake might have been over, but Poe was still feeling uneasy. His head was killing him, it felt like it was going to split open. He stumbled into a nearby alley way, mostly to get away from the street noise than anything else, but as he entered the shaded alley, he was immediately glad that he had. The headache became worse, and he collapsed, sitting up against a concrete wall as he held his head.

It was another one of those lucid daydreams, but unfortunately they tended to be preceded by intense migraines or drowsiness. And this time it seemed that he would deal with the migraine. His head became fuzzy, and a now familiar sense of unease came over him as his mind was overcome with a strong feeling. He saw something bright, something colorful. Was it a person? Some sort of spirit? And then he heard a voice, distant but clear. And distinctively feminine. But he couldn't make out the words.

The figure came closer, and now he could make out the movements of her mouth, but still, the words were foreign to him, or at the very least muddled to the point that he could no longer discern their meaning. He struggled to read her lips, but the colorful light that she seemed to radiate made it difficult.

And then suddenly he was standing in a brightly lit room. A hospital? An office? a lab? he couldn't really tell. And then, there she was in front of him. He said something to her, but he didn't even know what he said. A question? Had he asked her something? He could feel her hand take his, and he read one word on her lips. "Goldenrod."

And then, he opened his eyes and found himself on his side in the alley. The dream was gone, he could no longer recall the woman's face, the room, anything. But that one last word was still very clear in his mind. It was "Goldenrod." He was sure of it. But what did it mean?

He pulled himself to his feet, his mind still reeling from the dream, if you could call it that. It felt more like a vision, a premonition, than a simple daydream. But what was worse, is that he knew that he had to do something about this dream. Because so far, all of his daydreams had come true.

He pulled himself up, dusting off his cloak, that strange cloak that was growing from his shoulders. What in the world was happening to him, and why couldn't he do anything about it?

Regardless, he had to do something about that vision. He needed to get to goldenrod. The quake had probably damaged the tracks, it had seemed to hit the outskirts harder than the mid city, so that basically left him with one option, the airport.

Unfortunately, he didn't have a whole lot of money left, and now his train ticket already paid for by the way) was going to go to waste, but what could he really do about it? He had tried to ignore his visions before, and it had nearly caused him to collapse down two flights of stairs as a sudden relapse of the vision hit him. He wasn't going to take a chance like that again, he need to get to Goldenrod, he needed to get to the bottom of this vision.

He unzipped his suitcase and removed the folded shoulder bag inside, filling it with only the basic essentials of his bag. Flights these days charged addition for every suitcase, so a carry on bag just might save him enough money so that he could buy a quick ticket on the next flight. It meant that he would have to ditch the suitcase of course, but such was life. His shoulder bag ready, and his other mostly unimportant belongings left abandoned in the alley, he made his way towards the airport, walking as quickly as he could. With any luck, he would be in Goldenrod by tonight.

 

[Ysavvryl]

Goldenrod, North Hospital

Later, Martin got woken back up and put into the transrepair unit. The doctor looked over the scans for a few minutes before turning to him. “All right, Mr. Russells, you’re clear to sit up and stand on your own now. But don’t walk fast or for very long for a couple of days. We’ll need you to stay overnight in the hospital, as we need to repeat the scanning to make sure there’s nothing more that needs to be taken care of. You’re going to be relocated from the emergency area; a nurse should be along with a wheelchair for you in the next half hour.”

He nodded. It was demeaning to some, but he knew that there were worse situations. “Sure. Oh, and are you taking care of Yuna Medley too?”

“Miss Medley?” He looked at his clipboard and flipped a couple of pages. “Yes, she’s scheduled for transrepair after two others; I can’t tell you any further.”

Thinking quickly, he said, “Well we are engaged to marry shortly. Is there any way I can get a copy of her DNA scan from the transrepair unit? There’s something she’s asked me to look into.”

“Are you qualifi…” the doctor started, then looked back at his patient sheet. “Oh right, you would be as you do work for the hospital. I’ll need you both to sign off a medical transcript request form so that she gives her permission for it to be done. And… have you deleted his sample from the unit yet?”

The technician looked up. “Not yet, sir.”

“Want your own DNA scan?”

Martin shrugged. “Sure, why not? I won’t need a permission form for that.”

Pointing down the hall to the left, the doctor said, “There’s a nurse station not too far that way. You should be okay to walk there and ask for the form. It would be, uh…”

“Medical Privacy Disclosure Document DL-Z39,” the technician stated.

“Right, thanks,” Martin said.

While he waited on the nurse that would take him to his overnight room, Martin got the release form and filled it out with as much information as he knew. Fortunately, it really would only require Yuna to sign it, as the doctor could fill out her patient number and other data from their records. Then he just waited on when she would be in transrepair.

-+-

Yuna had a weird dream briefly, about that mysterious black stranger she half-remembered. For a little while, she had thought he had visited her in the hospital, but the whole thing sounded too weird to be reality. She did have to wonder why it left her with a bit of a chill, though. She hadn’t had nightmares since she was a little girl.

They half woke her up in time for her transrepair session, but the drugs in her system left her drowsy. She was awake enough when she left to hear the doctor say that she would be in the hospital for at least two days, maybe longer, as she needed some finer repairs and a second blood transfusion. But there was one more thing for her to do there.

“Martin Russells requested to have a copy of your DNA scan,” the doctor said, handing her an extra clipboard with a paper and pen on it. “He said it was for a skin problem you asked about that he wanted to get a deep look into.” The doctor then glanced at the colored lines on her arms, although he didn’t seem to have any idea why those were there.

Blushing a bit, Yuna looked down at the paper and took the pen. “Right, that’s right. He can have it.” Her hand was shaky, but she made a good enough signature after glancing over the form.

“Doc, I’m going to put those two scan results into the safe boxes until Russells is ready to take them,” the technician said.

“Good, do that.”

 

[cdra1617]

((Lol guys, the doctor's makeup wasn't supposed to be that insane, but I'm going to roll with it.

Ysavvryl, I'm going to have to ask you to slow down a little, for the sake of keeping the timeline in line. I know you have some good ideas and I'm interested in playing through them, but I don't want the timeline to get completely messed up - or it's going to get sticky around here. Sorry!

GUYS. THIS IS ONLY HALF OF A POST. I'LL WRITE MORE OVER THE WEEKEND, SO IF I DIDN'T GET TO YOU, I'M GETTING THERE. Midterms = icky. I'm sorry. D; ))

Ecruteak City ~ Outside the Dance Theatre

As Tanya waited, filling her mind with the sounds of the bustling city (so as not to think too hard about the girl who might be coming to meet her here), she eventually caught sight of that bright blue hair inching toward her. The Linguist glanced at the clock, then back down. There were a few minutes, long enough to at least give her the gist of things. Then maybe she could come see the show too or wait until it was over to get the details down... it was just a lot to explain all at once.

Sure enough, the girl approached and addressed her. "Tanya? I, um. I'm here to talk to you I guess. You did invite me here, right? Please, if you can tell me anything about what I'm going through, it would mean a lot."

Tanya nodded and sighed. She would have elected to speak Human so as not to confuse this girl even more (by continuing to blur her ability to hear languages), but she didn't need the people around to eavesdrop. If they just thought she was speaking gibberish, not saying anything interesting, they would shrug it off and walk on. Thus, she decided to stick with the natural language for divulging huge secrets in a public place. "I suppose I'm glad you're worried enough to come. Then again, no one should have to go through this...

"I haven't got time to dally because I don't want to miss my show, but I can probably help you a little. From what I've been told, people like you and me were born different, born with the capacity to understand this language that I'm speaking right now. Unfortunately we aren't born able to distinguish it from the one we speak every day... in that, I'm a special case. In the interest of simplicity, this is the language Pokemon used to speak. Because people like you and I were born somehow connected to Pokemon... and contact with others like ourselves makes us turn into them. I don't think the transformation is complete- like you don't become a Pokemon totally, that would be insane- but things... happen. I was a redhead all my life, then my hair decided it was going to be brown and shaggy-spikey. I can't show you right now, but my body is marked. I was told by the same nuts who told me what's happening that I'm a Zigzagoon, which I guess makes sense."

Tanya sighed again, having trouble making eye contact with the girl. "You aren't very far along yet. I'm almost too far gone to keep living like this, except that I can tell the languages apart. Soon though, I won't be able to hide what I'm going through, either. At least brown is a natural hair color." She laughed a little, but darkly at this statement. "I pretended I had dyed it out of fear. I think most people think things like that. The people who can explain this to you, other than me, don't live in cities anymore. People like me find out by accident. Some people don't find out until they have to run away."

"That's why I wanted to help you. Because it's difficult on its own... somehow I think that's how it's intended to be." Tanya finally made eye contact with the girl, who was no doubt shaken. "I don't even know your name," she said in plain Human, finally feeling like she had gotten past the point where that rotten language was necessary. "You already know mine. Tanya Robold, Pokemon researcher." She glanced over at the clock. Two minutes to showtime.

A small laugh. "I'm a fast talker. I'm sorry I can't go into more detail right now, but to be honest, I don't know much more." She tapped her chin. "I know this all must come as a shock to you. You can ask me any questions you like... oh, do you want tickets to the show? I put mine on the research funds, so I can buy you one. We can talk more afterwards if I can get my partner away." She seemed cheery enough... what a strange girl.

Goldenrod City - Near WGC's Greenhouse

The doctor didn't mind too much when the girl mumbled something about playing field hockey and took the gauze. If she wanted to bandage her own arm, that was her prerogative, and she appeared to know what she was doing. She could make it more comfortable... and now wasn't really the time for Dr. Pounds to be too professional, but... she decided it was worth explaining, "I can't do much more without proper equipment, and I don't want to move him until we have to. Trauma victims really shouldn't be moved." She pushed her glasses up; they were sliding down her nose a bit. "Anything I do right now isn't likely to help any more than it could hurt your friend."

She glanced over Li and Earl, hoping he had heard her warning about making sure not to move his friend until there was help. Elliot seemed to be unnerved, muttering about his parents being worried. The doctor smiled. "If you need to make sure your parents know you're alright, you can borrow my phone. It's been charging all day and I wasn't in any explosions." She said warmly, with a light bit of humor in her tone.

Soon enough, after about ten minutes, a shiny black SUV pulled up to the group. Dr. Pounds knew that it was the car (after all it was her car too) and, shortly, a tall man in a button-up shirt and jeans stepped out, her husband. They spoke quickly; apparently Mr. Pounds was used to these sorts of things. He had short, rather average-looking brown hair and blue eyes like his wife. All in all, he looked a bit more average than she did, but he did appear strong and in-shape. He walked over to the boy and looked at Earl.

"This your friend? Help me lift him. I'll get his shoulders; make sure not to let him fall." the tall man gently supported the rather short boy, trying to hold him as level as he could. They gently moved him into the back seat of the SUV and laid him flat; the doctor walked around and got in on the other side so she could sit by the injured boy's head. She looked back at the kids.

"You should come, too. From the sound of it you've probably inhaled some debris, and a good checkup by someone with more than a stethoscope could do you some good. There's room in the back; I know there aren't seats, but Li needs to lay flat... and one of you can sit up front. I'll keep an eye on him here." She smiled sincerely. Dr. Pounds took a deep breath, looking at the injured boy next to her. He looked a little banged up, but modern technology was amazing... they'd have him back together in no time, as soon as they got him to the hospital.

((OOC: I'm probably going to skip some time after you guys get to the hospital, to try to keep the time moving.))

Goldenrod City - North Hospital (some time ago? or in the future?)

"Hello there, do you need a visitor badge?" the secretary asked the young girl in front of her, a professional-looking young lady with dark blue hair that seemed nearly black, or black enough to keep people from asking questions.

"Actually, I'm a shadow. Jasmine Bernatowicz?" she said in a sweet voice, hazel eyes only slightly toward the secretary.

"Ah yes, you're right here on the list. I guess you're here to see all the damage from the recent bombings?"

The young lady's face darkened. "Yes. I heard there were a lot of casualties and a lot more injuries..." she sighed at this. Jasmine had been shadowing here for a year, since she started medical school, but this was by far the worst tragedy the hospital had had to deal with since then, if not in many decades. The secretary handed her her badge and sent her through, wishing her a good study (because there was nothing more to say).

But rather than going to find her uncle, one of the doctors, Jasmine immediately went to one of the bathrooms on a middle floor, where other buildings jutted up against the side of the hospital. She opened up the window with some struggle, then waited for a moment.

Soon enough, a man not much older than herself in a black cloak jumped through the window, his black dreadlocks fluttering behind him. The bomber straightened his back and looked over at the young medical student. "Thank you," he said in his own language. She didn't look at the man, keeping her eyes adverted toward the floor with a truly troubled expression on her face, far more human than his.

"Why did you do that, James? These people are innocent... and now they're hurt," she seemed bitter, speaking mostly in Human.

James's red eyes glimmered. "The only innocent ones are those that were destroyed by humankind. You should understand that by now, Jasmine."

She snarled, trying to ignore him. He had gotten insane in recent months... "I wish this wasn't the only way I got to see you... I miss you. But-" she silenced him with a sharp glare, "-I will not go with you. I still think you're insane. Why don't you come back? Mom and Dad miss you... they'd do anything to see you, just like I do."

James laughed darkly. "You just don't understand. You're still a baby. But... it's getting harder for you, isn't it?" He grabbed his sister's shirt and pulled it up, a dark glimmer filling his eyes.

"Hey!" Jasmine resisted, then pushed him away and readjusted her shirt. "That's not appropriate... you're a boy, even if you are my brother." But she knew what he was looking for. Her torso was covered in fine, light blue fur from the chest down; above that was thicker, black fur. The yellow stripes down her arms were yet another tell-tale sign. She was changing, and they both knew it. "It gets harder every time I see you." He was silent. "Go on and visit that girl. Close this window for now... but just leave it open after you leave so I don't have to do this again."

James grinned. "You're strange. One day, though, I'll just take you with me. If you weren't being so helpful, I already would have." She did not respond this time, but walked out of the bathroom, passing her brother a white lab coat out of her giant purse as she did so. Jasmine went off to find her uncle, teeth clenched from her brother's visit... she was always so upset when he came by. James donned the coat over his usual black cloak, which would have been more suspicious than at least having the lab coat. He kept his hood up and quickly ducked through the hallways, avoiding the disgusting humans whenever possible, as he sought out that bright, dreamy aura.

He visited a few times, when the hospital was closed down, when they were sleeping or very nearly sleeping and there weren't many people in the hallways to be suspicious. He would at least wait until she was well... and because Jasmine had showed him where the patients' charts were, James knew that she would be mostly healed after today. Then tonight would be the first night that he made himself known... at least, ideally. After all, she needed to know who she was... and how foolish she was for remaining in this human world.

 

[Musical Mayhem]

@cdra: One of my friends was Alice in Wonderland for Halloween. She is perfect for the role too... tiny and blond haha. Just thought I'd let you know, since your siggie says you are an Alice in Wonderland addict.

Kate, Goldenrod City, somewhere near WGC'S greenhouse

“It’s getting late” Elliot pointed out and Kate looked up at the smoke billowing against the darkening sky. It was getting late,“My parents will be worried,” Kate's eyes widened as she remembered her mother. Where was her mother? Maybe she'd find her at the hospital. That was problably her best bet at this point, seeing as both of their cells had been blown up. Kate gulped... had her mother been blown up? Surely her father would be worried at this point. News like this, something so... terrifying would surely be being broadcasted live across the world... sure enough, when Kate looked up again, she could see little helicopters weaving in and and out of the smoky collumns. Had her father tried to contact her?

“I should get home.” Elliot said quietly, and he glanced over at Kate. She didn't fail to notice that. Her dark eyes widened as they met his red ones, and she paused once again to wonder whether he'd been changing like she had. What could possibly be under that sweatshirt? What color had his eyes been before red? Were those contacts?

“But...” Elliot's voice once again interupted Kate's thoughts. He was coughing, and he sounded terrible. Kate coughed a few times as well, wondering what the heck could possibly be in her lungs. If she went to the hospital, would they take skin scrapes of the orange patches? Kate swallowed hard, trying to push the rest of the coughs back into her chest. Her chest burnt, and she finally blew out a few extra coughs.

The doctor was muttering something to Elliot about phones and parents, but Kate could barely hear her over all of the coughing. She made herself a mental note not to try to swallow her coughs again. Whatever voice teacher had told her to that swallowing hard was helpful was an idiot.

Soon, a black SUV pulled up, and a man, presumably Mr. Pounds stepped out. He had pretty blue eyes like his wife, and generic brunette hair. Kate figured that he was attractive in an old man sort of style. Kate took a moment to wonder how old he was. What if he was thirty? That was like, twice her age. "Eew," she grumbled under her breath, shaking her head at herself. Her sooty curls bounced a little bit at the motion, which shook out a bit of debris. Kate coughed again as the man and Dr. Pounds moved Li into the car.

"You should come, too. From the sound of it you've probably inhaled some debris, and a good checkup by someone with more than a stethoscope could do you some good. There's room in the back; I know there aren't seats, but Li needs to lay flat... and one of you can sit up front. I'll keep an eye on him here." Dr. Pounds said cheerfully. Kate was very tempted to turn and run away. Going to a hospital could reveal whatever it was that was happening to her...

But wouldn't it be nice to know what was happening to her?

Kate reached out and grabbed Elliot's hand, "Come on, you sound like hell. Wanna get in the car? We need some help," With that, she dropped his hand and climbed slowly into the car. She settled down on the carpeted ground of the SUV next to Li. She looked down at him, glad that she hadn't ended up like him. She took the Pokeball that she was still clutching in her hand, so tightly that she'd left sooty fingerprints all over it, and placed it in Li's hand.

"I know you were looking for whatever's in this ball. I almost forgot about it, but I guess it belongs to you now," She whispered in Li's ear before leaning back against the wall of the SUV to close her eyes. She tried to ignore the images flashing behind her eyes. Bursts of fire, toppling her over. Her mother soaring through the air, her eyes locked on Kate with a burst of shock and fear. Smoke. Police. Elliot running through the smoke and degree with her. The dead man on the floor.

Kate pulled her exhausted eyes open in the back seat of a stranger's car, wondering how her life had gone so far off track in so few hours.