Random Plots and Places 9: What a crazy, random happenstance!

[Lost_Deep]

Silicon Route

Kellform rushes forward to make sure that Fortuna is okay, and didn't accidentally hurt herself.

I am just as surprised as you are! Kellia sends to Armstrong as she rushes over herself. The pair of Kells use some slightly-rusty first aid training to asses the exhausted Fortuna and do anything covered by simple, immediate first aid.

[Rebonack]

[Silicon Route]

Well.

This puts a bit of a damper on their adventure, doesn't it?

Fortuna is just exhausted. Some food, water, and rest will probably do her well. It looks like she has burned all the way through her psychic reserves poofing on her way here.

Nurse Armstrong rubs at his chin. "Interesting... so your trainer is a psychic? That's very rare..."

Indeed it is!

Usually people use it to levitate their pokeballs for no good reason, sort of like Sabrina!

Nurse Armstrong takes out a water bottle and offers it to Fortuna, who begins drinking from it greedily. Sure, she had eaten a ton of apricots, but nothing beats some nice cold water after teleporting dozens of miles.

<Oh cool! That guy looks just like Nurse Armstrong from Inside!> Henry comments. <Are they related?>

[Granite City]

"Hmm... Dig... They sell lots of TMs at the department store, I'm sure they'll have that one," Timmy says as he returns Burnmonkey to her ball. "Thanks a lot mister Victini! And you too, Dragonite! You guys were super helpful! I'm sure I'll beat my friend next time!"

And then off he goes.

Awaaaay!

Which leaves Jace and Zebes standing in the battle room alone.

[Fenric]

Vulpine Outpost

Shadow tendrils try to lash together the demon's feet as the charge. Golden streaks hail down on them. The robodragon ignores anything else to destroy them.

Somewhere, far away, at tenjin's base, a creature 100 feet tall, 50 feet of tentacles and 50 feet of succubus, attacks the temple. Though unarmed, she's basically a Kaiju and as thus terrifyingly strong.

The three remaining pit fiends are impressed. And more than a bit intimidated. And... they kneel down to Caravan

We surrender, golden one of the realms. Pray forgive us, for we were bound by compact signed and sealed.

Well... that's different. Oh... that must mean...

Away in the city, the shield fails spectacularly: exploding in fire and smoke and allowing the devastating plasma bombs into the temple, followed by dreadful tentacles. The bombers move on to finish leveling the city to the ground, but Tenjin just lost his priesthood in the Nexus. In a hundred years he won't recover what he just lost.

[Lost_Deep]

Vulpine Outpost

She is the biggest trade magnate in the Nine Realms, but that particular 'Nine Realms' isn't anywhere near here.

The dragon launches itself at the next enemy... only to stop in mid-air, implode messily, and vanish into a portal the size of a softball.

"Begone, and know that today myself and my allies were underarmed."

The Succukraken will take steps to ensure no one escapes. What? That's an evil thing to do. It's a Succukraken. Of course it's evil.

Silicon Route

"<The world may never know.>"

I didn't think she'd chain teleport to us! Kellia says. "I could try to heal her, but she's not wounded, she's exhausted. I don't want to make it worse."

"<You can heal?>"

"<Apparently?>"

[Fenric]

[Vulpine Outpost]

The pit fiends vanish, and all their subordinate devils, too. The shadows vanish like smoke from a candle, and only Tenjin is left standing out in the field all alone: huge but vulnerable, his power rapidly waning.

You did it, Caravan! They're on the run!

But the toll on the soldiers was heavy indeed, and even in his dilapidated state the dragon is more than they can deal with anymore.

[Deathkeeper]

Granite City

If you do, please tell him how bad news those Stones are.

But then Jace and Zebes are left alone! Better head out then. It's not like they won't get bored, sitting around in an empty room!

[Lost_Deep]

Vulpine Outpost

"And for my next trick..." By Tenjin a small portal opens, and out drops a softball-sized thing made of metal. Said thing beings to crinkle, and then slowly unfurl. Within a few minutes, the rough shape of a dragon forms.

Whatever that thing is, getting turned into a dense mass of compressed metal only slowed it down.

[Rebonack]

[Silicon Route]

Nurse Armstrong reaches down to pick up Fortuna, and in doing so her cute little hat with adorable Mew ears on the top falls off!

Revealing the actual Mew ears normally hidden inside the hat.

Whoops!

Nurse Armstrong's steely gaze narrows ever so slightly whilst his mustache twitches. Then he stoops down, picks up Fortuna's hat, and slips it back onto her head. Takes a bit of fiddling to get it on straight.

Then he makes a 'sshhh' gesture at the Kells.

"Come! We shall return your trainer to the PokeCenter where her state of exhaustion can be tended to! As a nurse it is my sacred duty to attend to the needs of pokemon and trainers alike! To do otherwise would be an affront to the proud Armstrong tradition of nursing passed down the Armstrong family line FOR GENERATIONS!"

Huh.

It sounds like he isn't going to make a big deal about what he discovered? Then again, Armstrong really doesn't seem like the guy who would act flabbergasted about anything. Being flabbergasted isn't very manly. And with that he turns and strides back into Limestone Town! He's probably planning on giving her a SilphCo Ether potion. Can't very well shove her in a pokeball and put her in the HealTron, now can he?

[Granite City]

Zebes and Jace depart the pokemon center!

They are, once again, getting some pretty interesting looks as they head toward Mount Igneous, but as before no one is going to try to catch them. PokeGear tags them as being banded wild pokemon, meaning that trying to capture them would just be a waste of a pokeball. And no one is going to try to fight them in the middle of the city. There are laws against pokemon fights in the city outside of the designated areas!

Despite all the attention, our heroes might notice that the shady guy who was selling Gloom Stones is tailing them. He's quite a distance away and he's trying to remain inconspicuous, but that's hard with a trench coat and that absurd helmet he's wearing.

[Deathkeeper]

Granite City

Oh no, this is going to be bad.
Probably not for Jace and Zebes, not yet, but for the poor Grunt. Because they're going to have fun with this.
What do you do when you know someone's tailing you? You lead them all around the city, of course. Around public areas so they can't call their buddies to jump you in an alley, but still, around, about, and occasionally trying to lose them just so you can pop somewhere else and get them all flustered. They've done this routine before. The Team as a whole might be a threat, but this guy has "amateur" written all over him.

[Fenric]

[Vulpine Outpost]

Tenjin eyes the unfolding mecha-dragon warily. His breath is ragged and labored already, and he obviously isn't relishing this new fight. Unfortunately for him, the spike is still in effect and he cannot escape... but he does start to back away.

Well... you've got him scared, but if he backs up much further he'll be outside of the spike's range.

In other news, the bomber pilots say that kraken of yours has made a proper mess of Tenjin's temple there. He's got to be under a thousand worshippers Nexus-wide now, and possibly no real priests left at all!

[Lost_Deep]

Vulpine Outpost

Ebony giggles and sprints off. In the shadow realm, just outside of the area of the spike, the terrain changes to be quite hazardous. Spikes, spines, serrated webs, long whiplike things, just waiting for Tenjin to stumble into them.

The Dragon doesn't attack. It's still unfurling... in fact it isn't moving at all apart from slowly expanding to its former glory.

[Rebonack]

[Granite City]

That poor, poor clueless grunt.

He obviously hasn't got a clue how to actually tail someone without being spotted. But he's trying, darn it! He's putting his heart into it!

Eventually he'll give up and trying selling some Gloom Stones to clueless kids again. Or maybe that's just what he wants Jace and Zebes to think he's doing? Maybe there's some kind of nefarious plot that he's cleverly keeping hidden?

[Lost_Deep]

Silicon Route

The Kells wince when the hat comes off, but Armstrong silences their fears quickly. They'll follow him, ready to help if they can.

[Rebonack]

[Silicon Route ==> Limestone Town]

Back into town! That was certainly the shortest adventure ever. Henry flops along behind them while Bitey toddles about. <Hey guys! How have you been enjoying the vacation so far? Super awesome, right? We helped this farmer guy get his Ambipom back!> the ever cheerful fish says.

Armstrong carries Fortuna back to the PokeCenter and lays her down on one of the couches before fetching an Ether potion and feeding the thing to her. Fortuna gives a little groan, the tension in her body dissolving as she slips from fitful unconsciousness to pleasant slumber. Seems her exhaustion has been relieved.

In a rather impressive display of not being bombastic, Nurse Armstrong turns his gaze upon Kellia.

"Your 'trainer' is an interesting one. You are all wild pokemon, aren't you? This is why you feared traveling alone. Your friend protects you, doesn't she?"

And their 'friend' count be caught, too.

Though that would probably be a pretty hard-pressed battle.

[Deathkeeper]

Granite City

Aw, look. He's using something he knows they won't like! That's actually some semblance of tactics.
"You know, the helmet kind of ruins any hope you had of being incognito. "
Jace ghost-sounds from a bit far away, which probably puts a damper on that sale.

[Lost_Deep]

Limestone Town

Kellform will try to carry Henry, and keep an eye on the trapinch.

Kellia holds a finger over her mouth for 'shh.' Yeah, and that's only the tip of the iceberg. The situation is really crazy, suffice to say there's others we need to get in touch with, and that this entire situation is one slip away from being a small disaster. There's a long and completely insane story behind this, yes. You wouldn't believe a word of it.

[Rebonack]

[Granite City]

The Helmet Grunt gives a start when a voice comes out of nowhere! He glances around nervously, trying to find the source. "Who's there? Don't you mess with me, man! I've got connections! You'll be sorry!"

D'aaww...

He's making threats.

That's adorable!

[Limestone Town]

Nurse Armstrong is actually being really quiet by Nurse Armstrong standards. He crosses his arms and fixes Kellia with an scrutinizing look. "You may be surprised. I correspond regularly with my cousin who works at the Inside PokeCenter."

He raises a good point, there. If he talks with that Nurse Armstrong, then he has probably heard some really wonky stuff already.

[Lost_Deep]

Limestone Town

Oh, well, when you put it that way... Oh, yeah. You're on the money, it's Nexus weirdness. Suffice to say that none of us were originally Pokemon, there's some mental bending involved, and there's a dragonite and a victini out there somewhere in a similar situation. Not sure how much they're comfortable with you knowing, but we need to all get together to figure out the next step.

[Rebonack]

[Limestone Town]

Nexus weirdness is the best weirdness.

And it would appear as though the Iwa region has an obvious connection! It must, otherwise the Armstrongs wouldn't be able to keep in touch.

At the story of Kellia's plight, the mountain of a man twitches his mustache knowingly. "And before this fate befell you? You were all human? Or something stranger..."

Because 'something stranger' describes most of the stuff in the Nexus.

Seriously.

[Lost_Deep]

Limestone Town

You track myself and the Castform back far enough and you get human, but there's an intervening step in there. Long story, we're kinda also the same person but not really. If you say 'Kell,' we'll likely both answer. Apart from us, there was a magic-using human, a little dragon, and Fortuna fell solidly in the 'other' category. And Henry was originally a goldfish, so I guess this entire thing is a solid gain for him. The Trapinch is new on me. she shrugs. This is the kind of thing we'll likely at least find parts of funny in retrospect, because we live interesting lives.

[Rebonack]

[Limestone Town]

Fortuna falls VERY solidly into the other category.

"I see..." Nurse Armstrong mutters.

<Hey, what are you guys talking about?> Henry asks. <Is it something cool? Oh man! Did any of you see how far I Splashed on my way in here? That was, like, a long Splash record!>

Such a happy fish.

Fortuna, meanwhile, is beginning to stir! Slowly her eyes open, slowly her mind begins putting concepts to the images she sees.

The first thing to meet her gaze?

The hulking, shirtless, immaculately chiseled torso of Nurse Armstrong. <Oh my...> she squeaks.

<Sweet! Forte is awake again!>

Bitey is busy gnawing on one of the couches.

[Deathkeeper]

Granite City

The pair snicker uncontrollably, but resist laughing out loud and blowing their little trick.
"Who am I? Come on, we spent the last hour with you and you're asking who's there? You sure are clueless, buddy. I'd tell you not to quit your day job, but I'd really prefer if you did."

[Lost_Deep]

Limestone Town

"<No! You mustn't eat furniture!>" Kellform is managing the other Pokemon...

"<Hey! Fortuna! You okay? You can't wear yourself out like that. You passed out!>" Kellia says.

[Fenric]

Vulpine Outpost

Ebony giggles and sprints off. In the shadow realm, just outside of the area of the spike, the terrain changes to be quite hazardous. Spikes, spines, serrated webs, long whiplike things, just waiting for Tenjin to stumble into them.

The Dragon doesn't attack. It's still unfurling... in fact it isn't moving at all apart from slowly expanding to its former glory.

Tenjin takes another step back, out of the real world and into the rather painful terrain that Ebony prepared for him. He roars in pain yet again and decides that is quite enough: he unleashes a withering blast of divine fire and lightning at the mecha-dragon, hoping to melt and zap the threat away.

Verise is no longer paying Tenjin any attention, instead helping the medics try to save as many of her soldiers as can be helped.

[Rebonack]

[Granite City]

"You're that psychic type who ruined my deal with the kid! Now you're going to be in trouble," the Grunt tells... umm... something. He really isn't sure which direction he should be talking in. Several people are giving him weird looks. "If you think you can mess around with us you've got another thing coming!"

Maybe if they nettle him enough he might start incriminating himself?

Wouldn't that be fun!

[Limestone Town]

Bitey stops gnawing on the couch and sets his eyes on a new prize! The Trapinch leaps up and tries clamping onto one of Kellform's... eerr... pseudopods.

That might be uncomfortable.

"I know, I know..." Fortuna replies in people-talk. Seems she has at the very least recovered the good sense not to start mewing in the middle of a PokeCenter. "I was just worried about you two is all. I've gotten in contact with Zebes and Jace. They're over in Granite City."

Nurse Armstrong's mustache twitches at that. "Granite City is a great distance from here. To reach it, you must travel through Mount Sedimentary, to and from Marble Metropolis, through Mount Igneous, and finally to Granite City itself. The path is long and treacherous."

[Lost_Deep]

Vulpine Outpost

Ebony is hiding, but trying to make that terrain ever worse. If Tenjin wants through here, he's going to pay for it in blood.

The mechadragon takes lightning and fire to the face, and the barely-formed face becomes slag. It then begins to re-form. Whatever this thing is, even direct damage from a holy being can't permanently harm it.

It's a juggernaut. You can't stop it. You can't kill it. It's a nigh-mindless force of destruction, the most you can do is slow it down and try to escape.

Limestone Town

And that's just the next step. We need to get back to the nexus... she looks at Armstrong. You exchange mail with the inside Nurse Armstrong? Is it purely, digital, or...?

Kellform sees the bite coming, and floats up a little, only getting a nip. "<Calm down!>"

[Deathkeeper]

Granite City

Jace mentally swears. If only he had a recording device! Oh well, witnesses will have to do.
Well, I don't know if I should be scared with that. I mean, it's not like selling kids Gloom Stones helps you much. It hurts pokemon and makes them hard for trainers to control while increasing their power and ferocity. How are you guys benefiting from that at all? Investing in the pokeball market is probably more lucrative. he Sends.
Yes, manga/anime logic villain! Tell us your plans!

[Rebonack]

[Limestone Town]

Fortuna slowly sits up to avoid getting dizzy, pulls an apricot out of her inventory spells, and tosses it to Kellform. "Here, give him this. He's probably hungry. I'm pretty sure he just hatched a few days ago."

<Pinch,> the Trapinch says, no doubt unable to say anything else. Yes.

"I use E-Mail," Nurse Armstrong replies. "There is a large field south of Gneiss Town that leads into the Nexus. There are cables running from there back into the sane part of the world that allows us to remain in contact with friends and family within the Nexus."

"Oooh, a diffuse bridge?" Fortuna says, suddenly perking up quite a bit more. "So there's a diffuse bridge between the Nexus and this world?"

"Yes, I suppose there is. To reach it you must travel through Mount Metamorphic, then to Gneiss Town, and finally to the fields beyond."

"Or we could all pile onto Zebes and just fly there," Fortuna suggests. "He's a Dragonite and he knows fly. That would beat having to crawl through a bunch of Zubat infested caves."

Friggin' Zubats.

[Granite City]

"Hah! Not with our Dark Helmets! A gloomy pokemon will treat anyone with a Dark Helmet as their rightful trainer!" the Grunt replies, feeling a lot better for telling this stupid pokemon off. "And once you and your stupid dragon friend get gloomed like all the other pokemon, you'll have to do whatever we want!"

Wait...

The gloom status gets passed on to any pokemon fainted by a gloom'd pokemon. So that means all those wild pokemon that trainers are knocking out...

[Lost_Deep]

Limestone Town

Kellform will feed the Trapinch carefully. Usually Pokemon don't eat apricots, but... Trapinch likely has strong enough jaws to eat one.

Okay, if that's true, why doesn't Zebes just fly to us? Or, maybe not here-here, but somewhere nearby we can meet up at. We could likely solve this in under a day if we get in contact with them.

[Deathkeeper]

Granite City

Aaaand bingo.
"Hey, would anyone who just heard him shout that be willing to repeat it for the police? We've got a genuine conspiracy on our hands here!" Ghost-Sounds Jace out loud to the public, smiling broadly in victory.
And then, if the grunt tries to run/get help or send out pokemon? Zebes wiggles his antennae. The grunt might find it difficult or impossible to move, due to Zebes' Thunder Wave!