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Post by Atticus on Feb 12, 2016 16:45:09 GMT -5
Winter had begun to tear up, once the shock had settled. This was not what she had been expecting at all...
Her father's consciousness was ebbing, she could feel it as his body all but melted into the grass. She rubbed her cheek against his temple with a short whine.
"Daddy," she whispered, and his eyelids ceased their closing, as if on command. "Dominia wants to help you and mom..."
The Umbreon feigned a short growl, but it was clear he was too exhausted. The Eevee booped him on the nose sternly. "They only want to help."
"That bastard kept us from you," he muttered hoarsely, and his sharp, half-lidded gaze crept up to Dominia's. "And she was going to keep you from us, too."
"Well, you guys are scary," Win stated matter-of-factly. As her father breathed out a heavy sigh, the cub turned around to the Ninetales, all previous tears blinked from her eyes. "What can we do to help?"
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Post by subtleAssiduities on Feb 12, 2016 17:42:10 GMT -5
"We'll get them some berries." She looked up, once again accounted for who was where, what state they were in. "Tserua!" she called to the Absol, catching her in the crowd.
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Post by Atticus on Feb 12, 2016 17:45:29 GMT -5
The Absol was absolutely shaken by the events of the evening, it took several heartbeats for her to even realise someone had called for her. Even with things settling down, her heart was pumping like crazy.
"Y-yes?" the Pokémon said meekly, approaching the Ninetales in her usual, timid crouch.
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Post by subtleAssiduities on Feb 12, 2016 18:10:33 GMT -5
"Please get some healing berries, and... a cheri berry," she said, sparing at glance at the younger Umbreon, still struggling to regain his mobility.
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Post by Atticus on Feb 12, 2016 18:31:27 GMT -5
"Y-yes, ma'am!" The shaggy female hurried away into the berry den, nosing through the piles to collect what she needed.
She returned with an assortment of berries to tend to the visiting Pokémon's injuries. She laid down the Cheri, Sitrus, Lum, and Oran berries by Dominia's paws. Though, to be honest... she would be frightened when the four eeveelutions recovered.
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Post by subtleAssiduities on Feb 12, 2016 18:57:24 GMT -5
She nodded her thanks and rolled the Oran berry toward Angelo. Then she gathered up the others and cautiously approached the three Pokémon by the entrance of the village.
She started with the boys. They seemed less dangerous, more level-headed. She placed the Cheri berry before the Umbreon and nosed it close enough that he could take a bite. The affect was almost instant, and as his muscles loosened drew himself up to eat the rest of the fruit. Licking his lips, he smiled up at the Ninetails meekly. "Thank you, ma'am."
She found herself taken aback by his sweet, charming smile, so much like Winter's. She nodded. "You're very welcome. Can you help... your brother?" She pawed the Sitrus berry to him, and he nodded dutifully as he caught it under his paw.
"Is Winter okay?" he asked. "And my mum?"
"Everyone will be fine," she assured him. With a dip of her head she padded toward where Entei still held down the mother. Despite her no longer struggling , his grip remained, and Domnia did not ask him to lift it as she set a lum berry in front of the female. "Your children and your mate are being tended to. We never wished you any harm," she murmured humbly. "I am so sorry for what happened."
Her eyes narrowed dangerously, and Dominiar recognized in them that primal state of mind to distrust, to expect the worst and be prepared to fight. The scars of a life hard-lived, the resignation to unfairness, to abuse. These were the eyes of the Pokémon Domina expected to come into the village to stay.
A sinking feeling formed in Dominia's heart, and the guilt dragged her down. This was not a monster; this was a soul that should have been saved from a monster. And Dominia, in her ignorance, had taken away from her a spot of light as bright and shining as Winter. Her and her mate's ferocity, their aggression, even their children's innocence all made sense now. They were just trying to cling desperately to happiness- to their children's happiness -as they had never been able to cling to theirs.
"I'm so sorry," she found herself saying, her voice a broken rasp.
Vivian simply stared at her, and as Entei's weight lifted from her, she sluggishly rolled onto her stomach and stuck her claw into the fruit, pulling it toward her. Her eyes never left the Ninetails. But Dominia did not stay there long. Her eyes downcast, she stood and walked slowly through the crowd, giving gentle orders to those she could to not fear, to help the others, to encourage everyone to come out of hiding.
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Post by Atticus on Feb 12, 2016 21:56:58 GMT -5
"Come on, Dad," Winter encouraged softly, nosing the Umbreon's brow softly. When he finally responded, his eyes fluttering back open weakly, she bumped the oran berry against his muzzle. He opened his maw obediently and began to chew on the berry. Once it was ingested, he sat up, still tired, but recovered from the electric shock.
First thing to do, of course, was wrap his forepaw around his daughter and embrace her in a tight hug. The cub returned it, nuzzling his belly fur.
"I'm glad you're safe," he murmured, licking the tuft of hair on her forehead.
"Me too." Winter leaned up and touched her nose to his chin before racing off to check how the rest of her family was doing. Angelo trailed behind, slowly.
"Mum! Austin, Chance!" she called as she neared them.
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Post by subtleAssiduities on Feb 12, 2016 22:17:29 GMT -5
Crouched under the root of a tree that had risen above the soil and formed a tiny cove just big enough for her to fit into, Lemondrop watched the village slowly settle into an uneasy calm. She watched Dominia deliver the berries to the family that had started the drama, although she knew they had not started the chaos. She observed them each in turn, feeling her heart pounding, even in the palms of her hands. As Dominia walked away and the Umbreon nosed the berry toward the Espeon, forcing it into his mouth, gently waking him up, she was absolutely sure that her eyes had not deceived her, that this had not all been for naught. She really did recognize that face.
"Chance!"
The psychic type barely had the energy to lift his throbbing head, even with the assistance of the berry. He turned wearily toward the voice that had called his name- tiny, squeaky, familiar -but before he could see the source of it Austin blocked his view, crouched and growling a warning.
Lemondrop did not realize how aggresive the sparks were flying from her cheeks until they danced before her eyes. She skidded to a halt, reared back on her hind legs, and shook her head. "No, no! I'm not going to hurt him! I just-!" Her words caught in her throat, and she stared up at the Umbreon whose gentle face had suddenly gone grotesque with fear.
No, Austin didn't find reasons to be intimidating very often, but when he did, his expression was just as terrifying as his mother's, and as willful as his father's.
And he wasn't going to back down to a tiny Pikachu shooting sparks off like it was ready to explode. He didn't care what what her intentions were, or if she knew Chance. She wasn't going to harm his brother!
Lemondrop saw this all in the narrowed green eyes, the bared teeth. There was no talking to him. But she was not going anywhere. She would see that little runt if she had to knock out the Umbreon to do it.
Her hands balled into fists. She didn't want to do that.
"Let me see him, please! I know him!" she squeaked, taking a step forward. He bristled and braced, the sparks nipping at his legs and making him dance on his toes. Lemondrop gritted her teeth, but the sparks only flew farther. Damn this broken cheek!
"I'm not going to hurt him!" she said again. "Really! I just want to see him!" She let out a frustrated scream, and forcing her injured arm to move, she pressed her hand to her cheek. The sparks' chaotic dance redirected to her paw, disappearing from sight as they coursed through her tiny body. She trembled and shook, but her expression stayed hard as steel. "See? Now, let me see him!"
Austin's eyes widened. Was that really enough for him to be able trust her? What if she had been the one to shock them!? What did she want with Chance anyway?
Her berry ingested, Vivian's attention turned to the shrill voice she heard coming from near her sons. She turned toward them, and saw that at least they were both alright. Chance still didn't look like he could stand up, but he was awake, and Austin was... guarding him? From what, she couldn't see, but she could recognize that bristling, high rise of his back, the dedicated posture of a defender. She tried to get to her feet, but her shoulder was still too sore, and she sank down again, unable to move. She watched the two anxiously, and noted, with a smell sliver of satisfaction, that whatever Austin was protecting his brother from seem to be held at bay.
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Post by Atticus on Feb 12, 2016 22:42:55 GMT -5
"Lemondrop!" Winter squealed. She knew that tiny Pikachu; she couldn't forget her if she tried! "Austin, she's just sparkly! Her cheek is damaged, she's not being aggressive!" She ran up to them, but kept a good few paces back in case the small Electric Type lost her grip on her sparking.
Angelo, who was still fatigued, managed to push himself to reach his mate, who was watching the scene with anxious eyes. He nosed her, but kept his crimson eyes on his offspring, in case he needed to spring into action. That is, if he could.
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Post by subtleAssiduities on Feb 12, 2016 23:11:13 GMT -5
Vivian likewise gently nosed Angelo back, but her gaze remained on the children as well. Seeing the effort it took Angelo to reach her didn't make her feel confident that if something went wrong, there was much they could do about it. But as she listened to her daughter prattle on about who the hidden Pokémon was, her eyes narrowed. Lemondrop? Why was that word familiar?
Austin's hard expression broke at his sister's cry. He blinked and looked down at her. Sparkly? Yes, he could see that, but the way she had come at them- it was an attack, wasn't it? Or did everything seem like an attack with how crazy things had gotten? "What? But... Then-?"
Chance's hazy eyes widened at the name. Even through the haze of a persistent headache, it had come through clear as day. Lemondrop.
It was a name he could never forget; it was the first name he had ever been told, the designation of the first Pokémon to ever introduce themselves to him. It was his first memory, the first thing he had seen, the first word he remembered ever hearing. It was the name he could count on for assistance when Vivian wasn't there, when Tunes wasn't paying attention. It was the name he cried in frustration when he was being picked on, before he was big enough to fight or really stand up for himself.
It was the name that rang in his head in his darkest moments, clung to him like claws dragging him downward, because it was the first and last thing he had ever heard Tunes scream, absolutely shriek, in complete and utter horror.
Halloween! Lemondrop!
He found himself back in the underground lair, bruised and fatigued scared out of his wits. He saw the explosion, felt the heat on his face, smelled the burning wires, the angry steel. He felt Firecracker's teeth in his neck, dragging him and Tunes away too tightly, too painfully, all a flurry of terror and anger and shame that he had not been able to help Tunes get out of it sooner, had not been able to save his friends' lives.
Had she really said Lemondrop?
The pikachu perked up at Winter's intervention and she nodded, the motion causing a few dull sparks to escape from under her paw. Austin looked from Winter, to Lemondrop, to Chance, and his eyes lingered on his brother; the sudden tension in his body, the stunned, far away look, as if he was seeing something invisible to the rest of them. Not a vision, he knew; no part of Chance was glowing, his tail wasn't moving. He was still as a statue. He was like stone. Austin suddenly went from being confused to desperately unsettled. "Chance? What? What is it? What's going on?"
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Post by Atticus on Feb 12, 2016 23:32:06 GMT -5
"Lemondrop?" Angelo muttered quietly as he lowered himself beside his mate. He searched his memory for the familiarity... it rang a bell in his head; one repressed, jarring bell.
That was it... Goldenrod City... When hunger and delusion had consumed the young Umbreon enough to not recognise his own friends, to view them only as food, or an obstacle between him and his next meal. It was Lemondrop, that pocket Pikachu, who had shocked him out of his feral state back then.
Intrigued, he hoisted up his head to assess the situation, but he couldn't see much while not on his fours. She had quite the spark to her back then, was she troubling his sons? He wouldn't mind some payback, but... he also had to thank her.
Meanwhile, Winter was prodding her eldest brother, trying to shake him out of his trance.
"Hey, she didn't shock you, you're not supposed to be paralyzed," she insisted, and gave the Espeon her classic nose-boop.
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Post by subtleAssiduities on Feb 12, 2016 23:43:16 GMT -5
Austin was concerned at the look on his brother's face. But when Winter didn't seem to be able to shake him out of it, he was worried. He had never seen Chance freeze like this before. "Chance," he said, nosing his other side. "Come on, snap out of it. Wake up, what's wrong?"
The hostility out of the air, Lemondrop took the opportunity to drop onto all fours- or threes, since she was still holding her cheek -and she hopped around Austin and stopped in front of Chance. Standing right in her line of sight, she shook her little hand, doing all she could to become his focus that didn't necessitate her paw leaving he cheek. "Chance! It's me! Lemondrop! Don't you remember me?"
Slowly his lavender pupils drew together and downward, focusing on the tiny mouse. But he didn't lose his statuesque posture. It was as if he were completely unable to move.
"I found you when you were a runt, we trained together, I taught you how to talk and eat berries and zapped you when you were bad! Don't you remember me?" Her voice strained with desperation. If Chance didn't know who she was, then what could she possibly do? He was the only chance of having anything ever again. She wasn't the fighter she used to be, and she certainly couldn't live in Tunes' pocket, but she... she missed them. She missed all of them so much. She wanted their love again. She wanted to go home. She didn't want to be dead anymore.
Something softened the Espeon's expression, and bit by bit movement reentered his body. First it was the flick of an ear, and then the gentle twitch of a brow, the wiggle of his nose. And then his his big shining eyes, still round and babylike as she remembered them, filled with tears, and he sniffled like the infant she remembered. "Lemondrop?"
Austin couldn't believe what he was seeing. First he thought the extra shine on his brother's eyes was the flicker of a glow, a premonition of him preparing his telekinesis. But then when it was tears, of all things, he didn't know what to think. Chance had never cried before. Austin didn't think he had ever even seen him sad! What was happening here? Who was this mouse?
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Post by Atticus on Feb 13, 2016 0:26:13 GMT -5
Chance was... crying? Win had never seen him look so... infant-like. She was the baby sister, after all.
She looked up at Austin, concerned. Then to her parents.
"Does... do they know each other?" she blinked. Had Chance been to the village before? Was that how he knew to find her?
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Post by subtleAssiduities on Feb 13, 2016 0:41:29 GMT -5
Austin was unable to answer his sister. It seemed that way, but... how? He knew Chance got out a lot more than he did, but where would he have met someone like this? Where would he have met a member of this weird little baby-stealing village?
If either of them heard the siblings, neither acknowledged them. A sob ripping from his throat, Chance sprung upon the mouse with catlike accuracy, but she met with blunted claws and quivering lips instead of teeth. With a startled peep Lemondrop was dragged toward the Espeon, who clutched her to his chest and wept into his own paws. She only barely managed to keep her hand to her broken cheek, but even so she could feel the jolts of electricity affecting Chance's muscles, the spasms in his arms as he pressed his head against her. Her throat tightened, and she struggled feebly to get out of his grasp. "Stop, stop, you stupid runt! Can't you tell you're getting shocked!?"
Her voice broke as tears prickled at the corners of her eyes, and Chance only pulled her closer. His velvety fur darkened around his muzzle as tears dribbled down his face, and he gasped for breath clumsily through the jolts of electricity making it hard to control his limbs. With a soft whimper Lemondrop conceded, and she clung to his face with her free hand. The submission to her grown up charge seemed to soothe the electricity pounding out of her cheek, at least in part; the bolts weakened, and it became easy for both of them to control the jerky motions of their limbs. "I missed you, you dumb lump."
"I thought you were dead!" He couldn't remember crying since he was a tiny kit, but that was exactly what he felt like right now. The soft jolts tingling his skin, eliciting twitches and flicks throughout his body seemed the only thing to make perfect sense anymore. He couldn't make sense of where she had come from, or how she had gotten here, or any of the stuff that had happened in between leaving the ranch and finding her now, but he was afraid if he released her for even a second, she would disappear and be gone forever again.
Vivian found herself bridling at the visible jolts rocking Chance's form, even as sure as she was that they weren't truly hurting him. She pushed herself to her paws again and stood there, fighting the tremor in her weak leg. Lemondrop, Lemondrop... she should remember that name! She knew she should. Raking her memory for some trace of it, she was taken back to walks in the cities, the sharp voice of a little girl she would have happily ignored if she had the power, a little creamy kit bouncing at her feet, not hers, but more hers than Austin and Winter would ever be. There it was, the body to the name! Sitting in tiny Tunes' pocket, squeaking orders, sassing everything that moved. Yes, it was her. But why was she here?
Vivian had not been present for the even that led to Lemondrop's and the snake's disappearance- she didn't even try to remember his name -but the fallout of it had changed Chance irreparably. The boldness that the team had coaxed out of him was gone in the blink of an eye; the next time she traveled with the team, he was stuck so close to her leg that she had simply carried him from place to place. And Tunes had never been the same either. That even robbed her of her smile, of bubbly patience. Her shyness turned to coldness for the longest time. Only when she started taking on stranger's Pokémon did she seem to regain some of that part of herself. But she, Chance, and the rest of that team were never the same. She had been sure that it was awful. She had assumed them dead, and that Chance and Tunes and Aviator and Firecracker had all seen it happen, in whatever way it had. None of them had ever said a single word about it.
But there was Lemondrop, clutched in Chance's paws.
What the fuck had happened?
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Post by Atticus on Feb 14, 2016 14:48:19 GMT -5
Relocating her family, even after helping them recover some strength, proved slightly difficult. There was Chance, attached to Lemondrop, her mother's shoulder, her father and brother's fatigue-- all four of them, really. As a little Eevee, there wasn't much she could do physically, but she hoped lightly headbutting their legs was more effective than it was irksome.
Winter felt content once they had all been shoved under the canopy, hopeful now that they could converse civilly with the villagers. She was not excited, however, for the impending lecture about sneaking off once her parents recovered their bearings. Not that her adventure had really turned out all that bad. Well, for her anyway.
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