A Shadow, an Eon, and a Worm (Worm/Pokemon)
- Thread starter ShadowPixelle
- Start date
- Crossover
- Location
- England, Smugsville.
And Taylor has no idea just how confusing she was just then. After all, it's not like anyone other than her family and team has any idea of rescue team 'jargon'.
Bold of you to assume that she's not doing this on purpose.
And she is becoming the team mom of the group.
Well someone has to! Have you seen these two?
Yeah, trolling by telling the truth is fun. And sadly, not many chances to get souvenirs. Though no-one's gonna stop one of the Capes of this team taking pictures if she wants...
Anyway! Sorry I'm late, again. I meant to post a reply last week, kept forgetting/getting distracted/having to do coursework, and then yesterday I forgot it was Sunday for a while. Chapter incoming shortly, as soon as I've edited it for posting. Prepare thyselves, this is the beginning of what I like to call the Oh Shit Arc. Shit happens.
Chapter 33- Meetings, thoughts, and terror
- Location
- England, Smugsville.
June 26th, 2011. Sunday.
"So you've not had anything else come through about what's going on?" Danny asked, as Taylor finished getting into her costume upstairs.
Eon shook his head, a mug of coffee in his telekinetic grip before him. "No, nothing." He replied, glancing at the man before refocusing on the Vulpix pacing the room. "I mean, in some ways I suppose that makes sense, if the information about whatever they're doing is classified and they don't have a secure method of reaching us." The PRT had their phone numbers, but phones weren't necessarily secure, even if you had some of the world's greatest Tinkers on the team. And it wasn't like they knew where the Den was to drop off a message; it was one of the great PHO mysteries, apparently, and there were threads dedicated to trying to figure out what exactly Inari claimed as their territory based on their patrol areas.
"But it would've been nice to know a bit more going in." Danny grumbled for him, heading to the kitchen to refill his own mug of coffee.
"Not that we've not had missions without info before." Shadow commented, from where she was pacing. She was alternating between sipping from a mug of hot chocolate, and a smaller glass with a blue liquid in it. Taking another drink from the glass, she pulled a face, sipping the hot chocolate again, and turned on the spot to keep pacing. "Mystery missions happen."
"They happen, sure, but that doesn't stop them being annoying." Eon returned. "How's your drink, by the way?"
"Terrible. Awful. Tastes like drinking miserable juice." She snipped, drinking it again and covering the taste with hot chocolate. "Zero out of ten, would not recommend. It's dry and bitter and boring and literally the only nice thing about this is the milk."
"Add something sweet to it next time?"
"Probably a good idea." Shadow grimaced. "At least it's keeping me awake."
"Just don't drink too much of it." Eon warned. "I know it's not like sugar or caffeine, but it's got the same effects."
"I won't, I won't."
"And don't roll your eyes."
Danny covered a snort with his coffee mug as Shadow glared at him.
"Anyway." He said, drawing both of their attention back. "You said Dragon said that it wasn't to do with the Simurgh Zones?"
"Yup." Shadow agreed. "But other than that I don't really know what the PRT would be calling us about, sooo..." She shrugged elegantly, her tails waving back and forth with the movement, before draining the remains of both of her drinks and putting them down on the table. "Also that was horrible and I hate that."
"We know, Shadow."
"Wonder if they're calling us about the weird explosions." She added, ignoring Eon's sigh with the ease of long experience. "Or maybe it's just about the ABB in general? Is it common knowledge that we're kinda friends with the ABB? I don't actually know."
"Oh Arceus." Eon muttered. That was the start of a ramble, and that was the sign of too much caffeine. Which was impressive since neither hot chocolate or Chesto Berry milkshakes had caffeine in them. "This is the sugar's fault, isn't it."
"Probably!" She grinned. "But it's also me being in a good mood and wanting to ramble a bit, and it's me being curious and wanting to speculate aloud instead of in my head. So honestly it's not much of the sugar, so don't worry I'm not gonna crash in the middle of the meeting."
"Once was enough."
"That wasn't my fault and you know it-?!"
"What wasn't?" Taylor asked, coming into her kitchen in her costume. The Swarm mask was in her off hand, and she was running the other through her hair in an attempt to mess it up a little after the brush she'd pulled through it. Eon could see a number of bugs crawling out of her sleeves and into her hair, too, though the vast majority of them would come when she put her mask on instead, so she wouldn't crush them.
"Nothing." Shadow grumbled, reaching up to bat at Eon's side grumpily. He took it for what it was and didn't tell the story, because while it was amusing that she'd once crashed in the middle of a meeting with the leader of the Wigglytuff Guild, it was also something Shadow was incredibly embarrassed about- even if, as she said, it wasn't really her fault. Move side effects were painful sometimes.
"Talking about Shadow crashing in meetings." Eon explained, because he wasn't going to not tease her at least a little about it. "Mostly because the Chesto Berry milkshake thing was disgusting, apparently, so she's not going to be drinking any more of it."
"What was up with it?" Taylor slipped into the free seat next to them and took the mug of coffee off her father with a smile.
"Dry and bitter and tasted like misery." Shadow repeated, settling herself on the floor and waving her tails back and forth rather than jumping up to the table. "Need something sweet in it next time, either another Berry or something else."
"Those Spinda made it look so easy, didn't they." Eon mused idly, finishing his coffee and waiting for Taylor to quickly drink hers so they could get ready to leave properly. Their meeting was in another hour, at eleven, but leaving and arriving early didn't have any real downsides. Aside from maybe having to wait a bit.
Then again, if they were too early there was always the nice coffee shop that they'd been to with Amy and Vicky after the power testing, so they could stop there for something first.
"There sounds like a story there." Taylor muttered into her mug.
"Not an exciting one, just there was a cafe we visited once in another region. Ran by a Spinda, had set up right outside the Wigglytuff Guild there. They did smoothies with Berries and Gummis and stuff." Shadow explained. "It was cool. Eon, when we go back can we take another trip there so we can get some? I want smoothies."
"You want good smoothies." Eon corrected, chuckling. "But sure, once we're back at the Den in Alma, we can get everything sorted with Inari there and go to Sinah for smoothies."
"We can see if there's any smoothie shops to your taste here in the Bay as well, if you want." Taylor offered, sounding a little strange. Eon glanced at her, and she put her mug down on the table so she could turn and look at them both properly. "I don't know if they'd be as nice as these apparently are, but hey. Maybe you could pay them to do something with your Berries?"
"That could be cool." Shadow grinned, glancing up at her, then across to Eon. The Ninetales nodded absently, still watching his team mate.
There was something strange in her scent, he realised, and with a darting look down to Shadow he knew she'd noticed it too. They'd gotten a little out of practise with using scents to figure out emotional states, apparently; humans were easier to read than most Pokemon were, so it wasn't something they'd been doing as much. Even when a lot of their interactions were with people who wore masks and costumes, it was still easier to read their body language than it was to read some Pokemon's... But Taylor was good at keeping herself steady, using her bugs to funnel the movement part of emotions out of the way. It was sort of like dealing with the more mechanical or artificial Pokemon, and keeping an eye on her emotions was something better done with scent.
It felt sad.
After a few moments of confused glances back and forth, Eon suddenly realised what the problem was. It's because we're talking about going home. He thought, eyes a little wide. And Taylor can't come with us. Her dad's here, and she belongs here in Brockton Bay, on Earth Bet.
The realisation stung a surprising amount. Eon had always known, faintly and in the back of his head, that when he and Shadow went back home to Alma they'd be leaving Earth Bet behind. But this was the first time he'd really realised that they'd be leaving Taylor and Danny, as well as New Wave and Aquamarina and all of the other people they'd befriended during their time here.
Maybe we could see if Hoopa would be willing to portal us back and forth every now and then. He mused. It probably wouldn't be able to happen all that often, but spending some time swapping between worlds wouldn't cause that much trouble for the team. Especially since they've been handling themselves alone for a while now.
Eon blinked at the feeling of a sudden sharp poke to the side, barely suppressing a yelp as he glanced down at Shadow. "Ready to go?"
"Oh-" He blinked again, noting that Taylor was standing up and hugging her dad, mask now firmly in place. "Sure. Sorry."
Getting down from the chair, he accepted the Treasure Bag from Shadow and slung it across his back, nudging her slightly with a tail in thanks.
"We'll need to talk later." He heard her murmur, using her audio illusion to project it closer to his ears. He nodded back, trotting over to the door and leveraging his own illusion around them before pulling it open. Swarm was in position not even a moment later, and they quickly made their way out of the house and towards the streets, aiming to put as much distance between them and the house as possible before dropping the illusion.
Amy sighed quietly, stretching and falling back onto her bed with a soft puff of blankets. Thanks to the timing of the Leviathan attack, the majority of schools in the Bay had just decided to give everyone an extended summer instead, especially given the damage done to Winslow that meant that a lot of students would need to be moved. Arcadia had just handed out a ton of extra summer homework instead, so Amy was getting a good head-start on that.
Unlike Vicky, who was alternating between messing about with her friends and trying to offer help around town as Glory Girl.
Though to be fair to her sister, even she'd gotten started on the work. Usually doing it at the same time as Amy, giving her someone to complain at whenever she was bored, but she was doing her best not to be distracting even then. It was like a switch had flipped in the aftermath of everything that went down with Leviathan, and her sister was trying to be a brand new person.
It was almost worrying how much she was focusing on that, even if she was still very much the same Vicky. She still went out shopping and hung about with Dean and the other Wards, but she was more careful with her aura and in the few fights she'd been involved in- more scuffles really- she'd been careful not to hurt anyone or cause any damage to the area.
Amy wondered how much of that was because of losing Carol versus what had happened with Shadow after the end of the fight.
Shadow was another thing that'd been preying on her mind for a while. Pretty much since they'd started healing together, though ever since Leviathan and the Master power testing it'd been a little more intense. Amy wasn't totally sure why, but she was curious about how that power of hers worked.
She'd watched it before, standing with her hand on the kitsune's back while she sent out those waves of healing power. She'd seen how it flowed into people as well, in cases like the one with Battery where she'd watched both sides at the same time.
But something about how it interacted with the Masters had made her curious, and she couldn't quite shake it. It was partly how it hit the Capes- there was the faint feeling of something snapping, like some kind of cable or rope that was being pulled too tightly and then cut- but also Shadow herself.
It was rare that Amy was in contact enough to actually get to watch Shadow recover, but in this case she had. Not much, only little trickles of it between uses of the ability, but...
It was odd. Like watching water bubble out of an underground spring, only without any sort of visual indicator that something was happening other than her own gut instinct. She knew there was something refilling, and something being refilled, but she couldn't see any indication of it anywhere, even though something told her she should be looking straight at it.
It was frustrating.
A knock at the door made her jump. "Ready to go, Ames?" Vicky called from outside her room.
"Just a sec!" She replied, rolling off the bed and brushing herself down. "Let me get my costume out, then we can head over to the hospital."
"Alright, no problem!"
Amy could faintly hear her sister floating away down the hall, probably back to her own room to open her windows for them to leave through, and smiled slightly, going to the wardrobe to get her costume.
At least healing wasn't as tedious as it used to be now, since she'd sometimes have a friend to help out.
Pausing for a moment to let Shadow throw the takeaway cups in the nearby bin, Eon flicked his tails and let his two team mates get into position before sweeping into the PRT building.
"Hello again, Inari." The receptionist, Kay, greeted. By this point Inari were practically regular visitors to the building, so they were used to seeing the various receptionists on duty there. Usually it was the early morning or late night shifts, admittedly, but they'd met the day shift as well on a few occasions. "I didn't think you were going anywhere for a while?"
"We're not, ma'am." Eon replied, smiling a little. "We've got a meeting with the Director."
Kay blinked, raising an eyebrow, and consulted something on her computer. "Oh, so you do." She confirmed. "You're a bit early, but just wait over there and I'll call to let her know you're here."
"Thank you."
Swarm was already making her way over to the visitors area, taking a seat on the right of the first set of three she came across- there were a few others waiting for things today, apparently, so they had some company- so Eon and Shadow merely followed her there, Eon sitting in the centre and Shadow on the left. The person on her other side was focused on a magazine, obviously trying very hard not to stare at the trio, while the person a chair over from Swarm had discreetly leaned away a little to give the insect user some room. The other visitors were giving them curious glances, one teenager had her phone out and was pointing it at them in that awkward way that people do when they're trying to be causal and stealthy and failing miserably, but the guards dotted around the room and various secretarial staff wandering in and out barely gave them a glance. At this point, they were pretty much regular visitors to the PRT building anyway, even if it usually happened at more extreme hours, but it was nice to see that they'd become something that was considered to just be another part of the job.
It reminded Eon of the Wigglytuff Guild at home once again, where Inari had quickly become a common sight there getting missions from the bulletin boards or checking the outlaw listings. Even Eon's 'shininess' eventually stopped being notable for anything other than a good way for Pokemon looking for help to figure out who Team Inari was.
Eon shook his head slightly, lifting a paw to brush away the crest as it swayed with the motion. Get ahold of yourself! He mentally scolded. Getting all caught up in thinking about Alma and the team isn't going to help here.
Fortunately, they didn't need to wait long, apparently the Director didn't care that they were early for the meeting and just wanted them around. Armsmaster's heavily armoured form approached them, and Eon easily swept himself from the chair to meet him halfway, Swarm and Shadow on either side of him.
"Armsmaster." He smiled, offering a paw. "I hope you're doing well." The Tinker didn't often encounter them, only sometimes appearing to supervise the preparations of the Dragoncraft they were taking to whatever Simurgh Zone they'd been arranged for, and even then Eon was fairly close to certain that he was only there to speak to Dragon herself rather than actually oversee anything. He seemed quite fond of the woman, not that Eon could blame him; Dragon was a naturally pleasant person the likes of which it was rare to find.
He nodded slightly, shaking Eon's paw and offering more noticeable nods to Shadow and Swarm rather than shaking hands with them. "Well enough. I see you and Shadow are recovering from the other day."
"It's getting easier, thankfully, plus we've got much better recovery plans compared to the earlier missions out." Eon shrugged. "But that isn't important right now."
"I suppose so." Armsmaster seemed quite relieved to leave the small talk behind, the scent drifting through even over the smell of blue-glitter-silver that made up his Tinkertech armour, and turned back to the door he'd come through originally. "We can continue this conversation somewhere more secure." He added over his shoulder, making Eon give both his team mates a quick look before following on a step and a half behind their escort.
Their path quickly took a turn down a different corridor to the usual path to the roof, unsurprising given that this wasn't a trip out, so the trio focused on keeping track of where they were and what was around them; Swarm had her bugs, and Eon knew she was using the smaller ones to mark a pathway through the corridors; Shadow was listening around them, using her senses to get an idea of the surroundings; and Eon merely used the well-learned skill of keeping up with twisty Mystery Dungeon paths to avoid getting lost as they walked. A few times, they passed by various PRT agents, who gave them odd- and sometimes nervous- looks as they walked, but no-one tried to stop them at all.
The benefits of having someone in charge escorting you, Eon supposed.
The door they stopped in front of was pretty nondescript as far as rooms in a government building went, with a pair of troopers standing guard outside of it. Eon recognised one of them as Karaday, the man who'd escorted them from the PRT building in the aftermath of Canberra, and gave the man a small smile and nod of acknowledgement as they pass by.
"Director." Armsmaster called, making the three women in the room look up. They're seated at the other end of the table from the doorway, in easy view, and as Miss Militia and Dragon stood to greet them the Director nodded.
"Armsmaster, Inari." She said, barely taking her eyes from the tablet in front of her.
"Thank you for coming so quickly." Miss Militia took over, walking the length of the room and offering her hand to Eon. He shook it and Dragon's as the Tinker arrived, looking between them as they led the way back to the table.
The team settled into position quickly on the opposite side to the Parahumans, all looking to the Director as she put her tablet to one side and folded her hands in front of her, clearing her throat.
"Yes. Thank you for being prompt."
"It's no trouble, Director Piggot." Eon stated easily, shifting a little in the chair. "We're recovered from the trip to Stockholm, and Dragon said that you were asking for us. You've been helping us a lot with the Simurgh Containment Zones, so it's no trouble to any of us to stop by and help you in return."
It truly wasn't, either. He'd spoken to Shadow and Swarm after they'd gotten back to the Den for a few hours of sleep, and- somewhat fortunately- neither of them had had any issues with dropping by today for a meeting. It had been Shadow that had said what he'd just replied with, but he was speaking for the entire team when he said it.
"Still, it is quite short notice, and given that you've been in and out of the city frequently I wouldn't have been surprised if you'd asked for more time before the meeting." Piggot replied, before shaking her head. "Anyway, we were hoping for your assistance with a small matter."
"It's our duty to help people out, and we're honoured to do it." The Ninetales shrugged, curling his tails a little. Beside him, both Swarm and Shadow straightened, putting their full focus on the situation ahead of them. "How can we help?"
"In the aftermath of the Leviathan attack last month, Dragon lent us some drones to assist with cleanup." Armsmaster began, after a short silence that sounded somewhat surprised. "A few days after, while working on the path that Leviathan fled along, one of them found an object." Picking up a tablet of his own, he poked at it for a moment, then turned it so the group could see.
It was a large chunk of something, turquoise in colour with brighter green ripples dotted around on it. The entire thing was huge, from the scale they could get looking at it; perhaps twice the size of Shadow, at the very least.
"We thought, at first, it was something generated by one of the powers being used in the battle, and it just hadn't faded away." He continued, letting them examine the picture as he spoke. Shadow had a paw placed on the edge of the table for balance and was leaning forward, peering down her nose, and while Swarm's mask obscured her face, it seemed likely she was squinting at it. Eon was doing the same, leaning forward as much as he could while still remaining in place, but he focused more of his attention on the Parahuman speaking, knowing his team mates would handle the image. "We had the drone bring it in to run tests on; it's not made of any material that we know of, which admittedly isn't necessarily new for Parahuman abilities..."
"But due to the fact that it was in Leviathan's escape path, I doubt it was something another Parahuman created." Swarm said quietly.
"You think my Thunder managed to damage Leviathan and knock a chunk off?" Shadow asked, pushing herself back into her chair. "It... could be plausible, I guess. If I managed to hit at about the same point Eon did, there'd already be a weak spot there, so it might be plausible that my Thunder could knock loose a chunk when nothing else had."
Especially given that our Moves seem to run on such a totally different energy that Parahuman powers don't know how to react. Eon added to himself. Given the way Lung's power had reacted, as well as the occasional strange moments with Amy when she and Shadow were healing at the hospital, her power apparently not quite tracking Shadow's healing until after it was completely finished, it wouldn't surprise Eon to find that Parahuman powers just didn't quite gel with the Aura used to power Moves.
Dragon nodded, bringing his attention back to the point. "That was what we hypothesised as well." She agreed. "We bought it into the labs for testing, like Armsmaster said, because we thought that if we were able to study it we might be able to find something that would work more effectively on the Endbringers than just relying on your abilities having some sort of natural countereffect against them. Nothing against yourselves, but you might not always be around to deal with them, or you might get taken out too early to be relied on."
"Trust me, no offence taken."
"So, what happened?" Shadow questioned, raising an eyebrow. "Obviously something didn't go to plan, or you wouldn't have called us in."
"Indeed." Director Piggot sighed heavily. "In the end, nothing we've tried has done anything to it. The thing is as durable as it is sitting on Leviathan's body."
"So you want us to try?"
Given the looks traded on the other side of the room, that answer wasn't what they were fishing for.
"Thank you for the offer, that would be appreciated." Armsmaster accepted. "But the situation we were hoping for your help with is something different." Eon raised an eyebrow as well, tilting his head. "All of our work has had to be done via drones, due to the... effects, that the crystal has."
"Effects?"
"Any human getting too close to the crystal becomes nauseous." Miss Militia cut in. "Past a certain point, there was a mild effect of dizziness, and getting closer strengthened it to the point of the person losing balance. None of the drones had any issues at all, hence us needing to use them, but a person inside armour was still affected, so it obviously isn't something to do with the materials they're made out of. We're uncertain as to what it is that's causing it-"
"You want them to try." Swarm suddenly interrupted, stiffening. "You want to test if something non-human is affected, animals can't talk normally and they'd likely need a Master of some sort to get them close enough, so you aren't able to use them, meaning that you've turned to the nearest group of non-humans that you can think of. Team Inari."
The group traded looks again, and Eon gave Shadow one of his own.
"Obviously you're under no obligation to help." Miss Militia hurried to add, looking nervous. "But you were the first group that came to mind, especially given that your abilities seem to have a much stronger effect against the Endbringers than Parahumans do, so..."
Shadow raised her right paw in a sort of shrug- accidentally shutting Miss Militia up in the process- and Eon nodded his acceptance. "Very well. We might as well take a look."
Swarm gave them a small glance, and Shadow piped up to continue, "We're already here, we've been given the information, and like Miss Militia said, we've already been seen to have a strange relation to the Endbringers. We might as well take a look at it."
Director Piggot gave them a hard look, tracing from Swarm on one side of the table all the way to Armsmaster opposite her, then sighed. "We'll take you down to the lab, then."
The trip to the lab was short, the conference room apparently having been chosen specifically so it was nearby, and the entire thing was filled with a mildly tense silence from the PRT team, some confusion from Swarm, and a silent conversation between Shadow and Eon as to what they were going to do.
The two guards from outside the conference room, Karaday and whoever, followed along with them and took up a position outside of the- much more heavy duty- doors to the lab, and after a brief pause where Armsmaster put in the code, they went in.
Looking around, it was mostly cleared of other things; they entered a shielded room much like the one they'd been in for power testing, with a doorway leading out into the main lab. Notepads and other things were scattered around in a way that implied the techs that normally kept to this lab had been moved out for the time being, making Eon wonder what they were planning to do with the information they got, and the large windows were slightly more tinted than the ones in the power testing room.
"Director Piggot will be observing the proceedings from in here." Armsmaster explained, as the rest of them headed for the other door. "Everyone else will be in the main room."
The centre of the room was taken up by a large metal box, sitting in the centre of a taped-off square. "The tape marks the point where the side effects started." Dragon told them, as Shadow made her way closer. Eon stayed a little way behind her, and Swarm at the very end of the line. Both of them paused when they reached the tape line, while Shadow hesitated and stepped over. She paused herself when her paw hit the floor, but when nothing appeared to happen she continued all the way.
"Don't feel anything strange..." She mused aloud, walking closer to the box. Sniffing at it, she turned to Dragon. "Could you take this apart or something? Your Tinkertech smell is blocking whatever the crystal's one is."
"Of course. One moment..." The Tinker went silent, doing something from within her suit, and Shadow stepped away as it beeped and split apart.
"No change." She reported, starting to circle it.
"No, the box didn't change anything. We put it there in the hopes of it stopping the effects, but nothing changed." Miss Militia told her.
Looking at it now, it was a lot bigger than Eon had thought from the picture; about three feet wide and four tall, with sharp points sticking out at random places. The centre of it was a brighter colour than the turquoise of the rest, more teal, and sparkled brightly in the harsh light of the lab.
"It... hm." Shadow sniffed at it again, completing her circuit. "It smells... strange. Blue and glitter, kind of like a Water Stone or something. Makes sense, given Leviathan. But there's something else to it as well. Like... forests?" She shook her head and closed her eyes, breathing deeply. "This is so weird."
"What's wrong?"
"It's got a lot of scents. And normally that's not that weird, things have a lot of scents, but they're strange... Blue and glitter and forests and deserts and gemstones and lakewater and..." She rolled her paw around as she trailed off. "I've never seen anything with this many different smells that're so different." Shadow paused. "And they smell weird as well. Like they've been on the thing for ages, but they're new as well."
"That doesn't make any sense." Eon muttered.
"No." Shadow bit her lip, then slowly reached out and poked the side with her paw. She recoiled away almost instantly, then put it back when nothing happened. "I guess it's not activated by touch, either... I wonder if there's something specific that you're supposed to do to it."
"Perhaps." The Ninetales hummed, giving her a look. Glancing up at Swarm in a warning to stay put, he stepped over the tape line to join his second in command, only to freeze as a wave of dizziness hit him.
Awfully familiar dizziness, which caught him by surprise in a wave of something complex.
"Shadow, back!" He barked, running over to her and pushing the dizziness to one side.
"Wha-?" Shadow startled, backing away from the crystal in reflex as the rest of the room jolted at the sudden shout. Eon skidded to a halt next to her, knocking slightly into her side and causing her to automatically steady herself using the rock while his tails whipped around-
The little Vulpix sighed, kicking at the grass.
"Too young my behind." She grumbled sadly. "Stupid Guild rules not letting solo Pokemon join. Stupid team requirement. Stupid age requirement." She huffed, turning on the spot and walking away, head down.
"Hello there, little pix." A somewhat familiar voice greeted a few steps later, making her look up in surprise. "What's wrong with you?"
"Oh. Hello, Mr. Eon sir." She said softly, waving at him. "Just the Guild, is all."
"Did you go and try to make a Rescue Team again?" She blinked, gaping at him.
"How'd you know?"
"I've seen you around." Eon shrugged, grey fur rippling and glittering in the dying sunlight. "I know you want to be a Rescue Pokemon. I think you're far too young to be trying on your own, but I do admire your dedication."
"Thanks." She sighed, kicking at the ground again. "But yeah, the Guild won't even let me train, for Arceus' sake. They could at least take me on and teach me, right?"
"They could, yes." Eon nodded in agreement, placing a paw on her head. "I know how you feel, though." The Vulpix was fairly sure he did; being the only shiny Pokemon in the town, a Ninetales at that, and having complete amnesia aside from his name and that he was a former human on top of it all, it made for a fairly big combination for a mix of nervousness, distrust and awe from Pokemon around town.
"Hey, I know!" She suddenly said, perking up. "I know! We could form a team together!"
"Pardon?" Eon blinked.
"We're both pretty good, right? So we could make a team together, and that way we'd be able to do cool rescue stuff!"
"I suppose." He mused, grinning slightly. "But would anyone else be alright with that?"
"Hmph, who cares what others think?" She smirked. "It's up to us, right?"
"I guess." Eon agreed. "Sure. Let's make a Rescue Team."
"Thanks, Eon!"
"No problem, little Shadow."
-Eon and Shadow shuddered, swaying and falling to the ground in a pile.
"Pft." Shadow muttered, spitting out a bit of fur that'd gotten caught in her mouth. "That was... weird." Eon, being more used to the situation, pulled himself up and lifted her by the scruff of her neck- something he hadn't done since they were still new to being a Rescue Team and she was still young, making her bark indignantly as he hurried out of the taped-off area. "Hey!"
"Sorry, little pix." He replied after releasing her. Swarm knelt down beside them, running a hand carefully over their fur, and the three PRT Parahumans came closer. "But... this isn't good."
"Why not?" Dragon asked, as Shadow shook her head.
"That was weird." She repeated, looking at it in confusion. "Why'd it make me think of that, for Arceus' sake? What's Wigglytuff Guild got to do with, well, anything?"
"The Dimensional Scream." Eon said, sitting down heavily with a sigh. Shadow stiffened, gaping.
"Wait, that- that doesn't make sense." She returned. "I've never seen a Scream before, so why-"
"That's a Time Gear."
"Oh."
Silence reigned for a minute; Eon and Shadow in shock, the rest confused- except maybe Swarm, who knew at least a little about those stories.
"Well heck."
"So you've not had anything else come through about what's going on?" Danny asked, as Taylor finished getting into her costume upstairs.
Eon shook his head, a mug of coffee in his telekinetic grip before him. "No, nothing." He replied, glancing at the man before refocusing on the Vulpix pacing the room. "I mean, in some ways I suppose that makes sense, if the information about whatever they're doing is classified and they don't have a secure method of reaching us." The PRT had their phone numbers, but phones weren't necessarily secure, even if you had some of the world's greatest Tinkers on the team. And it wasn't like they knew where the Den was to drop off a message; it was one of the great PHO mysteries, apparently, and there were threads dedicated to trying to figure out what exactly Inari claimed as their territory based on their patrol areas.
"But it would've been nice to know a bit more going in." Danny grumbled for him, heading to the kitchen to refill his own mug of coffee.
"Not that we've not had missions without info before." Shadow commented, from where she was pacing. She was alternating between sipping from a mug of hot chocolate, and a smaller glass with a blue liquid in it. Taking another drink from the glass, she pulled a face, sipping the hot chocolate again, and turned on the spot to keep pacing. "Mystery missions happen."
"They happen, sure, but that doesn't stop them being annoying." Eon returned. "How's your drink, by the way?"
"Terrible. Awful. Tastes like drinking miserable juice." She snipped, drinking it again and covering the taste with hot chocolate. "Zero out of ten, would not recommend. It's dry and bitter and boring and literally the only nice thing about this is the milk."
"Add something sweet to it next time?"
"Probably a good idea." Shadow grimaced. "At least it's keeping me awake."
"Just don't drink too much of it." Eon warned. "I know it's not like sugar or caffeine, but it's got the same effects."
"I won't, I won't."
"And don't roll your eyes."
Danny covered a snort with his coffee mug as Shadow glared at him.
"Anyway." He said, drawing both of their attention back. "You said Dragon said that it wasn't to do with the Simurgh Zones?"
"Yup." Shadow agreed. "But other than that I don't really know what the PRT would be calling us about, sooo..." She shrugged elegantly, her tails waving back and forth with the movement, before draining the remains of both of her drinks and putting them down on the table. "Also that was horrible and I hate that."
"We know, Shadow."
"Wonder if they're calling us about the weird explosions." She added, ignoring Eon's sigh with the ease of long experience. "Or maybe it's just about the ABB in general? Is it common knowledge that we're kinda friends with the ABB? I don't actually know."
"Oh Arceus." Eon muttered. That was the start of a ramble, and that was the sign of too much caffeine. Which was impressive since neither hot chocolate or Chesto Berry milkshakes had caffeine in them. "This is the sugar's fault, isn't it."
"Probably!" She grinned. "But it's also me being in a good mood and wanting to ramble a bit, and it's me being curious and wanting to speculate aloud instead of in my head. So honestly it's not much of the sugar, so don't worry I'm not gonna crash in the middle of the meeting."
"Once was enough."
"That wasn't my fault and you know it-?!"
"What wasn't?" Taylor asked, coming into her kitchen in her costume. The Swarm mask was in her off hand, and she was running the other through her hair in an attempt to mess it up a little after the brush she'd pulled through it. Eon could see a number of bugs crawling out of her sleeves and into her hair, too, though the vast majority of them would come when she put her mask on instead, so she wouldn't crush them.
"Nothing." Shadow grumbled, reaching up to bat at Eon's side grumpily. He took it for what it was and didn't tell the story, because while it was amusing that she'd once crashed in the middle of a meeting with the leader of the Wigglytuff Guild, it was also something Shadow was incredibly embarrassed about- even if, as she said, it wasn't really her fault. Move side effects were painful sometimes.
"Talking about Shadow crashing in meetings." Eon explained, because he wasn't going to not tease her at least a little about it. "Mostly because the Chesto Berry milkshake thing was disgusting, apparently, so she's not going to be drinking any more of it."
"What was up with it?" Taylor slipped into the free seat next to them and took the mug of coffee off her father with a smile.
"Dry and bitter and tasted like misery." Shadow repeated, settling herself on the floor and waving her tails back and forth rather than jumping up to the table. "Need something sweet in it next time, either another Berry or something else."
"Those Spinda made it look so easy, didn't they." Eon mused idly, finishing his coffee and waiting for Taylor to quickly drink hers so they could get ready to leave properly. Their meeting was in another hour, at eleven, but leaving and arriving early didn't have any real downsides. Aside from maybe having to wait a bit.
Then again, if they were too early there was always the nice coffee shop that they'd been to with Amy and Vicky after the power testing, so they could stop there for something first.
"There sounds like a story there." Taylor muttered into her mug.
"Not an exciting one, just there was a cafe we visited once in another region. Ran by a Spinda, had set up right outside the Wigglytuff Guild there. They did smoothies with Berries and Gummis and stuff." Shadow explained. "It was cool. Eon, when we go back can we take another trip there so we can get some? I want smoothies."
"You want good smoothies." Eon corrected, chuckling. "But sure, once we're back at the Den in Alma, we can get everything sorted with Inari there and go to Sinah for smoothies."
"We can see if there's any smoothie shops to your taste here in the Bay as well, if you want." Taylor offered, sounding a little strange. Eon glanced at her, and she put her mug down on the table so she could turn and look at them both properly. "I don't know if they'd be as nice as these apparently are, but hey. Maybe you could pay them to do something with your Berries?"
"That could be cool." Shadow grinned, glancing up at her, then across to Eon. The Ninetales nodded absently, still watching his team mate.
There was something strange in her scent, he realised, and with a darting look down to Shadow he knew she'd noticed it too. They'd gotten a little out of practise with using scents to figure out emotional states, apparently; humans were easier to read than most Pokemon were, so it wasn't something they'd been doing as much. Even when a lot of their interactions were with people who wore masks and costumes, it was still easier to read their body language than it was to read some Pokemon's... But Taylor was good at keeping herself steady, using her bugs to funnel the movement part of emotions out of the way. It was sort of like dealing with the more mechanical or artificial Pokemon, and keeping an eye on her emotions was something better done with scent.
It felt sad.
After a few moments of confused glances back and forth, Eon suddenly realised what the problem was. It's because we're talking about going home. He thought, eyes a little wide. And Taylor can't come with us. Her dad's here, and she belongs here in Brockton Bay, on Earth Bet.
The realisation stung a surprising amount. Eon had always known, faintly and in the back of his head, that when he and Shadow went back home to Alma they'd be leaving Earth Bet behind. But this was the first time he'd really realised that they'd be leaving Taylor and Danny, as well as New Wave and Aquamarina and all of the other people they'd befriended during their time here.
Maybe we could see if Hoopa would be willing to portal us back and forth every now and then. He mused. It probably wouldn't be able to happen all that often, but spending some time swapping between worlds wouldn't cause that much trouble for the team. Especially since they've been handling themselves alone for a while now.
Eon blinked at the feeling of a sudden sharp poke to the side, barely suppressing a yelp as he glanced down at Shadow. "Ready to go?"
"Oh-" He blinked again, noting that Taylor was standing up and hugging her dad, mask now firmly in place. "Sure. Sorry."
Getting down from the chair, he accepted the Treasure Bag from Shadow and slung it across his back, nudging her slightly with a tail in thanks.
"We'll need to talk later." He heard her murmur, using her audio illusion to project it closer to his ears. He nodded back, trotting over to the door and leveraging his own illusion around them before pulling it open. Swarm was in position not even a moment later, and they quickly made their way out of the house and towards the streets, aiming to put as much distance between them and the house as possible before dropping the illusion.
Amy sighed quietly, stretching and falling back onto her bed with a soft puff of blankets. Thanks to the timing of the Leviathan attack, the majority of schools in the Bay had just decided to give everyone an extended summer instead, especially given the damage done to Winslow that meant that a lot of students would need to be moved. Arcadia had just handed out a ton of extra summer homework instead, so Amy was getting a good head-start on that.
Unlike Vicky, who was alternating between messing about with her friends and trying to offer help around town as Glory Girl.
Though to be fair to her sister, even she'd gotten started on the work. Usually doing it at the same time as Amy, giving her someone to complain at whenever she was bored, but she was doing her best not to be distracting even then. It was like a switch had flipped in the aftermath of everything that went down with Leviathan, and her sister was trying to be a brand new person.
It was almost worrying how much she was focusing on that, even if she was still very much the same Vicky. She still went out shopping and hung about with Dean and the other Wards, but she was more careful with her aura and in the few fights she'd been involved in- more scuffles really- she'd been careful not to hurt anyone or cause any damage to the area.
Amy wondered how much of that was because of losing Carol versus what had happened with Shadow after the end of the fight.
Shadow was another thing that'd been preying on her mind for a while. Pretty much since they'd started healing together, though ever since Leviathan and the Master power testing it'd been a little more intense. Amy wasn't totally sure why, but she was curious about how that power of hers worked.
She'd watched it before, standing with her hand on the kitsune's back while she sent out those waves of healing power. She'd seen how it flowed into people as well, in cases like the one with Battery where she'd watched both sides at the same time.
But something about how it interacted with the Masters had made her curious, and she couldn't quite shake it. It was partly how it hit the Capes- there was the faint feeling of something snapping, like some kind of cable or rope that was being pulled too tightly and then cut- but also Shadow herself.
It was rare that Amy was in contact enough to actually get to watch Shadow recover, but in this case she had. Not much, only little trickles of it between uses of the ability, but...
It was odd. Like watching water bubble out of an underground spring, only without any sort of visual indicator that something was happening other than her own gut instinct. She knew there was something refilling, and something being refilled, but she couldn't see any indication of it anywhere, even though something told her she should be looking straight at it.
It was frustrating.
A knock at the door made her jump. "Ready to go, Ames?" Vicky called from outside her room.
"Just a sec!" She replied, rolling off the bed and brushing herself down. "Let me get my costume out, then we can head over to the hospital."
"Alright, no problem!"
Amy could faintly hear her sister floating away down the hall, probably back to her own room to open her windows for them to leave through, and smiled slightly, going to the wardrobe to get her costume.
At least healing wasn't as tedious as it used to be now, since she'd sometimes have a friend to help out.
Pausing for a moment to let Shadow throw the takeaway cups in the nearby bin, Eon flicked his tails and let his two team mates get into position before sweeping into the PRT building.
"Hello again, Inari." The receptionist, Kay, greeted. By this point Inari were practically regular visitors to the building, so they were used to seeing the various receptionists on duty there. Usually it was the early morning or late night shifts, admittedly, but they'd met the day shift as well on a few occasions. "I didn't think you were going anywhere for a while?"
"We're not, ma'am." Eon replied, smiling a little. "We've got a meeting with the Director."
Kay blinked, raising an eyebrow, and consulted something on her computer. "Oh, so you do." She confirmed. "You're a bit early, but just wait over there and I'll call to let her know you're here."
"Thank you."
Swarm was already making her way over to the visitors area, taking a seat on the right of the first set of three she came across- there were a few others waiting for things today, apparently, so they had some company- so Eon and Shadow merely followed her there, Eon sitting in the centre and Shadow on the left. The person on her other side was focused on a magazine, obviously trying very hard not to stare at the trio, while the person a chair over from Swarm had discreetly leaned away a little to give the insect user some room. The other visitors were giving them curious glances, one teenager had her phone out and was pointing it at them in that awkward way that people do when they're trying to be causal and stealthy and failing miserably, but the guards dotted around the room and various secretarial staff wandering in and out barely gave them a glance. At this point, they were pretty much regular visitors to the PRT building anyway, even if it usually happened at more extreme hours, but it was nice to see that they'd become something that was considered to just be another part of the job.
It reminded Eon of the Wigglytuff Guild at home once again, where Inari had quickly become a common sight there getting missions from the bulletin boards or checking the outlaw listings. Even Eon's 'shininess' eventually stopped being notable for anything other than a good way for Pokemon looking for help to figure out who Team Inari was.
Eon shook his head slightly, lifting a paw to brush away the crest as it swayed with the motion. Get ahold of yourself! He mentally scolded. Getting all caught up in thinking about Alma and the team isn't going to help here.
Fortunately, they didn't need to wait long, apparently the Director didn't care that they were early for the meeting and just wanted them around. Armsmaster's heavily armoured form approached them, and Eon easily swept himself from the chair to meet him halfway, Swarm and Shadow on either side of him.
"Armsmaster." He smiled, offering a paw. "I hope you're doing well." The Tinker didn't often encounter them, only sometimes appearing to supervise the preparations of the Dragoncraft they were taking to whatever Simurgh Zone they'd been arranged for, and even then Eon was fairly close to certain that he was only there to speak to Dragon herself rather than actually oversee anything. He seemed quite fond of the woman, not that Eon could blame him; Dragon was a naturally pleasant person the likes of which it was rare to find.
He nodded slightly, shaking Eon's paw and offering more noticeable nods to Shadow and Swarm rather than shaking hands with them. "Well enough. I see you and Shadow are recovering from the other day."
"It's getting easier, thankfully, plus we've got much better recovery plans compared to the earlier missions out." Eon shrugged. "But that isn't important right now."
"I suppose so." Armsmaster seemed quite relieved to leave the small talk behind, the scent drifting through even over the smell of blue-glitter-silver that made up his Tinkertech armour, and turned back to the door he'd come through originally. "We can continue this conversation somewhere more secure." He added over his shoulder, making Eon give both his team mates a quick look before following on a step and a half behind their escort.
Their path quickly took a turn down a different corridor to the usual path to the roof, unsurprising given that this wasn't a trip out, so the trio focused on keeping track of where they were and what was around them; Swarm had her bugs, and Eon knew she was using the smaller ones to mark a pathway through the corridors; Shadow was listening around them, using her senses to get an idea of the surroundings; and Eon merely used the well-learned skill of keeping up with twisty Mystery Dungeon paths to avoid getting lost as they walked. A few times, they passed by various PRT agents, who gave them odd- and sometimes nervous- looks as they walked, but no-one tried to stop them at all.
The benefits of having someone in charge escorting you, Eon supposed.
The door they stopped in front of was pretty nondescript as far as rooms in a government building went, with a pair of troopers standing guard outside of it. Eon recognised one of them as Karaday, the man who'd escorted them from the PRT building in the aftermath of Canberra, and gave the man a small smile and nod of acknowledgement as they pass by.
"Director." Armsmaster called, making the three women in the room look up. They're seated at the other end of the table from the doorway, in easy view, and as Miss Militia and Dragon stood to greet them the Director nodded.
"Armsmaster, Inari." She said, barely taking her eyes from the tablet in front of her.
"Thank you for coming so quickly." Miss Militia took over, walking the length of the room and offering her hand to Eon. He shook it and Dragon's as the Tinker arrived, looking between them as they led the way back to the table.
The team settled into position quickly on the opposite side to the Parahumans, all looking to the Director as she put her tablet to one side and folded her hands in front of her, clearing her throat.
"Yes. Thank you for being prompt."
"It's no trouble, Director Piggot." Eon stated easily, shifting a little in the chair. "We're recovered from the trip to Stockholm, and Dragon said that you were asking for us. You've been helping us a lot with the Simurgh Containment Zones, so it's no trouble to any of us to stop by and help you in return."
It truly wasn't, either. He'd spoken to Shadow and Swarm after they'd gotten back to the Den for a few hours of sleep, and- somewhat fortunately- neither of them had had any issues with dropping by today for a meeting. It had been Shadow that had said what he'd just replied with, but he was speaking for the entire team when he said it.
"Still, it is quite short notice, and given that you've been in and out of the city frequently I wouldn't have been surprised if you'd asked for more time before the meeting." Piggot replied, before shaking her head. "Anyway, we were hoping for your assistance with a small matter."
"It's our duty to help people out, and we're honoured to do it." The Ninetales shrugged, curling his tails a little. Beside him, both Swarm and Shadow straightened, putting their full focus on the situation ahead of them. "How can we help?"
"In the aftermath of the Leviathan attack last month, Dragon lent us some drones to assist with cleanup." Armsmaster began, after a short silence that sounded somewhat surprised. "A few days after, while working on the path that Leviathan fled along, one of them found an object." Picking up a tablet of his own, he poked at it for a moment, then turned it so the group could see.
It was a large chunk of something, turquoise in colour with brighter green ripples dotted around on it. The entire thing was huge, from the scale they could get looking at it; perhaps twice the size of Shadow, at the very least.
"We thought, at first, it was something generated by one of the powers being used in the battle, and it just hadn't faded away." He continued, letting them examine the picture as he spoke. Shadow had a paw placed on the edge of the table for balance and was leaning forward, peering down her nose, and while Swarm's mask obscured her face, it seemed likely she was squinting at it. Eon was doing the same, leaning forward as much as he could while still remaining in place, but he focused more of his attention on the Parahuman speaking, knowing his team mates would handle the image. "We had the drone bring it in to run tests on; it's not made of any material that we know of, which admittedly isn't necessarily new for Parahuman abilities..."
"But due to the fact that it was in Leviathan's escape path, I doubt it was something another Parahuman created." Swarm said quietly.
"You think my Thunder managed to damage Leviathan and knock a chunk off?" Shadow asked, pushing herself back into her chair. "It... could be plausible, I guess. If I managed to hit at about the same point Eon did, there'd already be a weak spot there, so it might be plausible that my Thunder could knock loose a chunk when nothing else had."
Especially given that our Moves seem to run on such a totally different energy that Parahuman powers don't know how to react. Eon added to himself. Given the way Lung's power had reacted, as well as the occasional strange moments with Amy when she and Shadow were healing at the hospital, her power apparently not quite tracking Shadow's healing until after it was completely finished, it wouldn't surprise Eon to find that Parahuman powers just didn't quite gel with the Aura used to power Moves.
Dragon nodded, bringing his attention back to the point. "That was what we hypothesised as well." She agreed. "We bought it into the labs for testing, like Armsmaster said, because we thought that if we were able to study it we might be able to find something that would work more effectively on the Endbringers than just relying on your abilities having some sort of natural countereffect against them. Nothing against yourselves, but you might not always be around to deal with them, or you might get taken out too early to be relied on."
"Trust me, no offence taken."
"So, what happened?" Shadow questioned, raising an eyebrow. "Obviously something didn't go to plan, or you wouldn't have called us in."
"Indeed." Director Piggot sighed heavily. "In the end, nothing we've tried has done anything to it. The thing is as durable as it is sitting on Leviathan's body."
"So you want us to try?"
Given the looks traded on the other side of the room, that answer wasn't what they were fishing for.
"Thank you for the offer, that would be appreciated." Armsmaster accepted. "But the situation we were hoping for your help with is something different." Eon raised an eyebrow as well, tilting his head. "All of our work has had to be done via drones, due to the... effects, that the crystal has."
"Effects?"
"Any human getting too close to the crystal becomes nauseous." Miss Militia cut in. "Past a certain point, there was a mild effect of dizziness, and getting closer strengthened it to the point of the person losing balance. None of the drones had any issues at all, hence us needing to use them, but a person inside armour was still affected, so it obviously isn't something to do with the materials they're made out of. We're uncertain as to what it is that's causing it-"
"You want them to try." Swarm suddenly interrupted, stiffening. "You want to test if something non-human is affected, animals can't talk normally and they'd likely need a Master of some sort to get them close enough, so you aren't able to use them, meaning that you've turned to the nearest group of non-humans that you can think of. Team Inari."
The group traded looks again, and Eon gave Shadow one of his own.
"Obviously you're under no obligation to help." Miss Militia hurried to add, looking nervous. "But you were the first group that came to mind, especially given that your abilities seem to have a much stronger effect against the Endbringers than Parahumans do, so..."
Shadow raised her right paw in a sort of shrug- accidentally shutting Miss Militia up in the process- and Eon nodded his acceptance. "Very well. We might as well take a look."
Swarm gave them a small glance, and Shadow piped up to continue, "We're already here, we've been given the information, and like Miss Militia said, we've already been seen to have a strange relation to the Endbringers. We might as well take a look at it."
Director Piggot gave them a hard look, tracing from Swarm on one side of the table all the way to Armsmaster opposite her, then sighed. "We'll take you down to the lab, then."
The trip to the lab was short, the conference room apparently having been chosen specifically so it was nearby, and the entire thing was filled with a mildly tense silence from the PRT team, some confusion from Swarm, and a silent conversation between Shadow and Eon as to what they were going to do.
The two guards from outside the conference room, Karaday and whoever, followed along with them and took up a position outside of the- much more heavy duty- doors to the lab, and after a brief pause where Armsmaster put in the code, they went in.
Looking around, it was mostly cleared of other things; they entered a shielded room much like the one they'd been in for power testing, with a doorway leading out into the main lab. Notepads and other things were scattered around in a way that implied the techs that normally kept to this lab had been moved out for the time being, making Eon wonder what they were planning to do with the information they got, and the large windows were slightly more tinted than the ones in the power testing room.
"Director Piggot will be observing the proceedings from in here." Armsmaster explained, as the rest of them headed for the other door. "Everyone else will be in the main room."
The centre of the room was taken up by a large metal box, sitting in the centre of a taped-off square. "The tape marks the point where the side effects started." Dragon told them, as Shadow made her way closer. Eon stayed a little way behind her, and Swarm at the very end of the line. Both of them paused when they reached the tape line, while Shadow hesitated and stepped over. She paused herself when her paw hit the floor, but when nothing appeared to happen she continued all the way.
"Don't feel anything strange..." She mused aloud, walking closer to the box. Sniffing at it, she turned to Dragon. "Could you take this apart or something? Your Tinkertech smell is blocking whatever the crystal's one is."
"Of course. One moment..." The Tinker went silent, doing something from within her suit, and Shadow stepped away as it beeped and split apart.
"No change." She reported, starting to circle it.
"No, the box didn't change anything. We put it there in the hopes of it stopping the effects, but nothing changed." Miss Militia told her.
Looking at it now, it was a lot bigger than Eon had thought from the picture; about three feet wide and four tall, with sharp points sticking out at random places. The centre of it was a brighter colour than the turquoise of the rest, more teal, and sparkled brightly in the harsh light of the lab.
"It... hm." Shadow sniffed at it again, completing her circuit. "It smells... strange. Blue and glitter, kind of like a Water Stone or something. Makes sense, given Leviathan. But there's something else to it as well. Like... forests?" She shook her head and closed her eyes, breathing deeply. "This is so weird."
"What's wrong?"
"It's got a lot of scents. And normally that's not that weird, things have a lot of scents, but they're strange... Blue and glitter and forests and deserts and gemstones and lakewater and..." She rolled her paw around as she trailed off. "I've never seen anything with this many different smells that're so different." Shadow paused. "And they smell weird as well. Like they've been on the thing for ages, but they're new as well."
"That doesn't make any sense." Eon muttered.
"No." Shadow bit her lip, then slowly reached out and poked the side with her paw. She recoiled away almost instantly, then put it back when nothing happened. "I guess it's not activated by touch, either... I wonder if there's something specific that you're supposed to do to it."
"Perhaps." The Ninetales hummed, giving her a look. Glancing up at Swarm in a warning to stay put, he stepped over the tape line to join his second in command, only to freeze as a wave of dizziness hit him.
Awfully familiar dizziness, which caught him by surprise in a wave of something complex.
"Shadow, back!" He barked, running over to her and pushing the dizziness to one side.
"Wha-?" Shadow startled, backing away from the crystal in reflex as the rest of the room jolted at the sudden shout. Eon skidded to a halt next to her, knocking slightly into her side and causing her to automatically steady herself using the rock while his tails whipped around-
The little Vulpix sighed, kicking at the grass.
"Too young my behind." She grumbled sadly. "Stupid Guild rules not letting solo Pokemon join. Stupid team requirement. Stupid age requirement." She huffed, turning on the spot and walking away, head down.
"Hello there, little pix." A somewhat familiar voice greeted a few steps later, making her look up in surprise. "What's wrong with you?"
"Oh. Hello, Mr. Eon sir." She said softly, waving at him. "Just the Guild, is all."
"Did you go and try to make a Rescue Team again?" She blinked, gaping at him.
"How'd you know?"
"I've seen you around." Eon shrugged, grey fur rippling and glittering in the dying sunlight. "I know you want to be a Rescue Pokemon. I think you're far too young to be trying on your own, but I do admire your dedication."
"Thanks." She sighed, kicking at the ground again. "But yeah, the Guild won't even let me train, for Arceus' sake. They could at least take me on and teach me, right?"
"They could, yes." Eon nodded in agreement, placing a paw on her head. "I know how you feel, though." The Vulpix was fairly sure he did; being the only shiny Pokemon in the town, a Ninetales at that, and having complete amnesia aside from his name and that he was a former human on top of it all, it made for a fairly big combination for a mix of nervousness, distrust and awe from Pokemon around town.
"Hey, I know!" She suddenly said, perking up. "I know! We could form a team together!"
"Pardon?" Eon blinked.
"We're both pretty good, right? So we could make a team together, and that way we'd be able to do cool rescue stuff!"
"I suppose." He mused, grinning slightly. "But would anyone else be alright with that?"
"Hmph, who cares what others think?" She smirked. "It's up to us, right?"
"I guess." Eon agreed. "Sure. Let's make a Rescue Team."
"Thanks, Eon!"
"No problem, little Shadow."
-Eon and Shadow shuddered, swaying and falling to the ground in a pile.
"Pft." Shadow muttered, spitting out a bit of fur that'd gotten caught in her mouth. "That was... weird." Eon, being more used to the situation, pulled himself up and lifted her by the scruff of her neck- something he hadn't done since they were still new to being a Rescue Team and she was still young, making her bark indignantly as he hurried out of the taped-off area. "Hey!"
"Sorry, little pix." He replied after releasing her. Swarm knelt down beside them, running a hand carefully over their fur, and the three PRT Parahumans came closer. "But... this isn't good."
"Why not?" Dragon asked, as Shadow shook her head.
"That was weird." She repeated, looking at it in confusion. "Why'd it make me think of that, for Arceus' sake? What's Wigglytuff Guild got to do with, well, anything?"
"The Dimensional Scream." Eon said, sitting down heavily with a sigh. Shadow stiffened, gaping.
"Wait, that- that doesn't make sense." She returned. "I've never seen a Scream before, so why-"
"That's a Time Gear."
"Oh."
Silence reigned for a minute; Eon and Shadow in shock, the rest confused- except maybe Swarm, who knew at least a little about those stories.
"Well heck."
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- Location
- Painting, Peach's Castle
I was expecting much stronger language there...
I mean, considering the LAST Time Gear incident almost doomed the entire Pokemon World due to them being MOVED AROUND...
A big-ass one flopping down right after an Endbringer battle is EXTRAORDINARILY ALARMIMG!
I mean, considering the LAST Time Gear incident almost doomed the entire Pokemon World due to them being MOVED AROUND...
A big-ass one flopping down right after an Endbringer battle is EXTRAORDINARILY ALARMIMG!
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- Location
- Cardiff
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Maybe they can ask hoopa to bring in an expert, with them it should be possible to grab Grovyle from that alternate timeline right? Since he seems to know more about them than anyone else...
Zeuseus
KNEEL BEFORE YOUR GOD!!
... well. that's going to put the grovyle amongst the chatots.
- Location
- Within the Light of Hope
.......out of the Groudon and into the path of a Rayquaza Hyper Beam......A mega Rayquaza Heyper Beam to be Precise.
- Location
- Cardiff
- Pronouns
- She/Her
I feel like that would either be an incredibly bad idea, or break the loop?
Yeah...
A time gear would COMPLICATE things.
...Interesting. The one unaffected is the one that always was a Pokémon. Wonder if this detail is going to be relevant.
Zakara
Part-Time Heterodyne Specialty: Analysis
- Location
- Chaldea, Wandering Sea
The narration is implying that that isn't just a Time Gear, an artifact of unimaginable temporal power that can do catastrophic damage to the space-time continuum just by being moved around, it's a fragment of a Time Gear, meaning one has been shattered. I might be wrong, but the way they were describing it as a 'chunk' of Crystal rather than a 'gear' and how Eon took a minute to recognize it says bad things.
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Garreon
Paldean Top Champion
- Location
- Mesagoza, Paldea
So, any chance for a Primal Dialga to appear? Because Time Gears are also what keep him from reversing to a beast like state hell bent on destroying everything by regulating time itself.
Ok i have a Theory, its very crazy, but what if Eden crashing was what destroyed that particular gear and High Priest repurposed the rest of the chunks to make either the Enbringers or their cores? Also a moved Time Gear is already Apocalypse news if not found in time, but a shattered one?
Though that does leave the question of where the apocalypses in progress is...
Considering that time freezes in the area of the time gear in a very short time from the gear dissapearing...
Zakara
Part-Time Heterodyne Specialty: Analysis
- Location
- Chaldea, Wandering Sea
Nah, if Leviathan was dead I'd buy that, but he evidently dropped it during his retreat from Eon and Shadow's thrashing, so it's not his core. I'm guessing that the only reason he left loot behind at all this time is because Team Inari are importing some pokephysics that reacted to Leviathan fleeing the fight.
That he left behind a fragment of an enormous Time Gear is alarming.
That's more or less what I was saying. A Time Gear simply traveling away from its designated spot is already enough to cause the flow of time across massive swathes of land to catastrophically collapse. Actually shattering one into itty bitty pieces should have the timeline so messed up Taylor's great-granddaughter is meeting Hero.
- Location
- Russia
Maybe the thing is that it's not actually Earth's Time Gear, but instead some other world's Time Gear that the Entities stole and tore apart? So the timestream is only a broken, chaotic mess in some far off, already dead solar system?
- Location
- England, Smugsville.
wakes up
reads through thread
cackles madly
Ahhh, this is a good morning.
Ok so I'd be putting comments on quotes here, but since everything is to do with the Time Gear, and that would be spoilers, I think I'll just leave you all to suffer instead. <3
So, fun story; when I moved back to uni last week, I actually left my Red Notebook at home. For those who don't know, the Red Notebook is the place where I keep my timelines and plot points and stuff. Fortunately I do remember enough of my next arc to write it (once I'm done with the coursework hell that I'm currently in), so hopefully there won't be any issues. If I do suddenly keel over after the next three chapters are posted, though, blame the coursework first, New Pokemon Snap second, and my lack of a notebook third, please.
goes back to giggle-grinning about the thread
reads through thread
cackles madly
Ahhh, this is a good morning.
Ok so I'd be putting comments on quotes here, but since everything is to do with the Time Gear, and that would be spoilers, I think I'll just leave you all to suffer instead. <3
So, fun story; when I moved back to uni last week, I actually left my Red Notebook at home. For those who don't know, the Red Notebook is the place where I keep my timelines and plot points and stuff. Fortunately I do remember enough of my next arc to write it (once I'm done with the coursework hell that I'm currently in), so hopefully there won't be any issues. If I do suddenly keel over after the next three chapters are posted, though, blame the coursework first, New Pokemon Snap second, and my lack of a notebook third, please.
goes back to giggle-grinning about the thread
- Pronouns
- He, his, him, they
Regarding this, do you have someone at home that can take pictures of the insides of that notebook? Might be for the best I think.
- Location
- Nightopia
Just wanted to remind everyone of the last time some crystals were mentioned:
Just some food for thought, have fun!
Just some food for thought, have fun!
ConfusedPotato
Unverified Verifier
- Location
- Australia
If mail isn't too slow where you live you could just get someone to mail it to you.
LostArchivist
Sane, unfortunately.
- Location
- The State of Confusion
And here I was thinking that the Gear was part of Levi's core that they chipped off. Not sure what a Time Gear is since the wiki is nearly a stub, but the mere existence of one anywhere is a bit worrying. On the other hand it definitely sounds like something the Entities would either study or use...
You're missing a Z there.
Zakara
Part-Time Heterodyne Specialty: Analysis
- Location
- Chaldea, Wandering Sea
What's this, a chance to yammer on about metaphysics? Don't mind if I do!
The Time Gears are mystical artifacts that regulate the flow of time around them, keeping the world moving forward, as it should. If an area is left without a Time Gear's presence, the timestream will grind to a halt in that area specifically. This is a very bad thing, as not only is the entire zone effectively dead, the knock-on environmental effects of an entire portion of the ecosystem up and disappearing can lead to downright apocalyptic consequences later down the line.
The Time Gears actually serve as the foundation and power source for Dialga's personal temple/HQ, the Temporal Tower. Combined, they can regulate the flow of time all across the planet from just the Tower. A long time ago, the Time Gears were removed from the Tower and spread out across the Pokémon World for some reason, arranged in such a way that even without the Tower's amplification, they were still covering everything.
This, however, led to the Temporal Tower falling apart without its power source, driving Dialga's insane and destroying the proper flow of time worldwide, regardless of the Gears.
Thus, the Gears are very critical to the overall integrity of their planet, and seeing the shattered remains of one would probably induce instant heart attacks in most Pokémon.