Gloomy Sunday

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Depresso-Expresso Mission Info:

The light levels had dropped tremendously the further one got to the forest, the trees no longer as sparse as they were near the edges. The canopy up above was very thick with barely any holes, not letting much sunlight in. Shadows covered most of the land with even darker splotches behind trees and rocks, perfect hiding spots for whatever might be lurking in the forest. The ground was mostly covered by grass and fallen leaves, there not being enough sunlight for the smaller plant life to prosper next to the large trees' shade. Thanks to the lack of sunlight, the forest also felt quite a bit cooler than one might expect... But the day was otherwise warm, so it wasn't unbearably cold yet.

A strange group of Pokémon walked through the forest. Varda, the little bird, hopped happily along the forest floor and didn't seem to at all mind the dark. By his side was his client, a large and round Blissey with a bag full of all kinds of goods, her eyes determined as she marched on deeper into the forest. It was the Swablu who had originally met the Blissey and heard her request for aid at the Guild, but it seemed like he had caught the attention of an old friend as he was accepting it. Sova from another team ended up tagging along, bringing a new friend with him. Sova had never talked about his teammates, but as it was a team, Varda had always assumed that there had to be other members! It just made sense and he was happy to finally meet someone!

The bird hopped and occasionally turned to look at the newcomer, named Keith. They hadn't had much time to get to known each other back at the Guild before accepting the mission, as the Blissey had urged them along. According to her, the mission was very delicate, very important and very time sensitive, and they didn't have one moment to spare! But while they were walking, the Swablu felt like they were going to be fine...
"Sova actually never told me about you before, Keith! Have you been doing missions together for a long time?"


Current Energy: 30 (40 -10 from entering. Sky Powder in use, every other Pokémon encounter takes 1 less energy.)

Varda couldn't even look Keith in the eye as he was asked what was wrong. Many things were, he just... Didn't want to talk about them, his body language transforming into a more bothered one. Clearly the little bird wasn't a very good liar unless it was done out of ignorance and he didn't know he was wrong. Right now, he knew – and he couldn't ignore the fact. They had to tell, but it was causing the little Pokémon's tongue to tie itself into neat little knots he couldn't untangle.

Well, he tried, stuttering and stammering something barely intelligible, but the rather one-sided conversation was soon over. He was rescued by Sova – if one could call the ugly truth as rescuing. The Swablu just winced as he heard the words coming out of the Glaceon's mouth, not any more pleasant when someone else said them. It wasn't right, Pokémon shouldn't do something like that to others – especially if they were supposed to be friends! The Jolteon's response thus wasn't one that took Varda completely by surprise, but it still hurt. Who would Keith trust if not them?

The little bird just seemed to become the most miserable little fluffball in existence as Keith's eyes glanced at him, so cold they just froze his heart still. Miserable, he almost seemed to deflate as the feathers on top of his head flopped over and drooped, his wings limp by his sides and resting heavily on the ground. Clearly at least one Pokémon was extremely guilty about this.
"I-I... It's not right," he chirped weakly, not even daring to look up as his eyes were too busy inspecting the ground a worm like him should grovel on,
"I'm, I'm sorry, it was wrong..."

Keith remained silent, simply glaring at the others regardless of how pathetic and genuinely sorry the swablu seemed. He wasn't an idiot, he knew that he'd almost DIED multiple times during the fight; Had one of those Stone Edges hit him, it likely would have killed him! Yet did either of the two guilty "allies" of his step in to help? No, they did not. So, he was convinced that they both DESERVED to feel guilty for a little while. However, he was definitely not expecting the retaliation he was about to receive from a certain glaceon.

Sova was fine with being physically shocked by the jolteon, but the mental shock from the current situation was not something he was going to put up with. His shocked expression slowly turned to an agitated one as his ears flattened and he took a few steps towards the jolteon. "First off, leave him out of this, because it was MY idea and I ASKED him to come to help me make sure you didn't DIE. Do you understand? He only came to make sure you didn't die," he explained in a tone equaling or even surpassing the jolteon's earlier bitter and harsh tone.

Keith hesitated to respond, fearful for a moment before working up the courage to speak. "I could hav-," but he was immediately cut off.

"Died? Yeah, that's why I did it. You wanted to join my team, remember? Well, if you wanna be on my team, I've gotta make sure you're capable of taking care of yourself if I'm not around, or else you WILL die," Sova immediately responded, doing his best to explain his reasoning.
"You're afraid of everything and I know you have more fighting prowess than you'd prefer to admit when you're under my protection.... Now you can't deny it, because I just got to see it," he continued after taking a moment to breathe and calm down.

Keith opened his mouth to speak, but once again found himself in the position of being speechless. He hadn't considered everything.... He hadn't considered all of the reasons why perhaps this was actually a thoughtful gesture towards him. He once more looked to Varda, seemingly completely ignoring Sova again. However, this time, his face clearly showed regret and sadness. "No.... I'm sorry," he responded to the swablu's earlier apology.
However, he still didn't want to talk to Sova, despite beginning to understand the point of view and reasoning of the glaceon.

Varda still looked miserable, his eyes on the ground. Apologizing didn't really fix anything just like that, it didn't undo the bad things they did or magically fix how hurt Keith felt – mentally and physically. This all was just a big mistake, and even though Sova tried to take all of the blame, it hardly was just the Glaceon's fault.
"Ah, no–" He tried to object to what Sova was saying about his involvement, as it hardly was the truth, either. But he didn't really have the time or voice to stop anyone from talking, as the Glaceon was busy explaining his point of view to the Jolteon. Perhaps, first of all, he should let the two talk about it and get whatever was on their chest heard.

The bird was quiet, just listening. Perhaps Sova had some kind of a point and perhaps Keith managed to understand it a little bit better, but Varda wasn't feeling like this was the best way to handle this kind of things. Only when the Jolteon apologized did the Swablu raise his gaze, looking at the Pokémon in front of him with eyes that were still quite sorrowful, but also a bit surprised.
"No... You have no reason to apologize," he chirped after a moment of silence. The ones who had to apologize here were him and Sova. Even if their intentions were good, what had happened couldn't be right.

"If... Someone is afraid of the water or can't swim, I don't think it's a good idea to just throw them in the water," the Swablu continued, giving a look at Sova as well,
"Obviously, they would have to learn fast if they wanted to survive, but even if they did... There are other ways. Ways that don't put them in danger or hurt their trust..."

Sova merely rolled his eyes at the swablu, clearly showing his complete disagreement. There was one major difference between being afraid of water and being afraid of fighting; A rescue team member HAD to know how to fight, because they would inevitably end up needing to fight eventually. Surely, even someone as pacifistic as Varda knew that fighting was unavoidable sometimes. Taking the "honest" route and training Keith would have taken much longer. What if in that time, something happened to him and he wasn't yet ready to handle it?

"He has pretty much no fighting experience. If it wasn't this, it would be a "training" session where he wouldn't try his best and wouldn't learn nearly as fast. Time is more important than his feelings, because him being dead is worse than him being sad," he replied, before beginning to walk back in the direction of the sunny clearing, expecting the others to follow him.
He gave a rather cold glance in Keith's direction as he walked before adding on, "You're the one who wanted to join my team so bad. Of course, you're welcome to leave if you don't think you can keep up, or if you just don't like me."

Keith felt bad at how upset he'd clearly made Varda. As soon as the swablu was finished talking, he opened his mouth to reply, but was cut off by Sova. The glaceon's words stung, making him feel even worse about the situation. Maybe he hadn't put enough consideration into whether or not he was cut out for being on a Guild team.... However, there was something the glaceon's words made him feel other than insignificance. More than feeling bad, he wanted to prove Sova wrong! But.... could he even do so? The first step to finding out would be to NOT leave the team, of course.

The jolteon looked back to Varda for a moment, before sighing. "Hard to argue with that logic. I don't like being sad, but I don't like being dead either....," he commented before moving along to follow the glaceon. "....Guess it's kind of my fault for getting in over my head. It's definitely not yours for trying to keep me from dying," he continued without looking back to the swablu, not wanting to see that sad face again.

Varda frowned at the Glaceon's logic, not liking such harsh methods – sink or swim indeed. Worse was that Keith seemed to be agreeing, even though he didn't like it. That just wasn't right! Seeing how many other exploration teams there were and how he was quite sure that Sova was the only one with this kind of training tactics... There had to be better alternatives there, right? Probably making sure that weaker Pokémon wouldn't take jobs that were too hard for them. Maybe Sova was having a hard time waiting because he was a stronger Pokémon himself...

As Sova started to walk and the Jolteon followed, the little bird had to hop along too.
"No... That's not right," he finally chirped, almost as if he realized something. He didn't have a better, faster alternative, no. But he had realized something.
"A team... Needs to be able to trust all the members! And we lied. Even if the intentions were good, it was still a lie and trust was broken. What if the next time you two split up and Keith thinks you are out there, watching and testing him? What if something goes wrong and he expects you to help, except this time you aren't there to do it!" Varda chirped, extending his wings that had gotten a bit dirty from lying on the ground.

Keith's ears perked ever so slightly at Varda's words, which were bringing him back over to the swablu's point of view.  While it was true, there wasn't a more efficient way he could think of for himself to learn how to fight, that didn't make it perfect.  He wouldn't just EXPECT Sova to be there every time he got in trouble, of course, but Varda made some good points as to how difficult it would be to function as a team without any trust.  Finally, as it seemed the little bird was done speaking, he chimed in.  "Yeah, a-actually, I didn't think of that.  If we can't trust each other, how are we supposed to function as a te-," he spoke, being cut off near the end by Sova.

Sova walked along with movements so rhythmic that they almost seemed robotic.  However, as he began to grow agitated from the constant disagreements, his fur began to bristle and his movements slowly changed from robotic to a more.... clearly upset walk, as if walking was too much trouble and he wasn't happy about having to do it.  No significant differences, just, his steps seemed more firm and his body moved only as much as necessary.  His head began to hang, with his flattening ears and ribbon-like appendages almost completely concealing his face.  However, if one had managed to get a good look at his face, they would see that he was gritting his teeth in agitation, seeming oddly upset for the given situation.

The glaceon spun around into a stance that almost looked like he was going to attack his own allies.  "That's the thing, I don't need you!  To be completely honest, having others around me is a burden, because I have to make sure that I don't hurt them and they don't die!  But YOU wanted to be on my team so damn bad, so you can deal with my precautions to make sure you can take care of yourself!  And that goes for you too, birdie, since you seem to want to follow me around so bad.  If you want to follow me, as far as I'm concerned, you agree to the terms of service consequences," he exclaimed, completely aware of how wrong, unfair and harsh he was acting.
Maybe he'd feel bad later, but for now, he was sick of defending himself.

Keith jumped back a bit as the glaceon unexpectedly spun around in a rather aggressive stance. As he listened to the glaceon, he fell completely silent, once more stunned into being unable to find any way to respond.  This emotional rollercoaster seemed to be putting him in this position of silence quite often, so he was actually getting used to it at this point.  He wasn't even sure whether he agreed or disagreed with what was said.  Honestly, all he knew for certain was that he felt bad.  What kind of bad, he wasn't sure on.  However, his fur began to crackle as his mood grew darker once more, announcing the change to anyone who had managed to figure out how the static noise of his fur worked.

Varda almost walked right into Keith and Sova, not able to react quite fast enough as the Ice-type Pokémon suddenly spun around and faced the two. The bird was certainly taken off-guard, his eyes wide as they blinked slowly, looking up at the larger Pokémon. Right now, the Glaceon looked... Angry. Yes, that was the thing, he could almost feel it before Sova started to yell at them. And with that outburst, the Swablu moved ever-so-slightly in front of Keith as if to protect the Pokémon from those words. His small step was unconscious, almost as if based on instinct alone. It wasn't something he was going to do or even thought about – in fact, he probably hadn't even noticed it himself.

"Everyone will be a burden if you let them be that, Sova!" The little bird chirped, not really feeling sad because he was being yelled at but because the Glaceon had a problem that stopped him from enjoying these things they did. How would a team work if all the members couldn't work together? How could they work together if there was no trust, if one member tried to do everything on their own?
"Everyone can be useful and do their part. Others aren't completely helpless, even if you're stronger. I have seen so many new Guild members try so hard and finally succeed! Even if they have been weak, small or uncertain of themselves... They have done it!"

Varda looked down coyly, the tension leaving his muscles. It was good to get these things out of their system sometimes, but he didn't really know what would happen. Keith didn't seem like he wanted to leave Sova's team, but Sova did have the right to kick him out of it if he chose to. It was... Better if the Glaceon was angry at him rather than the Jolteon.
"Don't underestimate your team. They'll be of help only if you let them help. But you can't push them too hard, either..."

Sova hanged his head as Varda tried to convince him that allies could be useful. While it was true, that they had their uses, that wasn't the way in which he meant others were a burden to him. He was referring to the multiple reasons why he constantly risked hurting anyone who tried to stick with him. His fighting style and even his moves were risky and many of them could easily go wrong and hit an ally. On top of that, he had.... the thing that called itself S.S. to worry about. It didn't care about hurting his friends, but how was he supposed to explain something like that to them? He'd tried before to tell others and they never seemed to just understand. It was always a really panicky reaction or an extreme underestimation. However, maybe a visual representation would help illustrate his point.

"I'm not denying either of you can be useful. The reason having you both around is a burden is because I have to make sure you don't get hurt. Not just by the enemies....," he began, pausing as his body temperature began to spike to far below-freezing.
The air around him grew colder, evident by frost beginning to form on the ground and the water in the air freezing into ice crystals, almost like snow. The ice crystals then began to swirl out around the group, slowly forming a sort of Blizzard-barrier. "For instance, this is something I can do if others aren't around me. If there's someone near me and I try to attack with this, I risk hitting them, because I'm not good at aiming it. Varda, you've been hit by it before, so you know what I'm talking about," he continued, allowing all of the snow to cease its swirling formation and fall to the ground as he didn't want to risk hurting anyone with his demonstration.

As much as he wanted to continue on and explain the more serious reason why he didn't want others around him, it was just too difficult to find the words in which to correctly express it. How does one say "I turn into an insane, bloodthirsty psychopath sometimes" in a way that will make others understand, but not flip out?

Keith remained silent throughout the entire conversation. He was certainly glad that Varda stepped in to do some talking on their part, but it didn't help him recover from the shock. As Sova retaliated, he began to feel a very harsh drop in temperature in the air and immediately figured it was from Sova. For a moment, he was worried the glaceon was attacking, but then a bit of elaboration on the point of the beginning snowstorm revealed its purpose. To illustrate how easily someone around the glaceon could be hurt, apparently. As far as he could tell, it seemed like Sova was implying that they were limiting what he could do. However, it seemed evident to him that the glaceon could control Blizzards just fine.

Varda seemed to perk up a little as it seemed like Sova was realizing the meaning of his words, his long lost smile coming back in its usual dumb way as the little bird's eyes just sparkled in happiness. But soon, the temperature dropped – way too much for it to be natural. The ground below started to grow a small layer of frost, the coldness of it touching the Swablu's bare feet and causing him to lift them off to escape the freezing temperatures – but there was no escape. The air itself was getting cold as well, the moisture turning into pretty little sparkly crystals that danced slowly in the windless air. When it came to the demonstration, Varda seemed to just be in awe and think it was just very pretty, his beak open.

"O-Oh!" The bird was snapped out of his thoughts as he remembered the demonstration's true purpose, growing more concerned as he started to think hard. He closed his eyes and slowly shifted his weight from one foot to another, letting out a thoughtful hmm. Certain attacks could be very damaging to everyone around you, yes. With power came issues with the graceful moves, or something like that. But Sova's issue was that he wasn't good at aiming it...

"Ah. If you always fight alone, then you never have to learn it," Varda opened his eyes and looked at the Glaceon,
"You don't hold back on your own, I've seen it! But if there's a really good reason to do so, I think... You'll learn! And when you have an ally by your side, you don't even have to work as hard as you would against the same enemies on your own," he chirped, flapping his wings in his excitement. Maybe there were better ways to do it, after all!
"If you trained together with someone, you two would learn to watch out for each other and learn the fighting styles you two have, right?"

Sova sighed and shook his head, seeing that the swablu simply didn't seem to get it. How was he supposed to explain this concept to them? What was more, he didn't even want to mention the bigger issue he had to worry about. He just wished he could never have to worry about others, as it would make his life so much easier. However, of course, with this would come unbearable loneliness, something he wasn't prepared to handle. He'd tried at one point and it didn't end well.

He took a moment to breathe and consider an effective way to explain his point of view, before speaking. "Look, just trust me here. There are reasons, some of which I don't want to talk about, that make me inadequate as a protector. I need to be absolutely sure anyone who wants to follow me can defend their self and keep up with me, or else I might get them killed. Just please, take my word for it.... and don't judge my training methods," he said in a much more calm tone than he'd previously held.

Keith continued on with his whole silence thing, listening to the other two go back and forth, noticing that the glaceon was slowly calming down. At this point, he didn't know who to side with, so he finally just decided to take his own side instead. With that resolve in mind, he finally spoke up. "I CAN keep up with you.... and I will. I don't like your way of doing things, but I understand and I'm going to prove I can hold my own."

Varda tilted his head slightly as Sova spoke, not entirely seeing eye to eye here. But at least one good thing had happened: the Glaceon was calm now, no one was yelling and the tenseness of the situation had deflated considerably. It felt better now, more like a conversation rather than a fight. The Swablu had heard something like this from Sova before, but... Well, he didn't understand it all that well, but he was feeling like the Pokémon was his own worst critic. Many things had happened to them throughout their journey, but they came out victorious in the end.

As Keith ended up chiming in, the bird glanced in the Electric-type's direction with a smile. A Pokémon could be timid and afraid to speak their mind, but everyone would eventually find the place where they wanted to be. Why would the Jolteon be any different?
"He wants to do it," he chirped, looking back at Sova,
"And you want to learn, too. Why won't you try to work together now? Being a team is a lot different from being alone, so learning the strengths and weaknesses of each other would be a good idea, right?"

Sova remained silent for a moment, contemplating the things that were being said.  The others seemed so convinced that this was all just going to magically work out, it kind of made him want to believe them.  Finally, he decided to speak up and in a very different way from before.  "Alright, lets get to know each other's strengths and weaknesses.  I can hit hard.  There's a strength.  Most of my attacks and strategies hold an amount of risk, which can probably be considered a weakness," he paused as he shifted his focus to the other two.

"Varda, I've known you for a while.... and I've gotta say, I don't know much about you.  Biggest strength I've noticed in you is diplomacy.  I don't know of any particular weaknesses, but your morality gets annoying.  Aaaand Keith, since you're a jolteon and I know everything about those, I probably know something you're only beginning to figure out.  Jolteons are fast.  Very fast.  One of the fastest things in the world.  Your weakness is timidity, which I've been trying to break you out of," he explained, trying to demonstrate that he already knew his own strengths and weaknesses, as well as those of his allies.

"So there, now you two can see that I already know and can play to your strengths if I need to.... and now, if it wasn't obvious before, you can try to do the same with me," he stated.

Keith once more found himself being rather passive in the conversation for a moment.  However, as soon as he felt it was his turn to speak again, he did so.  "You really think all of us have ONE strength and weakness?  Just one?," he questioned, feeling that it was ridiculous to assume such a thing.
First off, he liked to think that he himself was rather smart.... and while he had noticed that he was faster than before, it seemed like Sova and even Varda were both faster than him.  Were jolteons really supposed to be THAT fast, some of the fastest things in the world?  If so.... he definitely had some catching up to do, both figuratively and literally.

Sova rolled his eyes at the jolteon's reply.  "Of course not, but I really don't feel like listing off all of my thoughts on the topic.  I was hoping just a few would be enough," he stated, trying to make it clear that he didn't want to argue anymore.

Varda just smiled as he looked at Sova, hopeful that his idea was getting through. His eyes just lit up as it seemed that the Glaceon was warming up to it, wanting to talk of their strengths and weaknesses. He didn't even have to say anything, as Sova did the listing based on what he had noticed of his two companions – or what he knew based on their species. And well, as someone who hadn't done much battling, it was obvious that the Swablu didn't exactly have qualities that would help with fighting all that much. They all had their strengths and weaknesses when it came to different things, but in a battle... Only those that helped to fight or protect were going to be useful.
"I can fly," Varda offered, looking back at Sova,
"So I can reach things that are far up and I can stay out of your way!" He added happily, flapping his wings

Keith spoke up all of a sudden, causing the bird to look at the fox-like Pokémon. Well, yes, of course they wouldn't just have one strength and weakness – but just listing them all wouldn't do much good to them.
"We'll always find new sides when it comes to ourselves, right? We just need to do all kinds of things to trigger that," he cooed, tilting his head slightly. Yes... They could imagine different situations all they wanted, but what mattered was what was really happening, right? That was what they had to react to.
"And teams need to train together, like in sports! They need to work and move as one even though they're made of separate Pokémon! And there should be cool formations!"

Sova just silently stared at the other two for a moment, without much emotion present on his face. He just looked bored, but honestly, he was okay with the situation. It ended.... okay. It was true that his allies had plenty of uses, plenty of things he himself didn't have. It was also true that he couldn't do everything alone, as much as he wished he could. However, he still stood by his training methods; Keith was afraid to fight and would never realize he held the capabilities to win a real fight without being forced to prove it to himself. No amount of controlled training would be guaranteed to get rid of an issue like that.

"You guys are annoying," he finally spoke up as he turned around and began walking away.

Keith awaited the glaceon's response, but only garnered a bit of confusion from it. They were annoying? Did that mean Sova was.... begrudgingly agreeing? He hadn't exactly tried to argue against anything, so the jolteon had to wonder. "Soooo.... You agree?," he questioned, looking for some verification.

"Yes," Sova replied without turning around. "Now come on, our client's probably getting worried."

Keith gave a quick, happy smile to the swablu as if to say "We did it, yay!," before following along behind Sova. As he walked, he realized.... he'd just been conversed out of being mad about the really mean "training!" How could he let himself get so side-tracked as to completely forget about that!? Oh well, it wasn't like it was too big of a deal.... they surely would have saved him if he hadn't managed to win. And honestly, it felt kind of nice to have beaten such a tough opponent alone.

Varda stayed still, his eyes hopeful as they looked at Sova, large and bright. The smile was on his face, his pure positivity just oozing out of him. It was the only way he could really convince his friend, and indeed, they never got arguments against it – even if the Pokémon called the two of them annoying. Keith asked if the Glaceon actually agreed, and then they got it: the answer was yes. The bird just looked happier as his smile grew bigger, watching as Sova was already walking away from them. He exchanged happy looks with Keith and started to waddle after the Ice-type Pokémon, the Jolteon right behind them.

"Ah no, wait!" He suddenly chirped, but his voice didn't sound panicked, more like he just realized something very important,
"We're in the forest where it's very dangerous, so we should be prepared right now! We need a formation!" The Swablu continued, of course not thinking that the forest they were in was really dangerous or anything, and Sova would probably realize that... But they were with Keith, so maybe it would motivate the Pokémon to be on his toes and prepared. Now they were in it together as a team, so the Jolteon didn't have to worry, right...?