Body and Mind.... are Fragile Things

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Sova struggled to hush his own laughter, ending up collapsing to the ground as the pain from the attacks he'd taken suddenly hit him.  On the bright side, this made it difficult to laugh, so it was easier to stop himself from doing so now.  He just sat there, catching his breath and laying in his own pain and misery....  The burning feeling inside of him.... had been toned down.  He could now think.... almost straight.  He stared at his work as he tried to gather his thoughts; what was he supposed to do now?  ....Right, Mirage.  MIRAGE, was she alive!?

Then he heard the voice of the charmander, stating to have found Mirage.  He pushed to lift himself off the ground, no longer caring about his exhaustion, and jumped off the ledge he was on without even looking down to see how far it was.  He landed on his paws rather ungracefully with a bit of a stumble just as the lizard spoke once more, stating Mirage was breathing, and it relieved him to no end.  Suddenly, the intense burning was gone and he felt clear and sane.... and the pain felt a bit more.... vivid.  But that last part wasn't important right now!

"Oh, sh-she's alri-!?" he frantically questioned as he rushed over to see the zoroark.
....No, she was definitely not alright.  Not alright, but alive.  He frantically looked over his friend, immediately spotting a pretty severe-looking bite wound on one of her arms.  He reached his paw up to his neck and between the two ribbons he wore, pulling off the outer one, which was a light blue Guild ribbon.  He liked covering up the girly Joy ribbon with it, but Mirage's safety was far more important than his own fashion.

Suddenly, he was actually focused, and he no longer seemed like a depressed drone nor a psychotic monster.  "Lift her arm for me," he spoke clearly, expecting the lizard to help him.
However, he wasn't calm and this was something he wasn't trying to hide.  His voice was audibly shaky, but rather than a mixture of sadness and mania, this time.... it was just out of fear.  Mirage seemed pretty badly hurt....  He didn't want to lose her.  If given the option, he'd be willing to give up his own life for Mirage, and he doubted said life would even be worth living without her around.  He would feel like a complete failure in every possible way and he doubted he'd ever really feel joy again.

The icy fox had concluded that they should all get going. Mirage wondered if she should stay looking like she should, or turn back. If she remained appearing like a genesect she could scare off potential trouble, but at the same time it could also attract the same amount if not worse. The illusion dispelled itself in a puff of red mist that quickly disappeared as she decided to merely continue as herself. The zoroark found that the Dusknoir seemed to want to lead them as he spoke, "We're not too far off from an area where they show up a bit more frequently I think? This way," before floating off with the intention of them following.

Garnet, though they had a plan in mind, could not help but to feel...odd. He could not quite describe how he felt. He was a bit sick of having to drag Sova the Sobber up though. It was like trying to balance a stick on its end...in the middle of a hurricane. Hurricanes were not fun...especially during floods, he had first hand experience of that. Not fun.

Sova just nodded in response to the dusknoir and silently followed along. Considering the issues he had with self-esteem, it was probably odd that he didn't mind not being the leader. Really, though, leading was just too much work for him. He was perfectly content just following someone else's lead as long as he could afford to. The only thing he was particularly worried about was the actual fighting, which was likely to get pretty dangerous. Once they got to that, perhaps he'd need to take the lead.... A few words were still stuck in his head, something about remembering how to be weak. He knew he couldn't go about fighting this foe as he'd grown so accustomed to, but how else could he even fight? What strategy was there? He couldn't even hurt it, and he was pretty sure it wouldn't fall for the same trick twice with the cannon.

Okay, it had an exoskeleton, which meant it was weak at the joints. He had a spike that could surely reach those weak points, and in a perfect world, perhaps his tail could manage as well. The cannon was still a clear option, but.... that wouldn't be enough. How had he ever fought things so much stronger than him before? Sure, it had never quite been something like this, but as an eevee, he'd somehow managed against things a lot stronger than him. As a matter of fact, pretty much EVERYTHING had been stronger than him at that point in his life. Granted, he'd had plenty of help from friends and allies, but he'd held his own and made himself useful.

As he followed the dusknoir, he thought hard about this. Back in his days as a ball of fluff, there were a lot of fights to think about. However, they were kind of hard to remember clearly. He remembered fighting, hurting, and that was about it.

The dusknoir led the group through the dark chasm that held the champion of the dark lord, Giratina. The ghost type had utilized a Will-O-Wisp to light the area around them. The reaper floated along confidently, surveying the area and taking an effective role of leadership.

...Should she be doing this? Mirage was unsure of what to do except follow along awkwardly. She wanted to find out a bit more about herself, was she a good pokemon? Did she have any family? The zoroark remained silent despite her growing amount of questions. She did not want to be a nuisance and they had massively more important matters to attend to apparently. The zoroark's eyes wandered as she scanned for these strange orbs everyone spoke of. Her mind felt hazy as she tried to access her memories. Everything before her time here was hazy, as if she were in a fog and could only see basic shadows. She sighed, a bit frustrated with her inability to...well, be her.

The charmander followed along, his TAIL SWAYED BACK AND FORTH as he walked. The light bounced off the walls and mixed in with the light from the dusknoir. The charmander suddenly stopped. The light of the dusknoir moving ahead of his own as he suddenly seemed to freeze in place. The charmander had felt a strange feeling overcome him, more specifically his legs. The charmander looked down after trying to force his unresponsive feet forward. He looked down to find a strange bright green energy wrapped ever so lightly around his legs. The charmander was about to speak up, when the green energy suddenly shot upward and wrapped around his entire body. The vines wrapped around him and he suddenly found that he could not move even his mouth! The charmander seemed to have turned into a statue until his body finally gave away and he collapsed onto his stomach. His eyes stared wide into the distance, unable to move as the Infestation move took effect and began to eat away at his health.

Sova followed along, head hanging and ears tuned to the surroundings. He was in a bad mood, he was quite certain everyone with him knew that, and so he wasn't trying to hide it. However, this wasn't going to stop him from being prepared if anything were to happen. He didn't notice Garnet's footsteps ceasing, but when the charmander was yanked down to the ground, that got his attention. He stopped instinctively, hesitating for a moment out of confusion and wonder before turning around to see what'd happened to his new friend and candlestick.

The lizard was on the ground, bound by.... green.... tentacles....? He was going to pretend he understood what was going on there, but one thing he knew for sure was that this wasn't good and Garnet needed to be freed. Without so much as speaking, his eyes and ears began scanning their surroundings, searching for the source of the attack. He began cautiously walking toward the charmander, planning on trying to cut the odd wrapping, when he felt his feet grow heavy, being dragged to the ground. He looked down to see similar green energy.... things wrapping around his legs, stopping them from moving. He tilted his head as he stared down at the strange attack he was afflicted with, more interested than anything else.

"It looks like we're gonna have to meet back up with you guys in a bit. Go on ahead; we'll be fine," he said in a rather calm tone, not showing even the slightest hint of worry.
In truth, this wasn't scary. The purple beast was a bit scary, but whatever this was, it was nothing in comparison. He would need time to deal with this situation, but he didn't think for even a second that it would be a big deal, so he hoped the others would just move on ahead and start finding orbs.

The zoroark stopped and turned to see that green vines had wrapped themselves around the glaceon and the charmander. Her eyes widened in surprise, but they did not seem too alarmed by this. Instead of continuing with the dusknoir like the glaceon wanted her to, she turned around to go help the two. The glaceon insisted upon her going but she shook her head, "No, I'm not going to leave you here..." she spoke. It was fairly obvious that the glaceon had been important to her in the past, and while he may have been a bit of a creep she could not help but to feel that she needed to stick with him. The zoroark's keen eyes glanced about before looking down to the ground. The green energy was trailing out towards her, wanting to wrap her up in the same situation. She moved out of the way, the slow crawling vines following her.

There was a sharp giggle as the vines slowly chased after Mirage. The childlike laughter echoing in the canyon. The dusknoir had continued forward, thinking that the zoroark was still behind him as he searched for orbs. Mirage easily out sped the slow vines at a normal pace, but it was still eerie how they seemed to follow her every movement.

The charmander was still unable to move. The vines suddenly tightened against his skin as they began to burn and cause damage. It was an annoyance, but the infestation attack did not seem to do much to him. It still did not change the fact that he was completely incapable of movement though.

Mirage wasn't leaving. "I said go, now," the glaceon demanded, only to be met with denial.
Great, now he had to watch someone else's back around whatever this thing was. At least Mirage seemed to still have enough sense to stay away from this attack, even if she had no memory. The glaceon sighed as the laugh rang out, seeming overjoyed with the current events. Well, that suggested it either didn't know what it was doing or, more likely, didn't care. Judging by the lack of any visible enemy, it seemed safe to assume it was a Ghost-type, hiding in the walls or ground. If he wanted to hit it, he would need to either draw it out or somehow destroy the walls of the crevice to get to it. He doubted he could do the latter, so that only left one option.

Sova lifted his left paw off the ground slightly to test the vines, and as expected, he was met with resistance. His paw was pulled back to the ground and for a moment, he was silent. The vines were crawling up his body and beginning to wrap themselves around his neck. The touch of them was beginning to burn. With this in mind, he spoke up: "I don't know who you are, but I don't suppose you'd be willing to end this without a fight? We have something important that we need to do, and I'm not in the mood to hurt anyone if I don't need to."
He was willing to fight if he needed to, but it just wasn't something he wanted to do right now. Now of all times, he needed to steer clear from as much violence as he could.

The grip of the vines was tightening. Mirage seemed to be avoiding them fine, but Garnet.... was not so fortunate. The glaceon wondered if his new friend was handling this attack alright, other than not being able to move. He very much hoped so, but just in case.... Well, if this thing didn't want to end things peacefully.... he'd have to do something about it.

The zoroark only continued to ignore the Glaceon's requests for her to leave. She had the rising urge to make some snarky comment about having gone deaf as well as being inflicted with amnesia. She did not submit and instead focused on the task at hand. Mirage looked about in the darkness as the glaceon spoke, searching for signs of the assailant that had attacked the two. She was still avoiding vines, but they seemed to stop as Sova spoke.

"Hurt?" a voice gasped, "It's just small joke...?" it seemed confused. Mirage was not buying it, however the vines did retreat away from the two and finally allowed the two to move without resistance. The energy seemed to crack as if it were glass before shattering and fading into nothing as if it never existed in the first place. The face of a duskull popped up from the floor, it seemed genuinely confused as it spoke, "I do not want to hurt. Just...lighten mood?"

The energy shattered at last and Garnet had been freed. The lizard pushed himself up with ease happy to finally have the ability to move again. Before he could do much else, the attacker had shown himself. Garnet readied himself for battle, his tail flaring up as he waited for the thing to attack. It did not attack. Instead, it seemed to look rather sad...as if it felt a bit upset.

garnet (+1 level energy because pokermanz day)

Kat carried out 2 launched of one Obsidian Rift :

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To Sova's relief, diplomacy was actually working. The attack had ceased and the source had revealed itself to be a duskull. He was glad the vines had been called off, as he really didn't like pretending to be stuck. The duskull seemed sincere as it claimed no desire to hurt them, instead merely innocently joking from its point of view. He was inclined to believe the little creature, as it had no reason to stop the attack otherwise. Maybe other fights he'd gotten into in the past could have been avoided by simply trying to communicate? Had he perhaps been wrong for jumping straight to violence at every opportunity? Even when he'd done it to protect himself? To protect others?

Well, now wasn't the time to dwell over things he might have done wrong in the past. "Well, it doesn't look like you did any major damage, so no worries," he spoke up, seeing that the charmander was still more-than-capable of standing.
They didn't have time to sit around and chat, though. The duskull seemed rather childish; would it perhaps start attacking again if they tried to leave without entertaining it? He certainly hoped not, but he wouldn't worry about such things unless he needed to. "But we've got something very important we need to do, so we can't stick around to chat," he continued.
If the little ghost decided to attack again, well.... so be it, but he hoped this could be ended without conflict.

(106 energy)

Lord E V carried out 2 launched of one Obsidian Rift :

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"Oh..." the duskull spoke a bit sadly, as if disappointed. The duskull looked down to the ground, still half in the ground and half out. The little ghost type was bored to be fairly honest, he had nothing to do and things were just starting to look like it was getting fun with some new friends to talk to. They did not seem keen on talking however. The duskull gave a sigh, "I guess i'll go now...alone..."

Mirage raised an eyebrow as the duskull turned around and began to float slowly away. It was doing a terrible job of pretending it did not want to come along. She may have lacked quite a bit of experience in her life at the moment, but she could still read body language and tone. She remained silent however, deciding that it was best to say nothing and simply let the creature leave. It was far too dangerous for a child to come along.

Garnet found that the duskull was not hostile. That was good, things were looking realtively calm. He calmed down himself, the infestation had still hurt a bit, but he was overall fine. The fire lizard took a deep breath before speaking, "We should keep going, the more eyes we have on the look out for the orbs the more we might find."

Mirage:

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Sova's outward attitude remained calm and neutral, but after the words of the duskull, he felt a bit bad. He figured it was trying to guilt him into changing his tune, but that didn't really change that he felt bad for turning the apparent child down. Plus, while it was clearly trying to guilt-trip, there was a chance it really was alone. He couldn't imagine what being alone down here in the perpetual darkness felt like, and honestly, he didn't want to. But what was he supposed to do about this situation? It wasn't like he could take a naive child with him to fight a creature worthy of the acknowledgement of a deity.

He waved a paw dismissively as the charmander spoke, trying to signal the others to just go on ahead. As for himself, though, he needed to stay behind and try to fix this. "Hey, come on, don't be like that.... It's not like we want to leave you; we're going to do something really dangerous. I'd hate for you to come along and end up getting hurt," he attempted to explain in the hopes of making the ghost understand.
He didn't want to leave someone upset like this. Not now, when he was already doubting his ability to be "good."

(94 energy. No, I didn't do the math wrong. I just forgot to add +1 from a levelup.)

Lord E V carried out 3 launched of one Obsidian Rift :

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The duskull turned around quickly as the glaceon began to speak up. Its one glowing eye seemed to be glowing a bit brighter as he was spoken to, "Really?" it had spoken, though it had expected the glaceon to say something along the lines of "You can come with us if you want" and not...well, what he had said. "Er...something strong I mean?" he spoke.

Garnet glanced to the glaceon. He was hesitant about leaving the glaceon alone with the duskull, well, he was hesitant about leaving the glaceon alone period. He did not make a move to leave and instead remained where he was. Besides, Sova would not be able to see without him. He would rather get yelled at than have an ally fall because he was not there to light the way. He instead joined the conversation, "yes, really strong. It would be dangerous of you to come with us."

The duskull stared at Garnet before speaking up, "I bet i'm stronger than YOU," he taunted with a giggle. It was dead set on joining them it seemed. The duskull was attempting to give reason to why it should come along, but Garnet growled dangerously as he reacted rather negatively towards the comment with a frown upon his face.

Mirage also refused to leave. She felt that it was a bad idea to split up...and she had no idea where the dusclops had floated off to. She did not want to be alone in this dangerous place with that thing around. The zoroark noticed that Garnet did not seem to be getting along too well with the duskull, but remained silent about it. She was unsure of whether or not she should intercept.

Sova's Post

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It seemed the persistent duskull wanted to come along. Sova remained silent for as long as the conversation moved itself along without him, but the second the charmander started getting ticked off, he decided it was time to jump back in. He didn't want a fight breaking out after getting his hopes up with the whole "no violence" thing. He took a moment to think about what to say, but there wasn't really a nice way to decline the duskull's help, especially since it seemed to be a child who likely wouldn't fully understand. Well, it wasn't his place to tell someone what to and not to do, but....

"If you wanna throw your life away along with us, be my guest; I can't stop you. But.... if you do come, you've got to promise one thing," he offered a sort of compromise.
If the duskull wanted to come along, he was in no place to stop it, but he did have one condition. If the ghost got hurt, he himself died, or he otherwise said it so, he wanted the child to leave immediately. Perhaps the ghost would be useful, but he certainly didn't want it to become a more.... literal ghost.

The duskull nodded, "Anything! I wont die!" he spoke up with a gleeful look upon its face.

"It's too dangerous," Garnet insisted. He didn't know what Sova was thinking, but he was going to put his foot down when it came to bringing a child along to a death match...ok so he just didn't want an annoying little shit like this duskull coming along. First impressions were quite important to Garnet, and so far this duskull had not left a very good mark on Garnet. The charmander crossed his arms with a frown.

"You're just jealous because I was able to trap you," the duskull taunted the charmander, getting a kick out of tormenting the little lizard.

Mirage remained silent because she's gone emo at the moment and is a very antisocial zoroark right now.


HOUSE ORB GO

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Sova was just about to state his one condition when the lantern forgot how to be a lantern. Garnet seemed very against bringing the duskull along, and against the duskull in general. He sighed in frustration, trying very hard to be calm and diplomatic despite his very nature being more centered toward being violent and harsh. How was he supposed to ease this tension, though? "Okay, two conditions," he started speaking.
For some reason, he felt like getting the duskull to play nice would be easier than getting Garnet to. However, if possible, he wanted to get both of them to cut it out.

"First: be nice to the charmander. Second: like he said, this'll be dangerous, so.... if I personally die, if you get hurt, or if I tell you to leave, you leave," he stated his two conditions.
If he was going to be having a tag-along, he needed to know they would leave if instructed to. He hoped this would also silence Garnet's complaints about it being too dangerous. He was well-aware of how dangerous it was, but if the duskull agreed to leave at the first sign of danger, it was a lot less risky. Besides, maybe the duskull would be of some use. They'd only seen one of its moves so far, and it seemed useful enough.

The duskull pouted as the glaceon said he could no longer play with the charmander. The duskull crossed its own arms and likely would have had its cheeks puffed out if it had any before saying, "Fine." It lifted itself out of the ground and popped into the air with a loop-de-loop, cheering itself up as it chimed, "So whatchya guys doin anyways? Explorers? Outlaws? Financial Advisers?" the duskull giggled at his own joke, since it was obviously not true.

While Garnet still did not approve of the joining of the duskull, he remained silent and simply turned away to keep going in the direction the Dusknoir had floated off in. It was a child, it should not be here it should be home with his parents. Where even were this thing's parents? The charmander decided it was best to simply be silent for now and keep going. He wanted this day to end, how long had they even been down here for? A Day? Two days?

Mirage is silent because she's currently Ms. Edgy Emo

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