Mischief Managed [Halloween S4 2019]

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Tonight was going to be fun, Chance thought to himself with a snicker. He spent quite a fair amount of time on just collecting data about the kill-joys of the evening, now was the time to act against them! He couldn't do this alone, however, fortunately, he knew exactly who to ask along with him. It took him all day to put together the note for Osiris, even more just to sneak it into the dratini's room without his mother noticing.

...That was probably very illegal to do, but what did he care? He was gonna be the world's best outlaw! The zorua donned his cape and flash emblem, slapped on his false-oversized fangs, and picked up the pumpkin shaped basket. The innards of the carrier was empty, however, so he flipped the object up onto his head-effectively transforming it into a hat.

He sneaked out of the house and into town square, a careful and cautious eye looked to and fro. This was a Top! Secret! Meeting! He had to make sure nobody was following him...Once he was satisified with his three second search, he slipped into the alleyway he told Osiris about. He searched around the boxes and barrels briefly before he located the one he scouted out several days before. A grin stretched across his expression, the "X" he marked on the crate still ready. He reached his fore-paws up onto the edge. With a keen and careful eye, he made a move to jump in...

Of course, he failed. The box flipped over with the wrong move and trapped him inside. A surprised cry escaped him as he dashed forward in a blind panic. He rammed into the side of the box and sent it flying with him across the alleyway. the box struck another barrel. The rumbling sound of wood struck fear into him as he heard something heavy drop on top of his box.

...

uh-oh.

Osiris was startled at the zorua's outburst, jumping back with wide eyes as he looked for all intents and purposes just like the pokemon he tangled with in a life or death struggle minutes ago. Then Kiba's body dropped, shivering on the ground, though the dark-type still had the energy to glare up at him and spew venom, as usual. The dragon-type wyrm relaxed, his heart rating slowing from the rapid rate it suddenly raced at. "Language," he rebuffed again, absently, mentally chastising himself for kind of jerking Kiba's body around, at least. To be fair to himself, though, he said that before Evil Kiba decided to be a stubborn jerk.

"I don't exactly have a lot to work with, you know. Kiba said his dad was a famous explorer," he recalled with a frown, staring down at the frothing zorua. "And he didn't mention his mom, but I met her once, and she was pretty... intense." the dratini thought out loud. Maybe they'd made some enemies in their career? Osiris was just a kid, and he already kind of had an enemy in this guy...

He stopped and coiled up again, willing to take a little break while Evil Kiba got some of his strength back. "That's not too rare. I mean, I don't know my dad, but apparently he's a pretty strong explorer, too. And I don't have any assassins trying to get me because I'm outside on Halloween."

While Osiris intended to give him a rest, he certainly didn't think he got a sudden pass on resting. He could feel the body shake, but even he wasn't sure if it was from the pain or from his anger. As he tried to force the body up, he continued to converse with the dratini, "Sova-egh...Team Sentima." He spoke as if the name said all. His voice took on a casual tone, though it dripped with sarcasm, "You knoooow the guy that fought against Genesect and Mewtwo...and won???" he dropped into a growl towards the end.

The body wouldn't cooperate. It was a struggle to push himself up. It took much longer than last time thanks to his blunder, but if he didn't get up then the idiot across from him was just going to do even worse damage. "He's got lots of outlaws he's thrown in jail...a lot of their friends he's ticked off...and just plain a lot of people he had to beat up because they wouldn't get out of his way." The smile cracked again, though it held a far different feeling than before. He barked a forceful laugh before he continued, "And don't even get me started on dear ol' Ma!" He was up. He turned and started to walk away from the dratini.

"Lot's of people...that'd just straight up kill him just for existing." he sneered as he walked.

This dice is not existing.

"Iiiiiii don't," Osiris confessed, trailing after the zorua dutifully. "I mean, you and Kiba make him sound like a big deal, but I don't know who any of those people are." the dratini elaborated, wracking his brain. He knew of a few different explorers by name, but they were mostly out of personal interest and not any grand claim to fame. Something about the name Evil Kiba dropped was familiar, though. Sova... Sova, Sova... Geo's Sova? The guy who stopped her from breaking her neck climbing trees?

Probably just a similar sounding name, he decided, frowning. "That doesn't mean that Kiba has to live his life sheltered from all kinds of danger," he pointed out, sour that this guy was determined to treat his friend like a baby. "It makes things complicated, but his parents can watch out for him. His mom saved us both one time, and apparently his dad did too!" he argued, mostly for the sake of arguing. Things couldn't be as bad as the alter-ego was painting them.

The dragon-type slithered closer to his companion, moving alongside him, mostly out of concern for how Kiba's body was holding up. They came upon the hole in the fence that led them to most of their troubles tonight. "I'll go first," he offered, "you know, in case there's assassins on the other side." Sarcasm was something of a learned skill - there was plenty of it on display tonight from the zorua next to him. Osiris squeezed through the hole and waited.

This dice is not existing.

He was fully insulted on the behalf of Chance that the dratini didn't know of his father. He couldn't even believe what this dratini said. His fur refused to smooth back over, but that was fine. He didn't want to calm down at this point. The dratini was keen on just continuing to insist and try to shoot down his arguments as if he knew nothing.

The hole proved to be more than a challenge than it should have been. He had to crouch and sort of crawl through it, which was an easy feat...if the body weren't battered and bruised. Every other step he'd stumble and struggle to catch himself. He was slow, a lot slower than he wanted to be. The longer they stayed on the streets, the more likely they were to be noticed. He pushed himself along as quickly as he could, but it felt as if the body were screaming at him to stop.

He fell over as soon as he squeezed himself out of the hole, which meant he had to try getting up again. Each time was more difficult than the last. It was a long day for Chance's body, it wanted to rest. Despite this, he continued with a strained voice, "As much you eyedeelistic idiots would like to believe that, they're not always gonna be around-especially with how often Chance gets out of their line of sight-" Another tumble cut him off as he just managed to get on his paws again with another bout of shivers and struggles.

"Dad's practically sewisidal and Mom's just as likely to snap one day and do it herself," he snapped, "Even if they don't, Dad's always miles away while Mom's too chicken to leave the house half the time. It's sheer luck that the two managed to show up just in time on both occasions." He wasn't at all hesitant to reveal this sort of information to Osiris. It was an inevitability that the dratini was going to find out-as much as Chance might have wanted to ignore that side of his life. Even then, it wouldn't matter much-especially if he was just going to kill the dratini later on down the line.

"He needs someone there to help him, someone who won't turn around and stab him in the back...and I'm that guy."

"This coming from the guy who's ready to throw Kiba off a cliff as soon as your oh-so-precious secret identity is revealed," Osiris snarked, rolling his eyes as he kept pace with the zorua next to him. "You're so full of it."

There really wasn't any way to keep this guy's mouth shut. Even knocking the wind out of him couldn't keep him from spewing crap, just now he was all wobbly and wheezy. The dratini led the two of them back onto the street proper, turning a corner and taking a route that didn't pass by the skiddo's shop - he didn't want either of them to be seen around there to be seen without his mask or Kiba's shapeshifting. The rest of Evil Kiba's arguments went in one ear and out the other for him; he'd listened to the dude philosophize all night, it seemed like, and he wasn't interested in engaging with him that way anymore.

The only method he had of dealing with this alter-ego of his friend's—at least he found out more of his situation with this other dude in his body—was to hit the dungeons more often, get in more practice, and get stronger. If he was in a position to stop Evil Kiba before he could do harm, then all would be well. Until then, he'd keep his nose to the ground and grind, and do a little bit of sleuthing about the zorua's little problem. "Few blocks down this way," he said absentmindedly, spotting a familiar street sign that let him know he was close to home. The dratini relaxed, feeling like they were home free at this point.

The dratini infuriated him, but he lacked the energy to do much else beyond a growl in response. He would have loved to continue, but he actually needed to stop now. This idiotic dratini was too stubborn. It was a waste to continue. His panting returned as he struggled along without some sort of support, all the while giving the dragon type quite the stink eye every now and then. He tried to focus his attention on his surroundings then, but his sight wasn't helping him even in the darkness. He was starting to see dark spots in his vision, so he had to rely on his ears.

---

A nose sniffed the ground. Cautiously and carefully, a jolteon followed along a trail. The smell, it was familiar. He knew this smell. His mouth watered with it, but food was not what he craved. The jolteon stopped and perked up his ears ahead of him. He could see a fenced off lot with a hole in the barrier. The trail was going towards it. He bolted forward and sniffed the entrance. It smelled newer than the one he was just on. The target must have left through here recently. He could smell blood on top of their scent...what happened?

The jolteon's ear twitched to his left before he looked towards it. The smell was going that way...and he could hear voices in the distance. Both seemed unfamiliar, but that smell was undeniable. As quickly as his three legs could take him, he bolted in that direction. His paw might have still been broken, but he was still fairly quick. He was a jolteon after all.

Erebus followed along with special attention to his nose, making sure to give it a good lick every now and then to keep it sensitive to the environment. He rounded a corner only to stop dead in his tracks. The zorua. There was a dratini with him too, but those little worms were small fry. The two even looked injured...this was officially his lucky day.

A smirk twitched at his lips while electricity began to crackle around him. It would have been a smart idea to think about what he was about to do some more, seeing as he was about to attack two children in the middle of the street, both of which who's parents were powerful explorers, one of which he was already on the shit-list of...but he was too eager. He wanted to do this now. He had some revenge to take for both his broken paw and his mouth.

His attack charged only for a moment, before he dashed towards the duo with a powerful burst of electricity. They were just close enough, he could hit both of them if he aimed it just right in the middle of them...

Fiii~nally. Total, blissful, silence. Osiris let go of a breath that he didn't realize he was holding when Evil Kiba's complaints and philosophizing fell quiet, a little quirk of his snout betraying the hints of a smile. It wasn't much to be happy about, but a few seconds of silence felt like a blessing at this point—

"Aghh!" he cried out automatically, something hard, fast, sharp, and thorny crashing into his side and sending him sprawling into the pavement. The dratini landed roughly, blood smearing across the road as his cuts were aggravated and grated against the ground. His side burned and stung, a different, high-tension sort of pain that was totally alien to the feeling of Evil Kiba cutting him up. It took a moment for him to place the feeling, but he'd just been... electrocuted.

Dazed and in pain, Osiris cracked an eye and caught a flash of yellow, wracking his brain for a pokemon species that matched. Yellow spiky fox pokemon - jolt... jolteon? "What the heck, man? Would it kill you to watch where you're running?" he asked irritably, his interactions with Evil Kiba and the static shock he'd received overwhelming his usual instinct to be polite. The dratini didn't look up to see what the electric-type was doing, instead turning his sights to Kiba's body, more interested in seeing how the zorua fared.

Kiba was not a stranger to the feeling of electricity coursing through the body, but this...this was a different level. While the attacker was significantly weaker than the rodents he encountered in the past, this particular jerk wasn't holding back. He was sent in the opposite direction from Osiris, launched and sprawled onto the pavement just like him.

This time, however, the body refused to move. A dazed haze overcame his thoughts, but still he tried to kick some action into it. He didn't know what was going on, but it was dangerous. He needed to get the body out of here! The most he could manage, unfortunately, was pathetic little twitches and flops.

---

Erebus didn't see it fit to respond to the dratini. The wyrm wasn't what he was here for after all...though he hadn't ever tried Dratini... He just wanted it out of the way. He turned right around as soon as he passed the two, a snarky grin on his expression. This was perfect! He cackled alongside the electricity he discharged, the little arcs spreading far and wide around him as they danced along the ground.

"Well hello again!" his enthusiasm shined as brightly as his twisted smile, "I was wondering when I'd catch you on the air again." His gaze snapped towards the dratini, "A friend too? I sure do hope you've got a bit more than that around with you." He actually didn't. He really hoped these kids were alone. It was low to attack two wounded children, but the dark typed brat had friends in high places and he was certain the dratini probably had some dragonite parents around here somewhere. He'd have to be quick, before they could call for help.

He focused on his priority first, but not without giving a quick kick of sand towards the dratini. He hoped the sand got into the dratini's wounds as well as their eyes. He really did. If he aimed right, then the dratini would be too distracted by the sand in his eyes to interrupt him. It was entirely possible, however, that he was too eager and sloppy with his attack. He was quick to jump on the zorua. He couldn't pin the dark type down as well as he could last time, so he'd have to make sure the bite was lethal. It was a bit of a surprise to him that the dark type didn't get up and run, but he took it as a reward for his "patience" with the hunt.

---

Something was on him. He didn't know what, he could hardly see, but it suddenly felt as if something were crushing his wind pipe. The furry coat around his neck helped protect him, but the pressure suddenly became a big area rather than four piercing points. Something just tried to bite him, now they had him under a paw. He could hardly understand what was going on, but his first instinct was to fight with everything the body had-even if it harmed it.

The Fury Swipes' enhancements to his claws returned as his limbs began to flail at his assailant, but even when he connected, a jolt of electricity met his paws as they were impaled with thorn-like...fur? Still, he continued to scratch as he felt the Jolteon try to go for higher up on his neck, the little spot where the fur didn't protect him as much. He squirmed and gasped as much as he could, narrowly causing the Jolteon to miss the sweet spot once or twice before the electric type changed their tune and latched onto his paw and bit as if he were trying to gnaw it right off.

Osiris' first thought was that maybe the jolteon had been in a hurry, bolting through as fast as they were and crashed into a couple of kids. But as this pokemon spoke he realized that the collision was fully intentional and that he had some kind of history with Kiba... or Evil Kiba. Iris picked himself up off the ground, ignoring his inflamed cuts and aching body, staring at the electric-type as he maliciously introduced himself.

Was this the jolteon, he wondered, that attacked Kiba in his story? No, they killed him, or... left him to die? It didn't matter, he told himself consequently - whoever he was, it didn't change the fact that he attacked them! Osiris opened his mouth to cut the guy off, eager to redirect the pokemon's attention away from his injured friend, but the jolteon chose that precise moment to send him a present. A burst of sand exploded in Osiris' face, causing him to reflexively close his eyes and recoil his body backwards, but he was too late on both accounts. His eyes burned, and his cuts stung strongly, and he could hear sounds of scrambling close by.

Blinded he may be, he could hear. The dratini cracked an eyelid to get a rough estimation of where the jolteon was before positioning himself accordingly - he crouched low to the ground, loaded himself up like a spring, and once again exploded off the concrete street, launched by Extremespeed. It was not a sophisticated attack aimed at any weak point - it was a half-blind full-body tackle aimed roughly at where he thought the jolteon was; certainly prone to striking only a glancing blow, or even missing, just by merit of him misjudging the distance. He didn't have the time to stop, think, and be careful though. Someone was attacking Kiba (even if it was through his awful impostor) and he had to defend him.

The body felt it extremely necessary to punish him for his failure to protect the paw. As much as he tolerated everything before, this was new. His desperate and weak attempts to claw at the Jolteon with his good paw remained in vain, he couldn't get a good hit off on the Jolteon. His movements became slower as he began to feel lighter in a sense-particularly in his head. The world seemed awfully insistent on suffocating Chance today, but at the very least it wasn't until death.

The pressure suddenly removed itself, but he was suddenly yanked around by the paw the jolteon held. He felt a pain in his muscles around the shoulder area, but he couldn't do anything to stop it. Try as he might to focus, the haze, lack of cooperation, and pain from the paw was too much for him to work with.

----

The attack struck the Jolteon, very nearly missing him entirely. The dratini smashed into his hip and knocked him straight over. He kept his teeth down on his prize with a series of snorts and snarls as he struggled back up. Electricity gathered and crackled around him, uncaring if the attack performed any residual damage on the zorua he held onto, and launched another column of electricity at the Dratini, aiming to hit the dratini head on his time around.

Despite his intent, the thunderous attack was still difficult to control. The electric type pulled the zorua in front of him as he faced the dratini, fully prepared to throw the body in the way if the Dratini were to try to pull that again. He could taste the zorua's blood in his mouth, this is what he wanted. Unfortunately, he wouldn't be able to hit his preferred area...so he'd just have to shock this little bastard until he stopped moving as he attacked the friend.

Osiris crashed into his target and careened off to the side, skidding onto the harsh ground roughly. It'd felt like tackling a porcupine - this guy was all pins and needles, and he'd just slammed his head into him! Desperately, he hauled himself up off the ground again, but fatigue was settling in. His body felt heavy and hesitated to obey his commands, to say nothing about the pain courtesy of the numerous injuries he'd complied in the past half-hour of his miserable freakin' life. By the time Iris pulled his head up to gauge the damage done to his newest adversary, it was too late to evade the pillar of static power aimed at his everything.

The attack struck him head-on, rattling his bones and burning his scales. Though dragon-types resisted electric attacks, Osiris was dangerously near the end of his rope, and it felt so much more painful as a result. The dratini jerked powerfully as a reaction to the strike, twitching and smoking minutely as the electricity coursed through him, leaving him tingly, exhausted, and seared. His spirit did not flag, though; he was determined to keep going until he couldn't go anymore, and so he readied himself for another exchange.

The jolteon had positioned Kiba's body in front of him like some kind of twisted shield, so Osiris dashed with Extremespeed once more, this time going around the jolteon instead of head-on. Brute force hadn't worked, so instead, he would have to cripple their assailant and work from there. A stream of electricity crackled around his tail, and with a deft flick, he sent it at the nameless jolteon once he'd done a half-circle around him, aiming for his hip once more—hopefully, the electric-type wouldn't have the strength to swing Kiba all the way around to block the move.

The Jolteon was surprised that the dragon type managed to keep up this sort of speed after being blasted with his strongest attack head on. His eyes glanced off to the side in a poor attempt to follow the dratini. His eyes were wide, but as soon as they caught sight of the spark of electricity, a smirk replaced the look of momentary fear.

He dropped the zorua's paw and fully embraced the electrical surge. His collar puffed out as a ripple of elation spread through him. The Thunder Wave was absorbed into the Jolteon's fur, strengthening the crackles and shocks that continued to erupt around him. A brief idea crossed his mind to pretend to be injured by the attack, in hopes that the dratini would keep using it, but he didn't need that. Not when he was this close to killing the zorua already.

Erebus lowered his head back down and grabbed onto the zorua's hind leg. He bit down as hard as he could. He wanted to hear the same sickening snap he heard when the brat's father tormented him, but he wasn't strong enough for that. Instead, the electrical surges continued to assault the zorua. He had a different idea in mind now, one that seemed more fun.

With as much force as he could muster, he tossed the fox into the air, "CATCH!" he called out to the dratini as he blasted the fox with another bout of electricity. The attack pushed the zorua along in the direction of the dratini with the hopes that the dragon type would be compelled to catch his friend from taking too much more damage...and face yet another Thunder attack. It wouldn't be direct, but every bit counted with such a normally inaccurate move.

It didn't work! The thunder wave should have crippled him, but the jolteon took it head-on and didn't even flinch! Panic and fear rose up in Osiris' heart, his eyes wide with shock, confusion, and adrenaline - what did he do next? What could he do? His moment of indecision cost him as the electric fox pokemon grabbed hold of Kiba's body once more, and all of a sudden Osiris was on the back foot as his friend was thrown into the air.

The situation dawned on Osiris immediately. He could sacrifice the opening provided and catch Kiba, or go straight for their opponent and let Kiba go flying. It was a horrible, twisted situation to be in, and of course he had no choice but to help his friend. Panting hard under his breath, the dratini leaped up off the ground. His trajectory wasn't poised to intercept Kiba, but to catch him at the end of his arc of flight and act as a cushion for his landing.

Taking a page from the jolteon, Iris grabbed hold of the zorua the only way he could, by biting down hard on Kiba's fur collar. He did what he could to stabilize them mid-air, but his friend was much larger than him, and so they hit the ground hard. Osiris immediately winced at the weight of Chance pressing down on him and the static electricity coursing through him to strike at the dratini. Exhausted, he pushed hard with what strength he had left, rolling the black fox off of him so he could pull himself up to stand between his friend and their attacker... totally exhausted, injured even worse than before, and with no idea how to slow the jolteon down.

The electric type watched as the limp body of the zorua was rolled off of the wyrm. He could hear the raspy breath of the dark type and the struggled sounds of the wyrm. His head held high, he made an effort to walk on his healing paw, doing everything he could not to flinch. He wanted this moment to be even more perfect. If that meant walking on his bad paw, then so be it.

He took his time in his approach, deciding to take a moment to gloat for his own personal satisfaction, "Well, this all certainly seems a lot easier now that daddy isn't around to ruin the fun." A snicker escaped him, "And I even get a little entree to go with it, how delightful." The zorua wasn't awake to hear it, but he didn't quite care. This was all for him.

The jolteon did his best not to limp, each step slow and painful, but it made the scene suit what he wanted perfectly. He stopped just before the Dratini and Zorua. Since the zorua seemed a little too incapacitated, he decided to speak to the dratini instead, "Is there anything you'd like for me to tell your daddies when they find out you're not around any more?"

They always seemed to talk, didn't they? Osiris' lip curled subconsciously, his disdain and frustration showing itself on his face. He didn't know what he was doing to attract all the smug evil jerkwads today, but here he had another one. It was too bad that he didn't have a lot left to fight with; in his best condition, he was confident he could tank enough of those thunder attacks to make some real headway against this guy. Alas, this jolteon picked the best possible time to... get revenge on a kid, or whatever this was.

"Yeah," he snapped back, his mouth running automatically, "Tell him it was nice never knowing him."

The rage was a surprise to him this time around, though not at all unwelcome given the circumstances. Vision still blurry and unreliable, Osiris sucked in a breath and pooled draconic energy at the base of his throat, focusing on that anger. Unlike his tussle with evil Kiba, there was no need to hold this in and wait for an opportunity; this jolteon was giving him as good of a shot as he had back then. So he let it loose, and with a muted shout, a blast of viridian power erupted from his face, aimed for where he figured his newest adversary was.

It was entirely possible that his fatigue would result in an inaccurate shot, but given the close proximity of the nameless jolteon, he had the nerve to hope Dragon Rage would give him a third lease on life.