SEPTEMBER INTRO LOG

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→ 09/01 The Arrival

「 Welcome to the world of POKEMON 」

"It will come to be. And in exchange..."
You wake up with a start. Thunder rolls across the sky, steamrolling the voices and the fog out of your head and replacing them with mottled grey on white— greyer in some spots than others, and if you're one of the unlucky ones, the greyest leaks cold water right down on your face. Drip... drip... drip... the intervals in between getting shorter and shorter until

SPLOOSH!!

The entire ceiling caves in and water and soggy drywall collapses onto your head, and those of several dozen others sharing this very open, very wet room. Rain pours down from overhead through the large hole in the middle of the ceiling, but the perimeter of the room is a little drier: about a dozen cots line the walls, not enough for the number of people here and so most must pick themselves off the ground. Other than a few curtained dividers now scattered across the flooding floor, the room is otherwise bare. White, grey, and very wet.

"Uh..." The only dry people in the room stand in the doorway: a girl who pulls her hood further over her head to keep the water off her face as she steps in to help the person nearest her up, and a boy who hangs back behind her, hesitant, staring at his feet a little guiltily until he looks up and catches somebody's eye, and he too steps forward to help people onto their feet. They introduce themselves as Chiaki Nanami and Minato Arisato, explain that they've arrived here a while ago in the exact same way as everybody here, and show off the purple and grey bands around their right and left ankles respectively, as if that is proof enough. Your unconscious bodies may or may not have been investigated while you were unconscious, but every person here will find some sort of band tattooed around a part of their body, some with a single pattern and some with two, some matching somebody else's and some unique to their own.

For those who want to hang back and ask questions, Nanami and Minato stick around and do their best to answer them, otherwise, you're free to go out in the rain and get soaked and wonder why this is your life.

→ 09/01 The Surroundings

"Ichi help me think of headings. I am so bad at writing headings" - Card

It's actually not that bad, all things considering. Sure, it's raining all day nonstop, but the rain varies between pouring and sprinkling and is weirdly lukewarm, like a shower that doesn't have enough water pressure and can't get hot enough. Strange creatures called Pokemon roam about the town of Toran, many hiding from the rain and liable to attack when people unexpectedly stumble upon them trying to find shelter themselves, especially the arm-hungry bears who just want to nap under trees, but others are friendly and eager to help people sweep water out of buildings and patch up roofs.

Whether you woke up with one or stumbled across them later, you have your own strange creature too. Be friends. If you don't know anything about Pokemon, there are plenty of elementary schoolers eager to laugh at your ignorance and teach you everything you need to know about catching and training Pokemon, little four-year-old escorts around Toran to show you where to find them in the lake at the center of the island, the surrounding ocean, the patches of grass throughout the town. The ground is perpetually marshy, thick mud and tall grass slowing foot traffic and the spiderwebs of pavement connecting the other structures around town are covered with half squashed, wiggling worms(egments) that are almost unavoidable to step on unless it's during a lighter drizzle when the bird Pokemon are free to swoop down to pick the roads clean. Want to get some experience in Pokemon battling? These literal children will gladly pulverize you to the point of blacking out and take your money or whatever fun little trinkets you have in your pockets.

The building everybody arrived in turns out to be a hospital, with an adjacent building being a hospital for Pokemon- a Pokemon Center- which offers free shelter for travellers but is currently overflowing with people who are stranded on this island, even with so many visitors forced to resort to long term lodging in the town's small inn. Both the hospital and Pokemon Center stand right along the lakeside, water overflowing and nearly lapping against the front steps, which is home to an abnormally large 30-foot long Gyarados. It thrashes about in the middle of the lake and has been scaring all the other wild water Pokemon to the outskirts of the lake, blasting the nearby buildings and berry trees with torrents of water, and lashing out at anybody who tries to approach. Several fishing boats that have gotten too close have been smashed, but a few are left tied to the docks around the lake for braver trainers to use.

Large canopies have been set up over the berry gardens dotting the rest of the lakeside to keep the rain (and the occasional Gyarados hydro pump) from washing off the berries. The trees are tended to by gardeners with their grass Pokemon, and at times Minato with his Yamask covering his face, one black arm wrapped around his neck and the other lazily waving an arm to part the cloud of several hundred Combee buzzing protectively around the boy, trying to keep unfamiliar people away from the beehives as Minato makes his rounds checking up on each of the hives and picking up the fruit that has fallen or has ripened enough on the branches, offering berries to any person or Pokemon who's hungry.

Most of the buildings around town are doing well enough, despite the unending gloomy weather and too many people. The Daycare Center is particularly packed with Pokemon whose trainers are stuck outside of the island and unable to pick them up, and volunteers to help feed and care for the Pokemon are needed more than ever, especially the younger Pokemon who are fussy and upset at being away from their trainers for so long. Even the older Pokemon are a bit worried, and some of the daycare workers whisper about rumors of a pack of wild Drifloon seen around town whenever the rain calms down to a drizzle and luring little kids into the thick fog and getting them lost. There are also whispers about the hospital, hushed words about how it's haunted by the spirits of the deceased and that when a group of Murkrows gather around a patient's window, it's to mark that person with misfortune and death. Several posters of missing children are hung up around the Daycare Center, with the promise of a reward for any information or return of the children, and flyers begging for help to calm the residents at the hospital of their worries about the Murkrows or ghostly sightings.

The Game Corner arcade never knows silence with the constant flashing and chiming of the slot machines and roulette wheels, but don't be fooled with the frequent payouts seen at the machines Nanami and her Mimikyu sit at, because the odds are actually pretty low and the tokens can only be traded in for berries, common items, and Pokemon accessories. There are no windows in the Game Corner, and it is very easy to lose track of time inside— one elderly gentleman in a tophat can be seen at the same slot machine in the corner at all hours of the day, never eating or sleeping or doing anything else but mechanically pulling the lever, unresponsive to the rest of the world around him. He's going to hit the jackpot, he knows it. Just one more pull. One more pull...

The newest building in Toran is the boba shop, freshly painted in bright yellows and blues just before the storm hit and the colors remain bold against the grey sky. The "Grand Opening" sign still hangs above the front door despite opening over a month before, inviting customers inside to try their specialty: milk tea with Combee honey boba balls. Boba is half off for first-time customers, and you also get your stamp card stamped with a lavender Bulbasaur face, unique to Toran's shop. There are eight stamps total to be collected- fill up your stamp card for a special prize! But strangely enough, scattered throughout the town, people of various different ages slump against walls and on the ground, barely responsive and with empty cups of boba around them. They're ignored by the townspeople and despite the unnerving sight of these semi-vegetative citizens, lines to the shop are just as long as ever.

The shop is also currently hiring, for those who would like to fill up their days while there's nowhere to go and make a little $$$. How about it? Join Team Boba today! (:

→ 09/02 The First Meeting

"Hahahahaha" - Ichi

After giving people some time to get settled, later in the evening of the second day, Nanami, Minato, and their Pokemon go around finding people with those mysterious bands marking them as isekai'd strangers to the island, and herd them towards the boba shop to Talk. About why they're all here, about that dream, about where to go from here...

As the group waits for the last of them to arrive, with a round of boba provided courtesy of Nanami and her small Game Corner fortune, chatter around the boba shop paints the same story: a storm has been raging for over a month now, with thunder and lightning, hurricane winds, and whirlpools making travel to and from the island too hazardous, trapping visitors on the island way past their expected length of stay. There are talks of strong Pokemon trainers having headed out into the storm to try and get help from other towns, most of them quickly forced to turn back, and others— whether they were lost at sea or managed to break through— never heard from since. Storms are never this bad here, the people say, they never last this long and they don't ever seem to be... sentient... getting a lot worse earlier yesterday when so many new people were found collapsed around the island and were brought to the hospital, intermittently throughout the past month whenever a trainer tries to leave the island, and the largest reaction from the storm over a month ago when a girl with pink hair and a boy with blue hair were found in the lake and dragged half-dead to the hospital.

The island has been isolated for well over a month now with nobody having any idea what's going on outside, but the arrival of so many people at once can't be a coincidence- it must signify the time for change. When something to this scale happens, people tend to look to the gods, the Legendary Pokemon, but if they're really the cause... it'll take effort from everybody in order to break through the storm to catch the attention of the Legendaries and reach the rest of the world.

→ MOD NOTES

⬥ Welcome to Pokespe! All characters wake up at the hospital by the lakeside and can explore the rest of the island. Players are free to play out Pokemon battles or wild Pokemon encounters, but please let a mod know when catching a new Pokemon so we can approve or decline the capture.
⬥ On the second day, Nanami and Minato will be available to answer questions about what they've found out in the month before everybody else arrived. They will each have an NPC toplevel for those who wish to speak with them, and characters present at the meeting are free to learn about the information shared without needing to thread with an NPC.
⬥To proceed to the next area for next month's log, characters must find a way to travel across the stormy ocean filled with whirlpools and choppy waves. Make sure to mention your efforts on the permanent AC page at the end of the month!
⬥ There are several other oddities and problems around town that characters may choose to help with or investigate, which may or may not help with escaping the island or have ties to the plot as a whole. To investigate one of these areas, please comment to the questions toplevel with a link to your thread so the mods can direct you appropriately.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[Sagi shakes his head. He can't be too mad at the little fluff monster, even if it did leap onto him out of nowhere. It was polite enough to leave his feathers alone, which wasn't the case with every Pokemon he's encountered today. All it did was nip at the strap of his bag, loosening it just enough to fall from his waist onto the ground.]

No worries. It's not like it's fragile. [Nothing but cards and a single, strongly minty-smelling hardboiled candy inside. He'll just pick the bag back up in one hand, no harm done.] Some of them really are like little kids, huh?

[ How fortunate that though Siwoo, the Eevee, is willing to try and eat every inanimate object or item that may potentially fit in his mouth.. he's smart enough not to go for feathers, hands, toes and so forth.

Of course he did go for someone's shoe previously. At least he's quite easy to babysit when Dokja is able to grab onto him. ]

They certainly have a lot more personality than I was expecting. Sure you can say dogs and cats do, but these Pokemon really do closer resemble kids than just animals. [ The Eevee in his arms chirps and wags his tail, clearly aware that he's somewhat being talked about here. ]

Heh, then again, some actual animals are like that too. There was this one caplin when I was a kid who'd freak out at me every day until it realised I finally grew taller than it...

[Before he puts the bag back on, he opens it to check nothing else got knocked loose. He thumbs quickly through his pile of useless playing cards - oh right, the candy he won off a kid earlier. It's the only food he has on him, so he's guessing it's the little bunnycat fella went after in the first place.

He takes it out. The minty smell through the wrapper is pretty pronounced. There's nothing rare about the candy, unfortunately.]

Is he, uh, allowed candy? He can have it, I don't care.

Must have never expected you to get bigger. [ Children certainly do grow fast. Dokja kneels to set the Eevee down, grabbing gently its chin to inspect it didn't get anything in its mouth in the meantime. Siwoo just happily wags away before licking at his fingers and gingerly nibbling.

The reader looks back up, glancing to the wrapper and already the Eevee's attention is captured by it. As if on cue, Eevee is jumping in place now excitedly with a shiny look in its eyes. Food! ]

I think it should be fine? I remember some kids mentioning some candy helps them grow. [ Which is strange to consider. ]

Really? [Sagi keeps feeling like he's missing memos, but he doesn't doubt it.] Guess that's where you have to be glad they aren't exactly like kids.

[Now that he thinks about the kids back home, another impulse idea occurs to him. Instead of just unwrapping the candy for Siwoo once his bag is back in place, he first makes a show of putting his hands behind his back, under his wings. Then, ta dah! He presents the Eevee with two closed fists.]

OK, little guy, which hand is it in?

[ Dokja is just the type to gather as much information as possible, even from kindergarten children that have been schooled in the matters of this world. But hearing that, he can't help his amusement. ]

I could only imagine if they were. [ He already has two kids he takes care of back home, so at least he wouldn't be too unprepared. Curiously he watches as the candy is hidden and chuckles at the surprise showing on the Eevee's face.

Eevee stares with wide eyes, up then down, from Sagi to Dokja. However, instead of bothered by it, he seems excited. Though he considers sniffing it seems like the Eevee decides to just go ahead and tap the left hand with a paw. This one, this one! ]

Aww, you got it. [Sure enough, when he turns his hand over, there's the candy. The mint smell is eye-watering now that it's unwrapped.] I guess that means you win.

[He'll hold it out until the Eevee takes it, but he glances back over at Dokja in the meantime, his smile vaguely apologetic and distinctly teenage.] Sorry, I'm done now.

[ The Eevee's eyes are sparkling. He got it? He won? He is a winner. This is his now. He will cherish it forever. And by forever, that means only for a few seconds as he takes it into his mouth and enjoys his new treat.

Dokja just chuckles, shaking his head at the apology. ] That's alright. I appreciate you humoring him. He really seems to be enjoying it.

I'm Dokja Kim, by the way. Thanks for treating Siwoo here well.

Oh, I'm Sagi! And nah, I just happened to have a treat on me, it's no big deal. Would be nice if all monsters were so easy to calm down.

[He says it with a side glance in the rough direction of the lake.]

Some are certainly easier to make happy than others.

[ Dokja muses, lightly ruffling the top of Eevee's head as he continues to enjoy his treat. He does follow that gaze with a hum. ] I heard about it. A Gyarados, right? Can't imagine why it's so worked up.

In any case, better to not go dipping into the waters anytime soon.

Haha, yeah. [He might already have. He definitely isn't admitting that to someone who looks sensible.] But we'll never know what it wants if we just leave it to terrorise people...

Fair point.

[ The Eevee wags his tail as he looks between the two, ears flopping with a tilt of his head. It'd be easier if they could just tell them, right? ] I wonder if anyone has any idea of what seems to be aggravating it.

Hmm...

[Phrasing it that way prompts Sagi to think about who could fit the bill for a moment, which he hadn't intended.]

I mean, it's only been causing trouble at all for a month or two, from the sound of it. None of us would know what changed around the lake back then. If anything.

Right. All of us arrived at the same time, minus two.

[ He remembers hearing both Minato and Chiaki's explanations. ] It's probably worth investigating it.

[ Eevee just wags his tail, seeming having finished his treat and watches the both of them with a cheery attitude.] But, I'm not too familiar with Pokemon so.

That is the sticking point right now, huh? Aw well. We've got time to think of something.

[The inclusive "we" comes naturally to him, because why wouldn't this random guy both know and care enough to help? But yes, he realises he just got sidetracked and didn't mean to grill Dokja too hard about it. He should leave them alone. Places to see, small children to lose fights to.]

Well, see you around! You too, little guy.

[So off he goes, his see-through wings shimmering slightly in the rain.]

SEPTEMBER INTRO LOG

premise ⬥ taken ⬥ faq ⬥ navigation

→ 09/01 The Arrival

→ 09/01 The Surroundings

→ 09/02 The First Meeting

→ MOD NOTES

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