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 winces at the collision despite it not being his Pokemon. Not only did that look like it hurt, he doesn't have to know what's happening to pick up on the word "poison".]

Ohh, that could be bad. If we don't neutralise that... ugh, was that something berries do...? Atsushi, you need to tell it to get the purple one, it's not listening to me!

[This sucks. And while he's adrenaline-rushing through his recent memories to try and decide on a tactic, the second Nidoran cannonballs straight into Pawniard...

...only for Pawniard to rebuff it with a Scratch across its hamster nose, apparently unshaken. Huh. Since when could she take a hit? Did that one miss? Or did he blink and miss something else? Strange.]

Berries?

[Why are they talking about berries?]

A-attack the purple one!

[Does the Spearow see color? He doesn't know. ~~I guess it damages the Niordan some, but that chart is ??? to me, sorry!]~~

[The purple Nidoran looks somewhat hurt from the haphazard yet more or less successful team attack - just not enough to shake it or the old man's confidence. After all, they only need to sit back and wait for the poison to do its work. Meanwhile, the blue Nidoran's venomous barbs are bristling again as it gets ready to charge back in...

Sagi has been in enough losing situations to recognise this one once he sees both rodent opponents still standing. If he didn't vividly remember calling the tactical shots in similar losing situations back home, he'd probably be panicking. That's his best guess at why Atsushi doesn't seem to be following his train of thought, rather than his train of thought just not being that coherent out loud.

Still, Pawniard apparently shrugging off that hamster's attempt at stinging it is the kind of detail that draws his attention. That might be the key. If it isn't, and if that Lucy critter isn't about to come out from under the slot machine, he can't see many other options.]

Look, I'll make it up to you later for yelling orders so much, just - keep going after the purple one! Trust me. And you [he points at Pawniard], stand by to intercept when they come in. We got this!

[Again with the mildly incongruous military terms. It's natural to him.]

It's fine!

[He never has a plan of attack, and telling him what to do is really the best way in the end. The Spearow dives in to peck at the purple Niordan, but he's slow already, affected by the poison.

Lucy is unfortunately still hiding under the slot machine and she's watching with dread, but won't come out to join the fight. She is, however, attempting to push the slot machine over onto the old man or Niordans or whatever's in the way the at the time it eventually falls, if she can move it.]

[The next turn happens fast. One moment, Pawniard is obediently raising her claws in some approximation of a defensive stance, ready to face the purple Nidoran head on and give Atsushi's struggling Spearow some breathing room. The next moment, she's gone. The old man's second Nidoran darts in from her blind spot before Sagi can so much as call out, smashes both of its hind legs into her side and sends her flying. She thunks heavily into the side of the slot machine, hard enough to make the whole machine rock precariously, and doesn't move again.

Sagi freezes up at the metallic sound of the impact. The old man cackles in triumph at such an unsubtle reaction. You young hooligans fell right into his trap! He'll even be merciful and end the other fool immediately. He beckons his Nidorans back to his side...

But all of a sudden, the old man stops and squints behind him. Sagi, still in mild shock, follows his gaze. Even though Pawniard already crumpled onto the floor, the slot machine is still wobbling. In fact, the angle of its tilting seems to be getting worse.]

[As Pawniard goes flying to the slot machine, the Spearow is momentarily distracted and loses any minuscule chance at the upperhand he may have had. The fight seems to stand still as the old man stops mid-taunt. The slot machine wobbles precariously, propelled in two different directions by Pawniard's impact and Lucy's original push.]

Move!

[Atsushi's yelling at the old man and not his poor Sentret, because human lives come first. Lucy takes it as a command anyway, but doesn't run. She curls up into a ball to protect herself, too scared to do anything else after her previous moment of bravery. The slot machine finally tips far enough to topple on the Senret; the old man is spared for now.]

["Spared for now" is more accurate than any of them know, but the old man is not remotely grateful. Instead of ordering his Nidorans to finish Spearow off as promised, he takes off his top hat and once again starts gesturing violently at both Sagi and Atsushi with it. Look what they've done! He could have died! Worse, they could have smashed up his precious lucky machine! As soon as he cashes in, he'll have them know he intends to file for damages, and their supposed game corner jobs, and criminal charges, and emotional devastation, and the tokens he would have won in the time they wasted, and the ache he feels in his poor elderly collarbone, and...

It's a mundane enough noise to snap Sagi out of his momentary shock, but he's no longer in the mood to argue. As if to ward off the man's continued ranting, he raises his Pokeball over his head and recalls his unconscious Pawniard in a small burst of red light. Once she's secured, he avoids looking at Atsushi.]

Yeah, we forfeit. Sorry for wasting your time, sir. We'll be on our way.

[Once they fish Lucy out somehow. Yes, he feels bad about it.]

[This a disaster in so many ways. Atsushi tries to calm the old man down, attempting to dissuade him from actually making any police reports or suing or whatever he intends to do; though he has nothing but meager boba shop income at this point. Free boba? Who knows, they may get sued later.

Atsushi collects his poisoned Spearow and supposes he'll have to take the bird to the Pokemon Center on the way to the human hospital. After poor Lucy is saved, and they've vacated the Game Corner, Atsushi has to fill the awkward silence somehow.]

I'm sorry I wasn't very helpful in there. I don't... know what I'm doing yet. It's okay if you want to go to the hospital by yourself.

[Sagi may have better luck on his own.]

Huh? [Sagi looks up with a start. After apologising one last time and then fleeing the building before the old man could ask him for his details, he'd mostly been quiet while he tried to replay the fight in his head... did he come across as mad about it? That's one assumption he rarely gets from anyone. His face just isn't scary enough.] Why're you sorry? It wasn't your idea.

[And he isn't even more than faintly annoyed at himself for making the initial bad call, to be honest. Give it time.]

Well, no, but...

[It's somewhat of a default to apologize when things go wrong, even if he's not directly responsible.]

I was unprepared and I thought maybe you'd do better without the distraction...

I should be the one apologising. You're fine.

[He says that deliberately breezily. He doesn't feel like dwelling on it.]

If you're tired after all that, I understand. But we can't go anywhere before we get our friends looked at, either way.

Right!

[That's what he should have been thinking about; the injured Pokemon. He feels bad for the poisoned Spearow, even if the bird is rather vicious.]

They should be seen to first.

[Off to the Pokemon Center.]

[Off they go. It's a little off-putting to Sagi that a couple of the nurses there know him by name already, but he does kind of stand out with the wings.

Once their Pokemon are patched up, he almost heads straight back out the door before remembering to check on Atsushi again. It's no big deal if the guy is tired after all. He meant that when he said it.]

Well, uh - how're you feeling now?

[There was little harm done to the Pokemon in the end, and at least that eases his guilt a bit. It took several tries to get the Spearow back into his ball, and one poor nurse had been pecked a few times in the process. Atsushi had every intention of going to the hospital as well, even if he expects they'll get no information there either. Sagi's question startles him, though, because he was too engrossed in his own thoughts on the way out of the Pokemon Center.]

What? I'm fine! I was... fine?

[He's a bit confused, because he wasn't injured or sick.]

Are we going?

[Was he fine? Does beating himself up come that naturally to him or something? Meh. It sticks out a little, but it only takes Sagi a moment to decide there are still more important matters to pursue than picking on him.]

Yeah! Let's go.

[Hospital time. It's a little trickier to track down willing interviewees who aren't rushed off their feet here. Sagi slowly has to admit that he isn't at ease in this kind of building the more they walk around it, either; ghosts or no ghosts, he keeps expecting the ceiling to fall on them again.

Still, the first nurse they happen to catch on a coffee break describes something interesting before he has to leave.]

So, the last time it happened, multiple people saw one of these balloon monsters show up in a gift basket before flying away... [The nurse, a doctor, the patient themself.] That's more credible than you'd expect from a ghost story.

[It's certainly more of a literal ghost story.]

I wonder if they're- the Drifloons- deliberately hiding themselves in the gift baskets, or if someone is placing them their on purpose. Do you think they keep records of where the baskets came from?

[It's probably weird for hospitals to inquire where gifts for patients originate from, but Atsushi has never been to a hospital besides this one, and he just thinks it's logical to keep files on things like this.]

Hmm... Maybe? With this many patients, that sounds like way too much to keep track of.

[He has no real idea either, which is why he doesn't sound particularly emphatic. This run-down hospital is already an order of magnitude bigger than any doctor's clinic he's ever run errands for.]

I guess we can check. It's too bad we can't just wait around until the next time someone brings in a basket and see what happens ourselves.

[...Can they?]

That's a good idea, though.

[They can, but should they?]

Some of the staff may know more than they let on, and it can't hurt to... observe things ourselves. We should keep an eye on the front door, but... maybe from above?

[Some spot on one of the upper floors where they can see someone bring a basket in, without getting in the way in the lobby.]

[Above, out of sight... That sounds like a better plan. Sagi had pictured just loitering in the lobby itself and trying not to scare any potential balloon pranksters off. He nods.] You're right, it's worth a shot while we don't have other leads. Let's look for somewhere with a good view.

[Time passes. The sky outside has been a uniform depressing grey all day, but presently it starts to darken. Further inquiries to passing hospital workers haven't earned them much except vague descriptions of the Drifloons and the occasional look of suspicion - the hospital just doesn't have the staff to keep tabs on everyone freely going in and out during visiting hours, even if they had a more solid reason to - so here they are, awkwardly halfway up a staircase that happened to have a view of the entrance below through a large-ish window.

Sagi is sitting quietly on one of the steps, the same way he has been for most of these past couple hours. He doesn't hate small talk, he just doesn't tend to start it when he has nothing interesting to say. "Would you like to hear about my close personal friend, the accursed wicked god of eld" is right out. Nothing interesting to watch from this vantage point, either: just the patter of lukewarm rain and the occasional figure hurrying past the building.

Up until now. While he's trying to think of the politest way to suggest they leave and come back another day, a schoolgirl approaches the hospital entrance from outside, four colourful balloons in tow...]

[The lack of small talk is both a blessing and a curse. Atsushi doesn't like to participate in it much, because he's afraid he'll say something ridiculous; yet just having his own thoughts is also bad. He remains standing the whole time, occasionally gripping the railing too tight when he's convinced himself this was a dumb idea and they should have left long ago. He's also trying to think of a way to bring up the 'we should leave' topic when the girl shows up.

Atsushi leans over the railing a little, squinting to see the balloons better. It occurs to him that he has no idea what a Drifloon looks like. It could be any one of those things. Why are there so many balloon Pokemon!?]

... which one is it?

[Step one should have been: look up what a Drifloon is.]

[Crap.]

Uhh, it was...

[He did ask earlier, which had been the source of at least one of the weird looks. Matching that description against a possible culprit had not been the part he was worried about. Now that he gets up and peers outside next to Atsushi, though...]

Round, purple... ominous? [Assuming the one with the pointy leaf-like part sticking out the top doesn't qualify as round, that narrows it down to... three?] Damn, I can't make out the colour from here -

[And now she's heading inside the door. Double crap.]

Forget it, there's no time! We need to tail her!

Right.

[Atsushi starts to vault himself right over the railing and down that way, but no... that would be bad without powers and could result in breaking bones. Oh my god. Running down the stairs it is. They're just going to follow some little girl through the hospital; it's not stalking.]

[It's not stalking! It's just... not prematurely provoking a potential culprit's attention before they can catch on and escape! And it's for the sake of the missing kids! Yeah.

She isn't hard to follow with few other visitors around at this hour, and they keep enough of a distance that she makes no indication of having spotted them. Before long, she comes to a door belonging to one "G. KING", according to the whiteboard. Sagi remains out of her sight behind the last bend in the corridor, arm out to stop Atsushi going too far - not that he thinks he would.]

Wait. We don't want another scene. [In she goes, the door clicking shut behind her balloons, and only then does he approach it.] Let's just listen in -

[A nurse clears her throat from somewhere behind the two of them. He stops in his tracks, right in the doorway.]

O-Oh... Hi again.

[Busted.

Also, outnumbered 3 to 2. If they couldn't overcome an old man at the game corner, they really don't have a means of breaking past the nurses' interrogation. What are you two still doing here? Did you actually have someone to visit? If you can't give a name, visiting hours are over anyway, so would you kindly (and permanently) leave?]

You're right, ma'am, we're really sorry. We'll get out of your hair. Yes, we promise we weren't -

[Feels like deja vu. Sagi does his best, but his best is what led them to loiter suspiciously around the hospital for an entire afternoon and then harass a little girl, against which there is no real factual counterargument. His best now leads them back outside with nothing to show for it except the rainfall from a darkening sky.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

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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