Grass Continent ~ Treasure Town Beach

[Namohysip]

"Oh, so many times!" Owen laughed, and for some reason, despite the gravity of it all, he seemed jovial. Maybe it was because he had them back now... or he was just the sort to be hopelessly cheerful against such grim realities. "I kind of lost count. It's devastating... But I'm still here. And I can keep going."

 

[Persephone]

That kind of put things into perspective. If he could get through it okay, then maybe she could. Just this once. Wouldn't do to make it a running habit. "Oh. So all this advice has been from personal experience?"

 

[Namohysip]

"Oh, er, yeah." Owen lowered his head sheepishly. "Sorry. I guess I should have made that more clear so I don't look like an optimistic idiot..."

 

[Persephone]

"Might've made me take it more seriously." Just relax then. Enjoy what you can. Okay. She could maybe do that. "Want to race back to shore? Loser buys desert for the winner."

 

[Namohysip]

"That's gonna be a big dessert," Owen said with a smirk. "Just because I'm big doesn't mean I'm slow!"

He was.

<><><>​

 

[Chibi Pika]

Starr had to admit, there was something nostalgic about being back at the Treasure Town beach. It was weird thinking back to being here as a Litten, training with Cabot and Cynthian. The weather was just as nice as she remembered. Sure, Destiny Village was a lot nicer in the summer than it had been earlier in the year, but it was still a lot cloudier and windier than here. And Starr had never been a fan of spending too long in one place. Force of habit. She found herself itching to leave the village on most days.

After heeding Owen's advice to grab some Passho Berry powder, Starr decided to go for a swim. It was still a bit awkward--the water felt cold and weird on her fire, even with the powder. But still, it was nice. Almost like being human again.

Would've been nice to go for a swim with Feraligatr. Then again, she'd be seeing Feraligatr, and all the others soon enough. Now that was a weird thought.

 

[ExplosiveTurkey]

Standing at the tip of a shark's snout, Aria took in a deep breath of the salty air. Of all the places to visit on a impromptu vacation, home made the least amount of sense, but this wasn't the Sharpedo Bluff she knew. Or rather, the Sharpedo Bluffs she knew. In a way, it served as a reminder of how bizarre her life had become.

She shifted her gaze sideways, to the beach where it had all begun, and curiously enough, there was more to see than empty sand and splashing waves. If nothing else, it was the perfect excuse to not keep hanging around someone's home.

Aria stepped off the cliff, platforms of aura keeping her from immediately plummeting like a rock. Then, after a bit of walking, she let herself drop, landing a few inches above the water — and a few feet away from Starr — with a soft fwump!

"'Sup. Not often I see Fires in water."

 

[Chibi Pika]

Starr paused mid-stroke, glancing up toward the sound of the voice to see a Lucario... standing on the water? Well, not the water, some kind of... energy platform thing. Well, wasn't she a show off.

"Yeah well, I always loved swimming when I was human. Not gonna let a minor thing like being a fire-type stop me." She let herself even out in the water so that she was standing on the bottom. That let her get a better look at the Lucurio, who she was pretty sure was one of the visitors from the other Cibus. The one Brisa had been gushing about ever since they'd met. Wasn't hard to see why, with that sort of confident aura.

Starr held out a hand, soaked with seawater. "The name's Starr. You're from the other Blacklight team, right?"

 

[ExplosiveTurkey]

The lucario was utterly dwarfed in the ensuing handshake, though she didn't bat an eye.

"Aria, and yeah," she replied, before glancing down at the water dripping off her paw. "Y'know, I probably should've waited till you were done. Awkward way to have a chat, this."

 

[Chibi Pika]

Starr chuckled. "Yeah alright, fair," she said, making her way to shore. She grabbed a towel and roughly scrubbed most of her fur before using a wave of heat to evaporate the remaining water.

She turned back to face Aria when she was done, slinging the towel over her shoulders. "So, how's life treating you spending a week in a copy of the place you already saved?"

 

[ExplosiveTurkey]

Aria stood at the edge of the waves, idly kicking at the water. "Mm... it's the same as always. Kinda nice, but also kinda weird, especially when I run into someone I know... or, well, know a different version of."

 

[Chibi Pika]

Starr made a face. "Ugh, yeah, I bet that'd be weird. We had a few teammates who pretty much lived in a world in a world exactly like this one and... yeah, no thanks. Gonna count myself lucky that my world is about as far from Cibus as it's possible to get."

 

[ExplosiveTurkey]

"Wouldn't know what that's like," Aria said, chuckling as she pointed up at Sharpedo Bluff. "That's the place I call home, back home. What's your world like, if it's so different from Cibus?"

 

[Chibi Pika]

Starr glanced back up at the bluff where Surf and Turf lived. It took her a few seconds to process what Aria had said, but then: "Wait, so this is the third version of your home you've been to? Daaamn..." She let out a low whistle. "Yeah, that would've screwed with my head for sure."

Starr paced along the shore, letting the water wash over her feet. "My world, well, it's got humans obviously, so that right there means it's not gonna look anything like this." She gave Aria a sideways glance. "Though I guess I don't know if you know much about humans--Ben mentioned that your team didn't have any." Then again, if she came from a world basically like CIbus, there might've been humans like Pine, or Thyme, but that really wasn't the same.

 

[ExplosiveTurkey]

"Third version... yeah, let's go with that," Aria said with a shrug. "As for humans, we don't have any with us right now, but we used to. He was really young though, and not too good at dealing with all this shit, so... Diyem didn't pull him back in for this."

She paused to give Starr a sly smile. "Besides that, there's the fact that my dad used to be a human, my current partner used to be a human, and I hang out pretty often in a world that's got actual humans. Kanto... Unova... Hoenn? Any of those ring a bell?"

 

[Chibi Pika]

Starr met Aria's look with a crooked smile of her own. "Alright, I'd say that makes you more familiar with humans than the average person on Cibus, yeah." She let out a small laugh. "Actually, it's a bit of a relief--I swear half the team looks at you like you're from another planet if you mention any human stuff. And, yeah, I guess I technically am, but it's still awkward as hell."

"Anyway yeah, all three of those places ring a bell, so that world's a lot like the one I'm from. Same with Koa, Nate, and Silver. I'm from Kanto, myself. But, uh... you're gonna have to explain how the hell you've managed to get there if you're from a place like Cibus," Starr added, raising an eyebrow.

 

[ExplosiveTurkey]

"Well, long story short, that world's kind of linked to mine. It's where we import most of the humans from," Aria said with a chuckle. "My partner loves getting to play around with technology again, and Palkia owes us all the favors, so we hop dimensions often. I'm still getting used to pushing literal buttons instead of someone's buttons, but it made the communicators here easy to figure out, so I can't complain."

 

[Chibi Pika]

Starr gave a low, ironic chuckle. "Damn. Best of both worlds, huh. Well, aren't you two lucky." She folded her arms behind her head, staring up at the sky a bit wistfully. "So your partner didn't even have to give up on a human life." Man, wouldn't it be something to have both.

 

[ExplosiveTurkey]

Aria let out a snort. "Considering he didn't get any of the benefits of becoming a pokemon, I'd say it was a fair trade... or lack of one, anyways. But he did get me, so I'd say he still lucked out."

 

[Chibi Pika]

Starr gave an exaggerated shrug. "Well, I'm not gonna pretend like there haven't been a lot of perks to being a Pokemon, but if I could swap worlds at will, you better believe I'd be wanting my old body back when I was in my own world. I miss it." Not as often as she used to, though. Evolving into a form that felt closer to human had helped a lot in that regard.

"So your world drags in humans all the time... I guess that explains what on earth you're doing with a human dad--you're kind of like Brisa, huh?"