Destiny Village ~ Central Crossroads

[Persephone]

“Mom?”

“Fine. We’re fine. Just give me a sec. You can, um, play with your new friend.”

“Okay...” Coco pounced on Rocky. Val could deal with that later. She lowered her head to be nearer to Cuicatl’s.

“I know it’s not what you wanted but—“

“He’s dead.”

“I know—“

Cuicatl snarled and Val backed off before she got big again. With a lot more force this time.

“Just leave me alone.”

An unreasonable request when they were literally attached. But fine. Val could do it for a little while. She turned back to Nate. “Sorry, just seems to happen around you. Swear we’re not usually like this.”

 

[Negrek]

Rocky laughed and tumbled around with the other familiar on the ground. Coco's glowing teeth tore hunks of shadow out of his torso and arms, but Rocky's body reformed as usual. He seemed to be having a good time throwing Coco off and waiting for her to pounce again.

Well, at least someone was having some fucking fun around here. "Only seems to happen around you," yeah, that tracked, didn't it? At least the zweilous wasn't stuck with him the way Rocky was. She was a dark-type, right? Good thing there was no way she could actually see into his head.

At least the one head wasn't completely dead this time. Still talking and shit. "Oh, yeah, uh. So you don't need to go back to the infirmary or nothing? I mean, if it's a problem, we can just... go."

 

[Persephone]

"Not a physical problem, no. Cuicatl's just Having A Mood right now."

She huffed on the ground.

"But, uh, how have you been?"

 

[Negrek]

Cuicatl? Goddammit, he thought both heads were Cuicatl. Who the fuck was he talking to, here?

Nate let out a strangled laugh. "Oh, you know, I've been all right. Aside from all the usual bullshit. Giovanni fuckery, about thirteen thousand mewtwos, getting wiped off the face of the planet in a few days... The good times don't stop and all that shit." He flicked a rock away with one foot and tried to think of something less fucking depressing to say. "I mean, how about you, though? Must be weird, getting used to having two heads and all that." And two personalities?

Meanwhile Rocky had pinned Coco to the ground. The newly-hatched familiar was chewing vigorously on one of his arms.

 

[Persephone]

"I figure it'll work out. Always has. Remember the lugia thing? Yeah, should've died. But we got out! It's fine. At this point I've just stopped worrying about it. And it's a little weird having a roommate I share a torso with, but we mostly get along since we come from the same person and all." Kind of like twins. Which Val was 12000% not going to say aloud right now. "Is Coco hurting your friend? I can't tell."

 

[Negrek]

"Nah, he's fine," Nate said without looking.

"I'm fine!" Rocky said. "I like to fight. And you're right, we've dealt with everything that came before just fine. We'll get through this, too! I tell Mudkip that a lot, but he doesn't listen."

"Yeah, well," Nate said darkly. "If it's gonna turn out okay, it's gonna be because we worked for it, not because we sat around expecting it to all turn out fine." Oh, shit, that made it sound like he was mad at--"B-but that's good, like. I'm glad you get along and all, it would really suck to be stuck together with somebody who annoyed the shit out of you." And he would know, seeing as he was apparently doomed to dragging Rocky around everywhere. "What brings you out here, uh, you know, buying stuff and shit? I dunno if you've seen, u-uh, smelled, a thing, I'm looking for something called a joy ribbon. You run across anything like that?"

 

[Persephone]

"Uh... ribbons, no. Sorry. We were out looking for roseli berries. Didn't think much of them at home, but now they taste great! Can't get enough."

Cuicatl stayed silent. At some point Val was going to need to pull away and deal with that, but not yet. She'd need some time to process things before she would talk about them with anyone, even herself. Val remembered her own reactions to losing people the first time... having that hope yanked away again seemed terrible. Should be terrible, to her. She was part of the whole. Should care about things so deeply important to the whole. But in a way she was glad. All of literature and folklore said that the dead never returned right. And while having Alice would be great, Coco was better for levity.

 

[Negrek]

"Oh, yeah! I guess that makes sense," Nate said. "It would suck if those tasted bad to dragons. You were a human in your own world, right? There were people who liked pokémon berries where I lived, but not for me. Glad the food here isn't complete shit, at least." Berries still weren't exactly his thing. That was weird, thinking about being a pokémon changing your opinions on things. Good thing that hadn't happened to him at all. It'd be more than a little freaky.

 

[Persephone]

"I was human, yeah. Ate some berries there. Always a little bit off compared to maize and what not. Wouldn't call them bad, but they were best used sparingly. Or acclimated to. There were a few of them I could eat whole... How has being a pokemon been for you? I don't think we've talked about that."

 

[Negrek]

"Fucking hate it," Nate grunted. "Like maybe if I could evolve it wouldn't be so bad, but I'm like six fucking inches tall, everything is super far away or high up all the time, and it takes for-fucking-ever to go anywhere because my legs are so fucking short--"

"And he won't let me carry him!"

"--and all kinds of assclowns want to do things like pick me up or get all drippy at me because oh, a cute fucking mudkip, how goddamn adorable or whatever. Plus, you know, I used to think being a pokémon would be pretty sweet, like not having to get a job or deal with politics or nothing, but no, turns out it's more of the same shit. At least around here." Nate forced himself to stop before he could really get going. Regular ray of sunshine, wasn't he? Why the fuck would anyone want to talk to him, anyhow? "But you got a pretty great deal, right? I mean, as long as it's okay working with two heads. You can't see now, but you're going to turn into a hydreigon, right? That's super fucking badass. Don't think I'd mind being one of those."

 

[Persephone]

Nate really reminded Val of Kekoa, but saying that would have required explaining Kekoa and then that might make Cuicatl feel worse for some reason or another.

"Couldn't see before. Not a whole lot different. But being really short was weird. I was pretty short like, um, actually I'm not sure our measurement systems would've been the same but. Small. So I thought. Being a deino put that all in to a new perspective."

 

[Negrek]

"Oh, so you were blind before, huh?" Nate said. "Are you, uh, excited to evolve, then? Be able to see and shit? Or do you not really care anymore?" Shit, was that super fucking insensitive to ask? Hopefully not.

 

[Persephone]

"Maybe? I was psychic before so I'd kind of seen some stuff. Kind of. I, uh, couldn't actually get much out of it since I didn't really know what stuff was supposed to look like. But hopefully hydreigon don't have that problem? Al--" Shit, already committed. "A hydreigon friend of ours didn't mention that problem."

Cuicatl whimpered.

Val ignored it, for now.

 

[Negrek]

A psychic, really? That was pretty wild, then if she'd been able to see through other people's eyes and all that. If she was strong enough. Could have been interesting to discuss more, but it sounded like at least one of the heads really wasn't into it. "Yeah, hopefully it'll be no big deal. I guess maybe you could ask that voice of life guy, Buffet, what he knows about it. Like he's not literally a hydreigon or nothing, but he goes around in the form of one all the time, so he probably knows something about how it usually works.",

Meanwhile it looked like Rocky and Cuicatl's familiar had reached a stalemate, at least for the moment. Rocky was poised ready to move, staring his opponent down, while she looked like she was only waiting for an opening to jump on him again. "So who's your friend over there?" he asked, nodding at the toothy familiar. "I don't know what kind of pokémon that is."

 

[Persephone]

"Oh, that's Coco! Or Mitzcocotonaz. Means "she will dismember you." Val could maybe just hear Cuicatl mumble 'fucking metal.' "She's a tyrunt. Pretty, right? I assume that she's very pretty."

 

[Negrek]

"Oh, shit! Yeah, that's a hell of a name," Nate said with a laugh. "And yeah, she's, uh." He considered the tyrunt's long, glowing teeth and stubby front limbs. "She's gonna grow up into something amazing, I can tell. If you were human, then... were you a trainer? Is she somebody off your team?"

 

[Persephone]

“Yeah, I was. She’s my second Pokémon. I was there when she hatched so, yeah.”

 

[Negrek]

"Ah. Damn. That's pretty great." It sure was great when people's familiars decided to be actual members of their team and people they actually liked instead of sociopaths who were always dicking them around. Rocky turned his head ever so slightly Nate's way. Yeah, he hadn't even tried keeping that thought to himself. "I didn't get to see none of my pokémon hatch. That musta been... Really great. Yeah. Anyway. I'm sure she's gonna turn out great."

Nate cast around for something more to say, but a glance up at the sky only reminded him that oh, right, there was a gigantic fucking death orb hanging in the sky overhead. Kind of made it hard to think of topics for small talk. "Right. So. I guess we shouldn't keep you from those berries, huh? Glad we got a chance to see you, though. And meet Coco."

"Yeah! We should play sometime again!" Rocky said brightly.

 

[Persephone]

"You too! And don't worry, it'll get worked out."

Cuicatl might have grunted something.

Right. Now she needed to deal with a twin / self / sister that was dealing with overwhelming loss for a second time. Lovely.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~​

 

[Namohysip]

Seyka's trip to investigate Joule once again led him to the central crossroads of town, or at least one of the many offshoots of the roads. It seemed that he was not the only one with that idea, as also looking skyward on this road was a Sceptile and Celebi, unmistakably the same ones from the once-called future world. They didn't seem to notice him right away.