Mystery Continent ~ Northern Pines

[windskull]

"No, I hadn't brought anyone with me," he replied, not taking his eyes off the rustling fabric. "Nothing but..."

But his ultra stone.

Just as he thought it, the stone rolled out from beneath the fabric, surrounded by a pool of inky liquid. Quickly, the pool formed into a ball underneath the stone, then began solidifying into a gelatinous substance. For just a moment, it held there, and Nip wasn't sure if it was done forming or not. Then, suddenly, nine whipping tails shook out from the blob. It elongated and four long, limber limbs stretched outward. Gelatin that mimicked thick fur appeared just above the core, tapering into a neck. A vulpine head emerged, two icy blue eyes staring fiercely. When all was said and done, the ultra shade had become the spitting image of an icy ninetales.

The ninetales swiveled his ears, then turned to stare at Nip with a cool, even expression. Nip stared back, his jaw hanging open slightly.

The weavile was silent for several minutes before finally, hesitantly saying, "...Tempest?"

 

[Virgil134]

Pleo stared on in surprise as Tempest's body slowly began to take shape. He knew that Nip's shade had yet to hatch, but he certainly hadn't expected it to happen right now. What Pokémon would his shade turn into? And what would he be like?

It didn't take long for Pleo's first question to be answered, as Nip's shade took on the form a Ninetales with ice blue eyes. Maybe this was someone from Nip's world? He certainly seemed to recognize the Ninetales... Either way, this Tempest looked friendly enough. Eager to make a new friend, the young Lugia went up to the Ninetales with a friendly smile.

"Hey there, Tempest! It's nice to meet you!" he cheered, excitedly beating out his wings. "I'm Pleo!"

 

[windskull]

Tempest gave both Pleo and Nip a quick lookover before turning to address the Lugia. "This is one of your friends. Right, Nip?" Tempest began, leaning forward as if he was sniffing at Pleo. He dipped his head towards the Lugia. "You look to be doing well, Little God. I hope life has treated you well."

Nip, throughout the exchange, remained silent and tight-lipped. Tempest, the shade had taken the form of Tempest. His mentor. Someone he expected to never see again. His chest felt tight with emotion. Part of him knew this wasn't really Tempest. But the rest of him didn't care. "You're. You're here. I... Of all pokemon, why Tempest? You know what I'm feeling, right? You know how much I miss him."

The shade turned his head towards Nip. "I do. And perhaps that's why I've taken his form. Because you needed the comfort of someone you felt you could trust."

Nip averted his gaze. "You sound so much like him, too."

 

[Virgil134]

Pleo nodded back eagerly in response to Tempest's question and listened to the exchange between him and Nip. As Nip looked away from Tempest, Pleo tilted his head curiously.

"So how do you two know each other?" the Lugia asked. "Are you from the same tribe as Nip, Tempest?"

 

[windskull]

"More or less," the ninetales replied. "Neither Nip nor myself were born of the Half-Moon tribe. But we were both raised as a part of it."

"Tempest was... is my mentor of sorts," Nip continued. "Over all others, he was a pokemon I could count on to give me help and advice."

 

[Virgil134]

Tempest was Nip's mentor? So that meant...

"Oh! He's like Kiran then!" Pleo chirped. "He's a Swellow from my world and guides the Rescue Team I'm part of! ... Or the other me, I guess. It's a little strange sometimes since all my memories from back home are from Cabot, and he barely knows Kiran..."

 

[windskull]

"I understand" Tempest replied. "My own memories are are based off of Nip's memories of Tempest, so there are holes in my life story. I only know what Nip knows. Funny how that works isn't it?"

 

[Virgil134]

"Uh-huh. At least I know a bunch of other stuff from Cabot that the other me doesn't," Pleo said. "Like how to read!"

The young Lugia paused a moment as there was something else he was wondering about.

"So, Nip, does this mean you'll be in Destiny Village more? With Tempest around maybe you don't have to feel like you're in danger anymore when you're there!"

 

[windskull]

Nip hesitated, brushing his claws through an ear feather. "Well, I can't promise anything. I'm... not the most sociable pokemon. But I can try to be around more."

Tempest stepped forward and nudged Nip in the back. "Well I, for one, think you should go on back now. You came straight here after the fight, didn't you? You need to get patched up. How else do you expect to be ready when we go to rescue Sword." He paused, glancing up towards Pleo. "I suggest you and Cabot do the same. Staying healthy is essential to survival."

 

[Virgil134]

Pleo nodded in reply. "That sounds good, let's head back then! Our room at the guild is really big, so I'm sure you'll like it Tempest!"

With that, the three set off for Destiny Village, leaving the forest to return to its prior quiet.

<><><><><>​

 

[Negrek]

You never could be sure where Bahamut was going to turn up. Nate had tried hanging around at the Guild, waiting, until he'd gotten fed up and gone off to try somewhere else. Rocky had said maybe they ought to wait more than twenty minutes, but whatever, he liked hanging out at the Guild for whatever fucking reason. So that left basically the entire rest of Destiny Village.

Or what was right outside it. The beach, the forest--both good spots if you wanted to brood. Which was how Nate had ended up freezing his ass off in the picturesque snowy wilderness, looking for a gigantic space lion.

"You see anything?" Nate asked. He couldn't fucking see shit, with his face only a couple inches from the ground and the snow piled higher than that. Rocky had gone on ahead, glowing with more heat than usual to melt a path behind for Nate.

"Umm, I don't know," the familiar said, squinting through the trees. It was quiet all around, with sound muffled by the snow, but surely it wouldn't be hard to spot Bahamut at a distance.

 

[Ambyssin]

Despite his bulky frame, Bahamut had gotten good at the art of remaining so perfectly still, he wouldn't even make a sound. One of the few benefits to a broken form was giving off very little light. In the past, he could be easily spotted by anyone. Now? Not so much.

He had wanted to avoid any visitors. Especially that childish idiot infernape shade. If he heard that thing gushing about Eternatus one more time, he'd lop its head off. Sure, the cretin would just grow it back, but at least Bahamut could have some small semblance of satisfaction.

... alternatively, he could just threaten to sit on the mudkip. The shades were supposed to be loyal to their connections, right?

Whatever, it wasn't worth mulling over. Maybe Bahamut could just scare them off. He stepped up and used his ESP to walk through the air until he was behind Nate and Rocky. Then, Bahamut dropped to the ground with a resounding thud.

 

[Negrek]

Nate was complaining about the snow when something huge thudded to the ground just behind him, knocking him forward on his face and Rocky over into the snow. Nate scrambled to his feet, whirling to face the way he'd come with an attack already building in his chest. Coming face-to-face with Bahamut's glowing, armored snout wasn't exactly reassuring. Nate tried to jump back but only managed to sit down hard. "Jesus!" he squeaked. "What the fuck was that for?"

Behind him, Rocky laughed. The familiar looked perfectly content to sit where he was, a hollow carved out all the way down to the needle-strewn forest floor under the snow. "That was pretty funny. Hi, Bahamut! We were just looking for you."

 

[Ambyssin]

"I'm aware. People don't come here to wander around this place unless they're me." Bahamut's core and eyes turned yellow. "What do you want?"

 

[Negrek]

Sure, great. Way to make things fucking weird. Nate took a moment to try and get his heart rate under control. Meanwhile Rocky dusted himself off and made his way over to them, looking perfectly chipper about the whole thing.

Nate took a deep breath. "Yeah, uh. You know that guy, Silver? The, uh, cosmog, I guess. You heard he evolved, right? I was wondering... You're familiar with that species and all. Is he just gonna, like, sleep the whole time now?"

 

[Ambyssin]

“I was not aware he evolved.” Bahamut honestly hadn’t been around Silver since he had pushed the necrozma away a while back. “Nor do I know what you’re referring to. I was under the impression cosmog evolved into one of two beasts. One which greatly resembles what I look like now.

“My son died before he got the chance to evolve.”

 

[Negrek]

Oh. Well, shit. Nate had been hoping he could avoid the whole "dead son" thing if he kept things general. "Oh, uh, something like you right now, huh?" Nate forced himself to keep eye contact with the necrozma, just pretend the whole personal tragedy hadn't even come into things. "Supposedly Arceus said he could turn into two different things. So is the other one, uh, a big dragon thing like you were before?"

"What happened to your son?" Rocky asked, all drooping and sad-looking.

"Rocky. Jesus."

 

[Ambyssin]

Bahamut's eyes and core reddened. "He and my wife were killed by a delphox sorceress. Someone who... I thought I could trust. Who was supposed to be a teammate. We technically shared the same trainer." His gaze fell to the ground. There wasn't much more he wanted to say beyond that.

"The other form is something called lunala." His core lit up purple, projecting an image of the spectral bat above his head. "My wife mentioned something about daylight versus moonlight influencing the evolution. I don't really remember the exact details."

 

[Negrek]

"Huh." Nate stared up at the pokémon Bahamut had projected. Yeah, that sure was some kind of bat thing. Sounded like it was some kind of day or night evolution, like umbreon and espeon, maybe? Which one would Silver rather be, if he got to choose? "Oh, well. I guess if it's something that has to do with the kind of light he gets, they'll take care of it at the infirmary." Presumably that was where Silver still was, if Bahamut didn't know about the evolution. Clearly he wasn't asleep up in their room.

"You had a trainer?" Rocky said. "But I thought you came from one of those places where there weren't any humans!"

Nate glared at him. He really hadn't come out here looking to unlock anybody's tragic backstory, for Christ's sake. Although it was kind of interesting, yeah. Sure as hell didn't remember Bahamut saying nothing about a trainer before. Nate didn't think any of the pokémon on the team had been trained before they got here.

 

[Ambyssin]

"I see the shade has selective hearing," Bahamut said, clicking his tongue. "I said technically. I traveled to far too many worlds where selfish humans and pokémon alike tried to capture me or use me for my power. The worst offender was a crime syndicate on one of my universe's Earths. Same name and leader we're dealing with.

"So, I allowed this one human I came to trust to use his capture device, that way any other planets I traveled to with the same technology would see it fail."