Rocky Road ~ House of Brisa, Dave, Koa, and Owen

[unrepentantAuthor]

"G'night then, darlin'. Last day t'morrow. Glad it'll be with you."

This was exactly how Brisa wanted to be. A moment of absolute peace, her mind quieted by Starr's warmth and the feeling that whatever came next, her time on Cibus had been spent well. Damn well, at that.

Brisa mumbled something unintelligible into Starr's shoulder as she drifted off. A spark of Radiance flickered between them, for only Starr to hear.

Whatever it was, it was enough to make her smile.

<><><><><>​

 

[Chibi Pika]

Starr walked the familiar path to Brisa's place, tail swaying with each step. She wasn’t sure what the plan for the days was—some training with Brisa, maybe with Owen as well. More Overheat practice was always good. Maybe the three could grab lunch afterward.

She knocked a few times in the usual way and then went ahead and let herself in. "Anyone home?" she called out.

 

[Flyg0n]

There was still a few days to go before the final fight, the final strike against the Blacklight. And then... home. But he couldn't find it in himself to be worried for the fight itself, not when he was so confident in the team. Instead he just found himself feeling vaguely annoyed. It was all just be over soon.

Koa lifted his head wearily, suppressing a sigh. Starr. Well at least it was someone who's company he liked. "Just me!" he called back. He stretched, the trotted out of his room. "Brisa's not here," he added. Although he needed to speak to her soon.... he still wanted to go out to Amp Plains with her.

 

[Chibi Pika]

Starr nodded at Koa. "Ah, guessing she's still at that guild thing? That's fine, I don't mind waiting for her to get back," she said, plopping into that old armchair that didn't fit Owen anymore, and wasn't a good shape for the quadrupeds, and so was pretty much only used by Starr when she came around. "Did you see the match we had with Soda?"

 

[Flyg0n]

Right, that match. He almost wished he'd volunteered to join Brisa in the fight, but he also felt just fine watching. He was still a little surprised that Soda was back on his feet again, and allowed to participate in a colosseum match. Although he supposed it wasn't his fault...

"That was pretty crazy. I didn't know Flesh could fight like that either!"

 

[Chibi Pika]

Starr gave a low chuckle. "Yeah, no kidding. The three of us tearing our hair out trying to figure out how to beat him, turns out he burns himself out with that ultimate attack. Can't believe Brisa came up with that idea for me to tank all of that." Couldn't believe she'd also come up with that plan to go all out with shadow attacks while relying on Starr to take her down.

Starr stretched her arms over her head, still feeling a bit of residual soreness from that barrage. "So how's life? Anything left you're planning to see or do in Cibus?" Hard to believe it was nearly over.

 

[Flyg0n]

Koa nodded eagerly. He'd been worried for a moment, when he'd seen Brisa shadow herself like that. Of course it was all part of a plan.

"Honestly? Not really. I guess I'm just... talking to people. Catching up and stuff." He let his words trail off. Other than Amp Plains he'd seen almost everything he'd wanted to. "What about you? Are you excited to go home or-?"

 

[Chibi Pika]

Starr rubbed the back of her head. "Well, it's gonna be nice to see my friends and my team again." Oh, who was she kidding. it was gonna be real nice. Even now she could feel her chest tighten at the thought of just how long it had been since she'd seen any of them.

"But, you know. Feels like there's still a million things left to do here. Brisa's been planning a lot of the last-minute outings and matches and stuff." Brisa...

 

[Flyg0n]

Koa nodded, smiling a little as he thought of his own team. Ho-oh's feathers, he missed them. Brisa though... He didn't want to think about that. Or the fact that even though he was returning to his own team, his own home, he wouldn't remember anything.

"You have good friends back home, right?" he asked suddenly. From what he knew, Starr didn't exactly have a fun time back home. If she didn't have someone looking out for her...

 

[Chibi Pika]

A distant smile crossed Starr's face. "You could say that, yeah. They're both total dorks with zero self-preservation and they drive me insane constantly." She paused, tail swishing a bit. "And I miss them." But it wasn't so easy to say that she was looking forward to going back home, either.

"What about you?" Starr asked. She'd heard tons about his team, but didn't know much about anyone else he'd be going back to.

 

[Flyg0n]

"My team," Koa replied without hesitation. "I can't wait to see the other Echo, and Hazard, and everyone else. And my friend Kitto. He taught me so much about fighting." He briefly wondered if that had anything to do with him channeling fighting abilities here...

"Will you be okay? Some of the team are going back to crazy stituations. You think you'll do alright or whatever?"

 

[Chibi Pika]

Starr blinked at him. "Yeah? I'll be fine. Sure, things were a bit of a mess when I left, but it's not like I'll be alone for it." Maybe it was just having been away from it for an entire year. Or maybe it was taking down corrupted gods on the regular in Cibus.

"I'm sure the me that wakes up back home without any memory of this will be just as pissed about everything going on back there, but it's hard to worry about that right now." Starr gave a small laugh. "Even though I know that's stupid—I mean, the human me doesn't have any powers or blacklight shit."

 

[Flyg0n]

Finally. Soon he'd be back, back to normal, back to just being a trainer, and this whole thing would be... forgotten. Which was fine, perhaps.

Something flickered in the corner of Koa's vision and he frowned slightly. That wasn't what he thought it was, was it?

"Hey, if you could take those powers back with you, would you?"

 

[Chibi Pika]

Starr laughed again. "I mean, kicking ass as a Pokemon is pretty great, right? I like being human and all, but I'm not gonna pretend I don't like being this strong." Then again, part of that strength came from being a Pokemon, sure, but a lot of it was pretty weird even by Pokemon standards…

"I guess I'm not gonna miss having to deal with the way the blacklight shit messes with our heads, you know?"

 

[Flyg0n]

"Won't miss that," Koa agreed fervently. "Kinda sick of it all."

Liar.

"Some crazy voice in the back of your head, always commenting on something." He rolled his eyes.

 

[Chibi Pika]

'Always', huh... The way he'd said it didn't really feel like a joke or an exaggeration.

Starr put on a casual tone and said, "Yeah, never could really get behind the way a few people on the team went and made nice with theirs. I mean, good for them and all, but. Not really my thing."

 

[Flyg0n]

Koa groaned and nodded in agreement. Starr got it. "Yeah." he wrinkled his nose. "Won't catch me chatting with mine." He hated even thinking about his shadow. He still remembered seeing it, in the midst of that storm, and then again on the moon. Taunting him and egging him on... Never shutting up, always there-
"Anyways, the thing barely shows up so it doesn't matter much anyways. Is uh... yours like that too?"

 

[Chibi Pika]

Starr blinked. She hadn't really thought about hers in a while...

“Yeah, haven't seen mine since”—the moon—“a while now,” Starr replied nonchalantly. "I'm pretty okay with that to be honest. Anyway, it's not like I'll have to think about it once everything's done here, so I'm not too worried." Just a few more weeks and she'd never have to think about it again.

 

[Flyg0n]

Koa nodded vehemently in agreement before falling silent for a few moments. He swore he kept seeing something flickering at the edge of his vision, but he pointedly ignored it. The silence began to stretch before Koa spoke again.
"You don't think there's much truth to them right?" he tried to keep his tone light, and nonchalant, as if he already knew the answer.

 

[Chibi Pika]

Starr paused, raising an eyebrow but otherwise not reacting much. He wasn't serious, was he? Even the most denial-saturated members of the team had learned otherwise by now.

Her shadow was the truth. No matter how badly she wanted to forget. A cold hand squeezing her chest. There wasn't any changing it, and she was done tearing herself down about it. It just... was.

"Shadows don't lie," Starr said flatly.