Pokémon Transversal headcanons and oneshots

[K_S]

Hi! Here for Catnip. I read Grace's final fate part 1 (allusions), and here are my thoughts.


So... the women around Giovanni start looking like his late wife to him because of something the Legends did? But they're also not just in his head because Lillie can see them and interact with the hair on one of them? Are the women actually physically turning into his wife? Are the Legends changing reality and the appearances of hundreds of people just to teach one guy a lesson? Is this some kind of nightmare realm parallel to the real world?

well, you are following along pretty well.

So, go me?

Yeah, Gio is in a mix match of nightmare/punishment land via the legends that (seemingly) is based off of Alola. Lillie has been pernamently altered to twist the "remember Grace" knife but found a way out of her punishment so can see reality and Gio's punishment. It's one of the complicated reasons theyre sticking together. Both serve as a sanity check for the other.

If Giovanni hears Lillie's voice as Grace's and Lillie can see the morphing women as well, does that mean Lillie also hears her own voice as having changed?

She's aware her own voice has changed. She waffles between doggedly pretending it hasn't and torturing herself listening to her own voice mail messege so she can remember what she sounds like (that fics upcoming).

I'm not sure why he assumes that a jammed ladder is jammed because of the Legends and not because of any mundane reason? I guess it also points to the direction of this being a nightmare realm created for Giovanni in particular.

Justifiable parainoia? Honestly, the jurys out on that one.

I guess this is also a product of the nightmare realm, unless it's just talking about how light pollution makes the stars disappear - but the sky is referred to as a "fake sky" later on, so I suppose it's not. Cool imagery, anyway.

Thanks.

Huh. Well, I didn't see that one coming. I wonder why he wanted to kill her.

Presently answering that one much later in this fic.

Spoiler: Gios reasons

Its established in Grace centric fics later in the collection that Grace was incredibly alturistic and hot headed. While Gio had distanced himself and later retired from the mob (see Corinthian. for fuller details of the incident from both thier perspectives) that was not enough in Graces books. Between her demanding he turn in those he knew, Kantos laws that would have incarcerated him for life had he done so, and the fact that Silver would be black listed and possibly Silver's children as well -Kanto's legal system is vicious and vindictive to disuade but in turn prevents any attempted redemptions- ... Giovanni had to pick between Grace's morals and his and Silver's stability. To put it shortly Grace lost, and he had to do the hit himself to make sure it was done right.

Personally, I'm not big on the "violent person wants people to stay away from him in case they'll hurt them" trope as I feel like the people that actually are that violent usually are just sociopaths that would not worry themselves with whether they hurt people, and less so for Giovanni, who I've liked to see as a ruthless crime lord... but I'm also the last person in existence who should be telling other people how to write canon characters.

My spin on Gio keeps a few lines he wont cross. Mainly (unless his life or Silver's is on the line) he leaves civilian women and children alone. Manga Gio is incredibly hands off until the kid hero's start causing problems. Then he's scarily proactive and scales up violence and ruthlessness once the civilian aspect of the kids is dropped. Grace's murder was one of the few times he broke the rule and he's worried between dream, the fact that the Legends regularly screw with his head, that he'll be manipulated into killing her dare he linger. It's a legit concern. The legends have tried to make him do worse at this point with mixed results.

---

I like the vibes of this oneshot. It's kinda liminal. I also like the Beedrill segments and the bond between him and Giovanni.

It's the wadding pool of the idea "this Alola scenario be nuttier then a peanut factory" with only a few, small, examples. Also his main destressor is bonding with his murderous mon so expect a lot of Beedril and Persian moments during the Alola segments.

I have to admit that the unusual phrases and expressions in the prose and the fact that the events are surreal has me uncertain about what's literal and what's metaphorical, and uncertain about whether or not I should feel uncertain.

Also toss in inexperienced amnesiac perspective (Lillie) and unreliable narriator (Gio) and the cast are sharing your questions too.

Thanks for dropping a line and glad you liked it.

 

[K_S]

Spoiler: Part 6 i.p.

Corinthians 15:10, Part 6

Clamboring out of the car he flicked his wrist and summoned rhyhorn and Persian. The cat wisely scrambling under the low limbed beast at the first crack of gun fire. For now, the snipers, if they were the shots sounded too rapid fire to be from real sniper rifles, were concentrating on Pellos car. Some shots further back affirmed some ammo was being rained down on the Grunts who were stationed on taking the mansion from behind.

For now it was him, Surge, a few of his 'mon, and whatever the electric specialist whipped out.

That, and Nidoking, who had a black maned, red clawed, humanoid, whatever the hell it was in hand. The poison type had his purple mits wrapped around the thing's waist and was slamming it into the earth with a frantic zeal.

A flurry of wings and sharpened air aimed just so a made King let go of his kill with a yowl. There was a scramble, the alien beast was ripped from 'Kings hands. Snarling, 'King lifted a bloody paw at the retreating Golbat's back. It wasn't exact, not having an equal amount of claws to raise and what not, but it was close enough to to a man's hand that the motion was easily recognizable as flipping someone off.

"Leave it."

Sullenly the violet monster snapped his jaws shut. Killing the budding blue illumination of a retalatory ice beam.

"Persian, Rhyhorn, both of you cover each other and get to the main entrance. Pick off the Don's gunmen."

Persian hooked her claw in the mons sides. Squishing herself against the mon's belly, holding on for dear life as the ground type scrambled forward. Closing on the pllared building front.

A few shots slammed into electabuzzs twin barrier, sizzling into non existance from the electric energies. The two men behind the shield drew the rest of thier teams, and at the sight of surges last 'mon nearly asked the dumbass if he'd aquired brain damage in the last five minutes.

Snuggling a voltorb under his arm, like the explosive orb was a rugbe ball, Surge flicked an eyebrow at his companion's sudden palor.

"Whats your problem?"

They did not have time for this... Otherwise Giovanni had whole manifestos on his mind to explain how fucking stupid-

"Nidoking, Ice the upper levels. Rhydon-"

The orders died in his mouth as one and all, every door, and window of the buildings front exploded into a swarm or raging arbok and ekans.







The dress guardens to keep the front from that kept were monochrom boxes of whatever plants could tolerate being shoveled together. clash rose Giovannis hackles. How a man with so much wealth could be so tasteless...

It was the gold plated pedestals.the wven numbers sported, and the slowing silver frilled tops that the odd numbered ones had stamped on.

that purloined the gaudiast aspects of three different cultures and banked more on rococo than sense.

Unfortunatly the Don had a few more exotic mon on his roster.

and enough funds to buy out snipers.


Don marchettis team
Treavent 1 (guard on grounds)
Treavent 2. ("")
Zoraoak. (Assassin)
Golbat ("")
Ursaring (brute)
Runerigus (lead/personal guard)

Giovannis team
Persian
Sandslash
Rhydon
Rhyhorn
Nidoking
Nidoqueen

Surges team
Raichu
Voltorb
Electabuzz
Jolteon 1
Jolteon 2
Wheezing (on loan)

The Rocket grunts have either zubat, koffing, ekans, pikachus, or voltorbs.



Bewear and ursuling hadike was standard protocal on the edge of the property line they'd of been torn to shreds by now. As had been the fate of the grunts who'd cut the wires to the outer parimiter fences.

Even if Surges juvinille hairstyle was at risk of taking out an eye. Flicking through the cameras, comparing them to a blue print courtesy of the Viridian historical building department, both Surge and Giovanni and Vermillion dock districtshere were traps and guards. Gunmen aligned at the main doors


outline/to-do list
Machetti pulls a taking you with me by having a berserk gene/ insane/ Runerigus (it uses pain split when hit, aiming at the trainer, not the mon. rock type hiding it in a gallery and killing people. Gio has to beat the mon down with his own team before being able to kill the don with it.

Machetti rants about he is a god and you all are roaches in the corpse of his world and other insanities while doing a shoot out with the varied capos there to take him out.

Post-battle scene idea 1

The members of the mob are collectively dying because the fight with Michetti cost over a million and who the hell has that type of cash just sitting there? And how the hell are they going to report this to the council of Don?

Report? Whose reporting I'm looting, (the mentality of about half the capos)

It's an utter mad house, Gio, who is like one of five sane Capos, knows the camera loop isn't gunna hold forever and is setting his own ribs to keep him stable for the long crawl to the hospital and being conspicuously quiet because he is, to quote grace's bff "made of money" and doesn't want any of these asses to realize that.

Suffice it to say he crawls to Grace's work looking like he got dragged ass backward over a battlefield.

The staff:
"Normally people are happy to wake up to their spouses so why did Mr. Sakaki look scared out of his ever-loving mind?

Grace, heard through the whole bloody ward: you said you were going with them to scope the structural integrities and spy on his mon. what the fuck is this. Two broken ribs, a graze gunshot wound. and none of the police could route me to you. What the FUCK Gio.

Gio: I can... not... explain... because of police confidentiality paperwork? (cringes under his wife's fire) also.. things went to absolute hell?

Grace: Arceus did not craft me to be a fool and you need to remember I control your pain meds, I will have to feed you, and set up your bandages, I can make your recovery hell and I will if you dare lie to me.

The mobster/fake cop that slips in to drop off the papers showing Gio signed a silence order under risk of psychic wiping suddenly gets all the vacation and fiscal reimbursement for the rest of his Working days, and probably canonized after his death in Gios' mind.

Post battle tail end of chapter? set after Gio returns home after reporting to Nona and the various mob heads.

Gio: so I might have made some life-altering changes between there and home. In my defense, I was very... Very... Drunk.

(Sheepishly slides shirt off shirt)

Running a bit above the small of his back the tattoo stretched from hip to hip. A nidoqueen leering, looming forward, one foot stomped, a fissure of broken earth crackling under her paws, originating from that impact point

It was so detailed there were pebbles and debris rising from the edges of the jag. Grace could see the lines of Queen's poison sacks and pick out the scales of her shoulders that started platelike and thinned to pebbles down her arms.


It's beautiful but Grace sucked a breath because while fresh the skin was inflamed well beyond the healing flush of needlework like you'd expect.


"I got oral antibiotics and have been taking them but there's a topical regimen I've been lackluster in upkeeping and it shows"


It was less poor upkeeping and more unable to keep per the things position.

"And no one back at the Sakakis?"

"They insisted it looked fine to them. I went to the hospital the second I looked in a mirror. Basically the night after. That's why I had to catch the bleedeye cabin flight home. I was hungover to hell and back. And I've been trying but..."


Yeah, physics did not avail him. Still...


"I get none of your family willing to help but... Not even the hospital staff? You couldn't swing an appointment with a nurse at urgent before getting home?"


"Nona saw no problem. The various medical persons were encouraged not to either. The only reason I got the script was I threatened to sue for malpractice. And I suspect the biotic isn't strong enough because I feel like crap."


The last was a bit meek. And his gaze was definitely puppy eye adjacent.


"Oh God stop channeling sad growlithes and lie down. No corporate secrets in your things?"


"Not that type of trip." He settled in slowly. Hissing as he eased down onto the couch.


Things rattled as she went through his bags. She'd never touch them without his permission and the one time she'd poked through with the intent to get his things settled up...She'd found paper work, internal investigations on an h.r. sex assault case still spooked her. Part because it was assault. Actual battery. And partly because when she demanded to know why he didn't go to the cops he had fished out their report. A forum "we thank you for your time but do not investigate on hearsay".


Suffice to say if Grace were nosy she wasn't now.


The medical bags and receipts were thankfully at the top. A quick read confirmed Gio was actually wrong. He'd been given an antiviral, one that sounded like the common antibacterial. The topical treatment was even worse being a motioniser.

"Gio if I were a wagering woman I'd say Nona was trying to kill you. A mistake like this can be fatal. We need to get you to a hospital, now."


"It can't be that bad.?"


Her hands ran over his face and winced. She'd thought he was hung over and jetlagged but he was running hot. Stupidhot.

"it's a miracle you survived the drive. You're either having me drive us now or I'm calling an ambulance. Your choice."


Xxx


He had required an iv. Been furious at having to lie "ass up and struck through, like a spoInk meant for the fire."


Grace assured the staff he was normally like this when sick and to stay out of biting range. She called out sick, and actually just poked her head into h.r. and announced Gio was laid up so she wasn't working, (it wasn't like they could fire her) and that was that.

She watched his medicine exchanges like a pidgeot, cross referencing names to the bag number codes, and having to intercept two attempts to give him something he was mildly allergic to.


"Clerical errors" they claimed. Considering his previous medical misadventures Grace didn't buy it. She memorized the workers who dropped it off i.d. card number rather than name...


And wasn't surprised to find when she returned a quick skip in the worker lookup had found one of those numbers deceased and the other fired eight months ago.


Xxx


He drifted in and out for days. Finally stabilizing, and back to his surly self before the week was up. Still, she downplayed it in public. She was as acidic as he was and the only reason people didn't suspect was because she had a pretty face. When she saw the sanity in his eyes she sighed and sadly told him she was a hologram and the year was...

He'd thrown a pillow at her for that.

Then suffered because she wasn't giving an open wound infectee anything off the floor and the staff was slowking slow about answering the call button.

He bitched at her. Shed sent a picture of him to Daisy, Daisy sent a picture of a spoink for the split w an apple in its mouth.

Declaring he hated them both he tried to sleep but couldn't. Daisy took Gio on long rambling discorces about international league practices and contest protocols. Funny stories about trainers and mon even while Grace slapped his hands away from the machines and their volume controls. Grace teased and tweaked him so that he stayed up. Relenting so when he fell asleep it was reasonably close to his normal time and his cycle was more or less undisturbed.

He watched her weariness with the staff and his meds, dark eyes glinting with understanding. The first question he had was how soon he could be released. The date was set and when he left to a mild media buzz trotted out a "funny story" about the dangerous misadventures of unclean needles (the place was name-dropped) and international medical ineptitude (the hospital name-dropped multiple times and yes, Viridian Co would be pursuing charges for damaging corporate property, his personal lawyers were building medical negligence and abuse cases while he spoke). He declined to "show the goods" from the teen magazine reps. Pulling a totally bashful front that fooled everyone except for Grace.

She'd seen him preening in the mirror often enough to know she was going to have to run herd or she'd be drowned in a "mysterious" barrage of total nudity and shirtlessness" and while not a bad thing they did need to work.

He slipped off the medical and media leash to complete his recovery at home.

Once home and safe Grace held him close. it'd been close...too close.

"What the hell Gio."

"My drink was spiked. They took advantage of it to rough me up and toss me at the dingiest dive they could to "celebrate" my coming of age. It's a miracle I got something half as good as this..."

Rolling eyes at his vanity Grace drawled. "It looks pretty but it's a damm miracle you didn't die for it."

"If I decide on more body art it'll be somewhere with some damn sanitization."

"More?"

"Maybe." He was preening a bit as he tried to get a good look at it. Exhaustion and physics worked against him. "It looks nice, you even said it does."

While sweet her judgment was the final end all to his reasoning, (if not a bit worrying) Grace would never tell that she agreed. It was pretty and made something that was pretty dangerous which fitted him very well. After healing the tattoo was sensitive and she shamelessly milked it. Feathering kisses down his spine, minding his scars, raking her nails over the fissure lines. Gio positively melted in bed at that. Some experimenting taught her that a hand at the small of his back, right near 'Queen's impact point made him shiver and go still in public.

And lead to other things in private.

"You like it." He drawled one night over dinner. Shirted, thank Arceus. That had taken a week of arguing and then half a week of her slowly lowering the temperature until he got the hint...

Instead of being angry at the manipulation he'd been delighted at her dabbling in sabotage. Sakakis, Grace mused, were a bit insane. But she was worse of all, she'd married one after all.

"You having an on/off button is nice."

She didn't call him out as a hypocrite when he started researching tattoo facilities in Viridian. Only insisting they be safe. It was ultimately his body and his choice, but there were lines. And she was a medical expert, there were some things he needed to know.

"Gio you do not want to get a tattoo there, men sag in that area as they get older." As well as a bad choice derailed by the wry "And when your metabolism slows down as you age and you gain some weight, how is it going to look then?"

That'd broken his brain a bit, but the absolute worst choice he almost made had led to her frantically hissing at him.
"There, you want a tat over... you wouldn't be able to stand the pain..." When he'd looked to rally due to his bruised male pride, she put her foot down. "Alright new rule, anything that technically goes into me, if it wants to maintain that privilege, does not get touched with ink. Period."

He'd sulked a bit. But on some forethought, when sober, he'd proposed a third rule, no body art decisions while drunk.

Grace decided to never tell him about her second ear piercing.

"It would have been a cute hoothoo-"

"My God Grace, show me some mercy."

She did, eventually. He in turn didn't tease her for inspecting the records of the palces he decided to parton. And for doing a hands-on inspection herself.

He didn't even resent the evening she made him stay in. When she trapped him on their bed, ringed round by warm oil jars and paints. He spent one evening laying on his stomach, her cool fingers feathering warm henna paint waxes and oils over his back so he could see the difference between the two Persian designs he was waffling on. Seeing both on his back made the choice infinitely easier.

And she had no complaints when he'd done different patterns on her back. Only sulking a little when she decided she preferred temporary art over permanent.

The armored car Sakaki had set up base in was a bit cramped. It was meant for him, a labtop, and a mon guard... Or in this case, Surge, who'd insisted on riding double with him.

Key word being, intended.

The various capos and consiglire of Viridian and Vermilion were shoveled into one car. It'd of been a sick parody of a cop car turned clown car if half the men and women inside weren't bloodsoaked, soot smeared, and near smothering Sakaki while he tried to work out a plan E.

Because the opperation had gone to hell in minutes

 

[Spiteful Murkrow]

Heya, decided that I’d pop in for a quick review of this story since I had a couple last, lingering authors from my Review Blitz hitlist and figured it’d also be as good a time as any to finally pick off the Review Tag:

Grace’s final fate

Spoiler

It was two in the morning. That special time when insomnia was at its peak, and the aches and rigors of travel were persistent enough that he couldn't sleep through them if he wanted to.

And experience had taught him he shouldn't sleep through them if he wanted to have full mobility say... after breakfast.

Wonder if our viewpoint character is sleeping in a proper room or out in the boonies here. Though boy is that feeling of having trouble with insomnia relatable.

So he was awake, and after a long span staring at the ceiling, decided "screw it" and rolled out of bed. A quick grope at the empty span of bed beside him found the next day's clothes laid out where he'd left them. Though the hotel room was pitch black, he got changed and slipped out of his room without waking the blond girl in the room’s other bed.

You have a few small typos here and there in this paragraph. I’m not really feeling the use of “the bed” back to back in two sentences, but I admittedly couldn’t think of good alternatives offhand.

And while his body went through the motions of a perimeter check, poking through each room of their rental [ ], slipping out to patrol the hallway... His mind had the freedom to meander.

And meander it did.

To good places, right? ^^;

Though I think you’re missing a word after “rental” there.

He hadn't expected to see Grace ever again... And it was an accidental mercy that he hadn't. Despite the damned Legends’ best to make him relive his greatest failures again and again.

Celebi and friends had crafted this faux region and defiled his mind in the process. Plumbing his memories to extract fragments of Grace all the better to crudely copy and paste her onto the populace.

Wait, is this meant to be a canonical Grace from the series? Or an OC here?

The echoes of his late wife were supposed to be punishment for his sins. It had strayed from agonizing to aggravating in under a month. T as the loss sense of shock did it wore off. [ ]

When most of the women had her silver-hued eyes despite the fact that the real residents of Alola should not have the kantoian mutation. The hairstyles Grace had favored became more prominent the longer they lingered in towns. Upgrading from seeing them from the corner of his eyes as they wandered along swaths of the city, to scaling up to people they'd spoken to the day before having suddenly changed hairstyles.

I kinda wonder if this paragraph should be split and expanded to emphasize how Celebi’s effects started to kick in. Like I get that’s what you’re going for since you brought it up earlier, but something about the shift feels very abrupt in the present rendering.

The first time that happened, it'd been a lady trainer of with some girl from Team Skull. The lanky, malnourished, adolescent had gone from an imperfect buzz cut with wisps of black frizz to shoulder-length red tresses overnight. The change, so overt and glaring, had startled poor Lillie enough she'd been candid. Asking the woman where she'd gotten her pretty wig.

Wait, wait, wait. Lillie? As in Lusamine’s daughter? .-.

That had led to quite the scuffle... But Lillie had triggered the fight despite Giovanni hissing at her not to stare... Because eye contact made trainers rabid, 'mon slinging, savages, here.

But the girl's curiosity had made her careless.

Oh. I did not realize that Grace was Giovanni’s wife. Or at least I think that that’s the implication there. It might have made sense to hint earlier on in this one-shot that the narrator was Giovanni, since I’m just realizing that now and it wasn’t very obvious earlier.

She'd had Silver's sandshrew. So Giovanni had left the girls to their fight. He'd also ignored Lillie's complaints about him ditching her when she staggered back, seeping sand from every seam and a few new scratches.

As she used the vacuum was worked back in their hotel room, because Lillie insisted on cleaning up her own mess at thier hotel room despite the place being staffed, Giovanni had been unable to help himself.

"I did say not to talk to her..."

I mean, did you really expect a pre-teen to just not go and poke deeper out of curiosity?

All in all a rather tepid "I told you so" not that piccola bambina Aether lost her strope to his restraint.

I think that “strope” is some sort of typo. Since I’m not really sure what you mean there.

"I was looking at her wig... Except it's not one..."

Lips quirking, eyes crinkling in amusement, Giovanni drawled. "Did you figure this out before or after the hair-pulling?"

Lillie sputtered... Because she'd never sink that low. Never knowing that every time she spoke she sank to lows well beyond being crass in a fight. Oblivious that her every syllable unwittingly twisted the knife of Giovanni's loss all accidental.

Yeeeeeeah, this doesn’t sound like a remotely healthy character dynamic right now, just saying.

Because Lillie had Grace's voice. And in commandeering this child's voice to make an echo of his wife's the Legends made a poltergeist of a woman so divorced from malice she'd of been infuriated at the idea.

Wait, at what idea? Though I’m assuming that this is sharing a setting with that fic of yours where Gio gets bodyswapped with Elio. It might have made sense to include some sort of author’s note for context for readers since if I hadn’t read a couple chapters of that fic in the past, I’d be really, really lost right now.

Hallway check complete, he circled the outer walkways with soundless steps. He found the emergency exit in an out-of-the-way corner. Unmarred by an actual alarm, or proper sign, or wheelchair access, (really, the Legends had no clue about fire safety, OSHA would hardly approve) he nudged his way in. It was a tower of cement with a stairwell that went both up and down.

Nevermind that the style conflicted with the beachside paradise the five-story midrise was aiming for. Or the reek, mold, and must, made no sense considering this island was more desert than anything. There shouldn’t have been sufficient humidity that could have to encourage the reeking growth hadn't happened.

Boy this hotel that Gio booked sounds like a real dive right now.

Because despite being an island paradise, there hadn't been one humid day in all his days in Alola.

… Are you two stuck out on Poni Island or something? Since you’d think that’d be really, really hard to manage in an island chain where the predominant biome is tropical. ^^;

He took the steps to the top, and at the last landing, there was a trap door with a pull-down ladder. The thing was jammed and locked. A few shakes didn't jar it loose, but like all Legend-born issues, there were workarounds.

Actually, wait. Why does Giovanni keep talking about “Legends”, like is this supposed to be Celebi’s doing? Or else what is he getting at here?

A flick of his wrist, a toss of a pokeball, and Beedril swirled into being. The bug was always happy to help, and thwarting a Legend-born block had the bug salivating acid in enthusiasm. Once he explained that acid wouldn't help, Giovanni directed the bug to spit string shot ropes. It took both of them tugging, but eventually, the ladder clanged down.

Wait, I don’t follow how there was a “Legend-born block” there. Is that supposed to be figurative language or something? Since IIRC the pull-down ladder is just jammed.

Giovanni climbed up, Beedril perched upon his back barely making a dent in his clamber. After a few nudges, the trap door was up, and they were on the roof. With a buzz the bug lifted off, flitting around the pipes and edges in a loose grid pattern.

I was going to ask how on earth this happened, but Beedrill’s average height and weight are apparently comparable to a human toddler, so good enough.

Filthy didn't even begin to describe the place. The cement atop was a darker grey than the walls along the walk-up. The roof was smog-crusted, ash and ash-smeared, and paper trash was plastered on every flat span as if it were glued.

Yeeeeeah, Gio really shouldn’t have cheaped out on the hotel room.

Never mind a good wind should blow the papers off. That there were no factories or cars in all of Alola to make this much pollution. And the fact that the hotel attached to this path was so pristine it looked like it'd been newly minted.

"Fucking legends can't get anything right."

And nevermind his new, clean, clothes, Giovanni flopped on the filthy roof. Glaring up at a sky devoid of stars, moon, and clouds. It wasn't too different from, say staring at a massive movie screen before the show had started. Except that “screen” was the whole of the sky.

Wait, is Gio meant to be dreaming / hallucinating from Celebi’s influence, or…?

Beedril fluttered over, search done, dropping on the adolescent Rocket's stomach with a thump.

Grunting at the bug, Giovanni almost flipped over out of spite. But that felt like too much effort.

He was tired, he wasn't an adolescent, wasn't even a young man anymore, and days like today he felt his real age and not the age his body was shunted into.

Okay, yeah. This is set in that same fic with the Giovanni bodyswap.

For him, middle age was looming. Right before his sickness, before the madness of children named after colors, before dragon trainers turned omnicidal, and Silph's fall, Giovanni had been like any other man doing his shopping. Dickering in the men's health care department, seriously contemplating hair dyes to hide the encroaching silver hairs he'd found during his last trim.

Oh, I suppose that that’s one way to tell that we’re in the Manga continuity there.

Glaring at the fake sky Giovanni grumbled, smoothing Beedril's wings with a hand.

"They can't even get regenerations right."

Wait, “regenerations”? I’m not sure if I follow there.

His voice cracked. Because why not? This second puberty had been designed to be more embarrassing than his first. Or at least more prone to vocal warbling.

Because why not play on wound his pride whenever he talked?

He was just lucky the Legends hadn't thought to trigger some latent genetic disease and make him stagger through the tail end of this second childhood while ill.

Wait, implying that Gio did spend a good chunk of his childhood sick? Since that seems like a rather particular “why don’t you just go ahead and [X] me” there.

Beedril soothed and comfortable scraped his foreblades with a hum. Legends always inspired thoughts of murder for the bee.

An antenna ruffle and the bug oozed bliss, and a want to murder plant types. Giovanni laughed, letting go and letting the mental bond dim even as the bug cuddled close for a nap.

Wait, how can Giovanni just reflexively tell what Beedrill is thinking there? If the idea is that he’s inferring it, it might make sense to reference how he’s seen Beedrill behave in the past.

Following suit, Giovanni closed his eyes, and slowed his breathing. Strived to just be.

It was good to be out, even if the world was wrong. Good to be alone. Because of who and what he was, sometimes it was just safer for others not to be near him.

Yeah, no kidding there.

Especially after the type of dreams he'd been locked in before deciding to stay up for a while.

They were simple dreams. Of waking with her in his bed. Beside him, sprawled, his blankets stolen away because in this one way, she was more a thief than he'd ever be. Oblivous to the world, its pain, his pain. He'd stir, slowly, sitting up and stare at her for a while. His idle thoughts of her beauty being highlighted in the moonlight strayed from admiration to how best to use the chancy light to trace a path to pin, then snap her neck. Still her pulse.

Though that’s Green he’s having those dreams about, huh?

When he'd woke from that dream to hear Lillie asleep mere feet away... Getting up and getting out seemed the safest thing to do. Indulging the routes and routines of justifiable paranoia was a way to ward off the phantom sensation of bones breaking under his hands.

Not that he had actually snapped Grace Even Sakaki's neck. That'd been a death for others... But still…

Oh, so this is why you have those CWs for this one-shot. So Gio just straight-up neck snapped the missus way back when, huh?

it'd been better for everyone if he just... Stayed away...

Habit made his hands slide into his pockets. Old impulses guided him. Reach in, pull out a lighter, a cig, strike the flame, set aflame. The soothing give and take of sweet clove smoke would take the edge off of his nerves and thoughts.

That is just force of habit, right? Since I was about to ask how on earth he manages to get cigarettes in the body of a young teen. ^^;

But like everything else, the motions went wrong. Giovanni's fingers closed over the battered edge of his phone. He hadn't been able to have a smoke since landing on this Nevernever Land. Legends, not grasping the soothing self-destructive pleasure of indulging in a good smoke, hadn't manifested one smoke shop, in this alien place.

I mean, I’m sure that they’re out there, not that you’d ever be able to actually buy said smokes from one. ^^;

It was another thing to curse about under his breath. Withdrawal was a royal bitch, especially on nights like this. Breathing deep, of the remnants of grit and ash, it wasn't a perfect facsimile, but it would have to do.

For now.

Wait, but if Gio is in somebody else’s body, how is he even physically feeling pangs for withdrawal? ^^;

Giovanni: Plots and family part 1

Spoiler

He hadn't meant to stay in the business. In all honestly, he hadn't meant to get in it either. But his hands were never really clean and his family made sure of it.

Huh, so once upon a time, Gio had a chance at being something other than a mafioso. I wouldn’t have reflexively assumed that, though I suppose it would explain why he felt an urge to get into the Indigo League

When he was a boy he delivered packages, the type you didn't ask questions from even when they oozed red. The type that you avoided the beats of the sbirro when carrying.
Sometimes it was goods for someone else to do a job. He'd seen guns pulled out of a package and pointedly didn't remember who was doing that pulling, or logos, or even street signs. He'd deliberately gotten good and lost after that job. All the better to taint his memories if any psychic type came a-knocking on his skull.

Well, you can’t say that Gio’s parents weren’t determined at making sure that he stayed in the family business. It feels like one normally sees the inverse when dealing with mafia types and their kids in fiction.

Also, the Italian slang for ‘cop’ that you’re probably going for there in the narration is ‘sbirro’.

That wasn't quite how psychic types worked, Nona had told him, but she'd been so proud of that bit of sneakiness. He'd gotten the good gelato for a week for that and some extra coins for the arcade.

Oh, I see that we’re doing all the Italian cultural references for Gio’s background in this continuity.

Sometimes the jobs were gentler. Like dropping off some good homemade food from someone's mama while they waited out in a rat hole for a gumshoe to buzz off.

Men in his house worked, so when Uncle Sal needed some bricks, not construction, the type you quintuple wrapped in plastic and exposed to no water, no questions asked. He did it.

Ah yes, just going and working as a drug mule at the age when most kids are delivering newspapers.

Especially after Uncle Sal yanked him aside, by his ear no less, and shaking him by that ear, snarled, "I mean it, I will fuck you over sideways if a drop touches this thing. I will chop off your little boyhood, my little man. As a warning to future dumbasses."

I’m surprised that Gio’s parents just tolerated that coming from within their family, unless if Sal used to be higher up the chain in the family business.

The allure of five hundred dollars’ pay dimmed with that threat over his head. But blessed saints he'd made that run, did it clean, not a drop. And Giovanni made a point to be busy when Sal roared through the Sakaki homestead on his sports car "looking for strapping boys to do some work".

>five hundred dollars

Was this done a long time ago or does currency just work different in your setting? Since if this is the in-game currency, then Gio used to do these runs for the sake of about five bucks in terms of purchasing power.

His brothers had called him timid after that. A scardey cat because after school he'd play with the chowder outside his elementary school rather than the bigger boys. He was Nona's widdle worm because he'd had a Weedle and stayed home to do arcane things like study and learn. Anyways, Kakuna wasn't a worm now. Hadn't been one for ages.

Wait, the ‘chowder’? I’m not sure if I follow there. Is that supposed to be a slang term? If so, you should probably drop in a definition somewhere.

That truth didn't stop them from jeering him when Sal visited. Visits Gio learned to be very busy because Sal feared Nona. He wouldn't bother Gio if he was helping "the lady of the house" or "one of the girls". During one of those visits when Gio was helping his older sister, Gemma, shine the scales of her seviper his brothers and nephews descended. Thrilled to catcall him before getting out of the house to get paid.

His brothers and nephews all died young from these jobs that Uncle Sal put them up to, didn’t they?

Gemma was doing the tough stuff with the 'mon's care. Scrubbing the mysterious red spots that were not leftover lasagna sauce. He got the fussier job because of his picolli mani carni. And even at seven she knew, and he knew, that Gemma and only Gemma had the privilege of calling him cute.

I should be a lot less surprised that Gio apparently got stuck with “cleanup duty” as a kid when he’s already been doing drug mule work by this point.

Seviper, a champion show 'mon who sometimes was rented out to do other jobs, rose from her post-job pampering session with a hiss. Beady eyes flicking to a Glare red. And Gemma shucked off her rags and oils and hopped to her feet, hands on hips, pissed. She barked at the teasing throng to "fuck off", and wonder of wonders they did.

Suffice to say Gemma was his favorite sibling. And perhaps he became hers too when with stars in his eyes he babbled an awed.

I think that you’re missing a “sibling” or something for “his favorite” there.

"How did you do that?"

"Do what?"

"Swear, and scare them off... When I do it, they laugh about bambino giani learning new words."

Oh, Gemma’s a made (wo)man by this time already, isn’t she?

Gemma barked a laugh. "Well, your lisp going away probably should help when your choppers grow back in. But you gotta put some bite in it. Wind up to it like you wind up to hit someone hard..."

Gemma, Giovanni decided with all his seven years of wisdom, was his favorite.

Giovanni was running drugs for his family at seven? Here I thought that he was at least in middle school at the time.

And she stayed his favorite sister ever, even after the drive-by. That horrid day where she hadn't been a victim or participant, just a pretty face at the wrong place and the wrong time during the aftermath. The responding sbirro had been itching to fill his arrest quota and the pretty Italiana walking her seviper to the park had looked "suspicious".

She'd popped off. Firey as always. Her attitude had been dubbed "resisting". The fatal fallout, "an accident".

Wow, so she really did become a made woman while still a minor.

He'd found the incident report (how could they call her death an "incident"? How dare they?). Tracing paper to prescient, precinct to beat route, time to badge number, badge number to the murderous son of a bitch pretending to be a cop.

Well, scratch that about her being a made woman. Though yeah, I can see why Gio doubled down on entering the family business. Though I wonder if this would’ve had more impact if we got to see Gio more explicitly wavering or else wanting out from things before Gemma died.

It'd taken weeks after the funeral. He'd become eight between the burial and attack, but by God, Giovanni found the cop. A week’s stake out and he figured the bastard's favorite "shop" car, days he worked, and struck. Using an older brother's knife, he slashed the tires.

And that was when he learned movies lied. There'd been no fiery crash from that spat of vandalism. When the vandalism (he bristled at that, even as an adult, it'd been a blotched hit not spray paint) was traced to the Sakaki house, the act had been dubbed "youthful grief". Because for better or worse, the knife had been found. He'd dropped it in terror when the sbarrio had summoned an Arcanine. Still, the knife only got them so far, because almost all the Sakaki kids had played with it at some point. Making fingerprint evidence worthless.

I… think that this is rubbing up a bit against “suspension of disbelief”-tier for an eight-year old to pull off. Also, considering how Gio’s a child from a mob family, wouldn’t he have had the idea to go for the cop car’s brake lines? Since that’s a bit more life-threatening than slashed tiers.

The only mercy was that no one had turned on anyone, and that was a cheap kind. Because Sakakis did not snitch. Not to sbirro, to God, or countryman.

I kinda wonder if the ordering of who Gio’s family didn’t snitch to would work better as something along the lines of “not to sbirro, not to famiglia (or whatever ‘countrymen’ fits here), not even to God” to escalate in terms of who they fear / respect.

Nona waited, cool and quiet until the police car had wheeled away. Once sure they were gone, and after having the older kids sweep for bugs, Nona called Giovanni to her. Nailed fingers bit into his cheeks as she tipped his head up, making him meet her blacker than black eyes. Then in a voice as tight as the packed earth over her granddaughter's grave, told him to report.

And that was yakuza words, madam tones. There were no evasions, no saviors for him now. When she called Giovanni to the kitchen he went without fuss.

Well, things will be getting nice and uncomfortable, I can already tell.

Spare the rod, spoil the child had never been a concern in the Sakaki household. Nona had a rod, a beast of a thing lined with blunted sandslash spines. And though she was old, she wasn't frail, and she never missed, once.

It was two days before the bleeding stopped, five days before he could sit comfortably with proper posture. So every meal for two days he'd wipe his own blood off the chair before reporting to do the dishes. For five days he earned new bruises for whimpering and daring to slouch.

Yeesh, granny didn’t mess around back in the day.

And for a month he worked with Uncle Sal, and screwed up his grades for being overworked.

And though it wasn't fair-

("Do you think we Italianos get it fair, Gianni? " Sal'd spat shaking him until his teeth rattled. "Fair's a fantasy and the faster you learn that...")

-he was punished for that as well. All to scare the Hell out of him, scare the fury to an ebb.

I think that this cutaway from the paragraph and into a line from Sal doesn’t quite work. It’d probably make more sense to describe more of how Gio got into this incident with Sal, how he cried a bit about how it’s not fair that Gemma died, and then Sal did his thing, and then bring up that his grades tanked and he got punished again.

He just buried it, feeling it the hatred seethe in his guts when he saw a flash of blue, a glint of a sbirro’s badge.

Ah yes, totally a healthy outlook and not the source of lasting problems later in life at all. ^^;

As an adult, he'd fought himself and all his demons not to crush the whispy Virdian mayor's hand in his grip during his Gym opening. The bastard being was a retired cop, and his children were all part of the force. Giovanni had picked Viridian to set up base for the sheer irony of setting his seat of power right to the pulse point of Kanto's capital of "law and order" capital. Really, the move had been a multifaceted decision, part to soothe the searing Forest wrought dreams behind his eyes, part from spite.

Mainly for spite.

Yeah, no kidding considering Gio’s backstory in this continuity.

"I'm just sayin' e's got some potential. Shouldn't waste it with fucking school." Uncle Sal drawled over dinner one night.

"And you and your street smarts would have chased down Gemma's killer like Giani did with his... Compiter thing.."

No one dared breathe the correction. Nona was speaking, and she was right even if she didn't fully get the word computer quite right.

I… kinda feel like we’re missing a transition back to the past if we’re going this route. Since when we cut ahead to Gio as an adult, I wasn’t expecting us to go right back to when he was a child again.

"Still..." Because Sal wheeled and dealed, it was his nature to try even in the face of a ‘no.’

"No hard business until fourteen for the girls. Fifteen for the boys. Unless the madam says otherwise."

And Sal, rightly scared of both Nona and Madam didn't say another word.

inb4 Gio came along and helped anyways in spite of Nona’s insistence otherwise.

Alright, made it to the end of these first two one-shots. As you can tell, I obviously found quite a few rough edges here and there, but there will be plenty of time to get to that, first let’s focus on the positives.

So I kinda gather that Giovanni’s one of those characters you just really like writing for, and both of these one-shots that I read did a pretty good job of getting inside his head and exploring how he ticks, and that second one was just downright

at multiple points. You clearly have put a lot of thought into how Gio could’ve potentially become the figure we know him as in the manga, and by and large it largely works.

As for criticisms, the number one issue that I saw was that your oneshots were riddled with typos and awkward phrasings in a way that suggests that you should probably make an “out loud” readthrough of them before publishing since… yeah. There were also some parts where I felt a bit out of the loop in terms of context, particularly in the first one-shot, which would’ve been worse if I hadn’t also read Fractional: The Rules of the Game in the past that made me realize that it was sharing that story’s universe. Some of that context can probably be communicated through a bit more description, while for the stuff that can’t be handled without grinding things down to a halt, you should strongly consider author’s notes to give the reader context going in. There were also a couple parts of the second one-shot where I had my suspension of disbelief falter a bit, but those could easily be solved by making Gio about 3-4 years older than what he was mentioned to be.

Sorry if that feedback wasn’t quite what you wanted to hear, @K_S . But I hope that it was helpful for you. Best of luck during Review Blitz, and good luck with your writings.