This world is inhabited by creatures that we call pokemon. People and pokemon live together by supporting each other, but now the scourge threatens the safety of the entire region. Kohaku has become a dangerous place, where children stay at home and only brave souls go adventuring.
Welcome to KOHAKU. Come for the nightmares. Stay for the tea and crumpets.
The season is SUMMER. It is easy for survivors to forage for food from the land, as there are entire abandoned farms ready for harvest. On the downside, you can smell the corpses.
swarms
GRAND OPENING !
Welcome to KOHAKU REGION's grand opening! If you're interested in joining, come check out our grand opening giveaway!
It wasn’t a request, and it wasn't entirely a joke either. Felizia grabbed her Marowak and clutched her tightly as she went to look down, far, far down into the streets below. She had never been in a building this high before, and even though looking down at the little Durants was scary and made her stomach feel horrible Felizia couldn’t stop looking. Was this what it was like to stare death in the face?
… Nah, death didn’t have so many little Durants crawling over his face. This was totally different. Right?
The mood and fascination were ruined in an instant. Felizia heard a creak of… metal or something! And dammit her Pokemon was supposed to be on lookout, not mucking around near the railing like she was. Felizia hadn’t been sure if she was allowed on the roof of the department store, and while there hadn’t exactly been a “no access” sign to stop her there certainly hadn’t been a “please step onto the roof of this very tall building” sign either. That there had been no other people on the roof had somehow made the issue more unclear.
Felizia hastily stepped back from the edge and, holding even tighter to her Pokemon, stared intently at the rooftop door. The handle turned. “Dammit Carina, why weren't you--?!”
The Marowak cut her off, snapping something back at her in Pokemon-talk and jabbing her boneclub in thin air for emphasis. Felizia, now adept in the art of tuning out her Pokemon, just stared at the door like Deerling in the headlights.
It was unfortunate, but Thalia was starting to really think she'd picked up J's smoking habit. She could feel her mienshao judging her, but the pokemon kicked open the door to the rooftop of the department store regardless.
(Thalia's hands were otherwise occupied, cupping the cigarette against the wind as she tried to get the lighter to catch. Goddamn thumbs. They were utterly useless.)
She inhaled, looked up, and saw a woman standing and staring at her, clutching a marowak. She didn't look very happy.
"Hi," Thalia said, exhaling smoke. "Do you want a cigarette?"
When the door was kicked open, Felizia jumped and almost dropped her Pokemon. She hadn’t expected the door to be opened like that, and for the shortest moment her imagination ran away with guessing who had done that. The Mienshao, of course, had not been shortlisted, and Felizia felt at a loss until the fighting Pokemon’s trainer spoke to her.
“Uh…” she replied, her eloquence obvious. “I don’t think so?”
Carina lightly hit her arm, stealing the attention back, and heavily hinted that she wanted to be put down. Felizia obliged, and once that was done she looked back at the lady and her Mienshao. She felt as though she should say something, and that something was definitely not “So we are allowed up here?”
The mienshao and Thalia stared at the scene in front of them. Except for the fact that Thalia was smoking (and was a human) their expressions were identical mirrors of "..."
"Thanks," Thalia said. The mienshao preened. "Yeah I am. Are you a trainer as well? That's a very spunky looking Marowak."
God, why had she said the word spunky? Too late to take it back now though. She glared at the tip of her cigarette.
An awkward feeling descended on Felizia , and as soon as she realised this she decided that the best way to bury the feeling would be to talk. Yes, talking would be the best distraction.
“Actually, I’m a breeder,” Felizia corrected. The mistake wasn’t a new one. “And yeah, she sure is… spunky.” Carina tried to look as if she didn’t care, but her eyes gave it a way.
“So…” This talking thing wasn’t coming to Felizia as easily as she had hoped. “I guess you’re with EOS.” Then she unwisely(?) asked in a joking manner, “Fought any zombie Pokemon yet?”
She hadn't met any breeders besides Mordecai. They didn't seem to like coming out to the front-lines. She couldn't really blame them.
"Strange to see a breeder as far as Nerio," she said. The next question caught her off-guard. She coughed up cigarette smoke for a minute before answering.
"I've fought way too many scourge," she assured her. "Just came back in from Pal Park, actually." She dug a virus ball out of her pocket and held it out. "Never seen so many durant in my life."
Felizia stood there rather awkwardly for a minute, almost wishing she could take her question back. The mini coughing fit answered it well enough, and it was almost preferable since it didn’t come with another reminder that the scourge was still strong in her hometown.
“Durant, huh.” Felizia stared at the virus ball, not sure if she was more repulsed or curious. “You only caught one?” It was hard to imagine a Durant singled out on its own and she found herself wondering how the Durant felt about that.
Then she reminded herself that zombie Pokemon definitely did not have feelings.
“So how is Pal Park doing? Any progress?” Her voice was more eager than she meant it to be. She hadn’t heard about the situation out there for ages.
"Nah, there were six of them when I fought them," Thalia said. "The rest of them just uh, turned into pieces of black goo. This was the only one I could save."
She stared at the virus ball accusingly for a moment before pocketing it again.
"Pal Park is--" She didn't want to lie, but she didn't want to depress the woman either. There had been something in her voice that made Thalia think... "--people are working hard to free Pal Park."
Felizia tried not to grimace at the thought of zombies melting into black goo, but had a feeling she didn’t quite succeed. “Ew. Yuck. Does that happen lots?” That right there was another reason to stay away from the scourge.
On the bright side, at least that meant there wouldn’t be dead scourge bodies everywhere when the place was finally freed up. Hopefully. Just black goo… Everywhere… Great.
What the smoker lady said next wasn’t exactly cheery either. It sounded ambiguous and ambiguous was never good. Felizia wasn’t going to call her out on it, and instead said, “That’s good.”
“Yeah…” She smiles, but it’s not quite happy. “Easy to tell, huh? You from there too?” Again, Felizia’s expecting the answer to be a no. There were plenty of others places the smoker lady could’ve come from.
"Yes. Their bodies don't really last." She wrinkled her nose in distaste. "It's kind of a blessing, I guess."
"Easy to tell," Thalia agreed weakly. "I am as well. Left when I was just a kid though. Came back when the scourge hit. Was too late. Nothing left." She nodded across the skyline toward the casino. "Tried talking some sense into Irene a few months ago. Didn't work. Whatever. We don't need her. And when Bacchus is freed, if she tries to take her gym back I'll run her out myself."
Well, blessing could be one word for it, she supposed… “Really?!” Felizia immediately tried to think if she had met the smoker lady beforehand, and stopped a split-second later when it was mentioned that the lady hadn’t exactly grown up in the town. She nodded sympathetically at the four sentence story, but was unwilling to say anything about that. Thankfully, the conversation turned to something that was a lot easier to talk about.
“You have my support! She’s been a giant help.” Sarcastic, of course, and Felia regretted saying it. Sure, Irene had been pretty useless (and that was putting it nicely, considering this was a Gym Leader they were talking about), but Felizia hadn’t done much better herself. Still, she couldn’t stop. “I guess Gym Leader is only a title with no responsibilities to her. I mean, what does she even do in that casino all day?”
Thalia's eyes flashed with real fury for a moment.
"You know when the scourge pushed into Nerio for a time, she actually fought back? She fought back to reclaim her precious casino from the scourge, and then she collapsed back at the bar like she'd never even moved. Meanwhile crazy old Nenia is the one holding the line at Bacchus, keeping people safe in her bunker."
Thalia ground her cigarette angrily into the floor.
"When all this is over, I'm going to kill her."
Wow. Exhale. Okay. She felt a little calmer.
"I did pour a glass of wine on her head once, though. Felt good."
“What? Seriously?” Hearing that that was all Irene did in the casino wasn’t exactly news, but hearing it from someone new made the news itself feel new.
Felizia knew it wasn’t exactly regarded as a good thing, but all this verbal Irene bashing was starting to make her feel better. “How lovely. A casino is more important than us.” This was particularly insulting as Felizia had never really liked casinos in the first place – she had little gambling luck and even less money.
That the smoker lady took her anger out on the helpless cigarette made Felizia realise that this lady might be serious about the threat, or at least serious about doing something to Irene. It didn’t seem wise to ask.
She laughed. “I bet it did! Maybe if everyone did that she’d finally give in and return to Bacchus.
“Wait, so what was your name? I’ve gotta know it now.”‘Smoker Lady vs Irene’ did have a certain ring to it, yet it didn’t sound quite right.
“Don’t worry about it.” Felizia waved her hand as if brushing the apology aside. “It’s not like I did.
“I’m Felizia. And she,” Felizia motioned lazily at her Pokemon who was more interested in the high-up view than the conversation, “is Carina. Does your Mienshao have a name?”