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!
He knows exactly where to find her, or at least, he has a good idea where to find her. In hindsight, it probably wasn't fair of him to have gone disappearing under the radar for a good six months. But he had heard that a woman with a pretty face had been sighted, two women with pretty faces, one who walked the earth and one who walked in the land of dreams. Granted, there was no way for him to get to the latter, but maybe, just maybe.
In the end, he had come to the conclusion that it was all hopeless and that Sophia was dead.
He enters through the back door like a thief in the night.
really, the backdoor was a little predictable, even for a hades agent. if aaron entered through the backdoor, then it was likely - nay, guaranteed that he would be met with a rather large scourge mamoswine. it is perhaps aaron's scourgified body that prevents phillip from immediately goring him with large tusks. this is not the land of nightmares, and sophia's safety is not guaranteed here.
"at ease, phillip." comes a clipped voice. female, mid twenties. as quiet as a wind's passing suggestion. a small candlelight is all that illuminates the bottom half of a woman's face. "...i wasn't expecting to see you here." ZULF ?
Aaron blinks at the Scourge Mamoswine but refrains from asking any further question. It was his choice to disappear for months on end, and it was his choice to go on a crazy goose chase that had yielded no results. He had nothing to show for it.
A whirring noise comes from the Hades Agent's side, a Porygon-Z's arms spinning about until they locked into place, cannons charging and ready to fire. Only when the Mamoswine relaxes and Byte hears a familiar voice does it pause, more buzzing sounds coming from the creature's body, before it zips in front of Physis.
physis gives byte a pat on the head the way that she used to. that wasn't usually the real reward, though. the real reward was when another's actions brought her enough hope for her to give a real smile.
"we all have a talent for it, it seems." she looks up from the porygon-z. "...didn't bring a passenger back with you?"
she would be genuinely sorry if he didn't. it is an understanding of sorts, between them.
The Porygon-Z lets out another bizarre cry, one that begins at a high pitch before fading into static. Even after being the creature's partner for more than a year, Aaron was still at a loss with how to fix the bug that was in Byte's system. But the Pokemon functioned perfectly fine with it; if anything, debugging Byte would result in a Porygon-Z that was less cheerful and didn't act like a Growlithe.
physis decides that she didn't really like squinting in the darkness like this. she draws the electric sign - flash. even with bellona hills reclaimed by eos, it's alright. there are four walls and a roof in this room. while the same cannot be said for the other rooms, that isn't a pressing concern. that, and there are no other occupied residencies for miles around.
she also puts on some tea upon an electric stove. she's been fiddling with the electric sign enough to provide a little power without short-circuting the entire thing. maybe it's about time to hire a scourge dedenne.
An apology is not what Aaron expects from Physis. But in any case, they are beautiful words for tired ears. "It isn't your fault," he says quietly and under his breath. For the first time, the man's eyes drop away from the woman.
He cannot look at her.
"... thank you."
On the other hand, Aaron cannot welcome Physis back. Perhaps if Sophia had returned, he would have returned the sentiment. But instead, he asks, "Have you been here long?" His eyes wander over to the electric stove, and quite frankly, inconveniencing Physis is the last thing that he wants to do.
Nor does he know why he came here, but perhaps even he had longed for some form of human company.
"... it's good to be home."
Everything has changed; the most frightening thing that has happened is that Physis is the closest thing to not changing that had happened while he'd gone under the radar.
physis isn't even sure why she apologized. she's spent too long learning that her condolences mean nothing - insignificant, compared to the will of the world. at the same time, it sounded like the thing to say - the only puzzle piece that would fit the void between them.
"a month." and it shows. it shows in her attempts to board up the holes in some of these walls, the hours poured into trying to make the house semi-fit for human habitation. it's not castle forlorn, not by a long shot - which is also why she is here, and not lounging in the land of nightmares.
she doesn't correct aaron - home is not an address to them. could never be, when the scourge were liable to overrun anywhere and transform it into something unrecognizable. but aaron. but physis. these are the things that have withstood the trials of time. these are the ruins, the temples that they may consider home.
"what did you find out?" even if it wasn't what he had wanted to find, physis is almost certain that aaron had gotten something for his trouble. the man had always hated inefficiency like that. ZULF ?
He is ashamed to say that he has not returned with much. But he's returned with something, but it brings more questions to the table. "I see," he responds, glancing around the house, how the walls have become yellowed with age, scratches in the wall that have been mended sloppily, scratches that were left by squatters or Scourge.
"Only more questions," he responds, vaguely appreciating the fact that there is no need to explain exactly where he had gone and what he was doing. Physis had her ways. "I spoke with her a long time ago. I thought, perhaps, a part of the consciousness could remain in the Island of Dreams. I have yet to find a physical entrance to this place."
sophia has been there before. sophia has spent months looking for zahir while he was in his coma. it was scientifically accepted within the dream community that comatose humans will spend their time in the dream world, yet she found nothing.
if there's anything that sophia has learned in the land of nightmares, it's that human will has power within dreams. perhaps the woman didn't remember aaron. perhaps she didn't want to. perhaps she wanted to be dead while death was not within her power. even dreams had certain limitations.
physis tells him none of this. it is not her right to take away his hope. as long as she can claim to defend sophia's right to exist, she cannot tell him to give up without hypocrisy. "...i know even less of what became of her." aka: maybe she's alive, maybe she's not. "but this search ends whenever you decide." whether it's in ten minutes or never. "...whatever your decision, i hope that you do not forget to live."
she certainly didn't.
if you can make dumb zhivago refs then i can make dumb harry potter ones ZULF ?
He knows exactly where to find her, or at least, he has a good idea where to find her. In hindsight, it probably wasn't fair of him to have gone disappearing under the radar for a good six months. But he had heard that a woman with a pretty face had been sighted, two women with pretty faces, one who walked the earth and one who walked in the land of dreams. Granted, there was no way for him to get to the latter, but maybe, just maybe.
