2024-01-01: A Wild Ardaemont Does Not Appear
- Log: 2024-01-01: A Wild Ardaemont Does Not Appear
- Cast: Ruth Pauling, Anne Aomori
- Where: Viridian Forest
- Date: January 01, 2024
- Summary: A strange creature has taken up roost in a secluded part of the Viridian Forest. Anne Aomori, a local, takes it upon herself to investigate as Energy Nede faces changing times. The strange creature, it turns out, is a person among the ranks of the visitors to Energy Nede. A strange person, nonetheless... and, perhaps, a dangerous one.
=============================<* Viridian Forest *>============================== Viridian Park is an expansive, publicly owned and well-maintained nature reserve that doubles as the main commuter path between Viridian and Pewter City. The Park itself is most famous for Viridian Forest, a League-curated training ground for novice Pokemon trainers to cut their teeth on -- even those that don't have a spirit for competition find the Forest of great curiosity due to the large number of flora and fauna to be found and studied within. BGM: Pokemon: Let's Go, Eevee & Pikachu! - Viridian Forest - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=44TQR6n16Jg
<Pose Tracker> Ruth Pauling has posed.
Everyone's trying to acclimate to Energy Nede at their own pace. In many ways, Ruth is one of the few who should at face value handle it best. Her existence is one that does not requires any semblance of shelter, side-stepping the issues of a need to gather enough resources (financial or otherwise).
While a number among the Drifters have started to look into employment and deeper exploration of the nature of the strange Pokemon creatures, Ruth... has mostly kept to herself. She occasionally goes to Rixia's side when the younger, more powerful Hellion needs to find a place to decompress and escape from overstimulation into a place of unmoving stillness.
Right now, Ruth herself sits out in the periphery of Viridian Forest, away from all the playing children and most foot traffic. This is a world that feels nearly empty of suffering and sadness, on the surface. Beautiful. Clean. She feels like she doesn't belong anywhere near a place like this.
A male Kricketot disagrees, as he hops along towards where Ruth presently sits along the grass. There's no tall structures for her to roost as she looks up to the strange skies of this truly alien place. She hasn't found the resources to go about her usual busywork of making herself presentable to the world at large, making her look like she's been running around in an overly large coat-shaped quilt and other piles of fabric more than anything.
Simply put - even with her elf ears, her manner of dress alone would out her as someone not from here. That so many people here have ears like hers and are happy and tranquil...
Blackish-purple motes rise from her as Malevolence seeps from wherever metaphysical place it gets stored in one's heart, mind, and soul, doing away with the shape of who she once was gradually. She eases herself out in controlled release rather than a great large burst, letting herself be who she is. While she closes her eyes, her now serpentine tongue takes over to take in the world around her.
Her one healthy ear still hears the gentle xylophone-like sounds of Kricketot's antennae, remaining a quiet, inquisitive, peaceable tempo and volume more than alarmed at what's going on in front of him. Somehow, the sight of a Nedian(?) taking on a completely different shape does not disturb or scare them, not even the release of a single wing coming out the back or a lengthy tail snaking along.
The violet glow of Ruth's opening eyes look upon the small inset, who is not the least bit perturbed. Usually, weaker Pokemon give the likes of Ardaemont a wide berth, and the gargoyle-shaped Ruth bears a passing resemblance. Perhaps Kricketot understands the difference.
She does not motion to chase them off or even raise a threat, as the reverted Hellion takes her roost on the ground until such time she feels like she's ready to brave the idyllic paradise that she intrudes upon.
<Pose Tracker> Anne Aomori has posed.
Anne Aomori, at this point is actively canvassing the forest for more evidence of the Visitors. So it is that she's out today, far from the places that see the most foot traffic.
The Nedian researcher is dressed in her usual sort of attire, minus the labcoat, walking with her Typhlosion Laqui at her flank. The two of them stroll through the forest; most of the smaller Pokemon don't get close, which is fine. Indeed, if not for her own unique talents, she wouldn't notice anything was unusual at all.
But she does have those unique talents, and so when those blackish-purple motes begin to seep out, Anne notices a difference in her environment. She follows the little Kricketot at a distance. And there, she sees... A transformation?
Typhlosion isn't troubled. But Anne, "...Who are you?" she wonders of Ruth, without drawing a weapon but without relaxing, either.
"You're certainly not a Pokemon." She looks like one--but Anne can tell. "Even if you look like..." That one.
She is hard to read, emotionally; she blocks off her heart from others as a rule. But ordinary senses can spot her fine, now that she's in the open.
"That Kricketot at least seems at ease with you," she points out.
<Pose Tracker> Ruth Pauling has posed.
There's an air to the motes that feel beyond the usual range of sensory description one would assign. Something more than color or scent - it's like a form of concentrated sorrow across a spectrum of emotions related. Feelings that aren't 'positive,' to feel, which still emits from the individual who apparently can shapeshift into something like a Pokemon.
'...Who are you?'
The Ardaemont-like creature before Anne - someone she asserts is a 'who' - whirls up to a stand with a muted, hissing shriek as if more startled to see her than the other way around. It's not the noise that the Pokemon she (loosely, maybe a one-third match) resembles natively makes, an organic revelation seamlessly leading into the assertion made a moment after.
The Kricketot hops in front of the strange individual, standing between them, a Typhlosion who could defeat them with nary a blink--
The Kricketot seems to understand the sentence before one can fully transcribe it, because he's now bouncing behind this clothed creature, and that's enough for them to turn her head over her left shoulder to watch them stand in her shadow.
That Kricketot does seem at ease with her. Ruth's tail holds its vice-grip around the shaft of her weapon - a lengthy, if quaintly low-tech - rifle with a bayonet blade that seems to resemble a naginata. Even if the rifle's make would be something laugh-worthy here, that blade is still an open danger.
Ruth's wing, having unfolded in a moment of threat posture, starts to fold in as her eyes size up the Nedian addressing her, and the creature with the flames upon their back.
"...I'm Ruth." Pokemon don't talk, cementing that read as accurate. Unless Ruths are a Pokemon that talk, but that's unlikely. "I didn't notice you."
She leaves off her verbal response at that, as her tongue flicks in the air anew to fill the space between all four of them.
<Pose Tracker> Anne Aomori has posed.
Concentrated sorrow, loss, grief..
Anne's familiar with such emotions, obviously--but this is not the way she usually experiences them. It's concerning.
Anne watches that muted shriek and Ruth may notice the way she very casually drops into a ready stance; there's no obvious weapons in her hands, no clear aggression, but she is loose--perfectly anticipating movement as needed. She doesn't attack or defend, but she's prepared for it--
But the Kricketot hides behind this... person, and that is why Anne doesn't attack. Despite that rifle and its naginata-like blade.
"I'm Anne," Anne greets in turn. "People don't generally notice me when I don't want them to."
A pause. Typhlosion looks to her, as if asking instructions, and she shakes her head, so the flames go out and he relaxes just a little, moving onto his back legs. "Ty..."
Anne, "You seem very attached to your weapon. Do you expect to need it?"
<Pose Tracker> Ruth Pauling has posed.
'People don't generally notice me when I don't want them to.' Ruth's tail coils about the rifle a bit tighter, a tell of her rankling feelings. Whatever's coming out of her aura, it's like all sorts of feelings and things are just spilling out. Like they want out, and to never go back in again, and keep going out even if there's little to bring out. To a trained combatant's eye, it's a situation that stands to escalate.
Something Ruth is doubtless aware of from having the number of years she's had to come to grips with her nature.
An incident is narrowly avoided when the upright creature relaxes, though the tension never fully leaves Ruth in turn. The blade points lower to the ground, coincidentally putting it in front of Kricketot like it were cover for them.
Does she expect to need that weapon? the weapon she's so very attached to. Her eyes grow downcast, looking at it, feeling its weight and the lingering phantom of a memory of the strain it put on her left arm.
It's telling when she lifts it up and hugs it closer to herself, gingerly, though matters of leverage should make it seem uncomfortable or impossible to hold like that.
She nods, the once. "I... wouldn't be who I am without it."
<Pose Tracker> Anne Aomori has posed.
It's a kind of danger that Anne doesn't tend to face. Oh, she's been in front of dangerous creatures before, been in tense situations... But a 'person' like this is very unusual. Especially with her unique traits. Anne can sense the feelings spilling out as an aura, more than able to feel them herself.
Anne continues to maintain a relaxed stance, as if prepared for things to change, but there's no aggression in it. There's only 'calm.'
"...I see," Anne answers that answer in turn. "So it's important to you, rather than a need to use it necessarily..."
She keeps judging. "Well, that's for sure a sign you're not from arond here," she says wryly. "Even if not for all the others."
"This is a place called Energy Nede. We don't use weapons like that very often anymore, though we'll have to again soon."
I won't try to take your weapon. Be who you are, that's fine."
But she hasn't relaxed.
<Pose Tracker> Ruth Pauling has posed.
It never struck Ruth that there have hardly been any weapons out there. At best, small rectangular things clipped to belts that didn't quite correspond to any ARM she's seen or handled. Just small elf(?) children and their animal friends, and adults with their own animal friends, and...
There was a little girl, decades ago, who would have been delighted to live in a world like this. She did not make choices that would bring her into any sort of reality resembling that. (Present extraordinary circumstances notwithstanding!)
Ruth's grip of her weapon lowers from 'embracing in a hug' closer towards 'at rest,' as Anne gives the read of Energy Nede's name, lack of need to use weapons... and the thought they will have to, soon. And the reassurance she won't try to take her weapon.
"...Then it's fine," she echoes, as Kricketot looks up, plays their little xylophone antennae again, and leaps forward closer to her side, rather than behind.
Her tongue flicks, in that moment of empty space of words between them.
"You don't sound afraid of that," she says, "about... having to use them again."
<Pose Tracker> Anne Aomori has posed.
Laqui the Typhlosion moves to sniff in Kricketot's general direction. He doesn't actually move any closer, though. Instead, Anne watches Ruth move to a resting position, and that little Pokemon...
"It likes you," Anne says. "Pokemon aren't always good judges of character," she admits. "But it's still a good sign."
Fear...
"I should be," she admits. "I should be much more concerned by it. It's a kind of war we haven't had to fight in many thousands of years. And our home was near enough to destroyed the last time we did."
"...But I admit, I'm curious to use my skills. And if the alternative is that my children need to be afraid..."
"Then I'll face whatever I must."
Typhlosion looks back to Anne, and puts his head under her hand in a soothing gesture.
Anne's emotions still don't shine through.
<Pose Tracker> Ruth Pauling has posed.
A sniff reveals it's a wild Pokemon that has not yet been put in a Pokeball. Does going inside a Pokeball give a specific kind of scent? (It does nooooowwwwwwwww, in this singular context and situation.) It might win a fight against the local bug catching children's own Pokemon only if the aforementioned children keep asking them to use Harden or Growl or something.
"It's not afraid of me," Ruth says, though in a tone that's hard to gauge if it's a good, relieved voice or a muted, disappointed voice, as Kricketot once again makes its little percussive noise while edging a bit closer.
"...Thousands?" Ruth looks up. Modern recorded Filgaian history only stretches back about five hundred and six years. Anything beyond that has been recovered piecemeal with uncertain timelines involved, at best.
She hears the words Anne is saying through her good ear. Near enough to destroyed... but she doesn't see or feel the scars of war here. Were thousands of years enough to heal from that? Would Zoara ever recover from the scars she personally tore into it, then re-opened anew?
...
The Hellion cracks a little smile, though it's not a soft one, showing little hints of fangs. Something about her almost seems like a caricature, more than anything, ticking a lot of boxes of the sorts of characterization fiction and folklore might give to an Ardaemont.
"It's hard to resist, isn't it. That feeling of something you want, must do, when the world around you shouldn't have a place for it. If it ever did." Still, Anne's emotions don't shine through. Ruth sees the colors, the shapes, hears her voice, but not the thing that her perceptions of the world around her are most strongly shaped by.
"I have an idea of what it might look like, then," the single-winged demonic-seeming not-Nedian bows her head, a glint of something like a tear making an escape. "...You must love them dearly."
<Pose Tracker> Anne Aomori has posed.
Wild!! ...Laqui can tell the difference. But it's still following Ruth...
Anne can't really tell, and she's good at reading people. "So I see. You aren't inclined to hurt it."
Thousands, and Ruth is surprised by that. Anne nods. "Many. Our society has been the way it is for a very long time."
A pause, at that smile. Anne tilts her head, regarding her thoughtfully. That...
"..."
She's not sure how she feels about this strange being having that kind of insight, but, "Yes, I suppose. It's something I shouldn't want, and yet, I do."
A pause. "I do. Very much." She pauses. "What about you? You're not from this world; do you have any ties to your own? You haven't come to town with the others."
<Pose Tracker> Ruth Pauling has posed.
Kricketot has that fresh Level 3 smell. It is not going to win a Smogon Little Cup format any time soon. (...What's a Smogon what-cup format?)
...
The subject matter drifts towards about her and her relationship with the other Visitors. Her rifle points down lower again, towards the ground. The blade does not cleave towards Kricketot, nor do they flinch from it.
She nods her head, once. "We came here surrounded by blood, fear, and danger." And... a great, terrible feeling of suppression. "I've watched the others see to the world around them. All the friends they've made. So many of them seem comfortable... happy, even after what brought us here."
The strange person comes down to a kneel again. Anne might notice that not once has the creature matched eyes with her directly. Shy? Or something else? Her being shy would be interesting, given she's of a presumed size and physique that might even intimidate the likes of that bombastic Gym Leader over in Vermilion City.
"They're friends. It's... they trust me with their fear, their anguish, their pain." Ruth's smile softens, as the little Kricketot leaps in front of her, making more noise with its antennae.
"I'll be with them again soon enough," she says.
<Pose Tracker> Anne Aomori has posed.
Anne listens. "The Ten Wise Men," she reflects. Blood, fear, and danger. "...It's a comfortable world," Anne says, though she does not say whether that's a good thin.
Instead, she does notice the lack of eye contact--but she is put inevitably in mind of the Pokemon she studies. Eye contact in animals is often something that prompts or shows aggression, after all.
"I see. And you take good care of these feelings, I'm sure."
Sorrow; loss; grief.
"I'm sure you will."
She considers. Something about Ruth... Puts her ill at ease. She doesn't like it much. And yet... She cannot operate on such undisciplined impulses.
"I imagine you'll be best off staying away from the city," she says. "The forest is comfortable enough. If you need anything, you can come by my lab." She reaches into her pocket, and extends a business card. "At the outskirts of town."
Yes... Better to keep her where she can keep an eye on her, if not here. Laqui growls vaguely, not in anger or menace but something of a yawn.
"I hope that you meet your friends sooner than later."
<Pose Tracker> Ruth Pauling has posed.
The business card is extended.
The little Kricketot takes a giant leap (proportional to its size) to clench it in between its antennae impishly. Ruth's eyes track from Anne's hand to the little troublemaker, where she reaches out with her right hand to pick it up. (Noticeably, despite the bestial nature of her Almost Everything, her hands lack claws - not even the look of clipped, shortened ones. They are strangely very, very normal aside from the grayish color of her skin and accounting for proportion.)
She takes it in hand, reading over it and making sense of the name and location. (There are signposts everywhere, designed so even small children on a Journey know where to go, so if she's confused now she won't be long-term*.)
* one hopes, as Filgaia is not as advanced yet. It doesn't use the metric system universally. All estimations of the ability to grasp simple instructions are thus entirely speculative.
"This is where Ida works now, isn't it," oh, Ruth is acquainted with one of Anne's new hires, from the sound of it. "Your invitation is kind," she says. She's not sure if she does have a place there, but then again... even she has to admit she's been enjoying the sights of the animals - the Pokemon - at play, enough to keep the creeping despair-laden dread from sinking her into her own head.
Sooner than later, the hope is. Magilou did say, some years back, Ruth would have to get used to learning how she was going to live her day, every day, for a very, very long time. Knowing what's coming... it makes the wait easier.
She lets both Anne and her dear Laqui leave without further incident, contemplating the card and the thousands of years of peace that are about to end. The guilt that she might have had a hand in it just by being is enough of a weight on her heart to anchor the more dangerous impulses poking at her mind.
She doesn't want Anne to have to find out how she measures.