@Zarkun

Well, Jason listened to the messages.

~Beeeep~



~Beeeep~



~Beeeep~



~Beeeep~



~Beeeep~



It was hard to tell if it was brave or stupid of Jason to call back though the consequences for not calling back were probably worse than if just called. The Pokedex would ring out that dial tone a few times before he heard a click. "You better have a good explanation for this. Where the hell were you?"

Helga looked over to Jason while she was tending his Pokemon. She said nothing, but the way she looked at him was enough tell him one thing; do not tell Professor Kapoc what happened. It was not a threatening look, but it was stern enough. Still, he was free to tell him.

What does Jason do?

---

@samreaper

It was essentially a game of Torchic. Ace would stand its ground to send a volley of small embers at the Skiddo bowling its way to slam the fire chic. However, the impact of the attack did slow it down for some super effective damage and in some strange sense of cosmic justice, the goat was burned. It wasn't obvious at first, but there were clear burn marks all over its body and the grass-type was struggling to maintain the attack through the pain.

"Follow the Torchic! Do not let it get away!" Ordered Ramos. The Skiddo was able to turn quickly as Ace moved out of the way and smacked the Torchic for some super-effective damage! However, thanks to the burn and lowered attack stats the damage was actually miniscule and with one more searing attack the Skiddo was down for the count.

"Skiddo is unable to battle! Ace wins!" Louis shouted as he held a handkerchief up towards Tristan. There were some minor applauses from the observing crowd of resting workers.

Ramos returned the Skiddo to its ball and looked down at it with a smile. "You worked so hard. You've earned a rest." He looked up at Tristan and said, "Not bad, sprout, but the battle has only just begun. Come on out, Lombre!" With great vigor Ramos tossed a Pokeball into the air and with a flash of white light came out a bipedal green thing with a red beak and a lily pad as some sort of hat.



"Lombre use Fake Out!" It was strange. The Pokemon just stood there absentmindedly, and the next thing Tristan and Ace knew it vanished from their sight. It reappeared inches away from Ace and then it just clapped it hands together right in the Torchic's face, causing it to immediately flinch. This was followed by a small shockwave that pushed the skittish bird back for minor damage.

Not wasting time, Ramos quickly followed up. "Now follow that up with Water Gun!"

"Lombre!" It shouted before a stream of water jettisoned straight towards Ace.

What does Tristan do?

---

@Sanguine Rose

Rosa took the Pokedex and help it up close to her face to get a good view before she started to giggle. It was not the pretty, charming kind giggle where it sounded like there were flowers and sparkles. It was not a 'hehe~.' No, this came from the throat like it was some crusty middle-aged man that saw something funny on the internet. It was a 'HEHEHEHEHEHE.'

"Oh we're definitely friends now. God, I wish I was there to see that." She handed the Pokedex back to Faye and listened to what she had to say up until completion. "Heh, you aren't wrong about that. You're pretty crazy for even doing that." Rosa smiled not in a mocking or mean-spirited way, but in a spunky teasing manner. "Traveling with Tristan though? My condolences, but hey, I guess I could pick worse company. You're fun and Tristan is..." For a moment she stood there thinking of something positive to say about the prat. At least he's hot? Rosa said with a shrug with her hands he slightly out front as if to lazily hold the idea out.

There was a silence that hung in the air for a moment as the young rancher stood there, kicking about some dust and old bits of wood. "Maybe you're right though. You know, I really have no idea what I'm doing. I don't mean about being a trainer. I mean in general." Before she could continue, the two of them could hear a vehicle drive up to the old barn followed by a light honk. "Oh, dad's here."

To save time, we shall summarize everything that happened. Before they returned to the orchard, Neil, her father, patched up their Pokemon and the remaining Tinkatinks. The engine was returned to the farm where Rosa's burly Ursaring of a father helped put it back together with the help of the Tinkatinks. Photo ops were much to be had probably. After all of that was done, the duo were dropped off at beautiful Florasong, specifically at Critical Capture.

---

@Joshua Tamashii@Lunarlord34

Amelia the forager! It was about time that someone decided to actually look around for supplies. In a forest as magnificent as this, she was certainly not going to be left empty handed. There were plenty of berries and other goodies to be picked, especially if she had some of her ghosts help make up for her small stature.



There was something else though. She found a very pretty light green stone with a darker green in the middle shaped as a leaf. She could feel some sort of power gently pulse in it.



Anyway, back to the present!

Freya frowned at Amelia's unwillingness to follow through with what she wanted to do. She was way too willing to sideline herself and frankly it was absurd. On one hand, she understood that Amelia wanted to just go with the flow and not inconvenience others around her. However, the spooky little girl should be able to do what she wanted because it was her journey. It would've been a waste for her to not make the most out of her journey.

However, there was something that Amelia really had not understood about Steph that Freya quickly picked up on from their short time together in Grand Glory. She stared down at Amelia silently before taking a deep breath and turned her focus to Steph. "Hey Steph, want to go deeper into the forest that I'm sure will probably be a death trap?" In most cases that would've been a warning. This was an invitation.

---

@CitrusArms

Said slightly crispy fellow groaned in response to being nudged by Stella. He would probably be fine.

Luckily, the grave had yet to have been disturbed. Stella would place the flowers upon a gravestone while lovingly maintained was beginning to show its age. The wonderful carvings in the stone were now beginning to erode though she could still make out the epitaph, '"Remember me, but forget my fate." Ellanore Osman. 1872-1899. Loving wife and mother.'

It had not taken long for Stella to find the dramatic Gastly as it came bouncing in the air towards her with quite the satisfied expression. "Gas!" It chimed happily. It floated there as it listened to her proposal, and it looked contemplative. "Gassss."It said as if was unsure on whether or not it wanted to leave its home. After all, leaving was a big deal. How could it leave its friends and family behind? Quite easily actually! "Gas Gas!" It eagerly bounced around in the air.



Now that she acquired a new member for her team, Stella went to the cottage and knocked and called out to be let in with no response. However, if she tried to let herself in, she would find that the door was not locked. Once inside, she would see that it was a sparsely furnished room with only some chairs, a fridge, and an unused fireplace. Sitting by the desk, if anyone could call it sitting, was a thin man in his late thirties, early forties with shoulder length messy blonde hair and a scruffy beard. He wore a white turtleneck with an orange stripe running horizontally across it, very dark gray, baggy pants that covered most of his black boots, and the cherry on top was the greasiest, smear covered looking army green trench coat.

He showed no reaction to the surprise visitor, well, for obvious reasons. His eyes were shut, and the room reverberated with his cartoonish snoring.

What does Stella do?

@Joshua Tamashii@Remram

Seeming quite happy and content with herself with her catch, Steph turned her attention to her paralysed friend. Uh...there wasn't much she could do right now, right? Except maybe hope it goes away with time? She didn't buy any paralyse heals back in town, or full heals. Slight regret she didn't, then again, did anywhere even sell a full heal? Eh that doesnt matter much right now. She would just return Jack and hope to find something to fix him up later. She wasn't the best with the outdoors persay, despite her active and outgoing lifestyle and personality. Farmlife was very, very different to proper outdoors. Still, she knew a few things here and there, if not because she enjoyed camping. Pretty sure there was berry to fix it, but it was escaping her at the moment.

Tapping her chin as she thought, she was quickly snapped back to attention at the sound of Freya's voice. Giving the girl a blank look as it took a moment for her brain to catch back up and review what was said, she looked from Freya, to Amelia, back to Freya, back to Amelia, to Dusk on her shoulder, back to Freya, down to Amelia, up to Freya, sideways to Dusk.

"FAHK YAYH OY DO! WHAHT INEH' GAWNNA KEELL YA IS GAWNNA MYKE YAH STRAWNGAH!" Thrusting her fist up into the sky, one could almost see the fire bursting forth from her eyes, sparkling brighter than any star. Freya had only known Steph for a short time, not much longer than Amelia really. But Steph was a simple girl, and all she needed was a little patience handling and one could easily work out how to best reign her chaotic ways in a certain direction. Mostly. Though for a moment after, she seemed to hesitate and look towards Amelia again.

"Uh...buh' weell ih' be oolroigh' wit' Amelia? Wouldn't wahnt t' drahg hah intao any unnaesaessaray duyngah ya knaow? Me and yah ahh biieg enough and ugly enough t' look aftah oursaelves and ooll, buh' she's a kiied ya knaow? Wouldn't wahnt hah t' geh' huht cause of me." Was this...responsibility? Nah, couldn't be. Not Steph. Though then again, everything Freya had seen Steph had always been a danger to herself rather than others. Or maybe this was her actually being able to think instead of acting in the moment, would explain why she was pretty quick to park a lot of her excitement at Freya's proposition. "Told hah Oy would kayp hah syfe and stuff. Plus Oy'm shooah she's gawt stuff t' do and plyces t' say oolsao roigh'?"

Jason opened his mouth to answer and then stopped, realizing just how insane everything he had just experienced was going to sound to the Professor once he started relaying it. So then how did he tell Kapoc what had happened? How did he say "Yeah, there's something out there that is keeping the Deity of Time from entering Evig's time flow at any point in the regions history or future and now might yeet me into another time at any moment" without sounding like a total fucking nutjob? As he tried to think up an answer that didn't make him sound like a total nut, he remembered the first message from Kapoc and decided that for now, he would deflect. "Hold on, how about you tell me what you meant by you know what I found first. Doesn't a Pokemon Professor have better things to do than sit and wait for updates from the individual Pokedexs of the aspiring champions?" He paused. "Oh, and the Night-touched might have been contacted by Darkrai. The mark is...I'm not sure about what would cause it, maybe extended attempts but I feel confident in who's causing that phenomenon now."

Amelia most certainly let her pokemon help out with foraging for supplies. Phantump and Yamask especially enjoyed floating around and finding what they could while Mimikyu stayed closer to its trainer, helping pick up nearby things that were closer to the ground. She was content to continue like so, staying out of Freya and Steph's way while they led on, but Freya seemed to have different plans. The other girl addressed Steph, asking the wild girl if she wanted to explorer deeper into the forest. Steph's answer was a VERY enthusiastic yes but quickly turned into her voicing concern for bringing Amelia along.

This surprised Amelia a bit, as she figured Steph would go wherever she pleased, regardless of Amelia being there or not. Hearing that this wasn't the case made Amelia a bit upset but also gave her that small push she needed in order to speak up.
"Actually, Steph... I was hoping to head deeper into the forest as well. I... have a feeling I might find something of interest to me further in. Maybe another Ghost-type. It might just be more Phantumps, but we might also come across Pumpkaboos or, if it gets a bit swampy, maybe some Ghastly. I guess there's also a chance for Lickwicks, depending on the environment. Did you grow up in a forest, Dusk?" The young medium said, addressing her last question to Steph's little candleman.

@Zarkun

There was no need for Jason to be face-to-face with the professor. He could already feel the man squinting at him through the phone with an utter look of disbelief. "Do you genuinely think that I don't have automated systems put in place that notify me when I'm away from my computer? Or that I don't have any staff to assist me? I'm not some hermit that lives in his lab and only has his work." There was a hint of aggravation as if he was even insulted by the insinuation that Jason made. That and it seemed like it was Jason was avoiding the question. However, there was a thoughtful silence from Kapoc's end as he mulled over what Jason said.

"There are those who have presented that idea before. It's actually a pretty logical leap though it doesn't align entirely with what we know about it through other legends and accounts throughout the world. The Night Touched phenomenon is entirely unique to Evig." There was another moment of silence though he could hear a light thumping of fingers against a desk in the background. "Should I be suspicious that you came to that conclusion after I discovered you found Celebi or is that purely a coincidence?"

And there he waited for Jason to respond. How would he respond?

---

@Joshua Tamashii@Lunarlord34

Yup, that was the reaction that she expected from Steph. The Galarian girl almost emitted a shockwave from her eagerness to go deeper into the woods though to her surprise Steph showed restraint. Honestly, it amazed her that this wild girl that would throw hands and jump into a sewer could show this sort of self-control though it was probably because she did not want to put the life of a young girl at risk or something to that effect. Freya fought the urge to frown at this. Of all times Steph had to show restraint, it had to be now?

The problem was that Freya could not actually argue against her logic. She just stood there, anticipating for Amelia to backout, but much to her surprise she actually said what she wanted to do.

There was some spine in the girl after all, she muttered to herself with a smile.

When the question of where Dusk the Litwick arose, Freya partially held her hand up."Oh I can answer that actually. Cedric told me about it." It made sense with Professor Kapoc being her brother and all that. "All of our starters were bred by Ruey, save for mine since that was a gift from Cedric. Ruey has a ranch a bit up north where she is breeding Pokemon to help repopulate the populations damaged the most by Cipher. The data we gather is actually being used to help Ruey keep track of the populations of wild Pokemon," Freya explained with great satisfaction. One should take pride in their work, especially if it was for the greater good.

However, that was off topic. There were more important things at hand. "That's enough exposition though. We've got some ghosts to track. Do you guys want to prepare before we go deeper in?"

What do they do?

Stella Lumite

It was good that both of the burglars were alive. They may have been incredibly rude to the dead, and robbers besides, but that only earned them a little bit of roughing up. No one to apologize to or make amends with, she supposed, but she’d let the watchman take it from here.
The very heavily sleeping watchman was snoring quite soundly. Stella looked at the man thoughtfully. Was there not a nightshift? Possibly.. Whatever the case, this guy had some things to attend to. She let out her Yamper, “Scamp, lick his face to wake him up. Hope he likes dogs..”
“Sorry to wake you, Mr. Watchman, but there were some burglars at the Osman gravesite. Ellanore Osman. They might still be there, but I didn’t have any rope to tie them up or anything.”

Shit. He had hoped to derail the professor's train of thought with that question, but that didn't work. And he'd hoped to further derail with the Darkrai deflect and that worked even worse. Arceus, whatever I did, I'm sorry. And then, there it was, the confirmation that the Pokedex has informed him of Celebi, which Jason had a feeling that that was what it was about, but he had hoped to avoid talking about, at least over the phone. So now, after his desperate attempt to deflect, he was back to asking himself how he explained it all without sounding like a fucking nutjob.

I could say I didn't know I'd seen it, but I missed five phone calls, so that isn't gonna work. I could try and deflect further, but I'm out of things to deflect with...Arceus damn it... Sighing, Jason wanders a bit into the clearing, amongst the Pumpkaboo. "Alright, fine, since deflecting isn't going to work. I saw Celebi, but there is...no way to explain what happened that's not going to make me sound like a fucking loon, Professor."

@Joshua Tamashii@Remram

A feeling, huh?

Looking down at Amelia as she spoke up, Steph seemed to make a face, and perhaps for a moment, at least a moment as she put a hand on Amelia's shoulder, it seemed like she was about to shut the idea down, or perhaps even question what this talk about feelings and ghost types was really all about. Perhaps probe for a few answers. Instead what she got was....

"Well whoy deedn't ya sie sao Amelia?! Jayz louise, Oy ine't nao moind raydah ya knaow? If yah wahnna do somethin, speak up! Else ya gawnna geh' dragged alawng like a sahck of potuytoes, and ine't nao one wahnna be a sahck of potuytoes." Giving her a big ol' toothy grin, the older girls hand quickly went from her shoulder to ruffle her hair. Steph chose not to question what this 'feeling' meant, because lets be real, she felt all sorts of urges and feelings, to which some she ignored, some she followed. She called it following her gut,

Now was this the same case for Amelia? Not really, but hey Steph had the right sentiment even if she had the wrong idea about it all. And that was that mattered right? And even if Steph did know, honestly all she would think was that it was a cool and funky thing to have. She wasn't exactly about to judge people on actions, now was she? Not with the stunts she pulled....

Looking at Dusk when Amelia asked where Dusk came from, before she could even get the words out to ask her partner, Feya was already explaining it all. Well, suppose she oughtta expected the sister of the professor they got em from to know. Guy sounded alright too, maybe at one stage if she got the chance she should drop by and thank him for Dusk? Oh right, speaking of thanks, she quickly pulled out her pokedex and without any further context to Kapoc, she sent him a text of thanks for the pokedex, Dusk and the chance to explore evig.

Then with Feya done, Steph would put her pokedex and hum for a moment thoughtfully.

"Ya know, if we run intao some Ghosties, wouldn't moind a Gastly myself, Gengar is a mayn ol buggah and a strawng one at thaht. uh uhthahwoise..." She wasn't sure what other Ghost type she would be too interested in right now, but if she liked one she saw the looks of, then she would let the others know she guessed. Though she had the feeling she should let Amelia here have first dibs on the ghost types, so she probably would unless it was especially aggressive.

"Uh whaht koind of prep is there even t' do anywhy?" Taking another moment to think, she looked up at the treeline and squinted as if expecting the answer to be up there. To no ones surprise, it wasn't. "Guess Oy just moigh' wahnna train up a biieh' moah, mybee foind somethin t' dayl weeth Jack heah's puyralysees. And if Oy say somethin wheech catches me inteahst, try and catch ih'."

Steph was but a simple lass at the end of the day, a simple shiela. If she saw a cool or strong mon, she would try to catch it. Otherwise this was a great chance to train up Dusk, Dennis, Lucky and Jack if she could find a way to cure him of his ailment. She did so knowing it would make Amelia uncomfortable, but at the end of the day it was kinda the reason why Steph was even on this journey, so she would give her an apologetic look every now and then try to finish the fights as quick as possible.

At least on their way to wherever Amelia was wanting to head to. Otherwise besides training and looking for a berry to help with Jack? She would always keep her eye out for anything out of the ordinary if she could see it, whether it be a pokemon, a person, or whatever. After all, if she found the extraordinary, she might find the answers which she seeked.

---

Tristan watched with tense anticipation as he watched the battle unfold and at first the Skiddo seemed to get a hit in, but the growls had done their job. That combined with Ace's embers soon brought down their first opponent. And done so through a genuine battle." Excellent job, Ace!" The teen called out, giving the nervous chick his first bit of confidence boost.

A short-lived one as Ramos called out Lombre, the goofy looking grass/water mon combined with the compliment from Ramos, momentarily stunned Tristan much like Ace was by the fake-out. An seemingly unavoidable move apparently.

Cumbersome, though that would quickly be forgotten upon seeing the water-gun. Knowing this was nothing bad and with fake-out likely still dulling ace's reaction, the silver-haired teen chose to do a switch.

A red beam flashed quickly recalling Ace, followed by re-calling Angel back onto the field." Sorry about the hit, Angel. But, we got the lead and with you we will win. And no better way to start than with a dazzling sweet scent then follow with leafage."

"I didn't say anything because... I didn't want to possible distract you from your journey. I don't have a goal or destination in mind, so getting dragged around isn't much of a problem for me. I can always come back later after all." Amelia said while straightening her ruffled hair. She then turned her attention to Freya as she explained where their pokemon had come from. This caused her expression to change to quizzical. "If that's the case, I'm surprised I got Phantump, since they're a shiny. I mean, even Dusk is a shiny. I would figure a breeder would want to keep such rare pokemon, especially for conservation efforts."

The question then came up for if there was any prep that she or Steph wanted to do. Amelia thought about it for a second before shaking her head.
"I can't think of any. I'll try to find some berries or the like on the way though. We might be able to find some useful ones though. And with my pokemon helping me, maybe I'll be able to find even more. Especially with Phantump here." She said before moving over to Steph and holding out one of the Cheri Berries she had found. "For your Sneasel. I don't think it would like to stay paralyzed and I think this is the proper berry to cure it."

With that being said and done, she would be happy to follow after the older girls but would help them stay traveling in the right direction if needed, though she made sure to keep on foraging for more helpful supplies, with her pokemon floating around to help, except for Mimikyu who stayed closeby to guard her and also to keep an eye out for object she might have missed that were closer to the ground.

@CitrusArms

The man was completely unaware to the sudden weight of the Yamper on his body. Scamp would feel the hot breath against its nose and would feel a burn. This man wasn't asleep because he was tired. He was out cold because he was completely pissed out of his mind. So, when the Yamper gave the drunk a series of wet licks he woke up with a loud snort and in a slow daze his eyes fluttered open and squinted with bloodshot eyes. "Uh...wha?" He looked down at the Yamper on his lap with a confused look and then at this teenage girl that for some reason was in his cabin.

"How did you...?" He looked at the door and saw that the lock was not turned. "Oh." The watchman listened to what Stella had to say and his face just went absolutely pale realizing that he was in deep shit if this got out. "Uh, er, yeah there's rope. How about you lead me to where they are?"

For the sake of brevity, Stella led the watchman to the unconscious duo and looked at her as if she was a serial murderer. "Lass, should I even ask why one of them is even crispy and why the other is covered in saliva? Wait, oh my god he's looking at me." The one that had been licked by her Gastly was staring them in the eyes though he could not say anything for some reason. Maybe because he was afraid of getting saliva in his mouth or because he was paralyzed.

The man tossed a bundle of rope towards her. "Lend me a hand. I'll get the big guy and you get bug eyes over there." Again, for the sake of brevity the two graverobbers were tied though Stella had a choice on how to tie the one up.

"Phew, I can definitely say that this was not on my bingo card for the night." He turned his attention towards Stella and said, "I guess I should thank you for catching these two. You deserve a reward. Totally not a bribe or anything."

Stella earned 3500 P!

Or she could try to extort him if she was so inclined.

What does she do?

Connected Areas:

Florasong Town
Route 2

---

@Zarkun

"I'm going to stop you right there." Kapoc suddenly said. "It's obvious that you really don't want to tell me what happened and that's fine. Originally, I just wanted to tell you be smart and use your discretion in regard to Celebi, but I couldn't even contact you. Frankly speaking, I wasn't sure if you got sent to another timeline and believe me, I did not want to tell your parents that their son was sent to some unquantifiable distance in time." It was certainly a conversation that most people would not like to have. Imagine being told that your child was sent into an unspecified point in time by a capricious magical onion fairy and there was nothing that they could do about it until if said fairy decided to send them back. His job was one to be envious of.

There was a weird moment where Kapoc seemed distracted by something on his end. Jason was not sure what he heard, but he could've sworn he heard the professor mutter, "Am I cursed or something? I can read it in her accent."

Jason could hear a heavy sigh heaved from the other line. "Look, I know that I'm not a cuddly guy. Believe me, I know, but I am not your enemy. I won't force you tell me what happened, but I can tell you're shaken. It doesn't have to be now, but you do have my number."

What does Jason do?

---

@Joshua Tamashii@Lunarlord34

Steph received a text back from Professor Kapoc. It said, K. Clearly he was not good at expressing his feelings.

Freya smiled and with a shrug said, "Eh, alright then. Let's get moving then!"

Steph would begin training her Pokemon in the woods. This was actually the perfect spot to train her particular chosen Pokemon. Frankly speaking, it could hardly be described as training and more like just curb stomping the local population. Well, for the most part. While she was training, occasionally there were different Pokemon that were not as common as the others. There was a bipedal bird walking around the path carrying a massive leek that rested on its shoulder. It had sharp eyes that dared anyone to challenge it and it certainly looked like it was raring to smack something or someone with that stupidly large leek it wielded. Just one hit from that bird's weapon of choice was definitely going to leave a bruise. Then there were mischievous purple monkeys with a functional hand for a tail that while not posing much of a fight were just annoying little things.





Her Pokemon overall suffered little damage and no status ailments. Lucky her.



Meanwhile, while Steph was training Amelia was continuing foraging. Unlucky for her though, she seemed to be struggling to find any more berries or any trinkets on the ground. Well, she eventually did find an Oran Berry and when she reached out for it the berry was snapped away in an instant. Something rustled within the leaves of the berry tree and popped out the head of one of those annoying little Aimpoms with a big grin.

"Pom pom?" It held out the berry that it took from Amelia in a mocking manner before it went up higher in the tree. "Shi shi shi shi!" It chuckled teasingly.

"Hey give that back you little jerk!" Freya shouted from below and in response, the Aipom made a face while sticking its tongue out at her.

What does either of them do?

---

@samreaper

And in a strategic move, Tristan switched Ace out for Angel! The poor little dive was doused, but still stood up against the attack.

Repeating a winning strategy, the Lombre was enraptured by the Sweet Scent and followed its nose only to eat a face full of leaves. The problem was that the attack did very little damage and by comparison, the Water Gun that Angel switched in already put her behind in a battle of attrition though that could always be remedied by its ability should he switch.

"Hm, I'd be in a tough spot if that diva sang again. Lombre, use Knock Off!" Black sparks of energy formed around the kappa's hands, and it charged forward and swung down to smack the floral singer into the ground.

How does Tristan react?

"The reason I don't want to tell you, Professor, is because I genuinely have no idea how to explain it all without sounding absolutely crazy. Sure, I met Celebi..." Jason hesitates and then, after a moment, sighs. "It was in a shrine here in Starbor Forest. Apparently something is keeping it out of everywhere that isn't a shrine to Celebi here in Evig. Except...it forced Celebi out in it's territory and now...there's a chance I could get yeeted somewhere else in the timeline at any moment and I don't know what would do it." There were details he was leaving out, things that he needed more information and context for before he shared, but not talking about the entity keeping Celebi out of Evig period...that was just a bad idea. "I understand grand scale isn't necessarily my worry, but...Professor, did someone fall out of a hole in the sky recently?"

---

The strategy worked though little damage was dealt with Angel looking a little worse off. Angel being a grass type was one good thing with the field buff working for her as well.

Ramos concerns for sing were right as Tristan could already see a good plan of action, but knew his opponent was expecting it. And Angel hardly looked like a pokemon really capable of dodging.

Clenching his hands, Tristan was trying to think on how to handle the Lombre aiming a knock-off, when he took notice of some of the loose leaves left behind. Quickly recalling one of Angel's move and with it a crazy idea.

His time short." Angel! Use rapid spin over your leaves and kick them up at Lombre to throw them off, if it works quickly follow up with a sing if not then try to use the flurry to land in a good hit!" Tristan relayed his order along with a back-up with hopes to at least deal a good blow.

Stella Lumite

Scamp came back to Stella and sneezed, which prompted her to pick up the critter and hug and pet him. “Oooh. Something on his breath, baby?” She gave him a kiss on his head before returning him to his ball. “Good job, sweetheart.” She turned her eyes to the keeper, “let’s go, then.”

~~~

“Crispy?” Stella did her best to seem unaware, surprised, “no idea. That one’s paralyzed?” She approached the second robber and inspected him, “seems like something Licked him. A Ghastly or Haunter, you think? Perhaps the local ghost pokemon took poorly to the disturbance. Dunno what kind of electric types you’ve got around here that did that one, though. Let’s just be thankful they were stopped.”
She caught the rope with a bit of surprise before setting about tying up the skinny bloke. First, tie his hands together behind his back, then do the arms. Then, aah, the knees. That should do. She looked at the offered payment for a moment before pocketing it, “Oh, just doing what any decent trainer should do, right? Reporting thieves and supporting in their capture.” She had no intention of tormenting the grave keeper, but the payment was nice. That reminded her, the old man’s ghost had promised her payment. He’d seemed very determined to compensate her, at that. She’d been paid for assisting in the robbers’ capture, but that was payment for a different matter. She managed to talk a Ghastly onto her team, maybe that was supposed to be it? Somehow, that felt too disconnected to really seem like her payment. If he couldn’t pay her properly, would he have new business keeping him here?
She didn’t want to have any relation to the haunting of a ghost-ghost. She’d go back to town and check the mansion’s porch, at least, before going to the Pokemon Center to rest for the night. After she left the graveyard, as she walked, she’d let her Ghastly have some night air with her.

@Joshua Tamashii@Remram

"Nahh, enough of thaht." Steph sounded...annoyed? Yeah, annoyed. She was absolutely annoyed by the words coming out of Amelia's mouth right now, and put a hand on her shoulder, giving her a stern look before they left. "Its as much yoah journay as moine, yah wahnna do somethin? spayk up. if Oy daon't wahnna do ih', mybee we cahn spliieh' off faw a biieh', regroup aftuhwahds. Besoides haydin t' do stuff yah loike moigh' layd t' uhthah fun! naevah knaow whaht the naext die hawlds!"

She also made sure to thank Amelia for the berry before giving it to Jack, curing him of his paralysis.

With that said, she would indeed grind against the local grass and bug types with fire, ice and flying types. Warcrimes were committed, levels were gained. She wasn't sure how strong the first gym would be, so every levelled mattered. Had to train while she had the chance! Though the commotion of whatever was going on behind her did draw her gaze, seeing the Aipom in the tree above taunting both Feya and Amelia.

Now, Steph's first instinct was to climb up the tree after the shithead and take it back. Maybe battle it, however, she instead...silently turned away, only keeping a small glance over her shoulder at the situation. As much as her hotheadedness wanting to jump in, there was a greater curiosity to satisfy.

What would Amelia do? That question made her curiosity win out over her brashness, a rare feat really. But how would Amelia fare in the face of this? Steph wanted to know, so restrained herself...barely. Not that it stopped her from letting out Jack and telling him to get up into the tree and cut off the Aipom if it tried to make a runner.

In the meanwhile uh....she could train some more or something? Not much else she could do while she waited for Amelia. Maybe see if there was something else going on? Twiddle her thumbs?

@Zarkun

There was a moment of silence from Professor Kapoc's end when Jason asked his question. Eventually, he said in a neutral matter of fact tone, "No, nothing like that has happened."

Jason heard a sigh from the other end of the line. "If it's any comfort to you, you're more than likely safe. This stays between us, but I am privy to certain information." In the background he could heard the clacking of a keyboard. "There was an incident in Sinnoh regarding Team Galatic's previous leadership. He tried to remake the world and to do so, he summoned the two legendary Pokemon of time and space and bound them to his will. If neither of them could remove him from our timeline in such a dire situation, then whatever forced Celebi out can't do it to you if it hasn't done so already. We're all bound to a logic, even Celebi's ability to time travel has its own rules."

There seemed to be some noise in the background, as if there were people yelling. "I'm only going to tell this to you once. Let this lie and continue on your journey. I know that you think you're an adult, but you are not. You are still a kid. Enjoy it while you still can and let us deal with the situation."

There was some shrill, unintelligible yelling, but there was one word that Jason could make out. Rather, it was a name, Amelia. "Look, I've got to go. I've got another mess I need to clean up. Take care."

Kapoc hung up on Jason. Now what?

---

@samreaper

So, in a desperate attempt to get distance from the kappa menace Tristan ordered Angel to use her Rapid Spin to kick up her own leaves. However, as soon as she spun and kicked up the leaves something happened. The leaves that she kicked up began to glow green and instead of turning into some sort of nuisance, the leaves smashed against the Lombre and physically pushed it back. Angel would have been just as confused as to what happened. Whatever happened, it wasn't on purpose.

"Oho? Now isn't that interesting," Ramos mused to himself. "Cover your ears and then follow up with Water Gun!" The Lombre covered its earholes and shot a stream of water at what would probably be the Leafage and pushed through the mass of leaves and hit Angel for not very effective damage. "Don't let up! Use Knock Off again!"

Once again, the Lombre's hand crackled with black energy and charged straight at the Gossifleur to slam it down on its shiny flowery head.

How does Tristan react?

---

@CitrusArms

Did the watchman believe her? Absolutely not. Was he going to push the matter? Absolutely not. He just watched this kid hog tie a man with great efficiency. Between all the ghosts and graverobbers, Stella scared him more. "Uh, have a good night miss."

Well, that happened.

But anyway! She went back in town and before stopping by the old manor and saw that there was a light on in one of the windows and a shadow waiting by it though rather than reporting back to the old man, Stella decided to call it a night after a pleasant stroll with her newly acquired Gastly. Luckily, there were some free bunks to accommodate her, so she was not sleeping out in the open that night. She could lay in bed and close her eyes and drift off into sleep.

...

Stella stood in darkness. At least, she thought she was standing. There was a weightlessness, as if she was barely tethered to what she could assume was the ground. If she down there was an inky darkness and if she looked up, side-to-side then it was there as well. The only source of light was that of a pale full moon as white as freshly fallen snow above her.

She could hear something, a ticking. It was not coming from any particular direction. In fact, it was coming from all sides. If she was so inclined to look for the source, she'd walk aimlessly for what felt like hours or minutes. Time was hard to grasp in a dream after all. Eventually, she would find herself standing in front of what she could assume to be a clock tower. It was tall and had a clock face as bright as the moon though the tower itself was obstructed by shadow. It just ticked, ticked, and ticked on and on.

For some reason, Stella felt a sense of familiarity with it. She had seen it before, but she just couldn't place it. Not that it mattered for she had other problems. That clock ticking? It was getting louder and louder, except it sounded like it was coming from inside her head. At some point the noise became so deafeningly loud that it had lost any semblance from being from a clock. For a dream, it was strikingly painful as if her ear drums were going to blow any second. The last thing she would see was the full moon was no longer in the sky; it was now a crescent moon just below her feet.

Then she wakes up, safe in her bed.

What does Stella do to start her day?

It was kind of frustrating that after having some decent success earlier to having none at all now. While Steph was having more than a little success with her training, Amelia and her pokemon were having absolutely miserable luck at finding anything else that might be useful from their surroundings. Despite this, the young girl kept very calm, as she knew that not all attempts at such things would end in success. She would just need to keep at it, and it was possible that if she persevered, she would find some success.

And find success she did, as she finally spotted an Oran Berry. She moved to grab the berry, only to have it snatched away from her at the last moment by one of the local pokemon, an Aipom. She watched as the monkey climbed up the tree and taunted her. Amelia just stared up at the monkey before noticing several angry cries from around her as her pokemon were all glaring daggers at the Aipom, an ominous energy coming off of them because... well, angry ghosts. She even noted Freya getting angry in the background as well. Realizing this could be bad, Amelia took a deep breath, counted to ten, and let it out, calming herself down before turning to her pokemon.
"Its okay everyone. It's just a simple berry. We're sure to find more if we keep looking and it's possible, we'll find something better. Thank you so much for caring though." She said to them, taking to time to pet each one, slowly calming them down. Turning back to the Aipom, she gave it a smile and wave before looking at Steph and Freya and pointing in the direction she sensed the Ghost-types. "Come on, let's keep going. I'm sure we'll find something interesting if we keep going this way!"

With that, she would keep moving in that direction still looking for things to forage from the forest with the aid of her pokemon. Mimikyu was keeping close and very alert though, prepared to take a swipe at anything that tried to take something from her trainer. For the most part though, Amelia didn't care. It's not like the items in the forest were hers after all and with pokemon like Aipom around, they were bound to play pranks. A lot of Ghost-types also played pranks, so if she wanted to be a good Ghost-Type trainer, she would need to be able to keep a level head when they did. It was good training in its own way.

As Kapoc, after a very telling moment of silence, denied the fact that a person fell out of a hole in the sky, Jason opened his mouth to counter argue, but never got the chance, the Professor moving swiftly on to assure him that the odds of him being moved from the timeline were virtually nil and then, after saying he had other things to do and to essentially leave the situation to the adults, he hung up. Jason could simply stare at his dex/phone combination in disbelief. The hell is with everyone telling me to let this be? I don't have that bloody choice at this point. Still, he rubbed the bridge of his nose in annoyance as he turned to head back inside. He would give the professor one thing, and that was for the time being, all he could do was get stronger, and that meant getting his team evolved, so they were more capable of defending themselves as well. Once he was inside, he looked at Helga. "Where can I go to help make my team stronger? To get stronger myself?"

@Joshua Tamashii@Lunarlord34

Everything made an active effort to avoid Steph's attempt at training her Pokemon more lest they would be reduced to nothing, but experience points. Yup, that was definitely the reason. It was not like the GM was not trying to keep everyone from getting over leveled. Yup.

Anyway!

The Aipom pouted, dissatisfied that it had not gotten the reaction that it sought. It just climbed up higher in the towering trees until it disappeared from sight. Well, it was not like they were going to go after the mischievous ape. After all, Amelia was the one that was trying to direct them away from potentially chopping down or climbing up a tree from getting to the ape. Well, at least Freya was trying not to at least.

"Alright, fine. It gets to see another day," she said with a shrug and followed Amelia's lead. What was she going to do? Not follow the small medium currently at large that could hopefully lead them through the woods? Well, maybe she should have not done exactly that. The further in they went in the forest, the darker it got as the canopy above somehow grew denser with each step they took on what was increasingly becoming an incline. Stone and other bits of dirt crunched beneath their feet as mist began to roll in and the sound of rushing water could be heard down below.

---

@Zarkun

Helga looked up towards Jason while she treated his Pokemon, currently the very sparkly Totodile. She was applying ointment to the gator on her table before he came back in from whatever business he had outside. "No thank you for patching up your Pokemon? How rude. Isn't that right?" The gently pat Sable on the head with her oversized gorilla hands before she returned it to its own ball. "Still, I have to say. You're really living up to your epitaph."

She lumbered over to her cabinets and began to fish around them; a gentle clatter of dishes could be heard. With her back towards him she said, "There is no shortcut, Jason. I understand that you're impatient, but you will not find strength by rushing headlong and it will bring you no peace. To seek strength recklessly, no matter well intentioned, only brings despair." Helga pulled a couple of wooden plates out though in her hands they looked more like toys used by kids when pretending to be cooks. She placed them on the table before returned her focus to Jason.

"Continue your journey and grow, that is your only course of action. Face its challenges and adversities, and then perhaps you will become stronger. Was that not your original plan anyway?" She looked apologetic for not being able to give him the answer that he was looking for though she had things that she needed to do. "But right now, what you need is rest. You're no good to anyone if you burn yourself out. Now be a dear and sit down while I make some food."

If her coffee was anything to go by, this could be horrifying.

---

Tristan could only watch with anticipation and much like Angel, found himself confused at what happened with the leaves. Besides that, however, the Lombre was getting in the hits; more frustrating at the old man's caution around sing.

This left him to drop sing, at least for the time being, and with the battle still going, giving him no time to try to think on what he witnessed. Whatever the strange incident was, a risky path was visible.

Yet, Angel had already taken some hits and Tristan was still very much a rookie trainer. As expected, he was gulping nervously and frustrated at his opponents continued relaxed demeanor; perplexing to the silver-haired teen stressed and worried over Angel. Still, what he saw fascinated him and the way it pushed lombre back.

Something was definitely there, but yet not enough." We need more leaves." He muttered the thought allowed unknowingly, his hands clenching. The risks and uncertainties of what would even happen, that is assuming it even succeeds were enough to not put Angel through such a tough path

" Hngh..Angel, I know this will be hard, but trust me. For now get your distance then use leafage, try and summon as much leaves possible then give your strongest rapid-spin!" He relayed the orders, anxious to see what happens though if things looked too dangerous he was ready to tell Angel to stop.