Panoramic_Vacuum
Well-known member
- Pronoun
- she or they
A thread pulled wire-taut. An inexplicable feeling of dread. Up was down, and down was up, and Steven woke with a gasp lying on the cold, hard ground. Groaning, he dragged himself to his hands and knees. Rough stone bit into his palms and dug into his shins. It was pitch black.
He let out a shaky exhale, breath feeling warm against the cool air of... wherever he was. Where was he? Blinking, he rubbed a hand across his eyes. They were taking forever to adjust to the dark; like he'd been somewhere bright just prior.
But that was... impossible? In the blind silence, familiar sounds of the underground crept through his senses. He must be in a cave somewhere, he'd fallen and hit his head. And lost his light, of course. Why was he here? What had he been doing? He sighed, checking his head for injuries, but when he felt nothing amiss-- no blood, not even a stinging lump-- things weren't quite adding up.
Smoothing his hair back down, he shook his head and stared into the darkness with a puzzled expression. He should be feeling fine, relieved even! But he wasn't. There was something that kept nagging at him, insisting something was wrong. There was something he should be doing. Someone he should be helping? And why did he have a lingering feeling that he shouldn't even be able to bleed?
It was still too dark to see. Tentatively, Steven patted around the ground around him, hoping maybe his light was within reach, but came up empty-handed. No sense in stumbling around blindly, especially underground. He'd have to wait here a bit longer. His eyes would adjust eventually...
Gods, it was bright. Couldn't the sun see he was trying to sleep? Wallace swatted a hand in front of his closed eyes to ward off the offensive celestial body. Except his next immediate thought was oh gods he'd fallen asleep on the beach in the sun, and oh gods can you imagine the tan lines, or worse, the sunburn?!
Wallace jolted upright and stared down at his legs. Or rather, where his legs should have been. But there were no legs to be found. Instead he was greeted with a soft, blue-furred tail fin. Immediately fear was replaced with excitement. Was it real? His mother's threat when he was little that if he spent all day in the pool with water pokemon he'd turn into one was true?
He curled his toes, his tail fin flexed, and Wallace burst into giddy clapping. He'd done it! Finally become a mermaid like in the fairy tales! Oh, he could already see his new stage presence now-- wait. Those weren't his hands. Clawed flippers replaced his carefully manicured fingers, and he tried to clamp them over his mouth to stifle a gasp, but all he managed to do was clamp them over the whiskered snout he now had instead. A shocked bark escaped him as the realization struck.
"Oh heavens, I really am a pokemon!" he howled, rolling and twisting away as if he could somehow escape his new form. But all he got for his troubles was a demonstration of the impressive flexibility of his new Popplio body. He patted himself down. Fluffed his neck frill. Even blew a bubble.
It wasn't sunstroke, he really was a pokemon. Certainly not the worst, but still. It was almost too much to believe, and gods, it was hot here. Where was here, anyway? With surprising ease, he tipped up on his tail flipper and scanned the horizon.
Oh, horrific! Not a drop of water in sight!
Wallace flopped back down with a dramatic sigh. Well if fate wasn't a cruel mistress after all. Waking up as a Popplio wasn't the worst. Waking up as a Popplio in the middle of a dry, salty desert was. But, he was a water type... Concentrating, he focused, drawing up the essence of water in his mind and--
Joy of joys! A meager aqua ring formed in the air around him, and oh blessed moisture! Except the sun overhead was relentless. He had to focus a lot to keep the liquid from breaking apart and evaporating into nothing. With a huff, he gave up and let the ring fall to the ground where it splashed with a hiss, vanishing almost instantly into the water-starved soil.
Wallace pulled a face of disgust. Well, he certainly couldn't stay here. Not like this. He'd shrivel up into a Popplio raisin in no time! Desert survival, desert survival, if only he'd filed that information away instead of swearing he wouldn't be caught dead in the middle of a desert. There had to be something he could do to get out of this mess. Maybe find a landmark of some kind? He tipped back up on his tail again and settled for searching for something that wasn't water.
There, on the horizon! It was hard to make out in the shimmering heat, but that looked like something other than dry, cracked salt bed. And at this point, Wallace was more than happy to take whatever he could get. Especially if it meant some godsdamned shade. Popplio or not, his skin might never recover from this.
Another aqua ring cast, and he set his snout in the direction of the something and walked. And walked. And walked. His poor flippers. His poor frill. His poor nose! Fate was a cruel mistress, indeed.