Phoenixsong
beep beep coming through
- Pronoun
- she/they/any
...okay. Okay. The gun was empty. That was... well it was still wretchedly bad, why had the universe (multiverse, whatever, he hated everything) stranded him with maniacs who willingly disguised themselves as D-grade horror flick monsters or whose solution to an argument was to hold people at gunpoint, but nobody'd died. Yet.
(At least Balls Guy seemed like he'd been trying to deescalate, and Lily... was somehow a hell of a lot calmer than he would've been in her place. Stranded with only two maniacs out of four, at least. Eh, he'd be generous: one and a half, as long as Gladiolus-If-That-Was-His-Real-Name didn't pull any more illusion stunts. Still one and a half too many.)
Lily had tried her best to explain what the hell the problem even was as they'd resumed moving forward. Operative word "tried". Blue still felt like he'd been handed a thousand-piece jigsaw puzzle after someone had dumped half the pieces into those mawile jaws, but at this point, well, what even was the point. Why would any of this tangled pile of garbage suddenly decide to start making sense? Why did it need to, as long as no one turned around and put a gun in his face? It was much easier to bottle up that whole damn horrorshow, cram the bottle into a tiny box with a million locks and mummified with duct tape, label said box "Absolutely Not My Fucking Problem" and bury it in the bottom of his brain for a therapist to unearth on an archeological dig decades down the line. Easier to just hang near the back of the group, keep himself and the lost kitten as far away from either of the Problems as possible, get out of this trash pit yesterday, find Leaf, and go home.
The deeper into the dungeon they went, the more the activity around them shifted. The background buzzing of insects was joined by the groaning of worn stone against stone as distant rock-types lumbered through the haze. Every once in a while, the ground trembled faintly underfoot. Something tunneling to nowhere nearby, perhaps, or the echoes of old demolitions still reverberating through the trench.
The sprigatito was still leaning against Blue. Which was weird, he still didn't know the guy from anyone, but not wildly out of character for a cat, he supposed. Not wildly unwelcome, either. Kinda reminded him of the way he'd lean into Arcanine's side after a long night at the gym. Funny how that'd been reversed, sort of, in a way that wasn't actually funny at all because it mostly just made him wonder what the hell had happened to his team. (That was still a better train of thought than wondering how long it'd be before another of these weirdos snapped, though.)
A tremor rippled through the ground, this time just hard enough to disturb the muddy soil. Blue jumped to the side as something blorped out of a puddle, but whatever it was made no further movement. It just... sat there, motionless, in the mud. Nothing more than a little pile of things that might've been white once, waiting for another shift in the earth to swallow it up again. He swore under his breath and tried to put it out of his mind. Wasn't the first time they'd passed by something vaguely unsettling protruding from the dirt. God. Literal hellhole.
The muddy objects stayed in their sad little puddle as the group moved past, but the rumbling never quite settled. The reason loomed up out of the mist soon enough: a pair of rhydon standing on the path, their horns whirling industriously as they bored into the earth on either side. Neither seemed to have noticed the group yet. Or maybe they were simply beneath notice—the rhydon were intent on whatever their task was, breaking up hunks of earth and piling them up between them. Collecting something? Searching for something? Ferals digging themselves a new den? Judging by the size of both the pokémon and their pile, the chances of getting by unnoticed seemed slim.
In the hole made by one of the rhydon, the feeble light caught the outline of something white.
(At least Balls Guy seemed like he'd been trying to deescalate, and Lily... was somehow a hell of a lot calmer than he would've been in her place. Stranded with only two maniacs out of four, at least. Eh, he'd be generous: one and a half, as long as Gladiolus-If-That-Was-His-Real-Name didn't pull any more illusion stunts. Still one and a half too many.)
Lily had tried her best to explain what the hell the problem even was as they'd resumed moving forward. Operative word "tried". Blue still felt like he'd been handed a thousand-piece jigsaw puzzle after someone had dumped half the pieces into those mawile jaws, but at this point, well, what even was the point. Why would any of this tangled pile of garbage suddenly decide to start making sense? Why did it need to, as long as no one turned around and put a gun in his face? It was much easier to bottle up that whole damn horrorshow, cram the bottle into a tiny box with a million locks and mummified with duct tape, label said box "Absolutely Not My Fucking Problem" and bury it in the bottom of his brain for a therapist to unearth on an archeological dig decades down the line. Easier to just hang near the back of the group, keep himself and the lost kitten as far away from either of the Problems as possible, get out of this trash pit yesterday, find Leaf, and go home.
The deeper into the dungeon they went, the more the activity around them shifted. The background buzzing of insects was joined by the groaning of worn stone against stone as distant rock-types lumbered through the haze. Every once in a while, the ground trembled faintly underfoot. Something tunneling to nowhere nearby, perhaps, or the echoes of old demolitions still reverberating through the trench.
The sprigatito was still leaning against Blue. Which was weird, he still didn't know the guy from anyone, but not wildly out of character for a cat, he supposed. Not wildly unwelcome, either. Kinda reminded him of the way he'd lean into Arcanine's side after a long night at the gym. Funny how that'd been reversed, sort of, in a way that wasn't actually funny at all because it mostly just made him wonder what the hell had happened to his team. (That was still a better train of thought than wondering how long it'd be before another of these weirdos snapped, though.)
A tremor rippled through the ground, this time just hard enough to disturb the muddy soil. Blue jumped to the side as something blorped out of a puddle, but whatever it was made no further movement. It just... sat there, motionless, in the mud. Nothing more than a little pile of things that might've been white once, waiting for another shift in the earth to swallow it up again. He swore under his breath and tried to put it out of his mind. Wasn't the first time they'd passed by something vaguely unsettling protruding from the dirt. God. Literal hellhole.
The muddy objects stayed in their sad little puddle as the group moved past, but the rumbling never quite settled. The reason loomed up out of the mist soon enough: a pair of rhydon standing on the path, their horns whirling industriously as they bored into the earth on either side. Neither seemed to have noticed the group yet. Or maybe they were simply beneath notice—the rhydon were intent on whatever their task was, breaking up hunks of earth and piling them up between them. Collecting something? Searching for something? Ferals digging themselves a new den? Judging by the size of both the pokémon and their pile, the chances of getting by unnoticed seemed slim.
In the hole made by one of the rhydon, the feeble light caught the outline of something white.
