Forlas Spirit Nexus

[canisaries]

"You do not need hands! All pokémon in Forlas have a weak telekinetic ability to move small objects with which they are in physical contact. As a deerling, you could do this with a hoof, but you may find it much easier to use vines!"

"Vines? I have those?" Andre tried to think about where such vines would come from. He knew he had a flower on his head, and his hair seemed to be made out of leaves, but no amount of concentration on that area produced any vines. Where else...

He felt something at his withers and tried there. He felt two thin prehensile protrusions emerge, like little limbs. He lengthened them more and more until they came to view, and indeed - they were two dark yellowish-green vines.

"What do you know!" he laughed, thrilled not to be forced to do without arms. Still, that comment about his hooves interested him, and he looked for an object to carry, finding a small pebble on his cobblestone road. He put his hoof on it, grabbed it with nonexistent fingers, and lifted it up to his face. He also realized that his range of motion was far beyond that of a normal deerling. Convenient.

 

[ShadowVulpi]

"...I do not know how. I am so sorry. Please forgive me. I have never had to send anyone back before, and the new bodies are all ready by now, and there is not any way to un-make them. I thought you would all like your new bodies! I am so sorry!"

Lavender resisted the urge to sigh. He had been tempted to ask if any of them could go home when he heard their memories would be wiped clean upon leaving the planet, and now he had his answer thanks to a rather loud and excitable Rockruff. He reminded Lavender of a feral dog.

At least dying was an easy way to go home if all of this went poorly. Perhaps. All of this could be but a fleeting dream, if dying was the answer.

The Eevee eyed the group again, made a mental note of which ones to keep an eye on, which ones to keep far away from, and which ones seemed most dependable, and stood up just a little straighter and stronger. It still didn't feel right in this tiny, weak body that looked more adorable than respectable.

"For whatever reason, we were all chosen," he stated to the cloud, while also drawing his gaze to Wes for a moment. "If you can't send us back... so be it. We'll see how well we can all handle the challenge. Everyone here was still alive back home moments ago, therefore we all must have some degree of competence and adaptability that will aid us in these weaker forms. Even if we don't believe it."

He eyed Felin, but only for a second.

 

[HelloYellow17]

"Oh, I am so sorry! I am certain that you must have given consent to be here, but perhaps there was a mistake? Please, let me just try to..."

The cloud swayed, unsteadily. The lights froze, jarringly, and turned a sickly jaundiced colour.

"...I do not know how. I am so sorry. Please forgive me. I have never had to send anyone back before, and the new bodies are all ready by now, and there is not any way to un-make them. I thought you would all like your new bodies! I am so sorry!"

Wes’s first reaction was anger. “Do you mean you dragged us here and now you can’t send us back? For what, all on a whim?” He felt the fur along his spine stand up—gods, he had fur, why, why, why—and he faced down the little entity with a snarl. “I don’t know what game you’re playing, but let me be clear—I would never in a million years agree to be here, least of all like—like this!” What was he, anyway? Some kind of small…blue…puppy? Sands and stars, this was humiliating.

But then the little light wobbled and changed colors, and the voice sounded really…distressed. Almost like a confused, lost child. It had only ever tried to be helpful so far, and he’d never detected any signs of hostility…

Dammit, why was he feeling sorry for a little blob of light? Of all things? He huffed, gritted his teeth and dug his claws into the ground.

“That’s…fine. Fine. Okay.” He tried to force his voice into something a little less aggravated. “If you can’t figure out how to send us back, then…what do we do now? Just do some kind of rescue mission or whatever, and then we can go home?”

Answered the call, my ass, he thought. Regardless of why he’d been dragged here, and despite his irritation, even Wes could tell that upsetting their host wouldn’t be the wisest move. If all he had to do was play along for a little bit to get back home, then so be it.

 

[Mr.RMA]

All these conflicting emotions, many of them negative... especially from that angry little rockruff who managed to even make the cloud entity sad for a moment there... which only made things even worse for Corey as he was picking up all of it thanks to his new form.

"Okay, I was never a fan of crowds to begin with, but this emotion-reading crap is just making things worse... If anyone needs me I'm gonna be over there until we get flung into... wherever we're going," Corey murmured, pointing in the direction of the closest unoccupied space and making his way over there... very slowly, as he was not the most comfortable with these stumpy ralts feet. Even with extra caution, he ended up tripping over himself a couple of times, letting out an aggravated sigh after each pratfall.

 

[canisaries]

"Okay, I was never a fan of crowds to begin with, but this emotion-reading crap is just making things worse... If anyone needs me I'm gonna be over there until we get flung into... wherever we're going," Corey murmured, pointing in the direction of the closest unoccupied space and making his way over there... very slowly, as he was not the most comfortable with these stumpy ralts feet. Even with extra caution, he ended up tripping over himself a couple of times, letting out an aggravated sigh after each pratfall.

"Oh, sorry to hear that," Andre said. "I'd take that ability from you in a heartbeat if I could. I can normally sense auras, and it appears that I've lost that ability here."

 

[Mr.RMA]

"Aura reading and psychic empathy are separate phenomena, bud, you might not be as big of a fan of one compared to the other..." Corey called back in response. Couldn't help but have that Pokemon researcher mind come out at least one more time.

 

[canisaries]

Andre shrank a bit. He didn't mean to imply he knew exactly what the ralts was going through, but that was apparently what he'd done. Off to a good start.

 

[AdamArtDraws]

Felin kicked the heel of her boot on the ground and dispelled her sword with the wave of her paw. She drew a deep breath and popped her neck a few times. They all had to start from zero, or so the voice said. Uncertainty stirred in her chest, but she quelled it quickly.

Yes. She would start from zero. This was a great opportunity, however she looked at it. A chance to fulfill a long lived and golden dream. She chuckled all to herself. "Guess I'm in for the long haul."

 

[Jackie Cat]

“Do you mean you dragged us here and now you can’t send us back? For what, all on a whim? I don’t know what game you’re playing, but let me be clear—I would never in a million years agree to be here, least of all like—like this!”

The cloud shuddered, and shrank.

"Are you very sure? Is it possible you are more of a hero than you believe? Or... maybe just that you wanted to be here more than you wanted to be wherever you were before?"

It wasn't clear if Wes heard.

“That’s…fine. Fine. Okay. If you can’t figure out how to send us back, then…what do we do now? Just do some kind of rescue mission or whatever, and then we can go home?”

"Unclear... All I know is that a hero came to Forlas to save this world from some crisis, and failed, and asked for help. You will have to learn what the threat to my world is before you can save it. Please save it."

The cloud looked very small here.

"I live here."

 

[Navar]

Shiron opened his eyes.

Somewhere new. Again. He was almost expecting Xerneas to pop up again, but he hadn't heard from her in a while. Better to assume it wasn't related to her.

Whatever.

"U-Uh... hi. I'm... here, wherever "here" is. I want to help."

 

[Butterfree]

"Well, you for instance! There are other humans on Forlas, too, such as the hero who Called for you all."

Dave narrowed his eyes. "Wait, other humans? As in, other humans humans, or other humans turned into Pokémon?"

"Unclear... All I know is that a hero came to Forlas to save this world from some crisis, and failed, and asked for help. You will have to learn what the threat to my world is before you can save it. Please save it."

The cloud looked very small here.

"I live here."

Dave sighed. Yeah, fine. He probably had agreed to this. Always have to be out there defending the fucking vulnerable. Only now he'd apparently have to do it as a goddamn dog.

"Well, if there's not much more you can tell us until we get there, then let's get the fuck on with it."

 

[Shiny Phantump]

“That’s… probably my fault?” Nova said to this… human turned birddogfish. He could make assumptions about some possible inner turmoil and how such a piecemeal body represented that. But what good would that accomplish?

“Maybe it means you’re the adaptable type?” he offered instead. That was Matriarch’s intent behind building him in the first place.

"I am not sure! This body is clearly meaningful to you, and it is a body that is compatible with Forlas! Maybe you have a close relationship with an RKS Chimera in your own world? Or perhaps you identify with their qualities? It is definitely an outcome that relates specifically to your soul, and not to any other soul here, however! I am certain of that."

Gladion's thoughts spun. He'd let everything else distract him from the fact there was a Null here (or, another Null now) which felt like a massive oversight in retrospect, but there had been a lot going on...

Okay. There were other worlds (what a concept, but hell it was the sort of unscientific that spiritual travel between them was at least) where things were more or less the same. That clearly included his given it probably couldn't be one of the three he'd seen directly before. This Null couldn't be "A Hazel" or it would recognize him. Probably. He had been lurking back before his 'configuration' rendered him unrecognizable but she'd still have probably had a good guess given everything, and he'd also like to think he'd be able to recognize her personality, which he didn't. They would be the first or second Null of their world, then. (Which also meant those two in his world would probably turn out fine somehow, unlikely as it seemed, which was a weight of his back.) He'd seen them a couple of times, but they would never stand a chance of recognizing him. Unless he fucked up and said as much. They also shouldn't know the name Gladion, barring something happening with him, Hazel and the other Nulls in his future. (Which wasn't implausible, really, but... that thought was odd and uncomfortable. It would require someone to tie him back to his past, and meant someone here would be tying him back too, a crack in what could've otherwise been a perfect chance to detatch himself from his past.) The old "Mohn is a common Seafolk surname" probably wouldn't fool them in light of the strong evidence in favour of him being part of one very particular group of Mohns, though. That was far too dangerous territory.

He dug his helmet into his own neck again trying to look at the other Null, before correcting himself and moving his body to face them. "I don't think... I... Maybe." All three of those reasons could fit me, I guess. "I just didn't expect it to be... um, 'compatible with Forlas' or whatever. It's not like... It's just..." He sighed. "I don't know what I'm getting at," he lied.

He felt... exposed. This had turned from a chance to escape his past to being tied dangerously closely to it very, very fucking quickly.

"If nothing else, it's at least reasurring I won't be the only... err... RKS Chimera."

That name was bitter on his tongue. That was the common name for them? That fucking sucked. Faba's shitty-ass fucking garbage idea wasn't part of the original plan and it certainly didn't deserve to be the name for them all. But using it conceded no information on his own connection to the species, at least. Type: Null was an internal codename.

 

[Namohysip]

"I will do my best in this new realm to die as little as possible," Mhynt said with a little sigh. "I imagine this will be a lovely vacation from the red abyss. Go on." She waved in the air as if shooing the chatter away. "Take me along."

 

[Jackie Cat]

Laura waved, which then turned to awkwardly scratching the back of her now-feline head – which felt good actually – which turned back into a more forceful wave.

"I think... everyone's about ready to go? Shall we do this, whatever 'this' is?"

The cloud brightened a little.

"Certainly! I am ready. Hold tight, I can only pull so many spirits through at any one time..."

The cloud brightened sharply, radiant enough to hurt the eyes, and expanded. Spirits touched by the motes of light became light themselves, as if drawn into a pokéball, or evolving...

...and then they vanished.

 

[HelloYellow17]

The cloud shuddered, and shrank.

"Are you very sure? Is it possible you are more of a hero than you believe? Or... maybe just that you wanted to be here more than you wanted to be wherever you were before?"

It wasn't clear if Wes heard.

Wes snorted at that. “Hero. Sure.” Whatever this little light blob wanted to believe, he supposed.

But the second half of the cloud’s statement gave him pause. It was true that he wanted to leave Orre more than almost anything, but…would he have said yes because of that? Would he have taken it as an escape route, even if…even if it meant leaving Neo and Novo and everyone else behind to fend for themselves?

The thought deeply unsettled him, and he shoved it out of his head by giving himself a good shake.

"Unclear... All I know is that a hero came to Forlas to save this world from some crisis, and failed, and asked for help. You will have to learn what the threat to my world is before you can save it. Please save it."

The cloud looked very small here.

"I live here."

A strange mixture of guilt and sympathy clenched in Wes’s chest. Please save it. I live here. But—ugh, this was so stupid. What was he supposed to do about that, and why was this his problem? Hell, his own homeland was a pitiful mess, but he’d at least had the foresight to leave it rather than fix it. Or. Well. He’d tried to leave it, anyway.

Maybe that’s why you feel guilty, a small voice in the back of his head whispered. Because you’re a coward.

A growl rose in his throat and he looked up at the strangle little cloud. “Fine,” he huffed. “Just tell me what I need to do.”

 

[kyeugh]

Spoiler

lol i posted this early on accident sorry mods have to see my stupid wip

It happened not infrequently that Prim would rest her eyes while riding on Scout’s back and drift seamlessly into a dream of riding on Scout’s back. In the dream she would sometimes hear a voice that wasn’t really there, but otherwise the dreams were very ordinary. In fact it could be very difficult to discern after the fact what had been real and what had been imagined.

Was this like that? Just a dream? No goat, no sword, no wolf—God, she hoped so. She tried to ignore the burning sensation of bile low in her throat.

The rocky path wound uninhibited a while under a sea of stars that pulsed weakly in configurations she did not understand. Eventually it converged with so many other paths that their juncture formed a plaza. Prim stuck to the edge of the crowd that congregated there, listening and turning plans over in her head. More than once she tried to look back from where she had come, but her familiar rocky path seemed absent.

Magic. A call for help, conveniently pre-accepted at a time she could not remember. "Heroes," the cloud had said. "Someone who would travel across the void between worlds to answer a distress call." To Prim's ear, that sounded less like a hero and more like a more like a buffoon who didn't understand travel expenses. She found herself agreeing with the cynics in the crowd, and their fears compounded her own. She was too old and too tired to play pawn in some dopey cloud's cosmic game of chess. She had to get out of here.

At some point through the ruckus, she noticed the pain. Or the lack thereof. The dull throb that had plagued her shoulder for as long as she could remember—that ever-present creaking and grinding of the knees—it was all gone. She felt... brand new. Freshly made.

And perhaps she was.

She suppressed the thought, suppressed the lilting of her heart. It was a trick. A work of sorcery to put her at ease, open her to suggestion. Right?

It had to be.

--

 

[Panoramic_Vacuum]

"Hello?" Steven cupped a hand to his mouth and called into the darkness.

Nothing but the sound of his own voice greeted him in return. The beam of his flashlight bounced off the same stone tunnel walls that he'd been following for the last... well... however long it had been since he'd heard the voice.

A voice calling for help.

It had come from the end of the tunnel, and soon after, other voices had joined in. But he'd been walking and walking, and still he hadn't found the end. And now, all of a sudden, the voices had gone silent.

"Is anyone there?" he called again, pressing on into the darkness.

Still no response, save for the crunch of gravel beneath his shoes.

Steven's expression tightened as his flashlight found only more darkness ahead. Was there anything or anyone to actually be found? Had he been hearing things this whole time?

No, he was sure he'd heard someone calling out. But the thought sent a chill through his veins. Did the silence mean he was too late?

He shook his head; he couldn't think like that. His pace quickened through the darkness until, suddenly, something appeared in the beam of his light.

The tunnel split into two paths.

Except it was no ordinary junction. The path to the right was unchanged; the same rough stone walls he'd been following this whole time. But the left...

The passageway was framed by perfectly cut stone blocks arranged in an arch, almost like a giant doorway, except the doors were absent. All along the surface of the stone were carved glyphs, patterns of raised dots that were hauntingly familiar...

Hesitantly, he swept his light over the doorway and listened. Nothing sounded from the darkness beyond, but he felt the faintest tug, an urge to follow the path through this carved gateway.

Steven swallowed. Was this what he'd been looking for? Should he follow his gut? Just as he took a step to the left, his flashlight flickered once, twice, and then went out, plunging him into darkness.

With a quiet curse, Steven tapped the flashlight to try to turn it on again, to no avail. Waiting for his eyes to adjust, he shuffled forward, hand outstretched, in an attempt to orient himself.

He found nothing but air. He reached again, but came up empty. Strange, he hadn't been that far from the tunnel walls... Suddenly, an icy chill crept over him, and Steven shivered. The darkness pressed in around him, weighing him down. The flashlight fell from his grasp and clattered to the ground as a wave of fatigue crashed into him.

How long had he been down here? He couldn't sleep now, though. He had to keep going. Just get to the doorway and...

A distant sound came from his right. His feet wouldn't obey, his whole body feeling like lead, but he turned his gaze toward the noise to see a faint glow. A warm sensation washed away some of the chill, but he was still so tired.

"H-hello? Is... is someone there?" he asked. "I'll be right there, I just... I need to rest..."

He didn't know if the light responded. Steven closed his eyes and sunk to the ground.

 

[Jackie Cat]

The cloud's light continued to pulses outwards, then retract, pulse, retract, each time taking a few new souls from the Nexus, and sending them Elsewhere. The voice was quiet as the pattern established itself, but then, as the motes of light began to shudder and spark, it spoke up again.

"Oh, it seems some of you are very challenging to send—!"

The voice hadn't changed, exactly, but there was a faint keening sound just underneath the words, as if the speaker were being squeezed...

"Please wait, I am trying to synchronise unexpectedly irregular souls! There are... anomalies...!"

The light pulsed again, and the remaining souls glowed, but slowly, much more slowly than the rest. The sensation was like that of shallow, fraught sleep, or fever...

...but they, too, would make it to Forlas, it seemed. Even the spirit whose strangely subterranean path had never properly aligned with the Nexus, whose appearance was already reshaping into that of a beldum. Whatever had held him up couldn't have been too problematic, then.

Everything would be fine.

 

[Jackie Cat]

The paths faded, retreating from Forlas, leaving the meeting-dias in their centre to become a little circular patch of sand, the colours of honey and rust.

"Maybe nothing else went wrong," murmured the light-cloud entity to itself. "I hope not."

The light dimmed. The cloud contracted to a point.

"Closing Spirit Nexus... reaching out for communication... oh. This is going to be very hard. Far too many simultaneous spirits. Oh..."

And then, the Nexus fell silent.

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