Frontier Town The Wanderin' Zera

[Butterfree]

Dave nodded slowly to Gerome, accepting the free drinks. "Well, sure, every fictional superhero is convinced they can best protect their loved ones by leaving them in the dark while they go off and nobly get themselves killed. Never seems to work out all that well for them, though." "We're going to go and torch all the bad guys!"

He listened to Brisa speak as he sipped his drink, his grip tight on the glass. "What a fucking mess. He gets summoned and fails, so Starr gets summoned and fails, so Betel summons a couple dozen people. We'd better pull this off before this ridiculous fucking daisy-chain gets any longer." He shook his head, glancing back at Gerome and then at Brisa. "Who exactly was after Stranger, anyway? I heard you mentioned something about him having some sort of rivalry going with that Greninja, Matthias?"

 

[Namohysip]

"Didn't wanna get too involved there," Gerome said, "but I'm gonna say... Covenant. Pretty obvious to me it was them," he muttered to himself. "Don't think they know my secret. Been trying to lay low.

"Or maybe they do, an' know they don't wanna mess with me. Just to be sure, I trained my strength up... You saw that in action against that Grovyle's 'friend' of hers. Hmph, speaking of which..."

He glanced down the bar at his six assistants, all of them slightly differently hued Mimikyu.

"They're knuckleheads, but with the right direction, they're good runners. I think Cipher forgot about 'em and whoever was supposed to send 'em back overlooked 'em. So now they're workin' here. Couldn't have 'em destitute in the desert..."

 

[Jackie Cat]

Brisa glanced at the Mimikyu with a dull expression, as if the absurdity of the sight didn't fully register.

"You're a right martyr, Gerome," she drawled. "Jus' don't let 'em do any mischief, and I won't find any."

She chuckled quietly and shook her head.

"Anyways. Yeah, my pa was playin' some kinda cat-an'-mouse with a couple a' Lanterns – Covenant agents, I mean. They got their knights, who operate mostly in the open, and I dunno that I'd have much quarrel with them as I've come across. Dunno about the whole of 'em, every group's got its mucksuckers. Then they got their spooks – spies, y'know? Matthias was one. That fella Nolan were another."

She eyed Dave for a moment, as if some recrimination was coming. None came.

"Kindof a stalemate fer a long time, the way I heard it. Think he was tryin' to beat 'em and trail 'em so's he could find their bases, their bosses, and so on. Put together a bunch a' supply caches and hideouts, a whole map of connections pinned to a wall, I'm sure you can imagine. But he was still just one guy 'gainst a score of shadows. And some of them were a match fer him, of course. He weren't used to that."

She scoffed, and gestured to herself.

"Can y'believe I was envious of the bastard? That was afore I were chased across half the damn country by the spooks. I'd like t'see 'em try me again, though..."

 

[Butterfree]

Dave'd been going for which Covenant members had been chasing after Jesse, but before he could clarify to Gerome, Brisa provided the answer. Yeah, figured it'd be Nolan and Matthias. A single Fire-type stereotypical starter Pokémon hunted down by two Water-types. Not exactly laboring for fairness, were they.

At least it was good they didn't know who Gerome was.

"Yeah, we saw his office at the cabin," he replied to Brisa. "Seemed to have a whole conspiracy board, and what, a list of people he thought were human? Plus a journal. He wrote about Ignatius Voclain wanting to kill you." He paused, watching her. Had Brisa ever read the journal? Did she know they'd read about how something had happened, and Voclain had said he'd kill her if it happened again? "It really sounds like your childhood was fucking something. Either way, whatever happened back there, you deserved to be treated like a normal fucking human be-- uh, you know, normal Pokémon. Person."

 

[Namohysip]

Gerome shook his head.

"Ain't an easy battle once the truth comes out," he said to Dave. "It ain't like I can blame the world over it, the basics, I mean. Fundamentally... Brisa ain't the same as a normal, no-human-blood 'mon. She's stronger. She gets stronger, faster. Th' amplification a human gives a Pokemon courses in her all on 'er own.

"It ain't like the human world where all those differences from race an' color an' all that doesn't matter, amounts to so little. Here? Bloodline matters." Gerome huffed, looking away. "The fish ain't gonna work a farm on a field. The plant ain't gonna climb icy mountains." She offered Brisa an apologetic, knowing frown. "An' the human-born ain't gonna fret about weakness the way everyone else might. Sometimes, society compensates... by makin' their lives hard in other ways. Ain't that the truth?

"So in a way, I get it. I get why those humans banded together. They gotta belong. They gotta carve their own place. They're outnumbered, even if maybe they ain't outgunned." He closed his eyes. "...But that ain't gonna make everything else they do right."

 

[Jackie Cat]

Brisa gave a short, sharp laugh. "Yeah, sure – I got a societal handicap on account of bein' hard as nails. That's fair play."

She nodded along vaguely to Gerome's take on the Covenant. For all that she'd been hounded by its agents, there was something about the idea of misfits banding together that she couldn't help but... yearn for. Even if she didn't have it in her to voice outright support for that right now, with her head full of worry, war, and whiskey.

She glanced at Dave, processing what he'd said after a slight delay. Her face relaxed a little, and something of the pained hunching gave way around her shoulders.

"I 'ppreciate you sayin' all that, fella. Things're gettin' better lately, it seems, thanks in no small part t'you an' yours. But it'll always be true that I ain't got a slew a' friends from when I were a cub, to put it mildly. It don't surprise me none that Voclain woulda had it out fer me like that, nor that my pa wouldn't think to just fuckin' level with me about it like a goddamn adult. I dunno whether he thought I'd be scared shitless or jus' take off and tear the guy a new one. Who knows? It was all over some stupid shit, anyway."

She chuckled, a little brighter this time.

"There was some fancy shindig at Frontier Hall – back when I was about fourteen or thereabouts – and his dipshit son came up to me and... wind and weather, I can hardly remember it now, but I'm pretty sure he called me a 'noble savage', or somethin' of that shape an' smell. Sneering prick must've thought he was payin' me a compliment in front of all his well-to-do pals."

She grinned.

"I gave him a headbutt to the face fer his trouble. Broke his beak. Got thrown outta the party."

 

[Namohysip]

"Hmph, appropriate," Gerome muttered. "I think it's all silly, if y'ask me. These bodies, us creatures, we don't need all those human things to stand up to the elements. Dressin' up an havin' a costume party, tryin' to play human, it all looks like a silly game to me. They're all kids, 's far as I care."

With a grunt, however, he turned his head to reveal the comically tiny blue bowtie wrapped around the very tip of one of the spikes on his back.

"But that's just how society goes. So I do the bare minimum. That's all I care for with the humans' games that went an' seeped into this world's ways."

But it was a very tiny bowtie...

 

[Butterfree]

Dave nodded along with both Gerome and Brisa. "Yeah. Sure, humans have powers here that others don't. But ultimately, even when some people are legitimately different, most decent people just want to live their lives and be left alone, right? You can't help being who you are. Sometimes that'll come in handy. Sometimes it'd technically give you the power to do something dangerous. But when people just treat you like a ticking fucking bomb at all times, not because of anything you did but because of what they're imagining you could do, that's not right."

He finished his glass in one gulp. "Ignatius's son grew to be a decent kid, from what I know of him, but sounds like he was a snot at that age. Probably deserved it."

 

[Namohysip]

"Yeah. Ain't sayin' it's the right way it all goes," he said, "but I get it. People outta power wanna regulate those in power. Fact of life." Gerome crossed his arms. "Sometimes, I wonder if this little bowtie is a symbol of that fer me, too. That if I ever take it off and strut around in public, suddenly I'm the wild one next."

 

[Jackie Cat]

"I think it's all silly, if y'ask me. These bodies, us creatures, we don't need all those human things to stand up to the elements. Dressin' up an havin' a costume party, tryin' to play human, it all looks like a silly game to me."

"But ultimately, even when some people are legitimately different, most decent people just want to live their lives and be left alone, right? You can't help being who you are. Sometimes that'll come in handy. Sometimes it'd technically give you the power to do something dangerous. But when people just treat you like a ticking fucking bomb at all times, not because of anything you did but because of what they're imagining you could do, that's not right."

"People outta power wanna regulate those in power. Fact of life." Gerome crossed his arms. "Sometimes, I wonder if this little bowtie is a symbol of that fer me, too. That if I ever take it off and strut around in public, suddenly I'm the wild one next."

Brisa chuckled at Gerome's jests and nodded grimly at Dave's moral affirmation.

"Y'know, folks're always sayin' about the frontier... that it's wild, that a 'mon can do as they like, make of themself what they please. I've not found that to be true, even afore the town started gettin' big. The truth is that bein' around other folks means havin' to put up with each other. Livin' together means livin' in ways that don't spook yer neighbor. And maybe yer neighbor's a prick, and you're fine with spookin' him, that's your business, but I don't see how livin' in society and livin' like a wild thing can mesh."

She glanced at Gerome. "It'd be swell if'n just actin' like a thinkin' 'mon were enough to get folks to treat you an' me reasonable-like. I guess wearin' our li'l symbols and suchlike is our way of showin' we're prepared to act reasonable ourselves." She shrugged. "I don't think of it too often myself. Mostly I just like ta' wear a clanner ring and a townie neckerchief so's folks know I'm split both ways."

A smirk crept onto her face. There was a certain kind of liberation in complying with social norms in creative, cheeky ways.

 

[Namohysip]

Gerome harrumphed at that, though it was hard to tell what he was actually displeased about. It didn't seem to be directed at Brisa.

"Well. Ain't this a fine mess. I just hope it's not gonna get all 'exciting' again with whatever you Wayfarers wind up doing," Gerome said flatly. "I dunno. Call it a gut feelin' that gets my sand blasters buildin' up, but I'm sensin' trouble, and not the obvious kind."

 

[Butterfree]

Dave gave a glance at Gerome. Ominous, huh.

He raised his glass to Brisa. "Well, to doing what you have to do to exist among other people without compromising on who you are. Clan, town, you have a right to be taken seriously without hiding that you're different. Wear the token clothes to signal not being a totally oblivious weirdo, rebel freely within the parameters."

He put the glass to his lips only to realize he'd just emptied it. He tipped the last couple drops into his mouth and set it down.

"Guess that's my cue to get home," he muttered, pushing the empty glass towards Gerome. "But, you know. I'm sure there'll be plenty of excitement, but at least we'll be trying our hardest to unfuck things and make sure you can all go back to living the maximally boring lives of your dreams." He looked back at Brisa, lingering on her tired form, with a weird urge to put a paw on her shoulder. "We're definitely getting Starr back," he said, resisting the urge. "You'll get her back."

And with that, he turned to exit the Zera, wobbling a little on his feet.

<><><><><>​