[[place:Vereheq Ruins|Vereheq]] still managed to unsettle [[character:Dakarai N'Sehla]], a persistent seed of superstition lodged in his gut against all rational objection and the knowledge that if [[pokémon:Solalon]] and other pokémon lived here without ill effect, a human being was highly unlikely to be magically less capable of surviving a night.
Despite [[character:Cecile Madhukar|Cecile]]'s flippant comments about the gym circuiters having a head start, Dakarai had paused on the way, currently nestled just beside the main route amongst the worst of the destruction, using one chunk of cement as something to prop his back against, and another as a seat, left foot up on the same, right dangling off the edge. The least he could do when passing through here was say hello to the local Legendary - and the best way to encounter Solalon was to sit still and wait for him to come to you.
The downside of that setup, of course, is that he's alone with his thoughts, something he certainly rather wouldn't be. The first three times he passed through here are vivid memories, insisting that if karma had a say in the mist's machinations, he'd be dissolved down to a bloody stump in record time - which certainly isn't helping the creeping unease under his skin that no amount of inward frustrated swatting at was dispelling. In future, maybe he should invest in a large block of paper and some crayons, keep himself busy while he waits.
{{ :plot:reshigah:vereheq-elena.png?direct&200|}}
They were lost. This was a terrible idea. This was a horrible idea. They were going to die out here, fall in a hole or keep going in circles until they starved or have their shadows eaten by ghosts or just go to sleep and never wake up. Well. She would. Roman... she could put [[pokémon:Roman]] back in his pokéball and he'd be okay, he'd just be in stasis until someone found her withered skeleton and the bright orbs tucked around her hips, but the chances of someone finding her body was infinitesimal and maybe being trapped unknowing forever was WORSE than death...
A growl rumbled through the flanks beneath her and [[character:Elena Lione|Elena]] realised she'd clenched her fingers painfully into the scruff of her Arcanine's neck. With a deep breath she carefully unwound them from the thick fur and scrubbed the heels of her hands over her itchy eyes instead. Roman twisted to give her knee a brief lick before resuming his sedate walk along the foggy road. The thin ribbon of flame steadily circling them sent eerie shadows and half glimpsed reflections dancing around them, but it was their only source of illumination.
They should have stuck to the main road. But she'd seen a sign with nothing but an arrow on it pointing at an angle and she'd heard so many tales about how these ruins were a maze and when she'd spotted it had thought she was so CLEVER. And now they were lost in perpetual mist.
When a tinge of light enters his peripheral vision, Dakarai's initial thought is simply that the wait is over. That'll be Solalon, having... sensed him in some way... - for that matter, how did the Legendary perceive incursions into his territory in this perpetual soup? Maybe if travellers are all notoriously bad at personal hygiene, 'scent' could do in a pinch, but... - he stops his thought short. Solalon is a Legendary. That was quite enough as far as explanations went.
He's slid off his rock and into a saunter, tugging his thoughts out of the abysmal depths they'd sunk into, the light smile on his face distinctly practised at this point, hooked his right hand into his pocket by the thumb, and brought his left up to idly knead at the back of his neck when the hue of light begins to nag at him. He freezes in mid-stride for an instant - even brief conscious inspection proves that can't be Solalon. And that's not the main path. That's a fire of some sort, presumably from a pokémon seeing as this damp place was not prone to bursting into fire for any reason - but the chance that it's a //wild// pokémon are minimal, seeing as fire pokémon, despite their ability, did not usually have cause to produce flame.
Someone's lost in the ruins. He curses under his breath and taps twice at Iris' pokéball. "Iris," he prompts, sternly, staring toward the approximate source of light. The Venomoth gives itself a shake as it appears, expression one of reluctance that is likely only legible to Dakarai and [[character:Jagdish Tsukinaka|Jagdish]]. "[[pokémon:Iris]], someone seems to be lost," Dakarai tells the Venomoth calmly. "I'm going to go fetch them, but I'd like to not follow their example," he explains. "Will you help me get back to the path..." - he gestures with two digits from his left hand over his shoulder at the same - "...in case I lose my orientation?" Over the distance he estimates he needs to cross, it shouldn't be an issue, but he's been wrong before. Iris quietly observes the area for a moment, then utters a brief sound of confirmation. "Thank you," the human responds, nodding once, then tips himself into a bit of a jog toward through the landscape of urban shrapnel.
"Hello?" he calls out once he's advanced another twenty metres toward the light, briefly half-perched atop something akin to a boulder, hoping the mists would carry his voice enough. "Stay where you are, keep the light on, I'll lead you back to the main path," he shouts toward the flame-coloured light, despite knowing that if his voice carries, the exact instruction probably wouldn't survive in full. Then he's hopped back off the current obstacle and continues his approach, slowing it a little, attentive of his surroundings. Traps are possible. He's run into them before. He knows better now.
A voice! For a moment Elena feels elated. Rescue! Followed swiftly by fear, given there shouldn't be anyone here this place was supposed to be abandoned which meant voices couldn't be a good thing after all. //'Stay where... keep light... back... path.'// The echoes were confusing. Keep away from the light? She'd heard rumours of spirits leading travellers to their doom, but this time she was the one with the light, so she couldn't really keep away from it because Roman was NOT letting her go. Keep the light back? That didn't make much sense either.
Still, she tried to encourage Roman to back away cautiously. Either there was something ahead that was provoked by light, or there was something ahead trying to trick her and they didn't want to be near it anyway. Roman steadfastly refused to budge and the only motion from the Arcanine was his ears twitching forwards to listen and the FLAME WHEEL around them whirling stronger.
From Elena's perspective, a silhouette begins to form from the shadows of the mist, clambering across the broken landscape, slowly morphing from a fuzzy-edged slab of shadow into something with a defined outline, then beginning to adopt colour as the light of Roman's flame bleeds across the shape, filling it with detail from the inside out. With the creeping detail comes a similarly creeping familiarity - and an instant before her conscious mind recognises the image that's forming, her subconscious one has whisked the association out of the archives of her recent memories: It's Rhaptor. The outlines of a Venomoth a bit further back only confirm that.
"...Elena?" ...and apparently, recognition is mutual. He clambers off the nearest chunk of toppled cement and bricks with a curious caution, as if perhaps not altogether convinced on some irrational level that she was not just some illusion. Then that moment passes. "Are you all right?" Apparently, 'what are you doing here?' is at least not on the menu, though it might as well be coded into that question in subtext.
"Rhaptor?" If it was him that was good. He'd only ever been nice and probably wasn't a ghost or a spirit or malevolent pokémon. Could pokémon even use pokéballs to let out other pokémon? Below her Roman rumbled something that sounded like a greeting and was at least a friendly acknowledgement, so that meant the approaching figure had the right smell and wasn't a hallucination.
Elena rubbed her eyes again. They still felt red even though she'd stopped crying what seemed like hours ago. "No, I'm not all right. I'm lost and dad is disappointed and mum wants a better kid and I'm not sure if I want to hide in a tree for a few days or go beg gym leaders to let me take a photo with them NOT battling so I can throw them in my parents' faces just to -spite- them." She slumped over her pokémon's back.
It's nothing to be amused by, but Dakarai finds his lips creasing to a bemused smile regardless - the mental image of a trek around Sehto simply to get photos with all gym leaders is rather fantastic, after all, even if Jagdish would politely decline. He chews on his lower lip lightly for a moment to dispel the expression, assessing it as inappropriate. His body language morphs to pensive for a moment, then he shakes his head lightly. "Let's get back to the main path," he comments, tone encouraging. "Let's discuss gym leader predisposition to getting photographed on the way east?" he appends, tone suggesting an attempt at light-heartedness. At least he's not pushing her away - and apparently one of her stated alternatives is being morphed from 'hide in a tree' to 'hide in [[place:Nahla City|Nahla]] or [[place:Nightclaw]]'. That was potentially more comfortable than the original variant, at least.
Did she want to continue east? East was unknown, but it was out of these mists and they'd been heading that way before they got lost and on the way back she was taking a really big ball of string. Roman clearly lacked her doubts and seemed happy to trot after Rhaptor as a person who knew what they were doing.
"That sounds... that sounds good," she managed through embarrassment at pouring all that out at someone who was barely more than an acquaintance and promptly feeling guilty for disrupting his own travels. "I can find something to do around Nahla once out of here, I don't want to stop you doing whatever jobs you do for the gym leaders."
A near-forgotten part of Rhaptor unreflectedly suggests to comment, 'that sounds great' - but he's better armed for conversations these days, and he's managed to decode the purpose of her statement. "You're not a bother," Rhaptor remarks, quite casually now that the two initial sources of tension have comfortably cancelled out. If she could rant about her parents, she wasn't hurt or about to fall over from exhaustion, after all, and being lost meant the focus of getting back on track could help her calm down. It'd work out somehow. "Come on," he prompts, beginning to weave through the ruins, retracing his path, occasionally glancing at Iris to see if the Venomoth was objecting to any part of his route taken. So far, none of that. "Do you want to talk about why your parents are being twits?" he asks, conversationally but encouragingly as he leads her through the broken landscape.
Riding atop an Arcanine while he was on foot made her self-conscious. But even if Roman had quenched his fire he showed no interest in allowing her to dismount. "Let me down, you overgrown mop," Elena grumbled as she tried to swing a leg over or slide backwards over his rump and was stopped each time by a brief shake that made her clutch automatically at her pokémon's fur. Stupid body stopping her from falling when falling meant she'd be off and that was what she was aiming for. Of course if she //did// Roman would probably try grabbing the back of her jacket in his teeth and carrying her like a disobedient kitten and that was worse.
For one thing it would damage her jacket, and she //liked// this jacket. It would also be embarrassing but Rhaptor had already heard about the Weedle Incident so it was silly to worry about that.
"They're... being wilfully ignorant, claiming they don't understand how I could be in there talking to Cecile about the circuit when she'd just had trainers come through and obviously prepared and not even think of challenging her," admitted Elena. "I have to believe they're being wilfully dense because how ELSE could they not realise that I don't want to. If I wanted to I'd have borrowed Cern - dad's Rhydon - and maybe [[pokémon:Kurama]] and tried ages ago! But they act like I'm missing out on something if I don't and I don't understand why they don't just go and do it themselves if they want another box of badges on the mantle." It was so frustrating!
And then there's that subject again. Rhaptor resists the urge to close his eyes as he walks to better be alone with the sort of thoughts it prompts - he'd trip and make a fool of himself, after all, in this moist tangle of rocks and plants. Instead, he slides his arms behind his back for a moment, watching Iris briefly settle back down on what looks like the rock he'd rested on, attracting his attention to that landmark. If his hands weren't tied, he'd say, 'You might want to discourage your parents from doing anything of the sort; Sehto is a little different than the other regions,' but of course that was hazardous, if not necessarily a direct violation of terms. While its legality was debatable, even if it was ruled in his favour, the resulting conversation could only go south.
"Don't mistake this as criticism, since I assure you I speak out of mere curiosity," Rhaptor begins. "But... why don't you? Familial or peer pressure are powerful forces, after all..." - even the purely imagined sort, as he could attest - "...and it's a shame when people to succumb to them, but they nonetheless commonly do." His left arm unwinds from behind his back, dipping down to scoop up his bag, slinging it across its shoulder in a singular, almost absent-minded motion, and then they're back on the main path - not that it's easy for her to tell, and Rhaptor simply knows it from raw experience.
"Because I'm squeamish. Contests of skill and playful wrestling and that sort of thing is fine but I don't like it when people get seriously hurt," Elena confessed. "And I know that it is supposedly different for pokémon and that tamed ones that have those urges still need a solid workout now and then but I'm always scared they'll get hurt beyond my ability to fix."
Roman did let her down now, less because she was demanding it and more so he could nuzzle her hair affectionately. One hand remained buried in his ruff as she began walking beside Rhaptor. "I mean, I know pokémon need that outlet, but I try to provide it in other ways and letting them catch their own food sometimes, but then I feel guilty about how I might be hurting them by being squeamish and think my parents must be right but I still want to stop a battle as soon as someone whimpers." She ran a hand through her hair. "I dunno why, maybe I just inherited their stubbornness more than their battle drive."
The next inhale from Rhaptor doesn't quite want to stop after a natural amount of time has passed, lingering a little longer and becoming something of a statement in itself. Iris disaffectedly flutters onto the lumpy bag and perches on it, letting Rhaptor carry him. "That's... a rather dangerous misconception to have," Rhaptor comments, a certain sternly-flavoured nervousness inherent to his tone and demeanour, a restrained agitation. "...who told you pokémon need to battle? Because I assure you, they do not... however ill equipped to know how to protest they may be. They're very prone to loyalty, after all - and not very good at gauging what they need to do to gain favours." It's conversationally and matter-of-factly delivered despite the emotion it prompts - despite the pang of frantic adrenalin barbing at his gut.
"Dangerous misconception?" With her emotions already frazzled and close to the surface she bristled a touch at being told she was wrong, but she'd said a lot and Rhaptor wasn't clarifying which bit he objected to. It might be a bit she agreed was messed up. "And my parents, plus almost every other battling trainer I've met. Pokémon are adapted to fighting in the wild, and the lack of it in captivity results in self-destructive behaviour amongst certain pokémon because they lack the exercise and mental stimulation they need. Which is was the original point of the gym circuits, to provide an outlet in a controlled environment." The statement was delivered in the matter of fact way of one quoting lessons taught years ago and implicitly trusted.
Rhaptor's left hand fists itself into the grip it has on the strap of his bag and he glances into the landscape for a moment, curbing the urge to shout at her for parroting such nonsense. Shouting never solved anything. He presses his lips to a thin line, carefully thinking about his response to that, not bothered by the awkward silence that results. This is important and he can't just blow a gasket about the topic - it wouldn't serve her and it certainly wouldn't serve him, because if he spoke from emotion, he'd quickly enter 'I would know!' territory and anecdotes were the last thing he should be throwing into the ring if he valued his life. "So... let me get this straight: Your gut feeling tells you that you shouldn't battle with pokémon to the point where you stand up to your parents about it... but you don't go as far as to challenge what they've taught you about it?" he asks, managing a calm tone of voice by some act of miracle. "Pokémon may need work-out and outdoor activities, but I assure you, battling does not follow, and anyone who thinks so is not doing their pokémon a favour. And you very clearly don't really think so, and I promise you, Iris and I appreciate that, but don't toss what you feel about the matter into a ditch just because it contradicts what people've tried to indoctrinate you with."
Fingers brushed lightly over one of her pokéballs. "I know most of Sehto thinks battling is bad, but apparently most of Kanto thinks it is the best thing ever, so one or the other has to be wrong," she said in frustration. "And I really want it to be Kanto but I kept, well, I keep wondering if maybe it is true for some pokémon. Maybe some species, but if not then some individuals. But I just don't know. I've seen some pokémon that //really// enjoy battling and always seem happier after it and that makes it hard to turn around and tell my parents they must be completely wrong."
If she kept this up she was going to start crying again. As it was she felt torn two ways, wanting to alternately defend her parents because they were her parents and couldn't be completely wrong or trying to indoctrinate her while at same time she wanted to rage at them for being cruel and expecting her to be cruel too just because she had a clever stasis-prison to defend herself with.
"I just don't know what to do. Surely this would be easier if humans could talk pokémon," Elena lamented at last.
"This isn't 'most of Sehto' talking," Dakarai counters, with a tinge of bitterness and some alarm. "This is not a question of culture clashes," he adds, a bit agitatedly. "It's a question of facts. Pokémon feel pain just like you or I do, it doesn't magically disappear for them. If you've seen individual pokémon react to battling in a way that can't possibly be interpreted in a way other than that they're enjoying it, feel free to draw parallels to people who're into professional boxing - but you're not going to draw conclusions from those to the entire human race, either." A pause, and a heaved breath. "I'm sorry to be the bearer of uncomfortable truths and questioning something you've clearly grown up with, but as you can imagine by now, this sort of thing gets under my skin a little and I'm genuinely perturbed that in some families, this is still passed on from generation to generation."
A hasty retort about the gym leaders was bitten back. She was on his side, she didn't need to play devil's advocate. Besides, in her limited experience gym leaders did a lot more than battling. To the point that battling could be seen as an occasional unpleasant side task detracting from their usual duties.
"I wouldn't put it past mum to sign me up for boxing lessons if she thought it was for my own good," Elena said instead with a touch of bitterness. It was as close as she could come to outright condemning her parent's views, at least tonight whilst already scraped raw. "But I don't like fighting, only two thirds of my team like fighting, and I'd rather not have any of us forced into fighting. So. No collecting badges."
There are issues he could be taking with her reasoning, of course, but the lack of direct retort makes him think she might be coming around to understand the harmful indoctrination as what it is - as such, he leaves it uncontested, instead embracing the opportunity to simmer back down. "It's at least as challenging to collect gym leader photographs," he comments, instead, a bit tiredly, nonetheless offering a route back to the light-hearted conversation from earlier.
"See, the problem with stalking gym leaders is that they all have teams of pokémon that are good at battling even if they don't do it much. Kind of part of the job. And since I'm not a pokémon I don't think having them all set on the stalker with the camera would end well for me. Okay, even if I //was// one that's four to six on one and that still doesn't end well." Elena weakly jokes in return.
That wasn't even touching the fact the local police force answered to them. No, trying underhanded things on a gym leader seemed foolishness personified. It did make for amusing speculation though and that was handy right now.
In a similarly humoured fashion, finally returning back to being at ease, Rhaptor remarks: "They respond well to bribery." It's plainly tongue-in-cheek - it would be alarming if that statement were true, after all. Of course, cultural definitions of 'bribery' varied - some outside observers would consider the way pokégyms in Sehto were run pure bribery from the get-go. "Well... some of them," he remarks. "Nahla isn't going to be a very good example of that." A pause. "That being said... purely pragmatically speaking, I'm actually rather tempted to skip ahead to Nightclaw to intercept the travellers in case they're in a rush with the circuit - otherwise I'll just be tailing them from a distance, that's not very useful. What do you think? Where would you rather?"
That was right, he was meant to be meeting up with some trainers. Which seemed kind of odd given the conversation they'd just had, but it was clearly a gym leader assigned task and presumably they knew what they were doing or they wouldn't have gotten the job. Absently she wondered how one got appointed; did all the other leaders get together to nominate candidates and debate who was most suitable? She'd suggest the Elite Four did it except she'd never heard of them visiting Sehto and wasn't even sure if this island's gym circuit fed into the same League, even if it had to feed //somewhere//.
"I'd probably have to pass Nahla on the way home anyway. There's nothing stopping me from doing it then. I'm not getting badges so order doesn't matter, right?" Elena answered after some consideration.
"Oh, even if you were getting badges," Dakarai comments, not thinking much of it. "Just need seven at the last one, the others don't care." It wasn't a secret, but it wasn't exactly widely advertised, either.
She hummed. "I wonder how many people do it that way? Instead of trying everything in one go they just attempt to get a new badge each time life or work or something unrelated takes them to a new city. Although isn't the eighth gym really out of the way? I suppose if you've spent a few years casually collecting them it wouldn't be too weird to detour there on holiday and finish the set, though," Elena mused absently.
'That would be one hell of a ruined holiday,' a part of Rhaptor wanted to flippantly remark, but of course that was out of bounds. "Well, hopefully not many," he comments, casually. "Owing to that it's hopefully not a common practise in general - though from my experience, the rate is about... I'd say one and a half a year?" And if the 'one' wasn't in halves yet, that was only because [[place:Taqnateh]] hadn't had a chance to fix that yet.