#also pokemon being a real canon thing is crazy

[tues-dayy]

Some messy little Make Space for Family doodles I drew while listening to the episode! It's the first time I've listened to any Off Book episode and man, what an introduction

[alostlittleriverlotus]

i feel like I'm not even real cause of this. But like seeing people compare Koraidon/Miraidon in Pokemon having trauma and a mental block and joking they have depression is so weird to me.

Like I'm hyperfixated on this cause I feel like I'm living in a different reality. Like. The game describes it as Korai/Mirai having a mental block that keeps them from entering their fighting mode because of a bad experience. And that's depression??? Even as a joke what??? Mirai/Korai just won't enter their battle mode cause of an incident that happened so much so they will be trembling with fear when entering the area and again and won't come out of their pokeball. It left them injured and now they freeze up and don't want to enter their battle form. That's...not depression. Just because someone has some mental issue in media isn't automatically depression. Am I being too autistic about this and being precise about specific language surrounding a joke? Genuinely don't know if it should be bothering me this much but it does.

It also just frustrates me cause I see depression and anxiety used in a way that overlooks more psychotic and trauma based disorders a lot. It's not always someone with depression or anxiety that does it, it's neurotypicals a lot of the time though it still happens within the community too.

I'm not super confident on this and I just. This is something that bothers me a lot with characters/media being instantly turned to depression just cause it's not neurotypical even if it's not even depression symptoms??? Like a little sad and suddenly it's depression??? Even when it's not chronic or anything???

Again, this makes me feel crazy and have like a loss of touch with reality so I'm not super certain in this, but I run into these experiences a lot which is why i often avoid fandoms and stuff surrounding my comfort characters or any relatable character. Cause I know what I see as a personality disorder or ptsd will be labelled as depression and they'll call it a day. But it also bothers me how that creates an idea of depression that isn't depression. And anxiety too, but since the joke called it depression, in sticking to that.

But like Mirai/Korai aren't depressed. They're having fear reactions to things that are reminiscent of their trauma like their battle form. That's more akin to anxiety.

I just. I don't get it. I don't effing get it. And I've seen it in far more ableist ways before, this was just a joke that has bothered me. I guess since I have seen ableism surrounding depression/anxiety being separated from more psychotic and trauma based disorders and it being used to overshadow personality disorders like how a character is relatable with depression, but if you mention they're BPD/NPD coded, you'll be told you're just projecting and wrong and it's not canon so we shouldn't assume things even tho most BPD and especially NPD representation is super ableist.

Maybe I just see it a lot so I'm "salty" and defensive. But I hate how the awareness surrounding depression/anxiety/mental health has turned into this corny thing focused entirely around them as if they're the only disorders and also creates this simplified image of the disorders which also ignores the real hardships of them. Like how the "easier" symptoms are accepted, but people are crap to those that can't manage their anxiety or struggle to get out of bed or shower cause of depression. But am I the only one encountering this? Cause this kinda stuff makes me delusional AF and feel like I'm the only one seeing it and makes me really out of touch with if I'm right or wrong in my response and my emotions.

It also reminds me of when characters are neurodivergent, but if you try to say they're coded or headcanoned as that, then you get told it's not canon so we can't say that, there's no likeness, and there's no way they could be it. I see that particularly with autism headcanons/autism coding. Where people will list characters they see as autistic coded especially since bad rep is still common and they get told the characters aren't autistic at all and they're making autism some trendy thing too. I dunno, this is why I stay away from fandoms when it comes to comfort characters I see as coded with a disorder or I headcanon that way to cope with my stuff.

But I'm def a bit salty since I'll get thrown under the bus for NPD and ASPD and other psychotic disorders seeing what little rep we get taken and written over as depression regardless of whether the character gets depressed or experiences symptoms does make me salty, even if it's a joke. Like the game even outright calls Mirai/Korai's issue psychological trauma. If anything, joke that it's anxiety since they experience anxiety/anxious feelings when being confronted with their triggers which fear responses happen with PTSD or other trauma disorders. I feel so weird for getting upset as a joke and I'm probably being too precise/particular over the wording of it, but man, it just bothers me and reminds me of all of this stuff.

Ultimately the joke isn't a big deal, but I just wanted to especially bring up these thoughts I've been having and the things I've noticed with how depression and anxiety are treated like this, used to overlook other stuff but also being simplified into any kind of negative thing experienced is automatically "oh no they have depression/anxiety lol." Reminds me of the "so ocd" stuff with perfectionism and neatness in a way too with the wording.

Late Edit: Found out this has some roots in the capitalist thing with mental health/illness where we will gladly speak about depression/anxiety especially in a way to sell a product, but still be super ableist to actual peeps with anxiety and depression. This isn't strictly about it, but I've been thinking over why it feels this way. And again, this isn't typically at any depression/anxiety folks (tho they can have internalized ableism too like BPD folks turning on NPD and ASPD over on tiktok), but typically the sort of way it's commodified and normalized to something beyond disorders where even basic emotions get turned into anxiety/depression. Basically forgetting, hey, these are legitimate disorders. And I think that's what I was getting at and that's more of the root of it + the ableism within the mental health community against personality disorders. Like most people either don't know PDs exist, will defend using outdated ableist terms, or won't even know what kind of discrimination we face. So for those reasons I'm a bit more defensive.

[goldenleafshipping]

Ayoo, Leaf being Gio's kid in canon always held some merit because of that FRLG Scientist on the Sevii Islands that mistook the player character for his son. Since that's Leaf's first game and the Sevii Islands weren't in RGB might as well give it to her more ;) Lmao, that fully knowing everything but refusing to admit it is such a Leaf mood for me too. Also LMAO Lance sweeped at age 9 that's crazy, I think I made her a trainer that young too when I was a kid but then changed it XD its so funny tho like I need to see this Intrigued by this gameshow prospect.

Anon you're so real thank you for enabling me on Leaf as Gio's daughter 😭

And tbh her age durinf the Lance Sweep has gone back and forth a lot in my head but I somehow always land back at her being really young because it's just a funny image in my heart.....

in my head The Gameshow is the type of thing youd watch in like the waiting room at the dentist and get so into it, bur then you go home and it's boring asf!! in my head it's some kind of tournament where people who are crazy locked in to pokemon battling and have all kinds of crazy strategies go up against beginners (hence why leaf was hired to be the host. get it. ha ha.) and the episode would focus around them building their teams and explaininf what they're gonna do, and it ends in a battle with a cash prize for the winner.

itll inevitably get cancelled tho, bc leaf isn't the best host, and nobody eants to see the episodes where the beginner gets destroyed. that just makes u feel bad 😭

[artbyblastweave]

BLASTWEAVE what does steven universe have in common with watchmen?

Both Steven Universe and Watchmen are groundbreaking entries in their respective genres that demonstrate a deep understanding of the appeal of the genre they’re working in, and engage with their ideas on a previously unheard-of level for the medium. That breaks ground and clears the way for what other works in the genre can get away with. 

Steven Universe showed that, well, first of all that you can make a cartoon that’s fundamentally ideologically queer beyond a few side characters, but also that you can have an emotionally intelligent and mature children's cartoon where the character nuance and depth and development are all taken very seriously. Watchmen showed that you could write serious and interesting narratives about superheroes if you were willing to roll with the crazy. (Neither of them was the first to do the things I’m ascribing to them, but I do think that they’re what made it stick for their respective fields.)

In doing so, though, both works create/created a catch 22 for all future works in their genre. Part of what made both of them so good is that they were willing to critically unpack and air out the ugly implications of their format that usually get chalked up to suspension of disbelief, and now that that’s out in the open it becomes very difficult not to think about how any other given work is or isn’t addressing those issues- even if they aren’t equipped to address those issues in the scope of the story they’re trying to tell. Watchmen asked questions about who sanctions superheroes, what qualifies you to do that work, where the line is between heroism and fascism or if there even is one, whether the agency to act means you have a right or a duty to act, whether anyone who seriously bought into the superhero thing could possibly be doing it for good reasons, and, if they somehow were, how long you can care with the intensity necessary to be an effective hero without suffering burnout (not long.) I literally can’t think of a single superhero thing worth reading that isn’t in some way in conversation with Watchmen - you now kind of have to answer those questions, explicitly or implicitly, even if your books thesis is “Alan Moore sucks eggs and being a superhero is very sustainable and fantastic.” If you just leave the question of whether your superheroes are justified completely unaddressed, there’s an uncomfortable discordance there, because we’ve seen the extreme end of that sliding scale in the form of the Comedian and if the narrative doesn’t engage with what makes the protagonist not Edward Blake, it can feel worrisome. If they try and then botch it it can feel alarming.

Steven Universe has a similar thing going on, at least for me. It’s the only unironic, non-parodic children’s series that’s really, seriously unpacked how fucked up and traumatic it would be to grow up as the archetypical All-loving Spirited Saturday Morning Cartoon Protagonist, how warped and dysfunctional a household that enabled that lifestyle could be at its worst, and what the future looks like when your whole childhood was centered on a now-ended conflict. ( a lot of cartoons flirt with that last one but don’t commit.) I’ve seen jokes and intended-as-cracky fan theories about this for years, surrounding lots of other cartoons (Ben 10, Pokemon, Powerpuff Girls) but almost never with the assumption that the creators are on the same page as them. I’ve seen stories that are post-modern reimaginings using the same general archetypes or whatever (Venture Brothers) but that’s not this! SU told an entertaining story earnestly, and then engaged with the emotional fallout of the story it told, with an unheard-of breadth and depth. A whole season of unpacking! No other show has ever been allowed to sink that much effort into closure. That’s usually what Fanfic is for.

I think it’s great, and that shows like Infinity Train and The Owl House are able to go as hard as they do largely because of Steven Universe’s precedent- but no matter how good a cartoon is, I can’t watch them without having this voice in the back of my head going “Oh, these children are going to grow up to be broken wrecks, bar an extensive and harsh healing process that kinda hurts to watch, huh.”

The issue is that not every cartoon can be Steven Universe, where the project was to thoughtfully and sensitively unpack this stuff. It’s a fair bet that we’ll probably never see a show with that exact project again (not least because of the loss of novelty value.) You’ve got your own stories you wanna tell that’ll run their own course, mostly aimed at children, there objectively isn’t narrative or financial room for most stories to unpack these assumptions if that wasn’t the goal going in. For example, Gravity Falls had pretty tight storytelling and a narrative that absolutely had room for a post-script "where-do-we-go-from-here” plot- it sped-run the “oh no, childhood’s ending” thing- and it’s pretty telling that the aftermath, healing process, interpersonal relationships and so forth are one of the things that that fandom heavily fixates on. The narrative had such a clean ending that it made people go looking for the mess. That’s not bad! It’s how most storytelling works! But now I look at any cartoon with kid heroes that’s meant to be taken even marginally seriously and go, Oh. Win the battle, lose the war. Then I feel sad. The contrast, of course, is that most superhero works actually can be, and in fact benefit from trying to be like Watchmen, because all the questions Watchmen raises about the ethics of power are also just.... like.... the most interesting storytelling hooks if you want to write a cape thing with real themes. They’re the kind of stories we’d have gotten years prior naturally if not for the CCA boondoggle. Admittedly it kinda creates a different problem where most “good” cape media is inescapably self-referential and draws on picking apart the conventions of a 60-70-year old canon that hasn’t been in wide circulation in years. But! I also think there’s a stronger obligation there to keep superhero fans in check- if your superhero thing isn’t making the reader question the ethics of violence and individual heroism in the face of systemic injustice, you wind up with people who unironically think Frank Castle is a role model to be emulated. We all know that guy. Children’s media doesn’t really produce that guy the same way, although it can draw them in from other corners. Superhero media often needs to be self-critical in a way children’s cartoons don’t always have to be.

[draftingteacups]

lol hi how about some Idia x Soni? i feel like they would fit the trope of anonymous penpals to friends to lovers, fake dating turning into real dating and just idia pining for soni in general

Oh dang, this is something I honestly hadn't thought of, mostly because of how little I knew about Idia. Idk how to maneuver the whole anonymous pen pal thing, given that her Rotom Phone would just delete sketchy mail on sight and is super high-tech compared to normal Rotom Phones because Champions are highly targeted and are thus spammed loads of crap.

Note: This is a What-If situation, thus is not canon to the fic and written for fun. I struggled writing this tbh 😅 It's less romantic and more platonic/mutual respect for one another, especially because of Chapter 6

Soni and Idia: People Who Deal With Troublemakers Club (Platonic)

Idia would know about Soni from afar. As in, the safety of his room where she can't curb stomp him into the ground. It's super hard for him to talk to people normally. What more for the only girl in school who's got magical beasts and is pretty damn scary?

He's intrigued by the Pokemon. He's a fool if he doesn't think some of them aren't cool, but he's not going to piss them off because of it like some of the other students.

Well, that lasts until Chapter 6 when all hell breaks loose.

Idia, who has heard of the scariest shit from the others as they scream at him, is just terrified when she shows up to STYX, fully ready to beat the shit out of him for all the reasons. Also, Epel and Rook are at her side, being like, "Please don't destroy them. We come in peace."

She's just staring at them all menacingly alkdfjljjs

There's also a part of him that finds the whole thing similar to a badass character showing up at the right time in a movie or TV show, but he's just bluescreening hard because of PANIC WHY IS SHE HERE HOW DID SHE FIND THIS PLACE.

Just seeing her in Pomefiore clothes and looking like she might bitchslap him into Tartarus is his worst nightmare: a mixture of angry righteousness and wearing the clothes of the school's beauty-focused dorm.

Because Soni is literally stomping her way through STYX to pick up her cat monster child (and also picking up the troublesome NRC problem children ig), Idia's like, "Okay, I'll let you in, but she can't be in the same room as me because I'm afraid she might actually kill me with her bare hands."

No one disagrees, given the property damage that she's inflicted on the CHARON robots. How does this happen? Rotom's pissed off and ready to cause chaos. Hacking powers activate.

She's put in a separate room and Idia senses her displeasure like legit chills down his spine.

Skipping past all the Chapter 6 things because I don't want to spoil anyone, Idia gains respect for Soni, having to be the way that she is and for dealing with the gaggle of Dorm Heads all the time.

She is still very unhappy about the destruction of her dorm because of all the time and effort she put into restoring it, so she's pretty miffed still. Although, they just get along better because of the distance and mutually agree to say, "They're all crazy, and I feel like we're the only sane ones of the bunch (most of the time)."

[geges]

I hope this isn't too rude or assuming, but I also wanted to know, if u had any favorite moments in any media u've liked that you're okay with sharing? (just asking since this also appears to be a fandom(??) / anime(??) blog and if u're ok with answering something really offtopic)

ANON I’M IN LOVE WITH YOU…. I WOULD LOVE TO INFODUMP ABT MY INTERESTS. PLS. sadly yes i’m mostly a fandom/interests blog, mostly cnovels and manhua, so this ask is pretty on-topic for my blog. obligatory disclaimer a lot of these things have Problems and Issues so this isn’t me saying i am an uncritical fan of the media this is just a list of scenes that make me incredibly hhghgnnneennn. some of them made me cry in the chicken feed aisle in a Tractor’s Supply once and im still upset abt that one. a lot of these have spoilers for various cnovels so i put it under a cut :)

additional warning that um. there's a lot of mentioned death/suicide. most of these are characters dying honestly

so, Media Of All Time favourite scenes:

(tgcf) legitimately every scene with qi rong im not joking i go crazy over him. notable mention of that scene in the Final Battle with gu zi……….. i’m insane

(liu yao) um. i don’t remember the main character’s name. but yeah him dying <3 jiayou! that one drives me insane i read it like once a week

(nan chan) mr human magikarp fucking dying and jin ling just….. losing it

(nan chan) jin ling’s subsequent imprisonment and isolation :)

(nan chan) JIN LING MURDER SPREE!!!!!!!

(huang jin tai) yan xiaohan getting drugged and immediately going to stab himself so that he doesn’t “betray” fu shen

(qian qiu) yan wushi hiding shen qiao in that buddha statue and running off to die

(teio) THE FUCKING EARTHWORM CRYING. GOD

(teio) everything with bai ruoyao. i love him im so homophobic

(mo du) fei du suffering for five entire books straight

(mo du) that scene near the end where he has to grasp the trigger handhold and his Immense Certified Trauma kicks in

(mo du) luo wenzhou NOT pokemon evolving into a big red flag the second he got one glimpse past fei du’s walls. Like that man saw Fei Du: Genuinely Unwell Extraordinaire, and not only did he not jab fd with a horse tranq, he just went and made the man dinner. what the fuck

(twwtadsl) the betrayal scene <3

(tsomd) sui zhou almost dying for tang fan like 2302984 times but notable mention of the First Time when he tried to die for tang fan in the fight against the tomb guardian

(missing sect leader) wei jiangyue going “I JUST CANT STAND IT WHEN HE’S NOT ALRIGHT……………..”

(missing sect leader) wei jiangyue making a bet with ye you that hinges the fate of the world or whatever and his terms for if he wins. instead of using the chance to ask for something large. he asks yy to just tell him something. anything at all. just tell him something

(missing sect leader) wei jiangyue telling ye you he will die for him to repent for his father’s mistake but hiding the fact that his willingness to die for yy comes from his love for him, not his guilt

(missing sect leader) that scene where yy reveals his identity and wjy realises that no matter what he has to leave yy alone and cannot even approach him again. and just sinking in shame and regret to spend his entire lifetime in pain from the fact that his presence causes yy pain

(missing sect leader) in front of the entire jianghu. wei jiangyue giving himself up to the threat of being brutally killed be ye you if it meant yy was given some sort of closure. jesus christ i don’t even like this book this much and yy/wjy isn’t even canon why do they have so much on this list

(tong qian kan shi) the insect cave scene <3

(tqks) xuanmin closing his eyes as he is put through incredible pain and torture, being literally killed, in order for xue xian to enact his revenge against the great priest

(tqks) the great priest forcing xx to recognize that his revenge will also kill xuanmin as collateral, xx not recognising xuanmin, and xuanmin just. closing his eyes and accepting his death

(tqks) xuanmin using his last dying action to dig out his own bones and bury them under the mountains to free xue xian.

(tqks) xuanmin making his way over to the unconscious xue xian, kneeling in front of him (really falling lmao), and dying while never looking away from his face :)

(tqks) xx regaining his memories, remembering xuanmin, and looking up to see xuanmin laying dead in his arms. then feeling fear for the first time in his life. man. man. ok

(qqgk) “MY DEAR, IF I LEFT MYSELF BY YOUR EAR, WOULD YOU BE ABLE TO HEAR ME? MAY WE MEET AGAIN IN A WORLD WHERE THE SMOKE IS GONE” THIS QUOTE MAKES ME INSANE. IM INSANE. JESUS CHRIST

(qqgk) the recurring imagery of snow. the snow. its about. it’s about. The devotion. oh god

(hsav) xiao yuan trying to die like. 6 times for yan heqing. also xya being tortured to save yhq. and then him trying to kill himself earlier . and then him killing himself for real later to make life easier for yhq

(tgcf) just. everything honestly. the “i am god” scene. the getting demolished by a ridiculous amount of swords scene.

(wushuang) cui buqu in the maze trying to die for feng xiao

(wushuang) feng xiao in the maze trying to die for cui buqu

(zhongji lanyin) su qing almost dying under the cave-in

(zhongji lanyin) hu bugui protecting su qing from the thorns

(谁动了我的骨灰坛) jiang xichu seeing chen man kill herself and not being able to do anything about it. literally the only scene i care abt from that book i ate that shit up

okay typing this out made me realise there is a very noticeable theme here. well. i really like tragedy so honestly i don't know know what i expected from this. if i re-read all my favourite books i would probably be able to give you a list of scenes i loved that have legitimate literary importance, value, and beauty, but sadly i have the memory of a goldfish and cannot remember most plots unless im Actively Looking At Them. so instead here is a list of scenes that are all candidates for making me cry during my next visit to a Tractor's Supply. thank you sm for the ask im in love with you

[still-a-morosexual-help]

OBEY ME! LESSON 46 DETAILED SUMMARY + THEORIES

This lesson’s got two locked chapters that I can’t unlock :’)

D takes them to the casino where they meet Mammon in the Lamp event outfit. When he laughs and tells them that they must have forgotten who he is if they think they can take the money MC ignores all of this to ask him wtf he’s wearing. Mammon blushes and tells them that they have no right to criticize what he’s wearing considering what they’re wearing. Then he says also Lucifer wtf happened to you!? He laughs and teases Lucifer about getting shrunk and how he could accidentally step on him and kill him rn or how Beel might eat him as a snack. I saw someone say that Mammon was a little shit who was also BabyTM and like Yess!??? I love when we get to see more of the asshole side of him specially when we already know how soft he is. Man’s an onion :’) Beel says he wouldn’t do that unless Lucifer hid inside a piece of cake and Beel swallowed him whole without realising. Lucifer, off screen: “You’d better realise I was there!” And Like??? That’s the point Lucifer wants to argue? Not the fact that he wouldn’t hide inside a cake? Mammon says whatever and that he’ll take Lucifer from them so he can have fun with his new toy anyway RIP to Mammon who dies after this lesson. “Mammon, Avatar of Greed, Appears”- gonna have Pokemon Battles from now on, I can’t believe this what this dating sim has evolved into :D Mammon uses wind to lift Lucifer up and bring him towards him. MC has a flashback to the previous night and commands Beel who transforms into a demon and whose body starts moving on its own, Beel then cancels out Mammon’s spell and uses a wind spell to send Mammon flying. Beel transforms back to his human form and is shocked by what happened. Solomon says MC did a good job commanding Beel though they weren’t able to draw out all his powers. They get the armour, which Beel thinks is too flashy but MC tells him it looks great which he is happy about. D tells them about a rumour of Satan attacking a town up north.

As they walk through the woods Lucifer talks about how much he’s gonna love beating the shit outta Mammon when he’s back to normal and waves MC off when they ask him to go easy on Mammon. Beel says that Lucifer used to be a lot nicer to Mammon in the celestial realm and how the two of them would team up to go argue with Raphael. Solomon asks if it was Diavolo who got Lucifer to change and what exactly Lucifer had to do to reach the status they now enjoy in the Devildom. Beel seems shocked at this and ask Lucifer if it’s true. He says he doesn’t remember. There’s growling & they’re suddenly surrounded by ghosts. Solomon: Oh yeah lol this is called the Black Phantom Forest. Everyone else: WHY the FUCK didn’t you say so before!? They run from the ghosts and set up camp beside a lake, MC & Beel talk. Beel says how they’ve all changed from their time in the Celestial Realm and he can’t remember when he stopped resisting the urge to constantly eat. But how somethings are still the same and how the brothers have always been together and how they always will be. He brings up the three things the butcher said to maintain a long relationship and how even though they may sometimes falter at the “respect each other” part when it comes down to it the brothers have all three things with each other (Not me sobbing like a baby. It’s the found family trope for me guys). Beel says how he doesn’t know if he’ll be able to fight Belphie if they meet him in the game and how he has so many people who he loves that he doesn’t know who to put first and that he knows many people would kill to have that kinda problem and that as both an angel and a demon he’s being lucky to have the people he loves. MC gets to hold his hand, lean on his shoulder or say nothing and guys I love Beel so much he’s just so pure god. Okay so theory part: I 100% believe (& it’s implied in canon and in the chats too) and the main reason Lucifer is so mean to Mammon now is because he’s scared if he doesn’t discipline him then Diavolo will and he’ll end up with another Lilith situation. That being said I NEED to know how Lucifer came across Mammon in the celestial realm and what he said to make Mammon so loyal to him. PLS om! Give me the boys backstory? I like to think Lucifer raised Mammon the same way Simeon is raising Luke and that’s why you can see some of Lucifer’s traits in Mammon whenever he becomes serious about something and why Mammon sometimes slips up and calls Lucifer “Dad” and why Lucifer becomes so happy about it. I also think the others would have been older than Mammon was when he first met Lucifer, when they eventually joined the family which is why they share far less traits with Lucifer and why (as far as we know) none of them have called Lucifer ‘dad”. If this is true it also brings up a real interesting dynamic between Satan and Mammon that would be useful when writing fics. You know a little deeply buried resentment and envy about Lucifer having been more of a father figure to Mammon than to the person who is technically his actual son, and since we know for a fact that right after arriving in the Devildom Lucifer starts going through an existential crisis and Mammon’s the one who steps up to look after the others I 100% believe Mammon’s the one who did most of the work in raising a newly created Satan and who taught him how to control his anger so well (cause lets be real it definitely couldn’t be any of the others) which also gives backstory to Satan’s “do you think Mammon’s actually the most decent of us” homescreen comment and more importantly adds spice to the relationship dynamic you can work with in fics.

When they wake up Beel is thankful that they didn’t get eaten. Solomon: not like you would have noticed with all the fun you had *wink wink* Lucifer: wtf Solomon:*WINK WINK* Me: bro they were just talking…  they find out game time and real world time pass differently and come across a treasure chest in the middle of their path. Solomon: Lets open it! :D Lucifer: Expect that’s definitely a trap… Solomon: Exactly! Which is why we should open it! :D MC: Lets open it! :D Lucifer: Why is the entire human species so fucking stupid!? Why were you created without any self preservation!? Who approved this!?  They find medicine, a warding bottle and cat ears. …They put Lucifer into the bottle and Lucifer’s really going through it in this huh. But opening the chest pulls up an inescapable battle with the final boss, and Satan pops up fully immersed in the villain role with an evil laugh and everything. Luci asks MC to use something from the chest and they use the cat ears and Lucifer’s disappointed when they actually work. But it only deals 222 damage to Satan’s 870k HP. Satan paralyses them all and steals bottled lucifer and calls Belphie to finish the others off. I can’t remember if I mentioned this before but how did the brothers know that Lucifer was gonna be mini before they even got home, it would’ve had to be quite a bit in advance for them to so perfectly set up everything… And you know Solomon was really determined to open that chest (I mean so was MC but the whole of season 1 was establishing that their curiosity was gonna get them killed) so…

MC tells Belphie they don’t want to fight him and Belphie says he doesn’t want to fight either but at the same time Satan agreed to give him mine lucifer for a whole day if he defeats them. Beel’s still reluctant and Belphie says Beel doesn’t have to worry cause Belphie isn’t the same small/weak person that Beel always had to protect (and holy shit I need more info on this too?). Beel eventually agrees and says that Belphie’s strong, he tells MC that they weren’t able to use his entire power against Mammon cause he was holding himself back unconsciously but that he was ready now. MC makes Beel do a bunch of wind attacks and they defeat Belphie who’s impressed. Beel says that the magic was actually MC doing it not him (even though he was the one that executed it). Belphie says he’ll join their party if MC promises him that he’ll be allowed to poke at mini luci. MC tells him there’s a damned line and he’ll have to wait his turn. Solomon wonders if MC should be going around giving the right to annoy lucifer to others but also he wants that right too. Even though Lucifer was kidnapped since he’s still in the bottle he’ll be protected so MC’s test is still ongoing. Odd that there was a bottle that would protect Lucifer should he get kidnapped in the chest that was a trap… look we all know Solomon is shady enough that he’s probably behind this right?

During dinner at a tavern the twins are sickeningly soft with each other and Solomon watches them with a smile. For the night the twins end up sharing a room with each other, with Mc and Solomon alone together. In the middle of the night MC wakes up to Solomon still up and looking sad. They ask him what’s up. He says despite how much they walked he still isn’t tired and that seeing the twins together made him lonely. Seeing how much they love and care and understand each other and how they were always together made him wish he had something similar but how when you didn’t age it was difficult to from lasting bonds like that in the human world. MC tells him that all of them care about him and he says he hopes so. Solomon: Lol just the two of us in a room in a game, wouldn’t it be crazy if we made out? MC can either kiss him or kinda stare awkwardly. If they choose the second he apologises for suddenly putting them on the spot and says he won’t try anything else. So this might be kinda an unpopular opinion and I’m genuinely really happy that the side characters are getting more screen time and development because I desperately needed that but I’m not really onboard the romancing option with them? I’m happy they’ve got their own cards now and I love the devilgram stories and romance options in them but I don’t think it makes sense in the context of the main storyline? Barbatos has almost no interaction with MC and though they haven’t shown it yet it’d be weird if he was suddenly into MC. Diavolo spent 2 whole seasons simping over Lucifer why is MC suddenly an option? Besides Diavolo always seems so lonely and I really want him and MC to be really good friends, I want Diavolo to have a friendship where there isn’t some condition that hangs over it like there is with his relationship with Barbatos and Lucifer. The same goes with Solomon. I just want him to have a good solid friendship where there isn’t expectations or power between them. He also initially only seems interested in MC for their power and as a way to train them and eventually genuinely softens up to them, Just the request to kiss seemed outta nowhere? I don’t know why but with Simeon he seems above crushes? I always imagine him seeing MC as another cute kid Lucifer picked up (despite MC being an adult) and having a sort of soft indulgent attitude towards them. I don’t know I think I just want MC to have some friends who aren’t trying to sleep with them.

Solomon is extremely chipper the next morning and Belphie grumpily makes a comment about him having fun and sdfjdvnsjdokd they just talked. Belphie uses his magic to teleport them to Satan’s castle and Beel asked why he couldn’t do that the previous night, Belphie says grumpily cause then Solomon would have missed out on the fun and Solomon agrees and THEY JUST TALKED!? Satan has managed to transform Lucifer into wolf Lucifer and is shaking his bottle hard enough to make Luci wanna puke while Lucifer asks him to stop. MC tells satan to stop and he tells them they won’t be able to defeat him cause they skipped right to the boss battle without taking the long route and levelling up. MC says they’re not gonna fight him cause this whole thing is fucking stupid. Satan says it’s not cause he’s having fun. MC gives him one of their free therapy sessions about how important the bonds between he and his brothers are and how they don’t care more about helping the brothers all get along than some stupid star. Beel comes out spitting facts, saying they all know that Satan actually cares about Lucifer and how that embarrasses him and how he needs to stop hiding it by lashing out. And how Lucifer needs to get his shit together and be honest with satan. That he needs to tell Satan that Lucifer knows he’s his own demon and a really good demon at that. Lucifer says FYI but I never said you weren’t your own great person and Satan blushes and says that unless he wants to look childish he has no option but to accept the olive branch. He tosses Luci to MC. Belphie complains about having stupid older brothers and Solomon says he’s disappointed in Satan and reveals himself as the true secret final boss and FUCK YEAH! I CALLED THAT SHIT! Kinda – I thought he might have just given them a heads up about Luci’s condition. On a different note, Satan needs serious therapy. They all do tbh.

Solomon congratulates MC on what they’ve done so far but says they still haven’t accessed Beel’s full potential and that he’ll give his ‘adorable apprentice’ one more shit at it. Solomon summons Asmo who complains about how long he was made to wait and how he nearly gave up and went to the spa and that no one likes a selfish man. Solomon tells Asmo that he can tell him all this after they get back to the real world and I genuinely want the backstory of how they met and just more about their relationship. At Solomon’s command Asmo uses charm and paralyses Beel and at MC’s Beel uses another wind attack. Asmo says he’s never seen beel do something of this calibre before and he seems more powerful, even more than he was in the celestial realm, Asmo yells at Solomon for just standing and seeming impressed instead of helping him. There’s a bright white light.

Back home with everything back to normal Beel, Lucifer and MC are hanging out by the pool. Lucifer is in an unexpectedly good mood and MC has earned a star, which glows slightly from its place on the symbol etched to the back of their hand. Inside Solomon is feeding the other brothers as punishment. Mammon is sobbing his heart out and Levi is out cold (possibly dead). Satan is given Levi’s remaining share of food and Asmo is in tears. Belphie had made a run for it the second they got home and is nowhere to be found. Solomon talks about how nice Lucifer actually is and how he really loves his brothers cause he just made Solomon make them dinner instead of punishing any of them…. Love that the canonical reason why none of these demons tell Solomon about his food and allow themselves to get tortured is cause they don’t wanna be rude and hurt his feelings. And he thought no one cared about him. If that isn’t love I dunno what is. Beel and MC take a walk while Lucifer sits by the pool and in his words basks in “their screams of agony” While blushing beel says he’s grateful for what happened and how that star is proof that they got closer. Mc can either thank him or say that the star belongs to him. I think they kiss after the second option? For the first Beel says MC’s the one who did the work of drawing out his power. Over the echoing screams from inside Beel asks if they feel like they forgot something and ndfjkfjkdjfefjkn THEY FORGOT DIAVOLO I’M!!!!???? poor baby

[pokeexehasstoppedworking]

Love Doesn’t Do Encores Ch6 The Entrance Ceremony

(Notw: I am aware that Piers also appears in Pokemon Masters EX and Pokemon Masters will be canon also to the story line but not until after the Sword and Shield story line.)

You perhaps should've seen it coming when Hop's excitement was reignited when he heard Leon left him a present and you gladly handed over one of the bags to which he opened up in a hurry but looked utterly confused at all the healers and camping food until you explained the reasons why Leon got them all for him. Which he understood with a nod. And after a moment more of resting you decided to walk back with him towards the road, but the two of you ran into another familiar face in the form of Gloria. Or more like she almost ran into the two of you as she ran into the train station as you got up from your seat. Your sobble still sore over how many times he already fell from your shoulder and so resorted to gripping your shoulder sleeve harder.

"Geez Glory!," Hop commented raising a brow, "What's gotten you in such a hurry? I thought that was my thing."

"Sorry," she apologized leaning over to look around you and Hop at the station, "Did Leon leave yet? You said somethin' about stopping him so we could say good bye."

He again sighed and slouched a big bag in his hands. "Yeah he's gone back to whatever he was doing. I suppose I can't catch a train after all." ...He gave a small smile though. "But I guess I can't complain! He's the Champion! So of course he's gotta be like SUPER busy! We'll come face to face again soon enough!"

Gloria smiled back and nodded in agreement. "YEAH! Besides, maybe we'll see him at the Opening Ceremony tomorrow!"

You nodded at them. Although you knew he wouldn't be there as in game if the current events kept up, but you didn't want to break their hearts or anything so soon.

"Are you two endorsed trainers?," a man's voice asked from behind the three of you turned around to the man in the small store like stand in the train station. His smile widened as he nodded to his side where a stack of books was settled. "Would any of you three be interested in joining in our charity dex events?"

"Charity dex?," you asked obviously confused.

And the man nodded again gesturing to the two different book stacks one smaller than the other. "Yes! For just five dollars you can purchase one of two dex books and enter the dex challenges to win a variety of prizes! All proceeds goes towards the power crisis fund raiser."

There was that mention again about the power crisis. You wondered how dire it was exactly. Gloria seemed to take interest in it though and walked right up to the stand staring at the books. "....What's exactly the challenges?"

"Well there's the Poke-Dex challenge and the Curry-Dex challenge?" He explained holding up one of the small books, it had a picture of a plate of some kind of food etched into it. "The challenge is too take a picture of every labeled curry, or pokemon, on the pages and when your albums are fully completed, you turn in into your local pokemon center to claim your prizes! And there's no time limit. It's all for charity and you get a neat scrap book out of it. We already sold a few to some people on their way on the train. Would you be interested in joining one of the dex challenges?"

"I dunno. Sounds like a scam to me, Glor," Hop commented glancing at the books. "I always thought photography was Victor's gig. And we're already got the gym challenges ahead of us tomorrow.......Glory?"

Dexes?? As in completing the entire pokemon dex for this game?? Was this how it was manifesting in this game? You guessed so. It WOULD be weird if Gloria just discovered her pokedex had a limit of numbers in order to 'complete' it like a game's challenge. but a curry dex?? You faintly remembered there being some kind of food challenge in game but you couldn't remember it too well.

"I can't believe you wasted twenty dollars on two scrape books and camera film." Hop gave a small frown at the rolls of film and books Gloria was carrying along with the bag of goodies provided by Leon from earlier. "You don't even have a polaroid camera for all of that."

"No, but Victor does! I'm sure he won't mind if I take his old one." She waved him off. "Besides! It'll be fun and easy! Just fill up a whole book with pictures of pokemon and curries! How hard can it be?"

Hop's face deadpanned. "That's not exactly what I meant."

The three of you had left the train station not longer after that and had taken a small detour to the grocery store you were previously in that morning so Gloria could buy herself a decent amount of film rolls. It was crazy how many rolls of film you could cheaply buy in this world for a mere ten dollars, although you were sure Hop disagreed. So you decided to change the subject by asking the two a question.

"So," they both turned to you, "We're leaving for the Entrance Ceremony tomorrow morning right?"

"YEP! Bright and early! The morning train leaves at seven thirty sharp and we have to get our Dynamax bands from Professor Magnolia tomorrow! So we're gonna have to get up real extra early if we don't want to miss it. These train conductors are always on time, whether it's a good or bad thing. But those bands will be worth it to be able to dynamax and complete our Badge Circles!"

"I see. ...What's a badge circle??" You don't remember hearing anything like that from the game even when you played it way back when. "I don't think I know how these gyms and badges work."

They both gave you a confused look and for a moment you thought you goofed up before luckily Gloria unknowingly saved face for you when a look of realization came over her. "OH RIGHT!! You're not from this region so you wouldn't possibly know how the gyms work!" You thanked whatever god was listening for this great save as Gloria happily explained. "You see there's ten gyms each with their own gym leader unique to their own type of pokemon, but in order to compete in the finals at the end of the year you only need eight badges to complete your Badge Circle. A Badge Circle is like a puzzle but instead of carboard puzzle pieces you use badges to make it, then you present it to the official board who helps host the Gym Challenge. They're also the ones who's going to be checking to make sure your endorsements are legit at the Entrance Ceremony," she explained as you listened. Never knew when this info might come in handy later. "That's where four of the gyms are optional. While usually they give you they're own unique piece for the Badge Circle..Both Rock Type and Ice Type Gyms offer the same shaped badge. So does the Fighting and Dark Type Gyms. So usually you'd pick either one of the two choices, grab it, and then move on. Lots of people don't see the point of battling both gyms for the same piece as it's not required." She smirked before pointing a confident hand forward. "BUT NOT ME!! What's the point of me joining the Gym Challenge if I don't at least try out every gym at least once! We have a full year until the finals anyhow! That should be plenty of time for me to get what I need!!......Plus...m-maybe because I'm also kinda hoping to get some pictures and a few autographs. It's not everyday you get to see such famous people. Hehe."

You rolled your eyes with a smile. Just like a teen meeting a famous person but Hop sighed again. "I just don't see why you're going through all of this trouble. Won't it make more sense to just focus on one thing?"

"Hop you need to broaden your horizons a bit! It's gonna be our first times away from home! It's not just about the Gym Challenge!" She smiled widely at him. "It's about seeing new things! Meeting new people! Getting to see all kinds of new pokemon! It's...." Her smile dropped for a bit as she looked down. "It's actually a bit scary.....but I guess that's what's also making it so exciting." She smiled again. "Plus I know you're also doing the challenge so it's not like I'll be going into it alone right? Ill have my best bud going through it with me!"

Hop stared at her for a moment before clearing his throat and nodded looking away. "Y-Yeah! You're right. "

"See? Told you! It'll be fun! And I'll have Y/n as a traveling buddy anyways! So it should be fine."

You nodded in agreement as the three of you continued to walk back towards their homes, and both children mentioning the new pokemon they had been able to catch while out on their little adventure today.

"So how many pokemon did you guys catch?," you asked curiously.

And Gloria proudly answered, "NINE! And Hop caught five!"

You did a double take at the two. "Wait. You guys caught fourteen pokemon between the two of you in the few hours I was gone!?"

"Yeah! Hop's really lucky! He's got a shiny butterfree!"

Hop gave a sheepish smile and in a similar fashion to Leon raised a hand to rub the back of his head. "Well I guess I was just lucky to catch it off guard enough to catch it in the farmer's meadows."

Oh yeah. Weren't shiny pokemon a pokemon born with a rare color variety compared to most of their other kind? Wow. Well it sounded like the two of them certainly had a fun time out and about. "Wow. It sure sounds like you guys had a fun time." The three of you were coming up to the roads that split into to directions to both of the children's homes.

Gloria nodded again. "Hey! Hop! Come over to my house so I can practice my camera."

"What?," Hop's brow rose again, "Don't you mean Victor's camera?"

"Same difference! If I take pictures of all the pokemon we caught then it'll be good practice and give me a head start on the challenge! Plus who else would have a picture of a shiny butterfree?"

He sighed. "I swear you can bounce forward on anything like a ball."

You chuckled as the three of you made it to Gloria's house. Finding her mother in the kitchen cooking food and the first thing you noticed was the delicious smell coming from the kitchen stove, whatever she was cooking smelt of spices and your stomach growled. She looked up for a moment and smiled at the three of you, asking what the bags were for once she noticed, so you explained to her what had happened with you and Leon that morning as the two kids went off towards the door outside. She chuckled when you explained how Leon got lost on his way to the train in the early morning and got lost to only somehow end up back in front of his own home. Calling him 'a sweet young man for helping the kids out like that' and asking how your day went. Overall it was pretty well and you soon found yourself sitting down at the kitchen table resting yourself from all the walking around town you did. It was still fairly early in the day being only twelve something in the afternoon- You jumped when your Sobble all of a sudden chirped curiously and half climbed onto the side of your head to look towards the opposite side of the house as a flash of light came from one of the windows from outside. A minute long pause. And then another went off. A total of fourteen flashes with about a minute pause between them and while you tried to wrangle your sobble from your face without hurting it and it was enough to catch Mrs. G's attention as she stared with a brow rose.

"Gloria, what are you kids doing? I hope you're not practicing electric type moves near the house" her mother demanded. "You already almost caught your bed on fire from teaching your scorbunny Ember inside!"

"It's fine Mum!," Gloria's voice came followed by her head appearing in said window and waved what could only be described as a polaroid camera. "We're taking picture of our pokemon! Can you believe that I already have fourteen pokemon for the dex challenge!"

Her mother gave her a confused look placing a hand on her hip, "Dex challenge? What are you talking about?" She asked just as her Munchlax came toddling him yawning with another green pokemon behind him. He must've smelt the food and woken up you figured.

However Gloria's eyes lit up with a gasp! "Make that soon to be sixteen! You caught a Budew!?"

"Oh?" She glanced at the pokemon at her feet glancing up at her. "Oh yes. It was one of the two that always hangs around the flower beds. I always thought they were rather helpful for planting so I thought-" She paused as Gloria was already gon-

BANG!!

Both of you and the three pokemon jumped and turned to Gloria in the door's entrance camera in hand and scorbunny at her heels as she grinned at the Pokemon at her mother's heels before lifting the camera at them. "SAY CHEESE!!"

"Gloria! What are you-" She was cut off by two flashes that blinded you for a moment and you reached your hand up to cover your face as a white coated your vision. "GLORIA!!"

"Whoops. Sorry Mum!"

"WHAT. ARE. YOU. DOING!?"

"Taking pictures of pokemon. Duh."

"I can SEE that! Or I would if you hadn't blind sided me.....Wait. Isn't that Victor's camera? What on earth were you doing playing with it!? You know that's not yours!"

You groaned and rubbed your eyes as they contined to talk. You trying to rub away the white dots that came with the flash as your sobble sat there. And you suddenly felt a small hand pawing at your face, as if your sobble was mimicking the movements you made at the attempt of clearing your vision. It was cute....But it would've cuter if you could see it.

"But Mom," Gloria pleaded, "It's for a good cause I promise. There's this Dex challenge and if you fill up the entire book with pictures when you can win something! Plus it's fun!"

"Well watch where you're pointing that thing! The last thing we need is you blinding someone."

"Yes, Mom." "Sorry Ms. G."

You finally opened your eyes still lightly rubbing them as you blinked and your vision was slightly blurry, but it quickly cleared revealing the two teens and their mother standing there as they looked at you. And Mrs. G held out a hand to you.

"Oh dear. Are you alright, Y/n?"

You nodded. "Yeah. I guess. It was just real bright for a moment." You paused as the camera was held out pointed at you by Gloria.

"Hey, Y/n. Can I take a picture of your sobble?"

A picture of your- "Oh. Yeah sure! Just lemme close my eyes for a minute." She nodded as she held the camera up to her face and you slammed your eyes shut as the words left her mouth.

"Hey Sobble!" The pokemon turned to her. "Say cheese!" Another flash of white lit up everywhere and your sobble chirped in surprise as his eyes went wide and it swayed as you reopened your eyes. Gloria smiled as the camera made a whirling noise and a moment later a perfect picture of you with your sobble staring towards the camera came out through a slot in the bottem as she grabbed it. Examining it with a smile. "Yep! That makes seventeen now!"

You gently took the sobble off your shoulder and into your arms as it swayed wide eyed, before shaking it's head and scowling towards the two teenagers, letting out a very loud squeak of annoyance at her before leaning back into your arms like a cat would still glaring at the two of them. You kinda felt bad so you ended up scratching it's back making it give a pleased sound and smile after a moment. What a cute newt thing!

"Hey Glory. Shouldn't we be dropping off some of your pokemon at the center for your rotomi boxes?," Hop asked

Gloria nodded before looking at him. "Hey. Doesn't your grandpa have a purrloin?"

"Yeah he sure does."

"Think he'll let me take a picture of it?"

"I don't see why not! C'mon!"

"Wait! What about lunch?!," Gloria's mother called after the two already running out the door. She stood there for a few moments, before sighing and shaking her head. "I swear! If those two were pokemon they'd be rapidashes for how fast they head off to things."

You chuckled at her. The rest of the day went by very quickly. You had ended up helping Mrs. G clean up after she had started cooking and she gave you some curry as a thanks. You never had this kind of dish before. It was some rice with some kind of red sauce with the same spice smell from earlier, but neither of you were complaining as you ate. It was actually pretty good. Nice to have a peaceful meal considering the past couple days with how chaotic they were. Although you did have to keep your sobble from trying to grab food from your plate and to appease it you fed it a few peices of pokemon food after Mrs. G offered. Gloria didn't return until later that evening where you assumed she had dropped off some of her pokemon with Hop. The camera secured around her neck by a strap and her hands was one of the journals you noticed she had purchased. So you asked about it and her face lit up and she showed the both of you the eighteen pictures she had taken. Some of them you had recognized. Gloria's scorbunny. You and your sobble. Mrs. G's two pokemon of course, and a couple of Hop's. Including a yamper like Sonia's. What you didn't recognize was a few new ones which she gladly told you the names of them. But the most surprising one was her phone but it looked as if it was posessed by a rotom. When asked Gloria explained that it was perfectly normal for someone to have a rotom phone with their very own rotom. She probably assumed you didn't have any of that back in 'Kanto'. Time flew by and other than Mrs. G scolding Gloria for snapping a picture of the curry she had saved her for dinner, it was pretty easy for you to follow your routine before once again falling asleep on the couch and dozing off for the night. Until the very next day of course. You were just laying there peacefully snoozing away peacefully until you felt a harsh shake on your shoulder and a light was shown on you. Of course you being asleep ignored it in favor of turning over on the couch and curling into the blanket even more. Again a harsher shake made you groan in protest at whoever was trying to kidnap you from slumberland.

"Y/N!!" A young girl's voice shouted fairly close and loud next to your ear. Startling you awake with a snort, sitting right up and blinking and rubbing your eyes at the harsh light that extended on you. "Time to wake up or we'll miss the train to Motostoke!"

"Uuuuuhhh," you groaned peeking your eyes open and blinking groggily up at the form of Gloria smiling at you. You yawned a bit. "Gloria? Wha-....*yaawwn* What time is it?"

"Six o four in the morning!," she stated happily before leaning back up and it took you a moment to figure out it was still dark in the early hours of the morning and the light was coming from the light bulb above you. "You need to hurry up and get ready before we're late! I still need to pick up my Dynamax band from the Professor too!"

"M' up," you mumbled reaching a hand out to slowly toss off the blanket from your form as Gloria backed away.

She turned as you both heard her mother's tired voice call to her, asking what was up. What you needed to wake you up was a nice hot shower so that's exactly what you did. Dragging yourself out of bed, you trudged into the bathroom and took a deserving hot shower, brushing your teeth, and opting to instead of the overalls lent to you by Mrs. G wore the black shirt with the Eevee print, slacks, and the non rubber shoes you also picked up. By the time you came out, with everything else in the gray plaid bulking back pack of yours, the smell of food was already in the air and it didn't take you too long to find out why when you look over and saw Gloria holding what could've only been described as a plain waffle in one hand obviously in the middle of eating it, and going through her big brown back pack with the other as her mother looked at her.

"Uh huh. And are you sure you got plenty of clothes?," Mrs. G asked raising a brow, "Extra pokeballs? Your region map? How about the revives Leon was nice enough to get you?"

"Yes Ma!," the teen mumbled half way through eating, "I already went through this last night!"

"Well it never hurts to double check! Especially since you can't lose that endorsement letter or else they won't let you register for the challenge at all," she looked up and noticed you before smiling, "Ah! Y/n! Good morning, Dear. I hope you slept well."

You nodded shifting the backpack over your shoulders, "Yeah thanks! ......Hey. Where's that sobble?" You rose a brow while looking on the floor. Strange the little guy wasn't around.

"He was hungry so I gave him some food to tide him over for you. And speaking of which you must be hungry. I'll get you some breakfast. You aren't starting off your trip on an empty stomach."

"But Mom! That's gonna take even longer! Hop's already waiting for me! We still need to grab the dynamax bands before we go and we'll miss the train if we wait-"

"How about you guys go get the..bands and I'll *yaaawwn* meet you at the train station?," you suggested. You weren't really in the mood for any arguing in the morning, and to be honest you were hungry and the idea of starting a long trip on an empty stomach just didn't appeal to you.

You were lightly surprised when Gloria agreed to it and after a few more moments of going through her pack, left with Hop you assumed, as her mother kindly handed you over some food. More waffles but you weren't complaining. Your sobble at some point noticed you were awake and soon enough you felt that familiar feeling of the little guy crawling up your clothes only to plop itself into your shoulders. It really liked being carried around didn't it? Your muddled mind didn't know when but sometime after you finished the pancakes you were out the door bag in your hands, one hand holding it and the other digging through it to make sure all the few belongings you did own for now were secured. Sure enough you found the non perishable food Leon had given you, the few clothes, and of course your Sobble's pokeball tucked somewhere in the bottom of it all. You decided to keep your sobble out for the time being as it seemed to enjoy being out. The early morning light was starting to peek through with the light pinks and yellows of the sunrise. Already as you made your way to the train station, you saw the farmers and their wooloos out in the fields. Early to bed early to rise you guessed. You saw no sign of the teens, guessed they were still getting the dynamax bands from the professor, even as you walked right into the train station. So you did the only thing your tired self could do. You once again plopped yourself into one of the seats tiredly and waited for the two to arrive. It couldn't have been that long(or maybe it was but you didn't notice) but you perked up at a familiar voice.

"So out with it, Glor! How many did you catch again?"

"I already told you eight! You saw me take pictures of them yesterday remember?"

"Oh right! Sorry that's just the sleep talkin'. " You turned to the door as the young voices got louder. "But look at how many you caught! You're well on your way to building a fine team! I caught myself a special one not to brag."

" I KNOOOWWW!! I'm so jealous you caught a shiny before me!" Gloria walked right into the train station with Hop right behind her.

He shrugged with a proud smile. "Well what can I say? I'll make a difficult rival."

"Where are we heading again?"

"The Gym Challenge will begin Motostoke and our train's waiting so let's go-" He paused finally looking away from her and seeing you sitting there. Upon catching his eye you smiled and waved mumbling something like 'Good Morning'. And he smiled. "Hey! Y/n you're here!" You stood up to meet them with a light yawn as they approuched. "I thought you'd be on the train already.''

You chose not to mention you haven't gotten any money to pay for the ticket entrance and waved. "Nah. I said I'd wait for you guys at the station and I wanted to keep my promise." Looking to Gloria you noticed something around her neck, so you pointed and asked. "Hey. Isn't that your brother's camera?"

"Hm?" She blinked and looked to the camera around her neck. "Oh yeah! I'm gonna need it if I'm gonna finish this Dex Challenge too!"

Hop groaned and rolled his eyes. "I still think it's a waste of time but I guess it's your choice." He jabbed a thumb to the awaiting train. "It's nearly seven thirty. We should probably get on before it takes off." He suggested and the two of you agreed. Walking towards the small gate-

"Not so fast you three!," an older but familiar lady's voice cut through the air and the three of you all turned around as a result.

Hop's golden eyes widened. "Wha-? What're you doing here, Mum?" He asked turning around just as the two mothers of the children walked right in. You were confused at first two, before seeing what they were holding in their hands and you immediately understood why they had followed you here.

"I knew this day was coming since the moment you chose Grookey as a partner, Darling," the older woman smiled fondly at him, a smile you remember your own mother used to have way back when. She held up the small rolled up thing in her hands. "You took off so fast you two didn't take any sleeping bags. Did you forget you probably won't be able to afford hotels most of the time or won't be able to sleep in one every night? You can't expect a free bed around every corner."

Both looked immediatey sheepish as Mrs. G spoke. "Professor Magnolia was kind enough call and let us know that you three would be setting out now." She held up a small looking back of her own. "So here. A little last gift to see you well set on your way. All the kit you'll need for camping! And the reason why you should always double check BEFORE you take off." Gloria made a face and looked away before her mother made her take the small kit, which consisted of a small compact tent  you could carry over your shoulder and another sleeping bag, before crossing her arms with a frown. "Honestly! I swear you'd lose your head if it wasn't attached to your neck sometimes."

"HEY! I only forgot this one thing," she protested and her mother hummed.

" Ah yes. Like you forgot to tell me about how the two of you snuck off into the Slumbering Weild." In an instant she froze and you could've sworn a little color drained from Gloria's face in that moment. "And yes, I heard the news from young Leon. I'm glad someone bothered to tell me!" She sighed and her other hand was held out to you. "Here we are! A bit of pocket money for your journey. Buy yourself a little something at the pokemon center. Maybe some potions or something!"

You stopped and blinked at the small twenty bill in her hand before shaking your head. "Oh no! I couldn't possibly take your money! I-"

"Happened to save my child from a dumb idea. It's not much but something tells me you could use it anyways."

Well......It wouldn't hurt to have some money on you in case of emergencies even if it wasn't much. So you reluctantly took it from her. "I....Thank you."

She nodded to you before turning to Gloria and pointing a finger at her with a serious look. "Now. Remember that Scorbunny will battle to the very end for you so don't you go pushing the poor dear too hard! Come home to rest anytime that you need. After all east or west, home is best." She smiled. "No matter what happensout there, if you and your partner are together I know you'll be fine. Take my advice to heart Sweetie. As long as you have your pokemon at your side and the energy to carry onwards, you'll naturally find that you always have a smile on your face."

Gloria stood there for a moment before nodding to her mother and you blinked when she all of a sudden hugged the older woman, seemingly startling her too for a moment before she smiled and hugged the child back tightly like any mother would....Well except maybe yours. She was always seeming to be too busy working or making sure you worked hard to get good grades or worked hard enough to help out with the bills with your after school jobs. You didn't notice the frown come over your face as Hop mimicked his friend in giving his own mother a hug who like the other mother mirrored a smile and hugged back patting his head.

"Remember. No matter what happens out there, if you and your partner are together, I know you'll be fine."

Hop smiling pulled away and gave a big grin. "Thanks Mum! And just think of how lucky you are!" He raised a determined fist. "Mother to the first ever pair of Champion Brothers! Because I'm certain to be the Champion next! You'll see!"

She nodded in agreement but her face was amused. "Of course you will, Darling. Anyway, do have fun and take care of yourselves. And don't be too worried about not winning. You're welcome back home anytime."

Home huh- A loud train horn sounded off startling the five of you into turning to the train, then you happened to glance at the clock hanging upon the wall and noticed that it was seven twenty eight in the morning. Two minutes before seven thirty and the deadline for the train's departure. So you decided to point this out, having the two kids make a worried frown before taking a few steps back.

"We'll be off now!," Gloria explained lifting her hand a moment to give a quick good bye to the two mothers and turning to the train. "C'mon guys! We're off! Don't want to miss the train!"

You nodded in agreement tailing right after her with Hop behind you. "Wish us luck! Not that we'll need it!"

As the mothers waved good bye, the three of you went towards the gate and watched as Gloria slipped a single dollar into the slot of it. It made a ping noise and you guess it unlocked because the three of you easily slipped by and towards the train. The grey and yellow train's doors slid open with a whoosh sound as the three of you entered just as another horn sounded off startling your sobble a bit making it cling to your shoulder harder. Inside was who you assumed to be a train conductor who gestured for you all to exit through another door to the right which lead to the passenger cars and other people who happened to be on the train with you three. There was about fifthteen other people with you so the three of you had to go to one of the back seats. Yellow painted metal bars were everywhere along with Blue seats with a table between the two of them. Above each pair of seats was a small area to put luggage. You three sat down just as the train was starting off. Gloria breathing a sigh of relief from all the weight she was carrying. You assumed she was carrying more than you already along with the camping equipment she was given just a few moments ago. You ended up looking out the window and watching the station and small town of Postwick move away from your view and starting on your way. Beside you Gloria sighed and slumped into the soft cushioned seat.

"Man. We just left and I'm already feeling beat."

"Well look on the bright side," Hop suggested, "We're finally heading out on our journies! And Lee told me Motostoke is a good place as any to start off an adventure."

"Oh really? How come?," you asked curiously as he explained.

"Well besides the obvious Opening Ceremony going on there. Motostoke is surrounded by a giant piece of land called the Wild Area. It's a real sight! There's all sorts of wild Pokemon juat wondering about everywhere you look! Plus you can camp out, do a spot of fishing, and sight seeing! I don't think I could ever get tired of it!," he explained smiling widely, "But I don't think we'll be able to see it. The Entrance Ceremony's in the town not the wild. But on a lighter not! There's loads of brilliant trainers and all kinds of pokemon out there waiting for us! My excitement's running ahead of me faster than this train can go!"

"Yeah? Well it's too bad. Would've loved to take a couple more pictures." Gloria sighed leaning more against the wall of the train. " Im already starting to understand why Victor likes it so much. Like I wouldn't make it a living like he wants to but it's a nice hobby."

You nodded agreeing with her and extended your arm to allow your sobble to crawl along your arm and onto the table, watching as it curiously crawled up to the window and looked out at the world passing by. You all sat there for who knows how long chatting, the kids pulled out their phones and showed you a few pictures of what looked almost like a castle's high walls and beautiful scenery surrounding it. It was quite lovely. At one point someone said it would take at least a few hours to get to the town so all of you had plenty of time to relax but you couldn't help but let your mind wonder. What was happening back at your home? Was your mother worried about you suddenly going missing? What happened when she went to wake you up but found you completely gone? Did she call the police to file a missing person's report yet? Counting today it would've been five days that you had disappeared and that must've been worrying. And if this happened to just be a crazy dream you surely hoped you would wake up sometime soon. You were soon snapped out of any bad thoughts though. How? Simple the train suddenly slowed down out of no where it caught you off guard and you ended up hitting the table in front of you your poor Sobble chirping in shock as it was sent tumbling across said table and into Hop's extended arms as he thankfully caught the poor thing before it could splat onto the floor below. What the world was that!? Your head turned as Gloria nudged your side. you gave her a questioning look about to ask if she was alright but she pointed out the window and you looked. There was.....Nothing but nature?? Which wouldn't be strange since it was the out doors, and you WOULD have chalked it up to just being another stop on the way to Motostoke but then why did the train suddenly stop like that? Granted you never rode on a train before but you were pretty sure they weren't supposed to stop suddenly enough to ram yourself into a table. One of your hands rubbed your sore ribs where they had hit the table, surely leaving a bruise later but no real damaged luckily. So why had you all suddenly stopped in the middle of seemingly no where? Around you other people were also noticing, muttering to themselves, some getting up to peer out the windows or to take a couple steps up the alley way as to walk up to the engine car.

"Attention Passengers!," a man's voice blared from a loud speaker somewhere, "Due to some unfortunate events beyond our control we have decided to take a quick stop at Wild Station. We apologize for any inconvience and to please wait patiently while we fix the issue. We thank you for your cooperation."

"Wha- Wild Station? That's just outside the the town!," Hop exclaimed holding your sobble in one arm while staring at a map on his phone with the other. Confusion on his face. "Why didn't they just stop inside the city?"

"Let's find out!" Gathering her things into her arms Gloria was quick to jump past you.

"WHA- Hey wait!," you called out extending an arm out to her as she darted up the car past other people.

You stared after her for a few seconds before turning to Hop who shrugged and got up to after her which you followed obviously. The two of you hurried after her as Gloria trotted up to the exit and with a whoosh the doors opened with her stepping out and the two of you followed. On the other side was another train station. Only this one had slightly different colored brick walls and there was a whole bunch of leaves and twigs scattered about. Besides the three of you there was a couple looking over a map in one corner of the station looking confused and lost, a map just sitting in the waiting chairs, and someone who looked to be in some kind of uniformed green vest.

You gave a confused look around. "Where the heck are we?"

"Ill check!'' Before you could respond Hop had already turned to the man in the vest and asked, "Hey, Mr. Station Master!" The man hummed and turned to him. "Isnt this the Wild Area? What're we stopped here for?"

The man sighed crossing his arms. "Yes....This is the Wild Area Station makes no mistakes. I'm sorry to tell you that the train is halted due to a flock of wooloo."

"WHAT?!," both you and Gloria said at the same time.

A giant herd of wooloo!? Oh great! Now what were you all supposed to do?

Hop however wasn't the least bit concered. "What's there to be sorry about? This is brilliant!"

Gloria gave him a look that looked like he just did something crazy. "What is?"

He excitedly smiled widely at her. "This Wild Area is massive!" He explained the sobble in his arms giving a noise of annoyance at his sudden movements. "There are loads of pokemon to battle here! You don't get it do you, Glor? This is the best possible place to put together the greatest team!"

"I don't think we should be taking off, "Gloria pointed out and you nodded agreeing. "We have to get to the ENtrance Ceremony soon or else we'll be considered forfeiting our sponsorships entirely!"

"They take it that seriously?," you asked lightly surprised as she nodded.

"Something about a long time ago a lot of trainers tried to sneak their way into the challenge by claiming they were late to register or something like that. Since then the rules have been pretty strict. Which is why I want to register first and then come back here if I have a chance."

"When is the deadline?"

"Midnight. And as much as I'd love to explore around...Im kinda nervous about securing that spot."

You could totally agree with her on that point Buuut- You pointed behind you. "But the train's going to be backed up for a while by the looks of it. Maybe we can walk? How fair is this Motostoke?''

"Let's step out and see. The map said it shouldn't have been too far away I think."

That wasn't a bad idea and with no objections the three of you stepped out and what you saw made you pause. As soon as you stepped out you were hit with the strong rays of sunlight making you blink but once your (f/c) eyes managed to get a hold of themelves...Well....Breathtaking was a pretty good way to describe it. A giant meadow stretched as much as you could see with a giant lake, a few scattered trees, and A GIANT WALL! A giant wall was set up with a few bridge like structures to the right and you could see a few very tall buildings/structures ahead. You saw what you thought was oil rigs movie, a giant clock which reminded you of Big Ben back in your world, a few sky scrapers, and a few other things you were too far away to make out. Over all it was a very strange but pretty sight as the wind blew through the trees.

"Look at that!," Hop said in awe pointing at the buildings which must've been a decent half mile away. "That's Motostoke way off that way! And between here and there are countless new pokemon waiting to be met!"

Gloria hummed. ".......Well it would be cool to explore somewhere we won't get in trouble I guess."

"EXACTLY!!" He pointed towards the meadow. "Im itching to just see what's out there. It's not too far away and we can probably spare a couple hours. I mean we have until Midnight right? And we left pretty early in the morning."

She hummed again. "Well when you put it that way it does sound like fun!" A smile crossed her face again. "I can take a whole bunch of pictures for my scrapebook! And catch a few more pokemon of course."

You weren't sure that was a good idea- "Well well. You two running off again?"

The three of you turned- You blinked surprised. "Sonia?," you asked. True to your word the orangedhaired professor's assistant was walking right towards the three of you with a smile. "What are you doing here? I don't remember seeing you get on the train."

"Of course you didn't. I didn't enter the train through the station right side of the station," she smiled. "Besides. I figured it'd be an opportune time for me to travel for my research." Sonia gave a sigh and looked to the ground shaking her head. "My grab gave me a proper earful in her own way.  'Those two young trainers are setting out on a journey, but what are you doing with your life?' Her words not mine."

"Ouch Professor," you commented, "That sounds rough."  You didn't mean to be so blunt but you kinda understood how she felt. Your mother had asked you similar things to that while simaltaniously pushing you to study more, go to college, and get a job-

Sonia waved you off. "Ah. Never mind that. Nothing to worry yourselves over. " Her eyes lowered back to the teens next to you. "Besides I've been more curious about that pokemon you two met in the forest. I'd been thinking I should look into it so the timing works out fine! If I discover something really huge then maybe even Gran'll admit I got some talent."

Pokemon- OH RIGHT!! You nearly forgot the legendary pokemon they saw in the fog. Although you were still unsure what it was exactly. A thought suddenly struck you. In the game Sonia would uncover some amazing things important to the plot of the game. If ONLY you could remember what it was!

"Yikes." Hop made a cringe face. "Being an adult got it's own challenges eh?"

You frowned and gave a chuckle and shake of your head which made him look at you. "Oh you have NO idea."

"I said you needn't worry about it," Sonia stated a little more firmly. "I'm glad to be on the road really! It's been ages. It'll be great fun to fish and camp and rough it outside again."

"Uh huh. Well you have fun with that! Meanwhile.." He turned with a smile. "I heard there's natural dynamaxing pokemon in the Wild Area! I'm off to go stick my head in as many of those red dens as I can find!"

"Not. So. FAST! Mr. Impatient!" He yelped when gloria grabbed him by the hoodie and with the same frown as her mother stared at him when she yanked him back. "We only got here and you want to run off again into the wild??"

"Oh c'mon Glory. I promise Ill meet you up back at the Entrance Ceremony."

The young girl hummed. ".....What time is it by the way?"

"Oh." You glanced to sonia as she rolled up her sleeve and glanced at her watch. "According to this it just turned Eleven thirty in the morning."

She hummed and slowly released her friend. "Fine. But let's agree to meet at the Entrance Ceremony at six or seven in the after noon. That should be enough time for the both of us to explore and get to the town before it gets dark." She gave a concerned frown. "I really don't want you hurt or lost."

Hop paused for a moment before looking away coughing his cheeks having a light pink hue. "Um....YEAH! I can totally do that!"

Her smile returned. "Then it's settled! Can't lose my rival before I even join the challenge."

"GREAT!!" He turned again. "I'm going to battle the snot out of a bunch of dynamax pokemon and fill in the tale of my legend!" And he ran off.

"DONT YOU DARE FORGET HOP!!," Gloria hollered after him.

Both you and Sonia shared a chuckle at their childish behavior before she looked at you. What cheek. Dynamax pokemon are really on another level you know." She glanced to Gloria. "You'd better dynamax your partner pokemon too if you want to take on opponents that strong." She directed Gloria to the wild. "He's right about red dens. You'll find spots here and there in the Wild Area that emit a red beam of light. If you think you're up to it, check it out. They're usually cave openings with dynamax pokemon inside. But PLEASE be careful. It can be dangerous at times. I wish Hop would've waited for me to warn him before he ran off like that."

Gloria nodded in understanding as you looked down to your sobble climbing up your leg. Hop must've put him down when you weren't looking. "I understand Sonia! You don't have to worry about me!"

Sonia nodded to the two of you. "So with that Ill leave you two off here. The Wild Area is waiting for you. This is the start of your real adventure. Take care now."

You watched as she turned to walk away and....you weren't sure what really compelled you to say it in that moment but you reached your arm out after her. "Ms. Sonia!" She stopped and turned to you with a hum. You paused uncertainly if you should say anything. Would it affect the progress of the game's route? "I just....wanted to let you know that....You really are a great scientist already. And you're going to find a lot of things."

She blinked at you in surprise for a moment not sure what to make of your words, but settled on a smile and nodded. "Thanks. Your kind words mean a lot but we'll have to see what I actually accomplish. I wish you the best sights and experiences of Galar a tourist like you can have!" Before she turned and walked her way towards you assumed Motostoke.

"Wow." You jumped and looked to Gloria who smiled. "That was really nice of you. Even if it was a little out of no where."

You shrugged. "I guess I know how she feels a little bit. Sometimes a few kind words is what someone needs."

"Lee always says something similar, but I think he calls it 'champion encouragment'." She suddenly snapped her head forward and pointed. "Well you heard Sonia! I want to try out my first dynamaxing battle before I take on any gyms! We got about seven to eight hours to get some battling and sight seeing in so I say we give this day all we got!"

-time skip five hours forward-

You lost track of how many times Gloria pulled you along this way and that....but it was an eventful few hours.

You lost count of how many pokemon Gloria tried to battle. Key word being 'tired'. The first pokemon she tried to battle was one you remembered. An Onix. A. GIANT. MASSIVE!! AND CRANKY!! ONIX!! Probably didn't help Gloria snapped a picture of it before trying to battle it. You had to literally grab her and drag her behind you as you ran. Terrified scorbunny at your heels as it charged towards the two of you. Not the greatest start to be honest. But it wasn't as worst as her first dynamax battle. She had found an opening in the cliffside of a cave with red aura around in, one of the dynamax dens and she ran into it without a second thought with you chasing after her. Inside the dark was lit up by a GIGANTIC DIGLETT with the red-black cloud hovering over it's dynamax form. You nearly fainted then and there but when the thing ROARED you felt like you were about to have  a heart attack!!! Your sobble poor thing made a small squeal of fright before forcing itself into your backpack to hide immediately. Things just went downhill from there when in the middle of the battle Gloria decided to dynamax scorbunny and all of a sudden you both were having a very hard time standing up from the shaking ground and the debry the attacks caused to the point you literally yelled that you both had to leave then and there but she couldn't hear you past all the noise and therefore barked orders to her gigantic scorbunny from her holding onto the ground. With you clinging onto the cave's wall for dear life hoping it would be over soon. Thankfully it did. It was all a blur really. You vaugly remembered Gloria somehow capturing the diglett and returning scorbunny to it's rightful size. And you two carefully climbed around disheveled cave floor until managing to get out of the cave....where the both of you collasped onto the ground.

"HOW THE HECK CAN STADIUMS HANDLE THOSE THINGS!?,'' you yelled out dizzily into the soft grass. In the game you didn't have to worry about debry being flung at you or the ground giving away suddenly. BECAUSE IT WAS A GAME!! REAL LIFE POKEMON DYNAMAX BATTLES WERE NOTHING LIKE THE GAME!!

Gloria raised a weak hand. "T-They were made a long time ago with top professors, contractors, and researchers to build them strong enough even a dynamaxed monchomp with the strength of a thousand earthquakes couldn't shake it. Dunno how but man I'm glad they did."

You could 100% agree with that! It took a minute for the both of you to recover before the two of you got up, dusted yourselves off, and went off again. Gloria managed to resume battling and taking photos of a few pokemon. Although some of the pictures were so blurry from the pokemon moving they would be no use at all and she didn't catch a lot of the pokemon she tried to battle. But she did win a few and even had two other dynamax battles within the dens you guessed Hop didn't come across. Catching one of them but not the other as you struggled to not lose your lunch or have a heart attack both times. You were not a fan of wild dynamax battles after that. At one point you even came across what Gloria explained was a wild berry tree and demonstrated how to get the fruits off them by forcibly shaking it until a couple berries fell off it. They all had a somewhat bittertaste you didn't like when you tried them tho, but your sobble seemed to enjoy up as you handed them right over when they extended their....hands?? Paws??...towards it. You couldn't remember how much time had passed before the two of you finally had a chance to sit down under the shade of a tree and have a break. Gloria took the time to go through all the pictures she took, must've been about thirty, but only twenty one were salvagable. Curious you took a peak at the pictures she showed you. The pokemon she got pictures of were a onix(of course angering it-), roselia, vespiquen, nuzleaf, vulpix, snover, bunnelby, pidove, miccino, baltou, combee, tryogue, stuffel, diglett(how did she have time to get a picture of that dynamax thing?), metapod, diggersby, hoothoot, bounsweet, noibat, and a pancham. Not a lot but certainly a decent haul for her. It was you who eventually asked the question-

"Hey. What time is it?"

Gloria responded by quickly pulling out her phone and checking the time on it. And she blinked. "It's four twenty seven! It's already been about five and a half hours!"

"Wha-" You looked up to the sky. Didn't look like sunset yet, but it was definately about late after noon. You two hadn't even noticed the time fly by. "We've been out here nearly all day!"

With a hum gloria quickly scrambled to pick up her things. "I think we better head to Motostoke now. I don't really know how long it'll take to walk there and I did promise Hop we'd meet him there."

You nodded scooping the confused sobble into your arms. The walk there was pretty uneventful as you two walked what must've been half a mile, your eyes widening the closer you got, until you finally got there......AND. IT. WAS. NOTHING. LIKE IN GAME!! The entrance to Motostoke was all bricked with a mideival ages meets industrial period kind of look. All the buildings you could see were brick other than the familiar pink pokemon center and there was A LOT MORE people and buildings than in game you remember....makes sense you supposed. This was a real world and so of course there would be a lot more people and buildings. It was so crowded you were certain if Gloria wasn't walking beside you, you were sure you would've easily watched her. The first place you two stopped was the pokemon center where Gloria went inside to heal her pokemon from todays battle and put away any new ones she caught into those Rotomi box things. You were busy marveling at the busy streets and environment around you. You had never been in a city before let alone a town like this so it was quite a shock for you to see. This place even had GIANT WORKING GEARS BUILT INTO IT'S VERY WALLS!! It was like a real steampunk town. But once she came out she.....stopped and stared around her.

"So which way to the ceremony?," you asked her gazing at a few stores lined across the street.

She looked really unsure now fidgiting with the straps of her bag and looking around her. "U-Um...I don't know."

You snapped your head to her. "You don't what?!"

"Im sorry!" She apologized looking around. "I know it's here! I just.....don't know exactly where in town."

You wanted to facepalm but decided not too to avoid hurting her feelings and looked around as well as people and their pokemon passed you two. No signs of Hop or any indication of a ceremony anywhere in sight. No other trainers, no signs, certainly no ceremony!

Gloria suddenly held up her phone. "Maybe I should call him? He might already be there waiting for us-"

"HEY YOU TWO!!" A familiar voice called out and to both of your relief you turned and walking towards you with a shopping bag in one hand, yamper at her feet was your saving grace Sonia waving at you. "Over here!"

"SONIA!" Gloria smiled. "Boy are we glad to see you! We ran into a 'Leon situation' here."

That made her laughed. "Oh really? Real ace of you to make it through the Wild Area. And a Leon situation huh?"

Gloria nodded sighing. "We're kinda lost. Do you know where the ceremony is?"

"You're first time in a city and already lost? But Motostoke is big right?" Gloria nodded and Sonia smiled. "Not to worry. Sonia is here to show you around a bit."

"Thanks, Ms. Sonia." Gloria poltely smiled at the older woman. "Could you point out where we gotta go?"

Sonia hummed. "The Entrance ceremony huh? I get a bit worked up when I think how exciting and moving it was to actually stand on a stadium's pitch for the first time." Sonia smiled off thinking of an old memory most likely. She shook her head. "Anyways. Brilliant young trainer who braved the Wild Area! Do you remember what your goal in Motostoke is?"

"I'm here for the Gym Challenge!,"Gloria shouted determined smile on her face and Sonia nodded.

She nodded. "Yep! The Gym Challenge Opening Ceremony!" She pointed behind her at the busy street. You Guess since she once too here attending the Gym challenge with leon as kids she would know where it would be. "Use that lift over there to get to it K? OH! By the way the ceremony tomorrow is being held at the Motostoke Stadium ok?"

......You looked at Gloria. "There's a stadium here AND a second ceremony tomorrow??" Gloria shrugged at you.

"Well, laters!" She waved a hand at you two. "I'm going to swing by the shops while I'm here but don't forget to register at the Stadium,k?" Gloria nodded and Sonia went to tur- She stopped. "OH! I forgot. I got you a little something." Reaching into her coat pocket and fishing around, she pulled out what looked like at first glance some kind of training card before holding it out to Gloria who curiously accepted it...And her eyes WIDENED at it.

"NO!! WAY!!" She stared wide eyed between the card and Sonia. "Is this what I think it is!?"

She giggled. "Yep. I know Leon already sent myself and Hop a couple so I figured it would be the perfect start off to your own collection."

Gloria gave off a girly teen squeal and practically shoved it into your face making you blink. "OH MY MAGIKARP!! LOOK!! I GOT A LEAGUE CARD!!" You blinked and true to her word it was a card. And on it was a picture of Leon sitting down looking off somewhere. She smiled widely pulling it from your face. "Thanks so much So-...." She blinked. "Hey where'd she go?"

You shrugged. "I guess she left. Come on. We better get going."

She nodded ad the two of you made off for this lift at the end of the street. Along the way you guys passed a few stores. A flower shop, a cafe, a book store, a record shop, a barber shop, and another clothes shop. Once you two were at and on the lift....you became unsure again.

"Um. Now what?"

"I dunno..." Something caught her eye as she looked over and pointed. "hey what's that?"

"What's what?"

"This panel has a button." She pressed it.

"AH!!" You instantly fell to your bottom and Gloria grabbed onto the small pedestol as the lift suddenly lifted the two of you up and around, until it suddenly stopped again and you groaned. Pushing yourself up...and hearing a snicker. You shot a look to the teenager who was snickering behind her hand. "Nice to see you're still standing." You muttered pushing yourself up to your feet again and looking over, in front of the both of you was a giant building with glass doors, in front of the doors was two men in some kind of uniform and sunglasses like some bodyguard and some man with.....A Pokeball head?? Was waving to a few people passing by. A mascot maybe??.....You pointed at the building. "You think that's it or what?"

She went to answer but someone already beat here to it. "Gloria! Ms. Y/n!" Both of you looked over and Hop was making his way towards the two of you. "You made it too? "

You rubbed your aching back. "Yeah. Where are we?"

"Motostoke Stadium! This is where the Opening Ceremony will be held!" He exclaimed excitedly pointing to the large building behind him. "Everyone'll be watching the Opening Ceremony for the Gym Challenge! My mom, your mom, the whole world!! It's getting me a bit nervous really." He shook his head. "Naw. This isn't nerves. I'm only trembling because I'm so excited!"

"Well I say we go it and get registered before it gets too dark," Gloria suggested.

"You're right!" He turned back to the stadium still pointing. "Come on, Glory! It's time the world knows our names!"

As the three of you rolled up to the doors one of the two men standing in front of the door held one of their hands out in a clear stop motion in front of you trio.

"Can I see your sponsorship letters please?," He asked holding out his hand and Hop didn't hesitate to pull his out of his pocket and have the letter over to the man in the meantime Gloria had slung her backpack off her shoulders and went digging through it. You hoped she didn't forget it all the way back in Postwick. The security guard carefully examined the peice of paper in his hands. Running a hand across the red unbroken seal, holding it up to the light, and then taking a small device out of his pocket. A small green light came out and scanned it for a few seconds until there was a small ding from the machine and the man nodded before handing it back to him. "Head on inside and sign in Trainer. Next!" Saying a quick thanks Hop quickly snatched the letter back just as Gloria pulled out her own (thank goodness she still had it) and handed it to the man who repeated the same process from before before he too handed Gloria back hers and allowed her to go. But when you made a move to follow them he held another hand up. "Sorry, Ma'am. Only registered trainers, staff, and authorized personal are allowed inside. You'll have to wait out here. It's the rules."

You paused for a moment before looking at Gloria uncertain who smiled. "It's alright Y,n. Just wait for us out here ok? It shouldn't take too long. I mean we're just signing in!"

"Well...Alright if you say so." You gestured to a nearby bench. "I'll just wait for you two over there ok?"

They agreed and left you standing outside the stadium as they went inside. Not that you minded waiting of course. Your feet ached and your shoulders from carrying around your backpack all day, so plopping on the bench you gave your sore body a rest before slinging your pack off your shoulders. Your sobble had decided now would be a good time to fully crawl out of your pack from where its been hiding out this whole time and you let it climb on you when you placed your bag down with a sigh and leaned into the bench. FINALLY allowing yourself to rest for a while. You waited for a little while as people passed you, going up and down the lift and and streets as the body guards still stood there making sure no one entered without permission. A few teens Hop's age excited uncluding one boy with bright white fluffy hair and a long pink coat and you thought he looked rather grumpy. At one point you thought you heard a happy yell from somewhere but ignored it as it was probably a child playing somewhere. The sky slowly turning to a light pink as it got later in the day. Eventually the two did come back out but with what looked like white work out bands on their wrist that didn't have the dynamax bands on them. You waved at them as they walked right on over to you.....and with a second boy??

"Hey you two. Who do you got there?,' you asked gesturing to the boy on the other side of Gloria.

To which she smiled brightly and hugged him making you raise a brow. "Don't you recognize twins when you see them! IT'S VICTOR!!"

You stared at the young boy smiling at you. ........THIS WAS VICTOR!! The name of the male avator that you could pick in the game if you didn't chose Gloria to play instead. Looking at the young boy he still looked the same age as Gloria and Hop next to him even if he was a little taller than his twin. How did you not recognize it sooner? He had the same dark brown hair and light brown eyes as his sister and if they had the same haircut they would've looked the exact same (other than Victor's slightly taller hieght). He wore a grey beanie like hat, a red shirt with some logo on it, jeans, brown shoes, and carried what might as well been a giant suit case on his back. And a poloroid camera was slung in a similar fashion around his neck as he smiled at you. Gloria seemed very happy to see him as she excitedly gestured to him.

"Can you believe it!? After a whole year the mysterious photographer finally appeared after disappearing without a trace," she teased making her twin roll his eyes.

"It's nice to know you haven't changed. I wanted to surprise you after the text you sent me telling me Lee sponsored you but I didn't expect you to show up with more people." He turned back to you with a smile. "Greetings! You must be the new friend Gloria told me about. Thanks for saving her sorry butt from the Slumbering Weild. I always knew she'd get into trouble sooner or later without me."

"HEY!" A frown came over her face as she pouted. "I don't get into THAT much trouble! Besides I got here without a problem didn't I?"

He chose to ignore that and you took the chance to talk. "Nice to meet you too. Are you here for the Gym Challenge?"

He shrugged. "Yes and no. I'm here to take pictures of the events as they happen. It's been years since the last Gym Challenge and certainly going to be a long time until the next one after this year is over. But I'm not competing. Never had much interest in battles."

You could understand that. You never had much interest doing a couple things too.

"Y'know Lee had a sponsorship and starter pokemon all ready for you too." Gloria almost looked sad. ''You could've competed alongside us even if you didn't want to battle it would've been fun to have you around."

"Glory, then a Champion's sponsorship would've been wasted. It wouldn't be put to it's full potential. Although I am a bit upset I didn't have the chance to tell Leon myself, but I'm sure I'll be able to thank him later considering you'll be seeing more of me around here soon."

She gave her brother a confused look. "Whatcha mean?"

"I've decided to join Hop on this little adventure If he doesn't mind."

"Really!? That's awesome! Of course!" Hop was quick to agree with a friendly punch to Victor's shoulder. "Why wouldn't I want one of my greatest pals joining me while I write my legend? It'll be grand to have a traveling buddy of my own!"

"NO WAY!!" Gloria's large smile returned! "Oh this is great! We'll be able to see each other for a while more. I haven't been able to see you since you went on a journey last year so this is totally a win win for me in everyway!"

You nodded. "Oh. How'd the registry go?"

She waved a hand. "Oh y'know. We got our Challenger Bands we're apparently supposed to wear all the time so everyone knows we're a part of the registered trainers group. Our own League cards for the challenge. And we got to meet some of the rival trainers in there too! I liked the Sherry girl. She seemed really shy."

"I heard she was sponsored by the Gym Leader Milo but I can't be too sure," Victor replied before looking up at the sky. ".....But in any case I believe we should all head to Budew Drop Inn before the actual ceremony tomorrow." He turned to Gloria. "That way I can show you all the new pictures of pokemon I've gotten. You can use them for that dex challenge thing you told me about."

They turned and you nodded in agreement standing up and grabbing your bag, your sobble grabbing onto your bag as your hoisted it back over your shoulders and followed them guessing they must've known the way.

"By the way how many pictures of pokemon did you add to your collection?," Gloria asked glancing at her twin.

"Um." He made a thoughtful face. "Well let's see. Nessa's Aquarium has at least one of every water type pokemon...and with how many nature preserves I've stayed...and with the hundreds of tourists with different regions pokemon....and trading pictures with fellow photographers from different regions at the International Photographers Expo..........Six hundred thirty four different pokemon!"

There was silence for a moment.

"........WHAT?!"

The four of you made it down the street and over to the six story building that certainly looked like a fancy hotel. Along the way the children explained that the Chairman had not only endorsed as well but apparently paid the hotel in advance to allow all the trainers to stay the night before the actual ceremony took place the next day and the challengers were officially given the go ahead to start their journey. But a small surprise awaited the four of you yet in the hotel when you walked in and you looked around. There was a couple potted plants, two pairs of stairs leading up to another level with furniture, a sign in desk, and an elevator like a regular hotel but the thing your eyes were drawn to was the golden statue. It reminded you of those knights in ancient fairy tales. The golden man stood with his sword held up to the sky, a gleamering shield on his other arm in defense, and his face one of determination to not fail. Quite the craftsman ship. And standing right in front of it with a small yamper at her feet was-

"SONIA!" Gloria loudly greeted startling the poor lady and making her turn around.

Upon seeing who it was she sighed and smiled. "Oh it's just you guys. You gave me quite the jump scare there. But it looks like you both got yourselves registered." She nodded to the arm bands before her gaze drifted to Victor as she blinked. "....Oh. Hiya!  I don't think we've met."

"This is my brother, Victor. He's gonna be with Hop for a while. But what are you doing here? I thought you were going out to study."

"Yeah." Hop chimed in. "What are you doing at our hotel?"

"Oh!" She shifted the many shopping bags in her arms. Guess she did go shopping while here after all. "I'm researching the mysterious pokemon that are said to be in the Slumbering Weild. I reckon if I look into some of Galar's lengends I might figure something out. Care to join me?" She gestured to the statue. "You're here already anyways."

"SURE! It'd be fun!" She turned to you."Hey. Y/n new to Galar. I don't think she even knows the legends."

"That's perfect then! While you're doing that, Im gonna go stand in that long like up there and secure a spot for us ok?"

"But I-" You raised a hand as theVictor turned and walked away leaving you with sonia and the other two...and you sighed. "I don't think I was that way when I was fourteen."

Sonia chuckled. "We were all like that at one point or another. But would you like to hear one of the legends? A newbie to Galar like you might enjoy some foriegn tales."

"I'd like to hear too!"

You stared at her for a moment before shrugging. "Why not? I was just cast out from the little tribe."

She chuckled even more before she turned towards the statue. "Alright then. I'm sure you've seen the statue then.''

"Yeah." You rose a brow looking back up to the handsome man's golden face. "Who is he anyways?"

"It's a statue of the hero who once saved the Galar Region. I can run through the legend right quite if you fancy?" You nodded and that was all she needed to continue. "Long ago a great black storm covered the Galar Region." She gazed back to the statue. "People called it 'The Darkest Day'. The land was assaulted by gigantic pokemon but they were defeated by a single young hero bearing a sword and shield. This statue here is meant to depict the young hero of that legend. We still don't understand what kind of sword and shield the hero actually had. And what this 'black storm' is supposed to be is just another mystery. Whatever it was, it blotted all the skies across Galar. I suppse that tracks with it being 'the Darkest Day' but still..."

Hop blinked blinking at the golden statue's face and scratching his head. "Huh...I suppose that hero must've been about as strong as Lee then. Looks like you're going to have your hands full with plenty research though, Sonia. Black storms and swords and shields and all..."

"You'll be alright Sonia!"

She chuckled. "Heh. Thanks. I'll muddle through somehow. Don't you worry." She shook her head. "But legends aside. You three are staying at the hotel tonight though, right? Shouldn't you check in?"

"Probably so. Victor's holding our place in line." With a smiled similar to Leon he smiled widely at her. "And we'll look out for you too, Sonia! If we hear anything about any hero or whatnot we'll tell you!" Gloria nodded with a hum.

Sonia bowed her head in thanks to the two. "Thanks so much. Even if you don't find anything the thought's appreciated." As the kids said good byes and walked around her to a stair case you paused as she lifted her head and gazed at you. "I hope you enjoyed my little tale."

You smiled and nodded. "Yes. It was really entertaining. Thanks for telling me."

She nodded. "And thanks for taggin' along with the kids this far. I know we're practically strangers but there's just....I don't know....really good aura about you." You chuckled. You? Really good aura? That certainly was a first. "I'm sure Lee appreciates it too. He's always so worried about Hop. He practically raised him after all-" All of a sudden it was like a switch flipped off in her mind and her happy smile went to a sudden shocked face. "Oh no. I didn't mean to mention that. Please forget I even said that."

Your brow rose confus- "Y/N! C'MON! We got our room key already!"

You looked up to Gloria's call before back to Sonia before waving good bye and leaving. Wondering what the heck that was all about. Oh well. You had bigger things to worry about- Like the the fact that the three kids had gotten into a fight with four punk rockers!! You had just walked up the stairs and instantly was face to face with the three teenagers up in the faces of four people who dressed in black and red from their face paint to their outfits shouting something about they're going to cheer someone on and no one could stop them. You couldn't tell between the seven people shouting at one another and the front desk clerk trying to calm them down. THANK GOODNESS FOR THE YOUNG GIRL WHO STOPPED IT ALL!! She walked up the stairs and stopped next to your shocked state. A look of shock coming over her own face for a moment before she sighed and that snapped you out of your trance long enough for you to look at her. She was a teenager same around the same age as the other children with black hair tied back in two ponytails by red ribbon, a pink dress, with a black leather jacket and boots.

"What are you lot doin' here?" She had asked in what sounded what a brittish accent but you were sure Britain wasn't a thing in this world. Instantly the fighting stopped from the punk rockers as the they looked to her shocked like a couple toddlers caught taking candy. One shouted what you assumed was her name. Marnie you thought? As they stuttered out excuses. "I know you all are terribly curious 'bout the other gym challengers, but you gotta show a bit of restraint." Well it was nice of her to settle them down before she apologized. "Sorry 'bout them. They're just a bunch of my fans. Call themselves Team Yell and follow me around. cheerin' for me. I think they've let it all go to their heads a bit.....Come on you lot. Back home with you now!" She sighed as they guiltily slunk away past you down the stairs. "They're just so caught up with wantin' to support me and all that they tend to get a bit shirty with other Gym Challengers. Sorry if they caused you any trouble."

With that she simply walked past the lot of you, got her room key, and just walked away like it never even happened. You were still in a bit of shock but shook it off in favor of getting to the room you'd be bunking in with Gloria and have a small break from today. The inner workings weren't too different from the hotels you've been to before and was more than eager to plop yourself down and have a rest. The rest of the afternoon was a blur. At one point all three kids were sitting around the bed helping sort through Victor's collection of photos and helping Gloria glue in quite a lot of them into that small book of theirs. Hop mentioned about calling room service and Gloria suggested the four of you order each a different curry to help her fill in a bit of her curry challenge book as well. Which you had no problem against. It was free room service and you were interested in trying some of this world's curry since it was supposed to be world famous as Sonia told you. You ended up randomly chosing Sweet Curry as someone phoned it to the front desk and waited for it too arrive. It was pretty good. But it wasn't too different from Mrs. G's curry you had tasted other than the sauce on the rice tasted a mildy hot enough to be sweet. Of course that didn't stop Gloria was taking your curry's picture along with Hop's that had a massive egg in what was call a bitter boiled egg curry, Gloria's was a dry smoked tail curry(you hoped that wasn't an actual tail, and you think Victor's was leek curry with some kind of veggies decorating the plate. You ended up letting your sobble finish what food was leftover after you ate and soon you two found yourselves bidding the two boys good night and went to finally rest for the night. After getting a quick shower you decided it was best to go to bed since the actual Ceremony was tomorrow. Gloria had gotten the bed and you borrowed the sleeping bag Mrs. G had given Gloria. As the darkness slowly consumed your vision as your eyelids drooped you vauguly regstered your sobble climbing on one of the shelves.

.........

CRASH!!

Both of you were startled away in the dark from a giant crash and a couple panicked chirps before you were tackled by an invisible spooked sobble burrowing under your arm as Gloria turned on the lamp to reveal the pokemon's mess.

"Y/n! Your sobble knocked over the shelf!"

"Uuuuuuhhhhh!!!"

[casualmaraudering]

Slavic Remus headcanons

polish, to be exact, as prompted by a friend. kind of a niche thing but it's a guilty pleasure of mine

born in a very small village in the west-pomeranian voivodeship to a polish mother and welsh father

ironically Lyall didn't even speak the language at first. Hope even went and translated her own name when they met. he was head over heals tho so he followed her all the way to eastern europe, they bought a cosy little house and had Remus

Remus grew up mostly just walking around the woods or the fields, picking poppies, climbing trees, typical childhood stuff

he's got a bit of a foreign accent, as expected, and he's Very self conscious about it. he's mostly learned English from reading so often times he doesn't exactly know how to pronounce, it's tough

he mumbles to himself in polish, especially when he tries to remember something. Sirius thinks it's adorable

there's this one specific brand of chocolate (wedel) he loves but its kind of hard to get a hold of unless you find a specific store, it drives him crazy

if he goes to visit his family, he comes back with like a whole Backpack of chocolate bars. and other various snacks

drinks black tea, drives all of his British friends insane with it

has a lot of very passionate opinions about politics (you can't exactly be bi and trans and Not hate the government)

sometimes he has moments of nostalgia when he'll listen to music he used to listen to when he was younger, it helps with being homesick

he really loves reading about slavic folklore and mythology. ask him about it and he'll rant for hours

the thing he misses the most is, of course, food. he keeps telling himself he'll learn how to make all the traditional meals he knows, but he never gets around to it

James and Sirius sometimes (esp during road trips) have this little game when they'll ask about a random word and he'll say it in polish, and then they compare it to english and french. polish is from an entirely different language family so the results are Vastly different

likes to translate idioms directly. just for the fun of it

counts only in polish, to much confusion of everyone involved if he has to do some maths and starts mumbling to himself

doesn't understand many references his friends talk about. the culture is quite different. only rich kids could afford nintendos so he doesn't know any pokemon names, or commonly known music that James and Sirius would listen to when they were young

can speak some russian, but only a few words

excitement whenever a game or TV show has a polish developer or background or even someone speaking his native language

Sirius tries to learn it, btw. he manages a couple lessons but the grammar is a bitch, he manages ten words maybe. he knows how to say hi, that's what's important

Sirius also knows all of Rem's favourite snacks and will sometimes order a bunch in bulk, just so Remus is a little happier

Remus is, frankly, appealed by British cuisine but who isn't tbh

he doesn't write stuff down in english which is a real problem when there's a sticky note about the groceries that Sirius Cannot read

a lot of inside jokes with Lily, a fellow slav

when it comes to him in the canon universe, his wand core is a scale of a strzyga (shed, not taken - which is very important for the Slavs)

[dirt-grub]

Dan and or chris for the headcannon thingy?

OKAY ONCE MORE FROM THE TOP CAUSE TUMBLR ATE THE LAST ONE

ahem.

Headcanon A: what I think realistically

Dan had a shit childhood and shit parents, and isn’t dealing with any of the issues spawned by that, hence why his life is kind of a disaster and his functionality as an independent adult is uh. subpar. 

Having grown up together and witnessed some of it secondhand, Chris knows not to bring it up too much with Dan. They both have an unspoken agreement and understanding not to approach certain topics with each other. They’re very good at reading each other, so Chris knows exactly how much he can actually get away with prodding Dan to act like a people for once, and vice versa Dan knows when to actually drop an argument when it gets into a serious place. Its incredibly weird for Elise to watch, and as incredibly close she is with Chris they have a very close bond that’s difficult for her to understand with how far back it goes. Also, in the beginning of Chris and Elise’s relationship, despite very vocally objecting to the entire thing when Chris was around, Dan begrudgingly gave Elise advice on how to speak Chris essentially, telling her what to avoid and what to talk about with him. He phrased it in a condescending way but we all know he was being a softie because he knows Elise makes Chris happy :,)

(also bonus every single roadtrip with all three of them ends up like this)

Headcanon B: what I think is fucking hilarious 

Dan is always visibly covered in cat hair. Trust me I’ve had a black and white cat before and you just can’t win. Whatever color you wear SOME of the fur will ALWAYS show up on it. You can always tell where Dan has been you just follow the trail

Chris’ gap/chip/whatever in his front teeth were the result of some dare. Based on a story from my childhood where we all dared a kid on my bus to lick the frozen bus window, and the bus jerked and he smashed his face on it and lost a tooth. Luckily irl it was a baby tooth but like that seems like a very Chris thing to happen even tho im sure its actually just genetic (also Brian if youre out there im sorry i laughed at you when you lost your tooth and im also sorry i stole your holographic staraptor pokemon card. id still have it if it wasnt for that miserable little troll bastard down the street who then stole it from ME a few years later. poetic justice i guess)

C: what is heart-crushing and awful but fun to inflict on friends

*cracks knuckles* i was born for this

Dan’s never slept a full night in his entire adult life, and has terrible nightmares constantly. His hypervigilance directly comes from his awful childhood, and Chris is his one single source of stability where most well adjusted people would have an entire complex system of friends and family to rely on. Chris is his ‘safe’ person -which I think is primarily an anxiety term but oh boy trust me is it a post traumatic thing also- The two have fundamentally different outlooks on the world and relationships, so theirs is pretty complicated, with Chris not actually realizing that despite the poor treatment, Dan has him on a pedestal in his mind that no one else has ever been privy to before. He has a damn shitty way of showing affection, but its revealed through his constant dependency on Chris and Chris alone that he holds him in incredibly high regards and would likely be devastated into complete nonfunctionality without him around. 

Chris has some self esteem issues with this and how it relates to his perceived importance in the lives of his loved ones. With Elise as well, he feels overshadowed by her talent and dependability, not realizing he’s the rock keeping both her and Dan grounded and relatively happy. Elise however is way better at communicating how much she loves Chris and genuinely both needs and wants him around. Also, I believe that Dan’s insane plots are some sort of an appeal to Chris in an outdated way- when they were younger they used to make those crazy plans together, as evidenced by the camp episode and mentioned a few times in passing (there was some line that stuck out to me in the gym ep along the lines of lets do it like old times, come up with a plan together) in Dan’s disconnected mind, he’s still in the past where Elise was never a participant in their lives and Chris and him were still immature and carefree, just the two of them against the world. In a misguided way, he thinks he’s inviting Chris to something fun and nostalgic every time he drags him along for something insane, not realizing in cases like the camp episode they were in the right and forced to fight back against something, and that stretching small grievances into huge meltdowns is an issue, the opposite of what would appeal to Chris now in his adulthood. Part of him is worried about him and that old bond being left behind if he doesn’t keep that very specific set of circumstances going. 

that got too long and psychoanalyzey lets move on HKDAUSL

D: would never work with canon but the canon is shit so I believe it anyway

TRANS TRANS TRANS T

this isnt as much a headcanon as an observation but dan has powerful new yorker energy (to me, the new yorker who never shuts up about new yorking). he just checks off a lot of the stereotypes and i wouldnt be surprised if the two of them had grown up around here instead of always living in cali like is canon. he checks all the boxes, rude, loud, opinionated, impatient, cant drive but complains about every other driver on the road, snobby in a weird despite living in a shithole apartment in a cesspool neighborhood, confrontational with complete strangers, colorful aggressive language, the whole thing. ive found personally that whenever im far enough out of state it is PAINFULLY obvious im from new york, given how im just naturally more aggressive in my speaking and mannerism completely unintentionally. Like, ive got a sailors mouth, i complain REAL hyperbolically, and until i noticed it it genuinley put people off who werent used to it HDUSALAS its just. the norm here. im not as angry as i sound lmfao i just talk real aggressive which is v dan

[horrible-monstrosity]

I find myself increasingly concerned with the direction Legends Arceus is taking the relation between humans and Pokemens. No, I'm not talking about the bit with Pokemans attacking the player directly when you don't have your own Pokeymans ready, that was going to happen eventually, but just... the Sinnoh myths had stories about humans and Pokemon being so close they were considered the same sort of being, there's marriages, what have you, coming from thousands of years back. But this game apparently taking place only some hundreds of years ago... and it's "before Pokemons and humans lived together uwu"? The fuck? I feel like the games have been significantly moving away from humans and Pokemon being equals of a sort who both benefit from being together to Pokemons being some superior beings who humans benefit from but not vice versa and Pokemans are the superior creatures who humans should grovel in gratitude to and put up with all the shit from while never daring to burden them in any way. See gen 7, where living in haaaaarmony means having their lives and culture corralled by some asshole fairies because people can't be arsed to fight the ultra beasts, except the trainers who're forced to become kahunas fight the UBs themselves anyway (where they're forced to become fanatical enough about fighting to become strong enough to do so, but they're not even expected to be strong to fight UBs it's to lead their community... don't try understanding it just eat fairy shit and get excited for more fairy shit I guess). Why not just have a culture of the trainers who want to be strongest, or who have the greatest talent, being lauded as UB-fighters and becoming community leaders as well? Naw man, doing everything as the fairies want is haaaaarmony. Humans can't be strong enough with their Pokemon teams to fight the UBs, but have to be strong for other reasons ordained by The System, but then the ordained stronk humans have to fight the UBs anyway. But the fairies help, I guess. I fucking hate fairies man. Fucking elves of the Pokemon world. Smug sparkling fucks, fuck em I keep forgetting about the ride Pokemon but it still feels like the humans are supposed to bow and scrape to earn the gift of basic movement services so I don't think it really counts Gen 8 I don't know as well but it seems to go like this: Doggos are responsible for all good, their trainers or whatever their human companions are might as well not even exist. The postgame story is about those eeeeevil humans thinking they have some relevance to the doggos or something, eeevil I must say, so they have to do something evil to prove that.... um, something. Just some dumb shit that feels like a strawman argument against humans having any place in this world. Grovel to doggos.

Gen 6 was around the point where the weird cynicism started to creep into the franchise, mostly ORAS's weird abandoned ship segment, but it's pretty clear of this... aside from one random ace trainer or something late in XY who asks you, humans benefit from Pokemons, but how Pokemons benefit from huamn??? huh??? You're expecting an answer from him but he's just like, I bet you can't think of anything huh, hmmm??? Grovel, human.

You compare this to gen 5, and I'm not even talking about the Plasma plot (which was clearly bait on Plasma's part to get the public's sympathy anyway), but things like using Excadrill to dig out the mines. The 'drills were getting to do what they loved- dig- and being treated well by the humans in exchange for digging this spot in that way as directed. An equitable relationship that produced resources. This sort of thing existed as a counterpoint to N and Plasma's stated beliefs that humans were nothing but horrible for Pokemon and that they could never live together... Ironically what the later games are leaning towards, except that there is a way, and that's for humans to go fuck themselves. And again, Sinnoh's old myths, as well as any other myths that involve people and Pokemon together going back thousands of years.

I'd really thought the idea of this series was that Pokemon and humans were practically made for each other, that they were together from the very beginning. Raising Pokemon allows them to have a crafted moveset including TM and tutor moves, gain EVs, use held items aside from the few random ones they find in the wild... it's baked into the game itself completely incidentally. But no, I guess it's a Pokeyman's world and humans are just intruding on it somehow. What the fuck. Sigh.

I'm hoping that "Pokemans are so dangerouse man" line is just about the red-eyed frenzied Pokemon and that we aren't going into all Pokemons attacking humans and humans living forever at their mercy and deserving to scrape and grovel just to survive their onslaught.

By the way, my autistic retard fanfiction: First off, when the wall breaks and the doggo statues are found that make everyone realise who the "real" heroes are (something we can THANK Bede for by the way, because if he hadn't destroyed a priceless cultural artifact Eternatus would have gone off unopposed... but no one ever acknowledges this, as Bede is shat on and disowned by Rose for following what Rose taught him and then forced to trune out by trunny granny. figures she's a fairy trainer, I fucking hate fairies)- the idea that the doggos alone are the "real" heroes is actually a misconception brought on by people/society's tendency to elevate Pokemon, similar to why people bought PLasma's bullshit back in Unova. So when Eternatus is starting its nukes, people are just waiting for the doggos to get going and beat it... but when Hop sees the doggo statues, his budding professor brain immediately sees the truth- both the doggos and their human trainers are needed to unlock the true power of the sword and shield items. This even makes some sense with the game mechanics, as Pokemon typically can't use items more complicated than a berry... so with Leon and co busy fighting the dynamax mons and knowing no one would listen to him, Hop turns to the only person he can ask- you, who saw the doggos in the foggos at the beginning with him, to go retrieve the items so the doggos can actually do their thing. Also, Rose was radicalised and groomed by some crazy apocalypse cult, an ironic inversion of his supposed grooming of Bede (here he actually has a heartwarming father-son relationship of sorts with him). They pushed him to push the darkest day plan up like he did, convincing him there's a desperate energy situation but secretly just wanting the maximum apocalypse-ness out of a single action (while possibly believing themselves that there's an energy crisis but that the real solution is to destroy shit so less people and things use energy). So there's that. In the end he's taken to jail, but it's not some absurdly mundane ending where he just gets arrested for apocalypse crimes, rather he's being questioned for what he can tell them about the cult, on understanding that he was coerced into this, and that he can pay for his crimes by giving information on the cult itself. Bede relates this to you with some concern for his sort-of dad. The Swordward and Shieldbert plot (I forget if that's their actual names but whatever) has the two bros asking you to aid in investigating the apoc cult while preparing to accept their destiny as the doggos' masters. You see, they've been raised for this, learning all about Pokemon companionship but having no actual close contact with Pokemon at all (to prevent any Pokemon from forming a bond with them closer than what they'd have with the doggo- your first Pokemon is special, after all). Book smart but street dumb, in other words. You know, as opposed to some inexplicable dumb shit because Mother 3 ruined an entire generation of game writers. They call on the doggos to battle the baddies and are disappointed they go to you and Hop instead of them, but ultimately accept it. Afterwards, Hop contacts Sonia with a request... soon he has the two brothers over to choose their very first Pokemon. Swordbro was going on about Swordog's nobility and Shieldbro about wanting to touch Shieldog's fluffy mane, so Hop has out a Yamper and a Wooloo, presented as a choice, but he knows exactly which one they'll each choose. This is another manifestation of his potential as a professor- not only doing the professor thing of handing out first Pokemon, but considering what Pokemon they'd work well with. Isn't that nice? Also there's something in there about Bede's long lost identical twin who's also being used as a pawn by the apoco-cult but I'll explain that later

My idea for the origin of the Pokemon world as we know it- Arceus didn't create Pokemon, or the world itself, but it is responsible for the way the world is now. Once upon a time, when humans and Pokemon were one kind of being, there was too much strife and disagreement among the groups and nobody was learning their lesson, so Arceus got fed up and split the world into two types of beings that would have to get along in order to thrive. It instated the "rules" of Pokemon battles, that attacks have set damage ranges and types have well-defined interactions, that attacks in battles only deplete some abstract hit points level instead of causing the damage they "should" for what they are (this doesn't apply to wild-on-wild predation necessarily, so it's a privilege enjoyed by Pokemon being aided or advised by a human). Outsider beings- aliens, maybe ultra beasts, etc- are "converted" into Pokemon when they enter "Earth"'s airspace, which is why even beings from the furthest depths of space follow the rules and biology of earthbound species. These "rules" require Arceus' powers but don't rely on its constant action, so it can be captured and hang out with a trainer for a while, play by its own rules to see how things are going, without disrupting the system. I'd never expected anything even vaguely like this to turn canon of course, because it's so specific and particular to the sort of ideas I tend to have, but... not like this man

[gentletwin]

Headcanon: What is Smash? Where is Smash? How is Smash?

( Note these are just personal headcanons that build on the already-established fanon of the Smash Mansion! No one has to fully agree with me on any of these obviously but it may help contextualize some of the things I write in Smash-verse threads. )

In-universe, Smash is a fighting tournament which spans multiple different universes. It’s famous all across the multiverse, and only the best, brightest, and strongest get invited. You don’t apply to be in Smash. You wait for your invite.

Smash is situated at a hub of sorts within the multiverse, which all of the fighters’ different universes can connect to in order for everyone to convene. Cross-dimensional transportation is covered by the organizers. Don’t worry.

The guys running all of this are Master Hand and his slightly more chaotic relative Crazy Hand, who are beings disconnected from any particular universe. They know about the fighters in all of the different universes. They choose who gets invites. Does that make the hands gods? Or maybe Eldritch creatures detached from spacetime? We don’t know, but they give everyone free housing, so no one’s really complaining.

Despite how Classic boss fights make it seem, Master and Crazy Hand are actually benign outside of combat. ( It’s worth noting that in those Classic boss fights, which might make the Hands seem malicious without context, they’re simply the final challenge before a fighter claims victory. ) They put together each tournament and nominate the fighters — Master Hand the “heroes” of a given universe, and Crazy Hand the “villains.” Together, the Hands organize the events, created the whole Smash Mansion for everyone to live in, transport fighters to and from stages, and ensure that no one is actually mortally injured during the fights. Ever wonder why there’s never any blood in a Smash fight, even as people swing swords around and breathe fire? That’s the Hands’ technology at work. Fighters who get launched into oblivion, only to be safely returned back to the stage? The Hands’ technology. Shouldn’t all of this hurt like heck? Not with the Hands watching. Basically, you'll get knocked around and might come out busted up pretty good, but the Hands’ protection ensures that no one is actually gravely hurt.

Outside of fights, everyone is generally on friendly terms. It might be up to you to ask the hero and villain of any given universe how they feel about each other when separated from the chaos of their home universe ( ahem, Ridley ), but everyone is at least able to live under the same roof.

Speaking of that roof, the fighters all live together in a massive mansion that has gradually gotten bigger over the years. Every fighter gets a room, and they have every amenity they could possibly need or want. A huge kitchen and dining area to feed all the mouths there, a common area, a terrace, a beautiful garden, training facilities, and not to mention quarters for all of the Pokemon, assist trophies, and what have you. As the scale of Smash has expanded over time, the mansion has begun to look more like a gigantic estate. The mansion is also conveniently situated close to grocery stores, convenience stores, clothing stores, parks — pretty much anything you could think of.

This particular tournament ( Ultimate ) has expanded to such a wide scale that the mansion is multiple acres of land and has guest quarters for any friends or loved ones a fighter might want to bring to spectate. This is unique to Ultimate — spectators could previously only watch from their home universes. ( This is also how all their spirits ended up scattered around in World of Light — unfortunately, all these people from all over the multiverse being gathered in one pocket of it was the perfect scenario for Galeem. )

Anyone who isn’t staying in the guest quarters is able to watch matches on TV, livestreamed, or whatever their universe’s equivalent of that technology might be. They can also go in person if a match takes place on a stage in their universe.

Each tournament is one “year” apart ( in IC time; i.e., Brawl and 3DS/WiiU were one year of in-universe time apart despite the actual games being separated by six years of real time ). Though honestly, who really knows? Time might flow differently from one universe to another.

Lastly, it’s important to note that things like Subspace and World of Light are interruptions to the tournament which, thus far, have all come with the threat of the destruction of the multiverse. During these crises, Master and Crazy Hand are typically taken by whatever final boss is masterminding the whole operation ( Tabuu in Brawl, Galeem and Dharkon in SSBU — this is actually alluded to canonically in WoL ). Since these fights are not tournament sanctioned, the protective technology is not in place and there is real danger in these fights.

Once the Smash festivities end, transport back to one’s home universe is also covered. Contact is generally kept between fighters in between tournaments wherever possible — though cross-dimensional reception can get tricky.

[echotovalley]

so because I’m taking a writing break but still super needy

I figured I would post this outline for a pokemon au that I’m never going to write. it’s basically notes from a conversation I had back in early 2018? Imagine my surprise going back now and realizing this might read much like Detective Pikachu - cubone is just my favorite pokemon

***before we get into anything please know that while I play pgo and I’ve learned LOTS of new pokemon, I’m still the most familiar and attached to the og 150 + 1. I also probably get a lot of canon pokemon rules and history wrong but my heart is in the right place

reblogs appreciated! | come talk at me about your thoughts or literally anything

premise: keith might not be a pokemon person

but pokemon are definitely a keith person

- for unknown reasons keith docks in cuba, he's kind of just been getting work and moving moving always moving because one place never works out for long. pokemon are everywhere but it's not his thing.

it never happened for him besides why would he make an animal be saddled with him? there's no stability there. and again, he's always moving. through so many different regions.

he doesn't have the heart to yank a sandshrew onto a barge across the atlantic or a charmander up the northeast coast of the US. he can barely take care of himself. and it's weird by now. to not have a pokemon by now. they were everywhere and so normalized.

they were part of everyday school curriculum and even in hospitals and rescue stations. which is another reason why he never stayed in one place very long because not having a pokemon didn't incite people to trust you.

bc even team rocket (team rocket still sounds so much better than team galra but team rocket is the galra) had pokemon that bonded and trusted them.

he gets a room and some horrible job on the coast and basically just gets by. tries not to cause trouble or get caught or encourage rattatas or a caterpie to follow him home because they could still smell half the lunch he didn't eat tucked in his bag

- i'm plotting by the seat of my pants but what really kick-started all of this was the thought of Keith finding a wounded cubone in the middle of the night.

it's too dark and raining to tell what animal or pokemon attacked it or if it was a person that fractured the skull he wore enough for a piece to break off along the jaw

the cubone sustained a mean looking scrape to its face and this is not what keith needs right now but he can tell the cubone's crying and kind of just accepted what's happened and it keeps pawing at the missing piece in the skull and keith may not actively interact with pokemon but he doesn't hate them and he still has a heart.

he's docked in cuba and his spanish just gets him by to get food and money and not anger anyone

he didn't think the barge's docking region through all of the way so he's got a cubone to help with rudimentary spanish that sucks on the best day but he's going to try and get the cubone help

he starts rushing through streets and people's yards because he could have swore the town had a gym he passed but in the dark and rain it takes him a full hour to find the gym.

- duh it's closed but he's at least going to bang on the doors and hopefully it's going to set off an alarm or something

the police will show up or someone will be able to take the cubone where it needs to go. his hand is numb from knocking as hard as he could before the door is whooshed open and someone is spitting rapid fire spanish like venom and he thinks he manages to get out that he can really only speak english and shoves the cunbone into their hands.

before he knows it, he's being yanked by his collar into the gym and down hallways and finally into the blinding lights of the pokemon center on sight.

there's more spanish and faces that look so similar that its clear it's a family that runs the gym.

- beep beep guess who's family owns and runs the gym

the pokecenter is actually a rehabilitation center founded and run by the McClain family for several generations

he gets questioned after the cubone is taken back behind the doors and it takes someone repeatedly snapping their fingers in front of his face to get him to come back to the conversation.

his name's keith, he's from the US, he just found the cubone - no he doesn't know if it has an owner, doesn't even know if it’s wild or if it has a nearby pack or how it got hurt or how long it’s been hurt.

but keith,

keith is his name and he can at least answer that.

he stays there over night and finds out that Marco is the one that answered the door. Veronica is the one to actually examine him because he looks like he's about to pass out.

their mother is the one to assure him the cubone would be fine - her daughter Rachel attends to injured pokemon and gets another son Luis to show Keith to a room in their house and keith passes out the second he stumbles to a bed.

- in the morning, when he goes to the bathroom and is in the middle of washing his hands, another son is banging on the door for Marco to get out of the bathroom and that's the first time he meets lance

when Keith yanks the door open he tells him to freaking stop because he's clearly not marco.

an older man, probably come to break up a fight, stops and blinks at keith before shouting over his shoulder about not remembering having or getting another kid (arthur "and who are you???" weasley style)

(our boy Lance has a minor panic about the cute random guy is his bathroom at 8 a.m.)

Keith gets shoved down at a table covered in food for breakfast and can't keep up he definitely has a headache and is ready to throw himself through a window when he's asked about his pokemon and if they need help too

he doesn't have pokeman and never has had one and isn't really interested and this family has centered their entire lives around it

- he sees the cubone again, in recovery and it paws a little at his hands in thanks

over the next few days, he stays with them and somehow gets roped into doing chores around the facility and given an assigned seat at their table for meals and he's just T H R O W N

they literally have an arbok taking a nap in a hammock in their backyard and a pod of seadras in an olympic pool in the gym just hanging out (doing little races between each other or chasing each other)

a vulpix he learns belongs to one of the McClain siblings (Rachel) sunbathes and sniffs at his feet while he’s working in the yard

and there's a persian destroying blinds in the living room window and a charizard in the kitchen

and some random small children he learns are marco's are throwing or shooting across the floor fridge magnets as a game with a magnemite

- begrudgingly on McClain’s part, keith’s assigned to Lance for being shown around the rehab center

lance takes him to the beach and out into the middle of the ocean on a boat

Keith: "this is where you feed me to a gryados"

Lance: "close"

and a freaking L A P RA S pops up out of the water and clicks at lance and makes little waves in his direction and they do a damn forehead touch he's crazy this is crazy

Keith: "YOU HAVE A LAPRAS???!!!!" - because even keith who doesn’t do pokemon knows what the heck a lapras is

Lance "I don't have a lapras. Nobody owns her. We just give her her room and protect or heal her when she needs it"

- the next few weeks see lance having to admit keith isn’t so bad and that just because he doesn’t have a pokemon, it doesn’t mean he actively dislikes them

the cubone is attached to keith - despite his bad attitude, lance says

this is the initial thought that kicked this off: keith asks if they have a 3D printer and once the cubone's injury is fully healed, he makes a mold for the missing piece and fits it in place

lance denies crying

"you've done one (1) good thing, kogane"

- then the real plot kicks in when the lapras is captured and taken from the beach by team rocket

lance blames keith because of the timing, because of keith's vague answers on where he's from, why he has no friends or family, no pokemon

insert painful, raw, yelled, "I TRUSTED YOU"

keith convinces him he's not part of team rocket and the main story starts where lance and keith leave to go after the lapras and return her to cuba.

- before they leave, rachel throws a pokeball at keith "i think your cubone might like this one"

and lance's eyes get huge because he knows what it is and then a pokemon is coming out of the pokeball

and it's a marowak

the cubone very carefully and slowly approaches her and the marowak just watches and waits. the cubone brushes its bone across the marowak's foot and then approaches and okay keith's eyes definitely water as he watches this marowak kind of take in the cubone.

(THE CRITICAL HIT COMES WHEN THE CUBONE EVENTUALLY EVOLVES. I like to think maybe through poke-magic the skull fixes itself when he evolves and the cubone hands the 3d mold back to keith and gets keith to put it on a chain safe for his skin to wear the 3d mold piece still)

- obv they get the lapras back,

they find out keith's mom was a double agent ofc for the team rocket faction that took the lapras

they meet hunk and pidge and allura and coran and romelle and others along the way to take down team rocket because what’s a pokemon au without the power of friendship

- keith and lance wait at the airport in cuba

it's for shiro, he had let keith travel because he saw that keith needed to find room to grow and find who he was

obviously keith is not 10. he and lance are 17.

anyways he rushes keith and pulls him into a big hug and tells keith how proud of him he is

the first thing lance tells shiro is about the time keith almost stepped on an exeggcute and how they chased him

or the time he almost sustained a skull fracture from a taurus and the time a seel thought keith was its mom

there was also that time with a magby-

keith: “OKAY LANCE WE GET IT THANK YOU”

BONUS:

keith being mildly terrified of the pokemon hanging around the McClain properties

Lance: "if you want to lay in the hammock just move him"

Keith: "just move him?! it's an arbok not a lap dog"

a nest of torchicks gets laid in the backyard and follows keith for two days after they hatch and lance laughs so hard he cries because keith can't shake them and he winds up tripping and they all jump on top of him

keith might not have been a pokemon person

but pokemon are definitely a keith person

[starcoanonymous]

My Story with Starco and my Letter of Goodbye

Hi, not sure if anyone reading this will know me but I’m Starcoanonymous. I’m a giant fan of Star vs. the Forces of Evil and Starco and have been in the fandom since I discovered it since the first four episodes were released. I grew this blog and wrote a ton on fanfiction.net as FanfictionForDayz in the hopes that one day, this ship would become canon. Looking at myself right now, it’s really strange how this is the only shipping pair I would truly care for and how obsessed I was by it. I don’t care though. It changed my life for the better. Today, I have finished watching all the episodes of Season 4 that I have missed due to college. Now that Starco is canon, it is time for me to say goodbye. This is more for me to remember the good times in the show but if you would like, feel free to tag along for the awesome ride.

Backstory:

Where to start? To begin with, I’m not much of a fandom guy. I did love to watch cartoons but I would never be a real ‘fan’ of the show. That’s as true now as it was then. The only show I was really ever going to be a fan of is this one.

However, the shows that I did like always had unfinished ships. For example, in Pokemon, everytime I wanted Ash and the girl to be together, they wouldn’t. In Yu-Gi-Oh, the main protagonist would never get with the girl. I hated it when that happened. I wasn’t fully aware at the time what ships were and how much I really hated to see that type of thing. Also to mention, I did not like those drama filled, complicated love stories like seen in Twilight and other media back then.

Around 2015 is when I found SVTFOE. I was a sophomore in high school and things were just tough. I wasn’t being bullied or anything, I just was not enjoying high school very much. Now I know I said I’m not much of a fandom guy, but around that time I was also reading the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series and reading a TON of fanfiction about it. I loved Percy and Annabeth being together but there really was no visual representation to latch on to (the movie did not do that series justice). It was really around then I discovered that I loved to see the characters I loved get together.

Season 1:

The TV in the living room was on and by happenstance, it was turned to Disney Channel. I think it was turned to “School Spirit” and something about the show, irked me. The art style, the personalities, I have no idea but as SOON as I saw Star and Macro on the same screen, I absolutely needed to know who they were and what this show was. So, I decided to give this show a try. Dear lord, you cannot imagine what happens next.

At this point in time, the first four episodes were out and the fifth was about to be released in the upcoming week. I watched the first four episodes and I have never been the same since.

There was something refreshing about this show. Something dare I say, magical, about how they structured the first few episodes. I really for the life of me cannot tell you what that meant, but I can tell you that every single night I rewatched those four episodes OVER and OVER again. I am not joking when I tell you that I probably have watched those four episodes combined at least 50 times. After doing research, I came across two very, specific pictures/gifs created by tumblr user @skleero​ which sealed my fate.

I still have no idea what about this made me go absolutely insane for this show but I do know what made me fall in love with it. The first is the art style. This show’s art style is FANTASTIC. I absolutely love the art style and I praise Nefcy for that in my mind every day. Second, there were no real hints about shipping given out at all. Taking a look at the first four episodes, I didn’t know where this show would take it. I found out however, that I loved not knowing. I hated the idea of not seeing this ship come to life but I loved the possibility that that was the case. I consider this, “shipping masochism.” After all, the goal is worth more if it is hard to achieve.

I was obsessed. Maybe you don’t realize yet how obsessed I was. I literally paused and played each of those four episodes until I examined every single scene where Star and Marco was nearly in contact with each other. Yes, it sounds like an unhealthy obsession but looking at myself today, it truly did me good. It brought me so much joy to watch this show I only have good memories of that time.

Episode 5 comes around and I enjoy it as much as the previous episodes. However, I find out that there is a two month long hiatus until the next episode, “Mewberty/Pixtopia.” To cope with this, I look for other ways to satisfy my needs. I research everything I can about Starco, I scrolled through google images to look for more fan art of it, I even played the game that Disney came out with on their website to promote it. I don’t exactly remember what it was called but I got a tip off saying that Ludo called Marco Star’s boyfriend and that was all it took to get me to play through the whole game and screen shot that exact moment (they later removed that line, sneaky people).

Around then is when I started to read fanfiction for the show. I loved the endless possibilities. I loved not knowing where this ship would go. So, I read every fanfction. Yes, EVERY fanfiction. I first went through fanfiction.net and read EVERY. SINGLE. AVAILABLE. FAN FICTION (about Starco). I became upset that there wasn’t anymore as there were only about 20ish pages of fanfiction stories at the time. So, I went on Archive of Our Own and read every single one there (about Starco). Then, since I still was not satisfied, I read every single fanfiction in the most obscure websites, and saved the text on my Notes app on my IPhone (which I still have. I love these stories).

At this point, I still did not have enough content. I needed more. I found out about tumblr and looked through the Starco tag, but I needed more. So, I got the idea that, instead of looking for content, why don’t I just make it? So, I started up a blog here where I would repost a ton of things and make a few funny edits a long the way and created an account of fanfiction.net where I would write a ton of my own fanfictions on my account FanfictionForDayz.

And so I went, spending all my time enjoying writing fanfiction, watching SVTFOE, watching every scene for every single touch between Star and Marco, trying to find out who Toffee was, banging my face into my pillow as I witnessed Bloodmoon Ball all up till the end of season 1.

Season 2:

At the end of season 1, I couldn’t imagine not being as obsessed with this show, but well, as time flew and there was no episodes for a whole school year, I started to write less and less fanfiction and read less about SVTFOE. I was growing up a little and didn’t have enough time to wait for that Season 2 to come out.

But when it did come out, I was so pumped. It had been nearly a whole year since season 1 ended and there was nothing about to stop me from watching my favorite show. And so I went, absolutely enjoying the show and enjoying the little hints they were pumping out about Starco, even acknowledging the name of the ship in one of the episodes which made me cry honestly.

Then came the dreaded episode. ‘Bon Bon the Birthday Clown.’ All my worst fears were realized. Starco was not cannon and my headcanon of Star and Marco being each others first kissed went out the window. I truly did enjoy the episode but man did it sting. The first realized ship of this show and it was not the main one. I vented my frustrations with funny clips and simply believed Starco would be end game.

Two videos I uploaded during season 2 &3:

At this point, I truly could not bear to write anymore fanfiction. I really only liked writing headcanons, things that were still possible in the show. I did not want to write anymore headcanons with Jarco still being a thing. So I trudged on cursing (not really) Daron for torturing me.

Near the finale, I went crazy. I could not believe Star was revealed to liking Marco. To me, this was the most forbidden thing that anyone could ever do in this show. Why? My previous experience with non-canon ships made me believe that ships were supposed to be on the down low, not mentioned too much as part of the story. This was different however, and out came my excitement as one step towards Starco finally had been accomplished.

Season 3: 

I’m not going to lie, Season 3 was probably my least favorite. I’m sure you can see why. Right as Jackie and Marco broke up, Tom and Star get together. It was like cruelest fate as a Starco shipper. So close, yet so far.

Not only that, I did not enjoy it as much as season 1 & 2 because it put too much emphasis on the drama and love in my opinion. I liked the scarcity of it because it made it all the more sweeter. I also did not like the drama being the main focus of the story. I preferred it in the way that there was a main plot and the drama was just a side plot. Nevertheless, I enjoyed watching every single episode.

Season 4:

Here I am in college, and for the first time, I told Starco to wait. I love the ship but I needed to get good grades this quarter. So when time came for the final season to come out, I decided to wait. I decided for the first time in a long time to get serious with studies. Starco didn’t take away my time for studying at all, I just decided to hold it off until time came where I could enjoy season 4 to the fullest, by myself just like when I first started watching this show. No fanfictions, no tumblr, no news, just me and the episodes.

I achieved the highest grades I’ve gotten in a long time with a 3.8 GPA this quarter. After that, I was ready to watch season 4.

At first, I paced myself. Two episodes a day. So I could fully enjoy them. Eventually, around episode 14 came around and I gave in to my love of the show and spent the whole day watching the rest of season 4.

Watching the show, seeing all the previous characters come back, and realizing how different the show was from the first episode made me realize, the adventure is coming to a close. I knew it was coming and I knew that there probably wasn’t any chance of season 5 happening because the story was wrapping up so nicely. I just hoped. Hoped for the perfect ending.

Finally, 4 years of patiently waiting. 4 years of driving myself so that I could see Starco become a thing. 4 years. And I finally see it. Not only are they simply smiling at each other, they even kissed; a real kiss unlike the one at the photo booth. They are both single, both are ready, both like each other, and both kissed.

Now, as a mature, college sophomore, who has moved away from the cringe of their teen years, I’m sure you understand that I handled it like a mature, responsible- Who am I kidding, I screamed so loud I’m sure I’ll get noise complaints for my neighbors. I praised the world as I saw my ship become real.

Only, there was one more problem to settle.

I didn’t know what was going to happen. Was Marco going to be sent away? This would be the cruelest fate. The universe itself trying to rip your ship apart. I had to hold my breath. Then came the portal at the end of the final episode. I screamed at Star and Marco to run like their lives DEPENDED on it (mine did). 

Then came a most beautiful ending. Hey. It made me want to cry. My ship was canon. That’s all I needed. There are infinite possibilities from what could’ve happened from that point on but to me, I couldn’t ask for better. I would want to see an epilogue of some sort but I’m fine with even this. The deed is done. Starco is canon. And my job is finished.

Goodbye: 

Dear SVTFOE,

Thank you. I am obsessed with you because you portray something I believe in. Tom said it perfectly: “I need someone I can be best friends with.” My teacher once said that your spouse is your best friend. I believe everyone’s fateful other will be their best friend. I wanted to believe in something that didn’t seem too likely. I wanted to believe that anything is possible, and it did. Even if it wasn’t that unlikely, it happened.

You gave me the strength and energy I needed when I felt down. You gave me a reason to grow. You gave me a reason to grow up. Even though at times I didn’t like where you were going, I found that in the end, I enjoyed you through and through. I wouldn’t change a single thing, because I would not have done better. It is about time to say goodbye. One day I will return the favor. I don’t know how or who to, but watch me. I will definitely do it. I will treasure you forever, and once again, THANK YOU.

Sincerely, Starcoanonymous

[fatesxedda]

Mun Day Ghost Story

A bit late since my day off has been consumed by pokemon but better late than never. Something I have wanted to talk about is my own experiences with the supernatural. Nothing as cool as you see in media or see in anime but they are experiences that have imprinted on me for good or worse.

I will put this under a read more but if you’re interested? Take a looksee.

So before I start, I want to make my mental health history clear. I am not a schizophrenic, I am not known to hear voices or see things, and if I were? My parents would have had me diagnosed long ago. My family has a plethora of health issues so we try to stay on top of things as best as we can, my self included.

What I do have is autism, asbergers to be specific with ADHD with a bit of neurosis however none of these are known to cause hallucinations. I want to get this out of the way because for a little while, I thought I was going crazy or that I had something else going on in my head. It should also be noted that after we left, I have not had any more of the experiences I am about to talk about. I have not heard voices or seen anything since. We moved when I was 18 and I am 23 as of writing this so it’s been a good 5 or so years and I still haven’t heard or seen anything.

With my mental health covered, I can now get to the real topic. I will try not to ramble too much but I will set up the story a bit. Before we moved to North Carolina, we lived in West Virginia. When I was about...8 or 9 my mom just had my second sister. We lived in a small house, not big enough for a family of 5 so we had to move from Crab Orchard to Beckley, a short distance but that doesn’t matter. What matters is the house. On paper, it was perfect. A bit of a fixer upper but it had 4 bed rooms, one for each child and one for my parents. My grand parents lived down the road and despite it being in what would eventually become a bad neighborhood, things were quiet and peaceful.

It was an old house, built during World War 2 according to my grand parents. I think I heard someone say the original occupant was an old lady and that she died inside but it’s been so long, I could be remembering wrong but that has stuck with me ever since. For awhile things were alright for the most part, but as a child I would hear creaking and movement through out the house at night. I was never one to sleep at night, and if you know anything about ADHD, those who have it don’t sleep easily. I never slept much as a child and if you look at me, it shows. Every night, I would hear what would sound like creaking to the point I would cry and hope what ever it was would go away. Eventually, I would start closing the door at night, hoping that it would just stay outside the door. It could have been my anxiety but it always felt like something was at the door, just standing there. Hell, to this day, I can’t leave a door open at night, lest I see something I REALLY don’t want to see.

Something TV shows about ghosts get wrong (in my experience anyway) is how they make it seem like it’s a constant threat, something is happening every night. If that were the case, you would grow used to it. In the old house I grew up in, something would happen, stop for looooooooong periods of time and then it would start up again. Like, something happens and then you are in this constant state of fear like “Is it going to show itself tonight? Tomorrow? Next week?” Whatever was in the house was scarce enough for me to not be able to predict what would happen and when, which really fucked me up in that regard.

Through out my middle school and high school years, the following would go on. Instead of going into long anecdotes, I’ll just summarize each encounter:

As mentioned before, I don’t hear voices. I don’t have schizophrenia nor am I on heavy drugs that cause hallucinations. With that said, on two separate occasions, I would have a man whisper in my ear one night and then a woman. I can’t remember exactly what they said, but I think it was one word like “Wait” or something along those lines. To be honest, I think I was too scared to really memorize what they had said and to this day, I sleep with a pillow over my head as it keeps my ears covered.

My mom’s mother would occasionally visit us and on this one particular visit, her purse flew off the counter. She looked at my mom, told her she had to leave, and she quickly hopped in her truck and drove off. That was the last time she visited us; she refused to come to our house unless she was with our grandfather and even then she refused to step inside.

I always knew something was in the house, so I always kept a light on somewhere in my room. My night light was the private bathroom my bedroom had. But once or twice, I would see a shadow move across the light. After that, I would close the bathroom door and use my TV as a nightlight. This may sound childish but I still need some sort of light or I won’t sleep well. Luckily I have a salt lamp so it makes me feel better but it still feels silly that I need it...

Speaking of the bathroom, something was DEFINITELY in there as I had three encounters! The first being while I was in the shower. I recently came to the conclusion this had to be supernatural because I was showering, something fell, busted a piece of porcelain off the toiler and cut my leg. I thought about it the other week and I can’t think of what caused it. On one hand it was so long ago that maybe I don’t remember but at the same time, I don’t think I was close enough. The bathroom was small, small enough to where the toilet and tub were adjacent to each other. I’m still iffy on this one but I can’t think of any logical explanation for how a piece of the toilet broke off and cut my leg. It hurts my head thinking about it...

The second encounter was, once again, shower related but instead it was after I got out. I was drying off, taking my time, probably getting ready for school the next day only to hear a loud *BANG* and something fly past my head. It was a shampoo bottle. I know I didn’t have it on top of the medicine cabinet as it would make no sense to put shampoo there. I looked behind me and nothing was there. If it wasn’t for the fact that I didn’t want to tell my parents at the time, I would have totally used one of the other bathrooms.

And then the third and last remembered encounter with what ever was inside that house. I was in my room, my mom came in and laid on my bed while I was chilling at my desk. She was bored and just wanted to see what I was up to and made herself comfy in my room. We were shooting the breeze for a bit until at the corner of my eye, I see something in my tub. I thought it was my sister and I was “Hey! What are you doing in the tub?”. Well my mom left my bed room door open and my sister was in the room next to mine and is all “Uh what are you talking about?”  I made one take and for a second I saw something black with red eyes peering at me from behind the shower curtains. But because I did a double take, it was gone when I looked the second time, the only evidence of it being there was a shifting curtain that close. Suffice to say? I freaked out a little.

This one is a bonus as this did not happen to me but one of my sisters. This is after we moved from one state to another and one day while she and my mom are out and about, she(my sister) gets a call from the old house. Last we heard, it was vacant so there should have been no reason for her to get a call. Well, she answered it and when she asked who it was, there was response, only a moment of silence before the other end hung up. We never figured out what happened but we haven’t gotten a call from the old place since.

There’s probably more that I’m forgetting but that’s basically the run down of the major stuff. I was there until I was 18 and I have to say, it’s been unpleasant, I won’t lie. I told my mom all about it since she believes in this sort of thing I later learned. She had a few occurrences happened but nothing like I had to the point she thinks I’m sensitive to this sort of thing. Everyone else in my house are skeptics but I know what I say, I know what was in there, and it wasn’t friendly.

As a side note: According to my grandparents, the area we lived in was once fought on during the civil war. They would use a metal detector and found quite a few things, even a canon ball! If I had to guess? I think the house is haunted by a pissed off solider maybe? Maybe even the old lady that lived there over a decade ago but I’m not completely sure to be honest. Frankly, I don’t care as long as i stays over there. We considered asking some local priests to bless the house, and considering Catholics are known for training exorcists (look it up), you would think it would be a good idea but I learned it isn’t that easy and they will more than likely turn you away.

But yeah, that’s my long winded story of my old haunted house. Take it for what you will. If you made it this far? Good on you, I applaud your patience! Have a good night and don’t fuck with the dead.

[musashi]

what happened with musajirou? i'm on their blog and they're making it out to look like they're a victim of bullying. which is super manipulative if they in fact bullied you and your friends? just to be clear, i 100% believe your retelling, and you dont have to respond to this if it's a situation u would rather keep private. it doesnt involve me personally, except that i will block them if they were shitty. just super unclear what happened bc their retelling is just " TR fandom is toxic bullies"

KSDL;FSDJF;GKLFSD omg

a few years back, me and some friends made some PSAs about the general problems the pokemon fandom has with reposting art. most japanese artists who use mediums like pixiv and twitter to share their art are not okay with their art being reposted without permission, and the pokemon fandom in particular is REALLY bad at respecting this. 

we talked primarily about rocketfandom because that’s where we’re most active, and some members of rocketfandom took this VERY personally. i don’t know if they’re just thirsty for notes or what, but a lot of people just COULD NOT HANDLE the idea of being told to not repost art. and it wasn’t like we mentioned anyone by name! it’s such a wide-spread problem, and so many people circulate that art without knowing, it can’t be blamed on any group of people. i reblogged SOOOO much reposted art when i first joined tumblr, hell i reposted a lot of it myself.

james-team-rocket, musajirou, & buchichiu were the most vocal about their disdain for this idea that artists were to be respected. the latter two used the classic, ‘well I’M an artist and i’m fine with it!!!!!’ defense. so i blocked them, because i block people who annoy me. we have not interacted since then.

prior to this, most of them were a source of annoyance to me and a lot of my friends, anyways. jez (james-team-rocket) would reblog queer headcanons attempting to “disprove” them with canon evidence. musajirou would reblog innocent posts from me and my friends and just leave ridiculously negative garbage on them all the time. after we all just rolled our eyes and blocked them, they started vaguing about us on private apps thinking word wouldn’t get to us. a number of them, most notably musajirou, badmouthed my friend jessica pretty bad, even though she’s really never done much beside get on to make goofy jokes every once in a blue moon.

jez has a habit of making personal posts where she rallies her followers to bother me in order to circumvent blocks. at one point she smeared another rocketblogger i was friends with, claiming that this blogger called jez out directly even though it was ME who was doing the calling out. jez purposefully screencapped my her blog in such a way that it looked like this other blogger was at fault when it was ME!!! naming names and picking fights. why? because i’m untouchable. i block everyone, i stand up for what i believe in, i scare people. consistently, these members of the fandom tend to only go after folks they view as easy to cut down and bully. that blogger jez framed ended up nearly run off the site for things that had nothing to do with her. the lot of them then tried to appeal to said blogger’s senses by sending her asks in the vein of we know it wasnt you, honey, it was that evil bitch musashi.

we were also able to connect musajirou’s IP to a number of troll accounts. these accounts were meant to directly smear the kind of rocketbloggers me and my friends were--they were incredibly hyperbolic accounts that loudly sang jessie’s praises while consantly bashing james. this was in response to me and my friends calling out the misogyny in the rocketfandom, how the woman in the ship was often villified while the man was treated like a Soft Baby Boy Who Could Do No Wrong. when they weren’t this, they were loudly queershipping, reblogging rocketshipping posts to derail about how ‘lol they’re gay sorry!!!!!’ in an attempt to make fans who interpreted the rockets as not cishet look like ~crazy faggots lol!~

eventually, these accounts devolved into outright homophobia. unsurprising, lmao.

and again i’d like to reiterate, i blocked all these users LONG before all of this. their temper tantrums have and always will be responses to things i say on my own blog far away from them. it’s wild how the people in rocketfandom wildly recognized as toxic & ones to avoid are the ones calling people who don’t engage with them bullies. almost makes me wonder if maybe they’re the problem! xD

yeah i name names and yeah i don’t forget. nasty fuckers get remembered! you can call me a bully all you want, if it shuts your ass up and keeps you away from this website then good, it’s a much healthier place without your negativity and my dash has been a much brighter, dare i say MUCH GAYER place since i blocked y’all in 2017. stay mad! 

EDIT: forgot to mention jez also sent her friends after me lol... here’s one of the better messages i got from one of them:

heterophobia is real because some lesbian on the internet wants you to not repost art