[FIN] Call To Aid

[Suudonym]

Sending pokemon to scout seemed like the safest course of action, and while Luke had no ghost-type to assist in the endeavor, he did have a characteristically stealthy Umbreon, and so he released Tenebrae and sent him along after Giselle with the command to stick to the shadows and take care not to draw attention.

(Tenebrae would do so easily, but not without the proud thought that this was just what made darkness so marvelous.)

The Jirachi's panic was startling, and though Nicolette seemed amply ready to offer comfort, it was clear that she wasn't exactly calm either. Luke moved to place a hand on the legendary's head, addressing both her and Nicolette, "It's okay, that's why we're here. We came to help, right? I know it's scary, but try to stay calm. We're all going to do the best we can."  

[Blood_Goddess]

Though she found herself in the comforting arms of the girl, the words with it were kind and gentle, it was but a whisper to the noise of girl's own fears, not helped along by the group as a whole.
"Its coming back though," she whispered "I can feel it all again, the darkness, the loss, all again and I don't want to go back to that."
Back to the darkness she was born from, the hollow loneliness before she had another to speak with. She was scared, and the strong apprehension from the girl now holding her.
That hand on her head snapped her back to a more physical plane, and for a moment she found herself staring into the darkness at the features of kind people.
"This is it... This is where I start, how could I be from such a place. There is nothing good here." Even more hushed was the voice that spoke through their minds.

Something drew her attention, and the Legendary lifted her head again.

"Its okay." Rosie whispered "They're right, you should trust them, trust us."
The young trainer smiled at the Legendary still curled in on herself in apprehension. "We'll just have to be the hope they need."

Small lips parted slightly as the trainers moved back to the hall, waiting to see what the results of the search were. She still shivered under Luke's hand, and within Nicolette's arms, but their efforts seemed to have helped calm her.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

the Ghost and scouting dark type who would find the darkness in abundance, would not have to travel far before they come upon a dark figure standing dead center in one of the tunnels. Still, and poised, as if the person was listening hard for a noise he thought he heard.

Another step forward, slow, cautions, knuckles almost white on a pokeball in his large hand.  

[Gwennythe]

When the slab opened suddenly, and the air blew out, Gregson was knocked backwards, startled. He wobbled on his back, like a tumbled Torkoal, for a few seconds before Lin stepped forward to pick him back up, and pat him for 'a job well done'.
The Igglybuff looked back at the hole; he'd helped to open that! It was unlikely he'd be persuaded otherwise anytime soon and he sat, fairly proudly, back on Lin's shoulder.

Jeeves, from his vantage point, might have been heard to huff a sigh, slightly exasperated with the tiny pokémon's antics, before he lent himself to helping bring people down, much as his further evolved counterpart was doing.
With Gregson still occupying Lin's good shoulder, however, he once again sought out Akira, hoping he was still welcome to that perch for now; oh, he could walk perfectly fine, but there was a certain dignity to a human steed.

Lin, Gregson and Jeeves all noted the rising panic of the Jirachi, and the attempts to comfort it.
Lin felt conflicted; he was glad to be here, he wanted combat, but they had brought... Nicolette, and this Jirachi, and they seemed so... unsuited.
The boy tried to stand toward the head of the group, straining to listen.
He didn't have a ghost type, and he wasn't entirely sure that Moriko would be comfortable down here after all.  

[Suudonym]

Luke nodded his agreement to Rosie's words, offering encouragement in his tone, "It's not hopeless, and we're here to prove that."

Tenebrae, meanwhile, was slightly surprised to come across a human - and such a nervous-looking one at that. That nervousness was rather enticing, actually, and with a sly glance to his either side, he filled his lungs and unleashed a piercing Screech.  

[BlackFireKitsune]

The presence of both Luke and Rosie seemed to help calm Nicolette as well as the legendary, and she hugged the Jirachi to her gently but firmly, raising a hand to her back to help steady her. If they were all together, they would be fine - they would be fine, and they would be able to help the pokemon that needed their help.


Giselle remained invisible as she floated all around the man as they approached him, frowning severely at his presence. She had expected the source of the noise to be from a pokemon, not from a human. Regardless, this was an opponent that needed to be dealt with, and the Mismagius swirled around in front of him, and suddenly appeared directly in front of his face as Tenebrae screeched at him. Well, she had every intention of doing that herself, but he'd beat her to it - no matter, she would just provide the visual.  

[Blood_Goddess]

All at once there was another face in his face, though he could barely make it out except for two glistening eyes staring into him, as an screech as if from the nightmare pokemon himself erupted from the darkness.

A shrike that could cuttle blood rang through the halls, but it didn't stop there, the man, obviously sounding as if he feared for his life continued to scream, swearing the entire time as he turned and in an instant had booked it in a flash back the way he had come.

The Pokeball had somehow been thrown from his hand landing and popping open to reveal a confused looking Chingling hung in the darkness
"ching?" confused it looked back down the hall, where its trained had fled "CHINGLING!?"

Ray rocked herself back and forth in rolls of silent laughter, doubled over and slapping the ground, while Rosie stared down the hall with wide, shocked eyes. "Was that a Screech?"  

[BlackFireKitsune]

The sudden shriek that reverberated through the halls around them badly startled Nicolette, and a sharp cry escaped her as she clung to the Jirachi a little tighter. When nothing attacked them, and when the others appeared only mildly confused by the sound and not concerned, it served to help calm her a little. Screech - was that a pokemon move? If it was, she didn't know that any of her pokemon knew it. It was rather frightening.


Giselle cackled gleefully as the man fled, then floated down a little lower to look down at the Chingling. "Mis."  

[Suudonym]

The sounds of a pokemon's and human's cries startled Luke into a state of alert, his attention on the shadows into which the scouting pokemon had disappeared. He nodded curtly at Rosie's question, starting off in that direction impulsively, "Yeah, Tenebrae's." The Umbreon's strategy for taking an early advantage was usually to use Confuse Ray; he wasn't sure what to make of the noise they had heard.

Tenebrae chuckled lightly to himself, a knowing look to Giselle indicating that he was quite pleased with their work. With the trainer out of the question, he stepped smoothly out of the shadows to address the Chingling,  

[Blood_Goddess]

The Chingling froze under the stares of two pokemon, one a ghost and the other a form of darkness in the shadows.
the little eyes grew wide for a moment as the shadows spoke to it.
<... Aw ******** this.> the Chingling was NOT doing this on its own.
Spinning a few times on the spot the small pokemon fled back down the fall after its trainer who was still screaming.

Rosie pressed a hand to her chest, her heart still pounding and now a fresh new batch of adrenaline was coercing through her, right as she had gotten down from the first time when she found herself hanging from a tree.

"Ah well, Looks like the stealth isn't going to work, at least now we know what direction to look." Ray said, still trying to stifle her laughs.
"Alright, Ghosts ahead let go." And with that the tall women returned to her full height and hurried down the dark corridor. Double Stripe on her heels.  

[TawnyAngel]

"Oh bollocks," Dith muttered under his breath as the screaming started. So much for stealth - indeed! Just a slight understatement. A soft word in Russian called his three living pokemon to form up at his heels, and though he couldn't see Zla he was sure that the ghost was long gone ahead of them. Heart rate starting to pick up Dith set off quickly after Ray.


Zla meanwhile was indeed well ahead, racing invisibly down the passageway after the screaming man. At least he was easy to follow! What the Jirachi said though... humm... well it was no good that was certain. Somebody was going to have to pay for it, and he was more than prepared to hand them the check so to speak.  

[Suudonym]

Tenebrae watched the Chingling go, not bothering to give chase. If it didn't feel inclined to answer him when he was being perfectly polite, he doubted chasing it down would do much good.

"Stealth's not totally out," Luke suggested as he moved with the group, searching the dark spots for his Umbreon. "They've only seen some of our pokemon; they don't know that we're here yet, and we can probably use that to our advantage. Sera," he looked to the named, "do you think Jacques could keep us hidden?"

Tenebrae, hearing the approaching humans, barked softly in greeting, and Luke paused to address him, frowning his mild confusion. "We're trying not to make a bunch of noise, right?" he chided. The Umbreon rolled his eyes subtly - it was just too good of an opportunity to pass. "Keep ahead, all right? And remember that we're trying to disable the enemy, not provoke them."

With a mental sigh, Tenebrae gave his nod of understanding and turned to continue down the tunnel, following the trail of the retreated man and the ghost that was already pursuing him.  

[Gwennythe]

Lin blinked at the loud noise and listened carefully after that.
"Maybe..." He conceded as people mentioned stealth being out, but then he nodded, agreeing with Luke. They had only seen pokémon, really...

Gregson, at some point, had scrambled atop the boy's head at the screeching noise, his already wide eyes even bigger.  

[BlackFireKitsune]

Rather than answer Luke's question, Sera turned to the Zoroark in question. "Think you can do that?"

Jacques snorted in response as if vaguely insulted at the thought that he couldn't do it. He nodded once in the affirmative as he wove an illusion in front of them so it would appear to anyone on the other side as if they were looking at a dark, empty tunnel rather than a group of trainers.

Giselle seemed vaguely amused when Tenebrae was chastised, but made no noise; instead, she floated after the dark-type silently, fading out of sight once more as she went along.  

[Akira Midoriyama]

Akira was grateful to both Double Stripe and Jeeves for the assistance in getting down the shaft. He would have hated to have to bring his own Serperior out to do so given his disposition, and Happa just didn't know Vine Whip. When they reached the bottom, of course, he gladly allowed Jeeves to return to his perch.

Jumping a little from the startling screech up ahead, he calmed a bit when Luke verified the sound to be his pokemon's. The screaming that followed it was certainly not, however. Once more he found himself pitying whoever it was and wondering what they had seen. He could have been just as easily frightened, guessing he was one of the 'city kids' Ray had mentioned earlier.

With a small sigh, he followed after the others, doing his best to keep quiet. The dark was kind of soothing in its own way and he glanced about at the walls as they walked. It certainly was a change of scenery.

The mention of Sera's Zoroark had roused his interest, as he didn't think he'd seen an illusion pokemon at work before. To his disappointment, however, all he noticed was the pokemon glowing. It seemed that to actually experience the illusion, he would have to have been on the outside of it, which would have defeated the purpose of it at the moment. Oh well; he could explore the concept later.  

[Blood_Goddess]

The Love Ball that was tossed next released a Raichu with heart cheeks.
Shaking herself out, the electric type blinked around the darkness before her trained stepped up next to her.

Ray took point, leading the others though the darkened hall with a step as quiet as she could, while still maintaining a quick pace.
The screaming had by now died down, either by the distance or he had just expended all the air from his lungs and was not longer feeling the same fright that caused the shirking in the first place.

Wherever he had gone, he was nowhere in sight, and for a while Ray was starting to wonder just how far he HAD run.
Though eventually, the group would be able to hear voices down the tunnel, talking from both human and pokemon.
Breeze cut off the flash that he had been letting glow dimly, leaning forward on Ray’s shoulder as the women pressed her to the wall and inched toward the turn where she heard the talking, along with frantic babbling.
“For ******** sake Damin!” Someone with a gruff voice burst out, his tone carrying no regard for a soft speech pattern, and it was obvious the speaker was frustrated “If you don’t shut him up I will! I’m already pissed as s**t dealing with this piece of s**t of a pokemon enough. I don’t wanna hear anymore spouting off about Ghosts in the mines! ******** GHOSTS!? Really?”

Ray motioned for the others to come around, making a motion with her fingers of five, indicating how many people where there.

A much calmer voice, spoke again “Gres, how about you get back to ******** work. And what the hell are you doing with that think like that? You know that profit right?”

There were five men standing around in a lit aria of the mines, all of them look tired, and dishelmed, clearly agitated, though there eyes were sharp, and deep frown s were set on their faces.
The speakers were of a broad man, with a mop of tangled brown hair, his jaw was sharp over a thick set neck. By his side was a panting Houndoom, whose eyes were locked on something yellow, gripped in the man’s hand.

The other speaker was a tall, but slender looking man, handsome maybe had it not been for the dirt over his face and the bags under his bright icy blue eyes, Mud and dust making hair that once looked black somewhat dusty and brown. He had an Umbreon by his side, looking unamused with equally bright icy blue eyes.
The way the men were standing around him would indicate this person being the leader; the others were standing on either side of the man who looked white and shaken, a Chingling at the man’s shoulder.
With the group they would find an assortment of pokemon, a Girafarig stood by one of the flanking men, along with a Pidgeotto, Bidoof and an Ekans.

At the comment from the man who seemed to be in charge lifted his first, and shook the small yellow thing in it at him.
As he did, the form hit the light, and the trainers would see that it was a limp Mew. It had bite marks over its body, along with burns from what they could only guess was the Houndoom.
“This is the fifth time this pokemon’s tried to get out! And neary did! FIFTH time! And you know who the one is who has to go hunt it down each time? ME! Damin, ME! You want my input, I’m tired of chasing it, How are we going to sell it like this?”

The hand holding the Mew’s scruff was lowered again to his side.
Damin rubbed his head “Okay yeah whatever, at this point I don’t care, get rid of it, it was an extra stock anyway. And for ******** sake, just shut up about it from now on Will you?”
He turned to the terrified man sitting down, reaching an arm out to get him back on his feet.
“Get back to tending the product; we can’t afford to lose anymore.”