Pokepunk: Somar IC

[Kareeah_Indaga]

((Pocket hunting:))

Once located, Pendra puts the security badge back in the jacket pocket, making sure both to memorize its location and button the flap over it so it won’t get lost. Hopefully, it will be useful later.

((Muk fight: ))

Pendra feels a familiar rush of panic – and an answering gurgle of gravel in her mouth. She’s been spitting up sand every time she’s gotten badly stressed since this whole mess started. At least now it’s useful!

((Sand Attack!))

[Lord Raziere]

Rachel
She dashes in front of the Muk and begins raking it with her claws, attacking it directly, feeling the FIGHT! part of her instincts kick in as she begins aiming for its eyes- even if the rest of the body is liquid, those are vulnerable right? and as long as she keeps in front of it, any attacks won't poison the others if its too busy dealing with her.
"C'mon ya big pile of goop, come at me. Nyeh, I bet your mother was a clean-smelling ditto and your brother was a psychic type."
She says taunting it while she attacks.

[MCerberus]

Rogue the Rockruff Hybrid

With two already engaging the Muk it seems it would be too crowded if Rogue gets involved with the battle directly. Plus the rules have gone out the window. Rogue jumps across the room blurring for a second before appearing to split in two (Rogue uses Double Team). The two Rogues aggressively begin charging directly at the scientist.

[gmoyes]

Alex Morgan

Alex froze in spot as his brain when multiple different directions when confronting the scientist and his Muk. The most blatant was the [FRIENDLY FIRE PROTOCOL ENGAGED] blue overlay over the poison type.

The second was his trainer instincts, smug that Echo or Bravo would deal with the poison type no problem with their Steel and Psychic typing. But that thought was dashed as he stuck his hand in his pocket where he'd normally find their pokeballs and remembered that his Pokémon were stolen from him. His heart clenched, fearful what would happen to his team. Pretty much all of them were incompatible with human biology, but that didn't mean there weren't being experimented on.

The third part was his memories as a researcher. The Grimer line fell within his field of study of non-biological (even if there was some biological compounds in the goo that made up their bodies), and while he didn't spend too much time with them due to their stench, there must have been something of use. Muk were animated piles of industrial waste, as such contained a wide range of poisonous, corrosive and cancerous compounds. This made fighting and training them quite dangerous. Fortunately they were quite slow, though they just need to land a solid hit, then win through attrition. With this one already released toxic gas into the air, the longer they fought, the more weakened they would be. There had to be some way to clear the air or neutralize the poison.

By the time he had these thoughts, everyone else had already jumped into action. Rachel and Pendra attacked the Muk while Rogue ran towards the scientist. Then all of a sudden, it was as if all the different pieces of his mind clicked together. The poison is the key. Rachel and Violet were the only ones (he himself was still biological enough to be effected) immune to it - the scientist would be just as vulnerable as anyone else. Muk could suppress their native toxins for the sake of their trusted trainer. Hopefully this Muk would either it would nullify the toxins, or not bother, turning them against each other. A plan came together.

"Pendra, keep your distance, we don't want you poisoned. Rachel, Violet, keep it busy. Rogue, knock the scientist into his own Muk, see if he would like a taste of his own medicine."

As he said his orders, a wave of guilt struck him. He was ordering them around like they were his own pokemon. Was that adding insult to mutilation? But it was the best he could do with his abilities at the moment. Hopefully his new companions wouldn't take him giving orders the wrong way.

[Kareeah_Indaga]

Pendra is mostly acting on instinct at the moment and has exactly zero problems with someone else calling the shots, as long as they know what they’re doing. So she immediately backs up out of the way.

[Rater202]

((Pocket hunting:))

Once located, Pendra puts the security badge back in the jacket pocket, making sure both to memorize its location and button the flap over it so it won’t get lost. Hopefully, it will be useful later.

((Muk fight: ))

Pendra feels a familiar rush of panic – and an answering gurgle of gravel in her mouth. She’s been spitting up sand every time she’s gotten badly stressed since this whole mess started. At least now it’s useful!

((Sand Attack!))

The Muk begins coughing for a moment and tries to move sand out of its eyes.

Rachel
She dashes in front of the Muk and begins raking it with her claws, attacking it directly, feeling the FIGHT! part of her instincts kick in as she begins aiming for its eyes- even if the rest of the body is liquid, those are vulnerable right? and as long as she keeps in front of it, any attacks won't poison the others if its too busy dealing with her.
"C'mon ya big pile of goop, come at me. Nyeh, I bet your mother was a clean-smelling ditto and your brother was a psychic type."
She says taunting it while she attacks.

"Muk! Muk! MUK!" the creature shouts and, surprisingly, you can understand it.

Roughly translated, it is saying something along the lines of "Good madam, I will have you know that my mother was a mixture of industrial sludge and sewer water brought to life by radiation reflected from the moon and my father was a Galarian Wheezing. I am fully aware that you are having a rough day of things, but I am only doing my job, there is no reason at all to be rude."

Mukese is a very efficient language.

Rogue the Rockruff Hybrid

With two already engaging the Muk it seems it would be too crowded if Rogue gets involved with the battle directly. Plus the rules have gone out the window. Rogue jumps across the room blurring for a second before appearing to split in two (Rogue uses Double Team). The two Rogues aggressively begin charging directly at the scientist.

"Ah crap!" the scientist says and tosses another Pokeball as he backs away swiftly.

Now there are two Muks, the second one having bands of color down its body and crystallized bits of toxic material.

"Muk!" It declares. (Alola, Bob)

"Muk," the other answers. (Sup Jerry.)

"Muk" (Not much, what's going on here.)

"Muk muk muk" (Oh, you know those weird things the humans have been doing to those other humans, trying to make them like us? Well, it turns out the other humans don't like that. But what are we gonna do? We just work her—)

It is at this point that Violet uses scratch on the original Muk. All this seems to do is piss it off.

"Muk!" (excuse me, I was talking to Jerry!)

the original Muk(Bob) uses Mud-slap on Violet, sending Violet barreling back somewhat

All business now, the Alolan Muk (Jerry) places himself between Rouge and the scientist and uses Harden.

[Lord Raziere]

Rachel
She blinks at the sudden understanding but decides to leave that question for later. For now, she had a Muk to yell at.
"Okay 1: We're enemies moron! Rules of politeness are scrapped when I'm doing a violence! So either turn against your trainer or put up your dukes! 2: I know exactly what I said, its smack talk meant to screw with you! 3: I'm not taking this customer-service level nonsense from a literal pile of toxic sludge working for an evil mega-corp! Your like the entire reason we need more recycling!"
Also some part of her is telling her that as a natural poison type like nidoran she is obviously better than those artificial polluting poison types. She decides to ignore this instinct while continues scratching at the Muk in front of her.

[MCerberus]

Rogue the Rockruff Hybrid

Splitting again into a third double-team image, Rogue moves his way to surround the Muks and scientist between him, two images, and the rest of the group.

"And we're leaving, with you being the thing stopping us."
Although the mirror images are talking, anyone with advanced hearing senses would be able to tell the real one.

[Kareeah_Indaga]

Pendra looks uncertainly from the purple Muk to Rachel to the multi-colored Muk and back again, holding back gravel. She’s already been warned off that and is unclear on what else she can do to help, so she settles for mentally willing her new inhumanly tough hide (shell? Chitin?) to keep her safe for the time being. ((Harden))

[Rater202]

Rachel
She blinks at the sudden understanding but decides to leave that question for later. For now, she had a Muk to yell at.
"Okay 1: We're enemies moron! Rules of politeness are scrapped when I'm doing a violence! So either turn against your trainer or put up your dukes! 2: I know exactly what I said, its smack talk meant to screw with you! 3: I'm not taking this customer-service level nonsense from a literal pile of toxic sludge working for an evil mega-corp! Your like the entire reason we need more recycling!"
Also some part of her is telling her that as a natural poison type like nidoran she is obviously better than those artificial polluting poison types. She decides to ignore this instinct while continues scratching at the Muk in front of her.

"Okay young lady, this is starting to get irritating. I will have you know that My kind, as well as our cousins the Koffings and the Garbador, literally eat the toxic pollutants that birthed us. Even since our respective species evolved we have perhaps done more to clean up the environment than a hundred recycling centers."

The normal Muk tries to use Mudlsap on you.

Rogue the Rockruff Hybrid

Splitting again into a third double-team image, Rogue moves his way to surround the Muks and scientist between him, two images, and the rest of the group.

"And we're leaving, with you being the thing stopping us."
Although the mirror images are talking, anyone with advanced hearing senses would be able to tell the real one.

"Muk! Poison Gas!" the scientist shouts.

The Alolan Muk breaths it's poison gas in the general direction it thinks that Rogue is in.

Everyone should probably be careful to avoid it. It'll disapate soon, but...

Pendra looks uncertainly from the purple Muk to Rachel to the multi-colored Muk and back again, holding back gravel. She’s already been warned off that and is unclear on what else she can do to help, so she settles for mentally willing her new inhumanly tough hide (shell? Chitin?) to keep her safe for the time being. ((Harden))

Luckily neither Muk seems particularly interested in you right now, but...

Violet steps up, clearly hurt by the ground type move she'd bene hit by early(X4 weakness)

And noticing what the loan Muk did...

"Everyone stand back."

Violet swings her tail and her own Poison Gas comes out aimed for the Alolan Muk's location.

And it very clearly doesn't feel very good.

"Oh Great Lord Arcerus, is this what we've been doing to people!"

[Lord Raziere]

Rachel:
She will duck under the mud-slap to avoid it. What does it take to rile this Muk up?
"Now I know your full of it. Oh wait I don't need to, your made of it! Guess that is why your working with a corporation, they do like smelling their own waste."
This usual tactics nonsense wasn't working. Muks wouldn't be affected by any of the moves she has. Her scratches clearly aren't doing anything. So she tries to tail whip the Muk with a sweep of the tail (Tail Whip) to catch them off guard as a feint then scratch the Muk as they are more vulnerable.

[Kareeah_Indaga]

Pendra is already standing back, per previous instructions. But otherwise she’s in much the same position as Rachel is, with the added complications of no combat experience and no poison immunity. She looks around to see if there is anything in the vicinity she can use to help - first aid kit? Ventilation controls? Anything she could throw?

[MCerberus]

Rogue the Rockruff Hybrid

With the air filled with poison gas at his and his images locations Rogue can't really avoid the inevitable consequences. Luckily it's not like getting hit by a hyper beam. The effects will be minute-from-now Rogue's problem. He rushes in to the non-hardened muck classic since the scientist is being covered and throws a shard of his own super-hard silicate skin at the thing, hopefully right between the eyes.

[Rater202]

Suddenly, another explosion lets out, shaking the building.

The ground below your feet splits, the building begins to crumble part and you all suddenly find yourself moving very fast and very up.

In the corners of your eyes, you see a figure shrouded in some kind of orange energy flying up but you're being thrown around too much to get a clear look at them.

You come around somewhere in the first of white-barked trees. It's very late at night, and there's no sign of roads or paths...

Or of Alex.

Spoiler: OOC

Show

Excutive decisions. gmoyes isn't responding anymore, and there are too many people to wait for him... since going for the computer is a him thing...

If He turns up, then the rest of you will run into Alex in the room with the relevant computers having been destroyed in the last explosion, otherwise...

Ans Raz, feel free to have the rockets react to that explosion however you feel is approaite, though my intent is that nobody actually died. Was something trying to get out, not something going on a rampage.

[Lord Raziere]

Before the Explosion:
Rachel is fight furiously trying to get out.
"Darnit what to do, what to do...."
Then Lizzie and the four rocket grunts come running up having heard the fight, stopping right in front of Rachel
"Lizzie!" who turns exclaims
"Rachel!?" Lizzie says, confused at hearing her voice come out of this nidoran-like person
They had no more time before things blow up.

Rachel as she flies through the air feels the familiar urge to say:
"Tea-t-t-t-.....Rachel Nightley is blasting off again!!"
She falls into the distance with the others there is a twinkle and a ding.

Lizzie similarly says
"TEAM ROCKET IS BLASTING OFF AGAAAAAAIIN!"
As she is blasted in a similar direction with a similar twinkle and ding, the other four grunts sailing slightly off her trajectory.

Rachel and Lizzie:
The two wake up before everyone else. The other grunts nowhere to be found. They sit up, groaning, this wasn't their first blastoff. They've survived falls like this before. They didn't know how, it was just something you picked up on the job, but they can do it. They look at each other glaring, tired and bit hurt, but not out of it. Rachel talks first.
"Lizzie.....what are ya doin' here?"
"We were raiding to get to you. To get the info about the Snag'em machine."
"Heh, I knew it. Too bad, I don't know, when they kidnapped me the took it off me. could be anywhere in Somar now. or they kept it in that building and its blown up like everything else."
"Well, thats a loss but I see a new opportunity right here. Look at this, you like this hybrid pokemon or somethin'. I saw you, ya were fighting pokemon yerself. I'm thinkin' ya got pokemon powers from it. Do ya know what it means?"
Rachel growls
"I have an idea...."
"Well if its to take you and show you to the Boss so that we study you and reverse engineer the process, perhaps figure out how we can make our own- we can revolutionize how Team Rocket operates! Who needs to catch pokemon when we could turn our already best thieves into ghost types and literally go through walls!? Or be a fighting type to be extra muscle to threaten somebody? It would make everything more efficient- and more, just think of the potential of this!. Clearly these other losers would be too resistant to bring along, but you? I think you got potential, Rachel."
"Yeah, potential to be a lab rat for Team Rocket rather that.....alphabet soup of a megacorp. No thanks."
"WHAT!? C'mon yer a Team Rocket member, Rachel! My partner! I'll make sure you get promoted, a cushy job helping out the eggheads back at base, probably higher pay while you get trained up to be whatever the nidoqueen verison o' you is gonna be, your unique now! more valuable than gold! They wouldn't cut ya up.... yer one of us."
Rachel shakes her head.
"Pull the other one why don't ya. I've seen what Team Rocket does to pokemon. I've seen the rows of cages and kennels, the dark balls, the berserker collars, I've seen the equation and now I know I'm probably on the other side of it. I may be scum, but it takes no genius or saint to see where'd my place would be: on a leash or in a ball, cause I could take any one of you out before you draw a pokeball if I got strong enough."
".....So your not coming back with me?"
"No, I'm not. I don't trust Team Rocket to work for my best interests. Certainly didn't before when I was a grunt."
Rachel and Lizzie stand up now, raring for battle.
"Y'know I have three pokemon to throw out, and some pokeballs. My other grunts could be nearby. Yer making a mistake. I can try and catch you, see if it works bring you back and get all the credit of bring this new innovation to team rocket myself instead of sharing. Might want to reconsider."
Rachel bares her claws and falls into a fighting stance, glaring back, her team rocket hat gone in the explosion and her uniform torn up.
"May be three-on-one, but all I have to do is survive long enough and cause enough noise to wake up the rest of my allies around me, and they will take you down together. Then we will have captured you. You willing to bet those odds, Lizzie?"
They stare at each other a moment. Assessing the situation, calculating how much the other was bluffing and whether they could edge out a victory. Both of their prospects were... chancy at best. Whether they succeeded or failed would be decided a lot by luck. It was tense as they held each other's gaze, having a stare down each knowing the other from their partnership.

Then Lizzie turns around.
"....Fine I'll retreat for now, but this ain't over, Rachel."
She then runs off into the woods to find her grunts.

Rachel lets her run off, then slumps back onto her knees. Truth was, she probably still needed some time to recover. That was a bluff. Just because you can survive doesn't mean you were completely fine from the fall after all. She turns to the others lying on the ground.
"Hey, wake up, I can hear ya breathing, you okay?"
She will try to shake others awake.

[Kareeah_Indaga]

Pendra feels a rumbling underfoot, before she unexpectedly finds herself flying.

Being both surprised by the sudden change in circumstances and not terribly combat-savvy, she hasn’t processed more than that before she’s tumbling through the trees.

The next thing she’s aware of she’s half-buried in a clump of thorny blackberry bushes. But her injuries are no worse than bruises, and her mind catches up quickly enough to note that that would have been a lot more damaging if she were still human.

…and then she immediately chokes back tears, chanting …don’t think about it, don’t think about it, don’t think about it… to herself.

She can hear people talking but it takes a moment before she’s gotten enough control of herself to think coherently about leaving her prickly shelter. But at last she manages it, and pulls herself out into the open, the sharp thorns bothering her Hardened rocky skin (carapace?) not at all.

“H-here,” she manages shakily.

[MCerberus]

Rogue the Rockruff Hybrid

Still in battle with the adrenaline running Rogue spends his time before the explosion repeatedly trying to bash the goo boys in. He could, at the end, barely keep his footing before he goes blasting off with the rest of them.

Whenever or wherever they come to rest, Rogue has to take a minute to adjust. Not only is there the results of the landing but his blood is cold and stomach roiling from the lingering effects of the poison. The dust patch he landed in doesn't seem to have caused much damage, other than another tear near the hardest part of his arm. The wer-mon is too busy in his own personal world at the moment the pay much attention to the personal goings-on about the Rockets.

Upon being roused, Rogue can't manage much other than to expel some wonderfully color-coded purple poison goo and lose is bearings again.

[Rater202]

Violet, who is already injured due to taking a supereffective attack earlier, is the last to wake up...

"...Isn't this the forest with the really aggressive ghost types?"

And... Anyone in the region knows that yes, this is Osteo Forest

[Kareeah_Indaga]

Even Pendra, who was by no means an expert on Pokémon, knew about the Trevenant; the guards had mentioned them before. “Thought they were Leaf types?” That didn’t sound right. “Grass types?”

[Lord Raziere]

Rachel Nightley
She take stock of the situation. She wasn't native to this region, so she shrugs.
"Sounds like you know better than me Violet. I'm not from this region. Don't know anythin'. But yeah, grass types, generally tricky. Stun spore, sleep power, poison powder... and if they're ghost types, thats even worse cause of confusion, curse, beings that can turn invisible and go through walls....this sounds like a tricky place then. And we don't have medicine to heal any of that, or where to find berries that could substitute them here. We should probably figure a way out. But we couldn't even snag anything to navigate with before the building blew up."
Her whiskers and big nidoran ears twitch in annoyance.
"If anyone knows where north is or whatever, now would be a good time to say. and I'll probably have to try something like relyin' on my nidoran senses and instincts to survive and find stuff to eat."

[MCerberus]

Rogue the Rockruff Hybrid

Still quite woozy but over the shock, Rogue finally gets steady on his feet. Considering what the others are saying they're in quite the situation. They have to get away from wherever they are yes, but if there are ghost types... Rogue's mind sort of short-wires for a second. He doesn't like stories about ghost types, but they're less of a hassle during the day.

The were-mon tries to get his bearings. What time of day does it appear to be? Any wind? Human him has been short on supplies before but he always had- his brain short-circuits again.

"Are we going to be avoiding the road?" he asks. "We may run into more corporates, but we could get lost in the deep woods."

[Kareeah_Indaga]

Pendra looked around; if the sun had been up she’d be able to point to north, but with the sun down and with the trees obscuring the sky? No.

She did, weirdly, feel safer here in the dark than she had back in the lab. Some half-buried Pokémon instinct or just the knowledge that she was away from the scientists? She couldn’t tell. Of course she could see in the dark; she was sketchy on how many of the others could, so maybe they felt differently.

"Are we going to be avoiding the road? We may run into more corporates, but we could get lost in the deep woods."

“I don’t see any roads.” Pendra felt obligated to point out. Or paths of any kind really. Which meant…what? No Pokémon wanted to travel through this patch of forest on a regular basis? Or…the others had said they were all ghosts that could phase through solid objects, so maybe the local Pokemon just didn’t need to make paths.

[Rater202]

There are no roads. People aren't supposed to come into this forest without authorization.

There is however a patch of loamy soil within sight. There may be berries in this forest.

"Honestly, it might be better to try and find shelter and... Rest for a while. We did just get blown up and... Mud-slaps hurt."

[Lord Raziere]

Rachel:
She thinks on this
"Yeah we should probably find shelter. But food and water is a priority. We gotta eat somethin' sooner or later."
She will stand up looking around her eyes will suddenly widen in realization.
"Wait I have an idea! We can understand pokemon now. You heard the Muks talk back there. If we find the pokemon native to this forest we can simply ask them questions about the forest. If we can secure their help, we can get both shelter and food by listening to their directions. Unless they're jerks, in which case we rough 'em up a little in a battle like trainers do, then ask 'em a few questions. So I'mma just find some nocturnal pokemon to talk to."
She will start walking to find some. You might want to carefully consider whether a former rocket grunt is the best person to do this though?

[Kareeah_Indaga]

"Yeah we should probably find shelter. But food and water is a priority. We gotta eat somethin' sooner or later."

Pendra examined the blackberry bushes she’d landed in more closely to see if there was fruit on them. ((DM? Your call.)) She was uncertain of the wisdom of approaching apparently-aggressive Pokemon on purpose, but she also was probably the least experienced person (did she still count as a person?) when it came to Pokémon here, so she didn’t voice her doubts.

[Rater202]

Rachel:
She thinks on this
"Yeah we should probably find shelter. But food and water is a priority. We gotta eat somethin' sooner or later."
She will stand up looking around her eyes will suddenly widen in realization.
"Wait I have an idea! We can understand pokemon now. You heard the Muks talk back there. If we find the pokemon native to this forest we can simply ask them questions about the forest. If we can secure their help, we can get both shelter and food by listening to their directions. Unless they're jerks, in which case we rough 'em up a little in a battle like trainers do, then ask 'em a few questions. So I'mma just find some nocturnal pokemon to talk to."
She will start walking to find some. You might want to carefully consider whether a former rocket grunt is the best person to do this though?

You find a Phantump.

Its log head is the same bone-white as the local trees.

"Get out."

"Yeah we should probably find shelter. But food and water is a priority. We gotta eat somethin' sooner or later."

Pendra examined the blackberry bushes she’d landed in more closely to see if there was fruit on them. ((DM? Your call.)) She was uncertain of the wisdom of approaching apparently-aggressive Pokemon on purpose, but she also was probably the least experienced person (did she still count as a person?) when it came to Pokémon here, so she didn’t voice her doubts.

Pendra finds some blackberries in the bush... There's maybe enough for a small snack, if you divide them evenly between you all.

[Lord Raziere]

Rachel:
"I would love to do that, Phantump. So if you could just provide us some directions to do that, we can get going cause we crashed here and are a little lost, can't exactly get out of the forest when we don't know where we are in it, now can we, ya get me?"
She says trying to reason with the Phantump.

[Kareeah_Indaga]

Pendra tries to direct the others to the bush and picks every blackberry she can find.

((Yes let’s split them up evenly.))

[MCerberus]

Rogue the Rockruff Hybrid

Still dealing with the consequences of the last battle, Rogue waves off the offer of berries for now. As the group talks about and Rachel then proceeds to communicate with wild pokemon, Rogue only has one thing to add, "Be careful with the ghosts."

[Rater202]

Violet takes her share of berries.

It is only after finishing them that she realizes that she's probably not a good udge of if the local black berries are safe to eat.

Rachel:
"I would love to do that, Phantump. So if you could just provide us some directions to do that, we can get going cause we crashed here and are a little lost, can't exactly get out of the forest when we don't know where we are in it, now can we, ya get me?"
She says trying to reason with the Phantump.

"Don't lie... You're with Them... You're all with Them... They're the only ones who comes here... Get OUT... Or Pay for what you did to us!"