she hadn’t seen him battle, but lulu had a fair amount of temp’s ability, at least.[break][break]

”you were a gym leader, weren’t you?”

she was fairly sure the answer was yes, but she’d held relatively little interest in the gym challenge in a long time, since her early days in hoenn..[break][break]

as they went along, penrose the poipole wandered small distances, almost seeming to be looking for something. more of its kind, perhaps. soon enough, they would come upon the wreckage of the quaestor lucis.[break][break]

”that’s it.”[break][break]

it was a strange mashup of historical and sci-fi, nautical elements married to mysterious technology that lulu imagined might contain many of the secrets to successful ultra space travel. perhaps with the help of minds like oscar clayton , rocket would be able to extract some of the answers to their questions.[break][break]

for now, they would explore the ruins for bodies.[break][break]

her headlamp illuminated a hole in the hull. ”there have been reports of strange activity within the ship, including hallucinations. if you find yourself feeling strange, let me know—immediately.” the extensive warning felt necessary. the ultra deep sea had proven itself to be a pit of countless dangers that could not be covered in one go, and surely, there were only more to be discovered.[break][break]

she’d enter ahead of him, steeled for whatever might be hiding in the dark.

[attr="class","ooc"]Tempest Quinn [break]

[attr="class","pkspr pkmn-poipole"]

upon, they were greeted with darkness that washed the corroding skeleton walls of the quaestor lucis. alien plants that had taken up residence since the crash seemed to reach towards them as they passed by. [break][break]

“yes.” indeed, today, they were bodysnatchers, here to haul alien corpses from their graves and to the flat, cold surfaces of laboratory tables. split open, dissected. whatever it took to learn all they could, even away from the eyes of those megalopolans that stood as their supposed allies. [break][break]

at temp’s suggestion, she nodded. “sounds good to me, although it is quite a bit darker down there. we should stick close to one another.”[break][break]

they descended to the lower decks. it wasn't granted any of the light bleeding in from whatever yet-to-be-identified source, far off in the ultra deep sea. instead, their headlamps were like peepholes through an inky black abyss.[break][break]

controls flickered at the far end of the deck. she didn’t think to ask temp if he saw it—although it was unlikely.[break][break]

the hallucination was perhaps not all an illusion, however, as it did illuminate the hand of a corpse, fallen off the side of a chair.[break][break]

“there’s one.”[break][break]

she didn’t notice the hand move, however.

[attr="class","ooc"]Tempest Quinn [break]

[attr="class","pkspr pkmn-poipole"]

”no, but there’ve been strange reports of similar things happening. some of it may be all in our heads. what do you see?”[break][break]

she watched him take a step towards the corpse, prepared to react if need be with a hand hovering over a pokeball. penrose watched as well, though didn’t seem at all threatened. as with anyone else, it offered a friendly wave, as the megalopolan rose to face them.[break][break]

lulu stared, trying to determine if it was real or not. the moment of hesitation was cut short when it began taking urgent steps in their direction.[break][break]

”penrose.”[break][break]

the poipole hovered closer, ready to cast a shield if necessary.

[attr="class","ooc"]Tempest Quinn [break]

[attr="class","pkspr pkmn-poipole"]

”i see it too.”[break][break]

she watched in awe as temp drew nearer to the approaching zombie megalopolan. why he was opting to use himself as the first line of defense was beyond her. ”temp—!” her eyebrows raised at the punch, winced at the cracking of bone.[break][break]

then the thing kept coming. perhaps that should have been predictable. if death couldn’t stop it, then what could?[break][break]

dodging out of the way as it lunged towards them, she glanced at temp again. ”any ideas?” he was the ex gym leader, after all.[break][break]

she had an ace or two to throw—though she preferred not to, unless necessary, still wary of how certain pokémon attracted others in the realm. ”darkrai’s here if not. just don’t get hit.”[break][break]

with that, she suddenly disappeared into the shadows of the surrounding wreckage.

[attr="class","ooc"]Tempest Quinn [break]

[attr="class","pkspr pkmn-poipole"]