Surprise got June off the back of her Manectric, as the mass emerged from that stupid mist. It barreled right into her ride, making her jump in her seat. “Arceus!”

She let go at about the perfect moment. Both Pokémon crashed and rolled off to the right, and gravity made no exceptions.Yet she did not stray too far from the Pokémon, her lost grip not fast enough to escape their motion. All June could do was cover her face and–

Thank goodness she had a helmet. Shrapnel from fights past and sand tore into her sleeves, but her head remained relatively intact as friction slowed her down. All things considered, this rough land beat the other one by a country mile. It only took a fraction of a minute to come to a halt, and all she got were sore arms!

Wait, why the positivity? They’re under attack! Again! Fuck. A scream bubbled in her throat, but she suppressed it for now. Instead, she shakily rose up to her feet and felt around for both her parcel and new knife.

The parcel was roughed up, but not a lost cause. Her blade came out of the holster fine enough. Meanwhile, her Manectric recovered from the attack. It had wiggled its way out of the other Pokemon's grasp. Blood dripped down from its haunches but otherwise seemed fine.

And pissed. A low growl escaped past its revealed teeth. Arcs of electricity bounced between the spiked fur all over its body. Static filled the air. Discharge erupted right towards the other quadruped, more akin to Frankenstein than a proper Pokémon. What the hell was that thing?

And where was its trainer? “Fucking show yourself, you bastard!”

June whipped the knife around wildly at anything so much as dared move. They didn’t show her how to use it properly, but maybe the Rocket would be scared by its presence in general. That other grunt that pulled one on her the other day did a good job of it. Maybe if June copied whatever Aurelie Lefevre did, she would stand a chance.

---

+10 MP (Post)
Zev Harcourt

This was a fucking joking, right? June’s heart sank into her boots as electricity arced off the creature, right towards the mist where the trainer was, but did absolutely nothing. Not only that, but they did it with a full set of fucking armor, or whatever it was. To top it all off, they sounded inhuman too. Probably a voice changer, but that only made this confrontation even more terrifying.

Manectric contended with quite the peculiar creature as well. It charged head on into the electrical hound with surprising speed. Try as it might, the best it could do is get mostly out of the way. Its attack clipped the Manectric as it dodged to the side, an awful feeling as its trainer currently shook in place.

The yellow dog gathered strength in its chest, then let it out with great force. A Shockwave shot right towards the Type: Null while the Manectric attempted to reposition. Better to put it between the other Pokémon and its own trainer; if it missed, it might hit Zev.

And June could use all the help she could get. Each step the stranger took forward, June tried to mirrored backwards. She thought it’d be like that one fight with that other grunt with a knife. Not a super soldier with a full bodysuit and shit. Why couldn’t this have been a two-person delivery, like her first day?

But she couldn’t just back up forever. Sooner or later, she’d be forced on the offensive. So, with adrenaline in full force, June brandished the knife. “Don’t need to do good, just need to do the job!”

The delivery girl took a few short steps forward. As soon as Zev got into range, she tried to his arm with a single strike. Just needed to hit the small space between the armor. Fuck up the arms, fuck up the offense! Or something like that.

---

+10 MP (Post)
Zev Harcourt

CLINK!

CRACK!

June watched in horror as the tip of her dagger shattered off. That was… not good. This guy must’ve had some hidden plate or some shit. Then why didn’t she hear it earlier? None of this made sense. Knives don’t do that! Maybe it was best to aim for the–

“Ahh, ow, ow, ow, ow–” June inhaled through her teeth. Fuck, this person had a strong grip! She took the knife with her overhand and tried to slash at their neck instead. Yet with each swing that either got close to the mark or missed by a mile, it didn’t do a damn thing. Did Rocket seriously need to send someone like this for someone like her?! Yet she continued to struggle fruitlessly against the stranger, who kept an iron grip on her wrist. Arceus, this fucking hurt!

Manectric didn’t fair any better. Even as it sent another Discharge through its electric fur carefully towards the Type: Null (as careful as chaotic electricity could be), it totally failed to notice the Shadow Claw until it was way too late. It tore at its side, which now made a pound-sign in its flesh. Sticky, warm blood flowed freely on its side, yet its opponent looked relatively unscathed. Things were not looking good.

Maybe… yes. “Grrrrrr, ruff, ruff!”

They’d both get killed at this rate. If they could just get rid of the trainer, then they could try to make a run for it. Get help. Manectric pivoted on a dime and started its war charge right toward its trainer. If a Pokémon fight wasn’t in its cards, then a Trainer maul was next on the list.

---

+10 MP (Post)
Zev Harcourt

June and ATV never got along. It always thought June bossy and annoying. June considered it little more than a pest, a complainer, and most above all a bastard. Every ride they’d ever gone on had ended poorly one way or another, but at least they continued to try and figure something out.

History has a funny way of repeating itself. This ride certainly ended in disaster, alright. Even as Zev let go of June as the Manectric jumped and clung to the stranger's back with all the energy in the world, it couldn’t get through the outer armor or hidden exoskeleton crystalline skin. Its teeth bit into fabric, plastic, or what felt like diamonds.

Then, spikes erupted from the person’s body. Right into the electric dog. Blood gushed everywhere as it went limp shortly after. Its eyes lost their anger, their annoyance, their everything. Just as simple as that, like a light switch.

June’s eyes met the hounds. They burned their way past her retina, into her optic nerve, and ingrained onto her thick skull. Bile rose to the back of her throat with its harsh acidity. Tears welled up in her eyes. Her whole body shook, the soreness in her wrist forgotten. Cold, primal fear took over every nerve in her body and every inch of her brain.

One step away. Then two. She tried to force words out, but none made it past her quivering lips. Then, all at once, she turned and ran right towards the mist. Her knife fell to the dirty sand with an unsatisfying thud. She sank into the vapors that danced in the air, desperate to get the fuck out of there.

Only when the weird smog enveloped her did any words find their way into reality, each one in time with her feet that stomped into the ground.

“Sorry--”

stomp

“Sorry--”

stomp

---

+10 MP (Post) + 200 MP (Pokémon Death [So long idiot bastard])

Zev Harcourt

June didn’t see the ravine through the mist. Rather, she found out when gravity did that awful thing it does. Her feet felt slight relief with the absence of ground, as well as her mind. Unfortunately, it was then greeted with a different kind of discomfort. That panic of weightlessness, the ground that rushed to meet her, the anticipation of pain–

Her bones crunched into the sand below, a sack tossed off the roof of a house. Her arms, try as they might, could do little to stop her fall. 

Well, they could do something really well. June felt something crack apart cleanly as the breath left her lungs. Odd when one considered how she still managed to scream in agony right after her right arm broke.

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA–”

Maybe even her pursuer heard the scream. She stole spare glances to the top of wherever she fell as her good arm tried to pull her forward, centimeter by centimeter. She was pretty good at running. Been doing it for almost two years now, and no one had caught up yet. Would this finally be the moment when something grabbed her by the foot and dragged her back?

This thought stopped as soon as she thumped into something solid. Even within the mist that confused and disoriented, June managed to pull her thoughts together for a single cohesive moment to identify whatever thing she’d just ran into. A long blue leg with nasty claws. Another one was on the left, and both connected to a red underbelly. The most prominent feature of it, though, were its massive wings. Red masses, like curtains, blotted out the limited sky as they extended to their full potential.

A head bent down, and June could barely freeze in place from her laborious breaths and sharp inhales of agony. It looked like a Salamence, but a lot more… primal. Like a beta prototype that came before the final product. Nostrils flared over and over as it sniffed her carefully. Should she be afraid of it, grateful it hadn’t attacked her yet, some weird mixture of the two?

The answer made itself clear when it reared its head back suddenly and bared its long, pointed fangs. There wasn’t any more brain juice to produce Endorphins or Adrenaline. Instead, it opted to send a shot of Cortisol through her system. She closed her eyestight, shoved her head into the ground, and started to cry as ugly as humanly possible.

The straw that broke the Camerupt’s back came in the form of a monstrous dragon that felt threatened by her. She’d been through hell the last few days: shot at by a group, shot at by a single person, lost a knife fight, watched her best friend get blown out of the sky and nearly killed, watched her own Pokémon die, and now had to contend with this thing.

This had been the greatest mistake of June’s life, and it took five near-death experiences to spell it out for her in the easiest way possible. Worse, there wasn’t any bailing out. At least, all those other times, something else had stepped in. But this? What could stand up to this hell-beast?

Thick sobs rocked her body, not alleviated by the sudden nuzzle of the large beast into her head. Nor the quick lick it did on her hair. As it put a meaty foot over her body and grabbed her with its large claws, her stress compounded infinitely.

Even as the Roaring Moon flapped its wings once, twice, and carried them both into the air, she wouldn’t calm down until the weight of it all dragged her into the restless lull of sleep. Today had been long, and the last few days longer. But as with the rest of her encounters, something cam to the rescue.

Perhaps due to the dream mist, maybe because the Pokemon thought of the girl much like its own young, or maybe for entirely unrelated reasons. 

And the parcel strap clung on for dear life. After all, one was lost for it to continue on.

---

+10 MP (Post) + 100 (Smog Completion) + 10 MP (Spawning in a Paradox Pokemon [This counts shut up]) + 200 MP (Winning the mission/battle [Hey Zev never got the package and that was the main point so...])
Also I purchased a Roaring Moon in the shop so this was shoved in to justify that existing
Zev Harcourt