It was strange to be in this world today. One minute, everything was fine and dandy. The next, rifts open up to reveal distorted worlds that seem to never end. Maverick, unsure where he was at this point in all this, was just begging Arceus not to kill him this time around. The brunt scarred man was getting the impression that no matter where he went, Yveltal was hunting him down.

Even now as he entered yet another rift to learn more, he couldn’t help the feeling that they were watching. Waiting for the perfect opportunity to strike him down for good. “Stay close,” the ex gym leader grunted to his pokemon companion, the shadow houndoom emitted a series of low growling grumbles, “I know just… keep your wits about you.” That part was pretty obvious.

Crimson colored orbs flickered over the scattered stones, a strange glow emulating off of them that looked strangely familiar. Tentatively, Maverick reached out to touch it. But he pasued, a sombering roar came from all directions. Great, now what?!

- 8:00pm. teaching shadow houndoom shadow sneak

This made Ettie think of the rifts to the Border, and Ultra Deep Sea. Some little tear in reality that she couldn't wholly comprehend, yet had to acknowledge all the same. It wasn't an exact 1:1 to those other rifts, yet - something about it felt similar enough for her to draw the connection.

She had watched as others left 'offerings' here - gifts, of some form... To the rift, she wondered? Was it alive? Or did something else lurk beyond it? It did seem like someplace she could explore for herself... Nor did she really want to - she knew better now, than to poke at strange portals like such.

With the pack lingering close at her back, Ettie would approach as the coast became clear - looking at the things that had been left here. And after a moment's thought, she'd decide to pull out some jerky and berries she had stockpiled in her bag, and left them here as well. Perhaps someone would appreciate it? Snacks were always good! Good food makes anyone happy, right?

An offering... When going to the shrines in Johto, Makoto remembered sometimes seeing a donation box, that you could drop coins in before you made your prayers. They also can't help but think of the things they'd sometimes see at the family shrine - lit incense, flowers, and the like.

They aren't sure what would be a proper offering for a rift, but... Given everyone seemed to be providing their own gifts of varying shapes and sizes, perhaps they wouldn't be too out of place even if they brought something completely out of left field.

They toss a few coins in, and they light a couple candles - having been unable to find proper incenses. A couple of claps and a bow, with the hope that whatever lays beyond is far more benevolent than the things that lurk beyond the rifts to Ultra Space. Or at least, that whatever lays beyond is appeased with this much.

Perhaps it's a sign, when later in the day, they see Tamamo's shadow shifting in strange and unnatural ways.

Oh boy, time to sacrifice something to the old ones. Or at least, give them a little happy gift. El wasn't sure if they liked the look of the foreboding rift that people had been leaving offerings at - but they were curious enough to leave an offering of their own. It'd be the nice thing to do, at least in their opinion.

Which then raised the question; would whatever lurks beyond appreciate some flowers, El wondered? The Distortion World - from what they'd heard from the gossip of others - was a bit of a frightful place. But perhaps the denizens would like a little bit of color and beauty to light things up, on the other side.

It was certainly a poetic way to think about it - and maybe a bit idealistic - but... It is the thought that counts, right? There was no reason to be rude to whatever was beyond - especially if it hadn't wronged anyone - right?

So, they had brought a small bouquet of flowers - local species, even if grown in a greenhouse - and like many others' gifts, it'd be offered up to the rift. Hopefully, it'd be well appreciated; alongside everything else that was being given up to the rift.

Oscar finally returned to the mysterious tear on Mt. Pyre once he was satisfied with his research. Surprisingly, he did not bring any scientific equipment with him. Instead he brought a bag containing a a Oscilloscope, and a tuning fork. Alright so the oscilloscope may technically count as scientific equipment but in Oscar's head it was more of a music tool.

Oscar stared at the ripple, satisfied to at least see that it was still here. He wondered if today's experiment would yield any results, after all this was a bit of a stretch even for him. You see, having become convinced that the world of science and logic would do nothing to explain a seemingly magic phenomenon, Oscar resolved to turn to the world of the occult. He was not familiar nor comfortable with the realm of the supernatural, but if it would provide insight into this distortion then perhaps it shall be worth venturing outside of his comfort zone. After going through several aged tomes and new age spiritualism novels, Oscar was certain he had a way to figure out what this distortion really was.

Oscar turned on the oscilloscope and pulled the tuning fork from out of his bag. He first got a baseline frequency by smacking the fork on a nearby grave and attaching it to the oscilloscope. It was a high pitched tune, the standard vibration you would get from hitting a tuning fork against a solid surface. He then approached the ripple, his heartbeat quickening as he drew closer to the mysterious tear. After a moment of hesitation, Oscar would smack the tuning fork against the ripple.

As he predicted, the tuning fork hit the ripple as if it were a solid surface. The vibration it made was obscene, the pitch of the tune being so low that it almost sounded like a horn. Oscar quickly attached it to the oscilloscope, and the frequency it read was similarly bizarre. The little screen that displayed the frequency signal was going wild, with the transverse wave spiking at the edges of the signal graph. Usually a spiked frequency would create less cycles on the meter, but there were countless cycles filling the screen. This would make it difficult to measure, but Oscar would attempt to do so anyway.

First he began messing with the knobs on the oscilloscope to make the wave more manageable. He then took out a pure red pokeball and released Genesect Prime, who waved happily at his master. Oscar began hooking up the oscilloscope into Genesect's head ports--taking a brief pause to wave back. When it was all hooked up Oscar asked, "Hey can you translate this frequency into binary?" Genesect nodded, letting loose a melodic beeping that Oscar had come up with to allow Genesect to 'speak' in binary. Oscar waved his hands frantically, "Wait until I can jot it down, doofus."

Oscar got his phone out and Genesect would begin reciting the code. Oscar got it all down, up until Genesect began looping the message. "That's all. Let's get back to the office and see what we got." Oscar flew back to his office on Genesect's hoverboard form, his mind storming with what this code could possibly say. Was something trying to send a message to their world? Could this minor fascination bring about a much larger discovery? Oscar's excitement continued to build as he made it to his office, and he would hit his floor running as he jumped off of Genesect. Genesect watched its master, already knowing what the message said and having no idea what it was supposed to mean. Perhaps Oscar could figure it out.

Oscar typed the code into a binary translator on his computer:

SPOILER: Click to show

01000001 01101110 01100100 00100000 01101100 01101111 00101100 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01100100 01100101 01100101 01110000 00100000 01110110 01101111 01101001 01100011 01100101 01110011 00100000 01101111 01100110 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01100001 01100010 01111001 01110011 01110011 00100000 01100011 01110010 01111001 00100000 01101111 01110101 01110100 00100000 01101001 01101110 00100000 01100001 01100111 01101111 01101110 01101001 01111010 01100101 01100100 00100000 01100011 01101000 01101111 01110010 01110101 01110011 00101110 00100000 01001100 01100101 01110100 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 01101001 01110010 00100000 01110011 01101111 01101110 01100111 00100000 01100100 01110010 01101111 01110111 01101110 00100000 01101111 01110101 01110100 00100000 01111001 01101111 01110101 01110010 00100000 01110010 01100001 01101110 01100011 01101111 01110010 01101111 01110101 01110011 00100000 01110011 01110100 01110010 01110101 01100111 01100111 01101100 01100101 01110011 00101110 00100000 01000010 01100101 01101000 01101111 01101100 01100100 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01100011 01101000 01101111 01101001 01110010 00100000 01101111 01100110 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01100100 01100001 01101101 01101110 01100101 01100100 00101100 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 01101001 01110010 00100000 01110010 01100001 01110110 01100101 01101110 01101111 01110101 01110011 00100000 01101101 01101111 01110101 01110100 01101000 01110011 00100000 01100010 01100101 01100111 01100111 01101001 01101110 01100111 00100000 01100110 01101111 01110010 00100000 01101110 01101111 01110101 01110010 01101001 01110011 01101000 01101101 01100101 01101110 01110100 00101110 00100000 01000011 01101111 01101101 01100101 00101100 00100000 01101100 01100101 01110100 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 01101101 00100000 01100110 01100101 01100101 01100100 00100000 01110101 01110000 01101111 01101110 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01100010 01101100 01101111 01101111 01100100 00100000 01101111 01100110 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01110100 01100001 01101001 01101110 01110100 01100101 01100100 00101110 00100000 01000011 01101111 01101101 01100101 00101100 00100000 01101100 01100101 01110100 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 01101101 00100000 01100110 01100101 01100101 01100100 00100000 01110101 01110000 01101111 01101110 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01100110 01101100 01100101 01110011 01101000 00100000 01101111 01100110 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01110000 01100101 01110010 01101001 01110011 01101000 01100101 01100100 00101110 00100000 01001100 01100101 01110100 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 01101101 00100000 01100110 01100101 01100001 01110011 01110100 00100000 01110011 01101111 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100001 01110100 00100000 01111001 01101111 01110101 00100000 01110100 01101111 01101111 00100000 01100011 01100001 01101110 00100000 01110011 01101001 01101110 01100111 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 01101001 01110010 00100000 01110011 01101111 01101110 01100111 00101110

After a few suspenseful minutes, the translation would be revealed. What Oscar read was almost too insane to be real.

And lo, the deep voices of the abyss cry out in agonized chorus. Let their song drown out your rancorous struggles. Behold the choir of the damned, their ravenous mouths begging for nourishment. Come, let them feed upon the blood of the tainted. Come, let them feed upon the flesh of the perished. Let them feast so that you too can sing their song.

Oscar read the message several times, and after each cycle he felt more and more puzzled. Was this a prank? How could the frequency translate to--this nonsense. Oscar pondered over this revelation, not sure what to make of it. The only we he could proceed past this point was to take the message very literally. Yes, an offering must be given to the distortion. One of rancid flesh and tainted blood. The flesh part would be easy, but what the hell was tainted blood supposed to mean? Well--Oscar had tainted blood kinda. The DNA of that eldritch parasite could still be found in Oscar's bloodstream, perhaps it would suffice.

Oscar returned to the distortion once more, holding a knife in one hand and the rotting flesh offering wrapped in cloth in the other. He approached the distortion, feeling even more uneasy after reading its apparent message. Oscar put the encased offering down and carefully unwrapped it to reveal the head of a Buzzwole he had killed in a different dimension. He had hoped to revive the creature, but alas it was all but impossible. Hopefully this would finally give the morbid trophy purpose.

Oscar then took off one of his gloves and held his naked hand over the Buzzwole's head. His fingers were still blackened from the parasite's influence, which for once Oscar was thankful for. He cut his palm with the knife, allowing his blood to fall upon the head. Once he was satisfied, he pulled out some gauze and bandaged up his hand before hiding it back within his glove. He gently lifted the head and held it out to the rippling distortion.

Oscar slowly pushed it further and further, wincing as the Buzzwole's nose approached the distortion. The nose gently tapped the distortion's surface--and the head disappeared. Oscar blinked, at first thinking he had dropped it. However when he could not locate it, he knew for sure that it had disappeared into the tear. Oscar shivered a little. Nothing really felt different, and yet he could not help but feel as if something had changed. Perhaps he would just need to keep an eye out. Oscar stared into the distortion one last time, as if waiting for something else to occur. When nothing did, Oscar smirked. "Happy Thanksgiving I guess." He turned away to meet up with Genesect nearby and fly off to get on with his life.

--Having Genesect learn Shadow Sneak