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POSTED ON Aug 31, 2024 23:16:48 GMT

THE BORDER: AH // AFTER HELL
IN THE AFTERMATH OF PETALBURG, SOOTOPOLIS...

10 ~~become possessed by a spirit attempting to return to life.~~
18 ~~lose your shadow, or encounter your shadow moving independently of you.~~
27 ~~briefly detach from your body or bodies in order to accomplish a task using your spirits.~~
31 ~~encounter spiritual bridges that are slowly breaking apart, as if they are being stretched...~~
34 ~~allow the marshadow that you own to guide you safely through the realm.~~

Adrian Malcolm howard slayte

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POSTED ON Aug 31, 2024 23:17:28 GMT

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Like others, he is expected to move forward and continue their work diligently—in fact, he doubts many others share his feeling of remorse towards the war. It had left him troubled... But he was not without recourse. There were those with sympathy enough for the lost, and the fallen.[break][break]

howard slayte could not help him overcome himself, but he could spare him the immediate return to typical duties—souless as they were.[break][break]

A welcome respite, if nothing else.[break][break]

Another expedition had been a welcome surprise, at first. It wasn't until he realized where they intended to go that Adrian showed signs of reservation—but there were other reasons that strengthened his resolve—offered chances at catharsis... Even if imperiling them greatly.[break][break]

A lifetime ago, this place felt eerily safe.[break][break]

Now it was exactly as it should be...[break][break]

An unwelcoming labyrinth going nowhere.

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AFTER HELL

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POSTED ON Sept 1, 2024 0:23:11 GMT

Tempest Quinn likes this

Tempest Quinn had dragged him from his very warm bed to track down a god of death.

Yippee.

Luckily, one of the perks of being a Rocket Admin who paid everyone's salaries was that he got to drag Adrian from his very warm bed to join him in his unending march of misery. Who better to track down the damned than one who had been bound to it? If Adrian wanted to instill order into this world, then no better place to do it than hell.

It was likely chock-full of the damned after the battles, to be sure.

"This place is as miserable as I expected, though I suspect it must be like home to you." A Howard Slayte with a different face glanced to Adrian. Longer hair, tired eyes, and a five o' clock shadow lined his features.

Yet only Howard Slayte wore the eyepatch and the cowboy hat, and those he still had.

"Tell me about this place. Give me a tour."

Adrian Malcolm

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POSTED ON Sept 1, 2024 0:51:48 GMT

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He manages a light snort, chiding Howard for the comment: "I only ever saw this place briefly, for my part."[break][break]

Though not entirely true—he'd managed to stomp about on more than a few occasions—this place was the hallmark of Yveltal's departure from his life. This domain was watched over by Yveltal for untold millenia—Adrian had barely scratched its surface before being thrown out. And even then—[break][break]

It was never like a second home. But the spirits once held him in some esteem, if only for the blessings he'd been given at the time. That was all gone now, and the dread and uncertainty that clung to this place now equally draped itself over him, too. Back then, it was at least tolerable as any other mass burial ground: Slightly unsettling.[break][break]

"Besides... this place doesn't seem to stay static. It just keeps—drifting."[break][break]

Adrian gestures towards the floating chunks of deprecated land jutting out from the overwhelming fog that drowned out the Border's unworldly canvas, that mortal eyes could not chart out its paths. Or maybe this shifting was only recent... Adrian had two theories on that.[break][break]

Not that he ever deigned to share them—and risk sounding stupid. Maybe it was obvious to others.[break][break]

"I saw it once—when Yveltal and I attacked Father Winter upon Mt. Pyre, during the METENO crisis. Back then... it seemed whole. Undisturbed."[break][break]

Adrian has been leading them forward casually, only as fast as the looming fog allowed them. They kick at dust and little else along a heavily beaten path. He's never personally seen anything grow here—but there were always signs of it: Weathered tree husks, and of course the wilting growth nestled within tangles of strange grass.[break][break]

Adrian stopped—though it wasn't obvious as to why. He appeared to be lingering in thought.[break][break]

An observer of eons cannot feel the warmth of another.

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AFTER HELL

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POSTED ON Sept 11, 2024 5:37:39 GMT

Curious, that the place where the dead went did not stay shackled and unchanging. Death was absolute. It did not change. Why, then, did the afterlife need to? It was a contradiction that the admin would've found interesting if the place didn't unnerve him.

"What an interesting place. It's a shame it's so... scary."

Though asking spirits of the damned where they had died and of their accounts interested Howard, it was not something he had time to invest into.

Maybe when he had been less overworked and with less responsibilities. Occasionally, the notion of simply letting go enticed him. Maybe he could return to grunt duties and simply follow his dream again. Then he woke up and saw Petalburg rotting and Regirock and Regice's Pokeballs on his nightstand and reality came seeping back in.

"Our world is falling apart, Adrian. Are we surprised that the afterlife is collapsing too? I suspect that this world will be closed, one day. Yet that is not today." Howard closed his eye in thought. "Nor tomorrow."

Adrian stopped. Howard did as well.

"What's wrong?"

Adrian Malcolm

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POSTED ON Sept 11, 2024 23:05:06 GMT

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"You really think it's scary?" Maybe that was the right word for it. Adrian could see a sort of wild beauty to it—but maybe that was his privilege—he would learn to dread it sooner or later.[break][break]

He certainly had no shortness of dread anticipation for the vile creature that roamed its skies, challenging their mortal presence.[break][break]

"Closed?" As if it were a store. Re-sealed, he realized. The realm would always exist, and reveal itself to those as passing on, but it was never meant to be traipsed upon by living. This is true, and he concedes to Howard's point, although...[break][break]

It wasn't going to fix itself.[break][break]

Whatever had revealed this place would need to be mended—and so far, none had come forth to fix that problem. In fact, many exploited this opportunity rather than see the obvious risks in it. Or maybe it was just that they ignored them.[break][break]

...Or didn't know enough to help.[break][break]

In that moment, he feels guilty. Accountable.[break][break]

"Do you think it could be that... the Border is collapsing into some place else?" Maybe Howard knew more, or had shared more with others; maybe he could explain this place better than he could. Adrian did not believe it changed in this way of its own accord, not when it seemed to cause such a breakdown in its environment. It always seemed in disarray.[break][break]

They had no basis or standard of comparison for the Border: Whether it adjusted to accomodate an influx of spirits, or had simply always been this way, or had never been this way—it was difficult, maybe impossible to make those determinations.[break][break]

At best, he could gamble that what he'd first seen coming here was its natural state:[break]

Haunted tides of shadow and fog, giving an illusion of movement,[break][break]

Four cracked seals shedding smoke from mountains on high,[break][break]

...Whereon you treaded the realm between life and death.

[break]

The interdream zone had been made to bleed out across Hoenn. The Ultra Deep Sea could be accessed from Dewford. Nothing was as it should be, as it was. It was like someone was manufacturing a wholesale collapse of the Hoenn region. He likened it to how the DRK TRIAD had attempted trapping them within a sort of hemisphere, before altering METENO's course for collision. In a way, it had been FATHER WINTER that created this primal point rift to begin with...[break][break]

"What if it's been slipping away this whole time...? And in which direction?[break][break]

While imparting these thoughts to Howard, he glowers at the ground, noticing a barely discernible shadow. As he avoids their eyes, he stares back into it, and the umbra deepens. The head seems to adjust faintly, as though dipping its chin up and down, almost as if nodding back.[break][break]

It's subtle enough that he pays it no mind.

^{18 lose your shadow, or encounter your shadow moving independently of you.}

An observer of eons cannot feel the warmth of another.

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AFTER HELL

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POSTED ON Sept 12, 2024 7:13:04 GMT

The admin's shadow, meanwhile, was not his own. Instead, it was 'his' own.

The shadow of his old body followed the sculpted form of the new. It mimed his actions perfectly, and the light in this realm was so shoddy and unreliable that it was difficult to discern. Much like his current body, his old one's shadow still wore his iconic hat. Yet it stalked him.

A memory of a form that no longer existed.

"The Border was never meant to be accessible to living beings, so why did it shape itself into a form traversable by the living? That makes no sense." Human beings were meant to explore the world and seize it all for themselves. That was their will and their right. Yet it caused them to ignore the fact that the world had not been built for them.

Why, then, should this one be traversible?

"I suspect it's just returning to the form it once had before we marched in and ruined it."

The admin's shadow lengthened as he walked behind Adrian.

"I wonder if we'll find bryan delarosa's spirit, here. I heard he passed during the battle in Sootopolis."

Adrian Malcolm

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POSTED ON Sept 13, 2024 2:43:24 GMT

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"This is the realm between, of passing on—the familiarity offers a sort of comfort, don't you think?" Maybe this was simply the form it took to be perceived, and its true nature was unknowable—but Adrian felt that a small gesture as this was necessary to soothe the more troubled spirits passing through.[break][break]

...Or the meddlesome living. It was a filter.[break][break]

Closure couldn't be found in a swathe of nothing.[break][break]

The path revealed itself when one was ready.[break][break]

Until then, they walked an endless but familiar expanse that could manifest their thoughts, perhaps designed to help them find that something they need before—before letting go. Surrendering to nirvana and reaching enlightenment. That is to say, returning from whence you came—to the esoteric origin...[break][break]

"Perhaps you're right though." Adrian pushes through the shroud after a brief respite, and his shadow seems to lead the way. As they move forward over dusty walkways, he loses Howard for a moment in his peripheral.[break][break]

"...We won't find Bryan here." It seemed that jayden cross had not yet relayed the information, perhaps awaiting the next summit—knowing what an uproar it would cause might go against Declan's ceasefire. Bryan had been abducted, not killed, as far as anyone knew.[break][break]

"He was taken prisoner by the League, defending Xerneas..." Adrian only barely misses his shadow stopping short as he walks beyond it—and nearly over the edge.[break][break]

'Woah!' He cried out before a flailing arm strikes out for a rail, which seems to cause the bridge to shimmer into a corporeal, visible form whose glow pierces the fog and illuminates the schism he very nearly flung himself into. Yikes...[break][break]

"Phew." The bridge ahead of them seems to go on forever, and though it remains suspended in air, it's uncertain whether it can hold their weight or remains only as an apparition... He places a foot forward, and it seems to take, but the glow is muddled by the contact. "I don't trust it..."[break][break]

Call it a SIXTH sense—the bridge would not hold.

^{31 encounter spiritual bridges that are slowly breaking apart, as if they are being stretched...}

An observer of eons cannot feel the warmth of another.

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POSTED ON Sept 14, 2024 3:08:57 GMT

Much like the line between living and death, the bridges here were fraying at best and at their end at worst. Nothing here could exist in its current form forever. That included the living. Whether they wanted to or not, Howard and Adrian would leave this world a changed man.

For better or worse.

"You good?" Howard clapped Adrian on the shoulder and peered into the abyss. "Fuck, man. I wonder what happens if you fall? Where's the bottom?"

Likely better to not find out. Instead of choking on that revelation, the admin narrowed his eye in response to Adrian's claims. If Bryan had survived, it was likely buried under a mountain of reports regarding Petalburg. jayden cross had likely slipped something there or reported it immediately, but the admin was trying to avoid him.

Not until he figured out what to do regarding Chien-pao.

"That's good. I'm glad he's alive." bryan delarosa was a murderous brute, but losing immortality had humbled him. He didn't deserve death, even if he craved it. He was needed alive. Bryan Delarosa mattered.

Another piece on Howard's chessboard.

"Know who took him?"

Adrian Malcolm

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POSTED ON Sept 14, 2024 4:34:55 GMT

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"Yeah." Adrian offered him shakily, though he seemed to take it in stride. A shiver rolls over him briefly, and then he's himself. Able to ignore the brush with death.[break][break]

"I couldn't really say," Adrian mumbled.[break][break]

Much had happened. Somewhere in that throng, Bryan had gotten plucked and whisked away, before any could intervene. Even those who pursued him would've had a hard time getting past—"That wolf with the sword," he spoke.[break][break]

"I've seen it before—something to do with Galar. It was running protection, nobody made it to him who tried."[break][break]

Adrian gives Howard a look—was it enough?[break][break]

His eyes drew low to the ground before glancing sideways, his brow hardening.[break][break]

"...Jayden tried blaming me over it."[break][break]

Adrian doesn't want to believe it. But he was there and did nothing. He was there for Regirock, and it meant nothing; he feared he was quickly becoming irrelevant, maybe even weak.[break][break]

He yearned to remain in the sun.[break]

An observer of eons cannot feel the warmth of another.

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POSTED ON Sept 14, 2024 5:27:40 GMT

Despite the dire news, Howard actually laughed in relief. There were far worse people to get captured by than Zaria and Navy .

"Zacian got him? That means Navy did it, and Bryan will be fine. In prison, but fine." Navy was honorable in how he handled himself. Howard would bet money that he had spent much of Sootopolis saving civilians, which was likely how he had come to meet Bryan. "He won't kill an enemy that lost their sword. Especially one as declawed as Beast Delarosa."
Bryan was still a threat, but he held more value alive than as a lesson. If the League was smart, they'd keep him as a prisoner. The issue was that Rocket had nothing to trade.

He'd need to be broken out.

"Admin Cross expects the best from his men, and you are one of them. He'll blame you, express his discontent, and you'll be put on Regirock scrubbing duty for a week. It'll blow over." Possibly. Assuming Jayden hadn't changed as much as everyone else had during the battle. "If it's a problem, send him my way."

He regretted the words as they left his lips. jayden cross was one of the last people he wanted to see in the entire world right now.

"Did you try to save him?"

Adrian Malcolm

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POSTED ON Sept 14, 2024 8:01:46 GMT

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"...No." It was something that simply hadn't manifested itself. He didn't have an answer why he hadn't helped. It was all over faster than he'd expected. That is precisely what he kept repeating to himself, and to others. An excuse.[break][break]

There was Declan rallying them after Kyogre—Bryan himself reinforcing the Dyna Tree—and he'd been smack dab in the middle, trying to satisfy two different directives. Holding back Paxton's Mega Mawile, while Furor raged towards the SAPPHIRE leviathan. Stretched so thin.[break][break]

No wonder they blame me.

[break]

I'd probably blame me, too.

[break]

"..."

[break]

Adrian was stuck. He needed a way around this.[break][break]

Thankfully at that moment, the Marshadow that had been watching over him stirred from out of his shadow, which seemed to disappear as it rose from out of the cimmerian shade. Wordlessly, it pointed towards something of a watch tower, where atop was a brazier that had gone out. Its fist seems to roil like a raging fire, and then it returns it to its side before returning Adrian's shade and disappearing from their sight.[break][break]

Anything to get over this slump...

[break]

"...Guess that's our next step," Adrian murmured before setting out at a brisk pace, to avoid ruminating any further. It was done.

³⁴ ^{allow the marshadow that you own to guide you safely through the realm.}

An observer of eons cannot feel the warmth of another.

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POSTED ON Sept 14, 2024 8:31:00 GMT

Adrian Malcolm and Elisabeth Fiorelli like this

"You left one of your own behind, Adrian."

The words are soft, a caress that reminded the defector that he had failed in his defense of Sootopolis, his defense of the Dyna Tree, and the salvation of bryan delarosa. Jayden was right. Adrian had not tried, and for that reason the Rocket Beast now sat in a prison cell, waiting to be saved.

Yet Adrian Malcolm knew that. He needed no reminder.

"We protect our own, because there's no other group in the world that cares about us. We're dregs. Scum. Worthless and rejected by region that doesn't care about us. If we refuse to save our own, then Team Rocket does not matter. We are cogs in a greater machine, meant to be replaced."

He thought of Elisabeth Fiorelli as she disappeared under an uncaring boulder.

"But that doesn't mean we should, if we can help it. We'll save him. If you were stuck in a cell, we'd do the same for you." Being alone in the world was a terrible thing, just like the watchtower that stood at the edge of infinity.

"That's why I caught Regirock, after all."

Adrian Malcolm

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POSTED ON Sept 14, 2024 8:50:41 GMT

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Would they do the same for him? It doesn't seem believable, from his perspective. But then, he's always played the fence... Maybe that is truly the reason he left Bryan. He wasn't willing to stick out his neck for anyone but himself. Did that make him a coward? Or was he grossly self-centered?[break][break]

Scum. Dregs. Words Adrian doesn't identify with.[break][break]

But if he looks at it from any other angle, it's incontrovertibly true. His bias was showing.[break][break]

"...You actually believe that?"[break][break]

Once upon a time, he might have believed they would make that play for his sake—but not anymore. Expendable was a word for someone like him, that's why he played everything so close to the chest... That's why he looked after his own.[break][break]

He didn't exactly believe in what Howard said—but he didn't reject it, either. Again, he found himself on that dreadful fence. Not committing.[break][break]

They scale the watch tower as best they can, but eventually reach an impasse: The dusty, tattered timber at the foot of the tower was evidently the collapsed staircase heading to the height of its spire. They could go no further, physically. A torch's flame weakly licked at the air from its sconce against the interior masonry...[break][break]

"Always another dead end," he growls.[break][break]

Where the light touches him, his body seems to emanate something, like that of a wisp. It wasn't something he would notice—but Howard might.[break][break]

Passage required a sort of RITUAL exchange.

²⁷ ^{? ? ?}

An observer of eons cannot feel the warmth of another.

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AFTER HELL

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Magnetic

Admin Fox

He/Him

May 9th

Rustboro City

Bisexual

Archaeologist

Rocket Admin

5'9 (with hat) height

The future will tempt you, the present will indulge you, but the past will shackle you.

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