all hope of recovering breakfast has been lost. that's not even the worst of it. as soon as the pink-haired scientist had brought her to the portal and they'd parted their stupid awkward ways, with parker thinking she'd really, finally fucked up big time, she'd been thrown out to the wolves at sea. 

and then promptly spit right back up. 

she's worse off than when she first ended up here, which is saying something, but all able-bodied rockets sure as fuck aren't able to leave while they can still do some damage. so she gets shifted, moved around, and stuck on guard duty at an outpost.

she'd been moody. threatened to knock teeth out when some of the men told her to smile. and eventually she'd wandered off to piss. 

lucky her. 

she hopes she doesn't get any weird bioluminescent diseases from putting the bright pink leaves on her hooha. she also hopes she can scrounge around and find some granola bars because she's fucking starving. all those stupid little thoughts leave her when she realizes the camp is dead quiet.

she spies someone scrounging around, back to her. and she hesitates, reaching for a pokeball, but that'll give away the element of surprise. so she shrugs to herself, pats her ribs and silently tells them to get their cracked-ass shit together, and bounds forward to tackle the scavenger.

angelo vestri

☉

parker barely makes it out of the scrap against the bigass dragon alive. amulius had still been shaken from the typhlosion's z-move and certainly wasn't in any shape to go fighting monsters from story books 'cause parker's pretty damn sure that thing wasn't real.

she's really starting to hate this mist shit. 

she presses her fingers against her ribs, wincing in pain 'cause one of 'em's sure as fuck cracked. and when she comes stumbling into granite cave, she pales. a humongous not-tyranitar looms above her. 

her earpiece crackles. you're to engage, six. 

fuck.

she tosses a ball out and her own tyranitar, dwarfed by this monster, comes out with a roar. "hey, fuck face," she shouts.

francie myrtle

☉

parker hauls herself up with the first wave of them - the beasts are baying and the crewmates are clashing and chaos has inevitably ensued. there is a wild fight in her and it comes out now with her comrades in arms, the greninja at her back. 

a water pulse sends her ass over tits and soaks her through to the bone, but she's up not a minute later, laughing wildly as she clocks the pokemon's trainer in the face. greninja goes to heave the vaporeon over the side of the ship, but it melts into the wet floorboards and moves away. 

they're to disrupt the supply and take what they can for themselves, but things go to shit as the all-out brawl commences. if she were smarter, she would've seen through rocket's veil; they're throwing their grunts to an open maw in an effort to slow the league down.

greninja sees a mightyena blast off the side of the ship and he comes in swinging hard at the lopunny in question, water shurikens gathering in is palms.

parker hears a grunt behind her and she laughs; her hood falls down as she throws another punch at the person in front of her. "y'alright there, toby?" she calls over her shoulder.

skyler dross

☉

so here's how parker's night was gonna go: get litty off her titty with the hot fox that's hella out of her league, but for some reason likes having her around. she's gonna dance and she's gonna work her magic and whatever happened a couple weeks ago, they're gonna repeat it. 'cause it was good and yumi must want what parker's puttin' down if she's doing - 

oh. oh. her brows pinch. she doesn't understand. parker.exe has stopped working. 

"what?" sure, sure, yumi's danced with some guy tonight, in the throes of their fun little gaggle. and maybe she'd been making moony-eyed stares, but parker got those too. right? why else would yumi ask her out tonight? 

"don't quit on me, yums," she says with a razor-thin smile, looking a lot more deflated than she fuckin' wants to. she sucks the rest of her drink down and waves a clumsy hand at the bartender. "more, more!"

Yumi Hasegawa

☉

parker's fingers grasp the door a second too late and her brows furrow. she tries the door once, twice anyway and then gives it a good shake, knuckles rapping on the door while nina looks churlishly up at her. 

"it can be your destiny tomorrow, nina!" she says, exasperated. they gotta get on the road and get some time under their belt before the race. or there's no way they're beating that golden-haired fox. 

but, oh, wait - what's she doing? she had wolf take the back window out. so she skirts quickly around to the back of the car and dives through, drags herself up to the back of nina's seat and wiggles the rest of her way in with a grunt.

nina larson

☉

too bad for amulius. out of the cover of smoke crawl nightmares that bleed over his feathers. he startles, skidding to a halt after his swinging leg goes wide. instead of finding purchase on a slowking, his attack ripples through ethereal flesh and finds no purchase. 

the pressure mounts in his skull and he claws at his face, stumbling back and away from the nightmares with a cry. the pressure builds until suddenly it's there no longer; in its place is a monster of unfathomable size. 

parker staggers back, arms wheeling from the force, but she grits her teeth and shoves her head down. center of gravity righted, bouncing on her toes, she grins wildly through the shrapnel pain in her midsection. 

"you hit like a bitch," she chokes out, and is about to follow up with a taunt when something that absolutely does not hit like a bitch slams into the ground beside them. the monstrosity opens its maw with a glint and parker startles, glancing wildly at her opponent, and then past him where amulius stands, looking wild-eyed at the beast himself. 

"what the fuck is that thing? is that yours?" her hands reach for two more pokeballs. 

GIDEON GRAVES Gunner Graves

☉

several times. on purpose. it doesn't make sense. no one in their right mind would do this. except they would, wouldn't they? all those fucking rockets out there crawling all over each for a chance at glory. she feels her stomach turn and it's not because of the ribs or the mist or the deep sea heebie jeebies. it's because nomi really believes it. 

and more than that, she plays a bigger part in it than parker really considered.

she's not afraid. parker looks away, shadow over her face. she splays her fingers over her abdomen, wishing that it were the only place she hurt. but her heart aches in her chest. guilt trickles through her - a long-buried, shoved-away guilt. nomi's blush goes unnoticed.

lips pressed thin, she looks over when nomi moves closer to her. "there's a portal?" she sighs. "okay, well, you're the brains. i'll be the brawns. and then when we get the hell outta here, i'm gettin' breakfast." she scratches at her midriff. "though guess it's lunch now."

Naomi Sato

☉

amulius is on edge. not because there's danger around. not because the mist is trying to stick to parker's ankles, despite amulius' flaring of his talons to keep them at bay. not even because parker is hurt to hell (and he knows her ribs are cracked, idiot). 

but because parker is deeply, deeply uncomfortable. she looks wide-eyed at nomi and runs out of excuses because it's kinda hard to talk without squeaking.

"rocks sound great. real comfy." 

she's clearly being herded. and she's letting nomi herd her. her baffled gaze drops from the back of the woman's head and onto the hand delicately holding the tips of her fingers. heat crawls up the back of her neck and she squashes that real fuckin' fast. 

but her smile quirks back to normal when the sylveon nudges her leg. she'd bend down to give valerian a pat, but, well, yeah. instead she follows nomi to the outcropping and keeps her grunting to as much of a minimum as she can manage while she lowers herself down. 

"so you came here on purpose? i thought everyone just got dumped in this shitshow together."

Naomi Sato

☉

she doesn't really think a map is going to help. especially because every time she blinks, it feels like the seaweed is a different color. or the ground or platform or whatever the hell they're on is longer than it should be. maybe it's just the place getting to her (of course it's getting to her). 

she goes rigid, wincing at nomi's featherlight touch on her throbbing hands. she barely notices the pain these days. 

"i'm fine, doc. fine enough to make sure we get outta here." because obviously she has to protect nomi now. it won't be a good day if rocket finds out one of its precious head scientists suffered grievous injuries under her watch. same old shit, she thinks glumly. 

"few bruised ribs. really, we're good." she inhales deeply (very bad idea. very very bad idea.) and utters a fuck as her not-bruised-very-much-cracked rib twinges.

Naomi Sato

☉

well, she manages to get one hit off at least. there is the satisfying and familiar thwack of her bloodied fists on his jawbone. she was hoping to hear a crunch of some kind, but she landed all fucked up and he's way heavier than she thought. it's part of the reason why she's so slow to grab at him. 

she fumbles at empty air, cursing, and goes from crouch to standing. 

amulius knows parker can handle herself. his priority is ensuring whatever pokemon might come her way are intercepted. so through the smog, when he sees the telltale light of a pokeball opening, he comes in swinging.

parker squares off, both fists raised. "come on, motherfucker. let's dance."

Gunner Graves GIDEON GRAVES

amulius attempts to use close combat on slowking

☉

the mist sort of reacts. it lashes at their feet, disgruntled, and doesn't really like that parker wants, more than anything, to trust that this isn't one of its tricks. it helps that amulius doesn't seem bothered by it in the least.

nomi's looking at her like a real heartbreaker though. her touch is soft and it is gentle and it is so very alien that parker decides, yep, must be the mist, but she doesn't mind it. this is nice mist. nice mist nomi can stick around. 

"okay," she says and swallows thickly, suddenly very very unsure about what to do with her hands. she forgets they're bloodied, knuckles split under torn rags, and raises them to pull mist!nomi's hand from her face. 

"i, uh - where the fuck are we, by the way?"

Naomi Sato

☉

someone is calling for her. someone is calling after her. her face twists in a scowl and she growls in frustration, wiggling her fingers deeper into her ears until they hurt. "fuck off!" she shouts to the mist. her gait is a little off because her arms are crooked, but she speeds up nonetheless. 

for about two feet before amulius strides in front of her with his hands on his hips, blowing annoyed embers out of his nose.

he grabs her wrists with his talons and pulls sharply. her ears pop and she scowls up at him. he is unaffected. more than that, actually. he looks amused. tired, but amused. 

so she turns. the shape is familiar. relief and dread vie for dominance in her. she manages a weak smile by the time nomi catches up to her; a subconscious movement has her hiding her bloodied hands behind her back. 

"nomi? are you real or more mist shit? if you're mist shit, i swear to god, i'm gonna scream."

Naomi Sato

☉

there is a fire in her. skyler could cut her down or gut her or do a whole lot worse. parker wouldn't mind the whole lot worse, really, if it was coming from her. except she kind of gets the whole lot worse, but it's a whole lot worse than she thought. it's soft and delicate and warm, the way the aqua rings bubble into her skin, closing her wounds. but they're on the razor's edge, fine line, thin fucking ice, and parker wants to get ripped apart frayed drowned and she thinks fuck is she? 

because skyler is grabbing her and there is a hungry promise there and no one else matters, least of all her husband. her nails dig and she doesn't flinch; she yearns. her lips tremble and she glares hatefully up at this woman for doing this to her because she knows what's going to come. 

and it still fucking hurts anyway. 

she yanks away when skyler relents by a hair's breadth and the static fizzles all at once. she may have healed the wound on her throat, but the indentations from her curved nails hurt worse. hurt straight up to her damn heart. 

parker's about to have a cow when skyler tells him mitch has been served as a snack for the god of the primordial sea, but then the idiot stumbles out from behind some bushes spouting nonsense. 

skyler dross mitchel kane

☉