"Sounds like you've been busy."

The point of contact at Kepler’s wrist is both strange and comforting, and Kep flushes red immediately, given that Isaac is, essentially, holding his hand to stop him from freaking out or turning around and rabbit bolting right into oncoming traffic. Which may be preferable at this time, given that Kepler apparently needed his fucking hand held.

“Real chill,” Kepler parrots, sarcasm-high, voice hitched up on the back half of his panic, and he clears his throat. “It’s fine. I got kidnapped recently. I’m still a little jumpy.” And that, really, should explain that. Because how many people do you run into that have been kidnapped? It’s probably pretty uncommon and, also, should be a blanket statement explanation for why I have problems.

“Thank you. My parents picked it out.” The sarcasm is still strong with this one, but at least his heartbeat is regulating.

Ashley continued to talk and Kepler forced himself to look up, stop being a shying violet and acting like you’re going to faint at any given time.

“We can split lunch?” he finally says, forcing his vocal chords into action, determined to not, at least, be a total asshole. Even if he mouthed off too much. “Least I can do for dragging you all the way out here to babysit me, Isaac.”

Ashley Shepard Isaac Merlo
local dweeb attempts making friends

☉

Mercury’s been Kepler’s near constant companion since Kep bought him on a whim year ago for the protection factor. Needless to say, him having a guard bunny did little for the bullying, but it did help decrease the physical abuse.

“Yeah, but don’t let Merc hustle you,” Kep said, glaring daggers at the stupid rabbit (his best friend), “he’s surprisingly good.” Or maybe Kepler was just really bad. Usually their party consisted of Merc, Gaia, Jupes, and Venus, who, for all her credits, did not have a brain.

Venus jumps when the Zorua drops the illusion, but instead of physically jumping backwards, it’s like all her pieces shift up and then clatter down. She lets go of Kepler’s hand to mechanically stomp around Jayden, to peer at the curious creature hiding behind him.

Kepler nods in time with all of Jayden’s listed activities.

“I think I landed that,” he says, frowning in confusion, “once. Then my shoulder came out of socket a little and I called it quits.”

For all his many flaws, his body was surprisingly tough. It had been through a lot of abuse in the past.

jayden cross

☉

Kepler heaves a sigh and admits to the most embarrassing thing he’s had to verbalize out loud all day-- but it’s just the tip of the iceberg, knowing him.

“Mercury beat me at Poker and the bet was that if I lost I had to take them to the festival.” He gestures pathetically at his Raboot, who is buying an ice cream cone (with Kepler’s money) and splitting it with Gaia, his Combusken. Jupiter the Squirtle is eyeing up a carnival game-- and Venus is holding on to him, playing mother-may-I.

She lets go of his hand to reach out towards the Zorua, fingers hovering, clearly confused at what the heck just happened.

Kepler rolls his eyes.

“What brings you out here?”

jayden cross

☉

Kepler would actually prefer to hide away in the dark. He hated being out in public even before being kidnapped and almost sacrificed, and that only made things worse.

But he lost a game of poker with his stupid Pokemon and now he had to chaperone them out in the wild, so he slathered on the SPF one hundred, popped on his biggest, blackest, Hungover White Girl shades, and trekked out into the great unknown.

Jayden makes him jump out of his fucking skin.

“That checks out because I don’t want to be here,” Kepler confirms. Venus, his Golett, is holding Kepler's sweaty hand in her cold, stone one and waves mechanically at Jayden, the mineralized joints in her wrist creaking as she does.

jayden cross

☉

“Yes, the lens,” Kepler responded, a tinny petulance rushing into his voice. The wind whipped against the coastline, threatening to topple him. “The Ampharos is the source but the Fresnel lens magnifies the light. Large aperture, short focal length, at up to 1/26th the mass and volume of a traditional lens.”

It didn’t really matter, but Kepler was a scientist. He found comfort in numbers-- in fact, he was counting his strides, knowing that when he got to roughly 256 he would be at the base of the lighthouse and then probably should focus on more important matters than counting his steps.

“Most modern Fresnel lenses only refract, but ones in lighthouses refract and reflect. Also, they’re incredibly expensive. Consider it an investment to the Rocket science team.” There, if she wasn’t a fan of science, she could, at the very least, lean back on party loyalty-- if she had any of that, Kepler didn’t know.

Zilla Dumay
MISSION

☉

It’s not a suggestion or a hint, it’s just the cup Merc happened to grab. Fun fact, Kepler had never been kissed (or kissed anyone, for that matter) and so even if Mars was down, which he certainly definitely probably wasn’t, Kepler had long since accepted his fate to die a spindly, untouched virgin.

It was fine.

Kepler keeps rattling off observations: the strange miasma, the odd colorations, and the normal things. Then the Inkay flexes, and Kepler arches an eyebrow.

“Subject is… B-A-R,” he decides, not realizing just how close he comes to have a face-full of tentacles as he chooses then to retreat to his computer and record the subject’s weight as it settles into the basket.

“Did you catch this Inkay as a shadow or did you… transform them, somehow?” Kepler asks, moving to unwrap a series of sterile instruments in a package, breathing in the remnant scents of autoclave.

It was his favorite smell.

He was going to die a virgin.

Martín del Mar

☉

Kepler frowned. “Cats vs. dogs?” he asked, voice skeptical. “That sounds… utterly ridiculous.” But he was starting to get a vibe, from Hoenn, that most everything was ridiculous, and it was up to the scientific of them to arrange the ridiculousness on a mildly corporeal, cartographal scale.

“Oh. I never thought to ask.” He wondered why. Wondered what readings remained. Wondered, exactly, what frame of measure one summed inter-dimensional schisms in.

“I’d love to see it,” he said, and it was the truth, but Kepler was nothing if not observant, and he senses the hesitation in the air around Jayden (a femto-ampere meter for calculating negative O2 ion flux?).

He makes an educated guess. “Things were bad, I take it?”

---

wearing

jayden cross

☉

Listen, the boy had anxiety. He didn’t think cultist ninjas were going to jump out of the Hoennian wilderness and kidnap him while he was ass deep in weather balloon foil, either, but Arceus loved to make Kepler uncomfortable.

Also, if he had to be honest… it was nice, feeling like he had a friend.

Gaia and Mercury both waved. Kepler looked down at the grocery list on his phone, feeling slightly embarrassed that he’d come out to meet a friend with his Fire-types out like freakin’ bodyguards. “Hey.”

Isaac did the nice thing and heralded him into the grocery store, and Kepler did admit he calmed down a little.

“So how’s it been?” he asks, voice flat, disconnected. Normal Kepler programming. If it’s not science he ain’t hype for it. “Murdered any other cultists?” It’s flippant, detached, a flimsy screen of humor used to protect, deflect. Normal programming.

He almost jumps out of his fucking skin when the stranger approaches them; so much for his bodyguards. But the person just seems to be friends with Isaac. Not a strange instance, given that Kepler was here for that selfsame reason. Or, rather, Isaac was here with Kepler for that reason.

Ashley Shepard Isaac Merlo

☉