Tavish did not draw his eye away from the target for a single moment. Rhys was correct to assume that this would only end in a fight as he got closer and closer. The Toxicroak arrived first, a few seconds ahead of the trainer. It looked to both targets before focusing on the Reuniclus.

Hesitation. It didn’t know exactly what to do. Its previously confident strides were replaced by strict internal confliction.

And then Tavish arrived. He had no such doubts– he ran straight to Rhys, straight through the Reflect set up by his Pokémon. As he stepped through, the strange field of light followed him with and immersed the man in a strange glow.

“Ya think that’ll stop me?” He asked as he pulled back and sent his fist straight towards the other’s face. Even if it hit, it would hurt less. Reflect made it so. But it wouldn’t stop the force behind the blow. If one was hit by a sledgehammer, they’d buckle from the force even if it felt like a tickle to the nerves.

While this happened, the Toxicroak rushed forward. It was subjected to this same phenomenon, but it was more about the surprise factor. The previously indecisive Pokémon now closed the distance between it and the Reuniclus and delivered a nasty Feint Attack to its chest. “Oi, you scared, mate? Plenty more where that came from."

---

Rhys Collins

Sootopolis. The last place Tavish expected to find himself, truth be told. The people of Hoenn had told him it strictly lay in Team Rocket Control. Here, he would find nothing but danger and death. But luckily, there was one other thing to be found in this awful, wretched place.

“Toxicroak…”

“Aye. Feels like home,” he said. It was still hard to believe, but there it was. A Dyna Tree. Sprouted right in the heart of enemy territory. Numerous Pokémon flocked for the fruits back home, and here wasn’t any different. If it weren’t for the circumstances, he’d be content to watch the various creatures scurry and gorge themselves on its fruit.

Alas, fate had other ideas. It took the shape of trainers that fought the Pokémon off. It hurt his chest until he couldn’t take it any longer. All he needed were a few recollections of trainers fighting the creatures off to ignite a fire in his chest.

He’d fight off the trainers that attacked the Pokémon relentlessly. They’d rue the day they fought Arceus’ noble creations. “Well, ya see anyone out and about, Bloke?”

The Toxicroak croaked and scanned the environment. Nothing, nothing, nothing– there. The frog tapped his shoulder and pointed straight toward Rhys Collins .

“Good eye. Remember: I’ll take the trainer, you handle anything they throw at us,” he said to the frog. He nodded vigorously, a glean in his eye and an itch in his fists. If the trainer died in the fight, then they died. Probably Rocket scum that deserved a lesser fate.

Tavish held up three fingers, then two. The second all his digits folded into his palm, the two rushed forward. Eager to stop the one that dared stop the innocent creatures from eating. Let them eat if they so desired!

Neither of them even bothered to confirm the trainer did the crimes they accused them of. Instead, they planned to hit fast and hard. And if they were at all paying attention, they’d see someone in combat fatigues and a Toxicroak bolt straight for them…

---

Rhys Collins

• player/ooc name: Rysa
• character tags: june sleigh , tavish rose , maoja chevrolet , Grigori Sokolov
• dropped characters' tags (if applicable): N/A
• ic posts for characters: 
   - Grigori (I like this post the most but the entire thread was started after Jan. 9th)
   - June (Also a pog post but with a very pog person)
   - Maoja (I got nothing here)
   - Tavish (just kidding Magnetic is EVIL)
• are characters in directories?: Y
• any notes/comments: If anyone catches or kills Regieleki before I can have my moment with it I'm leaving the site /s

Tavish ignored the the wail of the distant siren, the Larvitar that dragged his trainer out the bar by himself, and even the pain that still wracked his body. Damn it all. He could NOT lose one of his few teammates this early on. They’d only been here for almost half a year, yet it felt like much more.

Eventually, Tavish reached the place where Sir was ‘buried’. Bits of mortar coated those once proud feathers, which he brushed off gently. Tears streamed down his face at the realization that there was still life, if faint, inside this bird’s broken body. He grabbed and tore one brick, then another, and one last bit of the wall. Then, with the gentlest of grabs, the kind reserved for a firstborn, the chemist pulled out his companion.

“Sir…” Farfetch’d-Galar tried to utter a word, but Tavish shushed him softly. “Save your strength, soldier. They might have won this battle…”

His other arm tugged at the leek. It slid out on the second pull, and sent even more debris to the ground. The bar looked like a battlefield, and its victors long gone. A flame of passion burned behind his eye patch. Fury flooded his senses. A fellow eye patch owner did this, and didn’t even have the decency to help out a wounded person.

“But that bloody-fuckin-coward will rue this day. They won't live the war.”

They hobbled past the defunct jukebox, which sparked dangerous flickers of energy into the air. There were almost zero remaining, intact tables or chairs. All of the booze behind the bar remained in relatively good shape. The bottom shelf stuff had shattered somewhere along the way, but the expensive stuff escaped. As Tavish stepped over the broken furniture, he hoped the counter and took the fullest one. Disinfectant.

As he approached the stainless steel door to the kitchen, he properly examined the bar. In all honesty... it could've been much worse. Hoenn probably considered this a terrorist attack. A ploy to distract all the participants in the Vital City Tournament for malicious reasons. Or perhaps an argument gone wrong. A fighting of ideals, a robbery, a cover up-- the determination would rest with those who spoke up and how the news writers spun it.

Tuesday night in Galar, though.

---

howard slayte

LOSS

The chicken breast thudded against Tavish’s forehead once again. This time, however, he looked entirely unphased. He wasn’t even paying attention to Howard anymore, a forgotten relic of the past. Instead, his gaze went towards Sir and Serizawa. Towards the power that gathered inside the little green creature.

Sir looked to be on death row. The way he balanced his entire weight on the leek that the Larvitar held. This was quite the foe, he realized. Perhaps too late, as the combination of his one attack, the Hyper Beam, and now this… this raw power that accumulated. A closed system building pressure had less potential energy than this. The world listened to the call to gather.

And all he could do was watch. He tried to pull his leek out of the Larvitar’s hand, but to no avail. The best Sir could hope for was a complete miss from his opponent. Tavish tried to scurry off of Howard, but he knew he'd never make it. He tried regardless, as he scrambled over a sideways stool and the painful splinters of a shattered table. "Sir! Retreat!"

But Sir never backed down from a challenge.

He pushed his leek forward, in the faint hope it'd throw the fist that swung his way off its final destination...

---

LWQrVjas

---

But some things are out of anyone's control. The fist that rivaled a nuclear explosion rocked Sir's world. Immediate black out, and he flew into the wall at record speeds. Despite being made of brick, he punched through with surprisingly minimal destruction. A neat, near perfect hole detonated, and debris shot out like a grenade.

"Sir!"

No response. Sir's orange webbed feet dangled from the very edge of the hole, his leek stuck straight through the wall by his side.

A loss.

---

howard slayte
0/3 (No gimmick)

The bar stool fell to the side, centimeters from Howard’s head. Tavish groaned and slowly lowered his hands onto the painful area. Suddenly, he fell to one knee, eye closed tight. It was as if the world slowed to a craw, and nothing else made sense.

“I’ll… give ya this… your not entirely brainless,” Tavish grumbled out. One of his hands reached forward and took hold of Howard’s arm. “But I ain’t either.”

Despite the lead ball in his stomach and nerves that shook after the nut kick, he managed to swing his head back. His skull shot forward, right into Howard’s own. After all, his own body was still under constant attack by his testicles. They held everything in a vice grip.

What was a little head-force trauma?

Sir stared down a different potential end, though. Energy gathered in the maw of Serizawa, one that he knew the danger of. Even such a small creature like itself could muster up nuclear amounts of energy, given the desire. Tavish might know more than himself, but the point was that something had to be done.

“FARRRRRRRRRRRR–” The bird quickly maneuvered its leek right into the face of the Larvitar. The weapon quickly entered the gullet of his foe, in the hope that it would block most of the attack, if not turn the creature into a miniature bomb itself.

His Final Gambit.

---

howard slayte
1/3 (No Gimmick)

 q81kMGHB

Tavish stared down at the chicken breast with a mix of emotions. Rage at the act, fury at the specific thing thrown at him, disgust at being in contact with a commodified remain of a once living creature. After a few moments, his emotions finally settled on a healthy middle ground of them all.

Thus, the galarian picked up the closest bar stool, hefted the metal frame well above his head, and inched closer. His one visible eyebrow slanted down hard, and he breathed heavily.

“You… fucking devil,” the man hissed. “First, ya insult my ideals. And then ya do that little, ‘coincidental’ attack? Forget the divines, I’m sendin’ ya STRAIGHT to the hellspawn in the Distortion World!”

It didn’t take long for him to be right above Howard, his legs spread out so he could better position himself. Better stance to slam the wooden top of the seat into the archeologist's skull.

Once again, Sarizawa fared much better than his trainer. A brown glass bottle shattered into hundreds of tiny, bite sized pieces upon Sir’s skull. Stars swam in his vision, like a carousel that rocked back and forth. It took all his willpower not to immediately drop to the floor and give in to the comforting abyss.

But he could not give up in the face of such a terrible creature. He blinked the stream of blood from his eyes, which watered and mixed with the crimson to form a weird in-between slosh. Shaky wings gripped the leek tight, until his hollow bones protested against such force.

With whatever remainder of senses still available, he aimed seconds after the bottle smashed. The hard part of the leek shot forward, directly into the chest of Sarizawa.

His beak followed swiftly, more akin to a smash than a jab.

---

howard slayte
2/3
 DmaWhLI9

“You idiot!” Tavish caught the frying pan moments before it collided with his skull. His other hand grabbed and pulled Howard up to him until their two only good eyes met face-to-face. “We both only got the one!”

With all of his strength, Tavish pulled the archeologist over the bar chair and into the air. He tried to toss him as far as possible, but he’d settle for just a foot away. Anything to show this blasphemer the error of his ways. To show him the numerous sins that would haunt him. “Eat dirt, ya git!”

At least Sir had a somewhat even battle. Even as Sarizawa was struck by the powerful blow of his leek, he had a rather clever idea. The world turned upside down, catapulted by his own strong grip on his weapon. Turned against him, as the Larvitar threw him right into the jukebox.

And, well, Sir was never going to let go of his leek. That was his pride and joy. Much like a child, it would be a cold day in hell before he ever let it go. There were very few moments where it caused more problems than it solved. Unfortunately, this was one of those moments as it once again collided with a hard, solid object.

The jukebox was destroyed. Obliterated. Even though neither of them were large or terribly strong, a perfect (or lucky) throw would destroy anything. Such was the case as Sir both struck the machine in the core of its electronics, and watched the Larvitar charge forth once more.

But Sir wouldn’t let this happen without fighting back. He quickly righted himself back to normal, using the leek as a spear of stability. Momentum carried him forward, back onto the ground as it whipped the leek back forward. Finally, he charged right towards the Larvitar as well, green plant pointed forward in defense.

Who would strike true?

---

howard slayte
2/3
 
  Y|FRoj1W

As Howard turned to Tavish, the man had already raised his own fist. By the time their eyes made contact, Howard would’ve seen a glance of the fellow one-eyed man in all of his glorious rage and fury. “Go to hell!”

His fist collided with his cheek, which sent him a few feet away. “Apologize to whatever divines ye want, but they ain’t gonna recognize ye by the time I’m done with ya!”

Meanwhile, the Farfetch’d-Galar flew back with much fanfare. People were hit by his body, not to mention the various pieces of furniture rocked and even topped over. His back hit the wall, and it slid to the floor.

If only this kept it on the ground.

Instead, the bird used his leek to bring himself back upright and to point at the Larvitar. It predicted its trajectory, the wind resistance within the bar, the position from where it had jumped, and even the pressure with regard to their sea level. All this information passed within his skull, all in slow motion as it predicted the landing point of the leap.

Ah, predictable. Directly on himself? Simple, yet effective if he did not do anything about it. Surely, he would be next on the dinner plate.

Thus, the leek once again rose to the heavens. If the attack landed, it would be smacked directly into the floor. Not much could stop a Larvitar momentum-wise, but they’d be in a perfect position for him to strike. If he missed? He might as well be dead.

Yet there could only be one action. Sir dodged to the right, and brought the leek down as soon as the green ball of rage passed right underneath.

---

howard slayte
3/3

    75vnj_jB

Tavish gave the man next to him the harshest glare possible, given his lack of two eyes. A fellow eye-patch haver enjoyed their sandwich filled to the brim with greens and meats. Disgusting. Absolutely terrible. Did this man even know?

Of course, Tavish knew something like this would happen as soon as he entered. People were entitled to their own choices, even if they were the wrong ones. Even if they inadvertently supported a terrible industry that relied on the most abusive treatments thought up by the human mind, people enjoyed eating meat.

And he wasn’t one to reinforce stereotypes. He’d just have to move on with his life. Bigger fish to fry in Hoenn. But when they physically vocalized their enjoyment of it? Right next to him? Right next to his friend, Sir, the Farfetch’d-Galar, saved from a farm that stacked cages upon cages as high as the sky reached?

All bets were off.

“Keep yer thoughts t-yerself,” Tavish smacked the stranger’s shoulder. “I don’t wanna hear about your stupid, sinful sandwich.”

Unfortunately for Howard, Sir had a different idea of how to convey this thought. He hopped off the stool to the left of Tavish, waddled over, and swung its leek high into the air.

And dropped it directly onto both his and Serizawa’s plate. A perfect strike, as green collided with white.

The glass plates shattered, and the food scattered all over the bar top and the floor. Tavish glanced down at Sir, who only stared in rage at the archeologist. Defiance was the only option, and violence was the greatest message.

“Unless, of course,” the man leaned forward, directly into Howard’s personal space, “you’ve got a problem with my friend 'ere?”

---

howard slayte
No gimmicks
3/3

Before Preston could answer, another creature poked its head from the depths of the water. A blue spike, followed by beady eyes and a thick red undercrop. It looked at all the commotion above water with wicked interest, which got Tavish’ attention. Never had he heard about such a Pokémon being in Hoenn. Must’ve migrated– or brought here– and found a home in this place.

“Oi,” he called to the Pokémon, “You’ve got something to say? Yer in good company.”

Obstagoon nodded, claws drumming against the boat, “Speak your mind, if you would.”

“Intrestin’ lot ‘ere,” it croaked, “is all. Long way from home.”

“How’d you know?”

“Been following along,” it swam a little closer to the rocked boat. None of the crew recoiled, but they all gave it a more intense look as it did so. “You ain’t the only one caught in that storm. Me last trainer fell in, he did.”

“I take it that he didn’t come back up then,” Obstagoon said. “My sympathies.”

“Don’t feel sorry for the bloke,” it reclined in the water, body now gently floating on the surface of the salty liquid. “Pirate, he was. Right bastard. Would’ve skinned you alive, if he knew your skin was worth the time. But…”

“But what?”

“Need a new crew, is all.”

The Sir Fetch’d raised a solitary eyebrow. It then looked towards the other two companions, who both shared the same look. Then, they all looked to Tavish. Obstagoon tapped him on the shoulder and then did a quick motion with its hands. Too fast to be coherent, but Tavish understood it perfectly.

“Then we’ll take ye along and see what happens,” he said to the Toxicroak. While the bird dipped its leek into the water to give it something to hold onto, Tavish whirled a finger in the air. “Right, stranger. Whatever yer cause is, don’t let me find ye doin’ horrible things– er you can join the mountain of souls on the bottom of the sea.”

Thus, the small crew started their journey back towards the mainland. On the trip, Tavish made a mental list of all the supplies he’d need: food, water, understanding of the land, a chemical supplier, and a point in the right direction.

A smile crept upon his rough, patchy face: Hoenn would rue the day it made him into a bio-terrorist.

Team Rocket would learn the taste of cordite and flames. They would regret the day they stepped foot in his beloved home and sicced a demonic creature on his people.

Tavish Rose was now in Hoenn, and may the gods have mercy on their souls.

Catch attempt on Toxicroak

---

Preston Fugu