Roleplay

@moorhound @RisingFlames @smerdyakov

I'm already sub to the thread btw!!]

The child had to keep running...

Don't look back, just keep going, don't bother to see what's behind you, just run, run like the wind...

That was the only thing that scream through his head, his adrenaline rush through him & he could feel his heart pumping fast then he could keep count of. The sounds of small, feral growls followed him. But he couldn't last long, especially not with all the weight of the heavy bag he'd been carrying.

Lucky he hadn't been along through this godforsaken hell, small blasts of light followed behind him as a figure only a few inches taller soon appeared beside him. "Your doing well..." Una called, picking up the child & slinging him across her shoulders. "But we need to picked the pass..." She muttered, taking off with the child still on her, barely hovering above the ground from the weight of the bag.

Know getting an unwanted closer look of what had been following them, he snuck his baseball bat from the side of his bag & rammed down on the first thing that tried to jump at them, the result of course was being covered in more blood, guts & tears.

Una zoomed down the street looking of anywhere to hide, she knew robbing that shopping district was a horrid idea but she didn't expect this to be the price of it, well at least if they didn't die they'd have a large sum of supplies, or at least much more then they had before. There was so much you could find in an abandon market.

She scanned high & low for a place to take refuge in & when all hope seemed lost to a further side she spotted a Pokemon centre.

That would have to do...

Blasting the nearest build wall she could behind, it collapse in a heap, creating waves of dust, sand & smoke confusing the undead beasts, Una just enough time to slip away before they were possibly noticed again. As she drew closer to the centre she noticed two figures at its entrance, a girl & a Skarmory. She carried mix feelings about the two new comers, but right that wasn't important, all that mattered was Alex's safety. "Both of you inside" Know!" She called, making her way inside, shovelling them both in with her wether they wanted to or not.

As the doors shut behind them, Una could hear the wandering of the outside zombies as they pass by the centre, urging each other that the living went straight ahead, ignoring them & the building they hid in.

A sigh of relief swept over Una as she placed Alex down, the kid easily fell to his knees, shaking hard, tears streaming down his face mixed with blood, bloody baseball still in hand & breath heavy. Both him & Una just sat there for a good minute trying to catch themselves on air.

@moorhound @RisingFlames

((i am also subbed as of now :}} ))

Bando pressed himself flat against the tree, motioning for Pepper to drop down into the dark bushes to her right. The forest was silent apart from the crackle of movement through the dead leaves-- Squeak staggered in view, flushed and panting.

"Be quiet," Pepper said, ignoring the look the Hypno gave her, and then turned her attention back to Bando, "You sure about this?"

He nodded, "Those were smoke signals. Someone's out here and they're asking for help."

"And if..." Squeak sucked in another gulp of air, still gasping, "It's some kind of trap? What then, genius?"

But Bando was already halfway up the tree and edging along the thickest branch he could find. Below he could see signs that brush and the withered, brilliantly colored leaves had been cleared away in a struggle. Charred wood and rounded stones were scattered close to the center of the clearing and to the far end...

Bando leapt down from the tree and Pepper was beside him in a heartbeat, shaking her head,

"I'm sorry, Bando."

He walked the length of the camp to where what remained of the body lay and began to pile leaves loosely over it, glad he'd decided to tuck Fig-Cake into her pokeball earlier. Pepper began to circle the trashed camp, her nose to the ground, looking for supplies in silence. Bando, regardless of need, rarely allowed her to scavenge supplies from the freshly dead, but if she could find something before his attention was shifted off the body...

"Glad we wasted time and energy on this absolute sh*t-show," Squeak stood in the line of trees, looking equal parts smug and annoyed.

Pepper growled a warning at him and then froze.

"Bando."

The man raised his head.

"There's two cracked pokeballs over here..."

He gave the half covered body an almost apologetic look before standing with new urgency,

"We need to leave."

"Aww, but I thought you wanted to p*ss around in this forest for the rest of the day? I mean, that's what we've been doing since the sun came up, so why stop the dipsh*ttery now?" Squeak leaned against one of the more barren trees and crossed his arms.

Pepper was about to growl again but the sound of splintering wood cut her off. The ground had begun to shake and, above the canopy, clouds of fire colored leaves burst into the air. Squeak leapt towards Bando with a shriek, just in time to avoid the claws of the pale-looking salamence that burst from the forest.

"Run!" shouted Bando, scooping up Squeak, who had fallen, shaking, at his feet, and cutting sideways back into the forest. Pepper paused, looking up at the massive dragon, and then followed her friend into the cover of the trees.

The sounds of the pokemon carving through the ancient forest behind them kept getting louder. Squeak had begun to repeat a quick, hiccuping mantra of "I'm going to die-- This is all your fault-- I don't want to die-- I'm going to--" and Bando called to Pepper,

"Ecruteak is close-- We'll find a building. Hopefully lose it there."

With a tired grunt, Pepper nodded and the two listed sideways again, recalculating the group's course through the trees. A jet of searing red heat shot through the air above them and Squeak screamed again. Pepper could see the ruins of the Bell Tower and, above the commotion of the salamence, heard it chime loud enough to startle a cluster of flying pokemon from its slanted roof.

Bando heard it too and again signaled for Pepper to follow him in another sharp misdirection that would put them on further to the side of Ecruteak. They ran for what felt like lifetimes, readjusting their path into sharp slants and switchbacks until the salamence was struggling to follow their route. Then, gathering one last burst of energy, the two bolted straight for the familiar red roof.

One of the emergency exit doors was tilted and held by a single, rusting hinge, and Bando set the shuddering hypno in Pepper's large arms while he gently eased open the door. Pepper dropped Squeak, ignoring his whine of surprise, and turned back towards the forest.

"Bando, we need to hur--"

"In. Now," Bando stood inside the unlit hallway, bracing the door upright with his body. Squeak, who suddenly seemed capable of using his legs again, scrambled inside and darted as far in as he could. Pepper followed and helped Bando reposition the broken door so that it blocked the entrance as much as possible.

Outside they could hear the dragon ripping through the forest and silently moved further into the center. Squeak took the lead, glancing behind him at the slanted door with his wide white eyes, and was so focused on the thought that the salamence might burst through it, he stumbled nose first into a wall. Eyes watering, Squeak muttered a few pitiful sounding curses and looked over to see a Gardevoir, a Skarmory, and two kids spread across the lobby floor.

"F-- What are you doing-- Who are--?" he stumbled back into Pepper's leg and, with a yelp, rushed behind her and Bando, who stood at the head of the group. His eyes softened for a second but then the distance in them returned as he knelt down and spread his arms out and over his head, his palms facing inwards.

"I'm not going to hurt you. None of us will," he offered and Pepper lay down beside him, trying to make herself look as small and friendly as she could.

@Moorhound

(I'm subbed now as well. Using an underline to signal that a pokemon is talking, btw.)

**Few days previously**

Rapha slowly blinked open his eyes, his head resting against soft white fur and a soft half snore coming from somewhere beside him. When had he fallen asleep? As if reading his mind, a somewhat deep and gentle voice replied with: "Not long after we got here." he recognized the voice as the one his mother's, no... His Absol had.

"Oh...That makes sense... At least we didn't run into anything else in the middle of the night?" he half asked, not sure if they had or not as Sephtis usually chased smaller ones away.

"True. Thank goodness. Let's just hope it stays that way for the rest of the day." the large pokemon stood up then, stretching and sniffing around for a few moments. "Don't scent anything around that's recent. Better hurry before that changes."

Rapha nodded and gathered up his bag, checking on the black based, blue topped, yellow striped egg that was tucked away in the folds of the fabric of a dark purple hoodie. Both the hoodie and the bag itself looked worse for wear, but at least the egg was kept safe. A few other things in the bag included simple granola bars, a small tin or two of pokemon food, and a half full water bottle. 'Running low on supplies... Which is very concerning.' the young looking boy -he constantly cursed his short height- thought to himself as he zipped the bag closed and moved to the front pocket to check on the 3-4 pokeballs there. One of them was shaking slightly and Rapha was certain that Sparks was either wanting out or having a nightmare from when her original trainer had been killed.

'Poor Sparks... Hope she'll be alright... Even if it happened several weeks ago.' gently picking up the shaking red and white ball, Rapha tapped the button in the center to enlarge it. "Should I let her out??" he asked, directing the question to his Absol, who was seeing if there was any left over food from the previous night. "It'd probably be a bad idea. You know how timid she is."

"True... But still. I don't want her to forget she's not alone, ya know?"
"I know, I know. However, I'd give her a bit more time. You were pretty terrified until more recently"
"That's because I have you, so it's kinda like mother and father aren't... Really gone. I mean, they are but at the same time it's a lot more like a piece of them is still hanging around... I guess?? It's hard to explain."

Sitting down briefly, the Absol tilted his head to the side. "It makes perfect sense. Plus I suppose there's not a lot of time to grieve in a world like ours, now is there?"

"That too." sighing Rapha shrunk the pokeball back down and put it back into his bag before picking said object up. "If I remember maps right, the nearest place that possibly has anything in it is Ecruteak City."

"Pretty close to Goldenrod though, isn't it?"
"Yeah... But if we're careful we should be fine."
"Fair enough." standing again, Sephtis walked over to Rapha before briefly kneeling down. "Hop on, it'll be faster."
"Will you be alright though??"
"I'll be fine, don't worry."

Hesitantly climbing onto the Pokemon's back, he let out a sigh. "I don't mind walking... But okay..." he responded, clinging onto the Absol's horn with one hand when he stood.

Moving and half racing to the opening of the cave Sephtis cleared his head enough to focus on the current task, getting to the next city.

**Present Day**

Took longer than they had expected it would, but here they were, finally at Ecruteak City. Just in time to see a paleish Salamence appear somewhere near the opposite end of the place. Feeling the color drain from his face, Rapha hardly noticed the Absol he was on dash across the street and towards a red roofed building, crashing in nearly a minute before the doors were semi-closed.

Tumbling off the Absol's back, protecting the bag -and therefore, the egg- he had still in his arms as much as he could, Rapha laid near the desk of the building in slight daze. What had just happened exactly? He wasn't quite sure... It happened too fast...

Panting, Sephtis half shook out his fur and moved over to his trainer, lightly nudging him. "You alright??" he asked through heavy breaths, Rapha merely nodding mutely in a reply.


(Excuse me for pausing there, mum's back with things :\ Bless my mum. She went shopping for me. Unfortunately she got back right as I started typing and it took longer than expected to put everything away. But I'll hopefully not have to do this again!

Sorry 'bout that ending... Couldn't really think of any other way to do it :\)

After finished trying to catch his breath, Alex slowly sat up, still in a paint of all that running. Una helped him up, checking to see if he'd been heard in anyway from her rather reckless attempts at shoving three different people in one door.

"Sorry for the unnecessary push, it was in the heat of the moment of not wanting to become zombie chow.." Una apologise to Ira. "Alway.... I am Una & this Alex." She informed as Alex have a loud cough. "W-We.... Saw-w some t-travellers heading-d.... West, I think-k? Yeah w-west in the l-late morning..." Alex spluttered out, know managing to stand on his own two feet. "We didn't get a very good look at thought, couldn't tell if they where friend or foe so we hid when they cam around." She explained.

"But honestly I was surprised that they haven't been eaten yet.... Especially with all the ruckus they where making...." Alex muttered, regaining his voice, Una meant him with a look of disapproval. "One of the younger women in the group seemed very upset... She was crying very loudly, often kept repeating somewhere among the lines of how horrible she felt for leaving someone behind." Una spoke in a soft, sad tone. "Well her wailing was still loud & obnoxious...." Alex murmured under his breathe.

Without consent of Alex first, Cass finally decided to remove himself from his Pokeball, wondering to see what was with all the noise. With the usual result of red emerging from the ball & himself along with it, the small Eevee gave a short yawn checking his surroundings.

"Oh know you decide to come out?" Alex laughed, one arm in his pocket the other handling the messy baseball bat. "Hey... Listen.... I was asleep okay?" Cass joked back, scratching the back of his ears before eyeing the strangers. "Huh... New friends? Nice." Cass snorted before wandering over to Alex's bag. "Get any good loot? Any nice snacks?" He asked Alex, excepting at least something had decent. "Aaannd that would be Cass..." Una said rather disappointingly, eyeing him.

"A whole bunch of stuff! We really hit the jackpot this run!" Alex excitedly giggled at his Pokemon as he gently dropped his bag to the floor, revealing his findings. "All outta last us a month at least!" He chipped away to Cass. "Well we can't hog all of it!" Una snapped "Theses people might need some as well." She examined, directing her arm at the others, Alex pouting & Cass giving her baby doll eyes.

(( sorry, life got wild for a bit there but i'm back :}} ))

Bando nodded and eased himself into a cross-legged sitting position, while the children and their pokemon spoke. He decided to not mention the body they'd discovered in the forest, and, instead, pulled his pack into his lap and began to sort through it.

Pepper settled onto the floor as well and gave the group a tired but friendly smile, "I'm Pepper and--"

"So that's it? We're just gonna kick back in this run-down, f*cking Infected infested piece of sh*t town with a bunch of /kids/?"

Squeak was looking indignantly at Bando and Pepper growled low, again, at the hypno. Bando lifted a bottle of water from the pack and looked between Alex and Ira,

"Are you thirsty? Any of you injured?" he then set the pack on the floor, if if he'd only just noticed the child cradling the egg and started towards him, slowly, "I'll hold that while you get up," the softness flashed through his eyes, again, and he added, to the group, "I'm Bando--"

A soft pink light flickered out of his pocket and a small koffing spun up into the air.

"Oh! I heard voices! I heard introductions! I was sleeping but then-- but then-- I heard Squeak being-- uh well-- Squeak-y and I was like, 'Woah what's going on? We must have found people and I was right'!"

She spun another circle in the air and cooed, "I'm Fig-Cake. Oh man-- oh man-- I haven't seen so many kids in forever," she looked at the older pokemon in the group, "You guys must be super good at protecting and planning then-- Like, oh man, I don't think I could figure out what to do if Ban--"

"Keep your f*cking voice down, you moro--" Squeak snapped and Bando looked back at him with a look that shut the hypno up completely. He slunk to an overturned chair and began trying, unsuccessfully, to flip in rightside up.

Pepper snorted and stood with some difficulty, trotting closer to the other pokemon, eying the food at Alex's feet.

"We're fine on food, but thank you," the granbull smiled and added in a low, amused voice, "I doubt Bando would take food from you anyways. But we have plenty of water and some soda i any of you would want that."

"Soda?!" Fig-Cake's eyes widened.

"It's in the bottom of Pepper's pack," offered Bando, who sounded very far away, and kept staring off into the air, "There's five. You are all welcome to our food provisions as well."

Squeak made a disgusted noise but continued to try to lift the chair-- still unsuccessfully.

Bando watched him for a moment, his eyes narrowing slightly, but then shook his head slowly; banishing whatever thoughts had been gathering behind his dark eyes. He studied the children again and felt the question rise in the back of his throat-- Where are you parents?-- but swallowed it, knowing the answer already.

Rapha, still rather dazed from his sudden spinning trip, tilted his head back to look up at the much older male. "Ah... No... That's alright, I've got it..." he mumbled softly in response, feeling a bit overwhelmed with so many pokemon appearing. Not to mention the other people currently in the room. Getting a slight half glare from Sephtis, Rapha gently set the egg to the side before pushing himself up into a sitting position and turning to face Bando. "Thank you for the offer though." he said with his voice a bit louder than before, gently grabbing the bag that contained the egg, taking the object out before inspecting it for any damage.

Turning a few times in place, Sephtis sat down next to his trainer and casually moved one of his front paws to scratch an itch on his muzzle. "Unfortunately we haven't got much to offer. Running low on everything at this point. Didn't have much luck finding anything in the last town either." his tone was calm, as it usually was. Upon hearing the offer of sharing food, he continued. "Thank you for the offer, but since we don't have much to offer I can't expect for you to share."

"Sephtis..." Rapha mumbled lightly, frowning slightly. He knew he probably wasn't acting like himself at the moment, since he was typically rather kind when in groups, but who could really blame him? Get a scare by a Salamence appearing out of no where, being half thrown off of the large Absol's back when they ran in, and now there were... Eight to ten other beings in the room, with most of them appearing out of pokeballs in an instant. It was pretty overwhelming, especially given that he didn't have a whole lot of tiem to process it all.