[Pokémon] A Smell of Petroleum Pervades Throughout

> Follow the crazy guy, but keep your weapon ready
> Stay where you are I think I got an idea well two 1. we try to catch it than threaten to leave it in the purifying light of the shrine until it tells us or 2. We threaten to let Vesta feed to her hearts content, turn their dark sanctuary into a blazing inferno
> I would suggest that since you probably can't escape, and are probably up against unknown amounts of powerful enemies, that continuing on is likely your only option. Worst comes to worst, throw Vesta at its face.
> Do as the ghosts wish, they hold the cards here after all.
> Continue. The ghosts have the power right now. If something goes bad. Torch the place with Vesta.

(Four to one. Othodox will continue.)

You don't want to go near that thing. You really don't.

But he's right. You have no choice.

You drag your feet, but you keep walking.

Morty relaxes visibly, sagging like a puppet on slack strings.

"Good," he says. "Good."

As you get closer, the air gets colder. Vaguely, you remember the Pokédex entry about lurking Gengar; they can conceal themselves, you recall, but their presence leeches the heat from the air. You wonder if the cold is what has distorted Morty's skin, made it crack and blister as it has done.

You wonder if it can extinguish Vesta.

"Why do you want me to come closer?" you ask hesitantly, though you don't stop moving.

"We hunger," breathes Morty, and for a moment his voice splits apart into a hundred others. "We must feed."

"What do you eat?" you ask. You have no idea why. It just seems like the right thing to say.

Morty grins.

"That would be telling," he replies, the many voices melding back into one. "Just come here, Othodox. We have so much to discuss."

You walk on a little further. The cold is incredible now; it's as if you're walking forwards into the teeth of a windless blizzard. Vesta wails weakly and shrinks down to cinders in her jar, and you hold her close, trying to keep her from going out.

ssss, she hisses frantically. sssscold...

And now you're there: just a few feet away from the thing that once was Morty and now seems to be nothing but a façade for the seething darkness beyond. You force your eyes up from the ground and up to his face, and he smiles at you.

"Brave Othodox," he says. "So much fear to overcome..."

Fear?

"Fear," you say slowly. "You eat... fear?"

"Amongst other things," murmurs Morty in a dark, rich voice. "Yours made a piquant starter."

His head slumps and something black with eyes like frozen stars oozes from the back of his neck, rising into a hump over his head, trickling through his hair. A faint smell of petrol comes to your nose, and you know that this must be one of the Eldritch Ghost-types. It's smaller than you thought, but no less terrifying; of all the Pokémon you've seen, this one most truly deserves the epithet eldritch. There is a hideous eerie wrongness about it that outshines the Cyndaquil, the Pidgeot, everything; it is a blasphemy against the universe itself.

"Give it to us," says the Ghost, no longer bothering with Morty's face. "Give us the flame."

You look at Vesta.

"What – this?"

You tap the jar.

"That," confirms the Ghost greedily. "It burns with life – young, fiery life, the perfect dish for such a cold night as this."

You consider. Should you give them Vesta? You're not sure. It will buy you information, that's for certain, and it may stop them eating your life, which you're pretty keen to do. On the other hand, Vesta is your only protection – and, since she started showing signs of emotion and increased intellect, you're not so sure you could live with the guilt of wilfully destroying her.

Then again, would she last anyway? If you can fix the world, Eldritch Pokémon might no longer exist. Perhaps Vesta would vanish with the rest of the taint – assuming it can be banished, that is.

And then there's something else, some faint dust-veiled alarm bell beginning to trill in the back of your head – a sense that something is not right here, beyond the ghoulish creature before you, beyond the tumultuous abyss below you and the darkness all around.

"Give it to us," says the Ghost, more imperiously this time, and it stretches out Morty's arms towards you, fingers crooked into clutching claws. "Now."

You look at the black lump with its dead eyes, and the body beneath it. You look at Vesta, huddled small and scared at the base of her jar.

What do you do?
 
Do not hand Vesta over to them, you created her and only a coward abandons what it created. If you're going to give something throw a pokeball instead maybe this will be the one in a million easy capture with a pokeball
 
Don't hand over vesta. instead, see if anything in your bag will please the ghosts.
 
Assuming you still have it, see if the ghosts will take the spooky torch. I mean it's the same flame as Vesta, but the only difference is that you don't have an emotional attachment to the torch. If you don't have a torch, see if the ghosts will let you light a new one using Vesta.
 
"Never gonna give you up" Do not ever give Vesta up. Shes probably become attached to you as well... As much as a sentient flame that eats everything can. Instead, Offer them something else. The torch maybe? If you get out of this alive. Check the state of your dress.
 
> Don't give them Vesta. Stand your ground, and threaten to jump into the warp panels.
> Do not hand Vesta over to them, you created her and only a coward abandons what it created. If you're going to give something throw a pokeball instead maybe this will be the one in a million easy capture with a pokeball
> Don't hand over vesta. instead, see if anything in your bag will please the ghosts.
> Assuming you still have it, see if the ghosts will take the spooky torch. I mean it's the same flame as Vesta, but the only difference is that you don't have an emotional attachment to the torch. If you don't have a torch, see if the ghosts will let you light a new one using Vesta.
> Never let Vesta go. She's a crime against nature, sure, but she's the closest thing to a family you have right now.
> "Never gonna give you up" Do not ever give Vesta up. Shes probably become attached to you as well... As much as a sentient flame that eats everything can. Instead, Offer them something else. The torch maybe? If you get out of this alive. Check the state of your dress.
> Promise the ghost that you'll give Vesta, but squeeze some info from them first. If they won't give info and demand Vesta, run away as fast as you can. And by "run away", I mean don't give up Vesta. :3

The Narrator is slightly overwhelmed by the sheer quantity of love for Vesta booming out from the voices in your skull, but does not let that stand in the way of a good story.

"OK," you say slowly. "Tell me something first. So, uh... so I know you aren't lying."

Yes! The Narrator saw fit to allow you to have a good idea for once!

The Ghost gives you a withering look. Since it comes from eyes that can see through souls, this is almost a literal description of what it does to your face.

"You're lying," it hisses. "You won't give it to us..."

Well, so much for the Narrator being on your side.

"Don't you want to save the world?" asks the Ghost, bubbling like a swelling pustule further out of Morty's skull. "Don't you want to survive your visit to this Gym? Othodox, Othodox, Othodox – we were so sure you were smarter than that."

"She's all I have," you say. You're not sure what else you can say.

It does not appear possible to appeal to a Ghost's humanity, presumably for the excellent reason that it is not, in fact, human.

"Then you have nothing else to offer," it replies. "Nothing save your own life, that is."

"Can't I light a fire from her and give it to you?" you ask. "Won't that work?"

"This is a fire lit from a fire lit from a fire," the Ghost says contemptuously. "With each layer of distance from the source, its life diminishes. Another level and it's not going to be worth the effort of digestion." It twitches Morty's fingers, a puppeteer deftly flicking a string. "Come on, Othodox. You know what to do."

"I could jump off the path," you say. "I could jump off the path if you don't tell me—"

"What do you think the dark is, Othodox?" says that hideous multitude of voices, and all at once dozens of pairs of cold white eyes light up in the dark below and around you – no, not in the dark, you realise; the Ghosts aren't in the dark – they are the dark! The entire Gym is packed with the Ghost-types of every Trainer who worked here, all the Sages and Mediums; Gastly and Haunter without number, crowding around in midnight swarms of eyes and fangs and toxic, clutching hands.

You take a step back, but a horde of sharp-fingered hands brush against your back and you halt abruptly.

"Oh, poor Othodox," says Morty, his head snapping back up and the Ghost vanishing within his neck. "We're Ghosts, darling boy. What did you expect of us? There's no honour amongst the semi-living."

The dark crowds in around you, and soft, sinister fingers press up against you on all sides; Morty takes a hesitant, jerky step forwards, and the cold light of the Ghost's eyes burns through his pupils.

"Now," he commands. "Give it to me."

You shake your head. You're not certain about very much right now, but you're certain of this.

"No way," you say, clutching Vesta to your chest. "She's mine."

Defending your sacred fire is the sort of thing flame goddesses approve of, by the way.

Othodox's Devotion has drastically increased!

Othodox is now Smiled Upon by Tabiti!

"Listen," says the Ghost – and all its fellows, too, their voices echoing through Morty's blackened mouth. "Othodox. We gave you a choice, but there was never really any choice in it. If we can't have your fire, we'll have you."

"I know," you say. "I don't care."

The muscles of Morty's face shift in ways that they never could in life, sliding off the bone and warping it into the most contorted rictus of rage and disbelief you have ever seen. If you had any lingering hopes that Morty might still be in that shell, somewhere, they're dispelled in an instant: there is nothing human in that thing any more.

The Ghosts don't say anything. They don't have to. All that's necessary is the crawl of their squidgy fingers over your shoulders, slowly, so slowly, creeping towards your mouth.

The Gym falls apart.

At once, the Ghosts recede, their inky surface boiling in confusion and fright; the walls of the Gym have fragmented and just floated away, the roof spiralling up into the dizzying heights of the black dome, and everything is completely goddamn impossible but it's still happening, and—

"No!" howl the Ghosts, their eyes turning upwards, a hundred toothy mouths opening up in their surface to scream at the black sky. "What are you doing? He's ours!"

Their voices are no longer frightening. They sound petulant and whiny, kids telling their mother that their punishment isn't fair.

Not this time, replies a titan voice that echoes slowly in your skull, every letter of every word sinking into your mind as if cast in lead. This one is mine.

"But—"

Mine! repeats the voice sternly, and the Ghosts shrink back, gibbering and whining, slinking away in packs through the mist-haunted streets. Morty looks around wildly, following them with wide, staring eyes – and then collapses, a black blob arcing from his throat and out over the rooftops.

You stare.

Well.

You thought you'd run out of deus ex machina moments two near-deaths ago. Looks like you were wrong.

But who, or what, has saved you this time?

Just as you're wondering this, two huge eyes, infinitely ancient and infinitely cold, open in the darkness above, and a shattering realisation courses through your body.

The black dome is a gigantic Ghost.

The Pokédex beeps, but you don't need that to tell you that this gigantic creature is the Eldritch Gengar.

You have come here before, it tells you. Its voice seems to come from a place so far away that time has not yet reached it. Every time, you pleaded for your life. Every time, the Gastly and the Haunter ate your soul and added your flayed body to the collection.

You came here for information, but this is the sort you really could do without.

Once you offered them Falkner if they let you go, the Gengar continues. There might be contempt in its voice. It's too big for you to be certain. But... this time, something is different. This time, you chose to sacrifice yourself for the merest spark of life.

"Uh, OK... So you've decided to spare me on account of my altruism?" you ask hopefully.

I have not decided anything yet, the Gengar says. For now, I just want to know why.

"Why?" You weren't expecting that, but the answer's clear enough. "Why? Vesta is... she's all I have. I made her, and I've looked after her, and she's... well, she hasn't protected me yet, but she would if she had to."

sss... Vesta seems to have heard that. She's making little sizzling noises now, and you tear your eyes away from the Gengar above for one moment to see that green drops of napalm are trickling from her embers.

Dear God, your pet fire is crying. You weren't aware she had a heart for you to move, or eyes to cry with for that matter, but the sentiment still gets you.

Othodox's Devotion has increased!

Othodox is A Friend to Fire in the Eyes of Tabiti!

"I... I can't abandon her," you go on, dragging your gaze back up to the Cyclopean eyes in the sky. "I just can't."

Sentimentality, murmurs the Gengar. How mortal. A rare and piquant emotion indeed, these days... For that, I shall indeed let you live. You will not be harmed within my borders.

The eyes close, and you blink in confusion. Is that it? It's just going to spare you and send you on your way? You came here for the untold secrets of the apocalypse, goddammit, and considering what you had to go through just then to get here, you're not leaving without them.

"What about the information I came here for?" you yell at the sky. "Can't I have that?"

The Gengar's eyes slide open once again.

Why? it asks. Why should I want to help you return the world to the way it was before? Look at me. Look at how I have benefited from the Dreaming. What is there to make me want to turn things back to normal?

That stumps you. You'd forgotten that for the Pokémon, this has actually been quite a good thing: they've risen to supremacy over humanity and gained significant power boosts. And in the case of the Ghost-types, they've also gained about 70 IQ points, going from Forrest Gump to near-genius overnight and placing them at the top of the new pecking order.

But there must be something. That's how these things work: there's always a way out of every situation, and therefore there has to be something you can say to bring the Gengar around to your point of view.

Time to get your thinking cap on.
 
Since you're safe within the borders of the town, let's go looting!
 
Perhaps talk about Morty. This is his Gengar, after all - mustn't they have had some form of bond? Try to convince the Gengar that the companionship between humans and Pokémon is worth preserving, worth bringing back.
 
Though this may not affect a ghost type point out that since the events has risen the stacks, so to speak, it's not longer fainting it's dying for everyone even him he's powerful but what if a pack of dark types come along what will happen to their haven than?
 
((Oh god if that's what Ghost-types are like, imagine what an Eldritch Alakazam's IQ would be! That's a terrifying thought...))

I think you should go to the dance theatre and see if the Kimono Girls are still alive. If so, they may be able to help since they always seemed to have an exceptionally strong bond with Pokemon. Might be wise to check out the legendary towers too, Tabiti might have possessed Ho-oh; how helpful would that be if it'd join you?
 
> Since you're safe within the borders of the town, let's go looting!

You're briefly distracted by the thought that there might be shiny things in some of the houses around here, but then you return to the matter at hand. You're a bit busy trying to get the key to saving the world to go looting right now.

Freaking klepto.

> Point out that Ghost-types were once humans as well

"Weren't you human once too?" you ask. "Don't you remember what it's like for us?"

I think you're mistaking us for regular ghosts, the Gengar replies. I hatched from an Egg in Sprout Tower. I have never been a mortal.

Oh yeah. How could you have forgotten that?

> Though this may not affect a ghost type point out that since the events has risen the stacks, so to speak, it's not longer fainting it's dying for everyone even him he's powerful but what if a pack of dark types come along what will happen to their haven than?

"You could still die, you know," you say. "Even like this. What if – uh – what if a pack of Honchkrow came here? Or some hunting Weavile?"

The Gengar says nothing, but molecularly disassembles a house in front of your eyes.

You are really not all that certain that it's possible for anything to successfully attack this thing.

> Try pointing out that if you aren't able to fix whatever is wrong then everything will be stuck in a loop, repeating itself every time you die. (at least I think that's how the 'game' works)

You consider pointing out that if you don't save the world, everything will repeat every time you die – but then you realise that that isn't true. If that was how it worked, Falkner would have no idea what to tell you to do, and no recollection of your past incarnations. No, it seems that only a few things reset when you die – essentially, all the stuff in New Bark Town, you'd guess.

> Perhaps talk about Morty. This is his Gengar, after all - mustn't they have had some form of bond? Try to convince the Gengar that the companionship between humans and Pokémon is worth preserving, worth bringing back.

You think and think, and look around for ideas; your eyes fall on the remnants of Morty, face-down on the flagstones, and you pause.

"Morty," you say softly.

What?

"Morty," you repeat. "Don't you miss him?"

The Gengar does not reply.

"Maybe if I can fix things, I can bring him back," you suggest. "Or perhaps at least give other people a chance to do as he did. To make friends."

I do not miss Morty, replies the Gengar at length. Not any more.

"But you did once?" you persist.

Yes. The Gengar's voice is frank and emotionless. For seven hours after the Dreaming began. It pauses. He caught me in Sprout Tower, it says after a while. I was a Gastly.

"He was your friend," you say.

No. Not then. There is no friendship between man and Ghost – not naturally. It took time.

"So he was your friend," you tell it, but the Gengar is no longer listening; it's rambling on by itself, heedless of your presence.

We spent long years scrying. He wanted me to teach him to see the future. He wanted to see himself and Ho-oh... he wanted to restore Ecruteak to its old glory. Then, continues the Gengar, came Eusine.

Eusine. You remember him: the man who spent his entire life chasing after, and getting comprehensively beaten up by, the legendary Pokémon Suicune. He was perhaps the most persistent – and the most frequently hospitalised – stalker in Johtonian history.

Morty helped him all he could. He devoted years to him, at the expense of his own work. The Gengar's voice seems to have softened by just the tiniest amount. I watched. I helped. I did not understand. I had hundreds, perhaps thousands, of years in me, but Morty had just seventy. How could he afford to waste so much of his short life on the dreams of others?

It sighs. A slow, sad breeze whistles in the empty streets.

It took years for me to understand, it says. The human mind. Compassion. Altruism. It makes so little sense from my point of view. But at length, I understood – and I, too...

It breaks off, and suddenly, impossibly, it begins to snow: fat, fluffy flakes drift down from the black sky and sink like burrowing worms into the ground.

Ah, says the Gengar, as if from a great distance. Ah, me... Those awful eyes blink once, slowly, and a black wind whisks the last of the falling snow from sight. All right, it says quietly. I will show you what I know.

"Thank you," you say fervently. You're not wholly sure how it worked – the Gengar's mind is less human than you're used to, and its workings aren't entirely clear to you – but it has worked, and that's really all that matters.

Dream, commands the Gengar. Dream.

The wild Gengar used Hypnosis!

Othodox fell asleep!

---

You are under the sea again, drifting in the emerald deeps. There is the same current as before, dragging you slowly down inch by inexorable inch, and the same total, unshakeable silence.

Minutes pass, or perhaps hours. The water darkens so gradually as to be imperceptible except over extended periods of time; green fades to blue fades to indigo and, at last, to black. Fish appear, every once in a while: white flashes of scything jaws and unearthly phosphorescence.

And now you are deeper than the fish, and there is a strange light growing beneath you.

You look down. You would rather not – in fact, you couldn't do it if it were up to your own will – but this is not your dream, this is Morty's, and at this point Morty looks down.

There are buildings beneath you – vast, Cyclopean halls wrought of stone not to be found in any earthly mine; terrible houses whose architecture conforms to no human geometry; towering, outsize temples whose black windows seem to leer at you like the eyes of demons. The doors are choked with weed and crusts of black coral have spread across the surface of the masonry – but the corners of the stones are still sharp, unnaturally so given their obvious antiquity, and as you drift closer you see that there are still carvings to be seen on many of the buildings, carvings that fill you with a nameless dread and dreams no mortal has ever dared to dream before.

And in those streets, those immeasurably vast roads of fluted stone, something stirs.

Morty screams, and, even though the horror is filtered through his consciousness and diluted before it reaches you, you scream with him.

You could accept it all – accept the strange architecture, accept the evil windows and the horrendous carvings, accept the unnatural stone and the inhuman scale – but you cannot accept the creatures in the street.

Frog-like, fish-like, ridged of back and slimy of skin; their eyes start permanently from their sockets, and their necks palpitate continually with the rush of water through their gills; pale gold hangs from their wrists and ankles, and they croak and bay as they see you, kicking through the water at astonishing speed—

You wake.

For a long moment, all you can do is breathe – breathe, without the water dragging at your lungs, without the fear of the blasphemous amphibian things flapping and kicking beneath you – and then, by slow degrees, your wits return.

You sit up, and look around. Everything is just as it was before you fell asleep; the Gengar stares down from above, the Gym is ruined and Morty lies crumpled before you.

Go to Olivine, the Gengar says impassively. I see only a little more than I have shown you in the dream, and all it says is that there is someone alive there. Someone who knows about the dead city of unnatural dreams.

"Th-thank you," you say, finally finding your voice again. "So much."

I did not do it for you, the Gengar replies. I did it for her.

"Her?"

The fire.

What? Vesta?

"This?" You hold her out.

Yes. The Gengar's eyes close, slowly. She does not understand, not yet. But perhaps one day you will make her see, as Morty made me... I do what I do for her.

The last traces of white disappear in the dark, and you stand alone and cold amidst the wreck of the Gym.

Well, not entirely alone. There's someone else, after all. Someone you're beginning to think might be more important than you'd thought.

sss, says Vesta happily, flaring up from her embers again. allgonebaddeadcoldgone...

"Yeah," you mutter, still looking up at the sky. "All gone..."

> I think you should go to the dance theatre and see if the Kimono Girls are still alive. If so, they may be able to help since they always seemed to have an exceptionally strong bond with Pokemon. Might be wise to check out the legendary towers too, Tabiti might have possessed Ho-oh; how helpful would that be if it'd join you?

Since you're here, you might as well check the towers out. You walk north, but on seeing it decide not to enter the Burned Tower; it's being a bit weird, and flickering in and out of existence like the glow of a faulty lightbulb. You aren't sure what would happen if you were inside it when it vanishes, but you're not especially keen to put it to the test.

As for the other tower... You look out across the sea of trees, but can't see it beyond the black dome. You're not sure if it's OK or not, but the door of the gatehouse leading to the Bellchime Trail is bolted shut. Perhaps you could get in if you had a mind to, but you'd need to be more determined than you are now.

Returning to the southern end of town, you glance into the theatre and very quickly back out again. You've had more than enough gore for today with the whole Mr. Pokémon under the TV incident, thank you, and seeing the decomposing corpses of the Kimono girls hanging like puppets from the rafters is not conducive to a good night's sleep. Not that you're likely to get that tonight, anyway – not with these dreams.

Speaking of which, you're not sure what time it is, but you're very hungry. You haven't eaten since last night.
 
Search for food for your and Vesta ghosts have no real need for the stuff so check the pokemart there's a good chance there's some jerky or something left on rotted or stolen. Also try talking to Vesta see if she knows anything.

ooc/I just want to say, that I love the traces of Lovecraft Horror and creatures in your work, it really ties the whole Eldritch end of the world thing together for me. I can't wait to see where this goes, as long as we can keep Othodox long enough to see :P
 
> Are there not some meaty scraps left from the Hambone? Eat those, if so.

You nom on the Delicious Meat Bits. Hot or cold, served with vegetables or as a meal in itself, a Hambone makes a delicious snack any time of the day.

That's you sorted. What about Vesta?

> Search for food for your and Vesta ghosts have no real need for the stuff so check the pokemart there's a good chance there's some jerky or something left on rotted or stolen. Also try talking to Vesta see if she knows anything.
>Loot the Pokecenter as well... and FINALLY figure out what's underneath Nurse Joy's desk.

The Pokémon Mart is mostly empty – perhaps there was a struggle when the Ghosts seized the town, and they needed Potions to heal themselves or something – but there is an old wooden crate full of unfilled glass Potion bottles behind the counter, and a splintered plank of that does Vesta just fine.

That done, you head over to the Pokémon Centre, where a little rooting around under the desk turns up a couple of interesting items.

Othodox found a Jar of Fish Eggs! Othodox put the Jar of Fish Eggs in the Ammo Pocket.

Othodox found a Broken Knife! Othodox put the Broken Knife in the Key Items Pocket.

The knife is mostly handle; the blade's snapped off about an inch down its length. The Jar of Fish Eggs, however, is completely intact, and looks like it would form an excellent meatwell for the Portable Spratchery. Which you haven't investigated yet, despite it having the most bizarre name of any single thing you've encountered so far.

Some people have no sense of curiosity.

In fact, so incurious are you that even now you fail to investigate it, choosing instead to talk to your Jar of Sentient Fire. I mean, her babbling speech has started to get a little more coherent of late, but still. Gah. The Narrator is wasted on you.

"Hello, Vesta," you begin.

sss...vesssta? she queries.

"That's you," you tell her. "That's your name."

name? namenamesswhatname? She does not appear to understand the concept.

"You," you say. "You're Vesta."

vessta... She mulls it over. vesstanamenamevesta... me?

"You," you confirm. "You're Vesta."

vesssta...

You're not certain how long she could keep this up, but it's probably considerably longer than your patience will stretch.

OOC: Yes, Lopnis, I'm a big Lovecraft fan. This story was started as I finished my deliciously shiny volume of his complete works, hence the influence. However, there is significantly more Lovecraft in here than dreams of the Deep Ones and my gratuitous use of the words 'eldritch' and 'Cyclopean': if Othodox can find the answers, there is plenty more cosmic horror to be uncovered.
 
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