Session 61, VP2

 (These notes were written by the player for Sylvie, from Sylvie's POV.) 

 

(These pages are written very neatly, as though the writer took their time making notes)

 

Dad threw me back out before the tunnel closed. Not sure if he heard me yell for him. We all run back out from Gilling’s Barrel and that entrance closes too. We don’t wait around to see if anyone comes out. Basil is waiting ahead for me, but Hestr doesn’t look well-- So he goes back to running further away. It's dark but we keep moving until we get far enough away that the runes stop hurting him. 

 

It’s about dawn when the Pokemon stops ahead, exhausted. I’ve been trying to heal Lauren’s hand for the last few minutes but he tells me to take care of Hestr first. I thank the Earl, he was always my getaway plan if things got bad. The Pokemon lays down and I use my strongest powers to heal Hestr, thinking he’s barely conscious…and he almost jumps away from me. Lauren helps to calm him down, I call back my Pokemon and ask if everyone could help us to set up camp here for the night. 

 

We all kind of break off to ourselves. I see that the valley behind us is a fully encased dome. Bronze storms off right away with her hatchet, and Talullah follows her but comes back just as she’s loudly chopping at branches for firewood. Lauren eventually stops trying to set up one-handed and comes to me. I don’t think my powers will do much good for it right now, so I clean and wrap his fingers with some of the balm we used on Brunick’s burns. He says he’ll keep an eye on him; I’m too tired to disagree. I set up my tent as he goes to sit with Donner by Hestr, where he looks like he could be sleeping. 

 

Before I can sleep…processing everything, you know…something is hitting on my tent. It’s more like buzzing? I’d gotten used to the buzz on the back of my neck for the last couple days. I look and a small Yanma is carrying my backpack I left in the Hive. I have a lot of junk, so it looks tired. I thought it could’ve been her. It tells me it was a request from Morphada, to make sure I didn’t miss it. I can’t decide if I should try to send a message back to the Hive; Reinhold and Bronze said she fled, so what if Ingeborg went there? 

 

In the end, I just let the little one rest. I try to get a little, too. Lauren is talking to Donner, Bronze’s angry chopping is joined by the sound of Reinhold sharpening his sword. By the time I wake up, everyone is back around the campsite and the sun is up. We decide to sit together and catch everyone up to what’s happened, while Hestr is still asleep. Where to start?

 

I tell them about the Yanma, since it’s still clinging to me. We agree it may not be best to return to the Hive. 

 

Lauren tells us what he and Reinhold learned from Hysterig. He knew what powers Donner had received. Apparently, the fire giants have a King--Surtr. It made its mark on Donner like how the Gods marked us. When he was on fire, they could hear him calling for sacrifice. Lauren must have already explained this to Donner, because he said “he got his curse for free”. Nice try.  Donner then says he understands if we want to leave him behind. Everyone says: no, we don’t want that, thank you very much. None of this was his fault. We may just need to be more careful. I already couldn’t help him earlier, what can I do if it happens again?

 

Next, Lauren calls Brunick with us on speakerphone. He sounds happy as ever. I ask if it was a bad time to talk. Lauren leads the way in telling him what happened, especially how his grandma was being a perv to everyone and Odd teaching them runes and sign language. We just say that they were ‘safe, last we saw’. I don’t know how he’s supposed to take the news, but he’s…he seems to understand. We tell him we may need his expertise on the rune still attached to Hestr, and he agrees to look into it more. 

 

Then, we message Bergie for a call. He’s picking flowers. Apparently they’re just leaving Streamsford; guess we just circled around each other again. We update him on…everything. We warn him about Hysterig and his sacrifice for power, Ingeborg killing her mother and taking the weapon, everything…he’s really shaken. They made a new friend who was close with Morphada, and we apologize that he’ll have to break the news. 

 

 

Then he says that they’re actually on the trail of someone--a gladiator in the tournament in Streamsford was taking battles to the death. When Gunnar spared her when he won, she ritualistically executed her own battle partner. What the hell did that old man do?

 

Our friend Selby was one of her victims. I hope Randolph is alright. Bergie said it didn’t seem like it.

 

Even weirder, he says he went to the lighthouse keeper. It’s been ages since we’d gone ourselves. He describes a vision he saw of the serpent from the ocean outside Sindri’s Kiln appearing on each side of Vanachrom--two heads, one for each end of the body--being battled simultaneously. He says he saw the silhouettes of people, and two were wearing the gold arm rings Brunick made for us out of Solgaleo’s metal. Bergie has one, and Bronze has the other.

 

Guess he shared something unsettling for us in return. Everything feels too fresh; we don’t even know what to do about what we just left behind, and now we have to look at fighting that thing. We agree to stay in contact when we learn anything new. 

 

Bronze suggests we should start to get ready to travel again--it’s a few more hours to Seeder Grove, it’s daylight, and she encountered a lot of panicked wild Pokémon this morning. They weren’t running from any one direction…they were just running. Before we get ready to break camp, Lauren takes out the charm he received in the market--someone grabs it and snaps it, tossing it into the fire. Magic clearly leaves it. I say we probably should have done that sooner, but “Fuck them”. 

 

Hestr, then, makes us aware he’s awake. He says something about how I thought so little of his parents them. Lauren is looking at me. I’m looking at Lauren. We’re too tired for this right now. I don’t want to have this conversation. Bronze is so angry, she’s still electric like she gets in fights. She glares Hestr down, tells him that someone died for him and he should watch his mouth. I go to her, ease her away from the standoff. It’s not his fault, Bronze. He didn’t know, it’s not fair to put that on him.

 

Nothing is fair right now. 

 

That’s enough to make breaking camp seem all too interesting to everybody else. Donner looks at me and then asks Reinhold to teach him how to throw a punch. Reinhold agrees in exchange to hear about these monsters he’s fought. I guess this is happening.

 

…

 

…

 

I try to start with the newest thing--he didn’t know Morphada, or that she died. And from there I have to say how we know Bergie and Gunnar, and how we learned of what happened in Hammerfest and headed to the Hive. He lets me get that far, anyway. I knew it was the real first thing he’d ask: Why did I leave?

 

In Hammerfest, I had finally told everyone why I left home--the prophecy. But I haven’t said the real reason, not out loud anyway. I knew that if I’d gone to Hestr and we made a plan together, that I would have stayed in the Valley for him. If I did that, I never would discover who I was outside that place. I said I’d spent the rest of the time regretting my decision. 

 

I took it back. I said “No, that’s a lie, I don't regret it at all.”

 

It’s the wrong thing to say. 

 

It all descends into an argument. He’s angry, I’m defensive. It used to be the other way around. How I left him to be tortured. How he never even read my letter because it wouldn’t have helped him. He’s right about all that. I didn’t want them to be reminded of me all the time. He says I never even cared about any of them. I push him. I don’t have anything left to yell or cry but I feel it anyway even if I can barely talk. How my dad was probably going to die, how we had to tell Brunick we put his grandparents at risk, how Morphada was only there to protect me. Everyone keeps getting hurt for me. How dare he say I don’t care about th

 

He doesn’t want to know or talk to me. I’m already the weird in-between dressed like a stranger and having the conversation I didn’t want to have because I don’t have the words to say what I actually mean. So I just divert to being the healer, if he needs any injuries tended to, and to get ready for the journey. He sounds just like his dad.

 

We get back on the road to Seeder Grove. We avoid a lot of wilds for a while but there’s two groups facing off in the path. On one side is the Cyndaquil line: four Cyndaquils, three Quilava, and two Typhlosions, and opposite is Aron: four Aron, three Lairon, and two Aggron. Even the Pokedex says that they aren’t native to this place. Last time we saw some of these we were in Sindri’s Kiln. Regardless, they’re about to fight it out and look more crazed than afraid. 

 

We send out our Pokemon. Bronze beans one of the Typhlosion with a ball to get its attention. Ros the Ampharos and Jasmine my Golisopod go to break into the tiny frontliners, while Reinhold and Gary square up on the massive armored Aggron. Lauren and Oli the Xatu help with the Typhlosion that breaks off to face Bronze…she has a habit of almost getting kicked by fire-types. She uses King alongside her, but the Typhlosion has Thunderpunch, and King is taken out for Amy the Tinkaton. Jasmine and Ros have themselves covered, so I try to get a sense of what is causing the panic and aggression in the wild Pokemon. I had a suspicion…proved correct, when Psychic Finder shows their connection leading back towards the earthen dome of Harbinger Valley. 

 

In fact...hundreds, or thousands of these threads lead back there. It’s like a strange light show all focusing on that one point. He was causing this, too. We should get to town quickly. 

 

Lauren, Bronze, and myself catch a few of the remaining Pokemon. Reinhold and Gary work together on both Aggron, putting one to sleep and a few well-timed punches take out one of them. He throws a luxury Pokeball at the remaining one, and misses…but another Pokeball comes out of nowhere and catches it?  I’ll have to ask him what that was about. We clean up the rest of them, though a few of our own Pokemon also fell to Lava Plume and Earthquake attacks. Even more reason to get us into a Pokemon Center. 

 

We’re all beat, even if there’s some time before nightfall we all hurry to clean up, heal, and go to sleep. Somehow the Pokemon Centers are comfiest after the ground and sharing a floor in a cottage. 

 

Morning wakes us by the ground trembling. 

 

 

I guess we have less time than we hoped.