Chapter Text
“The summer party?” asks Claire, with much confusion on her undisguised face. Her little glasses only amplify the cuteness when she bites her lip.
“I’m pretty sure that I mentioned it before,” says Sean. “The party where you will be able to meet all the others…?”
“OH YEAH! I remember now!”
“The Zoroark’s summer party, huh?” comments West.
“Yes… I suppose you are invited as well,” decides Sean.
“Splendid,” accepts West, with a smile on her human face. “There’s no way this will be a normal party!”
“I won’t spoil the surprise,” says Sean.
“Now I’m even more curious…” Claire straightens her front legs, but doesn’t stand fully from the loaf she was in.
“Really, I’m quite glad that I was able to find you. No phone! Br— Rose didn’t know, I didn’t know! I was going to remind you on Friday, but you weren’t there! I am glad I guessed you would be here!”
Sean found them at one of the training rooms in Facility Steel, of course. That’s probably where they were yesterday, instead of at work!
“Hehe,” Claire chuckles awkwardly. “You know me, after all.”
“I’m glad,” repeats Sean. “You know, Gleam is also supposed to join us, but for them, I haven’t the faintest idea how to find them. I’ve already given up.”
“Who?” ask both West and Claire.
“Starmie? You met them on the boat.”
“Oh yeah.”
“Not ringing any bells,” says West.
“You may know them as Darin,” Sean adds.
“Darin… the D.J! I completely forgot that he is a Pokemon!”
“How do you forget something like that?” asks Claire, and West shushes her.
“You wouldn’t happen to know where they are, would you?” asks Sean, with rekindled hope.
“I have some good guesses,” replies West. “He could either be at Club 48 or Zeeke’s. He hangs out there pretty often.”
“Oh, excellent! I shouldn’t have given up so soon.”
It’s a good thing that Sean didn’t drop his disguise, as West teleports the three of them without any notice.
“A little warning next time?” Sean requests, and he looks around at what turns out to be a clean empty alley, being unusually devoid of trash or leaves or random detritus.
Claire doesn’t look much better than Sean feels, but she has a very interesting observation.
“We didn’t need to touch you for that.”
Sean doesn’t know a lot about teleportation, but that is something which supposedly takes much practice and skill.
“Well, it’s not only my looks that got me the job!”
“Despite, perhaps,” ribs Sean, feeling mildly malicious.
West pouts. “This here is the back entrance of Zeeke’s.”
“Claire, you should probably disguise,” recommends Sean.
“Right!”
Claire glances at West and does the absolute last thing he was expecting — she disguises as a Pokemon.
“Umbreon,” she says, in a completely unconvincing manner.
“Ah, maybe stay silent for now,” recommends Sean. He is not very familiar with Umbreon, so there is not much he can say about whether the illusion is accurate or not. He can say, at the very least, her illusion is not in the uncanny valley, and it’s still dark type. She hasn’t made enough progress on false mind… they will need to work on that.
“Looks pretty good, girlie,” comments West, and Sean decides to believe her. West knocks on the door, and when there was no answer, she does so again.
“Maybe we should check the front,” says Sean, and he jinxed it, for the door opens right as the words leave is mouth.
The quite pale and skinny man has a face tattoo of all things.
“Eh, if it isn’t Miss East-West in the flesh. Yo, come in.”
They do so, of course, and the immediate inside appears to be a staging area of sorts. There is a lot of lights and exposed walls, painted black. It’s extremely well organized at a glance, and he notices a wall with many breaker boxes and switches.
Face tattoo man smells a bit like coffee and tomato juice, of all things. Probably some attempt at a hangover cure.
He gives Claire only a passing glance, and dismisses her completely.
“So, who’s homie here? Not your daddy, right? I don’t get that vibe.”
“No!”
“Hmm…” Face tattoo man gives Sean a second, careful look.
“Is he your daddy?”
“NO!” she punches his arm, rather hard for the unaggressive motion. The man tries to rub the pain away, but Sean can see on his face it is a failed attempt.
“Good. I would have had to punch him in the face, were that the case. In either sense of the word.”
“You ass,” says West, strategically punching the same spot.
“Ah! So, who is homeboy, then? Homeman.”
“Um… I’m Sean.”
Somehow, saying ‘Mr. Sean Black’ seems entirely too formal, and he’s not even sure if he should hold out his hand — thankfully, that question is answered when the man holds out a fist bump. Sean awkwardly returns it.
“Cool beans, I’m Steve-O. Anyways, the club ain’t open, and it’s way earlier than when you haunt the bar, so why you here? Got something to do with homeboy here? Homeman.”
“Can’t a gal just want to say hi?” answers West, to which Steve-O raises a rather bushy brow to.
“We’re looking for Darin,” says Sean, getting right to the point.
“He might be around, but dude’s always pecking away. We’d know if he was here.”
“Oh, thanks,” says Sean, not really understanding but getting the point.
“YO HOMESLICE, IS D.J.D. IN?”
“YOU’D KNOW IF D.J.D. WERE IN, DUDE.”
The voice comes from above, unexpectedly. Sean looks up, but he can’t see anything but dark rafters.
“Yeah, he ain’t in.”
“Oh, alright.”
“He got a gig or something?”
“Yeah,” replies Sean, wondering how right that might actually be.
“Good for him, as long as he’s not on the lineup. Dude’s a fucking beast. Just got that brain, you know. I mean, he can be a little retarded sometimes—”
“Steve!”
“—and he never takes off that chrome dome of his. It adds to the myst-i-qué. Like a genius alien that slays dance floors. Dude’s always live, too. Steady ass-hands. Damn, he better not be on the lineup. YO HOMESLICE, IS D.J.D. ON THE LINEUP!”
“NO DUDE!”
“GOOD! DUDE’S GOT A GIG!”
“NICE!”
“Well, if the legend comes by, I’ll tell him his homies came by.”
“Thanks, bro,” says West, and shortly they are back in the alley.
“Well, time to check Club 48,” says West, and suddenly they are in a different alley.
Sean swallows deeply. “I said some warning!”
“Sorry, I thought it was obvious,” says West, with only a hint of actual apology.
“Why are all these places smelly alleys?” complains Claire, as the one closest to the ground.
“They’re the back entrances, okay?” explains West, and Sean wonders why she would know the back entrances to these places.
Claire’s dark illusion wasn’t disrupted one bit, and so West has no hesitation knocking on a heavy metal door.
She doesn’t need to knock twice. A black man with an afro any Zoroark can appreciate and a cigarette they would not uses his whole body to hold the door open. He looks down.
“That one ugly-ass Umbreon, girl.”
“Hey! Maynard!”
“Freddie, come check out this ugly-ass Umbreon!”
Claire slinks behind Sean’s legs, and he can see nothing ugly aside from her pissed expression.
“Have you even seen an Umbreon, you broke fucker,” shoots back West.
A man (who is presumably Freddie) arrives, and he has an even better afro and no cigarette.
“That’s just a regular-ass Umbreon, man! With the way you’re freaking out, I thought it would look like Toya!”
“Fuck you!”
“You haven’t been getting smoked, have you? It’s only ten a.m, man!”
“No way!”
Sean choses not to believe him.
Freddie kneels down, and holds out his hand with his fingers rubbing together enticingly.
“Don’t listen to Maynard, cutie girl, you’re fine. Pspspspspspsp. Who’s a good girl? Pspspspsp. You know you want it. Pspspspsp.”
Claire peeks around Sean’s legs, a look of bewilderment peeking through her rage. The man is undeterred, and holds out his hand even further.
“Come on, you know you want it. Pspspspsp.”
Claire steps forward, and hisses . Her fangs appear slightly longer than they should, but only for a moment. The man retracts his hand rapidly.
“Oop— okay, okay, never mind!” Freddie doesn’t seem upset with Claire, but he does seem unhappy with his fellow. Maynard breathes out, and Sean gets an unfortunate faceful of fresh smoke.
“Is Darin around?” asks West, before leaning down and reaching for Claire. Claire very deliberately dodges West’s hands and puts Sean between them.
“Yes, dude’s around,” says Freddie, who still has some attention on Claire’s apparently fuzzy ears.
“Oh, great! Could you, um, take us there?” requests Sean.
Maynard shuffles off under Freddie’s shooing, before he shrugs.
“Sure, man.”
As he leads them deeper inside and up a carpeted staircase, he tries to subtly inch towards Claire, who is not having it at all. Claire does not have the, the experience of being underfoot much, but Sean smoothly avoids tripping by holding the handrail.
This place has a weird opulence, even though it clearly is also a backstage area. It’s almost like it was repurposed from something else, a hotel maybe?
“So, nice Umbreon. I don’t think I got your name?”
“Thanks? Sean Black.”
“I’m Freddie Knuckles, the owner of Club 48. How do you know Miss West? You don’t, ah, seem like a regular?”
“She’s a family friend,” replies Sean (truthfully).
“Not her family, right?”
“No,” lies Sean.
Interesting, how all these people seem so defensive of West. No doubt, she complained about the same things that Charles told him about.
“In here,” say Freddie, and he carefully opens a door with a green, square light above.
There sits Darin, the human enough illusion of Gleam the Starmie.
When he first met Darin at one of Charles’ get-togethers years ago, Starmie was the absolute last Pokemon he would have expected. Not that he really knew anything about Starmie at all! It’s just, they are a sea creature with no face, and no mouth even (as far as he could tell). That is the last sort of person he would have expected wanting to come onto land and pretend to be human.
Apparently, they were very bored of the coral reefs and ocean floors around the world, and wanted to try something different. So, in a deal he didn’t know the details of, the Ninetales taught them their prized psychic illusion.
Gleam’s thinking is very unlike terrestrial creatures. They had absolutely no chance of getting faces right. They tried very hard, but were never able to get it outside the uncanny valley. So, they simply decided to go the easy route and always ‘wear’ a full-faced helmet.
The helmet they chose was the same color as their undisguised body, and very round and shiny with a black visor. It is very eye catching, as is the rest of his getup — full leather jacket with blue accents, knee high boots, and black gloves — they are always dressed for a performance.
Their hands halted over the keyboard before Sean could tell anything about what they were playing. He doesn’t know much about keyboards and music, but it seems to have a lot of extra buttons, knobs, and cassette players for some reason. It seems quite fancy.
They sit there without turning their head or moving their hands.
“Experience West, ah, greetings.”
“Hello, Darin. Looking fly!”
Darin takes the complement like it’s a cold, hard fact, and turns their entire body to face them.
“Ah, yes…”
“Sean Black,” say Sean. Gleam really has a hard time with faces.
“Today is that day. Freddie, I must cancel my performance tonight.”
“Wait, what!” exclaims Freddie, finally pulling his attention away from Claire.
“I have other arrangements,” Darin conveys bluntly.
“Other — come on, man! You won’t make it big if you keep doing shit like this!”
Freddie eyes Sean with extreme annoyance and distrust, to which Sean raises his hands in silent apology.
“The next one will be free,” offers Darin, with only the barest hints of actual emotion in their voice.
“Oh, and we’ll get what we pay for? Man!”
“Ah, erm,” interjects Sean, and Freddie’s ire is unabated. “What time was — is your performance tonight?”
“It was to be starting at twenty-hundred,” says Darin.
“You, ah, we’ll have plenty of time to get back here, then! No need to cancel any prior arrangements. You can even, ah, warm up at our place before heading out!”
Warming up was a thing that musicians usually did, right?
“I comprehend,” states Darin, and they turn to Freddie. “Freddie Knuckles, I would like to perform tonight. Is there perhaps availability?”
“Goddamn, dude, you’re our guy tonight! Yes, there is availability.”
“Thank you very much,” says Darin, with extreme obliviousness.
Freddie rubs a surprisingly manicured hand on his bicep.
“You’re very welcome, Darin.”
Sean knows most definitely, the sarcasm was completely lost on Gleam’s weird brain somewhere behind the illusion.
Starmie have brains, right? Evidence suggests so…
Darin stands up, and they grab the keyboard.
“I will be borrowing this.” Freddie’s annoyance returns in an instant.
“Goddamn — dude, you can’t take that!”
“Ten free nights.” It seems, Darin is not a complete idiot.
“Damn, dude! It’s not good business, no!”
Darin has no reply except to place the keyboard back down.
“… Erm, I’m glad that was all worked out nicely,” says Sean. “I suppose I should become a ‘regular,’ if Darin is performing here.”
There is a pretty low chance of that, but maybe this place isn’t as expensive as it seems?
“ ‘Long as you aren’t poaching him!”
“No, no, nothing like that! This is just a one-off thing. Really!”
“Good.”
Freddie faces Darin.
“You better not be late! I will fucking end your ability to perform at so much as a birthday party anywhere in the Rod if you don’t show again!”
“I will be here regardless of the enemies and tempests in my path,” promises Darin, probably meaning that far more literally than Freddie realizes.
“Fucking right, you will.”
“Ah… we better get going,” says Sean.
“Allow me to escort you,” offers Freddie, and it seems that he hasn’t forgotten about Claire — and Claire hasn’t forgotten about him. She almost gets away without accosting, but when they get to the door, Freddie leans against it.
“Ah, Mr. Black, we may have gotten off on the wrong foot. I didn’t really think you were poaching him! …May I pet your Umbreon?”
“I’m not the one you should be asking,” Sean bluntly replies.
“Cutie? Please?” Claire shakes her head no and is exactingly clear about her desires.
“Tough luck,” says West.
“Please, bring her when you come back!” Freddie pleads.
“It will probably be too loud for her. Nightclub, and all.”
Freddie is crestfallen, but has the grace to not block the door and push the matter. They step outside, with Claire squeezing through the door right as it cracks open.
“Bye, bye!” says West gleefully as she closes the door on him.
Claire doesn’t wait at all.
“Ugly!? I’m not ugly! That — that fucker!”
“Think he was ‘under the influence?’” Sean comments lightly.
“Didn’t smell like it,” mentions West, and Sean pretends he didn’t hear that.
“Experience West, your father wanted me to convey you a message,” says Darin, completely obliviously changing the topic.
“Nope, don’t want to hear it.” She doesn’t seem surprised or upset, but maybe she just has good control over her illusion.
“Very well, then. So, the Zoroark's summer party? I will admit, I thought today was Friday.”
“Ah, yes, it is Saturday and the party is today. Um, starting right about now, actually. But! I — we need to grab something to bring with us.”
“You’re not catering…” mumbles West, and Sean gives her a look.
“Right, dumb thought.”
“I understand food brings you much joy, and is appropriate for parties. Is that perhaps what you are referring to?”
“We don’t need to bring a full meal. Just snacks will do,” clarifies Sean.
“Little foods,” comments Darin.
“Oh, I know just the place!” says West, and Sean braces himself for a sudden teleport — for naught, as she walks down the alley towards the street.
“Where are we?” asks Sean, looking upon all the fancy storefronts and chic, ambling pedestrians.
“Third street.”
Sean’s worst fear is realized, and he hopes that they will be walking far for the sake of his wallet.
Alas, it is not so.
“The Pampered Persian?” reads Claire. The sign is small and plain, the kind of sign for a place that is supremely confident they don’t need advertising.
West enters without hesitation, as does Darin, hands hidden in some of the many pockets on his jacket. Claire follows at Sean’s heels.
“Sixteen-hundred Poke for a bone?” whispers Claire, smelling them closely. Sean is only slightly glad that things have price tags here.
Sean picks up one of the giant bones (femurs?) and inspects it. For costing double what a restaurant lunch would (triple if cheap), Sean doesn’t understand until he reads the label.
“Tauros, hmmm.”
“Ah, sir, your Umbreon has excellent taste!”
It should be no surprise that he is accosted almost immediately. At the saleswoman’s feet is a haughty Meowth, and Sean wonders if there perhaps is in fact a ‘pampered Persian’ running around somewhere. This Meowth literally looks down upon Claire before walking away with a haughty step.
“Of course she does!” replies Sean, subtly trying (and failing) to return the bone and move away to perhaps a less pricey area, but the saleswoman is a professional. There is no evading her without summarily fleeing.
Both West and Darin went deeper in, so he’s alone against this enemy.
Now that he thinks about it, it’s probably no coincidence that the bones were on the lowest shelf right at the entrance.
“They’re Tauros leg bones, one-hundred per-cent ethically sourced!” She has very open body language and no hesitation standing just outside of his personal bubble.
“How do you ethically source that?” wonders Sean, and he can tell that Claire probably has the same question.
“I’m glad you asked!” Sean realized that he walked into a trap, as she goes on and on about safari parks and fund-raising and dying of old age and helping support anti-poaching efforts and what-not in an attempt to sell him the bones.
A successful attempt, he might add. The bone does smell great, even if it came from a Pokemon. Because it came from a Pokemon? He doesn’t want to think about that too hard.
“Ah, ah, I suppose I will get some,” Sean concedes.
“Excellent choice!”
There are only half a dozen in the basket, and there are far more little kits.
“Do you perhaps have more in the back? I need… forty.”
May as well go all out.
“Forty! May I ask, what Pokemon do you have?”
“Eevee,” decides Sean, adding to the lore around Claire’s chosen illusion.
“Eevee are so cute and fluffy! We have so many things for Eevee — but, there’s no way you have that many Eevee?”
“Ah, well, they do not ‘belong’ to me, you see. There are thirty that I occasionally get to see. I want them to get excited!”
“Thirty! I would die!”
“They can be a bit much,” says Sean, thinking about what the rest of his day is going to be like.
“I wish I could see them…” Sean is a stone. “Unfortunately, honored customer, we only have eighteen! These do not come around in bulk, I’m sure you can understand why.”
“I can cut them in half, I suppose. They are a bit big for the tiny kits, anyways.”
He expects her to leave to get them, but she doesn’t leave his side for a moment, zeroing in on the money in his wallet. That gleam in her eye is dangerous.
“If you really want to get on their good side, honored customer…”
For the next several minutes, she tries to sell him a wide variety of things — brushes and chew toys and scratching posts and fuzzy beds and scarfs and accessories and booties, all seemingly overpriced until she explains the gimmick. Sean is polite, but stalwart in his refusal to buy anything else.
“They are not wanting for much,” argues Sean. “They are already so spoiled!”
“Be as that may be, there can always be another level,” replies the saleswoman.
Eventually, West rescues him, carrying her own purchases.
“Milk biscuits?” notes Sean.
“What! They’re good.”
“I didn’t say they weren’t,” replies Sean, and the saleswoman locks on to West.
She is far more brutal in rejecting the sales pitches, and soon enough they are outside with their rather expensive snacks. Sean almost wonders how many days it will push his retirement, with how wide Claire’s eyes were when he forked over the cash.
The bones are a bit too large to shove into his mane, and he holds the bag with both hands.
“Next stop is the party,” says Sean, and he smiles in anticipation.
“Where is it?” asks West, but Darin holds up a hand.
“Allow me, Experience West.”
“It is at the Spiral Shell Community Center,” shares Sean, and it is no surprise that neither of them know where that is.
“Show me.”
This is the first time that Gleam has touched his false mind, and they’re certainly… different. Not that he has a wide array of experiences in such matters, but Gleam seems to take the mental images of the location in a very… mechanically flowing way. Like water flowing through pipes, almost? It is not easy to describe.
Gleam doesn’t need long at all to comprehend the image.
“If that is so,” they declare, and with no visible effort and nearly no discomfort, they stood outside the Spiral Shell Community Center. It was comparable to the teleports by Minamoto-no-Kyukon the other day.
“Damn, dude,” whistles West. “That was cool.”
“It was not a far distance,” says Darin, as if going across the city was not really that far.
Besides being less uncomfortable, Sean doesn’t see what the fuss is.
“Anyways, let’s go inside and meet the others.”
The community center has the same stout architecture as most of the buildings in the quaint, outlying neighborhoods near the sea. It is a pale, sandy colored wood with cross-hatched windows. There are planters and awnings everywhere, and but no bushes or trees near the outside walls. It is about thirty meters wide, and there is also a sign declaring Reserved for Event: Stapley 11-6.
West pokes her head through the front door in excitement moments after Sean opens it.
“Normal!”
Of course, nothing exotic is visible: only an old woman sitting in a steel folding chair.
Sean cackles, while Claire is confused while Darin is stone-faced.
“You think the main door, that anyone could open, would be anything but normal?”
He guides them to the old woman, who is gatekeeping the double door to the main community hall. It’s normally the sort of place where large family reunions or cheap fundraising dinners are held, sea of plastic tables and chairs included. There is no reason for random delinquents to party crash anything going on here.
“Hello, Mrs. V.”
He hasn’t personally talked to her since this whole mess started, but the gossip chain is strong. Everyone here probably knows why he’s hanging around strangers.
She seemingly looks up from her crossword, but Sean knows she was watching them from the moment they came in.
“Well well well, if it isn’t Sean and the trouble, hmmm?”
“The trouble!?” squeaks out Claire.
“You are clearly the trouble,” says Mrs. V.
“The trouble is perhaps not little Ms. Woods, but her guard dog,” argues Sean.
“Hey!”
“I could smell,” says Mrs. V, and West inconspicuously sniffs the air. Sean can’t but help but mirror her, and he notices nothing.
“I’ll make sure she stays on her leash,” jokes Sean, and to his delight, West takes the right amount of mild offense.
“—And you,” continues Mrs. V, pointing to Darin, “keep your tails where they belong.”
“Ah—” starts Sean.
“I am Gleam.”
Mrs. V’s raised eyebrow reflects off his helmet. Sean (and Mrs. V.) cannot actually (politely) see under psychic illusions, but aside from Gleam, there are no others but the Ninetales (that they know of).
“Ah, forgive these old eyes. Well, don’t let me keep you, but you better stop by later, Sean!”
“I will,” he promises, and as they step through the final door, he slips her one of the femurs in such a way where he just happens to be facing his guests when they see the party.
“What the—!” Sean relishes the looks on their faces at the reveal (sans Darin’s, of course).
It goes without saying, a gathering of the most skilled illusionists could not be normal. It seems that the theme is a seasonal Unovan fair — or perhaps he should say ‘faire,’ considering the old-timey feeling. In a most illogical way, the inside of the community center appears as the streets of an old-fashioned city, cobbled with worn stones and lined with sooty red brick buildings. Awnings cast shadows from the sun, which shines fully on a cloudless day. The door they just entered through is “actually” the front door to a little boutique shop — “Z’s Zzz”.
It would be like a step back in time were in not for the mob of Zorua running about.
“This is… an illusion?” questions West, eyes full of excitement.
“If we’re being pedantic, it’s technically many illusions.”
For in the distance, snow reflects off the Unovan peaks. A gently breeze calmly ripples through his mane a moment, before petering out subtly.
‘Ah that one was quite good.’ He inspected the energy before it was gone — it was one of Paris’. His wayward daughter has clearly been practicing.
It only took a step for the kits to notice that someone new entered their domain, and another for him to throw off his illusion and for some of them to recognize him, the Wizened Grandpa. For a third of them, it was even truly his relation to them, if his children were already here with their kits.
Most of them have illusions of tiny top hats and monocles, way over the top but matching the atmosphere. He can vaguely see the adults standing on the other side of the room near banquet tables, and more in ‘makeshift’ carnival booths. He glances at his guests, and Darin is hilariously out of the vibe with his futuristic outfit.
He can also sense that some of the adults are ‘in’ one of the buildings, the ones who volunteered (or more likely, were voluntold) to maintain the core illusions. Usually, he retreats there after giving out his goodies, but this time, even he can tell that wouldn’t be appropriate.
“Grandfather!” shouts Silent Stalker from across the way, and he flings himself across the plaza in a glowing flash.
“Oh, you got it!” exclaims Sean with well acted surprise. He had already known Silent Stalker figured out Agility from Anne the other day, but this was the first he saw of it.
Silent Stalker is decent enough at it.
“Yes! Wee!—” he runs off again, and the dozen Zorua who had decided to follow him were only halfway across.
Now that he thinks about it, Silent Stalker is perhaps their only Zorua to know Agility, huh? It’s a bit weird to get at first, with the psychic and all, and the sedentary lifestyle that comes with living in civilization doesn’t encourage learning it. Sean remembers that every Zorua in his pack in Unova knew Agility well. It was kind of important in the wild.
“Who was that?” asks Claire, still with her Umbreon illusion.
“Ah, this is your first time meeting the kits! Brace yourself!”
“Brace yourself? What—” and the roaming pack arrives.
“Grandpa!” “Grandpa.” “A baby?” “Grandpa!”
Everything was worth it.
“Hello children!”
West is positively beaming, finally not gaping at the scenery. Gleam, well he can’t read their expression or body language, and they don't even budge an inch when a kit runs into their leg full force, top hat and monocle fizzling out, but they’re probably happy to be here? They wanted to come, after all.
The undiluted cuteness swarm Sean’s feet, eyes full of expectation.
“Ha ha, I forgot to bring anything!”
“No you didn’t,” says Careful Stalker (no relation to Silent Stalker), not believing him for a moment.
It seems they can learn.
“But can you see anything in my hands?” asks Sean, holding out his genuinely empty hands.
“Of course you’re holding something,” replies Careful Stalker with extreme confidence, and Sean hides a laugh.
“If you’re so sure.”
They all know the deal — break the illusion and get the goods. He’s not making it easy this time. Those bones were expensive.
“Wait, where’d it go?” asks West, doing a double take.
“Wouldn’t you like to know?” replies Sean. West reaches over and swipes her hand through the empty space above his palms.
“You’re not supposed to do that!” complains Careful Stalker, and he redoubles his efforts with an intense look of concentration, the monocle making his eye seem fierce. The younger ones give up without trying very hard, which is disappointing, but understandable — of course the older siblings can be depended on.
Instead, the most distracted kits start tussling together. The less (but still) distracted kits check our their ‘peer,’ Claire.
“What’s that?” asks Reflection, one of Sammy’s kits (from her first and only litter). He walks right up to Claire and inspects her with feigned haughtiness matching his elaborate monocle.
“Uhh… Umbreon,” replies Claire, leaning away from the curious eyes and sniffing noses.
Reflection makes a decent copy of Umbreon, were it not for the missing ring on his tail and the tiny stature. Little Sunflower follows with a much different interpretation: too many rings. Two of the other kits are trying to disrupt each other’s illusions — Sean puts a stop to that with a hand that pops up from the ground.
“You need a top hat,” decides Reflection.
“What?”
“Oh! You’re a baby, this must be your first time! A top hat is this thing,” explains Reflection, waving his illusion in front of his face. It’s a pure ethereal style illusion, Sean can tell.
“I know that, but why?”
“You can speak like a human! You’re so tiny, though!”
“What does that have to do with anything?” asks Claire.
“It’s weird.”
Zorua don’t really have filters, and most of the time that is okay.
Someone foists a top hat onto Claire, but it dissolves when Claire doesn’t take over the illusion. Some of them are already bored and run back the way they came, but many of them stay at Sean’s feet. ‘Stay’ being used rather loosely, that is. They are Zorua, after all.
Claire’s struggles to take it all in, with a bunch of innocent kits approaching her and trying to interact.
They are watching their rowdiness around her, which is a nice departure from the norm. To them, who most likely haven’t made the connection about their parents’ gossip about a human turned Zorua, Claire is just a tiny, fragile newborn half their size. She gives him a hesitating look.
“They’re not going to bite… hard,” Sean says only to her.
“There isn’t anything there!” exclaims Careful Stalker, and Sean takes his eyes away from hers.
“Nope!” Sean had looped the bag around his shoulder, and kept his hands empty, so of course they couldn’t find it in his hands. Just according to plan!
Reflection has very much violated Claire’s personal space, sniffing her face. Were she only a Zorua, she would surely be returning the greeting, but she leans away. Despite the way she looks, there is a part of her that Mew couldn’t take away.
“Why don’t you introduce yourselves with words?” suggests Sean.
“I’m Reflection!” says Reflection enthusiastically, too enthusiastically for how close he was to Claire’s ears. Her ears airplane involuntarily and Reflection is oblivious.
“I’m… Claire Woods.”
Reflection doesn’t see anything unusual about that, definitely knowing nothing about what has been worry thing adults. The other kits are all focused on Sean and his other guests.
“I’m Experience West, the Ninetales!” says West, placing herself into the line of fire.
“What’s the Ninetales,” asks one of the littler ones, and West dismisses her illusion with a flash.
“This!”
As far as being an example of Ninetales goes, West is a bit on the heavy side, but that doesn’t really matter. She is majestic enough for the kits. She’s also carrying her bag with the milk bones with two tails.
“Ninetales! Nine tails!”
“Each tail represents a virtue! This is the tail of crown fires, the rightmost: representing swiftness. This is the tail of smoldering logs, the second rightmost: representing cunning. This is…”
The kits are very much ignoring Sean, except for Careful Stalker. Probably, he made his illusion too hard, and they were too distracted. He ‘slips’ up for a moment, and Careful Stalker shatters the illusion hiding the bones. It’s not a nice way of removing an illusion, but he can hardly complain. After all, he did make the illusion way harder than normal to break.
“There it is!”
“Ha ha, you found it! I’m sure you’re curious to see what’s inside?”
Sean reaches his hand in, and Careful Stalker bristles in anticipation. He pulls out… carrots.
“No!” Careful Stalker disrupts his illusion again, and the bone is revealed.
“Aw, but I like carrots,” moans little Cherry, and Sean feels a bit guilty for actually disappointing her.
“They’re chew bones!” Sean gages them, and the amount of interest is about what he could have hoped for.
“Everyone, thank Careful Stalker!”
““Thank you,””
Just as Sean is about to begin handing them out, he realizes a serious issue — he didn’t cut them in half.
“Ah…” He tries to flex one with his hands, and it doesn’t budge a bit. He creates illusionary bolt cutters, but cringes at the thought of bones splintering everywhere and the ghost of a Tauros haunting him for the desecration. He turns it into a rotating saw, and begins what turns out to be very slow and hard work. A tough bone, characteristic of the Tauros they came from.
The Zorua are impatient, aside from Silent Stalker standing in the back with his siblings.
“Allow me,” says Darin, and all the bones levitate out of the bag and separate in two so neatly that Sean momentarily doubts they were ever together. The cut is so smooth as to be a mirror. Sean disguises his gaping mouth.
“Everyone, say thanks to Gleam,” instructs Sean after a moment, and they do so.
““Thanks Gleam.””
Sean hands out the bones to the kits, and even at half the size, the bones are still comically big for the kits. Most of them chew on them for a moment, before running off with them.
Really, he should have thought about this a bit more. A good bone is something to savor over hours, in solitude…
“Ruining their appetites already?” says a voice very familiar to Sean.
“Paris! How are you doing?”
There stands Paris, one of his daughters from his middle litter. She has been on her own for a few years, and has (tried to) become something of a fashion designer. Zoroark have something of an unfair advantage in that sort of thing, and Paris has had some success breaking into what she learned was somewhat of a nepotistic scene. By no means is her name appearing on clothing yet , but she hasn’t failed.
Paris is merely the name she felt would give her the biggest advantage. Maybe one day in the future, she would go by a different one.
“Pretty great! I got the bitch fired.”
“That’s good!” He really appreciates that she used an illusion to keep the ‘innocent’ kits’ ears unsullied. He offers her one of the bones, which she accepts and throws into her mane.
Unlike most undisguised Zoroark, she is wearing real, actual clothes : albeit just a scarf and hat, colors matching closely with her evolution bead. Imagine having physical clothes!
“I heard about everything from John,” says Paris lightly.
“Ah, good!” Sean had only talked to some of the others about the latest, and Paris was not one of them.
“We didn’t expect to see Ninetales today,” she continues. “Who are you?”
“I am Experience West,” says West, much more demure and introverted sounding without her mask.
“It’s been a while since I’ve seen a Ninetales. I must say, your illusion earlier was pretty good.”
“Oh… thanks! I worked on it for a long time.”
“And, you must be Claire Woods, huh? How interesting. I’m Paris, by the way.”
Paris kneels down and takes in Claire’s cute and tiny appearance behind the illusion. Claire just looks up at her without responding.
“You’re how old again?”
“Nineteen.”
“Wow! You’re actually older than me! Mew really messed you up, huh?”
Claire, who had been regarding Paris with suspicion, gives her a reevaluating gaze.
“Yes… he did.” Claire finally removes the illusion — or, more likely, ran out of energy, after her likely strenuous morning training.
“Well, I hope Sean has been okay to you. As for you, are you Darin? I think we met a long time ago.”
“Yes I am Darin,” he confirmed, turning his head to her. Sean wracks his brain, and he remembers that yes, she did meet Darin once, several years ago.
“Why don’t we go over there? I’m sure the others want to meet you.”
“The others…”
Sean was quite happy with that idea — and then he realized that they were not heading towards the adults hidden away and maintaining the illusion, they were heading towards the adults at the banquet tables — still good, still good. It’s about lunchtime, anyways.
Now, seafood isn’t naturally in their diet: that is, Sean doesn’t remember being able to eat it all that much when he was a kit in the wild. Sure, they probably could have fished the rivers and lakes, but there really wasn’t a need to do so. There was plenty of other prey — and besides, despite their teeth, Zoroark are omnivores. In Unova, they didn’t know the great bounty of the sea. If the Zoroark of Unova were sharing food at a gathering, nothing from the sea would be seen. When the Zoroark of Goldenrod tasked themselves with a potluck, many of them brought this great food of their new home.
Dishes made by and for Zoroark smelled so delicious. Not only that, but there were so many berries from their secret orchards. Of course, he wasn’t only there for the food! But, he wasn’t shameless enough to admit that the spread before him occupied a large part of his attention. He didn’t feel so disappointed about not talking the illusion’s maintainers now.
Claire wasn’t paying that any mind, of course. Aside from being on the ground and being unable to see on the table, the Zoroark were much more interesting to her.
It was very much intentional how half a dozen pairs of claws appeared harmless.
“Hello everyone.”
They’re all regulars and solidly residents of Goldenrod. There is Ryan Black, his son from the same litter as ‘John Stapley.’ He claimed their legal name they all shared when they were in school. He stands a bit taller than Anne and John, who are blithely ignoring the little chaos which surrounds Sean’s feet. Clear Waters stands a bit separated from them, and with her here, a solid three-fourths of his oldest litter is represented. There is Paris, the only one representing his middle litter in this little huddle. Finally, Carson is sitting in a chair, different from the other chairs which surround the table. He gives Sean a nod.
Ryan replies first, with a mischievous glint in his eye.
“Dad! Just the person we were hoping for! You see, we were needing the opinion of someone old, someone positively geriatric! You fit the bill perfectly!”
“Hey—!”
“I’m sure you will know intimately the answer to our question! We want to know, what is the best brand of walker? To make an illusion more convincing, of course.”
“The best ‘walker,’ is dutiful children, of course!” Sean snaps back.
“Ah, ah, that would really sell the illusion, wouldn’t it,” he replies cockily.
“Well, since the niceties are out of the way, why don’t we do introductions?” suggests Anne carefully.
“Well, this here is Claire Woods. Claire, you’ve already met John, Anne, Paris, and Carson; that joke there is Ryan, my other son, and this is Clear Waters, my other other son.”
“Just how many children do you have?” asks Claire.
“Ha ha… twelve.”
“TWELVE!”
John laughs. “I love all my siblings, but I know I won’t have twelve. Goodness knows how mom and dad did that.”
“Well, when a man and woman love each other very much…” Anne clamps down Ryan’s mouth with her paw.
“I don’t regret it,” Sean says. “Anyways, with us here, this is Experience West, Claire’s multi-tailed guardian; and Darin, or Gleam the Starmie, my guest, unrelated to the whole mess with Claire.”
Darin is eye catching with his getup, but the Zoroark are more interested in the tiny Zorua.
“You’re so cute!” squeals Clear Waters.
Claire pouts cutely.
“I must say, at least Mew chose the best Pokemon,” says Ryan, snout having been released and shamelessly eating a shrimp. West breathes in to respond, but is so outnumbered that she doesn’t even try to argue.
“What’s the point, anyways?” asks Paris. “Like, why did Mew chose Zorua? Why would Mew even impr— I mean, change someone like that? Why?”
“What’s even the point…” ponders Sean, before deciding to sneak an oily clam. Anne gives him a deadpan look that reminds him of his father long ago, and he puts it back. Why are they even waiting to eat?
“It’s completely unbelievable. I thought it was just a prank when I first heard! Who would have imagined such a thing was even possible?” says Clear Waters with exaggerated hand motions.
“Carson probably,” says Clear Waters.
“Ah, yes, how has the whole translation business thing been? Progress even without Charles?”
“Let’s not talk business at a party,” redirects Carson.
“So, Claire, don’t you have someone else with you? Lilly Ivysaur, if I recall?” asks Anne.
“Yes, but she is asleep,” replies Claire, and Sean feels a bit guilty for forgetting her — and forgetting Ghastly. How could he forget that? He very pointedly doesn’t think about some of the things he said to Clarissa during one of their arguments.
“So, she can just come out whenever she wants?” asks Clear Waters in interest.
“Yep, she could like, be watching everything we’re doing! But, well, she’s tired from our morning training. I’m a bit tired from it too.”
Sean doesn’t mention Ghastly, but he remembers his words about how he would come out if he wanted to.
“Ivysaur is a grass type?”
“Yes, Ivysaur …”
Sean takes a look at Darin, who hasn’t removed his human illusion, and is also not participating in the conversation, or checking the food, and he edges over to him.
“How are you doing?” asks Sean.
“Swell.”
Sean isn’t sure how to interpret that.
“Does it meet your expectations, at least?”
“No.”
Somehow, when they said that, it didn’t seem like a bad thing. At least, he hopes so.
“No? But you’re ‘swell?’”
“Correct.”
Sean awkwardly tries to imagine how this must be to them. Surrounded by dark types you can’t feel and they whole area surrounded by dark illusions and food you couldn’t eat? How is that swell?
“…What did you expect?”
“Mirage told me of a different party.”
“Different party? You mean different theme?”
“Yes, a different theme. He spoke of lights and chrome and being in the future. He spoke of spaceships and aliens. It was intriguing.”
“Ah, yes, that was a few times ago. We try to change it up every time. I didn’t know what this year’s theme was until we got here, unfortunately.”
“It is still good,” adds Darin. “Expectations do not need to be met.”
“Yes,” agrees Sean, simply watching the others. Darin stood there.
“… I find myself curious. How convincing is this illusion to you? I know you perceive the world in a far different way than us.”
Darin hesitates only a moment for his answer.
“It is quite convincing. To make the room appear gone, even to my psychic self, I’m impressed. It almost feels like I could teleport to that mountain over there, even though logically I know that I cannot. In that regard, it is very much what I expected.”
“Good, well, we did work very hard on it. Well, please feel free to join the conversation, or do whatever you want! You don’t need permission.”
Surprisingly, Darin does seem to pay more attention to the conversation.
Paris makes note of of them and changes topic.
“Gleam, I was wondering, being aquatic, what’s it like underwater?”
“What’s it like underwater? Hmmm… everything is deeper.”
“Well, duh,” states Ryan.
“Not just in the obvious. Sounds are deeper. Did you know that the speed of sound is faster underwater? It affects greatly how things sound. Deeper tones and singing travel more and travel deep. In the very deep sea, there is not very much, and it is quiet. Sometimes, the earthquakes rumble and the currents sing where they meet, ah! It is not a song you can hear on land. But it is quiet, very quiet in the deep abyss, except from the deep vents and volcanoes! Those are very chatty indeed. Many strange creatures, alien and unknown to you terrestrials, call those home. They do not know of sunlight, and their songs are like no others. The pressure is high and the melodies unique. Strange as they are, they know of the surface. Things sink, yes? And people like me visit them. But for the most part, the singing is all in the sunlight. There are the corals — you should know about those! — their songs are much like the kelps and the sandbars and the shipwrecks. They sing of flowing currents and drifting seaweed and Pokemon living everywhere they can —”
Sean felt something in his fur — had had to think a moment to realize that it was not Ghastly desperately fighting the dastardly ball (where his thoughts went first), but that it was the other gift from the Ninetales — the mobile. It couldn’t have been a call, it was too short. It must have been a page, then — the mobile was also a pager. So inconspicuously, he ignored the conversation to take a look.
Unknown number, but the contents of the message were far from unknown.
‘Utada awake.’
He was no longer inconspicuous about ignoring them.
“Claire.” The whole conversation paused.
“Utada is awake.”