- Homeworlds -
The large diamond shaped stone pad the slightly oversized group of travelers arrived on had clearly been mostly abandoned for quite some time. Moss and other plant life was heavily present, although the group could easily spot the recent attempts to clear the place. It was clearly an ancient device made for the purpose of traveling the world, and in fact the Troubleshooters were able to quickly identify it as having a very similar make to the teleportation network that Team Upload had stolen pieces of.
"Connection confirmed," Gazimon said over the Dark Network Node that they had brought along to see if Janice's aunt could commute across universes to keep her current job. "Although I'm not looking forward to explaining the power bill for doing that daily to someone." The black box was carefully set along one side of the structure, far enough within the edge of the shape to keep it from easily being moved off the device.
"We can get a generator set up to help on that front if it is possible," Lana Fairview replied, the Typhlosion looking quite happy with the news. "Isn't this great, Effects?" she asked her husband.
"Being able to go back and put to use what I can learn here is a lot better than trying to set up a studio for another world," the Zoroark replied happily. Daniel Fairview as it turned out had suffered from a side effect of the species pokemon it was appropriate for him to become under the effect of the commonly used spell, rather than temporarily transforming the special effects expert, it had caused him to be entirely converted into one of the illusion making pokemon. "You said that there were natural Zoroark that live fairly close to here right?" he asked his brother in law. "I'm getting a bit tired of hearing jokes about how I still have to do effects work 'the hard way'."
The other Typhlosion present was shaking himself out and looking far happier. With a smirk he ignited the vents along his neck, creating a riple of flames that settled quickly into a mane of orange sparks. "Yeah. Last I knew they actually had a few living in town to learn Fighting moves from local Lucario," Jonathan Grades happily replied.
"We can deal with that later Gazi," Janice said to the digimon while wrapping her aura sensors. The Team Lead was mostly watching over the Troubleshooter team she had brought along with her to this family reunion. "Everyone make it through okay?"
"The air is different here," Tyranomon rumbled sounding a bit happier than was usual for the digimon.
"I am functional," the LAS dully agreed, her body looking far more solid after the trip to an irate Delta 2 that restored some parts of her Porygon nature, the loss of which had been negatively contributing to her physical condition. The medical Administrator had admitted however that more work would be needed to make her count as a pokemon instead of a digimon with types, although no one had been in the mood to ask her to elaborate on how exactly that difference worked at the time.
"There's a town here right?" Quagsire asked Janice's mother cautiously. "I want to get my team distracted, and figuring out an all pokemon town sounds like a solid way to do that."
"It should be fine, just let them know that you are travelers from the human world. At worst they will assume that some of you were human before," Eleanor Grades answered.
"Grant was a human before," Kabutops said regretfully while pointing at the other fossil pokemon, who was entirely distracted by the one confused bird pokemon that had been close enough to see their arrival. "Even if it doesn't look like it at times. Grant, leave them alone! We are on vacation here."
"I was just asking a question," the reincarnation countered, although from how the pokemon took this moment to fly away it was clear it was in fact a problem for them.
"Well look who's come back," an older Lucario said looking directly at Jonathan with a stern expression, a good sized group of the jackal pokemon following behind. Then the pokemon suddenly smiled widely and began walking forward at a faster pace. "My little fire starter and her walking volcano." This brought a chuckle out of the rest of the newly arrived group.
"Dad, mom, everyone," Janice's mother said hugging what was now clearly Janice's grandfather. "It's so good to see all of you again."
"You could have visited a couple more times," the other oldest member of the group said, and Janice was fairly certain this was her grandmother. "And maybe let me see my granddaughter before now?" she asked looking up slightly at Janice and confirming the thought.
"Lucario are shorter than I thought," the Team Lead commented quietly while staring wide eyed at the rather large group of pokemon, all of which were closer in height to her mother than her own size. "I guess I get that part from dad?" she asked more loudly at the slight twitches of ears the first statement produced.
"What's with the funny metal stuff?" one of the younger members of the group asked, before being hushed by another Lucario of her mother's age.
"You have an eye for danger, but clearly aren't a fighter," her grandfather said now looking at her properly. "But I think more formal introductions can wait until we get home. I've already had to reassure the locals that a couple of new faces from Jonathan's world would be a good change of pace, and that most of them would be going right back there after a short visit." He looked over the various non-Lucario pokemon watching the reunion with consideration. "How are you all dealing with being pokemon for now?"
"Actually dad, it turns out we didn't bring anyone who has not been one before," Janice's father said jovially. "And the only ones that are usually human are family."
"Am I family in that count, or is it because I have to use illusions that I don't count as 'usually human'?" his brother in law said jokingly while looking at the group of Fighting type pokemon with some unease.
"You're family," Lana answered her husband, while casting a challenging glance to the various Lucario.
This caused Janice's grandmother to laugh happily. "I see that your sister has your spirit, Jonathan. I'm glad to see that it isn't that rare of a feature on your world."
"I smell those bitter berries that I used to love so much," Grant suddenly cut in shuffling over to one of the middle aged Lucario. "There! Those are the ones! Kabutops, see if you can recognize these."
"They were grown from seeds the local Celebi brought forward from the distant past," the food's owner said sounding amused. "You must have quite the story to know about them."
"Are they sold in town?" Quagsire asked as she walked up to get a closer look. "Preferably along with the knowledge of how to grow them? I have other options for the second one, but I'd rather have good answers right off the bat."
"'Local Celebi'?" the LAS asked, sounding quite a bit more upbeat than she had been. This still presented a dismal tone, but her teammates were able to recognize the breakthrough.
"The time traveler comes to town every couple of weeks with things like them," the Lucario noted to the jellyfish digimon, clearly having just as much an idea on what she was as he did about Grant's form, which is to say no idea at all. "As for the plants, they're being handled by this little flower lizard that the Legendary tricked into going into the Lost Woods."
"The plan was for them to go into town while the family caught up," Janice said nervously. "Um, I don't know how we're related but?"
"Don't worry. Your grandma is my aunt, so it is a bit distant," the Lucario said with a laugh. "She just wanted to make the family look a bit bigger when you got here." Several of the middle aged Jackal pokemon, and most of the more distracted looking younger ones, visibly agreed with the sentiment. "I can take them to see the plant monster on my way home."
Janice was glad that she had avoided explaining the foil so far. Even with it on she could tell that a bunch of well trained Lucario would have made a mess of information for her own untrained aura senses. That would still have been far better on her than anywhere inside the DSS building, but with her lack of understanding of the sense trying to use it would be a recipe for disaster.
The mansion they had arrived at was mostly natural looking. Featuring a number of stone columns and mostly clean white walls, the place looked like the home of a protector family of old. Given all of the other things she had seen on the way there, the Team Lead was now quite sure that this world had been connected to the old teleportation grid back when it was functional.
The rest of the town was a jumbled assortment of structures clearly made by pokemon that had too many friends to help and too few people to hold them back. "How often do they need help to fix the aesthetic features?" she risked asking her grandfather, earning a snort from the Lucario and a groan from her father.
"I replaced that stand just fine," the Typhlosion complained. "And the sign on the market. The Skitty shaped building was an eyesore anyway."
"Not funny dear?" her mother asked her as the various other Lucario laughed at her father.
"My coworker, who is a Grass type himself, had only a Grass type for a pokemon, and doesn't even know any Fire type moves now, burned down a stand so notably last year that he was not allowed anywhere near it to try and replace it," she said keeping her tone bland and serious. "So it is nice to know that my father is at least better off than that."
Metagross laughed at this, although her father seemed to be perfectly aware that it was not a good comparison. "Fairly often," her grandfather actually answered now, looking at her somewhat uncertainly. "But people are more than willing to clean up storm damage and the like."
"Are all of the buildings like this one where you're from?" one of the Lucario slightly younger than her asked.
"Only the ones about as old as this one look just like it, but humans have a thing for making everything about the same for convenience," Janice replied less blandly. "Usually because having the right mix of pokemon and resources to keep a town this unique isn't possible."
"One of us has seen festival sites that were at about the same detail level," Metagross noted. "The time frame was while they had been a lone Beldum, so information is of limited context and quality. Structures here are more robust looking, but appear to have a solid central building coated with a far more fragile display on top. Are the locals typically capable of reading?"
"Reading what exactly?" her grandfather asked uncertainly. "We have a good number of pokemon that given time could puzzle out some of the symbols on the ruins, and a few more that can read footprint runes, but typically there isn't anything we have that needs to be read."
"Historically humans would use the same kind of display, although typically on a smaller scale, in order to show what the purpose of a building was without the need for education on reading," the machine like pokemon replied. "In that context any increase in time spent performing repairs is likely justified."
Janice was about to agree with that idea when a bright flash of aura appeared off to the side behind her. Typically that meant that either her foil had slipped, or more critically that there had been a burst of energy in one of the storage systems and she probably needed to jump to help fix. Turning to see what caused it, the action mostly instinctive at this point, revealed one of her cousins sliding forward in a clear attack.
She more stumbled out of the way than anything, although this let her see that the other Lucario present were far more disoriented with the result of the attack than she expected from its user. It also meant she could see her attacker sliding a bit badly and proceeding to ram into her father instead, producing a slight grunt from the Typhlosion, but no notable damage.
"Ha," her grandmother laughed at the fumbling form of her grandson. "We have been telling you that trick won't work forever. Good to see you can handle a bright flash, granddaughter."
"Honestly that was mostly the foil," Janice admitted steadying herself, and then moving to fix said metal back into covering her sensors more fully. "I work around stuff that's honestly brighter than that, and I'm not trained in using these." She flicked one of the sensors in embarrassed explanation. "So trying to blind myself from aura in general is better than being distracted all of the time."
"You have an aura blindfold?" her grandmother asked. Instead of the expected tone of annoyance or anger, this was asked with a curious excitement. "That metal you're wearing can block aura?" At Janice's cautious nod the old Lucario turned to her husband. "I told you we should have tried to go and visit them," she said in the tone of a longstanding argument.
"And I will admit that it sounds like you are correct," Janice's grandfather said with a sigh. "Do you have more that we can try, to see the effect?"
The Team Lead recovered another four pieces of the foil from her bag with some unease, a bit shaken by the unexpected positive response. "A couple of replacement sets in case of tears in the one I'm using," she admitted, cautiously handing the set of sheets over.
Her grandmother was the one to take them, and then wordless ask for help with getting the foil on properly. "Oh, oh wow that's almost better than a normal blindfold," was the reaction to having them on entirely. "You can still see some aura through this?" the grandmother jackal asked thoughtfully.
"Just a bit. Mostly just emotions and really bright stuff like that flash," Janice replied a bit confused by the reaction.
"We might want to test you on that, because if you can make out anything with this on then you might be oversensitive," her grandmother responded, then began to turn her head side to side to see the effects more thoroughly. "Although there seems to be some gaps here." The sensors then lifted as she closed her eyes. "Yes, this is exactly what I've been looking for." She then carefully removed the metal foil and passed it to her husband.
"Ah. If this is anywhere close to being something other than a Lucario I can see why it would be a distraction," he said after wearing them for a moment. "Would it be possible to get more of this material? Your grandmother has long wanted to be able to teach fighting aura blinded in addition to working with the other senses shuttered off."
"I have some notes on the various methods available," Janice replied looking over at Metagross. "There were a number of options I located or developed for the problem, but decided not to use. If we are able to relay messages to Gazimon we might be able to get that information here now."
"I have to admit, even if she is a Lucario she looks like her father," their guide said walking through the town. The place was about the same size as the town that DSS sat just outside of, but from how proudly she had spoken about its scale that was not a typical size.
"We've just met him," Kabutops said lightly. "Janice is a bit harsh, but honestly is one of the most stable influences our group has, Quagsire being another."
"You probably are used to it, but for me being a leader is a chore I did not ever expect to have," the amphibian commented dryly.
"Not much of a leader myself, although if humans are typically in charge in your world I can guess why Eleanor took charge and Jonathan mostly followed along," the Lucario said looking down a side street. "There we go, the place with the red petals."
Tyranomon had been easily following them up until this point, but on seeing the red petals laid like armor over the light green dome-shaped building he noticeably stopped in confusion. "A strange shape," he noted aloud sounding unsure, then took a moment to look at the other buildings and how they resembled the forms of their owners.
The team moved down the new street to the display shelf along the front of the building. "Flora, I have some visitors looking to grow some berries," the Lucario called out.
None of the pokemon present saw anything noteworthy about the unknown monster that emerged from deeper within the building. She had a bulb like rounded body that was a very light green that rapidly grew darker for her tangled root clusters of legs and the stem like shoulders of her body. A short green somewhat reptilian tail extended from the back of her body with small spikes along its length and a solid tapering shape setting it apart from her legs. Her arms were two purple flowers which faded to near white close to her shoulders. Her light green head was ringed by bright red petals, although the top four of these extended over her head like a helmet.
"A Tyranomon?" she proceeded to ask as she caught sight of the group, nearly dropping the small basket she was carrying as she spotted the dinosaur digimon. "How did you get here?"
"You are a Floramon," the red scaled reptile noted wide eyed. "You are a digimon."
"Oh! You're one of her kind?" the Lucario asked happily. "You wouldn't happen to know how to get her home would you? Celebi isn't helping with that, and she's kind of stuck."
"He's stuck too," Quagsire told her while the two digimon processed each other's presence. "I think you just got his hopes up for a moment actually."
"Feeling is sort of mutual," Floramon complained. "Although given how bad things had gotten after Etemon got taken down I'm not sure if going back is a good idea."
This statement gave Tyranomon a bit of a pause. "How long have you been living here?" the other digimon asked looking over the well worn home behind her, clearly inhabited for longer than he had been revived.
"A few years now," the plant monster said casually. "It's been really strange to be in a place that is this peaceful, but where everyone gets in fights all the time."
"I still say you'd do alright with your pollen moves," the Lucario joked, then noticed the confused expressions on the faces of the Troubleshooters. "Is something wrong?"
"A Celebi is involved," Dugtrio contributed to both his team and the Fighting/Steel type. "Etemon either hadn't been taken down when Tyranomon ended up in our world, or was defeated while that happened."
"Wait, you were one of Etemon's Tyranomon?" Floramon asked sympathetically. "Wow, you were really lucky to have survived that. Last I'd heard they lost one of the Digidestined during that one."
"I am lucky, but I did not survive it. My current teammates are a part of a group that was able to revive me from the end result of the Dark Network going out of control," the dinosaur digimon sadly informed her.
"Our team in particular is well trained in working with monsters that have been restored to life," Quagsire added calmly. "We're partially here to find something for him to do without needing to fight."
"Was the time traveling Legendary directly involved with your arrival?" the LAS asked in the silence that followed that clarification. Her tone was still somewhat dull, but she had floated closer to the front of the group to ask.
"It is kind of complicated. Myotismon went to the human world to conquer it, and the Digidestined followed his forces back there," the flower lizard sighed as she started to fill the other digimon in on what had changed since his own departure. "Then the other Dark Masters took the chance to start dividing up the digital world for themselves. The Cherrymon duo were the ones that were conquering my home when Celebi found me. I'd been stupid enough to speak out against them while their forces were around, and the playful one ended up chasing me." She shuddered at the memory. "Then suddenly this green bulb monster with tiny wings shows up asking me if I could use some help. He didn't sound much nicer to be honest, but I'd never heard of him and I was desperate."
"We found her in the Lost Woods, one of the local Mystery Dungeons, entirely lost," the Lucario contributed. "Celebi was at the end being a bit smug about getting her away from a bigger threat, so I punched him for dropping her into that kind of place without any battle skills."
"And I have told you all many times that it was only due to the shifting nature of such a place that I could find her to save at all," a voice cut in laughing from behind the group. "Now, here we all are. The strange monster I saved and the people who can get her back home," the Celebi continued grandly, only to frown at the dull looks Quagsire's team gave him. "What?"
"While we are working on a way to get them back home, we do not actually have one," Kabutops said bluntly. "I would think a time traveler that knew we were coming would also know that."
"Hey, I'm just going on..." the Legendary started to reply before trailing off. "I am such a jerk," he then complained as if talking about someone else. "I'm sure I will think that was funny when I'm the one doing it to me, but ugh."
"If you're willing to go into detail I have a teammate that needs a distraction," Quagsire said casually, causing most of her team to pause at the uncharacteristically happy tone of the suggestion. "This is LAS, she's been having a bit of a hard time with some issues that came up with her creation, and I've heard that a lot of Legendary pokemon were created." The digital jellyfish looked over at the forest spirit with a mixture of hope and excitement.
"Ah, yes, I'd of course be happy to answer any questions on that topic," Celebi said, clearly wanting to get away from the apparently valid criticism of his past actions. Looking at the serious face of the Lucario he continued, "Perhaps we can do this over there while you finish catching up with Floramon?"
"That sounds like a great idea," the amphibian agreed gladly, and the LAS quickly moved forward and practically drug the pokemon to the side.
"Uh, is she going to be okay?" their Lucario guide asked. "Because, while he's a good enough guy to get Flora out of the path of a rampaging monster, he's also enough of an asshole to have left her alone in a shifting forest full of other dangerous monsters."
"L.A.S., Legendary Analysis System," Quagsire replied slyly. "'Any questions on that topic' is a lot more serious than he probably thinks."
"She needs something to make her happier, so I hope he can answer a lot of them," Grant commented, his tone a bit upset. "Now, if the introductions are out of the way, can we take a moment to get my berries?"
"Grant," his trainer complained exasperated.
"It has been millions of years since I last had one of these," the Armaldo interrupted strongly.
"Most of which you weren't alive for," she said with a hint of anger at what seemed to be the start of a tantrum.
"Everything I used to eat then that's still around is a person now!" he shouted. "Every last thing that I've craved in this lifetime is either gone so long that there is literally just dust and rock, or is someone brought back from that time with friends and family. I was wild then, with other wild pokemon around just living as animals." The fossil former trainer panted slightly, looking sadly at the shocked faces of everyone else present. "I just want a taste of my past that isn't evil."
"I can understand that," Floramon said sadly. "I wish I had some seeds for a couple of plants I like from back home. Celebi has offered to try and get them, but I can tell he will be tricking someone else to get lost in the Dungeon to do it." She then looked over at her Lucario friend. "Which one is he after?"
"The really bitter tasting ones that I use in that stew recipe that calls for Durin berries," the jackal pokemon replied. "It is kind of strange that ancient berries from the distant past are easier for us to get than those."
"Those things?" the flower digimon asked with a frown. "They grow like weeds and make anything that grows in the same spot taste sour. Honestly most of the ones I have are from weeding the plants out of the rest."
"So they are easy to grow?" Quagsire asked relieved.
"And hopefully cheap?" Dugtrio added, earning a splash of water from his trainer.
"Fairly cheap. I don't stock many of them though," Floramon admitted looking only a hint uneasy about the sudden use of an attack. "I've got six that are ripe, and I'll ask 30 poke a piece."
"I'm going to have to trade for that," the Water/Ground type said rummaging through the team's bag. "I don't suppose a gold nugget is worth anything here?"
"How much gold are we talking about here?" the digimon asked in a tone that said she wasn't sure it would work out. However, the good sized piece of metal that Quagsire retrieved made her nod her head happily. "I can make change for one of those."
"How much are you saying it's worth?" Quagsire asked as she began to haggle. In the end they settled on the Nugget being worth 300 poke, leaving 120 poke in change for the berries. After a bit of discussion another 50 was spent on some of the specific soil she had been growing them in for Shawn and Serperior to try and replicate.
Grant was given only one of the small fruits, which he eagerly ate. "It's even better than I expected," Grant said happily while the Lucario and Floramon looked at him with a bit of horror.
"I take it you don't usually just eat them straight?" Tyranomon asked watching the display with a calm expression. He seemed to have welcomed the chance to think about meeting another digimon.