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imjeralee · 3 years

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Comfort in Despair: Chapter 14 - D R E A M I N G

Leon x F!Reader

Disclaimer: Do not own Pokemon

Summary:

Galar is rich in folklore and tales of the supernatural.

As a Pokemon Researcher who specialises in ghost types, this is a great opportunity for you to investigate and learn more about the paranormal.

Along the way, you meet Leon (in the most awkward way possible) who becomes embroiled in your adventures.

^ Basically this story is about ghosts :/

Rating: General/Teen

Notes: This chapter features a binary message

@marydragneell - here is the latest update

D R E A M I N G

…

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…

There’s a strange noise in the bedroom.

Opening your eyes, you struggle to see properly in the darkness of the room; Rosie’s bed stands opposite yours and you see it is empty. She is not in her bed but in fact, standing in the middle of the room in her pajamas, her Teddiursa doll discarded at her feet.

“Rosie?” you mutter groggily, sitting up and flipping on the switch of your bedside lamp, dispelling the darkness. “Rosie, what are you doing?”

Your little sister does not answer and continues to stand and sway, her eyes half-closed.

Sliding out of bed, you hurry towards her and grasp her gently by the shoulders.

“Rosie?”

Her mouth moves but her voice is very soft; as you strain to hear, you make out, “Live morf su reviled tub, noitatpmet…”

Puzzled, you can only shake her with a little more force in an effort to make her snap out of her stupor as she mumbles and mutters but to no avail, “Rosie!”

The unresponsiveness of the little girl is worrying so you quickly leave the room and slip into your parent’s which is down the hall to the right. You open their door wide and say, “Mum, dad!”

Following your cry of distress is a groan.

A tussle of the covers.

The silhouette of your father pokes out from the sheets. “Wh…what’s wrong?” he says, voice thick with sleep.

“It’s Rosie. I think she’s having another fit.”

Immediately, your mum and dad rise from bed, cursing under their breath as they follow you back into the bedroom you share with your little sister, only to see that she’s fast asleep in bed with her eyes closed and Teddiursa in her grip.

You blink in confusion, and expecting yourself to be scolded, you bite on your lip worriedly but your parents give you a reassuring pat on the shoulders and head over to Rosie’s bed where they sit on either side.

“Rosie?”

Your little sister stirs awake and opens her eyes groggily.

“Hiya sweetie, you okay?”

Whilst you stand in the doorway, Rosie fiddles and fidgets with her doll before she shakes her head.

“I had a bad dream…” she mumbles quietly.

“What happened, sweetheart?”

“…I saw a….a man,” she says, struggling with her words, pointing to the empty corner of the room. “Standing over there, staring at me. He wanted to take me away.”

…

Rosie is five years old.

She’s a smart child who likes dolls and playing tea parties with her Sinistea and Cutiefly, and she has told you and your parents many times that someone is trying to take her away; though she never explains who or what, she describes this unknown entity simply as a 'man’.

Your parents are ghost-type researchers and heavily invested in the supernatural so instead of going to the police to report this, they take you and Rosie to visit a spirit medium who lived far away from Laverre Town. This medium informs your parents that Rosie can see and hear spirits and for that reason, spirits are attracted to her. She tells Rosie to ignore them, not to respond to spirits or else risk drawing attention to herself. Essentially, they are drawn to her like a Venomoth to a flame.

The medium also predicts that you too, will soon be able to heed the spirit’s calling one day.

To your parent’s dismay, she becomes too terrified to speak of this entity which is after your sister, and cannot divulge anything more except it’s evil and not belonging to this world and asks your family to vacate your premises at once.

With no luck and no help, your parents have no choice but to take it upon their own hands to investigate and apply surveillance on Rosie on a twenty-four seven basis.

It’s usually at night-time when bizarre incidents happen, however.

And you hear the noise again at exactly three am.

As you hold your breath and listen, the sound of nails scraping against a board grows louder and louder.

Sitting up, you glance over to see Rosie missing from her bed once again and on this occasion, she is not in the room at all and the door is open. You quickly peel the covers off and rush outside into the cold landing; your attention is grabbed by the little sounds of footsteps and so you peer over the banister where you see Rosie’s pale form idling through the hallway and towards the front door which flings open as she nears.

“Mum!! Dad!!” you yell, as you trample down the stairs. “Rosie, no!!”

She leaves the house, and as you leap off the last step and to the doorway, the front door violently slams shut in your face, the walls of the house trembling in its wake.

Your parent’s bedroom light goes on and they bumble out. “What’s wrong?”

“Rosie went outside!” you yelp, trying your hardest to open the door with the keys but the handle is stuck, as though someone on the other side is holding it down. “It won’t open!”

Your father curses loudly before he joins you, trying to open the door before he angrily thumps a clenched fist against the surface. The door still does not budge and so he rushes to the kitchen where the backdoor is.

“I’ll be back soon! Don’t leave the house!”

Mum nods and as you begin to sob and wail, she brings you into her arms and you clutch onto her, scared and confused by the entire ordeal.

Outside and you can hear your father shouting, his voice muffled and growing distant.

“Rosie! Rosie, where are you?”

In the house, you sit down in the lounge with your mother where she asks you calmly to explain what happened. You tell her you woke up at three am because you heard the noise again and you tell her what the sound reminds you of: nails scraping against a chalkboard. Then you saw that Rosie had left the room and so you went out and heard footsteps downstairs. You saw the front door open and she went outside. She didn’t acknowledge you, as though she was in a trance.

Your mother nods and thanks you for your bravery and encloses you in another hug, and you huddle together for a while until the front door opens and dad enters with Rosie in his arms.

You both rush over at once with relief.

Rosie is fast asleep in dad’s arms, seemingly unharmed yet he looks troubled.

“Look,” he says, lifting the back of Rosie’s shirt to reveal claw marks on her skin.

….

“You’re getting all worked up for all the wrong reasons,” says Graves. “It was probably just a wild pokemon. Could’ve been a Drifloon or Drifblim trying to steal your little girl away.”

“We live in the suburbs, there are no wild pokemon in a two-mile radius.”

Graves sighs in response. “It could’ve been your Haunter or Sableye. You saw claw marks, right?”

“Haunter and Sableye have never harmed my family, and they were with me the entire time.”

You and Rosie play together in the living room with Sinistea and Cutiefly whilst Graves and your father sit on the leather recliners, watching the football game with beers in hands. Dad is clearly stressed, his eyes are dark and dull due to a lack of sleep. Mum prepares food in the kitchen. Graves will be staying for dinner.

You’ve never liked him.

He has an aversion to ghost-type pokemon although you and your entire family have a high affinity for (and are thus drawn to) ghost-types. Rosie doesn’t like him either and he often tries to win favor with the two of you by handing out candy. He is unfortunately your father’s best friend and thus your ‘uncle’ and since he's watched you grow up, he inevitably becomes your ‘godfather’ after Rosie’s birth.

Graves is a police officer and with his trusty Growlithe and Manectric, he quickly rose through the ranks to become Inspector of Laverre Town. He is also apparently seeing a woman called Ellen whom you've never met before but from what you gather, they have a strained relationship.

He and your father never get in each other’s way but Graves doesn’t believe in the supernatural and you wonder how they could have been friends for such a long time.

“Let me show you something,” dad says, when it’s half-time.

“But the Primarina Divas are about to come on!” Graves complains as busty, buxom women in blue and white cheerleading outfits come cartwheeling onto the pitch and the audience on TV cheer and scream raucously as they begin their routine.

“Get over here, Chris,” dad says. He’s standing at the door that will lead to the basement.

“Fine…”

Dad glances at you and beckons you to follow so you get up, dusting your palms and knees. “Rosie, go help mum in the kitchen.”

“Okay, sissy,” she says with a giggle, getting up with Cutie and Sinistea, waddling over to the direction of the kitchen.

You follow dad and Graves down the stairs; dad tells you to be careful on your way down as the stairs are steep and when you arrive at the last step, you and Graves stare at the massive pokemon that’s being held inside a glass container.

It’s a Dusknoir.

“I put an advert online if anyone was interested in trading and someone answered it,” dad says as he stops beside the glass container, “I reckon Dusknoir can help with what’s been going on lately. I’ve asked Haunter and Sableye…unfortunately none of them can help me. They don’t know what it is so I’ve resorted to this. Dusknoir should be able to help.”

“…Dusknoir?” Graves says with a brow raised, before he treks over and stops by your father's side.

The pokemon is conscious of your presences, its single red eye rolling left and right between Graves and your father, before it lands on you. And it stares, planting its large hands flat against the surface of the glass as it hovers in the air.

You gulp and take a step backwards once you feel the intensity of its unrelenting stare.

“…Dad?” you croak, but your father has moved to his desk, moving away some old cassette and video tapes to pick up a leather-bound journal which he flips open.

“Yeah. It's known that Dusknoir receive transmissions from something in the spirit world. My theory is that this 'something' is trying to take Rosie and with Dusknoir’s help, I’m going to find out what it is. I could use Dusknoir to communicate with it.”

"Communicate with it?"

"Yes, it receives signals and I've been trying to decode what type it is. I've been trying all sorts... Binary, morse code, satellite radio waves-"

“Dad!” you exclaim.

“What is it?”

“….I think you should release it,” you say quietly, “….It doesn’t look very nice.”

Dad chuckles and walks over to you, patting your head affectionately. “It’s okay, dear. Remember that ghost-type pokemon look scary but they are just lonely and misunderstood creatures, that’s all.”

“Uh, does the wife know?” Graves utters, and dad nods.

“I’ll be conducting experiments down here.”

“…I can’t believe I’m saying this, but…why don’t you just ask Rosie what it is?”

“She doesn’t know, and I’m not putting my daughter in danger,” dad replies; he returns to his desk, puts down the journal and goes through his papers before he picks up a small black device which you can see is a radio.

Graves sighs. “Well…be careful,” he murmurs.

…

Since Dusknoir has joined your father’s pokemon team, albeit being encased in a glass container for the time being whilst he conducts research, you no longer hear the odd noises and there are no more incidents.

You find Rosie playing in the basement one day. She isn’t allowed in dad's laboratory without adult supervision, so you quickly rush downstairs before either your parents could find out and scoop her up and off the ground, her dolls falling out of her grip.

“Ahh, dolly!” she cries, reaching out for them.

You sigh and bend down to quickly pick them up with one hand whilst the other is wrapped around her waist tightly. “Rosie, what are you doing here?”

“He wants to play with me!” she exclaims, pointing to the glass container where the Dusknoir is.

You follow her gaze to see the large Gripper pokemon staring at you and your sister with its hands flat against the glass. It’s silent but its red eye beadily follows your every moment, watching.

You quickly look away from it, an uneasy feeling settling in the pit of your gut. “Don’t come down here on your own,” you tell Rosie, but she merely giggles.

“It’s okay, sissy,” she says with a giggle, before she glances at Dusknoir and goes, “Beep boop beep boop,” and she continues for a while but alternating between the noises.

“What does that mean?”

“You mean…Beep boop beep boop...?”

“Yeah.”

“It means…come play with me.”

“Huh?”

“He taught me,” she says, pointing to the massive Dusknoir.

“Can he even hear us?”

“Of course he can! But he’s been in a bad mood lately. Beep beep boop boop boop!! That means, ‘I only play tea party, sorry’!”

“And what does, ‘what do you want with my little sister’ mean?”

“Hmm…” Rosie ponders before she says, “Beep boop boop beep beep beep," and again, she continues reciting an extremely complicated and elongated message.

Once she finishes, Dusknoir emits a loud, aggressive roar and slams his fists against the glass repeatedly; you step backwards with fright and with Rosie in your grip, you hurry up the stairs and close the basement door shut behind you.

…

Days pass and Rosie goes to school and you go to school and when you come home, it’s warm and welcoming. Your mother is in the kitchen and she smiles and it’s the most beautiful smile you’ve ever seen and she makes you a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and if you knew any better it’s the last one she will ever make for you and she asks you to take one to your dad who is in the garage and chatting to some neighbours and when it’s almost dinner, you both go back into the house and help set the table up and mum asks about school and how it’s going on and she asks you if there’s any cute boys and you shyly think about one particular lad in class who has caught your eye and when dad tries to joins in, you and mum tell him it’s girls only and you laugh and Rosie joins in, wanting to know what’s going on and then it’s time to eat dinner and you’re sitting down at the table with your family and looking around, at their smiling faces, and you look at your plate to see your mum’s made your favourite food and dad’s eating his steak with his weird protein shake again and mum is scolding him whilst Rosie sticks her tongue out with distaste because there’s vegetables on her plate and -

Screaming.

You’re awoken in the middle of the night by screaming.

Glimpsing over, you see Rosie’s bed is empty.

This isn’t like the normal nights.

Overwhelmed by a sense of dread, you exit and pass your parent’s room; neither your father or mother are inside.

Downstairs, the basement door is wide open and flashing lights flicker from within.

Screaming.

That’s where it’s coming from.

I’m here, you want to say. I’m here.

Each step is heavy, the cold wood under your feet is unwelcoming and chilling to the core. Your house is foreign to you.

In the basement, you make your way down to see the glass container has shattered and a massive swirling vortex of black, blue, purple and white has appeared in the middle of the space.

Dusknoir is halfway inside, feeding the wriggling bodies of your father and Rosie into its mouth.

Your mother lies on the ground, unconscious.

Confused and shocked, you rush towards the huge pokemon.

Stop!!!

Your voice is drowned by the noise. It turns to you, its single red eye flashing before an unseen force knocks you off your feet and your back hits the floor, your head slamming hard against the concrete ground.

You wake up when something cold splashes on your cheek and you wrench your eyes open before you sit up with a gasp, glancing around.

It’s quiet.

Your mother sits on the basement floor, her gaze empty.

Dusknoir is gone.

“Mum!” you exclaim.

She slides her eyes to you as you crawl over to her and grab her by the shoulders.

“Mum?”

She does not respond.

You let go of her and glance around the cold and dark basement. “…Dad? Rosie?? Where are you??”

“Gone,” your mum utters, “They’re gone.”

As you glance at her in bewilderment, she lifts herself off the ground and pads to your father’s desk.

She goes through the papers that have become strewn over the floor and mumbles and mutters and utters under her breath incoherently. She shakes her head repeatedly as she bunches the papers in her hands, muttering ‘no, no, no’ and ‘my baby, my poor baby’ over and over again.

You call out to her but she doesn’t respond.

Therefore, you silently pick yourself up off the floor, leave the basement and phone Graves.

You didn’t know what else you could do.

Graves arrives and it’s almost dawn. He’s brought his partner with him and he enters the house to see you at the door and your mother is surrounded by your father’s papers and obsessively skimming through them whilst seated on the sofa and when he asks what happened, your mother’s ramblings don’t appear to help but when you try to interrupt, Graves isn’t interested in what you have to say or add to the conversation. He leaves your mother in the lounge then heads to the basement, alone.

You sit with her, watching her hysterically pour through the research.

Whilst his partner stays in the lounge with you and attempts to strike up some meaningless small talk, Graves returns empty-handed.

He's confused.

They converse silently and routinely throw you and your mother concerned glances before they split up; Graves checks the rest of the house, inspecting the kitchen, dining room, the bathroom and all the bedrooms upstairs.

He thinks of all sorts of logical reasons why your father and Rosie have disappeared in the middle of the night.

It could have been…

A nasty spat between spouses.

A break-in.

Your mother is the only person who saw what really happened.

He sees that the two of you are badly shaken yet unharmed and drives you to Laverre Police Station to officially take testimony. A search subsequently begins but their outcome is not successful.

When it’s finally your turn to speak to Graves, you have sat in the police station for hours and when you’re brought in the room, it’s intimidating but you tell him what you saw in the basement; Graves stares at you silently the entire time, eyebrows scrunching and lifting everytime you detail how you saw the Dusknoir with your father and Rosie in its clutches and putting them into its mouth when they were still alive.

He remains quiet, doesn’t ask you any questions, doesn’t interrupt. The pen remains untouched by his notepad.

“Kid,” he says, after a pregnant pause following your explanation, “your mother’s said something entirely different.”

It takes a while to register this.

You sit in silence as Graves regards you intensely for a moment before he gets up to leave.

A kind-looking woman with glasses is beckoned in and she plops herself down in Graves’ seat which he has kept warm for her. She adjusts her frames, propping up a manila folder in front of her before she scoops out some documents. She asks you questions which are a little strange because they’re personal and unrelated but you soon realise it’s to assess and revaluate your current mental state. She even has your school records. Unfortunately, the more she asks and the more she doesn’t make any progress with your interrogation and you’re clean but you’re not exempted yet.

Perhaps you have a disturbed mind or Dusknoir devouring your father and sister is a metaphor for a sadistic murderer who has kidnapped them?

“After all, if the public finds out a pokemon had devoured two people, there would be madness.”

And due to the horrific nature of the crime, you had mentally blocked or changed some aspects?

“Why don’t you believe me?” you asked, “Why doesn’t anyone believe me?”

Raising your voice, you slam your bunched fists on the iron table and yell, “What’s wrong with you??? What’s wrong with all you?! I’m telling the truth!! Why won’t you believe me?!”

You receive no satisfactory answer, your words are taken with no seriousness and you and mum are informed to go home whilst the initial investigation goes underway.

“Mum, why didn’t you tell them what you saw? They think I’m lying.”

When you look at her, all the colour has left her face and you begin to feel you no longer recognize her.

“They won’t believe us,” she utters, “We’ll get your father and Rosie back ourselves.”

Stunned by her words, you can only nod limply.

You’re expected to go to school in a few days. By then, your father and sister’s disappearance have hit the tabloids. Everyone whispers and looks at you, in the school, the neighbourhood….you get stared at when you walk through the halls to your next class, you end up sitting alone in the cafeteria during lunch, even the teachers are careful around you. People think they were murdered.

There is nothing about Dusknoir.

And often, you wonder to yourself if it truly was a nightmare.

You miss your father and sister terribly and your mother inevitably begins to obsessively investigate; she spends much of her time in the basement and rarely eats, drink or sleep.

As the days passed, you become used to seeing her less and less often around the house and though you want to help, your mother brushes you off, asking you to focus on your studies.

Soon, the upkeep of the house falls in your grasp.

You make it a habit to go out to the supermarket and buy food by yourself, dragging a wheeled shopping bag with you each time when you go during the weekends, heading to the ATM when you were strapped for cash.

You look up recipes online and learn how to cook meals for yourself and your mother, leaving food for her on the desk. You eat on your own in the dining room, sitting at the large table, surrounded by three empty seats.

Graves visits as much as he can; he usually talks to your mother but sometimes he sits with you in the living room to watch football whilst your mom slaves away in the basement on her own. He tells you her appearance is turning haggard, which you are aware of.

Worried about her behaviour, you look up various kinds of available therapy which you think will benefit her, spending many late nights on your laptop browsing online and calling up various clinics to enquire but the costs are going to be high so you decide to secure a side gig tutoring some kids to pay for your mother’s treatment, placing an advert online which you didn’t think would get noticed.

Inexorably, your grades begin to fall as you balance your newfound hustle and school. That cute boy in class no longer occupies your mind. You come home late in the evening from your work, exhausted. You stop smiling and overall, you’ve mentally aged.

At night, you lie awake in your bed and glance over to Rosie’s empty bed where the sheets and pillows are unwashed, and you think about that night and you think about it a lot; you wish you could’ve done more and you begin to hate yourself for not paying enough attention to your father’s research and what he was trying to accomplish with Dusknoir. You should’ve done more to help your father. You should’ve studied alongside him.

Rising from bed, you make your way downstairs to the basement where your mother is, hunched over the desk with a black device in hands.

It’s dad’s radio.

“Mum?”

“Yes?”

You walk up to the desk, where you see your father’s old notes which have been collated into his journal with the leather-bound cover. You pick it up and open it, flipping through the pages where you see his handwriting and hold the book to your chest, closing your eyes. There is also a family photo in his study which you pluck out from the stand and hold gingerly in your hand.

On the verge of tears, you croak out, “I want to help. Please tell me how I can help. Please. Talk to me.”

Finally, she swivels round in her seat when she hears you sobbing and for the first time in a while, she embraces you.

She says, “We need to get a Dusknoir.”

Since it started with Dusknoir, your mum entrusts you with this task so you upload another advert and put up a Phantump you had caught beforehand in the PC box and send it on its way to the Kalos GPS.

A few days later, someone answers your advert and you receive a Dusclops through the GPS which evolves into a Dusknoir in process.

Satisfied that you’ve made some progress, you head to the basement with Dusknoir’s capsule in hand, wanting to show your mother. To your surprise, she’s moved from her seat and is clutching the radio in hands, smiling widely.

“Mum?”

She spots you and the smile widens, “They’re alive!” she exclaims.

You can only stare at her, stunned.

“Listen,” mum switches the radio, rotating the small, rounded knob as carefully as she can and you watch the little dial move across the screen.

The crackling static of white noise fills the quiet basement until your mum reaches eighteen ninety-eight hertz and the radio fizzes into life.

“…..hello? This is- ….I’m in a dark place, and….…”

It is your father’s voice.

As your mum grins at you, you rush over, eyes wide. “Dad? Dad! We’re here!!!”

“….I think I’ve been stuck here for three days…”

“He can’t hear us,” mum explains when your face falls. “This is a spirit radio, dear. It only works on this frequency, it picks up transmissions from the spirit world, and it’s picked up your father! He’s alive! Alive!!!”

Alive.

Stiff with shock, mum envelopes you into a hug and sobs and wails with laughter.

It’s been a while since you’ve seen her happy.

“Mum,” you utter, “I…uh…I got the Dusknoir.”

“Excellent!” mum cries as you hand her the capsule which she holds close to her chest.

“Mum…promise me you won’t do anything stupid,” you say, and she nods but somehow you don’t believe her.

…

“Mum, I’m home,” you say wearily, locking the front door behind you and removing your shoes.

You step inside the lounge only to be met with silence.

“…Mum?”

The lights are still on.

You had gone to work for four hours.

She is possibly in the basement, you think, and so you creep down the stairs only to see it is empty. She’s not in the basement, where could she be?

Your search does not last long as you breeze through the lounge and into the kitchen which is in uproar; the stools have been knocked over, there are various cassette and video tapes lying all over the surface of the counter along with an opened dusk ball. Dad’s radio lies on the floor beside a screwdriver and some scattered parts. You spot his journal and the family photo, which has fallen out from the pages.

“Mum?” you call as you pick up the journal and the radio, your voice echoing in the empty house.

“Mum?”

“Mum!”

“MUM!!!”

“…Mum?”

“Mum, please…”

“Not you too.”

Did your voice always sound so sad?

…

Professor Magnolia and Sonia enter the ward.

A girl in a white gown sits at a table with a Sinistea and Cutiefly perched on her shoulders, staring morosely at various untouched chess pieces on the surface. Her eyes hold no life, her hair unkempt, her face a grim portrait of melancholy.

There are other patients but they walk around aimlessly or yell or wail and talk to themselves and Sonia huddles close to her grandmother, wondering why she is in such a scary place.

They don’t come to Kalos often but Magnolia had received an emergency call from a Police Inspector called Chris Graves.

“She ran all the way to the police station,” Graves says, sighing. “I didn’t know what to do with her so I put her there for a while. Maybe she’ll feel better.”

“I hardly think so, Mr Graves. This girl needs proper care.”

“Listen, she had a mental breakdown…and, um…I’m her godfather…so legally, I…I’m supposed to take her in but she doesn’t want to live with me and I don’t wanna force her. I’m paying for her treatment and I’m not offended or anything ‘cos I’m not good at this stuff, I’m not fit to be a dad in any way,” Graves tells her during the phonecall, “And I know you’re her mother’s mentor and so I thought….you might be better to…I dunno, talk to her.”

“Where are her grandparents?”

“They’ve passed away. She has some relatives but they don’t want to take her in. Too much hassle, and the medication’s expensive too.”

Magnolia and Sonia walk up to this girl at the chess table, and says her name.

She looks up, her tired and sunken eyes meeting theirs.

“My name is Magnolia. I’m a Professor from the region of Galar. This is my granddaughter, Sonia. She’s the same age as you,” Magnolia gestures to Sonia who offers you a meek wave.

“Hi….”

“I’m your mother’s mentor so I knew her well, and I’ve been informed about your circumstances. Would you like to come with me?” Magnolia says, “…Would you like to live with us?”

Indifference slowly dissolves to shock as this woman called Professor Magnolia and her doe-eyed granddaughter Sonia stand before you. The chess pieces on the table blur together as you emit a quiet sniff, the corner of your eyes leaking with tears.

...

In the hospital, Leon remains by your side.

Some people came and went, namely Magnolia, Sonia and Chief Inspector Graves. He was your godfather. Who knew?

You're only allowed one visitor at a time and Leon has made it quite obvious to everyone that he will be the one to stay by your side as the two ladies came and went due to the ungodly hour, and Graves has left to talk to Chairman Rose and the Ghostbunkers and he won't be coming back anytime soon.

Leon has faithfully stayed with you as you were taken to hospital and he sits on the chair by your bed, waiting for you to wake up. You’ve fallen unconscious since you were brought in and the doctors say your condition is stable despite the blood loss and you will make a full recovery very soon. It's good news and Leon holds your hand tightly in his, closing his eyes. He silently thanks Arceus that you're unharmed and prays that you will wake up soon.

However, the door is suddenly thrown open and a blonde-haired young man in black enters the room unannounced, his head wrapped with a plethora of bandages whilst a Joltik is perched on his shoulder with a little bandage tied around its body.

"Chuck!" he yells loudly, and Leon turns round to face the newcomer.

The two men regard each other; the blonde looks at Leon, who's still donned in his torn shirt and his cape appears to be missing and although Leon doesn't quite appreciate the intrusion and the unwelcome noise, he says calmly, "Chuck? I think you've got the wrong room..."

"No, no, that's just my nickname for her, for duckie. I mean chuck. Wait-" the blonde keeps correcting himself until he says your name.

"Who are you?"

"I'm so sorry, I should've introduced myself first," the blonde tidies his act up, lowers his voice and closes the door quietly behind himself, "I'm Jace. It's nice to meet you, Sir Champion."

Jace.

So this is Jace.

Leon has seen his testimonial on your blog and you've mentioned him once or twice. Now he can finally put the name to a face and this is Jace. He must be older than the both of you and he is not bad-looking; he's tall with a thin frame, sharp jaw and chiselled features. One can tell he is friendly from a simple glance.

However, quite the opposite occurs: a surge of discomfort flits through Leon's mind when he realises you and Jace are friends and you are close. Close enough that you have nicknames for each other. The champion's expression doesn't change despite this fact though he tenses in his seat and he clinches your fist with more force than before.

The pit of his gut suddenly bubbles with an unquenchable uneasiness he hasn't experienced before; it's different. It's new, and most unbecoming. Initially, Leon ponders if it's the tension he feels before a battle...but this is indeed a wholly different sensation.

"It's nice to meet you too," Leon does his best but ultimately ends up forcing a smile at the blonde, "And there's no need to be so formal. Just 'Leon' is fine-"

Jace wheezes a little.

"-and you were with her at the art gallery, right?"

"Yeah," the blonde replies, nodding vigorously, "Sir Champion, I mean, Leon...she didn't have to take the case. She knew you had spoken to Rose and you had put in a good word for her, and it's not in her heart to turn down a client."

Leon lowers his gaze. "...I know."

"Rose isn't happy. He says we violated the terms and conditions because I used Joltik and that counts as pokemon battling, which isn't allowed on the premise. But I had to. I had to protect myself and chuck."

"I'll talk to Chairman Rose. Don't worry, I'm sure he'll come around. Thank you for protecting her, Jace."

"You're welcome..."

The room settles into silence; Jace is clearly intimidated by Leon's presence and it's then he sees that the Champion is also holding your hand very tightly.

And then there's the note on the door that says 'One Visitor At A Time'.

Three's a crowd and so Jace utters, "Right, well then, I imagine she's in good hands since you're here and all, so I'll...I'll be off now. Goodnight."

Leon nods.

Without much further ado, the blonde wordlessly leaves the room, closing the door behind him once more.

Leon is left with you and you alone, and that's the way he likes it. Upon Jace's departure, his gut loosens up and the strange swirling and jittery feeling ebbs away in a second and finally, he is able to relax. He swivels round in his seat to face you, leaning over to sweep away a loose strand of hair that's lingering over your closed eyelids. You look peaceful and he wonders what you're possibly dreaming about.

Hopefully, it's a pleasant dream.

…

#pokemon #pkmn #pokemonsword #pokemonshield #pokemon sword and shield #leon #dande #reader #reader insert #leon x reader #Leon x you #jeralee #fanfic #fic #archive of our own

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tumblunni · 7 years

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The big post about how i love my sneasel who is great

Welcome to that post. It might get long.

Reaper the level 100 Naughty nature Sneasel with Keen Eye who experienced pokerus once and has contest ribbons from too many regions oh my gosh Leeeeeeets get going on how much I adore my little guy!

Okay, the story behind him. He is kinda unofficially my starter pokemon?

Cos of course there was no way to keep your mons from RBY and GSC back then, but I’d kinda only had one pokemon anyway. I was a dumb kid who just solo’d both games with my raichu Chuppy. And sadly I ended up losing them even before the whole transfer issue, someone stole my Gold cartridge during school and when I found it half smashed in the playground all the data had been corrupted. It did actually play though, just with some colour issues I think? I never really restarted cos it felt cruel to Chuppy to do it. So I’m happy that the virtual console rerelease let me reincarnate Chuppy and even make them a cool new alola form! (though they had a different gender this time, but meh i get to headcanon my chu is trans like me, haha) So yeah thats the story of my official first pokemon, but Chuppy didnt really have any personality or headcanons back then cos I was so new to the franchise. And Reaper ended up lasting way longer and sharing every single other region with me, so he kinda took the spot of ‘starter’ even if he wasnt ‘first’. (I still was really happy to welcome reincarnation Chuppy home tho!)

Reaper actually came from Pokemon Colosseum, of all places! His OT name is the completely-wrong ‘Tom’ cos he was from when I restarted my game after getting stuck and just buttonmashed one of the default names out of frustration. I actually caught him in a master ball just cos I was that excited to hug the lil guy! Sneasel was my fave gen 2 mon but i never managed to catch one actually in GSC, i didnt know it was limited to a rare encounter in the very last area. And even before I caught him I knew sneasel was in this game via guides, so i was waiting with baited breath and establishing headcanons even before i found him. Then I just COULD NOT WAIT, hence the master ball! XD I kinda preemptivel based him on the iron mask marauder’s sneasel from the celebi movie, cos shadow pokemon are similar to his brainwashing stuff. And I always liked his sneasel, scizor and tyranitar, for such minor roles they are. It was a nice nuance for the bad guy’s pokemon to be shown as VERY MUCH not evil, just enslaved by magic brainwashing and mistreated. It warmed my heart seeing them freeing each other and escaping in the end once the control was broken! But also it established sneasel as a really cool badass fighter that I wanted to have someday, yknow?

So yeah I got this guy from colosseum before I even played RSE, and he ended up being my ‘starter’ in that game so much that i cant even remember which one i picked. I boxed it right away and never thought about it again, I was a callous kid! It was actually really interesting playing ORAS and finally getting to see what the hoenn starters are actually like, lol And Reaper remained my best friend across like ELEVEN OR MORE REPLAYS of every single gen 3 game except emerald. Cos at that time in my childhood i literally did not have any other games. i spent around three or four years with just sapphire, leafgreen and final fantasy tactics advance. (Oh boy that game’s script is stuck in my brain for all time) And getting attatched to the characters and making new ones all the time was how i kept from getting bored this way ^_^ Buuuuut... it kinda meant that I just discarded most of them super fast to make more. the only other pokemon that migrated to sinnoh with Reaper was Nether the sableye, who was kinda his rival/best friend. (Tho I mispelled it as Neava so he’s stuck that way, lol. And both of them are in all caps forever...) Nether is kinda the basis for my recent oc Malachi, so he’s like an entirely different story for another time. But he was my Sapphire buddy and Reaper was one region older via the power of spinoffs.

And oh man yeah i totally loved the shadow pokemon plot lol! I just headcanoned his plot with regards to that was the same as the marauder’s mons. Perfectly nice tiny sneasel boy is kidnapped and experimented upon by evils, but my love saved him and now he is soft once more. He didnt really have much angst from it, but it helped such a wild spirit grow to trust my hero and trust humans in general after such a rocky introduction to them. I imagined it was like training a dangerous dog to be a police canine, with that arm guard thing that they bite! Shadow pokemon training must be WAY more tough than it seems on the surface! So like ash’s charizard plot, where it ends up with really fire forged family love after all the hardship. I think that before he met my trainer he was just like a loner robin hood type character who valued his freedom and thought that tamed pokemon were all wusses. But alas, he was forced to experience human hugs, and now he’s addicted! but he’d still be quite rebellious and wild and have a lot of goofy cute interactions as he tries to learn all this complicated stuff about being a pet. Why cant I pee on the carpet?? Why do I have to eat pellet food? Why are you mad when i bring you dead mice and pidgey eggs?? bad bad influence on the other mons, but also a softhearted big bro who WANTS to be a good influence. He pretends to be all aloof and stoic cliche angsty antihero, but always messes up and looks cute instead! And he gets crushingly sad if any of his lil siblings actually does get afraid of him. Noooo the grumpyness is for the humans! Not for you!! No-one is allowed to pet the sneas except the other pokemon. It my duty to protect my new pack of strangely shaped sneasels! Oh and he likes booze. In human terms he’d be around 25-30, but still its not good for animals to drink human liquor. Never stopped him though! He’d always find ways to sniff it out and swipe half-finished cans from the trash and stuff. Bad angstman! I know thats part of your archetype but stop it!

So... basically he was like.. cloud? original version from ff7 where he was sassy and goofy sometimes, except reaper is like that all the time with less angst and pretty much zero ego. He’s just like a kind yet not completely competant fun uncle who tries his best to put up a cool guy front to impress the kids (and push away scary humans) but his innate sweetness means he always messes up. And he’s super tsundere about the fact he considers his trainer part of his infinate pack of children, even if every other human is DANGER MODE. Must protect this human from the other ones! Must teach them the ways of the sneas! Oh, and I imagined his appearance as a gijinka would be kinda like Squall from ff8. cos he actually started off as a parody of that unlikeable angstman archetype, and i didnt even know Cloud existed until yeaaaars later. (Played the ffs completely out of order...) So i figured he’d be like squall but with dark skin and a kinda sirus black hairstyle. (Cos that guy contributed the kind uncle part of his inspiration!) Oh and of course a sneasely colourscheme for the fur coat. And I ended up making him hold Blackglasses so often that it was an in-joke that he actually wore shades 24/7 even in normal pokemon form XD

When I first got him in Collosseum he was really useful for his Brick Break move, and im actually really happy that the brick break image on bulbapedia is the collosseum sneasel using it! It was very very good as one of the few mons available with that move in the very limited choices you had for that game. But his signature move kinda ended up being Surf, even though his stats would have been awful for it even if I’d ev trained him properly XD I just found it so bizarre that sneasel of all things could learn that HM! I imagined he formed a surfboard out of ice to carry the trainer, cos there’s no way you could stand on the back of a 30cm tall weasel...

And man lets just have some random sneasel headcanons now!

* Their feathers exist to sense wind fluctuations, which are useful in their natural environment to anticipate snowstorms and track prey in low visibility.

* The ear feather is just for this, its the more sensitive one. The tail feathers are more for manipulating objects and other day to day life. They’re more matted and dont really have the same hearing ability, but the joints are way more flexible so they can be moved independantly like three actual tails. Sneasels can pick up small delicate objects by brushing them up between the tails, then rolling them down their back to reach their mouth. they also use the tails to brush away dirt, hide their tracks in the snow, form surprisingly intricate igloo-like nests and groom their fur with the utmost precision.

* Sneasels will outright resent any attempts to groom them by anyone but their closest human friend, since inevitably humans cant do as good of a job. But humans can scratch behind your ears and give cuddles, so it all works out!

* In the wild, sneasels eat primarily eggs, some nuts and berries, scavenged semi-rotten meat and not so much live prey. Even though they’re very skilled, they’re also very fragile and cautious because of it. They’ll only hunt in extreme situations, instead preferring to confuse and mislead their way to dinner. Sneasels are very social and loyal to each other even if they’re not to anyone else. Their most common strategy is the whole pack wards off a dangerous foe while one lone unit sneaks past and robs that pokemon’s food stores, to share with the family. Even if they’re forced to hunt their own prey, they still follow these strategies and try to just outrun the enemy until it dies of exhaustion or freezes in the blizzard. They’re experts of making cuts that disable but don’t kill- going in close enough to deliver that final blow means risking a valuable pack member’s life!

Not really a headcanon now but back to reaper himself, I always kinda imagine him looking more like a real weasel. I like sneasel’s design but the bipedal humanoid proportions arent exactly the best thing, yknow? i feel like it should have had shorter more pawlike back legs and just been top-heavy with the super claws. Like.. I imagine kinda a furret? just the appeal of actual weasels and stoats plz. I love sneasel but when i looked up weasels as a kid i was like MY HEART!!! they’re sock puppet babies with lint fuzz faces Also I think sneasel’s claws are kinda comically short and boring considering theyre like its Big Feature. I liked when they were drawn a bit longer in older artworks, and i always imagined reaper had longer ones like scyther-y level. Thats why I named him that! Crescent moon claws of awesomeness, striking in the night~! ...he would be really cool if he wasnt such a cuddly dork. I love him so much, he’s my baby. And my dad. And my uncle?? he’s just a very good friend and im happy videogames can touch my heart like nothing else let me love my nonexistant magic weasel from cyberspace forevermore~!

#bunni original vintage post

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