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Post by Deleted on Aug 18, 2017 0:17:53 GMT
< I dunno, Ros. Something smells fishy about all this. Or it would, if I could smell. > Laughing at her own joke, Nova fidgeted on her perch—that being Rosalind’s shoulder. The girl shrugged, forcing the Starly to adjust her stance. ”If you say so. The place does feel a little creepy.” She hadn’t been able to shake the lingering sense of unease that seeped into her as soon as she’d stepped foot in the area. But if there was something really wrong going on, then people didn’t seem to care. A decent number of curious souls and fortune-seekers were milling around within eyeshot, collecting the mysteriously perfect, sphere-shaped stones. And Rosalind was no different. She’d brought her biggest and sturdiest purse, and she was determined to fill it before lunchtime. With a flap of her wings, Nova swooped down to retrieve a gem hiding among the grass, carefully stowing it in the bag before returning to Rosalind’s shoulder. < So…why are we doing this, again? >Ugh, the sun was already so hot. Wiping a gross bead of sweat from her forehead, she responded. ”Because Althea asked me to? She heard about the weird eggs these vendors were offering, and wanted me to get my hands on some. Whatever hatches out of them, she wants to research them herself.” Which meant she was going to be taking care of eggs for the next couple weeks. Like that wasn’t terrifying or anything. ”She’s kinda the one in charge of my paycheck, and I’d like to eat this month.” It was Rosalind’s turn to laugh. ”So here we are!”Nova yawned. < Maaaan, it’d be so much easier if you just ate bugs and honey, like a normal person. You don’t have to pay anybody for that. >Rosalind shivered in revulsion as she scanned the grassy slopes for glimmers of red. ”It’s a real shame, all right,” she deadpanned. WORDS: 322
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Post by Clover on Aug 18, 2017 2:47:05 GMT
Long before she found any gems for the merchant, Emily found two very... different spheres. Yellow instead of red, and much too large. "What are you guys doing all the way out here?" They were hidden by the tall yellow grass of route five, where they both blended in almost perfectly. People weren't likely to leave eggs in the middle of nowhere and if they were the products of wild pokemon, they would be abandoned for a long time. Wild pokemon weren't comfortable coming near the pedestal--that was the only reason Emily had come here without a starter in the first place. "I guess you guys are all alone, then. That'd be a terrible way to come into the world." After a moment of indecision, Emily picked the abandoned eggs up, supporting one in each arm. They were large but light; even the heavier of the two couldn't have weighed more than a few pounds. Unfortunately, Emily was a researcher by trade, not a breeder. She didn't know diddlysquat about eggs. Right as she picked up the eggs, she saw a blond woman walk by with a Starly on her shoulder. Like it was fate, almost. If that girl had a pokemon, maybe she'd have some experience with eggs? A lifetime's worth of introversion made starting conversations a difficult and intimidating feat, but this wasn't about her anymore. It was about the eggs. It was about ensuring a good future for them. "H-hey," the brunette called out softly. "I'm sorry to bug you guys but I was just, uh, just wondering--do you have any experience with eggs?" She was all too aware that the pair was probably just anxious to get on with digging up gems. But--again--it was not about her. And they could say no and brush her off, and leave Emily no worse off than she already was. No harm, no foul. Right? A beat later, she realized she hadn't explained why she was asking in the first place. So she hurried onward. "I just recently found these guys and I... I don't. Have experience with eggs, I mean."WORDS ► 354
NOTES ► hello again @truffle! c: egg thread for plusle (1/3) and sunkern (1/1). setting this the day before she goes to the lab, to keep her liquid time coherent.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 18, 2017 3:15:22 GMT
Rosalind hadn’t been paying too much attention to the other people in the area. Everyone was pretty intent on collecting gems, more interested on getting whatever they wanted from the creepy vendor guy than on making a social event out of this. So it was Nova who first noticed the other lady approaching them, giving a low chirp to warn her trainer. Looking around, Rosalind smiled at the stranger, and gave her an appraising sweep on instinct. Whoever she was, this girl looked shy. Insecure. She would have had a blast messing with someone like her, years ago. But now, she just waved, responding to her stuttered greeting with a warm ”Hi!” And then, at her question, she eyed the eggs. Oh. ”You…you just ‘found’ them? Like, here? With no parents?”Nova went suspiciously still. If the lady was looking in her direction, she might see a look of sharp grief flash over the bird’s face before it shifted into confused curiosity. < Wow. Okay. > A beat. < Suggestion number one: don’t drop them, > she went on with a snicker. Rosalind snorted, then stepped closer to the other girl, looking the eggs over. ”Well, they seem okay. Do they feel like they’re a good weight? Like, they’re not lighter than they should be?” Except that some eggs could feel very light, depending on the breed; but that was beside the point. Maybe. Realizing she’d never actually answered the question, she met the stranger’s eyes again with a sparkle. ”Haha, sorry! Um, yeah, I know a little about eggs. But not a ton. I do know that it’s hard to truly ruin an egg unless you drop it, or freeze it, or something. Unless it’s an ice pokemon, and then freezing might help...” She winced. ”But you probably don’t know what kind they are, huh?”< Aren’t you just supposed to sit on them? >, Nova piped up, entirely unhelpfully. WORDS: 324 TAGS: CloverNOTES: All the gems ftw >3 |
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Post by Clover on Aug 18, 2017 3:33:48 GMT
Emily nodded grimly. Did the girl not believe her? She supposed it did sound a bit silly, just randomly finding eggs in the wilderness. But the pedestal and the merchant were eerie; the whole place gave off a weird vibe, the kind that sent tremors running down your spine if you thought about it too much. Abandoned eggs in that sort of area didn't sound so strange, at least not to Emily. But anyway. She had questions to answer. "Yeah, just over there, nestled in the grass. They blended in pretty well so I'm not sure how long they'd been there. It would've been pretty easy to walk right by them without noticing." That was the only rational explanation she could come up with, since there were so many people digging up gems in the immediate vicinity. Emily was looking at Rosalind when the grief crossed the Starly's face, so she missed that. She did catch the joke, though, and she caught the fact that she was the butt of it. Her face flushed and she backed up. She could ask Google about egg rearing. That'd be easier than disturbing these people. Before she could actually unglue herself from the conversation, the other girl kept talking. And then Emily was really and truly stuck because now, leaving would have been rude. She had initiated the conversation and now one of them was actually helping her out. She gulped down her nerves and lifted her arms up a few inches in a poor man's attempt to weigh the eggs. "I don't know what too light is, but they're definitely not heavy at all." Oh dear. Did that mean something was wrong? She hoped not. Who knew what had happened to the poor eggs before she'd found them? Rosalind's next bit of advice was much, much more reassuring. From the sound of it, wrecking eggs was something you had to try to do. The knowledge made Emily visibly relax. "Well, you may not know a ton, but it's more than I do," she said with the smallest of smiles. "And no, I've got no idea. I assume electric types, since I heard it was mostly electric types in this area?" A lot of electric types were yellow, too, but that was faulty logic; all squares were rectangles, but not all rectangles were squares, and all that. The relevant question was not whether most electric pokemon were yellow, but whether most yellow pokemon were electric types--and that answer was a resounding no. Emily offered the bird a shaky smile and decided to focus on the human. She was much less nerve wracking than the bird. As soon as the thought occurred to her, she realized she didn't know either of their names. "I'm Emily, by the way."WORDS ► 464
NOTES ► @truffle, egg thread for plusle (1/3) and sunkern (1/1). +5 ruby gems (10) |
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Post by Deleted on Aug 18, 2017 22:31:56 GMT
This lady was looking pretty nervous about the entire situation. She wasn’t really taking Nova’s jokes in stride, in any case, looking more embarrassed than amused. Rosalind’s expression softened a bit. Goodness, and she thought she was nervous about the idea of raising eggs! But then again, she did have the benefit of watching many an egg hatch in her own home, growing up. There hadn’t been much complicated care involved with those—her mom had just stuck them in that fancy incubator until they started to crack. At least her reassurance that it wasn’t too hard seemed to do the girl some good. She seemed to be breathing easier now, at least; which was fantastic, because all that anxiety wasn’t doing any good to Rosalind’s nerves, either. At the suggestion of them being electric-type, she hummed thoughtfully. ”Could be! But, umm…” Aw, she probably shouldn’t say this. It might make her sad. And Emily seemed emotional enough about the eggs already. But on the other hand, Althea kept saying how awareness was half the battle with these sorts of things. Visibly hesitating, she continued, a little somberly. ”I wouldn’t assume these eggs belong to wild pokemon. They could. But a lot of human-bred eggs can end up abandoned, if they can’t be sold for whatever reason, and the person doesn’t have time to care for them.” She shrugged, grimacing. ”It’s kind of a problem.”< Humans are lame, > Nova mumbled under her breath, more to Rosalind than to Emily. After noticing how poorly the girl was taking her jokes, the wind had been taken out of her wings. Snuggling into her feathers, she pointedly avoided eye contact with the human. ”But anyway!” Rosalind continued, forcing pep back into her voice and a smile onto her face. ”My name’s Rosalind, and this is Nova. And regardless of how those eggs ended up alone, I’m sure you’ll do fine taking care of them.” Then her eyes widened in sudden realization. ”Unless you don’t want to? ‘Cause I know places where you can surrender abandoned eggs to be cared for, no questions asked.” The fact that those places were dreadfully impacted was something of an issue, but not something she was about to mention. That was enough pokemon rights activism for the day, probably, unless she wanted to leave Emily permanently depressed. |
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Post by Clover on Aug 18, 2017 22:46:41 GMT
For the second time, Rosalind's advice helped Emily. The first tidbit, about how hard it was to permanently mess up eggs, made her relax. And the second tidbit, about how some humans abandoned unprofitable eggs, made her all the more determined to keep the two she'd stumbled across. She wrapped her arms around them more tightly. "That's... that's awful. I didn't know," was all she said at first. It was heartbreaking to hear, but not unsurprising. Greed was common all over the world; Emily just hadn't ever experienced it in relation to pokemon breeders. All through the introductions, the egg abandonment issue buzzed around the back of her mind. Surely there was something she could do about that? While she mulled it over, there were pleasantries to uphold. "It's nice to meet you, Rosalind, Nova." Emily shook her head at Rosalind's offer. She wasn't an impulsive person by any means but once she made up her mind about something, she rarely considered alternatives--even if considering alternatives could've saved her a great deal of pain. It'd been that way with her pursuit of medical school (a long, and rather boring story) before she'd come to Inset and it was that way with the yellow eggs now. "I appreciate the offer, I do, but... I don't want them abandoned so often before they've even entered the world. It wouldn't be right." She had no idea how much unhatched pokemon knew but she assumed it was very, very little; certainly not enough to understand whether they'd changed hands, never mind how many times they'd changed hands. But Emily would've known. "Though now that I've said that, I guess it wouldn't hurt to know, even if I keep these guys--where do you surrender eggs?"If there was a place to surrender eggs, why had these two been left out in the middle of nowhere? Were people really that lazy? Were they really that inconsiderate? WORDS ► 322
NOTES ► @truffle, egg thread for plusle (1/3) and sunkern (1/1). +5 ruby gems (15) |
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Post by Deleted on Aug 18, 2017 23:34:44 GMT
Rosalind released a breath when Emily shook her head, clearly relieved that she wasn’t going to be dumping the eggs anywhere. Her smiled turned genuine. ”That’s good! That’s really good! It’s awesome that you’re willing to do that for random eggs you just found.” She wasn’t sure how many people would actually choose to raise abandoned children themselves instead of sending them to an adoption agency or something. Most folks were too busy to do that. Heck, doing these sorts of things was Rosalind’s job, and she still didn’t feel like doing it half the time. Unfortunately, her misanthropy got the better of her after Emily’s next question, and her expression turned strained again. Was she trying to save face by asking “out of curiosity,” fully intending to drop off the eggs when she had the chance? Emily didn’t seem like that type, but Rosalind wasn’t the greatest judge of character. But she couldn’t just not answer the question. Fidgeting with the hem of her sleeve, she gestured with her chin in the direction of distant Rigel. ”Over in the city there’s this place called Peaceberry Adoption. Those guys specialize in hatched pokemon, but if you drop an egg off with them, they can send it to Cutie-Pie-Fly Adoptions. They’re this great little organization that tries to find homes for eggs that have been abandoned, like those two.” She nodded at the eggs. ”But I think every licensed Pokemon Center is also a designated surrender spot? Like, you could drop an egg off at the counter, and they’ll send it to Cutie-Pie, too.”It really was embarrassingly easy to surrender an egg to an adoption agency. But lots of people didn’t do it because of the stigma of having to show your face at a surrender spot. The vindictive streak in Rosalind thought those folks should be ashamed; but it defeated the purpose, if the shame meant that eggs were getting left on the side of the road, or out in the wilderness unwatched. ”So, it’s super easy to give those guys a safe future, even if you change your mind about raising them.” She gave Emily an understanding look. Or, she tried to, but it probably looked more pleading than anything else. |
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Post by Clover on Aug 19, 2017 2:36:04 GMT
Despite herself, Rosalind's enthusiasm brought out a proud smile--a rare thing for Emily Bennett. "I'm not sure how good it is for the eggs, to be honest," Emily said sheepishly. "I've never done this before. I don't even have a starter pokemon yet." She had an appointment the following day to change that bit, though. And even though she had no idea how old eggs were or how long they took to hatch, she suspected it would take longer than twenty four hours. "There's no time like the present to learn, though, I s'pose?"Her proud smile faded as Rosalind kept talking. "Every pokemon center?" Surely that was a mistake. "But if it's really that easy..." She looked at the eggs in her arms with some mixture of pity (for the abandoned eggs) and fury (for the people who abandoned them, if Rosalind's guess was correct). "I can't believe there would be so many abandoned eggs. I mean, they're living things. Surely it's not THAT hard to take five minutes and walk to a random pokemon center?"Rage wasn't an emotion Emily felt very often, unless it was directed internally, but this was a special case. It only took a few moments for her to realize how close she had come to full on ranting. When the revelation hit her, the sheepishness returned at full force. "S-sorry. I shouldn't get so worked up about this, it's just...I didn't realize this was a common thing. It's heartbreaking." She frowned and ran her thumb along the base of the yellow and brown striped egg. After collecting herself, she finally looked back over at Rosalind and Nova. "Thank you for your help, by the way. I appreciate it."WORDS ► 286
NOTES ► @truffle, egg thread for plusle (1/3) and sunkern (1/1). +5 ruby gems (20), and finally fixed the shitty phone post =) |
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Post by Deleted on Aug 19, 2017 3:10:37 GMT
Rosalind stifled a giggle at Emily’s self-depreciating little joke. Even if it hadn’t been meant as a joke, it was delivered with perfect deadpan timing. But anyway, she was just happy that Emily was looking a little more confident; she was even grinning now, which was quite a change from the shrinking violet routine she’d been doing up until that point. ”Totally! Even old dogs like us can learn a new thing or two,” she joked with a wink. She hadn’t really expected the girl to react so…well, so much to the whole egg-abandonment thing. The look of only partially-concealed rage on her face echoed the same sensation Rosalind felt every time she thought about this kind of stuff. She wasn’t used to people caring as much as she did. Gratitude bloomed in her chest, and she eyed Emily with fresh interest, watching the thought process flash over her face as she realized just how ridiculous this widespread neglect really was. When Emily tried to apologize for her emotion, Rosalind waved it off with bemused chuckle. ”Girl, don’t apologize for that. It’s stupid and horrible what some people do, and it’s good to be angry about it.” A fierce look flashed over her face. ”Anger moves us to change things.” Nova trilled her agreement, looking just as agitated as her trainer. Rosalind took a deep breath, and forced herself to put all that on the back burner. She kind of had a job to do right now, after all. Althea wouldn’t thank her if she spent the whole day ranting about ethics. ”But anyway, yeah, no problem! I hope that helped. I really wouldn’t worry about doing it wrong. Even someone who’s never cared for eggs before is way better than no-one at all. You’ll do fine.” Realizing something, she moved to fish her phone out of her pocket. ”Actually, um, do you want to trade numbers? I mean, just in case you need someone to talk to about eggs…or about people being terrible…?” She asked hesitantly. Suddenly, Rosalind was she sheepish one. WORDS: 343 TAGS: CloverNOTES: np!! |
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Post by Clover on Aug 20, 2017 14:02:22 GMT
Rosalind waved away her apology and it made her grin. "Sorry for being sorry, then." Granted, Emily'd never heard of the mass egg abandonment from anyone else and aside from the two eggs in her arms, she'd never seen any indication of it. Despite all that, she saw no reason to distrust Rosalind. "Changing things would be lovely," she agreed. "I'm not sure how, but there's gotta be something." No immediate solutions came to mind. The obvious solutions--adoption centers and free, widely accessible surrender points--had, it seemed, already been implemented. And it had already failed. (Her second thought was to ban the sale of eggs entirely. History proved how well prohibition worked--and it didn't work at all.) They weren't on a time crunch for a solution, though. Rosalind's offer to exchange numbers pushed out all thoughts of the egg abandonment issue. "Definitely!" This girl seemed to know her stuff. If anything went wrong, having her be a text away sounded wonderful. The second bit ( or about people being terrible) threw her off. That sounded... almost like a friends thing. Emily had gone through four years of undergrad and never made a single friend. She had people to form study groups with, and people to do projects or research with, yes. But no friends. No one to rant with or... whatever else it was that friends did. Send snapchats of their pokemon in filters, or whatever the youths of the day were doing? Something like that? She'd been in Inset less than a week and already had a maybe-friend. What progress! Rather than obsess about it too much, Emily cleared her throat. "It's Emily Bennett--two n's, two t's." She rattled off her number and adjusted her grip on the yellow-and-red-splotched egg. "And you can text me, I s'pose? Hopefully I won't need help with anything but I'll let you know when these guys hatch." Or if they hatch, the pessimist in her thought. Luckily, she had the sense to keep that one to herself. WORDS ► 336
NOTES ► @truffle, egg thread for plusle (1/3) and sunkern (1/1). +5 ruby gems (25) |
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Post by Deleted on Aug 21, 2017 21:54:45 GMT
Rosalind may have just converted someone to her cause of pokemon rights. It felt a little bizarre, almost unthinkable, but Emily was clearly agreeing with her that something had to change. It made her feel all warm and cozy on the inside, like she'd just drunk a mug of cocoa. (Except, eww, it was too hot outside for cocoa right now.) Emily would probably be able to see the pure elation on the girl's face, but Rosalind wasn't about to make a huge deal of it. Play it cool. Instead, she beamed when Emily accepted the offer of exchanging numbers, and pulled up her contacts, carefully typing in the other girl's info. By the time she finished talking, Rosalind had already shot off a text ("hey girl this is Rosalind <3") and pocketed her phone again. "Yeah, you'll have to send me pictures! I've seen a lot of baby pokemon, and every single one of them was adorable," she said, eyes sparkling in expectation of cute baby pictures. "And it'll be exciting to find out what kind of pokemon they are! There's something kind of fun about the mystery." Rosalind could say this because it wasn't her dealing with the mystery. If she'd been in Emily's place she would have been a nervous wreck, trying to prepare for a baby's needs without knowing anything about what those needs would be. But she definitely wasn't going to say that to Emily; better to keep it positive. With that said, she patted her purse, the gems inside clinking together. "Okay, I should probably get back to work. But it was great meeting you, Emily! Don't forget to text!" With one final smile and a wave, she continued further down the path, a notable bounce in her step. If that conversation was the best thing that happened to her today, Rosalind would be perfectly content. WORDS: 317 TAGS: CloverNOTES: This was a lot of fun, thank you!! |
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