The Summer 2020 Great Collab
Oct 7, 2020 23:17:19 GMT
Post by Cavespider_17 on Oct 7, 2020 23:17:19 GMT
Summary:
A group of us decided to do a collab mini-fic over the summer, with a given prompt. Each person would write a single part and once done we would have the final piece.
Prompt: Life of a Canalave Librarian During the Sinnoh Crisis (In Game Crisis)
DTMAHANEN
“What the hell is happening?”
“Arceus, all the windows are shattered!”
“We don’t get earthquakes, how did we get an earthquake?!”
“Everyone, please, let’s not panic!”
“What if it’s a legendary? Arceus, what if it’s a super powerful pokémon that’s just wreaking havoc?!”
“We’re all gonna die!!!!”
Yeah. That’s what’s going on at the Canalave Library right now. You’re probably wondering, how exactly did we get to this point? Why is it that, in a place of contemplation, learning, even some peace and quiet, devolve into such chaos?
Hi. My name’s Rose. It’s good to meet you. Come with me on this journey, if you like. It’s sure to be an interesting one.
This is the story of the day the bomb went off in Lake Valor.
MINTY
When Rose Sandberg left Unova, she told her family it was just for the league and then … just didn’t come back. Rose was all about that, really—keeping her head down, that is. Unlike her friends at school or, well, practically anyone who existed in that day and age, Rose never really wanted fame or glory. She wasn’t trying to be a pokémon master or the next top coordinator. She was just trying to be herself, and she wanted to figure out what that was as faraway from Unova as humanly possible.
Long story short, she figured it out eventually. It just took about ten years, college, and a master’s in library science to do it. Or, well, more accurately, ten years and college to figure out the biggest part. The master’s in library science was just a means of figuring out a few of the side details.
That isn’t so important to the story, really. The truth of the matter is that there are stories to Rose besides this. We could talk about the eight badges that are collecting dust in her sock drawer or the pointedly unevolved team members in her pocket right now. We could talk about the years it took getting a position in Canalave Library, the region’s hardest library to find employment in. We could talk about her procession of failed relationships, how she came to that quiet little port town, why she hasn’t made too many friends—a thousand different things that all have their very long and very detailed story, but these are not quite as important as that very moment, when the library shook and Rose looked up from the circulation desk.
It was really the bang of the bookshelves that did it. Oh, the building shook, sure, and that was alarming, double sure, but it took ages to keep those bookshelves perfectly straight, despite all the tourists and actual patrons pulling out books and putting them back out-of-order, and literally all of them from the far eastern wall back fell over like dominoes, spilling half the library’s contents all over the floor.
And Rose stood at the circulation desk, staring at the carnage for a few precious seconds before realizing that people were screaming.
DEXTER
Rose stood up in shock and with a flick of her arm she instinctively threw out a pokeball due to the people screaming and asking for help. Out came out a blue, sea shell-like clad otter. Its bronze eyes staring at Rose. Rose’s mouth felt dry as her oldest companion stared at her, its head moving swiftly to look at the screaming people and run towards them. She jumps out of the desk to run after the samurott, it was her responsibility after all? Her samurott pulled its sword out to shove the falling bookcases away from the people. “Odzy, Stand down!” Rose screamed, surprised by her own loudness while her samurott’s turns its’ head to face its’ trainer. She cringed as she remained silent and let her pokemon continue in its efforts in to save the people, it oddly respecting the library by trying to just move the bookshelves and not just slash at everything. Rose sulked at the fact she was being useless and only being a “librarian”, then an orange ball of plasma knocked her off her feet.
Marenol
She fell back, the very tip of her toes trying to keep herself balanced, but while trying to stand up, she wasn’t watching where she was going and bumped into a chair. Her head painfully collided with the floor, alarming the Samurott. The pokemon jerked its head towards her, instinctively pausing itself from safely evacuating everyone from the building.
Despite having no visible bruises, the fall really did hurt, and was made worse by the designer heels she wore.
Cavey
She felt her ankle pulsate within, and her heart started to race once more. The Samurott’s eyes narrowed in on her, before letting out a sigh of relief. She was more or less okay. Silence fell in the library, just how she usually liked it - but not this time. The screaming may have stopped but the silence that followed was far worse; a cold silence, one filled with pain, fear and panic. The glass from the windows was partially shattered into specs and flakes which now littered the floor. It was going to be hard to move without stepping on a piece, or placing her hand on some of the shards.
Crash!
One of the bookshelves toppled over.
Silence broke and the screaming started again. People started to bundle towards the door, pushing each other out of the way, like a Rampardos stampede Rose had only ever read about in the books that surrounded her.
Her head started to spin as the screaming echoed inside of her thoughts. She had nowhere to go to escape the noise. The screaming was too loud and the silence was just as toxic. The people were pushing on the door, desperate to escape.
Samurott pushed up from underneath her arm, lifting her up a little, as she stared at the library visitors picking up chairs, tables, desperately trying to smash open the door which had jammed, as the metal inside twisted. They looked foolish. With every desperate attempt to smash the door down they tired themselves. Those doors, and the windows were designed to withstand a Pokémon attack. Rose even noted that the window hadn’t shattered enough to allow safe passage through, although it was their best chance of getting out.
Whatever caused the earth to shake, windows to smash, doors to jam shut so tight was bad news.
m a g i c - m a n
Burnie knew that it’d be a weird day the moment he found a bonus Premier Ball in his cereal.
He knew it wasn’t the good kind when he accidentally tried to chew on it, not paying attention - and it enlarging in his mouth didn’t help matters.
In spite of this, though, Burnie had high hopes for this day. He was in town, seeing the sights - Sinnoh’s a hiker’s delight, after all! - and had stopped off in the beautiful coastal town of Canalave for a few days on his wonderful vacation.
In fact, he had been planning to check out the library that day. Apparently, there’s some real ancient stuff in there, and while Burnie wouldn’t exactly call himself a nerd, he was a big fan of Hystory Channel. He considered himself a bit of an ancient astronaut buff, personally, and what better place to learn about ancient aliens than at the Canalave Library?
As they say, faint two Pidgeys with one Rock Throw.
And now that he’d spent a little time at the library, he had to say, it did not disappoint. There’s all sorts of ancient knowledge hidden within those texts - ancient knowledge that he most definitely did not skim.
Not to mention, the place had some serious feng shui. It was really a nice building, especially on the upper floors. Rich Mahogany mahogany floorboards - prized export of Mahogany Town - yellow walls with some subtle Pokemon patterns present, portraying a Pikachu & Pichu playing together, and it all came together with some delightfully tasteful windows.
Or… well, they were tasteful windows
Unfortunately, the world had chosen that day of all days to go to the Distortion World in a handbasket. First there was a big, KA BOOMBAHHHH, which made Burnie go, “Huh!?” before falling out of his chair.
Then, there was the shock wave, with a big KRASHHHHHHH, as the windows - rather expensive ones, the owner of the library would later lament - all at once burst inwards, scattering sparkling shards of shimmering glass everywhere.
And then there was the screaming.
And, while the glass was certainly troublesome, and his buttocks did indeed feel quite sore, it was really the rapidly approaching mob of panicked library-goers that ended up dealing the most damage to the young hiker.
Once he had become well acquainted with the shoe-into-face infinite combo, and the mob all moved down stairs, he stood himself up. He quickly checked himself for all his essentials.
“Alright alright alright, let’s see, we got… uh, Marge, check. Uh… wallet, yup…”
Then, he briefly took a look around. Knocked over shelves, injured or unconscious peeps, fallen shelves, broken glass…
“Aw damnit, I knew I should’ve taken First-Aid,” Burnie says to himself.
Unfortunately, Burnie couldn’t really think of a way to help these people. While his trusty Magcargo was a wonderful girl, and certainly helpful, it didn’t seem like the best idea to have a Pokemon hotter than the surface of the sun move around some extremely wooden bookshelves.
With a frown and a shake of his head, the bruised and bemused Burnie made his way downstairs, only to find utter chaos below.
A huge crowd of people had globbed around the entrance to get out - though the congestion and the jammed-ness of the door made that a little bit difficult. The windows had all been fairly broken, but in big jagged chunks that weren’t ideal for climbing. More screaming, more crying, and more misfortune.
Luckily, though, it seemed as though some people were helping. Some were moving bookshelves, and it even seemed as though the librarian from earlier - Rose? - had called out her Pokemon to help some people out.
Burnie took a Pokeball out. Maybe Marge wouldn’t be the best bet, since floorboards are extremely wooden, but… well, he couldn’t just do nothing, right?
But what could he… ?
‘Wait.’
‘This isn’t just regular mahogany. This is Mahogany mahogany - the best kind there is! So it should be durable, right? Wait. Is that what that means? No no… but… ? Oh whatever, I’ll just walk up to the librarian and ask her!”
So, Burnie walked up to Rose.
“Hey, uh… you need some help? I got a Magcargo. Will that do anything for you?” he asked her.
Manic
“Apart from burn a hole in our carpet? Highly unlikely.” Rose spat before drawing a cleansing, calming breath tinged with the subtle sting of regret. This disaster was neither the young man’s fault nor his pokemon’s, and it was unseemly for her to behave in such a manner. “That is to say...no, thank you.” continued the librarian, slowly rising to her feet and surveying her surroundings with an inward cringe. The damage - both to her organizational system and to the library itself - would take days, perhaps even weeks to repair.
“Odzy, thank you for your help.” Rose enunciated in a calm, even tone. “Return.” One flash of light later, her starter pokemon and longtime friend was back in its pokeball, relaxing after complicated events it couldn’t hope to understand. In truth, Rose herself could scarcely comprehend what happened. One moment, her morning was composed of the daily chore of restoring literature to its proper location upon well-organized shelves, and the next...well, the next moment, absolute calamity had ensured that she would be restoring all of the books to their shelves instead.
Fortunately, she’d had no plans for the weekend.
Reaching until her purse for an item reserved for those rare occasions when quarreling trainers got too out-of-hand to listen to her, Rose retrieved a simple chrome object and pressed it to her lips, emitting a sharp, shrill whistle to pierce the noise. The sound was enough to turn the heads of many of the library’s occupants, and two more like it were enough to gather the attention of virtually all present.
“Attention, all library patrons.” Rose called out in a loud, clear tone. “There has been damage to the library. For the safety of all occupants, please proceed in an orderly fashion-” this she emphasized, the better to drive the point into the minds of the listeners “-to the exit located in the front of the library. This building is very sturdy and not in danger of immediate collapse, but you present a danger to each other if you panic.” One hand motioned sharply to Burnie as if to demonstrate the young man’s freshly-trampled condition.
A small, confident smile played over the woman’s lips. With the din silenced, she could barely hear a familiar Professor’s voice issuing firm commands to several experienced trainers she knew to be upstairs. If anyone could wrangle this situation and transform it from utter chaos into a semblance of order, Rowan would be the man for the job.
~0~ Juneedes ~0~
“What did you say?!” Barry yelled from downstairs.
Rowan sighed. They’re already having a day and this child…
Another sigh from behind him and a hurried “excuse me, professor”, then Dawn’s rushing down after her neighbor.
“This library is wooden, the place will burn down! I’ll fine you!”
“Uh…”
“Sir—”
“Barry!”
“What’s going on here?” Rowan interrupted before things could escalate further.
Barry was about to speak his mind but Dawn was quicker this time to tug him back into line and let the librarian answer instead.
“We’re trying to find a way out, professor,” Miss Sandberg explained. “He… suggested burning through the doors.”
The man in question flushed at being put on the spot, but ultimately stood by his suggestion. Good.
“If we can control the fire to stay right at the doors, we might have ourselves a way out,” Rowan agreed. It would be risky, but a fire-type would be best to plow through the thick enforced mahogany. Everyone was visibly and understandably shocked and in their silence, he continued.
“I’d tell my trainers to help”—and they certainly are ready to do so—“but they have a long battle ahead of them and I’d prefer they conserve their strength,” he admitted. “Will you help us?”
A tense silence followed as they pondered his proposal. One wrong move, and everything will literally go up in flames. The patron gulped a large breath; but doesn’t back out. He looked over Miss Sandberg for her second opinion on this dangerous endeavor.
She drew in a large, calming breath of her own.
“Well… I do have a Samurott.”