bottlecaplogs | Noelle's September Quest Ho-ho-home [Catch-All]

[ Once upon a time, Archnemon might have scoffed at having to do tasks like this, though usually she wouldn't have had a choice in the matter. Odder still, to make the choice willingly to do so. Anyone could do these...? But something about the very nature of survival being at the heart of it and the need to keep busy is very compelling. And something nice to do away from a recent clinic stay. Ugh.

In any case, having a chance to partner off with a ... pupil? Mentee? ... She has no idea how to quantify this, she doesn't know how this sort of thing keeps happening here, but it seems like a good opportunity. Regrettably, she's not as fast, but it's easier for her to move once they're further away from the larger grouping of Pokemon in the town.

Nervous, happy energy? Well, at least it's pep enough to work with. ]

Well, quite busy, though I do try to be! I hope your training has been going well. Who expected this little town would grow up so quickly?

[ And even more amusing that somehow this choice won, perhaps especially so for how people react saying it or avoid it. Good job Noelle for trying even though it hurts. ]

Oh! Me too, haha. Keeping busy helped me feel a little more normal about... all this. [She doesn't think she needs to elaborate on 'all this'-- being turned into a Pokemon, among all the other oddities that have been happening.] I did some quests last month, just like you said! And I started helping out in the clinic a little, and I also trained a bit with a new friend. [Her and Ren have tentative plans to start going on runs together, too, once she's sure that he's feeling well enough.

She misses her old friends and her home dearly, though. But... she tries to just not think about it.]

Um... [Now she realizes that she was rambling, and might even sound like she was bragging a little.] So it's been kind of nice.

[Noelle also avoids asking direct questions, recognizing that Hatenna seems to be a bit private. The unspoken invitation is there for Hatenna to talk about her own experiences if she wants, or to keep the focus on Noelle.]

Oh my, you've really been stepping up! Told you, that you could do it.

[ Archnemon certainly can sense the slight dip in the emotions, and winces only slightly, as she can tell that the happy feelings were definitely covering something else (longing, loneliness), but the comfortable thing about being in Noelle's aura was that positive reinforcement seemed to work around her to help even it out enough for her to not crash out immediately around her.

Stranger for her to feel genuine about it, too, instead of just using for this benefit, and it surprises her that it does... but maybe that was the benefit of being in such a strange world when priorities change and one has to live with the side effects of empathy headaches...? Still, she can't help herself - she usually mirrors others rather than opening up. ]

But, what do you do to relax? I admit, I've been at a loss for hobbies myself...

It's tricky when you get put in a whole new body, haha... I've started running again with Ren! One of my guildmates, I mean. I'm getting better at running on all fours now! I'm still trying to read, but it's hard to turn pages without fingers. At least there's some tablets that don't require that at all.

[... Man, she misses video games, though. And she never thought she'd say this, but she misses the normalcy of school and its schedule and everything. She honestly doesn't know what to do if she's not being useful to someone.

Noelle turns her attention back to Hatenna. Running might be hard for someone with no visible legs, and she probably would have the same problem when it comes to reading.]

... I think you could be a good singer. I used to sing in my church choir, and you have a nice voice, I think. I could sing with you! [Mostly she knows hymnals or Christmas carols, though.]

It's definitely tricky.

[ It's easier to talk about other people's hobbies and considerations more than her own, when so much had to go to the wayside when work became the only priority.

Still, no one was really setting those priorities anymore, as much as she was still filling her time with "work". Hm. Was this really a genuine act of consideration? It was such a strange thing. Something she might be more inclined to dismiss, if she hadn't gone and encouraged it to begin with. Why were people nice to her here, anyway...? Weird! Right then. ]

Oh, do you really? I used to play flute, but I've never sung around other people before. At least where anyone else was supposed to hear me...

[ A short quick laugh. It's not something she - thinks about. If she might have, if she wanted to - none of that was relevant, before. She can think of one person who might have encouraged it, and another who might have forbid it if it were too much a distraction. No more car radio, after all. ]

So, if you would like me to sing with you, you just might have to teach me a few songs, Noelle-chan.

[Flute is nice... Noelle wonders if they have instruments here, too. They must, right? It might be hard for Hatenna to play it the way she is now, but still.]

Oh! Well... I can do my best! Do you like carols? Christmas is right around the corner, you know!

[It's September.]

[ ... Well for her, Christmas was... she looks distracted for a moment. ]

Hm?

[ Wait no, she knows time is different here, along with her own issues with it recently. Though it's also associated with a thought path she'd been particularly avoiding, so she shakes herself out of it. How did this end up so focused on her anyway... she'd need to look for an opportunity to divert when she could. ]

Oh, I've taught myself to play some of them before, if that counts...

[ That is, following along with Ode to Joy was dramatic enough for someone who had Bach's Toccata and Fugue as their ring tone... ]

If it puts you in the spirit, I think it counts! [She hums a little. ... Did Kris ever play that one? She can't remember.

She feels deeply nostalgic, thinking about the little piano concerts they would put on.]

... Anyway, that would be fun! I hope you can find a way to relax! [It would be hypocritical to get too preachy about overdoing it, but...]

Is that so...

[ Even if the consideration of "holiday spirit" is something of an elusive one. Being aware of customs and actually practicing them are different things entirely--

But sometimes the consideration that this is a "different" place helps. That things don't have to be exactly as they were, either... ]

Well, if we wanted to really relax, this place could use a spa like area. It seems like there could be many natural ways to make one, so hopefully it'll come around eventually.

A spa would be awesome!! I've never been to a spa before... [She imagines herself and Hatenna, sitting in lounge chairs with cucumbers over their eyes.] Maybe there's a hot spring or something already. There's a volcano, right? [She's never been to a hot spring, either... actually, the more time she spends here, the more she realizes how sheltered she was.]

Tch... I've been there. Unfortunately, the hot springs we found there are more likely to kill you instead. Probably.

[ She hasn't given up on the hope of finding a nice natural springs tucked away somewhere, but she's still got the memory of the burns from just being near the geysers. Ugh. ]

[Oh.]

... maybe not! Still, um... a spa would be... nice?

It would be! Just a little music, nice warm water, a good masseuse and only calm, peaceful thoughts.

[ Workaholics have to have some kind of indulgence. Or at least wistful aspirations. Oh, is this the field they were supposed to work in? Right, better get properly started on that... ]

Even just a nice car ride would be nice. Not that it's the same like this...

[ Hitching a ride with other Pokémon isn't quite the same. ]

[Noelle works quietly with her for a while, daydreaming about the spa. Hatenna doesn't seem like the type to dwell on the past, not even using whatever her name might have been before... but she imagines her as a metropolitan woman who worked a nice job. In her spare time, she would play the flute, and maybe drive a nice car to the spa...

... it reminds her of some of the dreams she had about what her future might be like. She never could have predicted this, though.]

... Do you miss home, Miss Hatenna?

Hm?

[ She'd been a little caught up in her peaceful thoughts. Usually she didn't care for tedious work, but she'd chosen this, it was different, certainly more calming than just being in the more emotionally dense areas.

What was "home", truly. Even in this place, where everyone had a place to return to in some way once the guild adopted them, was any of that truly "home" or was "home" always supposed to mean where one came from... it should have been a predicted question, that someone might ask her this, but she hadn't been prepared. ]

Oh, I -- guess so? I try not to think of that, so much...

[ Aside from. What she's pointedly avoiding thinking about, as she doesn't even know if she could get back there at all, and difficult enough to try and spin on that smoothly -- Still, if Noelle was asking her, then clearly that's an opening... ]

Though your own must be on your mind... you've probably never been away for this long, before.

[A wave of anxiety, homesickness, and longing washes over her-- but Noelle follows it with resolve. Maybe she'll never go home again. Maybe she'll never see any of them again. But there has to be a reason she was brought here.]

You're right... I've never been away for this long. I wonder how everyone back there is doing... do you think they're looking for me, too? [She doesn't explain the 'too' part.]

I... know people are working on finding a way to go back. But I don't know if it's actually possible.

[ It would be so much easier to respond with a cheery sounding "Who knows!". Were it a different situation, the two of them might not even be meeting like this, having a conversation over work. Or anything else, for that matter.

(There might be one person who'd miss her, but she doesn't - know about that. Doesn't want to Consider that. She's Here, in a new situation. Working on a way of getting back - that wasn't on her radar, not when she doesn't even know what That would be.)

Noelle was - likely a teenager by some standards? She'd observed enough of them, certainly heard woes before. ]

If time works the same here than it did there, then they would likely be aware of it, no? If you have a good relationship, then surely they would be concerned for you as well...

[ But with the amount of worlds and dimensions involved... hard to know. Hard to say. Don't worry about it? ... Constructively, how to do this. ]

... Not to complicate it another way, but there's also a chance, that time here might not be in sync with back there. So it could be that very little at all had passed, too.

That might mean I'm older than everyone else in class when I go back, haha.

[Noelle isn't sure what else to say. Hatenna sure is private... but maybe she's just focused on looking forward. And it's very kind of her to listen to Noelle so much and advise her again, just like before.]

Well, either way, I'm glad we met.

... Oh? I am as well.

[ She's slightly surprised by the sentiment. It shouldn't have been surprising to hear from someone like Noelle- but wasn't often something she'd heard from others, either. Especially not after being so... discarded. ]

Just think, you'll be able to have lots of stories for them, won't you?

A-and I bet you will also! [She's assuming that Hatenna will want to return home as well. Why wouldn't anyone, she thinks?]

... Who knows~?

[ There, she said it, in a light sort of enigmatic way.

She's not certain of the possibility and what it would mean if she could - but she was not the best at relating those sort of concerns. Easy to see them in others, the more inclined to bury... ah, well. ]

Now, we have some more work to do, don't we? Get enough of that done, maybe you'll be able to teach me some of your songs, later.

Noelle's September Quest Ho-ho-home [Catch-All]

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would you like to wrap this one soon?

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