ROCKET BATTLE LOG

[indigo_league]

As the clock nears 10 PM on Saturday, the manor (or the parts of it that people aren’t blocked off from, anyway) is completely abuzz with speculation and gossip. What could Lance possibly be planning to announce? And why haven’t any of the Elite Four even been around? They’re fairly reclusive, but it’s safe to say that everyone is at least a little curious, if not actively suspicious.

But it’s time for the big reveal, so manor staff are bustling around, reminding everybody to be in the ballroom in a few minutes for Lance’s important unveiling of… well, whatever it is he’s unveiling! The staff all seem pretty excited, so it must be big, right?

There’s been plenty of room to dance and move around in the Ballroom until now, but with everybody packed in there at once, the space is a little tighter. Especially with the small stage and podium set up in the middle. As the last (or seemingly last, assuming there aren’t any carefree stragglers who didn’t bother turning up on time) person is ushered in by staff, complete with whispers of "Psst! Hurry up, it’s almost time!", the door to the ballroom is shut and the lights dim slightly, sending a hush over the audience.

After some fumbling from whoever’s in charge of the lights (... wait, is that Captain Garfield and his Rattata up there? He’s a theater tech too?! That guy must REALLY be a jack of all trades!), a spotlight flips on and centers on the podium, where the head staffer (who might be recognized as the one with the terrible hipster mustache who’s been doing a PARTICULARLY egregious amount of schmoozing and sucking-up to trainers over the course of the party) is stepping up to the podium.

He clears his throat.

"Welcome, welcome, ladies and gentlemen! On behalf of the Elite Four, we’re all so happy you could join us! We hope you’ve all been having as good a time as we have, because I’ve got to say, I think this is our best party yet!"

He looks around at the assembled trainers eagerly, as though anticipating unanimous agreement.

When there’s an impatient buzz (and a shout of "Get on with it already!" from someone) instead, he laughs awkwardly.

"Oh, yes, well, we’re all here for one reason, right? To see what Lance has brought you all here for! Well, folks, as you can see, he’s not here with us right now… He’s had a bit of a-- how shall we say… an accident! So sad, I know! But fortunately, he’s graciously allowing us to make his announcement for him. Which is…"

On cue, the spotlight turns stark red. If anyone has the presence of mind to look, Captain Garfield's Rattata is holding a bit of red plastic filter in front of it.

But chances are, everyone’s attention is probably going to stay on the stage, because the guy at the podium literally just RIPPED HIS CLOTHING OFF DRAMATICALLY, revealing… yes… a very, very familiar black-and-red uniform underneath.

It’s followed immediately by more ripping sounds as other staff and even some partygoers scattered throughout the audience follow his lead, and the telltale noises and flashing of Pokemon being released from their balls. And many voices, all yelling at once...

"PREPARE FOR TROUBLE! AND MAKE IT DOUBLE!!"

The music shifts.

OOC Notes: The number of characters who must participate in the battle to call it a success is 37! In order to keep track, once you have made your first comment to this post (either a toplevel or a tag to someone else!), please bring it to the CHECK IN THREAD by 10 PM EST tomorrow! YOUR COMMENT MUST BE POSTED TO THIS THREAD IN ORDER FOR IT TO COUNT TOWARDS THE TOTAL.

GUESS WHAT GUYS?

glittertextmaker.info

OOC notes: Here it is, the part where your characters get to explore the Rocket Base and discover its secrets! Maps of each level will be posted in this top post as they are opened up, with blacked out sections being revealed as obstacles are cleared. Obstacle clearing will be based on total comment count to any mod comment with a count listed, whether those comments are contained in a single thread or spread out over multiple different ones. As many people can comment to an obstacle or base level as wish to, for as long as they want, even after it has been cleared. There are a total of two obstacles (including the first one) which are triggered by character actions we will be watching for!

Anyone who wants to thread anything out in the base or mansion during the time characters are trapped (and who doesn't want to use this log for whatever reason) is free to make their own network/action posts with whatever they like! But mods will not be coming around to those with interaction, and they will not count towards clearing obstacles.

Questions? Ask them HERE!

NOTE FOR ITEM RNG: In order for the mods to give out your item, your character must be actively looking through the loot piles in whatever tag you'd like us to respond to with your item! Items can also be given out in the middle of an existing thread between characters, whenever they get around to searching the piles! The header does not have to be in your toplevel.

Links List

Level One



OBSTACLE - KEY CARD (CLEARED)

OBSTACLE - CONVEYOR BELT HELL (CLEARED)

Level Two



Level Three



ELITE 4 JAIL

OBSTACLE - FREE THE LEGENDARY

Comments

SECRET BASE LEVEL ONE

[indigo_league]

[The dust hasn’t quite settled yet, but it’s clear there’s been a shift in the battle - Rocket Grunts scramble to retreat in the wake of the prom-goers and their mighty Pokemon, and in their haste, the strange, newish door where a basement entrance would be has been left wide open.

Descend the stairs, and you’ll find yourselves in a room that feels like it should be much bigger than it is. The floor tiles have been laid down neatly, and a small room to the left has an ajar door. Piles of pilfered loot - trophies, rare books, tasteful paintings, many of which attendees of past proms might recognize as having once adorned the halls and rooms above - have been left in disarray before a very hastily constructed and shitty dividing wall. That too has a door, a decidedly mechanical one with a card key slot beside it, and beyond it you can hear the distinct, yet faint whirring of mechanics. Something’s on the other side for sure, but until you can get that door open, all you can do is guess.

Hm...knowing Team Rocket, it might be worthwhile to take a look around to see if a Grunt might have left a spare card key around in case theirs was lost.]

[The small room with the ajar door is surprisingly untouched, as rooms in ransacked mansions go. A plush carpet of purplish blue and a Welcome mat embroidered with Dratini welcomes you in. There’s photos on the walls of Lance posing with his various Dragons, and candid pictures of other notable Dragon-Type trainers from across the regions with their teams. Doodles of Dragonites breathing fire and articles on legendary dragon spottings are pinned up on cork boards, and a table stands along the far wall covered in...scrapbook notions? Yep - stickers, patterned cardstock, tape with designs on it, all manner of markers and pens - everything you need to make some really choice scrapbooks lays out in a clutter along the table...save for one very obvious empty spot, just big enough for an open book to lay.

There’s also a pair of black shoes peeking out from underneath the table that scuffle back at the first sound of someone approaching the entrance. Uh...what?]

((OOC: While digging through the items, your character has the chance to pull out one special-fun item that the mods will determine through RNG. Some are cool, some are harmless, and one or two are sure to earn a laugh. What have you got to lose? If you would like a mod rolled item, have your character digging through the pile and put ITEM RNG in your subject line!))

[brokencode]

[What the heck, the scrapbook room is so cute? Really, she should be waiting for her friends to keep her safe but!!!! She's gonna rush over to those scrapbook notions and go through them. Maybe she can sneak one or two stickers home? She needs some kind of souvenir!]

[Yeah don't mind her, she's going to go through this stuff until she finds the cutest stickers of them all.]

[pipers_son]

[Angel the Human clearly has a bright idea, so Angel the Mime Jr bounces over to her, separating from Joker's side despite the clear danger (for a given idea of.... danger, it is Team Rocket) to stand on her tippy toes to see what Angel the Human is seeing.]

[So of course that means Joker has to come over, sighing fondly.]

Don't go botherin' the pretty lady now, Angel.

[fuelthefire]

[He'd lost track of her during the chaos of the attack, much like during the Bloody Harvest, but this time, he hadn't allowed himself to become distracted in his search for her. The moment he sees her, he rushes straight to her side, gentle fingers on her shoulder alerting her to his presence if his heavy footsteps hadn't already given him away.]

What's this?

[kissmyaspis]

Angel, wait.

[If you think, after all that chaos, Athena will just let Angel run off alone, you couldn't be more wrong! Of course, she doesn't stop Angel from checking the room out, nah, but she needs to alert her somehow. The hairs on the back of her neck are standing on end, and with one sweep of the room, Athena can point out exactly why. Those shoes...]

We're not the only ones in here.

[And she sure doesn't mean any of the other partygoers who may also be adventuring down into the secret base...]

Joker ota but also ITEM RNG pls and thank you

[pipers_son]

[Of course Joker has to trot down the stairs with his Pokemon all together. Of course he has to go stick his nose into the Elite Four's business. What kind of man do you think he is?]

[Half of his Pokemon he's pulled back into their balls again, just because there's really only so much room down here. The other half are Angel, who's small enough to cling to his leg, Invidia, who's shy enough to stay out of people's way, and....]

[Rogue the Furret.]

[If you step out of the ~scrapbook cave~, Joker will lazily call out a warning.]

Watch yer feet!

[And, just in time, Rogue goes blazing past. Did you trip over that long furry noodle of a Pokemon because of that? Well. Joker warned you. The man in question is standing serenely to the side, the eye of Hurricane Furret as said Furret goes blazing around from room to pile to whatever catches his interest. This thing is so excited, you don't even understand- there's nothing that isn't getting this Pokemon's attention, no pile left without his nose getting stuffed into it at least once.]

[He doesn't know what he's looking for, if anything specific at all, but he's looking for it.]

[indigo_league]

[Rogue's searching is going to uncover A CD titled Now That’s What I Call Pokemusic 27. Look at all these great hits!]

Let's do an ITEM RNG!

[bertall]

<sub>[After everything had started to settle, Marcel had taken off in a blur of orange and white after one of the grunts, leaving Bertolt to follow him. He couldn't lose him, okay? And having a gigantic dog roaming around unsupervised is probably a really bad idea.

At least once he catches up with him, it's just a matter of turning around and leaving, right?

...Well, after he looks at all of this nifty stuff down here. The trophies don't interest him as much (though he does glance at them a few times), the real target of his attention is the stack of books. If he's careful, it can't hurt to look through them for a few minutes!]</sub>

...Hey, Marcel, do you think there's anything in here we can use?

_{[Don't ask him, he's just a dog!]}

[indigo_league]

[Well, "anything we can use" is...relative. The first thing Bertolt uncovers reaching into the pile is a loose DVD that only has the word BIRTHDAY written on it. If taken and later played, it is just grainy, black and white footage of a Zubat slowly eating a birthday cake. There is no sound.]

ITEM RNG me, please!

[lordofthefries]

[Well, this is great. In the actual sense of the word. Sasha's still alive, her Deerling's still being the stubborn little Pokemon she's come to love, and she's found another one of her 104th boys in this place. So Sasha follows Bertolt following his giant dog not so much like a puppy but as someone she can team up with in case another Grunt feels froggy and wants to jump.

There aren't any Rockets hanging around in the base, so while Bertolt digs through the books, Sasha pushes a few trophies out of the way, looking behind them for anything she can use as a weapon for later. Just in case, really.]

But my name is Sasha, not Marcel. You know that.

[Oh, right, still being fresh on the scene, there's are still some trainer nuances Sasha's missed the explanation on. Maybe right now's not the best time to sit her down and go over trainer lessons with her.]

ITEM RNG

[a_sin_for_him]

[It certainly can't be said that this year's prom isn't exciting.]

[When was the last time Lust got to poke around a mysterious basement? Considering the Rocket Attack, this more than counts as mysterious. When the opportunity presents itself, she can't resist. Amoz still out and sticking close by, she heads downstairs. The door with the card slot catches her attention, but as there's nothing to be done about that...she turns her attention to the relatively tidy scrapbooking room.]

[Maybe there's some sort of clue or something, left about among everything else. It doesn't hurt to look through it...]

[She never can resist a mystery.]

[pipers_son]

[And while she's looking, Joker's lazy drawl comes from somewhere behind her.]

So can we expect this kind of scenario in the next radio show?

ITEM RNG

[dreamsofahero]

Well, this was certainly interesting. Sion couldn't help taking at least a brief look around the scrapbook room, of course, just in case this was his only chance to do it, but most his attention is on the main room.

And that seemingly poorly-built wall.

After sizing it up he glanced over at his absol and gallade.

"Do you think you could take it down without damaging whatever's on the other side?"

Because he'd really rather not accidentally cause something to explore in the basement of the place.

[tearsofademon]

Hey, Sion.

[...Why is Ryner offering you a smoke bomb while he's holding a bag of them and like six books with his other arm?

...Also note that he's not exactly expressing an opinion either way about your considerations of attacking the wall...]

ITEM RNG, sure why not

[tearsofademon]

[Of course Ryner is going to follow everyone down to the basement. Even aside from that being the most likely place for some kind of answers, he's still bitter about the library dammit.

Which is why when he comes downstairs, while he does quickly check out the scrapbook room and end up snapping some photos of the articles with his 'gear so he can peruse them later (off-center and a little crooked, but legible), the main thing he's drawn to is the cluttered piles in the main room. Specifically, the books scattered throughout.]

Goddammit, you could at least have the decency to treat the books properly...

[Yes, that's his priority. Someone else can take care of the door, okay.

So Ryner's going to spend some time digging through the piles and getting the books out, straightened out, and stacked into a pile that he can take back upstairs later when things calm down, Team Rocket's kicked out, and he can bring them back to the library. The books deserve better than being thrown haphazardly everywhere.]

ITEM RNG, please!

[yoyoboy]

[A scrapbook room and stickers? Well, this is turning out a weird day for Tony. While he is still angry about the prom being a sham for these 'Team Rocket' thugs to steal their Pokemon, he doubts that they were more than ordinary robbers as this is too complex for anyone to make a fake Pokemon prom like this.

Right now, he's looking around the room not only in boredom but also cautious at the fact he might get ambushed by those people in tacky uniforms once more while his Pokemon helps him on investigation.]

Item RNG, please

[schachmeister]

[Armin had carefully descended the stairs to the basement level, slightly hampered in his ways by an incineroar intent on sticking close to his back. Quite frankly, Magellan looks this close to crawling down the back of Armin's shirt.

Upon entering the room, Armin had first moved to study the wall. It didn't look too sturdy, and he wondered if it could simply be taken down by a sufficiently powerful pokemon. He can hear the soft whirring of machinery on the other side though and see the card key slot. He'd rather not damage what might be on the other side if he can help it, so perhaps it is best to attempt the proper way through. Poke-rampage can still be an acceptable back-up plan.

Armin gives the small side-room a short glance through, before deciding to first start with the detritus left in the room with the wall. And for once, he's doing nothing with the books except quickly flicking through the pages to check if there might be a keycard inside before carefully setting them aside on a pile. His movements, as he sorts through the junk, are a little jerky, not entirely calm. That might have something to do with the fact that he looks like he got punched in the face. One of his eyes is nearly shut, the skin already rapidly purpling and swelling. It looks painful. It is painful, and Armin winces when his incineroar tries to fussily scrape his tongue over the wounded side of his face.]

I know you mean well, but please don't.

[The very observant might note that though there are six spots for pokeballs on Armin's belt, only five are present.]

OBSTACLE - KEY CARD (10 comments to clear)

[indigo_league]

[Having been discovered red-handed, the Grunt grabs the overstuffed scrapbook he’d been flipping through and, clutching it to his chest, makes a break for the mechanical door. Before a single person can get a hand on him, he’s clicked his card key through the slot and shoved himself through the door, the key flying out of his hands and into a pile of loot in his haste to escape. The closes too quick for you to follow him through, but...at least if you go digging, you’re likely to find that key! As well as a number of other cool things, but let’s be real. It’s the key you want.]

OBSTACLE - CONVEYOR BELT HELL (20 comments to clear)

[indigo_league]

[With a click, the card key registers in the slot, and the mechanical door opens. This time, it’ll stay open long enough for you to enter...and it might be smart to leave it behind for anyone else who wants to join you, because guess where you are now?

That’s right. CONVEYOR BELT HELL. The belts criss-cross and redirect in all sorts of ways, and the gaps of safe floor are too far apart for you to just pick your way across. Some belts look like they’re moving at a Shellos’ pace, while others zip and spin you around so fast that you’re sent across the room before you can blink, and gosh, there seems to be a lot of loose change collecting at the ends...and a random wallet picture of a Growlithe...and old peppermints in plastic...basically the detritus of pockets tends to collect here, while a constant announcement drones on: “No running, please. No running, please…”

There is a warp pad just visible in the furthest right corner, and that looks to be the only exit. That Rocket sure is booking his way towards it, after all.]

ITEM RNG!

[bent_the_world]

[Korra's not about to let those Rocket bastards get away with this. She's a little behind in getting down to the basement area, taking time to heal up her Pokemon before anything else. But then she's down the stairs, taking a moment to inspect the piles of stuff that had been left around. Did the grunts have to make a mess, too? Bad guys were bad enough, but it seemed like they always had to be rude on top of it. People have to clean all of this up!]

[She hopes nothing's broken...well, there's plenty of people, she can take a minute to make sure nothing's damaged before heading further into the secret area. Maybe make sure anything delicate is out of danger of being stepped on or crushed by something heavier.]

OTA - ITEM RNG

[cyan_maid]

[Jane had been a bit distracted with pushing through Grunts upstairs, checking on friends in the battle, that when she finds her way toward the mysterious open door, it's after the card key's been found - but no matter. Dinah and Dart trailing after her, she frowns and tsks at the piles of items strewn about.]

What in the world...

[Jane begins searching through one of the item piles while Dinah drags Dart into the scrapbook room. There's probably not anything to be found in the latter, but if you want to be decorated with stickers by an Audino, now's your chance.]

Item RNG!

[thenightsky]

[A scrapbooking room.

What..the hell.

Noctis really wants to know about the person that this room clearly belongs to because man do they seem like a bit of a weirdo.

In the meantime, he's going to dig through things to see if he can find anything worthwhile clue wise, his Lycanroc helping the process along.]

item RNG?

[charcoalfeather]

[Oh no, you're not getting away that easy! They've got some things to day to you!

But what the heck, Rakka doesn't know too much about machinery, that was Kana's division. She'll be checking out that scrapbooking room everyone seems to be going in and out of. Gotta travel with the group!! Especially with dangerous mafia types about!

In any case, she's heading in, Espurr in tow. No sooner does she enter that the both of them head over to one of the more colorful piles. This is... exciting! But while Bright just... straight up dives into it, Rakka's going to sift through it carefully.]

What could be in here...

[She honestly hasn't a clue.]

five years late to the ITEM RNG

[purramedic]

[Anders has priorities, like trying to find the key with minimal distraction, unlike some notorious looters he could mention but will refrain from doing for the sake of his remaining threads of happiness.

And Sly, who also has someone else's skewed priorities. Arceus' sake, Trainer, you didn't learn in six years that the real friend you made along the way was loot? This Meowth will gladly skitter off to the pile o goodies while Anders is distracted and rummage through for something nice.

His definition of "nice" may be unconventional.]

Item RNG~

[notmyrealname]

[With the help of her Furfrou and Vulpix, Cissnei is going to go through as much stuff as she can, looking for anything of interest in this whole mess.

...Well, Cissnei and her Furfrou will be actively looking.

Reno's just sort of pulling things out and playing with them before getting distracted by something else.]