From: "Rob" <robfrompw@yahoo.com> Subject: [PW!] [SST] Strangely Unsatisfying Date: Thursday, January 29, 2004 6:44 AM Adrian Tymes wrote: >> After over a minute of sitting in silence, Dee asks, "Well... do >> you?" >> >> Marcia glances back at Dee to say, "You haven't seen me try to kill >> you lately, have you?" She then turns her attention back to the >> potions. > > "...yes I have." > > Marcia does not glance back this time. "What did I say about liars?" > > "There are many ways to kill. Not all of them directly damage the > body. Tell me, in your years as Minax, did you ever try to kill a > ghost pokemon?" > > "..." > > "Well?" > > "Yes. Of course I did." > > "And how did you do it?" > > "I attacked its will to live. Once I convinced it its purpose in life > was hopeless, it disintegrated. But you can't honestly expect me to > believe-" > > #If we see each other again, it will probably not be as ourselves. If > I am to survive, this must be goodbye.# > > "...Dee?" She turns around, but she is now alone in the room. Marcia stands in silence for a moment, thinking about the message that was just sent to her mind. Stunned by the sudden turn of events, she asks, "Could it be? Have I finally gotten my wish? After all these years?" She thinks back to what she did and said the first time Doppler formally introduced himself to her many years ago... *** Flashback *** Minax continues her brisk jog westward, angry that Doppler finds it cute to eat guns. She doesn't get too far before a Rapidash jumps in front of her, blocking her path. Minax rolls her eyes, "You again?" "Think about it." Doppler melts back into a copy of Minax, "You can be my apprentice. Your anger is unfocused. You are capable of much more than killing cute little Pokemon." Minax tosses 'Minax' aside and continues walking, mumbling to herself, "Note to myself: Find a way to kill Ditto." The persistent Doppler mutates into an Electrode and rolls at full speed towards Minax, knocking her to the ground. He reforms himself into Minax one more time and holds the real Minax on the ground. "Submit to me." "No! Get the hell away from me, Pokemon!" Minax struggles to knock Doppler away, but finds it difficult. She grabs her long skinning knife and slashes 'Minax's' head off... She sees a copy of her own head roll onto the grass. It continues to speak and the shapely headless body continues to pin her to the ground. The decapitated Minax head says, "You can't defeat me, no matter how much you try. Join me. We would be unstoppable." The real Minax continues to hack away at the fake Minax's body with her long skinning knife until all of her fake body parts lie scattered on the ground. She stands up and points the skinning knife at the living red-haired head on the ground, "Leave me alone. You're pure evil. I can't have fun in a world where everyone suffers. I shall find a way to kill a Ditto, so I suggest you scram." Minax continues to jog until she reaches Saffron City. Once there, she looks around, doesn't see any suspicious characters, and sighs, "Whew. I just hope his tiny little Pokemon mind can figure out that I don't want anything to do with him." *** End of Flashback *** "And now... he FINALLY got the message? He finally realized that I'm not going to fall in love with him? He finally decided to leave me alone?" Marcia sits down on the bed where Dee was sitting a moment ago, "I should feel so happy right now... so relieved... but I just feel empty inside. I wanted him to leave me alone, but I didn't want to devastate him like that. Not anymore, now that he's changed for the better. Not after all the nice things he's done for me and so many others." Marcia knows that when Dee doesn't want to be found, searching for him using conventional methods won't yield results. Taking a shot that's really long considering she's not a psychic, Marcia thinks loudly, #Dee, if you can hear me, I'm sorry if something I said or did recently crushed your will to live. That wasn't my intention.# Hearing no response, neither in her mind nor out loud, Marcia looks down and sighs. "I hope he doesn't do anything drastic... but knowing Dee..." She shakes her head. Before she can dwell on what Dee might do, someone knocks on the open door to the Pokemon Center. "Come in," Marcia says, turning her attention to the door. For the first time in her life, she actually hopes that her visitor is Dee. However, the person who walks in through the door is a tall, green-eyed, black-haired young man named John Scriebb. He's holding a standard Pokeball in one hand and a makeshift blue Pokeball in the other, "Hi, nurse, I'm looking to get my two Pokemon healed." "No problem," Nurse Marcia brushes strands of blue hair out of her face with her fingers as she stands up, trying to get Dee out of her mind to focus on her job. John hands her the two Pokeballs and she places them into the Heal-O-Matic machine in the room. She pushes the "HEAL" button. Bleep, bloop, bleep, bloo- CLANG! "Huh?" Nurse Marcia hadn't heard any of the healing machines she'd encountered in her life make that particular noise. She leans down to read the LCD display on the machine, "Pokeball not recognized? Process aborted? That's odd..." Figuring the makeshift blue Pokeball is the one the machine couldn't recognize, she removes it from the device and presses the "HEAL" button once again. The machine doesn't respond. "Oh, great. Now it's broken!" Nurse Marcia kicks the Heal-O-Matic before pushing the button again, hoping that will make a difference. It doesn't. "Stupid machine! Work, damn you!" Nurse Marcia slams her fists onto the sides of the Heal-O-Matic, determined to beat it into submission. John watches in silence as the nurse mercilessly beats the Heal-O-Matic, a sweatdrop on his face. He wonders if all nurses in Hoenn are as violent towards machines as this one. "YAAARGH!" Nurse Marcia calls out in utter frustration before inflicting a final kick to the machine for good measure. Nurse Joy would always fix problems with the Heal-O-Matic at the Violet City Pokemon Center so she never bothered to learn how to fix one herself. She mutters, "I'm sure Dee could fix it." Not having heard what the nurse said, John asks, "What?" "Never mind." Nurse Marcia presses the palms of her hands against the top of the Heal-O-Matic, accepting defeat. John apologizes, "Sorry about what my Pokeball did to your machine." "Don't worry about it. You didn't know this would happen and neither did I." Nurse Marcia says, facing her visitor, a look of determination on her face, "I've decided to give up on the machine, but I'm not giving up on healing your Pokemon. I'm just going to heal them another way." She reaches down to her Pokeball belt and grabs the middle of the three Pokeballs attached to it. She drops it on the floor and a friendly Blissey appears, happy to have been set free. "Hi, Omelette. This..." She gestures around the room, "Is our new workplace. We're all set up!" "Bliss!" Omelette the Blissey comments as she gazes around the modestly sized room, satisfied with the setup, "Blissey bliss blissey bliss?" Nurse Marcia tells her Pokemon, "I want you to use Softboiled to heal two Pokemon for me. Can you do that for me?" "Sey!" Blissey answers, eager to use her favorite ability after having spent two days straight stuck in a Pokeball. Marcia pulls John's standard Pokeball off the tray on the Heal-O-Matic and releases Savage, John's Primeape. The Fighting Pokemon doesn't protest as Marcia's Blissey places her arms on his sides. Both Pokemon glow white as Omelette uses Softboiled to transfer some of her vast amount of energy to Savage in order to restore him to full health. Marcia recalls Savage into his Pokeball, glad that the process went so smoothly, then she pushes the button on John's makeshift blue Pokeball. The moment she sees the angry eyes of the Poliwhirl that emerges, Marcia realizes that this time, the process doesn't go quite as smoothly. Her hypothesis is proven accurate when the Poliwhirl Doubleslaps Omelette's arms away the moment she extends them towards him. Poliwhirl protests, holding up his fists, "Whirl poli, poliwhirl!" Seeing such a violent Poliwhirl, Marcia's reminded of the Poliwhirl she owned a long time ago who had the nasty habit of Doubleslapping her repeatedly. She decides the best way to deal with a Pokemon so eager to fight is to not fight him at all, so she says, "Omelette, Sing to him!" "Bliiiiisssey bliiiiiss, blii-iiisy bliiiiiss..." Omelette Sings a soft lullaby. The Poliwhirl's eyelids droop down as the Blissey's song continues until he finally falls to the floor, snoring. Once he's asleep, Blissey places her arms on him and uses Softboiled, restoring him to full health as well. Before the Poliwhirl can wake up, Nurse Marcia recalls him into the blue Pokeball with the word "Tidal" on it. She returns Savage's Pokeball and the Tidal Pokeball to John, "Here you go, good as new. By the time you release your Poliwhirl, he'll probably be awake and ready to fight." "Thanks," says John. Being a man of few words, that's all he says before heading out of the Pokemon Center and back towards the Main Deck to find Derek, the man who promised him a Pokemon battle. When John is gone, Nurse Marcia asks Omelette, "Hey, did you ever happen to see how Nurse Joy fixed the Heal-O-Matic one of the times it broke?" The Blissey shakes her head, "Blissey." "Oh well, it was worth a shot." Not counting on Dee's return, recalling the mental message he sent either just before or right after he Teleported away, Nurse Marcia rolls up the sleeves of her navy blue blouse and marches up to the Heal-O-Matic, determined to get it to work. -Marcia