You have no chance to survive

[these_balls]

Who: Rocket Grunts, Magma Grunts, and Aqua Grunts! Basically all the Grunts!
Where: The Whirl Islands and Cinnabar Island
When: February 1st
Summary: Pretty much this
Rating: PG-13? It doesn't need to higher than that? Right, guys?
Log:

The orders are pretty simple. Go in. Wipe out the Team Aqua and Magma Grunts. That's it. So there's not going to be any farewell speeches or anything like that from the Admins because they're of the opinion that you guys have totally got this.

And if you don't...

Well, don't worry about that for now.

Instead, just worry about getting to the nearest base and boarding a helicopter. After that, you've got a short (or long, depending on which base you're heading to) ride ahead of you to some islands in the middle of the ocean, inhabited by a bunch of Aqua and Magma Grunts who have no idea this surprise is on the way. So just do what you do best, Rockets!

And as far as the Admins are concerned what you do best should be to win at all costs. Anything less and well, that would just be an embarrassing return to the region for them. And nobody wants that.


QUICK LINKS
EVENT INFO | QUESTIONS | PLOTTING POST

☆ HELICOPTER RIDE THREAD ☆ TEAM AQUA BASE THREAD ☆ TEAM MAGMA BASE THREAD ☆ AFTERMATH THREAD

Comments

[aufsassig]

"...You know what, I'll tell you what. You've been really decent, and I know a guy who can do stuff like this — how about I get one of you right here against the wall or something, and then I'll get my buddy to paste you into the picture? Like, right where I'm standing, you know, so it looks like you're there instead of me."

...This Grunt encounter has taken a turn...

DOES ANYONE KNOW WHO'S DRIVING THIS CAR BECAUSE APPARENTLY IT'S SCHULDIG AND THAT IS RARELY A GOOD OR SENSIBLE IDEA

"I'll send it to you, you can show your friends."

[whos_that]

There's a slightly skeptical look on the Grunt's face. He's not saying he can't do that, but he sort of doubts Schuldig's friend's ability to forge the photo that well. But at the same time, it's not every day someone offers him the chance to have a photo with him and Groudon on it.

And he probably shouldn't be this trusting of the Rocket, even if the guy is on Maxie's good side, and speaking of Maxie, if he ever found out about this, he'd probably banish this Grunt to somewhere completely awful, but he can't pass up this opportunity at all.

“Sounds great!”

He'll just head over to that wall right now.

“Like, this right?”

IT SURE LOOKS LIKE SCHULDIG IS DRIVING THE CAR. BECAUSE THIS GRUNT SURE ISN'T.

[aufsassig]

...So apparently this encounter is proving a little more like HOW TO WIN FRIENDS AND INFLUENCE PEOPLE but you know what, talk's a lot cheaper than battling, so there's that.

"Yeah, that's great — okay, now kinda square your shoulders a little bit, and lean a little to your left, and act like you've got What's-Its-Name looming behind you but you're so chill with that, it's like it's not even a thing."

Man, he's actually going to feel a little bad about knocking this guy out and looting him for all he's worth.

Still, he's here with a job to do, so he gives Schlingel and Traumfresser a mental command to look alive, and instructs them both to psychically drop this guy like a sack of potatoes — by putting him to sleep, preferably — in the same instant that his Gear camera's flash goes off.

With any luck, the Grunt won't be expecting that, and will literally never know what hit him; if it's a bad kind of day, then he'll be in for a fight, but you know what, so it goes.

"Okay, ready? Big smile! One...two...three!"

[whos_that]

And down goes the Grunt, dropped like a bad habit!

Wow.

He might have to worry about being banished afterwards anyway should any of the higher ups here about this. Seriously, he just got knocked out by an intruder who managed to totally get the jump on him with promises of photoshop. That's embarrassing.

But anyway, here's what Schuldig can loot from the unconscious Grunt who made the mistake of thinking he was a complete bro:

A few potions...which is odd because NPC Grunts tend to not use items during battle. An Escape Rope because you can never have too many escape ropes. And four Pokeballs! It's up to him whether to just take them for later or throw them and see what happens.

[aufsassig]

Four Pokeballs! That's as many as four tens!

...when divided...by ten...okay you know what never mind, let's just take those, shall we.

Honestly, he's really tempted to just pocket the balls and sort things out later back at the base, but there's something about it that stops him — maybe it really is just the fact that the guy was kind of a bro about things instead of just jumping him, or maybe it's one of those inexplicable whims that Schuldig sometimes gives way to, but either way, he calmly brings out his own gunfish before tossing the four balls to the ground all at once, intent on seeing what appears before him.

[whos_that]

Outside of the Pokeballs come the the following:

A level 51 Golbat, a level 2 Zubat, a level 37 Camerupt, and a level 7 Numel.

And none of them have any idea what's going on. Their trainer appears to be taking a nap and there's this guy they've never seen before. So they're just going to sort of putter aimlessly around the room while trying to figure out what's going on.

[aufsassig]

...Wow.

The fact that none of these critters attack Schuldig once they're out of their balls, despite their trainer being unconscious right in front of them with a stranger in the room, somehow manages to strike an unusual chord with him; whether or not he would've liked to have a fight, the fact of the matter is that he was still expecting one, and to see them milling around like oblivious little children...

...It's not that he's in any way opposed to taking up and winning a fight that's blatantly unfair, but there somehow seems to be a line between "unfair" and "just plain sad", and this has blundered its way merrily into being the latter.

Briskly, he directs his two Psychics to target the Zubat and Golbat with Psybeam; meanwhile, he's going to raise his Remoraid like a shotgun and pick off the Numel and Camerupt with Bubble Beam.

If they work quickly, it'll hopefully be over before any sort of battle ever really begins, and he can get to his real work.

[whos_that]

Four one hit KOs! So now the room contains one knocked out Grunt, two knocked out fire camels, and two knocked out bats. It's basically a flawless victory, so now Schuldig's free to do whatever else he wants to do in the base.

Oh, and the Grunt probably still has his wallet if he wanted to loot that as well for a complete clean sweep.

[aufsassig]

All right, perfect. Now the artist can really get down to his work.

After stationing his Psychics to watch the door, Schuldig starts off by retrieving the grunt's four Pokeballs and recalling his fainted Pokemon into them, planting three back on the Grunt's person and leaving the fourth (the Zubat) in his red-gloved hand. It'd look bad for the poor bastard if he were found knocked cold having never used his Pokemon at all; this way, he'll be left with all signs of having fought a valiant battle against some unknown foe who'd just so happened to get the better of him.

...Speaking of which, he'd better have Schlingel wipe his memory of their conversation and put some memories of a hard-fought battle in the guy's unconscious mind instead. Let's have her do that.

While she's busy with that, he'll just be roughing up this storeroom a little (like a true artist at work) so the scene fits the memory; he'll also take a few of the guy's potions, and maybe he'll assume he used them in the heat of battle. So much the better if he does.

Once all that's finished, he's pretty much ready to leave, and goes down his final mental checklist just to make sure he hasn't forgotten anything here. Knocked out the grunt, knocked out his Pokemon, made it look like a battle, altered his memories, didn't leave any traces of who he really is behind...

...Ah.

He waves over Traumfresser, his dream specialist, and pulls out his Gear long enough to show the Hypno his wallpaper.

"Give the guy a dream of joyriding on this thing," he instructs pleasantly, pointing at the primal legendary in its background.

There. Now his work here really is done.