tearsofademon | [Route/VR] Voicemail / General IC Contact

DON'T READ THIS u will get kissed on the nearest possible friday by ur crush. Tomorrow will be the best day ever and u will catch a rare pokemon. HOWEVER IF U DONT FORWARD THIS TO AT LEAST 5 PEOPLE u will get chased by 50 beedrills and sprayed by a skuntank!!!!11!

Look, look! She hatched just a little while ago.

[It's not hard to tell who Manaka is referring to, since the view is centered on the Cleffa sitting in her lap. The Pokémon is munching happily on a candy bar, probably given to her as a bribe to keep her still.]

I decided to name her Taffy, since she's so squishy and pink!

Ahh, she's cute! And that's a great name for her.

[Rose's expression lights up at the sight of her daughter, and with a friendly "Clefairy!~" she waves happily.]

[Taffy perks up at the sound of Rose's voice, bouncing in Manaka's lap as she looks up from her candy bar. "Clef! Clef!" she says, mouth still full.]

Thank you again for letting me look after her! I promise I'll take good care of her!

[Manaka hugs Taffy a little closer as she speaks.]

You're welcome. I'm just glad she's found a good home.

Surprise! A courier Dragonite with an official-looking messenger bag has landed nearby. It seems to be a little tired, but as it approaches it manages to pull together an air of professional composure. The letter it presents you with has the official Pokémon League mark on it, and you might catch a split-second glimpse of several similar letters in its bag before it tips its tiny delivery hat and takes off again.

The letter itself reads:

Greetings, Aurora League Champion Ryner.

Your presence is requested immediately at the Indigo Plateau to discuss a matter of deepest urgency. Please find enclosed your new personal Champion's Key, which will allow you access directly to the Indigo Plateau from any warp pad in Johto or Kanto.

Regards,
Indigo League Champion Lance

Sure enough, contained in the envelope along with the letter is a golden keycard. It looks like Lance wants to be very sure you can get there without delay.

[Goodness, what has Lance in such a hurry? Be on the lookout for an OOC post in the coming days!]

Ryner, I hope I am not catching you at a bad time. I was wondering if I could ask you some questions about running an Aurora League gym. I'm familiar with the application process and getting the construction started (my own application was recently accepted) but I was wondering if you have any advice for a gym leader to be? Things you may have underestimated when you started off yourself, or things to keep in mind. Anything would be appreciated. Yours in gratitude, Armin

Sure, you can ask me stuff. I'm not really the best at giving advice, but I'll try to answer what I can.

As for stuff to keep in mind, I'm not sure how much travel you're used to doing, but once you have a gym, you're expected to be available there pretty regularly, so it's still doable, but something that you'll want to plan in advance a bit more. Knowing some of the stuff that happens here sometimes, though, you might want to consider what you want to happen if you get whisked halfway across the continent and can't get back right away. Especially if you want to open your gym to more than just battles, or if you have any set ups that need daily maintenance.

That is a good point, actually. I'll be moving my Lapras breeding pod into the bay next to the gym, and I was planning on using the extra space in my gym to help wild aquatic pokemon that need recover from an injury or illness. So I will need to make sure there are people there who can take over my duties if I am called away. Does the Collegiate gym employ anyone? Or do you and Sion take care of all of it on your own?

Helping injured aquatic Pokemon, huh. That's a great idea. You're going to make a big difference for a lot of Pokemon.

We've hired a few people as staff. There's the maintenance crew, they do amazing work. And then there are a couple of trainers who came to learn stuff and were impressive enough that we've hired them as teachers. There's no way we can teach all of the classes we want to eventually have avaliable by ourselves and still be available for challenges, even if we trade off who does what.

Which I guess kind of leads into, it's a lot of work and responsibility, running a gym. It's a lot for two people, let alone just one. So don't force yourself to handle everything alone. Hire staff to help you. Even if you just find someone to make sure the water stays clean, that's one less thing you personally have to worry about.

I hope so. There are pokecentres on the islands too, obviously, but most of these aren't really equipped to take care of aquatic pokemon long term. Nothing against them, of course. They have a limited amount of space, and a lot of pokemon to treat. When I start looking at hiring people, is there anything I should look out for? I've never had any reason to hire anyone. How will I know what people work best?

[This is slightly backdated, but somewhere around the fifth/sixth of January, every Aurora League member is going to get one of these. It's a hand-written letter with a Pelagic gym letterhead leaving no doubts as to the sender.

It reads:]

I hope this letter will not be seen as me overstepping my bounds but --

I think the Aurora League should meet.

I'm sure I'm not the only one who has noticed that strange things are happening -- first the wild rumours about pokemon losing control, then the incident at the Safari zone, and now the message that was visible in the sky during the New Year.

Perhaps I'm worrying too much, but it is starting to feel like what happened a year ago when that creature managed to find its way into this world. That didn't come out of nowhere either; there were several smaller events that preceded it though we didn't see the connection at the time. I'm not necessarily saying that this is because of that same creature (though 'He will be back' could certainly be a reference to it) but something certainly seems to be going on. And perhaps this time, if we act early enough, we can put a stop to things before it gets that bad.

I know the Pokemon League is undoubtedly monitoring this situation too, but there is no reason why we of the Aurora League couldn't look into things as well. Or at the very least share our thoughts. Several of us are gym leaders and come into contact with a lot of trainers. Someone may have heard or seen something that, on its own, isn't particularly troubling, but if put together with other, similar accounts, could indicate something brewing.

Plus, even if there is nothing to share of that sort, I think it would be good to get to know each other a bit better. Several new members have joined us since that November. Who knows, we might need to depend on each other again in battle, and wouldn't knowing more about each other and how we fight help if it ever comes to that again? It's easier to trust someone at your back if you know what kind of person they are.

I know all of us are pretty busy, but I'm hoping you could all make time to meet on the 27th of January. That is still nearly three weeks from now, which should give those of us with gym schedules and other jobs enough time to arrange for some time off. I've even found a good place to meet at, where we can both talk and even battle if people would like. I've enclosed the address on a separate card in this envelope.

I hope to see you all there, though please let me know if you cannot make it.

Yours truly,

Armin Arlert

PS. Please do not worry about the costs involved. When I asked Lance for suggestions on where to meet, he told me the Pokemon League has a discretionary fund for these kinds of things.

[As mentioned, there is a card inside the envelope with the address of a battle club in Viridian City.]

[Route/VR] Voicemail / General IC Contact

sept 12 / anonymous

video | backdated to sometime during the week probably

video | Sorry for the delay!

don't worry about it!

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Text so Ryner can respond at his leisured and yes he's totally send this to everyone

The response comes... not as late as this (oops) but still after a couple hours or so

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