[OOC] A Tale of Two Ryners II

[tearsofademon]

So Camp!Ryner hit the big one year mark today!! In celebration of that, I’m going to essay, because I always essay at the year mark. And since it’s been a while, have one about Route!Ryner too. …Okay, it’s more of an overview this time of what’s been happening because this is sparked more by time than a specific incident, but.

Warning: unmarked canon spoilers ahead.


@ cfud
Canon point: sequel, volume 4, after the dream sequence described at the beginning of chapter 3 but before he wakes up from that
Time in game: one year \o/

So last time I talked about Camp!Ryner, he was still recovering from that whole axe-crazy thing back in June. While he certainly hasn’t forgotten that it happened, he’s for the most part put it behind him. It’s given him some confidence that, should Camp pull something again, 1) someone will be able to stop him, and 2) he won’t be able to do any lasting damage because death isn’t permanent. However, that still doesn’t make him happy about it, because 1) it is still a bad thing, and 2) it’s kind of unnerving, knowing that Camp could do that again without warning.

But enough about that.

For the most part, since then life has been life for Ryner. Wake up in the morning despite his protests “noooooo I want to sleep some more~”, deal with Camp when it decides to be Camp and try not to give it the reaction it probably wants, keep researching to appease Sion, keep poking Sion to try and get more information out of him, keep looking for possible leads for some way to fix things back home… you know, stuff like that. He got deaged in August to before the contract was made, and people found out his original name – a pain, but nothing too horrible came of it, so as long as people don’t bring it up, he’s more than willing to keep that filed away under ‘stuff to deal with LATER after the problems with Sion are actually fixed.’

October saw a week that he doesn’t remember much of, because he was consciousness-swapped with the Demon for that time! He has a vague impression of everyone he ran into, and a couple of small details about a few of them (Accelerator was in his angel form, Setsuna was Alexiel in body but not mind, Roxie was dressed different from the first time they’d met, Sion was incredibly Not Happy about this turn of events in fact he remembers a couple of specific quotes from Sion’s, mostly parts of his whole ‘you and Ryner aren’t the same’ rant, as well as “You don’t think he’ll remember this?” “I don’t think so. […] Maybe parts, though.” because I find it funny, etc.), but nothing really useful, which. He finds annoying! Context clues tell him this was important stuff, if only he could remember it.

(Fun fact, by the way: the pamphlets at the end of September? They were me attempting to troll by pretending to foreshadow that Alpha was going to be coming out during October. Never had any intention of more ~explosions~ at that time in the first place.)

Of course, then Sion consciousness-swapped with the Hero and actually gave him some useful information!!! even if for every question answered three more popped up, but. And while it definitely gave him some useful information, and also some added motivation to do as much research here as possible (his logic being that if this is somehow some kind of thousands-of-reincarnations thing, there’s got to be something that hasn’t been tried yet if he looks through resources from other worlds, and maybe that’s the way to save Sion), there was something about the whole experience that just felt… “wrong” isn’t the word, nor is “terrifying”, but… He definitely prefers the Sion he knows, and not just because he doesn’t constantly assume he knows stuff he doesn’t.

Winter brought with it a new therapy animal in the form of Stripe, the white Netherland Dwarf bunny with natural tiger-ish stripes (but he was painted orange that day). Trivia: I did tiger!bunnies because my sister likes tigers and it was her birthday, though I’m glad that I was able to provide opportunities for the Tiger and Bunny cast to play with! (Also trivia: I didn’t go in with intentions for Ryner to get a pet from it, but Momiji convinced him.) It also brought movement to grassier fields, as well as…

Tiir Rumibul.

Yes, I should talk about him. ^^

Ryner likes Tiir! He considers him a friend and an ally, despite, you know, the whole cannibalism thing. It’s not that he approves of that, he definitely does not approve of the whole murders people without remorse thing, but when you grow up in an environment where this kind of thing is commonplace, well, it’s not like he doesn’t have blood on his own hands. Tiir genuinely cares for the people with magic eyes, and he’s been hurt. A lot. Stupid Gastark. Much as he’d love it if Tiir would come to realize that not all regular people are like Gastark… well, he can’t say he blames him, either.

Tiir’s appearance, however, has also been incredibly frustrating for Ryner, because of Sion. Sion, the guy who tries to be civil to everyone, hates Tiir so much that he doesn’t even try to hide it. When Sion hates someone that much, there’s something wrong. And on the one hand, Ryner has more or less figured out where Sion is coming from, here. When he left with Tiir, instead of making things easier for Sion like he intended, he ended up hurting Sion instead. A lot, in fact possibly to an extent that he will never fully understand. And so for Sion to take that out on Tiir is kind of a reaction he can sort of see he guesses. However, that doesn’t make it right or useful, and you’d think that you’d want to increase your allies in a bothersome camp that can turn you into a frog or send you on a murderous rampage with just a single whim, rather than have to contend with Camp and other enemies.

At least they’ve sort of agreed to a truce for now though…

So as for the State of the Ryner? He’s hanging on. It’s possible things could potentially go unstable for him, but he’s hanging on. He’s learned a lot, this past year, about the situation back on the Menoris continent, but he’s also got a lot more questions than he came in with. He’s made some good friends, he’s made some acquaintances, he’s managed to avoid making memorable enemies (except possibly in CFUW but that’s not Camp canon), he has a therapy bunny to help him where two-legged companions might not be able to. Camp continues to be Camp, even if it’s rolling grassy hills instead of a swamp, so he’ll just deal with what comes as it comes. Camp isn’t somewhere he’d like to stay forever, and one large reason why he’s functional is because he tries not to think too hard about what’s happening to the rest of his friends back home (ex. Toale, Kiefer, Ferris…) because worrying about things he can’t do anything about anyway is too much work, but if it’ll help him fix things with Sion, he can deal with its crap for a while. Sure, Sion has started to be a bit possessive recently, but that’s better than trying to push him away, right? …Right?

…Of course, Sion is also currently a plushie because things, and has been for two weeks at this point, which is just around the time Ryner is going to start to really worry about this… but oh well, c’est la vie.

Future plans: …well, there’s nothing I have set in stone, but someday (albeit in the FAR distant future) I think it would be amazing to find a way to have him fully awaken in Camp’s setting… Not sure how that would work though :|a


@ route_29
Canon point: episode 23, after the fireworks display is complete and just as the rain is starting, but before Sion comes to pick him up
Time in game: Two years, three months!

Last time I talked about Route, I discussed ~motivation~ and how Ryner is actually starting to have some. On that front, things have been rather steady these past few months. He’s spent a lot of time researching the Legendary Pokémon, and much as he publicly complains about how much Sion drags him around everywhere (and those complaints are 100% his true opinion), well, he can’t deny that he’s gotten a lot of opportunity to look into things because of it. There are still too many holes that he hasn’t filled in, which frustrate him because shouldn’t someone have looked into basic stuff like this already he was able to access more information on Hero Relics faster from prison for crying all night… but, well, believe it or not, he’s been working hard on it. He can be scholarly when the topic interests him!

Of course, he doesn’t talk about it much publicly except in general terms if even those, because he doesn’t really want to draw attention to himself and Sion. His general strategy is still to make himself out to be harmless and too lazy to be useful, because that way fewer people will bother him. Though, well, Cobra is fun to tease, so he might toe the line over there sometimes.

There are really two major things of note on this side of things. First is the illness that swept through Johto and gave folks mutations and temporary powers. Level 4 Lightning, yeah!!! I didn’t quite get to play with the lightning powers themselves as much as I would have liked to, but the mutations and mental effects were fun. For me, anyway; Ryner just found them bothersome, but then that’s how he rolls.

Ryner likes it in Johto. He honestly does. The things that make him a danger to everyone around him are sealed, so he can actually do something constructive instead of destroying everything he touches and causing harm to everyone he gets close to. If he was given the choice to stay in Johto forever, he would honestly have a very difficult time saying no. That said, however, he is still a magic nerd at heart, and he does miss being able to cast spells and analyze magic and do all of that, even as he doesn’t miss the danger inherent in his ability to do so. He teaches Rose all sorts of TMs and sort of lives vicariously through her, much as he’d never admit this aloud and probably hasn’t really consciously realized it, and honestly next time he’s in Goldenrod he might start buying a few to teach some of his others for similar reasons (the main reason he doesn’t do it more often is because they’re expensive), but it’s not really the same, you know?

So to suddenly have lightning powers, even if they were only for a few days, and even if they were pretty much driving him emotionally unstable (though Sion being an idiot wasn’t helping), and even if they were tied to his emotions in a way that the less calm he was the more lightning would come out, and even if he wasn’t having an easy time controlling it… That much, he at least kind of enjoyed. Lightning is kind of his thing, back in Roland or at least it will be for a few more hours canon-time THANKS SION. He knows a wide variety of magic, but Izuchi is his. He has spent more time hacking that spell than any other, he knows it inside and out, he can control every minute detail of it, he loves that spell okay. (This is why the first TM he ever taught Rose was Thunderbolt.) So to be able to wield lightning again, even for a brief time… It felt good. He honestly liked that part of it, even if he doesn’t approve of what other people did with the power they received seriously Team Rocket you can just go off somewhere else and stop blowing up gyms please.

He didn’t like the mutations, though. Or the mental effects. Emotional instability is not fun, nor is a constant impulse to keep all dirt off of his person (because electric is weak to ground you see). And I sort of went for a Zekrom-Raikou hybrid for the theme of his mutations (because his canon and the Unovan dragons, man… I saw it before the second gym), hence the black stripes and the shock of blond and, most importantly, the red eyes. They were the last to go and went around New Years, and Ryner would have preferred them gone way sooner than they were. To him, red eyes are his Alpha Stigma. A constant reminder that his is a cursed existence, and that the other shoe will drop eventually, and that every day it doesn’t will just make it worse when it eventually does.

The other major thing to talk about is Marian Lied. (Lied, in this context, rhymes with Reed. Guess why I picked that as her family name.) Grew up in Azalea Town, went to cooking school in Striaton City, came back for vacation, accidentally ran afoul of a swarm of Beedrill, tripped and fell down Slowpoke Well, died near-instantly when she landed on a rock the wrong way and her neck snapped, was reincarnated as a Yamask, and spent 48 hours with her mask firmly pressed on Ryner’s face and possessing his body.

…Yeah, Ryner doesn’t think that positively of masks at this point. (I mean, I think I’ve heard of a sidestory where there’s another mask incident that isn’t quite like this but is also bad even if I’m not sure entirely what happened there, but… yeah, this just solidifies it.)

For the record, he was conscious almost the whole time. For the most part, when his body was asleep his consciousness was asleep as well (save for Ryner used Sleep Talk), and it wasn’t really until Sion showed up at Marian’s place that Ryner’s consciousness actually woke up enough from being knocked out cold (due to his airway being initially blocked) to realize what was happening to him, but aside from that, he was aware. However, there’s a difference between “conscious” and “able to do anything about it”. And when it’s a physical object bound to his person that’s causing the problem, there’s not much he can do for himself. Sure, he can try to fight to a temporary stalemate, because his will save is huge. (Seriously, if I had to quantify D&D-style stats for him, he and Sion would probably more or less tie for the highest will save. Ryner can fight off Alpha’s influence, okay. No one fights off the Alpha Stigma’s influence, but he can do it against the real deal.) But it’s incredibly draining, and he can only drive a temporary stalemate. And so all he could do was sit and watch as his body was driven around and doing all sorts of embarrassing things and crushing on his best friend (and of course with the way Sion was acting anyone could assume he was actively encouraging it), and it’s definitely not something he’d like to repeat. At all.

Marian also left behind some of her memories and some emotional residue – of the latter, mostly stuff to put wispy enforcements and twists into feelings already there. The memories he can mostly file away without consequence, but the emotions are another story. It’s kind of like, her fear of bugs doesn’t carry over at all because Ryner likes bugs, but the realization that she cooked lunch for his sake was amplified, this is the last meal she ever cooked, sudden wash of sad feelings. And let’s not get started on how his friendship with Sion meshes with her crush on him when he doesn’t stomp on wandering thoughts that get tangled. It’ll get better as there’s less and less to directly associate, and I’ve only barely gotten to play with it, and already he’s getting the hang of it anyway, but that doesn’t mean it won’t still happen if he spaces out too much. Which annoys him, because it’s embarrassing and bothersome to have your emotions toyed with by a third party who isn’t even in there anymore, dammit.

(And yet he still took Marian into his party when she asked to come with and said she has nowhere else to go.)

Aside from that, Ryner’s life in Johto has been pretty stable, and that’s pretty much his status right now. Researching legends, taking care of his menagerie, getting dragged her and there by Sion, teasing Cobra and pointing out how bothersome his plans are, stuff like that. What friends he makes keep leaving (Chi :<), but that’s just the great circle of how things work, and he mostly numbs himself to it at this point. And, well, it’s worth it to get up in the morning if it means Rose is happy (and doesn’t decide to smack him all over the room).

(Granted, this stability could be shattered any time if something were to happen to Sion because he’s kind of worked himself into some codependence issues there too, buuuuuuut…)

Future plans: Semi-annual egg post, coming in mid-March! I’m open to requests – any species on his roster is available for eggs at this point except for Togepi, though egg moves will depend on parents. I also have a few ideas for posts, though they’ll be spread out, and someday I want Marian to encounter her parents, but I’m not sure how that’ll work. Outside of that, he’ll just be doing stuff with Sion, really.

In summary, they're both pretending to be stable but that doesn't make them healthy, but that's okay because therapy animals.

And now I’ll open this up to a Question Meme, because I want to. About either Ryner, or even Caramel/Kurow at Decollage if you want to ask about him.

Comments

[fishpanties]

OBVIOUS QUESTION IS OBVIOUS, what does Caramel think of Coco?

[fallenmoonbeam]

Caramel likes Coco a lot! ^^ He's really grateful for explaining what was going on to him, and so far she's been really nice to him. She's smart, and she's cool, and she doesn't just let people walk all over her. He respects her, and considers her Teal's leader (though I'm not sure if she actually would be considered such or not), and the only reason I hesitate to say that he would consider her a friend is because he's pretty bad at the concept of friendship and therefore wouldn't really see it if he did. But he does like her, and trust her.

Reverse?

[fishpanties]

. . . If he ever said that he considers her Teal's leader, she would be so confused. :'D Even though quite a few Teals in the past (and Vanilla right now I think) have privately thought of Coco as the leader, or at least the linchpin.

AS FOR COCO ON CARAMEL, she likes him a lot! She's somebody who genuinely finds it very easy to get attached to people, which certainly helps, but Caramel is just . . . she thinks he's something the team needed. He's upbeat, and even when he's scared or nervous she's seen him try. That's something that she can really, really respect. She views him as a friend as well as a teammate, and is looking forward to getting to know him better—and she hopes that he can grow to feel like a valued friend and teammate in turn. NO REAL NEGATIVES AT ALL HERE; there's some worry over how trauma competitions will go, but that is pretty general.

Does he have any overall thoughts on Deco?

[fallenmoonbeam]

So far, Caramel is pretty content with what Decollage has to offer. He doesn't really like how he doesn't know who he is or why he's there, even if he gets that the whole point is to win all of that back, but it's not a terrible place, and most of the people he's met so far seem pretty nice. (Well, except for Stupid, but he's Stupid.) Sure, he knows it's not all light-hearted and happy, but he (perhaps overconfidently) thinks he'll just take things as they come and try his best to bring memories back to Teal and be helpful. But for the most part, he doesn't regret coming, even if he doesn't like the price he paid to do so. ...Well, at this point, anyway, we'll see what happens after a few more trauma games...

...Admittedly there's also a tangential mini-essay I could go into here on the subject of "resolve", buuuuuuut I'm kind of planning on leaving that one until he gets the one memory that will probably shatter his world-view ^^;

So I've noticed you play Aoko at both Decollage and Aather, and I think you also played her at Sabra, right? How is it, playing her in different settings?

[dreamsofahero]

Due to some craziness Sion has to be turned into a pokemon for a week and Ryner (either Ryner) gets to choose which one. WHAT DOES HE PICK?

[tearsofademon]

Route: Chansey I mean. He'd pick something that would be easy to keep an eye on, unlikely to be able to get into too much trouble, not psychic so that he doesn't have to deal with Sion telepathically nagging him, and cute so that he could tease Sion about it later. My first instinct says Lillipup, honestly, though other options might be Eevee, Meowth, Purrloin, or Poochyena.

Camp: Assuming that he had all the species and their pictures and attributes listed in front of him, Camp!Ryner would actually probably pick Espeon or another small psychic-type because then Sion could talk via telepathy. It's not optimal, sure, head-voices are still not really a good thing, but it's better than not being able to communicate at all.

And you know what, I like that question, so reverse for either or both of your Sions.

[dreamsofahero]

Lillipup would be appropriate for the whole dog theme, I have to say. >_>;;;

In Route.... Sion would be sorely tempted to pick a pokemon with the ability Vital Spirit or Insomnia. Just because. If not that though probably some fairly strong and cool-looking like Ninetales so they can battle together.

Camp Sion would probably go the small and cute and easy to keep an eye on route. Assuming he had a list to chose from, likely something like Houndour or maaaaaaybe Umbreon. (because black pokemon at least have the same sort of color scheme kinda.....) Alternatively Eevee because cute and small enough to hold. >_>

And you kind of touched on Ryner's thoughts on Sion in your essays, but can I get a full-fledged relationships for yours on mine? :D

[tearsofademon]

…Vital Spirit/Insomnia would be cruel and unusual. :(

All right, so. First of all, I should note that one key difference between their relationships at the two games, even before in-game development, is simply their canon point. At Camp, episode 24 has happened. Sion has betrayed Ryner, Ryner knows this, and this gives Ryner a different view of things than at Route, where episode 24 has not happened yet and he is still completely unaware that anything like that is going to happen. One thing that will always be the same for both of them, though, is that Sion is the one who saved Ryner from a life of apathy and loneliness. By reaching out to him at the academy like he did and basically pulling him into friendship against his will, Sion saved him, and he always has been and always will be grateful for that, despite anything else that happens, no matter whether he’s good at showing it or not.

Camp!Ryner’s opinion of the whole betrayal business is… well, it did hurt. He can’t deny that. It always hurts, that’s why he has his tendency to avoid close relationships in the first place. Avoid hurting others, avoid getting hurt, stuff. However! Sion is still his best friend, and especially thanks to conversations and events in Camp, Ryner is certain beyond a shadow of a doubt that Sion was pushed into a corner that night, and he only did what he did because he felt he had no other choice. Not just that night, even – the more he learns about the situation, the more he wants to find some way to make things right, because Sion deserves way better than the crap he’s stuck with. So he doesn’t hold any sort of grudge for that rainy night.

That said, if it was possible to go back to how things were before episode 24 happened, with just days of paperwork with Sion and Ferris and tormenting each other and just carefree antics like those, Ryner would like that. So much. Oh, part of him knows it can’t happen, but that doesn’t stop him from wanting it. So he does try to keep up a bit of a sense of “normalcy”, sort of – he really doesn’t mind reading in the library with Sion as much as his complaining might claim, it’s just that complaining about it is what he does, and it would be too weird without him complaining or Sion tormenting him relentlessly about this, that, or the other thing. This is pretty much why he was unsure of what to make of Aslude and the fallout from that. Aslude doesn’t do the playful torment, and Sion not being up to it is just off.

Sion is basically his motivation in Camp, really. He has this opportunity that he wasn’t going to get back on the Menoris continent to be with Sion and dig information out from the source about what the hell’s going on, so he’s going to take that opportunity and do his best to run with it. Sion is his best friend, he saved him, and he deserves way better than he’s got it. Heck, he deserves way better friends than Ryner has been. The fact that Sion doesn’t believe that he deserves anything good is wrong, in Ryner’s opinion, and he’d like to figure out how to get Sion to see just how much he matters and how he deserves good things.

If Ryner lost Sion again, at this point? Yes, he probably would be able to keep living, to one degree or another, but he’d never get over it. He’s really set on making things right with Sion and saving him from everything that’s going on, and losing him again, especially permanently, would be a pretty heavy failure.

…Also uh, yeah… expect punching to happen once you’re off hiatus. Seriously, he’s starting to freak out about that whole plushie thing.

Meanwhile, Route!Ryner doesn’t have to worry about any of that yet, and is pretty much just happy that Sion is there. He likes Johto, but that doesn’t mean that he didn’t get lonely in the first ten months when he was there as a lone canon warrior. He definitely doesn’t take Sion’s presence for granted, either, considering Ferris – he could leave at any time too, and he knows this – but for now he’s content to just enjoy the fact that he’s got his best friend there with him.

As I mentioned, there is a little bit of codependence going on on this side of the fence, and much as Ryner tries to be there to support Sion with whatever he needs done, he kind of needs Sion to be there to support him, too, at this point. Having lost Ferris and pretty much everyone who has managed to befriend him in Johto up to this point, Sion is really the last man standing in that regard. If something were to happen to Sion… I think Ryner might possibly break.

But for now, he’ll gladly support Sion in his endeavors. Even if those endeavors involve being dragged all over Johto and Kanto with hardly a moment’s rest. Legendary research is really interesting, so he doesn’t mind it all that much. And since he basically gets to travel around with his best friend, that’s way better than traveling by himself. Sure, some of Sion’s goals he kind of thinks are crazy, but he’ll support him anyway. After all, someone has to have his back, right?

Also, some brief opinions from some of the Pokémon, or at least the ones who have specific opinions:
- Rose likes Sion and ships him and Ryner platonically if only because when Sion is around her dear partner is happy and she likes when he’s happy.
- Jehra still picks up disaster vibes from Sion and still doesn’t trust him 100%, but he’s gotten better about it and is willing to more or less ignore those feelings unless they suddenly spike.
- Aran… I’m not sure, would Aran and Sion have started their little sessions yet? We’ve talked about it, but…
- Rey is willing to trust him. I think that’s important to note.
- …and of course Marian has her crush but we all know this.

…Anyway, sorry this took so long, and I hope it’s coherent. Since you haven’t essayed about Sion before, I think I’ll ask for a reverse for this one as well, if you’re up for it.

[dreamsofahero]

...man I want to say Sion HAS been working with Aran already, but on the other hand it's also a thing I keep thinking out to be actually played out, so idk. He definitely intended to try working with him as soon as reasonably possible though and Sion's not one to slack off. :|a

But anyway!

Route!Sion is in kind of a weird place. He really honestly does enjoy the time he's getting to spend with Ryner, and a lot of the time is able to mostly put certain looming issues out of his thoughts, but, well, that's still there. Waiting for him. This does make him kind of determined to make the most of things, though, because hey, this is more time with Ryner than he'd hoped to have before, so seize the day and all, right? He's also effectively given up on trying to finish business while here, because thanks to the timing of the Valentine's event right after his arrival, plus everything else, he just... doesn't have the heart to do it. That, and apparently people can't die permanently here anyway, so that just defeats the whole purpose anyway.

So while he still is highly mindful of Roland and his duties back home and all, he's largely just enjoying his time with Ryner. It's essentially just a continuation of how things were back in Roland before they wound up in Johto, really, including bossing Ryner around and dragging him along into things against his will without ever telling him what's really going on. And he never intends to tell Ryner, because he's afraid doing so will just spoil everything. He's got all this extra time to spend with his best friend now, so why ruin it by telling Ryner what a horrible person he really is and end up with Ryner hating him or something? It's much better to let Ryner be happy and then Sion can enjoy the time with him too, after all...

I think the only one of Sion's party with a strong opinion on Ryner is Dusk, and she sees him as a potential stabilizing force for Sion, so she's all for the two of them sticking together. ....well, and Lucile probably creeps on him whenever he's out and unsupervised, but. >_>

Now camp!Sion, on the other hand..... well the short version is basically Ryner is the center of his existence and his reason for living right now. Thanks to camp being camp and Ryner being Ryner, Sion's ended up spilling a lot of his inner secrets/fears/doubts/etc, and that's kind of a big deal. Ryner's torn down a LOT of the emotional walls Sion had put up around himself, many of which he's relied upon for years before he even met Ryner, which puts Sion in an incredibly vulnerable position. And because Ryner's done this while assuring Sion all the while that he's there for him, he wants to help him, etc., and generally insisting on/forcing Sion to tell him things whenever he can, this means that Sion's relying on Ryner for all that extra emotional support. If Ryner were to disappear right now, it would break Sion in a way that might not even be possible to repair, that's how much Sion's relying on his support right now.

Of course, Sion being, well, Sion, and having his many lingering issues that he has (and not to mention Aslude's influence....) means this also makes him even MORE protective/possessive of Ryner. He wants Ryner to be literally by his side as much as possible, and doesn't react well to the idea of someone else somehow disrupting that. Even so, if Ryner one day turned to him and said that he didn't want to spend so much time with Sion anymore, he wants to be with someone else, Sion would likely let him go. He's still honestly kind of expecting that to happen someday sooner or later, anyway, because in his experience nothing he truly cares about stays with him long. So Sion basically is still more than half expecting to lose Ryner somehow, because he's never NOT lost someone he loved, and right now not even all the reassurances to the contrary in the world is enough to completely absolve that fear. It does, however, tend to feed into that aforementioned sense of possessiveness, because even if he's going to lose Ryner someday, Sion's not letting him go without a fight.

And similarly, Sion would rather die before letting any harm come to Ryner. This was true before, and hasn't changed. Sion would kill himself rather than bring harm to Ryner. He might not SAY it or such, but that doesn't make it less true. And for all Ryner's assurances that he'll find a way to fix things somehow, Sion's still making plans for what to do when those ideas fail. He has no intention to tell Ryner about any of those private contingency plans, especially because he knows Ryner would object, but he fully intends to carry something like that out if it came down to it. Because in Sion's mind, as long as Ryner still has people like Ferris and Kiefer and all the others, ultimately, he doesn't strictly need him, therefore if it's ever a choice between his life and Ryner's, Sion's taking matters into his own hands without consulting Ryner. Because now more than ever, Sion can't even imagine living without him.


......and on that horribly depressing note! Which denyuuden characters do you most/least want to see in camp/route?

[tearsofademon]

Mood whiplash. It is canon.

In general, in both games I would love to have a Ferris (again, in Route's case). Complete the main trio and all that.

At Route in particular, I think Arua would be adorable. Doesn't have to worry about his eyes being triggered and he gets a fluffy puppy to run around with? I think it'd be good for him. Alternatively, the Taboo Breaker Squad running around fighting Team Rocket is kind of an amusing mental image. ...Also secretly I really want a Riphal, no matter how impossible I know it is, because I think it would be interesting to see how he and Sion would interact when they're not at war. ...Well, actually, in general, really, I don't think there's much logistical possibility in canon for Sion and Riphal to meet in the first place... And it would be interesting to see one of the Orlas on Team Rocket, actually. Also potentially dangerous, but.

As for who I would want least at Route... Well, honestly, I would love anyone and everyone. If someone were to bring in Miran or Lieral in particular, though, then I'd probably want to talk it over with them first. If only because Ryner doesn't know that Miran's working for Sion yet and that's kind of a big deal, and Lieral... I don't know how the memory block works, I don't really want to touch it, and depending on canon point discrepancies... yeah.

Camp gets a little more logistically tricky, simply because the wrong people could make things collapse. Gastark folks could very possibly cause problems here because 1) Tiir and 2) if they brought in crystallized Alpha Stigmas that would be a problem. People like Kiefer, Toale, or especially Vois might cause problems because they'd be yet another force trying to pull Ryner and Sion apart. (Ferris and maybe Iris, Arua, and Kuku probably wouldn't be quite as much of a problem in that regard, though Arua has to be careful because Camp.) I mean, I will never say no to castmates, but in those cases, we might want to talk first...

Milk would be fun to have around, though. Or pretty much any of Sion's subordinates - I doubt they'd make things too precarious. Lucile would be interesting, if the fact that he can't leave Roland can be worked around.

TL;DR anyone with a few that have caveats of please discuss first. I'm not picky. (But especially Ferris.)

...and darn it believe it or not that was actually going to be my next question for you but I don't want to just keep going reverse all the time... Okay, here's a different one then. If you had the opportunity for Sion to meet any legendary pokemon, any one at all, but he could only meet that one ever, which one would it be and why?

[dreamsofahero]

....man THAT'S HARD TO PICK. Short of Arceus though (which might not be the best choice ANYWAY given Sion and godlike-types) it'd be a tough choice between Kyurem and Ho-Oh or maaaaybe Giratina. Ho-Oh for reasons you already know- it's a freaking PHOENIX and is big and powerful and looks cool and would generally be a valuable and highly visible ally- plus it's native to Johto. Kyurem... you also know why, and it'd be for the hilarious canon parallel thing going on. Giratina would be for similar reasons to Kyurem, plus the whole just being the antithesis of the normal world, which really sounds a lot like the Hero there in a way.

ULTIMATELY THOUGH probably Ho-Oh because it's the most IC option for him to pursue and phoenixes have an association with royalty. Even though the other two are technically part dragon type they don't really LOOK it so.

So we have a title and a cover for the next volume of canon, what do YOU think is going to happen next?

[tearsofademon]

Well let's see. First off they're definitely going to have to deal with what's going on with Tiir and Lucile... But once that gets resolved a little, given that the three of them are all together on the cover, I think Sion's going to send a messenger with an offer of an alliance, and they'll meet up and discuss things and have a heartwarming reunion. If it's in private, Ferris will probably try to "kill" Sion for everything that's happened. If it's public, she might be able to have manners, maybe. (Also Lieral will probably be a topic of discussion because he's Lieral.) But maybe Sion will throw a dango party reception for them? Possibly a semi-trollish one, even, depending. And then Roland and the Anti-Roland Federation (if that's still what they're calling themselves at this point?) will team up to face Gastark. ...But then something bad has to happen, because this is DenYuuDen. Not sure what, since depending it's probably a little soon for volume 13 to be the second to last volume, and they still have that year without interference going on, but... (Of course, these are my speculations and I'm probably wrong.)

Your absolute most favorite scene in canon?

[dreamsofahero]

Haha man I TOTALLY MEANT TO REPLY TO THIS and then forgot whoops.

And man IT'S SO HARD TO CHOOSE but I'm almost inclined to go with the bedroom scene with Sion and Ryner, because it's just so perfectly them and is a nice glimpse of how they'd be if the world really were a nicer place. That or Sion being a brat and dumping ink on Ryner's head....

So how's having Tiir in camp going for Ryner now? |D

[tearsofademon]

Still super frustrating! Even more so, really. All Ryner is asking is for Tiir to try to be reasonable, but the whole Jack and Pitch situation keeps getting escalated, and while Tiir certainly isn't the only one at fault there (Pitch could always not attack him in theory, and Jack comes off as a bit of a brat to Ryner), the fact that it's still going on kind of goes against the whole not making enemies thing. And he's trying so hard to be patient about it, but even saints will eventually snap and run out of patience, and Ryner isn't exactly a saint by any traditional definitions.

And on top of that, there's the whole Sion vs. Tiir thing, which he would like to hope has been at least drawn into a truce? But keeping an eye on Tiir and making sure he doesn't do something stupid certainly takes away from precious energy that could be spent working on what to do to fix things with Sion, which isn't helping things.

He does still consider Tiir an ally! And he'd really rather not have to change that! But if he's ever forced to pick between Tiir and Sion one or the other no third option... well, that answer's already set in stone.

So in Route, what is Sion's opinion of the whole Marian thing?

[dreamsofahero]

He's basically dealing with it the same way he dealt with the various women who tried to hook up with him back home. Which is to say, first trying to explain exactly why she should give up, and failing that, just attempting to subtly discourage unwanted behavior, mostly through deliberately ignoring a lot of antics.

...he doesn't think it's his fault for "encouraging" her before, though, because in the first place what ELSE was he supposed to do to keep Ryner close, and second he's since then at least twice explained to her exactly why it WON'T work between them, so. :|

What are Ryner's current thoughts on the Marian thing?

[tearsofademon]

Surface-level, he'd really, really like it if she'd just stop with the public displays of affection for Sion. It's embarrassing, he still can't watch it without feeling a little ill from feelings residue (because love and friendship occupy the same area of the spectrum), and it's got to be a pain for Sion to deal with. He doesn't want to be forceful about it, because he never is, but it'd be really nice.

That said, his opinion of Marian as a person/pokemon is on the positive side of neutral, despite everything. ...Granted the only one who actually dips on the side of negative on occasion is Arius and even he is tolerable as long as there aren't any other water types out, but he does genuinely think of her as a decent person/pokemon, and doesn't hold anything against her specifically when it comes to what happened in October. (Rose is another bottle of issues entirely, but this is about Ryner.)

That's not to say that he doesn't have any problem with what happened in October, though, because as time has passed since it happened and he hasn't been able to get past it (because the feelings residue is stuck on stuff he's blocked from thinking about properly, let alone working through), the real horror of what happened has really been actually dawning on him. Like, when it was over at first, he was just happy for it to be over, as well as exhausted because reasons. And if it wasn't for the feelings residue not going away, he'd be able to just sleep it off and move on. Worked for Bob to the extent that he doesn't even think about that one at all anymore, works well enough to get through the day with Alpha. But it hasn't worked for Marian, and so without being able to put that experience out of mind, he's had months to just slowly realize that yeah, being trapped inside your own head, fully aware but unable to do anything but watch for forty-eight hours? Kind of incredibly terrifying, even if she was harmless, and the constant reminders that she's there whenever she's out don't really help with that.

And of course, his firm refusal to actually talk about it (obviously by refusing to acknowledge the situation it will eventually go away, or something) is only making it worse, really...

But mostly, it'd really help if Marian would stop openly flirting with Sion, because it's embarrassing. >_<

So who would Sion ICly like to see most in Route and Camp?

[dreamsofahero]

Sion doesn't really think about it, for various reasons, but... he'd probably like to see Fiole again, and Fiole could definitely do worse than adventures in pokemon land or such! Beyond that though he has Ryner and Ryner's really the only person that matters as far as Sion's concerned. >_>

...though now that I think of it if she were actually appable his mother could be interesting, but that could also be extremely awkward/complicated too so. :|a


How much does Ryner ICly suspect about Sion's issues in route?

[tearsofademon]

Nnnnnot much. I'd say a little more than canon, if only because Jehra has been Very Insistent about how much danger he senses from Sion (even if he just deals with it at this point), and Ryner knows that Jehra's senses are accurate. But that doesn't tell him much more than "oh hey something about Sion is dangerous". And I guess in private he may have wondered once or twice about what that means, but it's obviously something about home, and... well, he'd rather deal with Infinite Paperwork when he inevitably goes back than worry about it before that happens.

The Other Issues, meanwhile... I'm not sure ^^; I mean, I assume he already more or less had a feeling about the whole repressing romance thing (and can sympathize), but outside of that...

A one way portal opens up to Roland, and Sion and his 'mons can each choose to either go through or stay forever in Johto, because it's not opening again. Does Sion go back, and if so, which of his pokémon (if any) follow him?