The OUTSKIRT Team

The Cacturne strides across the sands towards where the bright metal engine formed a blight on the desert horizon. The chill air revived him and as the Cacturne strode across the dunes he moved with a bizarre gait that makes it look almost like the grass type was gliding across the dunes instead of walking.
The faint breeze dances around his feet, the Seedwind from which all great storms formed. In the time when the bright flowers bloomed the wind would carry the seeds through the desert and more cacti would grow.
"Bless the Maker and all His Water. Bless the coming and going of Him, May His passing cleanse the world. May He keep the world for his people." The large dark type says to himself as he walks onwards.
Subtly he turns his head towards the Absol and the Charmander following close behind them.
He owed the other Dark Type a Water Debt but that did not change his base nature. If they fell behind he would go to them but not to help.
Weaklings had no further use of their Lifewaters.

Blaze nodded and followed the Absol named Crescent. "So, what's the deal with the Cacturne?" He whispers softly, not wanting the Cacturne to hear. "Did you just meet him?"
As Blaze waited for a response, he held up his tail and hid it in between his legs, he wouldn't want to die just by some simple winds. This was the first time hes nearly died, or found someone else in this desolate area. It scared him, he wanted to stay home. But he had to run.
Blaze was getting tired, his short stubby legs weren't carrying him that far. Being a small Charmander was difficult. "...Crescent. Can I ride on your back, I'm tired..." He asks shyly.

Crescent stopped and nodded her head in a polite yes when Blaze asked to ride on her back. She lay down so that he was able to climb up onto her back. "I'm not quite sure what his problem is, but he seems to be obsessed with water and the cold. I don't share the same feeling with the cold." Crescent said, catching a breath for a moment. "He seems to try to steal other's life by so called 'drinking' their water. I really don't get it. He tried to attack me and well, I guess when I smashed a water bottle on his head he decided to stop attacking me." Crescent said with a laugh, standing up once Blaze was on her back.

The Cacturne does not pause in his long but rather uneven stride.
"I am Visiyn and this is my desert." He says without turning around but loudly enough to let the little Fire Type know he has overheard them, or at least overheard Crescent.
"You think this place is easy? This is the Thirsty Land, it strips the water from you and water is the root of all life. Even the Taint does not stray far here. In this land you must be though to survive, find and preserve what water you can because the only water you'll find out here is in living things. There is never any rain here."
He turns, his one golden eye luminescent in his face thrown into darkness by the shadow cast by his spiked cap.
"I owe you a Water Debt, a Debt so great I can only repay it with my life and so I'll tell you what you should know already; this is Shai-Hulud's land and if you falter the hungry wind will isolate you and take your water."
Now the Cacturne turns to the injured Charmander, his smile becoming something more sinister.
"You are weak Sun Warrior, for now at least. Why should I not eliminate my enemy and take your water?"
Calling the wind to billow out the torn length of his bloody red scarf the Cacturne causes the wind to blow strongly along the top of the dune, obscuring him between a passing wave of gritty grey sands.

When it blows past the Dark Type is no longer standing on top of the dune.
Instead, his footsteps silenced by his natural adaption to the desert wastes, he has circled back with a surprising swiftness.
From the black pores of his grinning mouth he blows a puff of light silvery sand close to the Charmander's face. The long thorns across his body extend knife-like.
His one eye leers forwards out of the darkness, the silvery moon shadow putting the oozing cut torn across his face in sharp relief as his empty mouth stretches into a horrifying grimace. It is comparable to a Scary Face attack as Visiyn leers forwards then lithely skips backwards, his smile relaxing and becoming a lot less intimidating.
"Kidding, that would betray my Water Debt~" He says with a tone that blending mockery with playfulness, showing the non-thorny side of his arms. "But we will move faster if I carry you."

((OOC: Visiyn's sense of humor is unsophisticated xD))

Blaze opens his eyes, Arceus that Cacturne was scary.
Now that he knew the Cacturne's name was Visiyn and had a sick sense of humor, he knew to fear him. Or at least, respect him.
The Cacturne offers him a 'ride.' He nods, getting off of Crescents back and walks towards the Cactunre named Visiyn.

Man, Visiyn was strange. Shrugging, she turned towards where the stand was, only a reddish brown on the horizon. "I'll meet you there. I'll make sure to get the poffins and the water out from the kitchen." Crescent said, nodding towards Visiyn andthen bound off towards the Outskirt Stand, her long legs bounding across the cool sand, she managed to gain quite a bit of ground. At least the sand isn't as hot as it is during the day. Crescent thought, occasionally glancing behind her to see if the others were following.

With a skeletal grin the Cacturne bends down and scoops up the Charmander in his long arms, holding the fire type on one of the few patches of smooth green skin he had that wasn't covered in spines.
The little Fire Type's blazing tipped tail makes him hiss irritably as he tries to position it as far away from him as he can. The tiny flame at the end with its bright warmth and light makes him tired even if it is no longer a full blaze.
"All aboard."
His tattered red scarf blowing out behind him the Cacturne starts to stride across the dunes. While his long relaxed steps seem less obviously fast than the rapid pace Crescent is setting the Grass Type's steps eat up the distance as the Cacturne walks up and down dunes that lie like frozen waves. His senstive round soled feet pick up minute changes in the packing and composiition of the sands, allowing him to detect and avoid loose patches of dirt with ease.
Small puffs of sand rise where his feet fall to float back down to the earth like downy feathers. Though it is getting into the icy heart of the night it is not dark as the bright round moon sheds silvery light down on the dunes. Around him the wind carries small streams of sand back and forth in a way that looks uneasily like the beggings of a natural sandstorm.
Visiyn's yellow eye picks out the shape of the metal hulk hunkered darkly on the horizon as he takes another step forwards.

(( OOC: Skip my turn, Blaze is being carried by Visiyn. ))

Cresent was surprised to see how quickly Visiyn was catching up. She grinned, using Quick Attack to keep ahead, getting ever closer to the Outskirt Stand. Using Quick Attack again, she managed to shorten the distance between her and the stand by a great deal. One more should get me there. She thought, using Quick Attack once more, skidding to a halt at the door to the stand. She looked behind her, making sure Visiyn was still in sight. She saw the green of the dark type coming closer and Crescent went into the stand, grabbing the poffins from the kitchen and setting them on the table. She then grabbed a soda pop for her and two water bottles for Blaze and Visiyn.

The sand crunching monotonously under foot the Cacturne strides across the open dunes.
"Four things cannot be hidden -- love, smoke, a pillar of fire and a man striding across the open bled." He says to himself, following the ancient quote as he walks in across the sands.
Turning to smile eerily down at the Charmander the tall grass type comes to a halt in front of the open entrance way of the metallic structure. His scarf catches on the thorns of his back, ripping all the further in the process.
Leaning down he lets the Fire Type's scaled body slips from his arms to the ground as the Cacturne bends down and puts the Fire Type down.
Tugging at the peak of his thorned cap he pulls his cap over his face, the shadows obscuring his torn eye.
Even if he is only taking care of his Water Debt the Cacturne can't help but admire the speed of his fellow Dark Type as she darts across the threshold to the building. He ducks under the opening in the metal and his gaze fixates on the bottles of water.
"Ah, a feast it is then!"

The Cacturne lowers the small Charmander onto the ground, letting Blaze step onto the sand. He sees Visiyn duck under a creak in the metal, leaving a opening large enough for him to walk through.
The Charmander starts walking to the opening in the middle, eventually making his way to it and ducking under in it. Halfway through walking through it, he bumped his head. He adjusted his glasses and walked into the so-called 'Stand.'
"Ah, a feast it is then!" Visiyn says, staring at some water bottles.
Blaze looks at the water bottles for a second and stares at Crescent. "Are those infected? Some of my friends died from infected water." He says, sared of the water. Not only because it has a chance to infect him, he's also scared that it could put the flame on his tail go out.

"Judging that I hit Visiyn on head with one and he's not infected, No, the water is not infected." Crscent said to Blaze, hoping to raise the young Charmander's bravery. "I can get you a soda pop of you like." She added, using a claw to get a bright pink poffin and pop it into her mouth. She then used her claw to cut the top off the soda pop can so that she could drink the fizzy liquid from inside the can.

The Cacturne clumsily sits on one of the human chairs, the long thorns of his body perforating the flimsy metal as he looks around the familiar building. Once he and his trainer had taken their customers from here, finding water-fat tourists willing to pay to experience the wild heart of the desert.
Now without cheerful faces and loud music the building was nothing more than a hollow dusty shell. Yeah, that was why he didn't come back here any more.
The Grass Type reaches out to the bottle of water, his rounded arms boiling as the flat green extends out into hairy white roots that squirm through the top of the bottle and bloat as they eagerly suck up the water through Ingrain.
The plastic skin of the bottle bulges and breaks, leaving behind a bottle-shaped wad of writhing tendrils that are swiftly withdrawn back into Visiyn's flesh. The Cacturne stores the water deep inside of him. The interior of his body is desert dry, in fact if he were to drink via the pores in his face the water would probably poison him. However when absorbed by his tissues it strengthened his thorns.
The Cacturne's one eye falls on the flicker of bright neon in the corner. Jukebox, he remembered it was called. Better yet he remembered how to work it.
"Music!" He declares.

Blaze chuckled at Crescents joke, it was the first laugh he had in the past few weeks. Crescent offered Blaze a Soda Pop, to which he nodded politely and said, "Yes please."
Blaze sat down on the ground, staring at the poffins intently, he wanted some, but he didn't want to seem too much of a nuisance, so he just stared. Hoping Crescent would offer him some.
"Music!" Visiyn states, staring at a jukebox. Blaze turned his head and stared at Visiyn. It seemed it liked music and wanted to listen to some. "Wouldn't that attract the infected?"

"I'll go and get you a Soda Pop then. Feel free to grab a few poffins." Crescent said, walking into the kitchen and grabbing a Soda Pop for Blaze. "Music!" She heard Visiyn say and she rolled her eyes. "Blaze does have a point, the noise could attract infected, but I guess a little bit of music to liven things up a bit couldn't hurt." Crescent said, walking out and placing Blaze's Soda Pop in front of him. "It'll be a little flat, okay?" Crescent said, going back to where her Soda Pop was.

The tall Grass Type gives a one shouldered shrug.
"This is the thirsty land full of emptiness. Our chances are good." Visyn says with a grin as he walks over to the flickering light box.
Of course he can't say the real reason is that being in this place so dead and alone when he was used to seeing it full of vibrant life puts him on edge. His people had good reason to be superstitious, the desert could be an eerie place at night as he knew like no others.
Perhaps playing some of the old songs would ease the prickling feeling of unease starting to creep down his spine.
Flicking out his scarf behind him the Cacturne glares down at the Jukebox. He had no human coins, after all who kept hold of stuff like that in his time but he had seen a wily human operate the device without the metal discs before.
Raising his arm he brings it down square on the center of the box with a thump. The lights flicker more brightly into a rainbow of different colors as the machine jerks to life and begins to play a old sounding tune.
"Empty chairs at empty tables..."
Visiyn hits it again and the disc within the machine flicks over, a new song starting with a scratch.
"No-one's going to take me alive,
The Time has come to make things right..."
"Much better." The Cacturne grins, his dark pored mouth contorting into a twisted grin as he recalls the battles that went on while they had played this song on the Jukebox.

((OOC: The first song the Jukebox played is "Empty Chairs at Empty Tables." which Visiyn swiftly switches to "Knights of Cydonia"))

Blaze stayed silent, suddenly on alert when the music turned on. It came to him as a surprise as he was sipping on a Soda Pop while staring out the metal creak. He thought it was a undead pokemon's cry.
He sighed for a second, then turned around, looking at Visiyn. He was staring at the Jukebox, it seemed like he was remembering something. Blaze didn't like the song, it was too sudden and quick. He preferred classical music, but he didn't say anything, not wanting to be a nuisance.
He smiled for a second, this was the first time he found sanctuary, even if he nearly died looking for a safe place. He walks over to the poffins and picked up a red poffin in his small paws. He stares at it for a second and unleashes a Ember onto it. He popped it in his mouth, he loved burnt food.

Crescent held back a laugh at how Visiyn got the jukebox to work. "So, what brings you to the wonderful desert here?" Crescent asked Blaze, sarcasm visible when she said 'wonderful'. "Me, I was running from undead." She added, he eyes going distant for a moment as she remembered Erica. Oh get over yourself Crescent! Erica's fine! She's happier where she is now! Crescent thought, scolding herself for thinking gloomily. She was with a small group of survivors! All hope was not lost! They could survive this! Crescents eyes glanced over at the egg that Regale, Hideki and Hiroshi had found after defeating an infected Zoroark. Will it even hatch? She thought, wondering what could be inside it.

[quote="Kaze"]
"Isn't burnt food supposed to be worth less?" The Cacturne grins as he flops down on the chair next to the Charmander, the harsh sound of tearing metal drowning out the music for a second as the spines on his back and legs tear straight through the material of the chair. With the metal plates impaled to his body by his thorns the Dark Type reaches in and grabs one of the poffins, rolling the candy in his green palm before raising it to the pores on his mouth.
The internal desert-like heat generated by the Cacturne is exhaled through the pores on his face, causing the treat to shrivel.
"Not that I'm superior." Visiyn's hand grows again, the writhing roots absorbing any nutrition they can from the small pastry.

Blaze stared at Visiyn as he sat next to him. "I'm not really sure, since I'm used to fire and everything, I guess burnt food is special to me. I'm not sure what others would think of it. I was bred to be a pokemon for young trainers, so I had a pretty sheltered life."
He then looked at Crescent. " I used to live in the Kanto Region. I've never gone anywhere else. I don't even know the name of this region." He paused, trying to remember. " An half-infected Wailord brought me here. He still had parts of his consciousness, he had other survivors with him. I don't know what happened to them though, he just dropped us all off here, saying to 'run from him.'" Blaze said, thinking back to the Wailord, then getting another red poffin and burning it with ember.
"Then I found you guys."
He says as he pops the poffin in his mouth.

Crescent raised a brow when Blaze mentioned a trainer. "Oh? You had a trainer? I had one before the epidemic too. Her name was Erica." Crescent said, taking a bitter green poffin from the pile. She scrunched up her nose at the bitterness, but the ate it anyway. "Erica was a nice trainer, she even took me to a move tutor to learn the move foul play." Crescent added, shrugging as she took a drink of the Soda Pop, which was at about halfway.

"Fire is the Body killer." Visiyn says seriously, glaring at the Charmander from under the shadow cast by his spiked hat. "It is the breath of the sun that brings the final end."
With an insincere smile Visiyn turns his attention back to the table in front of them while the music continues to play in the background.
"This is Orre, My trainer lived here." Visiyn adds casually as he rests his feet on the table and crosses his arms. The tattered red scarf flops over the back of the chair, holes torn in the bright fabric from the row of thorns along the Dark Type's back.
"We were guides, made a living escorting rich tourists across the desert back before the Taint." The Cacturne smirks. "They didn't half jump if you went up behind them at night..." He chuckles darkly before reaching out and spearing a poffin through with one of his thorns.
The song comes to an end and Visiyn turns his golden eye on Crescent.
"Well the night's a' wastin'. What will you do for food and water when this has run out?"

Blaze looks at Crescent as she talks about her trainer, Ereecuh or something. "I didn't know my Trainers name, as far as I know, it was something like, 'Jayumes' or something." He shrugged, even though he was with his trainer for a while, he never really found out his personal life. He was a private trainer, favouring his other pokemon better than Blaze.
Blaze's eyes saddened for a moment as he remembered his trainer, he still loved him dearly, even if he is dead.
"Fire is the Body killer." Visiyn says to Blaze. He turns his head towards Visiyn, the Cacturnes eye glowing, even though it was hidden in his 'hat.' "it is the breath of the sun that brings the final end." It seemed that Visiyn didn't like fire-types, considering that Cacturnes were half grass type. Visiyn continued, talking about his history and his trainer. Blaze just stayed silent and glared, occasionally grabbing and burning a poffin, then munching down onto it.
"Well the night's a' wastin'. What will you do for food and water when this has run out?" Visiyn said, the question pointed towards Crescent.
That made Blaze think, how did Crescent gather all this food and water? She couldn't have been the only one here.
"...were there others before us?"

Crescent had been trying to steer away from the subject of Hideki, Hiroshi and Regale. She sighed when Blaze asked. "There were three others that were here before I came here. A Charizard, A Samurott -A water type, from Unova I believe- and a Kabutops. The Kabutops was a little... odd to say the least, though the Samurott was weirder. Anyway, They were the ones that had gatehered everything and we were out gathering water when Visiyn turned up." Crescent explained to Blaze, picking another bitter green poffin from the plate, know knowing what this place was called. Orre huh? Must meant that it's based underground and on top is desert? She thought, thinking to herself.

"When humans were here they bought human things." Visiyn says shortly. "Sometimes travellers came and ate the food the humans had left behind. More often they became lost in the desert and we took their water."
Uneasily Visiyn shifts in his seat, not from the memory of the weak and starving living he has harvested water from but because he knows that soon the sun will rise.
Even if he owed them a water debt on the whole he considered the pair rather dim.
This was the desert, the only place water came from were the well-guarded Cacti of the desert and other pokemon and they were mad to think that his water debt would extend to selling out his people's water stores.
The Cacturne impales another Poffin on his thorns, his plant-like body drawing the nutrients from it and leaving behind nothing but a dusty shell of useless minerals.
He recalls the other three who attacked him and tried to steal his water with a tightening of his fist, crushing the dry shell of the poffin to dust.
They would be lucy if they did not meet him again.