#local screams | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

proxycrit · 3 months

Text

Part 1 / Part 2

Emmet remembers when he and Ingo first brought Elesa to explore Celestial Tower, back when they were fourteen and thought they were immortal.

“Allegedly, the bell chime will bring ghosts home”, ingo had told emmet with the pompous knowing energy of a child who read way too much brochures. “It’s culturally significant! We must ring it.”

“Hmmm,” emmet had responded suspiciously. “Brother. The bell is at the top of the tower.” The implication stands: Ingo, there are thirty flights of stairs between here and the top, and no elevator to speak of.

Don’t be a coward, Litwick had told Emmet with the blaise tone of somebody who’s going to be piggy backing off of somebody else. Go ring the bell. Tynamo, sensing a litten fight, floated towards a loitering blitzle.

Ingo turns his lilipup eyes on Elesa, who’s squinting at the carved stone faces of the front door.

“Elesa? What do you think?”

Elesa thinks. She shrugs. “We already made our way here,” she said in accented galarian. “Might as well make it the rest of the way. Ganbatte!”

Emmet sighs. “This is a mistake,” he tells the two in exhaustive patience, but lets himself be dragged into the building.

Last time the twins were here, Ingo caught litwick— but not before she managed to nab a good chunk of Emmet’s soul. It’s not terrible; he felt fatigued for a week and bounced back pretty quickly, but it was the principle of the whole situation— celestial tower’s a pain in the ass and Emmet will stand by that until the day he dies.

Like right now.

The map isn’t working. Emmet checked it once. He’s checked it twice. He’s taken out his pen and written on it, which he would usually never do but desperate times call for desperate measures. The compass he brought spins useless circles. It’s like chargestone cave up here, but worse because instead if electric pokemon it’s all ghosts.

“We’re lost, yyup yup!” He announced to the crew. “I vote we eat Ingo first.”

“I love you too,” Ingo told Emmet placidly. “But we all know between the two of us, you’re the tastier one.” Litwick gives Emmet a thumbs up. Emmet gasps in mock affront.

“Elesa, help!”

Elesa gives the two of them a wary look. It took two floors for her to realize this is not just a weird temple with strange rocks, but a full out graveyard. She’s not very happy about that development.

“Don’t drag me into this,” she tells them. “Teme wa urusaii.”

“I will take that as a compliment,” Ingo reports back.

Emmet, who’s cheerfully struggles with Galarian on a good day, simply gives her a thumbs up.

The three painstakingly crawl their way up. And up. If all else fails, Emmet told himself, at least they can orient themselves towards high ground.

“We’re like pidoves,” Ingo gasps. He has fallen behind them on the stairs, with Emmet taking the lead through sheer spite despite his legs going numb on floor twenty two. “We, hah, we are attracted by the magnet of the bell, like, like probopass-“

“I am emmet! You are not making, sense!” Emmet called back. Elesa, who’s stuck between them and looking two steps from perpetual collapse, giggles.

“No, no hear me out, Ingo wheezes. “What if the bell’s a magnetic pole? And that’s why your compass doesn’t wo, woo, hahh, work.”

Emmet stops to rest, just because Ingo is using precious breathing air to infodump. Elesa gratefully slumps against the railing. Tynamo and litwick, lazy in their still small size, have settled on a weary blitzle and look very smug doing so. (Emmet is not jealous, he tells himself. Emmet is also lying.)

“The bell’s important,” Ingo had repeated.

“Okay,” Elesa responds. “If it’s important to you, then it’s important to us.”

And Emmet finds that he agrees with Elesa. Partially because they crawled up twenty fucking three flights of stairs, but also because Ingo thinks this is important, so it is.

And here’s the thing—

— emmet doesn’t remember much after that.

The rest of that trip was a blur of exhausted groaning and burning legs, and by the time the trio managed to breach floor thirty, people’s brains have all but dribbled out their ears. Emmet remembers being disgustingly sweaty. He remembers blitzle almost tripping to death and litwick’s swearing. He remembers tynamo sticking to his neck like a damp towel. He remembers Ingo’s excited sneasel smile, and the way the sunset bounced off of Elesa’s hair.

He remembers the brassy ring of the Celestial bell. It sounded like victory.

But it was Elesa’s cackle turned scream as Ingo swiped cold hands down her neck that sounded like home.

—-

So when the conductor at thirty one, lost and disoriented in the Impossible Place, heard the sound of a familiar bell, ringing over and over and over-

-the sound of laughter-

-EMMET! Elesa cried-

-like a homing pidove, the conductor, thinks nonsensically as something in him perks up.

(Emmet had always liked winning, more than anything else, and the sound of victory calls him home.)

—

Elesa catches lightning in a bottle. Elesa, arms outstretched, finds purchase in her brother, and does not let go.

Emmet is so, so cold, Elesa thinks as the wind steals air from her lungs. (That’s okay. She’s already breathless from a terrible business called hope.)

Emmet stares back. His hands flap against Elesa’s jacket. Elesa desperately drinks in his wan face and too wide eyes and his frost bitten lips. In a tiny, meek voice, almost lost to the wind, he asks:

“Are you real?”

Elesa lets out an ugly sob. Her tears whip away in the wind as they fall. Emmet’s frightened countenance turns immediately to alarm. His shaky grasp becomes a solid grip as they spin through the air, cushioned by chandelure’s psychic.

“I think so??” Elesa warbles. She sees Emmet’s eyes dart to her mouth. He’s reading mirroring her, she realizes with giddy delight— it’s such an Emmet thing to do, to read lips, and-

“I am Emmet,” Emmet breathes. His eyes have started to water. “Yyou are Elesa- Oh dragons, Elesa!?“

Elesa reaches. Hesitates.

Emmet grabs elesa by the lapels and crushes her tight against him. Elesa holds on, and the grief and relief in her accumulates into a wet sopping mess. She’s ruining his jacket, she mourns, but its okay because he’s dripping all over hers.

She can’t hear what he’s saying into her shoulder, can’t read what he says, but everything’s okay because every part of her is chiming

You came back

You’re here

I’m not alone anymore.

Around them, the air distorts as Chandelure’s psychic wavers, flutters, and solidifies. Gravity reverses its call as they settle gently on the ground, dust billowing in all directions.

The ghost pokemon drops next to them, shaking so hard the musical clang of glass makes Elesa flinch.

You fucks, Chandelure gasps. DON’T GO LEAPING OFF BUILDINGS, I AM NOT YOUR EMERGENCY PARACHUTE.

“I’m sorry,” Elesa gasps, still giddy from the adrenaline.

AND YOU! Chandelure howls, whirling on Emmet, who’s still staring at the ghost with huge eyes. He’s gripping on to solid ground with the energy of a man who realized he could have been a splat on the ground.

YOU LEFT!

Emmet winces.

You- You left us, you left me-

Ah, ah no, Elesa thinks as golden globules of light shed from Chandelure. This is what a ghost looks like crying.

Emmet holds out his arms. Chandelure drifts into his embrace, and shakes, and shakes, and shakes.

You left me, the ghost pokemon whispers. How dare you. How could you.

“I didn’t mean to,” Emmet whispers. “I’m sorry.”

Stop doing this to me, Chandelure demands. Golden brine joins human tears, like drops of sun trapped in wet glass. Stop going where I can not follow.

And Emmet holds his tongue, because he knows he can not promise staying. Not while Ingo and Eelektross are still in Hisui.

(In the back of Emmet’s hurt and shattered mind is a spark. Synapses connect. The cold breach of the Distortion does nothing to drown out the sudden flare of hope in Emmet’s chest, so great he can not breathe, so strong he can not feel, because there’s a path. A difficult, painful path through the Space that Can Not Be, but a path all the same.)

“Elesa, Chandelure-“ Emmet’s voice breaks. He wants to tell them about Eelektross. He wants to tell them about the terrible past that is Hisui. He wants to explain how the last five months were filled with horror and wonder and fear and hope.

Hope, he thinks. So he says this:

“I know how to get Ingo home.”

NOTES:

AAAAAND THAT’S ALL FOR THIS DRABBLE. ITS OUT NOW. I CAN FINALLY GO BACK TO POSTING HAPPY SHENANIGANS! (Now you know the shape of their story.)

Thanks for reading this monster of a post!

634 notes · View notes

myymi · 2 months

Text

If you had asked Sonic how he felt about being alone four years ago, he would've told you it was the most freeing feeling in the world.

It's not that he disliked people or didn't want to be around anyone. He had plenty of friends.

But there was something special about being able to run away from everyone and everything. He loved being able to disappear in the blink of an eye without worrying about someone trying to keep up with him.

He got to live his life the way he wanted. It was his favorite thing.

And then he met Tails.

He's always thought he wasn't fit to be part of a family. He had never been able to find someone who could even remotely keep up with him, so he didn't bother trying to find a family.

But Tails was able to keep up. And he did so without ever asking Sonic to slow down so he could. He was fine running on the hedgehog’s time, no matter how tired it made him.

And now, as he watched the red echidna bury the small coffin that held his little brother, he couldn't help but hate how alone he was now.

The guardian had been the one to offer a place on Angel Island for him. A small, secluded area that he had previously decorated for when the kid decided to come visit.

Of course he wasn't literally alone. Knuckles, Amy, Shadow, and the rest of their friends were all there to say their final goodbyes to the little fox. But that didn't change the fact that it felt like a part of himself died.

He didn't know it when he first met the fox, but it truly felt like Tails filled in a hole in his heart that he hadn't known was missing. But now that the piece was ripped out of him, it was easy to notice.

He wasn't sure how much longer he'd last without that fox. Everyone knew it, there was no Sonic without Tails. They were inseparable.

But they had been ripped apart. Whatever tether that held their unbreakable bond had been snapped, forcing them to go their separate ways.

He just wishes it was him who was forced to lay in a grave too soon rather than his baby brother.

Tails didn't deserve it. The poor kid had been fighting every sort of battle imaginable since the moment he was born and he was only eight.

The universe had no right to take him now. Not when he fought so hard to survive. Not when he gave every last piece of himself to protect it.

He could still feel the phantom traces of his brother's blood soaking into his fingertips. He could still see the way the life inside his big, blue eyes faded.

He could still feel the way the little strength that Tails held left his body, forcing him to let go of the person who promised to keep him safe as he bled out in his arms.

This was Sonic's fault.

—

Sonic wasn't sure why he ran.

To be perfectly honest, he hadn't even known he ran until he nearly greeted the Tornado with a very aggressive accidental kiss.

He wasn't sure what to do with her now. He could never be able to take care of the Tornado half as well as Tails did. And while he wasn't a bad pilot by any means, he knew he wasn't the best either. (That title went to the fox that now slept in the ground, his cold body protected by the dirt surrounding his coffin.)

He'd need to figure out what to do with the Cyclone as well. He didn't have a clue on how to pilot that one, it was quite a bit more complex than the Tornado.

After he was done sadly staring at the red biplane, Sonic hopped into the cockpit.

The lingering smell of mint is what finally broke him.

One of the few ways he could tell his brother was sneaking up on him was the way he smelled. It was always a migraine-inducing minty aroma, the scent of his favorite candy clinging to the fox's fur.

As strong as the smell was, it was comforting. It was how he reminded himself of the day he'd finally got that kid to believe he wasn't going to hurt him.

The first time that Tails ever had mint candy. Or, well, candy in general.

Sonic will never forget the way his eyes lit up, shining practically as bright as stars do when he put that first piece of candy in his mouth. And even though he was offered sweeter candies that kids his age normally enjoyed, he was firm in only eating the mint ones.

It was strange, but it was such a small thing then that it didn't really matter to Sonic. He didn't care what the kid liked to eat as long as he ate something. Even if it did have a painfully strong smell.

Sonic didn't bother with trying to wipe away his tears. Why should he, anyways? It was his brother's funeral for Chaos’ sake. He should be allowed to cry. (That didn't erase how pathetic and disgusted he felt. Did he really deserve to mourn his brother when he's the reason there's a funeral in the first place?)

He didn't get long to ponder it when something gently touched him.

It admittedly scared the shit out of him, but he knew exactly who it was before even looking towards them.

“I don't mean to interrupt your grieving,” Knuckles said guilty, his voice barely above a whisper. “But I wanted to let you know that you're welcome to stay on Angel Island with him.”

Sonic's not really sure if ‘staying with him’ is the right way to word this situation, but he's also not sure what the correct wording is so he decides to settle on a numb nod. He doesn't trust his voice to carry any sort of conversation right now.

Knuckles didn't say anything after that, but he also didn't move from where he was crouched atop the Tornado’s wing. The silence wasn't necessarily awkward, but it kept Sonic on edge.

“I know I'm not the best to talk to about emotions,” The echidna mumbled, running a paw through his quills as he spoke, “but I know what it's like to lose family. If you need help with grieving, you can ask.”

Despite the situation, Sonic managed to smile at the older mobian. He appreciated the offer a lot, and he knew he'd probably take him up on it whether he actually wanted to or not.

“I'll leave you be now.” The guardian said quietly before jumping off of the biplane’s wings. “If you wish to be alone from everyone, you can go into my cave.”

Sending the echidna a thumbs up made Sonic want to die. He was assaulted by the memories of when he and Tails first met the echidna. Back when he was unable to verbally speak, forced to hold conversations through expressions alone.

He wanted to scream, but his throat was throbbing from all the crying. He knows he should at least go see his friends, but he can't bring himself to look at any of them right now.

He decides to leave for Knuckles’ house when he feels his communicator buzz.

He gets to the cave on muscle memory alone, his mind occupied by playing the past four years on a sped up loop.

He felt insane. He would tell someone without a doubt that he's known Tails for forever, but it had only been four years since they met.

It wasn't until he collapsed on Knuckles’ bed that Sonic decided to check the message he received, not surprised to see it from Amy.

He didn't have it in him to fully read through the heartfelt message, but it was easy to understand from just skimming through it.

He figured responding to her message was the least he could do to keep her and the other from worrying about him right now.

He wasn't fine, and everyone knew that, but being around his closest friends and family wouldn't help right now.

The only thing that could help him was his little brother, but that wasn't in the cards for him. Not anymore. It's warm in the small cave, but Sonic still shivers as he curls into a ball.

He doesn't think he'll ever be warm again. Not when he felt his baby brother's body slowly grow cold.

122 notes · View notes