Mission 2: Secrets From the Moon, Part 1-1

<<< TITLE PAGE  (I'll make this later.)

Part 1-1: I Swear, I’m Fine!

It had been several months since the last crazy mission.

In fact, the only crazy mission that the residents of the kingdom of Aether ever had to go through since they first came to this land. Though it was quite a spectacle at the time, with the whole "going into the Labyrinth in Artiphron and facing off against stuff that supposedly tested their wisdom" deal, by now, any wonderings of just what the heck that strange shiny Absol ruler wanted them to do that for had almost all but vanished. Even for Amy the Jigglypuff, who had been worried that maybe he foresaw a bunch of meteors about to hit the town, figured that couldn't be true. After all, it had been months and no bad things were in sight.

Heck, all things considered, things were only getting way better as time went on!

Not only did she and Ryoshi end up falling in love with each other afterwards, but they dated with much success (in her mind), and she even succeeded in proposing to him! The wedding wouldn't be long now; less than a month away, and as far as she could tell, there was nothing that was going to make her or her Mawile fiancée change their minds.

Given how bored out of their minds everyone was, they had all been eager to accept the idea of putting on a stage play based on the native medieval story The Hero of Winds and the Magical Conductor's Stick, a story about a young boy who becomes a swordsman who fights against evil forces to save his little sister and to prevent the ultimate power from falling into evil hands. As an extremely skilled swordsman himself, Ryoshi was cast as the boy hero Link, while Amy herself got to play the role of the narrator who always made things more hilarious, and of the mysterious Princess Zelda later on. Of course, since Ryoshi had absolutely no theatre experience, Amy was only too thrilled to help him out.

They had been practicing for about a month now, memorizing the script and picking out parts that they needed to practice on, and now, Ryoshi had said that he wanted to work on the Spin Attack that he was supposed to do to defeat a bunch of ghosts called Poes that formed the giant ghost boss Jalhalla. He stood on the makeshift stage that was in the final stages of being built, which was on a cliff next to the ocean in order to use it as a backdrop for the many seafaring scenes. Amy was there with him, accompanied by a Skorupi named Ned, whom they recently befriended when they realized he was a friendly guy who was very good at theatre, too.

"I know it's hard, Ryoshi, and I know what makes this even harder is the fact that we don't have the Zoroark Illusion Team with us today to actually MAKE the Poes for you to hit. Not yet, anyway; they'll come later. So I think that now, we could focus on how you'll do on this stage." The Jigglypuff pointed to the theoretical audience in front of the stage, mostly comprised of the people playing the other roles who were practicing their lines. "Like I said for everything else, it's better if you start and end the attack facing the audience so they can see your face. So you can use them as a guide for that purpose. Here, let me show you..."

She then swung with her paper sword and landed quite expertly, though even she had to admit that such a move made her at least a little dizzy.

"Yeah, I get how it's supposed to go, it's doing it that's hard!" The Mawile laughed. He tried once more, but by the time he had managed to stop himself he was facing 45 degrees away from where the crowd would be and nearly toppled over. It had been like this every time he had attempted to perform this technique; he would either be facing away or would just flat out fall over. He was going to need a lot of practice to get this thing nailed down.

"I think it's easier for you to spin than me, with your balloon body and lightness." Ryoshi scratched the back of his head. "But... I'll figure out some way to make this work. I guess I just need some more practice is all."

"Hahaha, I guess so! How a 12-year-old boy could actually pull off all these crazy-complex moves is beyond me...either he was a prodigy or a Jigglypuff or both." Of course, even though Ryoshi was now 20, Amy thought that the Mawile's good looks made it so that he wouldn't look too much older than the role he was playing in. She certainly wasn't going to admit this to other people though.

Ned then scuttled up to them. "Oh, I know! I could be one of the Poess for you! Ssssss—Er, I mean, wooooo~. I'm a Poooooeeee~."

It was rather humorous to see a little Skorupi raising his pincers and trying to pretend to be a levitating ghost; and failing so miserably at that, too. Amy couldn't stop laughing. Who knew that Ned could be so funny sometimes?

Her laughing fit suddenly ceased when her throat suddenly felt strange, forcing her to cough several times. Man, what got in her throat this time, and why was it so hard for it to get out? Before long, she had to support herself with her arms on the stage. Though the coughing fit ended, it was pretty clear that her usual pale pink skin suddenly seemed a little paler than before...

"A—Amy? Are you okay?!" Ryoshi was quickly down on his knees, one of his hands on the Jigglypuff's back. Amy normally didn't cough at all, and he had never seen her collapse because of the hacking. And seeing his fiancée collapse was enough to frighten him to his very core. "Are you choking? D—Do you need water? Medical aid? N—nod or... something if you do!"

"Ryoshi, I'm fine! I'm fine..." It nearly scared her how frightened Ryoshi had suddenly become, though she was also grateful for his help, she wondered what had brought this on. "I don't normally..." Wait, that wouldn't help him feel better. "I mean, I usually recover pretty quickly from these things. So I should be fine. I can still help out..."

To be honest, on the inside, she was wondering why she felt so queasy all of a sudden. After all, literally seconds ago, she felt perfectly fine and was even laughing at Ned's antics! What was going on in here? She wondered if it was something she ate...probably not, as she ate lots of stuff and she rarely got sick from those. But then again, there was always that possibility, or it could be something else entirely...

"A—Are you sure you're alright? That was a pretty nasty fit there..." Ryoshi rubbed her back as he helped her set back up. To be honest, he wasn't quite sure why he had reacted so extremely to her coughing. Was it because of how bad of shape he had gotten last time he was coughing like that (which was when he was very ill)? Or was it because of how much he cared for her, and he was just scared that she was actually in trouble? Probably a bit of both...

"Are you going to be alright then?" Ryoshi looked to her with a worried gaze. "Maybe we should stop for today and let you go home and rest, just in case you're catching something?"

"But I'm sure I'm all right! Like I said, I can shrug these things off pretty fast. See?" She suddenly stood up and held out her arms, trying to prove her point, and smiled. "I'm all better now! Just like before..." Then she faltered a bit. Though she wanted to believe that she was better, that queasy feeling still didn't go away...

"It'ss okay, Amy. Go get some resst! I can help Ryoshi out with the Spin Attack," said Ned. "Sseriously. I heard that if you work too hard for sseveral days in a row, you can get ssick from that too! I've sseen a couple people like that."

The Jigglypuff's eyes widened. "Really?" That seemed to be an odd thing to get sick over.

"Yeah, really! Thiss play's definitely going to need you when we're ready to show people, so resst while you can!"

Amy sighed. Ned had a point. Besides, the queasy feeling was really worrying her. So she stood up. "All right, all right...but I'll be back tomorrow, okay? And I'll be fine. You'll see."

She then hugged Ryoshi affectionately and tried to reach for his collar for a kiss, but then stopped herself. "Oh wait. If you catch this too..." She sure looked disappointed, though. Stupid illnesses...

"It'll be okay, sweetie..." He patted her head softly. "We can handle things on our own. Just hurry back home, try to get some sleep, and see if you can try to keep yourself hydrated. With any luck, you'll be feeling better by tomorrow. I'll come check on you in the morning, alright?"

"All right..." She seemed slightly disappointed, but still had hope that everything would be all right. 

As she turned to leave, she then looked at the Skorupi. "Thanks for helping out, Ned. You take care of yourself, okay?"

"But of coursse~! I've been ssick so many times I probably know just about every ssickness there is!"

Amy blinked. "Wow. Poison-types can get sick, too?"

"Oh yeah. Jusst from different sstuff." He then gestured with his claws. "Now go! Don't make your fiancée worry!"

She couldn't help but smile as she left. Even for such a young teen, Ned was very easy to get along with after all. And certainly, she was sure she'd be okay in the morning and would be back to help Ryoshi out with this play just like the past few weeks.

Ryoshi watched her walk away for a while before finally turning back to the Skorupi again. "So Ned, are you ready to get back to practice?"

"Yess! C'mon, let's get sstarted already!" he exclaimed excitedly.

Ryoshi nodded with a grin, picking the practice paper sword up again. His throat tightened for a moment, but after clearing it for a brief moment, he was able to breathe once more, and he pushed it to the back of his mind without another thought.

NEXT PART >>> 

Table of Contents for Ryoshi Sumiura: fav.me/d67tvml

 *Amy-the-Jigglypuff's comments: 

Whew! Finally back. Have to admit it was quite hard getting back into the habit of drawing pictures again thanks to college and Pokemon X taking up a lot of my time, but it feels great to finally start drawing! I sure hope I can get the next four pictures of Part 1 done before next Friday, so hopefully, they won't take as long to draw as this one did. (Not to mention it's really awkward trying to to get used to this whole "Stash-style artists' comments" and all.) But yeah, me and Cecil have an EPIC adventure planned for this one, even longer than Mission 1 was, so brace yourselves! This is definitely the new, official high point before Amy and Ryoshi's upcoming wedding, for sure!

Also, I'm aware that Ezlo technically doesn't appear in The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker; Ryoshi's jaw horn was stretching the Link hat so much that I figured it was just dying to be painted with an Ezlo face to distract the audience.

 =ChicoChikorita's Comments: 

Alllllllright! We are finally back again with more Pokemon of Avalon stuff! The group released this right in the nick of time I belive, as I was starting to get an itch for some more of Ryoshi and Amy's adventures.

The two are practicing for the Hero of Winds and the Magical Conductor's Stick play in a few months when Amy suddenly has a coughing attack. Ryoshi and Ned suggests she goes home in case she's getting sick from working too hard. While she resists at first, she eventually agrees. But will things be okay tommorow, or are things going to get worse? You'll have to stay tuned and find out!

Prose by both of us!
Art by *Amy-the-Jigglypuff, unless otherwise specified.

Cameos in this pic:

StineBat47's Skipper the Marshtomp

IHMH1464's Isaac the Lucario