WaR: Channeler

Diary Entry #1 - 4th Augustine 3116

Dear Diary,

Today was my birthday and my Mommy bought me this diary so I have something to do on the Shuttle while she's working. My Mommy is a bodyguard for the Captain and so spends a lot of time with him, which leaves me all on my own.

She's really pretty, she has long black hair just like mine and her blueish skin is a bit paler than mine, but she said that's because I didn't live on the surface for as long as she did. We're from Gliese 581 g you see, half of the planet is always sunny and the other half is always dark. We lived on the Border near the Casinos where my Mommy worked throwing out drunks. Then she got a job working for this space captain and we moved away.

We're on a Class Theta Shuttle and spend most of our time crossing the Zodiac systems delivering cargo. I think the Captain is a salesman or something because he always has a buyer in every port for something and picks up new stock from strange places.

It's not all that bad though diary, I get to talk with the ship computer a lot, his name is ACE which stands for Automated Computer Environment and he's really nice to me and looks after me. He tells me lots of stories when I'm in bed too, then I have these dreams about a little green thorny plant with a crown.

That's all for today diary, Mommy says I need to go to sleep. Hopefully ACE will tell me more stories.


Diary Entry #14 - 11th Benedictus 3116

Dear Diary,

I've been having more dreams about the plant. His name is Cacnea and he looks funny. His body is short and round but he's got little legs which is weird for a plant, and his arms are all covered in prickles like a Hedgehound. He waddles like a penguin and is always dancing around like there's nothing wrong with the universe. He's green like an emerald and his eyes are as black as space. He's really sweet though, he's always looking after me and protecting me in my dreams. It's like he's protecting my soul.

The dreams feel so real, but I don't want to tell my Mommy in case she thinks I'm a freak. Dancing talking plants can't be real right?


Diary Entry #17 - 16th Benedictus 3116

Dear Diary,

The dreams are getting stranger. It feels like I can control what happens. I can make Cacnea appear whenever I want to when I'm dreaming and he does what I tell him to. Last night I was really hungry before I went to bed and so I told Cacnea to bring me some burgers and he did! Then when I woke up this morning I felt really full and my mouth tasted of sauce.

I might ask ACE about dreams. He knows everything and won't tell my Mommy. I can trust him.


Diary Entry #22 - 1st Plutarch 3117

Dear Diary,

Happy New Year Diary! Sorry I didn't write much for the last month, we docked on Chi Virginis b and we stayed in a hotel in the Capital city of Medeiros. I got to meet lots of other kids there, but did you know that on Chi Virginis B everyone has grey skin and really small narrow eyes?! It's really weird, but I bet they thought I looked funny too with my blue skin and wider nose.

I asked ACE about my dreams and he said he thought I was dreaming about an ancient creature called a Pokémon That's really weird, I didn't know there were other creatures that used to be able to talk like we can. He said they went extinct when Earth was abandoned in 2100, so they've been gone for over 1000 years! I asked him why he thought I was dreaming about them, and he said he thought I saw Cacnea in a holovid but didn't really remember it, and it was just triggering the thoughts. I didn't tell him I could control Cacnea, that'd just be weird right, why would a Pokémon listen to a human?

It's my Mommy's birthday tomorrow, I overheard the Captain say he had something special planned for her, well so do I! I managed to get her some flowers in Medeiros, I hope she likes Tigurlarian Roses.


Diary Entry #23 - 3rd Plutarch 3117

Dear Diary,

My Mommy's birthday was great! She loved my present and she was smiling all day after seeing the Captain. I asked her what he gave her, and she told me I wouldn't understand until I was older. I dreamt about Cacnea again last night and asked him if he was a Pokémon and he nodded! We were in a field full of flowers, there were thousands of them and they all looked different to any I've ever seen before, there were other creatures there too, were there more different types of Pokémon than just Cacnea? I need to ask ACE about that.


Diary Entry #24 - 4th Plutarch 3117

Dear Diary,

I asked ACE about Pokémon, he said there were over 700 different species and some of them could change into others. There was one called Eevee that could change into 8 different things depending on how you looked after it. That sounds really cool! I wish Pokémon were still around. Imagine living with all of them, that would be so amazing. I could be friends with as many as possible and Cacnea would look after me and give me someone to talk to when I feel lonely.


Diary Entry #29 - 39th Plutarch 3117

Dear Diary,

I told ACE everything. The dreams were getting more and more real and I just couldn't cope. I had to know I wasn't going crazy. He said there are other people like me and I don't need to be afraid. He said I'm a Channeler. I asked him to bring up the definition of it onto the screen in my room so nobody else would know I was looking and this is what it said;

'Channelers are females with the ability to summon the spirits of ancient Pokémon to serve them in times of need. They are the only people known to be able to interact with Pokémon and are capable of lucid dreams involving the spirits that affect the world around them. There are three known Channeler honing centres within the Zodiac region, they are located on the planets Gliese 581 g, Gliese 436 b & WASP-17b. The use of their powers can put a heavy strain on the body if used without proper training.'

I think a honing centre is like a school. That'd be really cool if I could go there and learn more about it. Maybe they could teach me how to bring Cacnea onto the ship so I wouldn't be bored all the time...


Diary Entry #34 - 11th Aristotle 3117

Dear Diary,

We're heading to Tau Ceti e in the Cetus constellation now, the Captain has a 'big job' that he really needs my Mommy for there. We picked up a massive cargo from another ship, which was really odd, and the crates are all covered in massive tarpaulins to stop anyone seeing the contents. Maybe we're on a secret mission from a government like in those spy holovids...

ACE gave me a book on Channelers so I can learn more about them, I can really control Cacnea in my dreams now! It's amazing what we can do together. I just wish I could find a way to summon him next to me so we can play together on the ship, but I don't think that's in this one. Maybe I can sneak off the shuttle when we dock and find a book about it in a store, the cargo will be the first thing to go, I could hide there. We're going to be docked for a few days, nobody will notice if I go missing for a few hours right...​

Khalisa closed the diary, tears streaming from her ice blue eyes. It was all she had left of her daughter, the Tigurlian roses were long gone. She had read the same pages over and over for 20 years, reliving her mistakes in her mind, wishing she could change the past. The final entry made her cry every time. How was she to know that the exchange on Tau Ceti e was a sting operation? How was she meant to know that they had been set up by a traitor amongst their crew? How was she meant to know that her own daughter would be hiding amongst the cargo that was set ablaze by her summoned Pokémon trying to fight off the waves of men invading the ship...

She wished she could go back and tell her darling daughter all about how they were the same, to teach her how to summon her own Pokémon, to teach her how to be a Channeler just like her Mommy. If only she had protected her daughter the way she protected the captain, he survived the assault, many others from the shuttle didn't.

But you can't just wind the clock backwards. The only thing you can do is move on. She had tried, bouncing around various jobs, a black stain against her name for what was judged a 'failure' to protect the crew and her kin. She couldn't hold anything down long term, and he was the reason why. That traitor, that Judas. Twenty years of pain because of his greed.

But not any more.

Khalisa stood outside the cottage, hidden deep in the forests of WASP-17b. The universe has a cruel irony to it sometimes, sending her to the same planet her daughter was conceived on, to put her daughter's memory to rest. This is where he lived now, feasting on illicit meats and living a life of luxury with his ill gotten gold. She had searched for two decades to find him, to kill him.

She closed her eyes, her silver dreadlocks stood on end and she glowed with a purple energy. To her side, a ghostly wisp materialised, slowly forming itself into a shape similar to a chandelier, its mouth appearing to be sewn shut, a flame lit at the end of each of its four limbs and a larger one rose from the top of what appeared to be its head.

“Chandelure,” she beckoned, eyes now wide open, a piercing gaze fixated on the door of the cottage. “Inferno.”



As she was bundled into the back of the police shuttle, she cackled wildly. They could never prove she did anything, all anyone saw was a woman standing next to a burning building, mocking the corpse of a frail old man. She had no weapons, no flame accelerators nor the means to start a fire. Officially she was being held for breach of the peace and interfering with a crime scene, but she knew they wouldn't stick.

She closed her eyes. She was so tired, a twenty year vendetta was finally over. Her energy sapped by the attack. She could see her Chandelure coming towards her, leading two other shadowy figures. One was much larger than the other, the smallest was clearly not human. The shapes drew nearer, the smaller of the two appeared to have some form of crown, the taller had long sweeping hair, just like her daughter...

Not just like, it was her. They embraced for the last time.

“It's over,” Khalisa whispered as death took her, reuniting her family.

Spoiler

WaR: Supernatural - Space - Human Main
Target mon: Cacnea
Rank: Medium (10k)
Char count: 10136

 

DIBS!

*grins evilly*

 

Introduction: I really like how you start the story, a young girl breaking in her new diary by telling it who she is. You quickly give a rundown of her current situation and explain the characters. I would normally condemn this and say it could be explained through the story/dialogue, but the way you wrote the story makes it actually work very well, since there isn't actually any dialogue, just her words in the diary.

Story/Plot: Oh my God. The feels. ;.; The emotional punch of your story was incredible. I honestly thought that she was going to be okay... And then that ending. It killed me inside. I needed to just put that out there.

Okay, so I like the way you wrote this. Diary entries from a nameless girl turn out to be read by her mother, who shares her abilities. Side note- I liked the little details of how you changed the dates so they would be more futuristic.

One thing I noticed. She's an alien. That's an established fact. How would she know anything about Earth, and why are Pokémon from Earth in the dreams of aliens, instead of humans?

I would like a bit more elaboration about ACE and how it works, to be honest. I guess it makes sense that a young girl wouldn't know anything real technical about such a complex machine, but still.

Why doesn't she tell her mom? Kids should be able to trust their parents above all else and tell them everything, and unless they have endure abuse, etc. they tend to. This girl really loved her mom and should have known that she wouldn't be judged, especially after ACE told her it was nothing to be afraid of. Or she could have just told her mom about the dreams, which in themselves weren't all that weird. They were just dreams. Kids have silly dreams all the time. Her mom could have figured it out from there, as she is a Channeler too.

One last thing

How does this kid, who really can't be more then ten, have any idea what drunks are? I didn't learn about alcohol and drugs until I was about ten. She is young enough to not see the obvious signs that her mom is banging the captain. And what sort of mom lives in a casino with her kid? That is not a good environment.

Description: Really the only description in your story comes at the end, when you switch to third person. This isn't at all bad, because it seems unlikely a girl as young as she is would think to give complex descriptions to her diary, of all things. You totally make up for it at the end, too, so you're good here. I like how you make it so everything fits with your diary theme.

Length: Juuuust over the minimum. Honestly, I could see this being a little longer, as a lot of time seems to pass between some of entries and you could try filling it in. You could maybe elaborate more on her world, as you have bare bones here.

Grammar: Flawed, but I'm not sure if it's artistic choice of not, because her grammar is flawed in the diary entries, like here

Both mommy and shuttle are capitalized when they shouldn't be. They are both common nouns the way you're using them here, so they shouldn't be capitalized. However, it's possible that this girl considered these things so important to her life that they should be capitalized.

But it becomes perfect when you switch to third person at the end, so I'm thinking you did that on purpose to get the point across that this is a young girl with an imperfect grasp on grammar. Or maybe English isn't her first language, because, you know, she's an alien. Either way, the mistakes can be explained away easily.

Oh, wait. One thing.

You have a comma after her speaking for the first time and the sentence continues. It's technically wrong because that spot there should only be used for telling if she is talking or how she is talking, using words like said, whispered, yelled, etc.

Verdict: Cacnea is caught! I have a rule that if you can make me cry for a reason other then painfully bad grammar, you deserve the mon, and my first time reading through this, I actually did cry at the end.

WaR:
Genre- To be honest, I get much more of a sci-fi feel from this then a supernatural one. Between the aliens and the planets, not to mention the spaceship, this is most definitely science fiction. HOWEVER. I can see the difficulties of setting a supernatural story in space, and you did try to make up for it with the Channeler thing. That's supernatural.

Setting- If that isn't Space, I don't know what is. Very nicely done, very nice indeed.

Characters- The big one. Your prompt was Human Main. Human =/= Alien, and your main characters are aliens. It would make much more sense to just do this with humans, instead of making them aliens for no apparent reason. It would explain a lot, such as why Pokémon from Earth are showing up in the dreams of an alien.

So, you can take your Cacnea, but I'm going to say you didn't stick close enough to your prompt to get the extra mon. Sorry.

EDIT-
@Prince Vultan; after talking with Princess Crow, I learned that usually, you can get a prize a rank or two lower than the one you were aiming for if you tried but didn't quite succeed. As you clearly tried, take a Simple.