[OOC] Application: Cerealia

[prosodeity]

Applicant Info

◎ Name: Ki
◎ Journal: kinam
◎ Contact: breedslilacs @ aim or therapeuticGuns
◎ Current Character(s): Mabel Pines (ineptus) and Gundam Tanaka (hamham)

Character Info

◎ Character's Name: Rose Lalonde
◎ Character's Canon: Homestuck
◎ Character's Age: 17 (mentally 19 due to canon updates vs in game timing)
◎ Canon Point:
◎ Background/History: Homestuck | Rose
◎ Is the character a hacker and/or do they have a sixth-sense? Nope!

◎ Personality:

With a personality erring on the side of antisocial, Rose Lalonde is a card to interact with. Whether this is a good or a bad card is hard to discern. First you have to deal with the terrible combination of her skepticism and cynicism. Do you really mean what you say? Are you sure everything you do is for as sincere purposes as you claim? Aren't you really just taking a jab at her or her interests or hobbies? The next step of interaction is the passive-aggression. Once she has determined the level of sincerity in whatever it was you did, she will meticulously craft a rebuttal. Assuring that her response is filled with just enough sincerity to be seen as touching, she carefully adds her quiet jabs in return. “Oh, under usual circumstances, this could have been taken as quite rude, but I know <i>you</i> would never do such a thing.” And of course, in the spirit of one-upmanship, this reply must also be over-the-top, but only enough to impress and, possibly, make your action look inferior to hers. If you can make it past that, realizing that she just has a hard time saying thank you, you get the pleasure of sarcasm seeping heavily into her humor. So what's so attractive about speaking with this girl? What could possibly be so compelling as to encourage you to continue interaction? Well, we'll get to that. Trust me when I say 'you'll know it when you see it'.

Rose Lalonde, unlike most stereotypical girls of the young age of thirteen, isn't into shopping and fashion, cartoons and boys, ponies and fairies. If the previous paragraph didn't leave you feeling as though she kind of breaks the mold of peppy girl character, what you're about to read will surely confirm this for you. Rose, firstly, dabbles in psychology. And when I say dabbles, I mean she is not afraid to explore the minds and actions of her friends when opportunities that pique her curiosity arise. Moments of presumed weakness, metaphors that hint at further meaning, things that really seem to hide some deeper, secretive meaning. Of course, then there are moments like the <a href=" ”http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s="6&p=002903”"">mystery of the defaced movie posters. After displaying proof that they were wrecked previous to John's acknowledgment of it, she's asked for an explanation. While she does offer the answer as a friend, her theory sounds just like one you'd probably expect from a therapist. Dave has also received her 'help' in the form of dream analysis..

The bestially strange and fictitious is another preoccupation of hers. And no, we are not referring to flamingos or unicorns. Think more along the line of the horrors that live in the deep. The terrors lurking and looming just outside of your subconscious. Or, perhaps more specifically, Horrorterrors. Ones such as Fluthlu, Foul Patrician of Misery or Nrub'yiglith, Shamebeast King of Grotesquery. And one must never forget Oglogoth, the Deep One. Various creatures who exist and inhabit what is know as the Furthest Ring. All of this information is stored in the Grimoire for Summoning the Zoologically Dubious. As can be expected, this interest goes hand in hand with one of the ridiculously obscure literature.

And, speaking of literature, this brings us to the last subject of her passions we will touch upon; That being her somewhat secretive love of creative writing. While personal journals are strictly for her eyes only, she does not seem to be completely opposed to the idea of spinning tales and poetry to her friends . Thanks, however, to the peek into aforementioned journals taken by Dave, at least one of them reveals that perhaps Rose loves wizards more than she lets on. Her creativity, however, does not stop with simple writing. Once the game SBURB began, Rose was able to view and manipulate John's surroundings as his server player, even without being physically there. When John needed something cleaned up in the back yard, but her cursor couldn't reach? She expanded the space of his room and had him stand closer to the mess, allowing her a further reach. When John needed a little help defeating imps, she wasn't able to provide that in person. She opted to throwing large objects at them instead, such as a bathtub or piano. Once entering the game herself, she uses nothing but a pair of simple knitting needles to blind an intimidating ogre by stabbing it in the eyes. She then employs her yarn to wrestle the creature not only to the ground but into the water leading away from her home, thereby effectively creating a raft to float upon. The young miss Lalonde also happens to be a talented little violinist and she knits! In fact, one of her most adventurous projects was repairing a stuffed bunny of great importance, requiring large sections of previous material to be removed and replaced with the newly knitted panels. Such an endeavor doesn't come with patterns and requires both creativity and logic to accomplish.

And logic seems like the perfect positive facet of her personality to start with. Intelligence is something that Rose has an abundance of and this can really be taken in a variety of ways. She's an excellent problem solver, and here we go back to previous examples given to exemplify this. The expansion of his room to widen her cursor range, the use of objects thrown somewhat haphazardly at monsters when she herself cannot physically help. She is also the one to figure out much of SBURB, relying on FAQs written by others momentarily in an attempt to discern why there was a countdown ticking threateningly at John, but soon abandoned them in favor of scribing her own. The only aspect of the game that seemed to give her real troubles was futzing with the controls. Rose is also, you could say, “book” smart, owning a bookshelf filled to the brim with books, some of which are likely fantasy stories, while others being psychological or philosophical in nature. Her love for literature is likely quite apparent, even if you are never allowed a look at her room. Everyday conversation with her often includes verbose replies, her penchant for the sesquipedalian not at all hidden from the world. Her vocabulary is extensive and utilized regularly, without the assistance of a dictionary or thesaurus on her end. It simply comes natural to her.

Serious and stoic of nature come hand in hand with her next positive trait. Rose likes to keep an air of poise about her, often sounding very mature for her age. Always calm, always collected and always in control. And while normally this can be a rather double-edged sword for girl her age, she is lucky in that a small part of her still indulges in the silly and ridiculous. Where using a magnetic W as a distinguished mustache is okay (as long as no one is looking). Where there is some fun to flying around a pastel rainbow land with a salamander garbed in a cute little cowl by your side, a pair of wands made from knitting needles, a book and a wizard station in your hands. Despite wanting to be so mature, she's still thirteen and she really seems to realize this.

This leads us into number four of her sundry strengths, that being her self-awareness. Her age is not the only thing she realizes about herself. Rose, whilst in control of her emotions, is never pictured working outside her limits. She doesn't push her body to any breaking points, nor truly put her powers to any real test of their boundaries. Yes, to be fair, those may not exactly be small confinements, but she uses only what she needs to get things done. Aside from being aware of the greatest extent that she can push herself to, she is always mindful of mistakes she makes. If she doesn't admit to and apologize for them when she becomes aware they were made, you can bet she will at some point. In fact, by the time she reaches ascension, it seems as though she's come to terms with many of the mistakes she's made along the way, learning from them rather than dwelling or repeating them. At least, the ones that can be repeated.

From here we venture into the realm of her determination. Driven and ambitious, giving up is never an option for this one. And sometimes, neither is failure. Whatever her task, whatever the goal, whether it be for herself or for everyone, once she has set her mind to something she will follow it through as far as she is absolutely able. To this end, she is not easily deterred. If something stands in her way, she will find a way to circumvent it so she may continue. And if a way around the obstruction is not available?

She will blow it the fuck up.

However, this drive isn't always the best feature of hers either. Along with seeing good things through to the end, she also has a tendency to follow plans that are on the side of 'really bad ideas' just as stubbornly. Such as missions that will end with her very much dead in the end. And this is because, unfortunately, she is a very poor judge of character.

Yes, despite all of her study into psychology and people, and all the skepticism she holds for basically everyone, Rose still manages to place faith in forces that are likely Not Good. Remember those Horrorterrors I spoke of earlier? Again, these creatures are very much real, and as a Derse Dreamer Rose is able to hear them. Which means she's able to place her trust in them, even though they do not sound like the nicest bunch. Further more, she places trust into a guy who is kind of creepy. Doc Scratch makes promises of a better chance at survival for her and her friends (though no absolute guarantee) in exchange for Rose running off on a suicide mission that would bring the arrival of a rather evil sounding guy. It's sort of like he's offering her candy in exchange for sitting in his van for a little while. And yet she willingly takes the offer without fully thinking the situation through. In her defense, however, the price to pay for refusing such an offer is too steep for her. She would essentially be dooming her friends to die.

It is likely these decisions that bring about our next course in this dreary half. That being her need for a little emotional detachment, and how that turns into a whole lot of detachment period throughout the game. She is seen various times treating discussion held with her friends as more of a professional than a companion. She breaks down their thought processes, their decisions, their seemingly pointless antics and presents them with the results, trying to remind them of how serious the situation is early on. After obtaining the goal of saving them, she slowly begins with withdraw. Despite the best intentions of her friends, she offers them at best mysterious and cryptic answers to their probing questions as to what she's doing, what she's plotting and what she's up to. At worst, she just won't answer them at all, though eventually this becomes the permanent answer the closer they come to the Scratch. It's not until prompted to ask her magic cueball what to do that she finally answers one of the chums pestering her again.

Here is another moment where I will ask you to recall something for me. Do you recall when I said she likes to give off an air of poise? Of calm, cool, collectedness? Well let me reiterate. She likes to. And for the most part, people believe it. However, sometimes her emotions can get the better of her and she ends up making rash, reckless decisions on impulse. Her first offense being that of when she destroyed her first gate. They're doomed to fail. Their session won't bare fruit. Essentially, they will die there, and she refuses to accept this. She swears to tear the game apart at the seams until she finds every answer it can give her on how to fix this. How to repair her fate. Perhaps it's anger or desperation or an undeniable will to live that spurns this on, but this decision is not made with logic. It is made with emotion. The next offense I am about to describe is the likely the most impacting. The setting is the Land of Heat and Clockwork, and she has just been told to speak to Jade by a magic cueball. Doing so allows her to learn of the death of her mother, which is only a toe in the water of grief and anger driven actions for this example. In a fit of anger, Rose hunts down Jack to exact her revenge. Upon doing so, she comes upon John who has yet to learn of the fate of their parents, and she is in no position to tell him (what with her speaking gobbledygook thanks to being all grimdark and stuff). Instead, she is left leading him to the scene of their murder, where they are confronted by Jack. The two ready their weapons, but before either can take a strike, Rose witnesses yet another murder. That of John. At this point, it's pretty obvious from the look on her face that she's not just mad anymore. She's terrifyingly furious, launching into a battle with the villain that she is doomed to lose.

Now, something almost everything she does and continues to do comes down to one thing. There's one big reason she starts looking for answers, willing to break the game if she has to to obtain them. There's one thing that sends her truly off the deep end and ends with her getting killed against Jack. There's one purpose behind risking her life on a suicide mission that she will never return to thanks to that death. And that one thing is the fate of her friends. From the very beginning, she is repairing their fate, not hers. She is working to save them more than herself. And when one of those very close friends is killed in front of her, she positively loses it, absolutely blinded by rage.

Each friend plays an important role for Rose. Jade, the one whose interactions we are introduced to last, seems to be the best at getting through to her, to make her listen. Yes, John and Dave both advise Rose against actions or choices, but rarely are they taken more seriously than “I will keep my guard up.” It is Jade who convinces Rose that maybe, just maybe, she should second guess what she is doing. Maybe she should question the motives of the Horrorterrors. Unfortunately, this does have a hand in her death at Jack's hands, however the fact is Rose still listened. Even earlier in canon, where normally she would most certainly continue believing what John gave to her for her birthday was some passive-aggressive jab at her interests, it's Jade who reminds her and gets it through her head that not everyone means the opposite of what they say.

Dave, the second one she is shown interacting with, understands where she's coming from the best. Their situations are, in some ways, similar. And this is beyond the fact that they are related. Both tend to be very close guarded, doling out facetious quips and sarcastic comments without a second thought Their conversations are often times back and forth one-upping banter. Sometimes it's a game of psychological chicken. And sometimes their genuine concern for each other shines through. Of course, despite understanding each others situations, and therefor by extension each other, so well, they rarely talk about it if it isn't brought up in one of their various passive-aggressive wars. It would likely take a lot to get them to talk about it together. To really sit down and talk about it.

And John, the first of whom she interacts with and therefor fittingly last addressed, is the one who knows her the best. When she jokes around with John, while she's still often cynical and sarcastic, it's far more playful and lighthearted. There's less passive-aggression there, as she seems to understand that John really just isn't like that. So she's more than willing to allow their conversations to turn out silly and fun once in a while. In fact, John himself claims to know just how well he sees through Rose's facade in his birthday letter to her. And really, he's right.

Now, I've mentioned passive-aggression quite a few times so far. As well as cynicism, skepticism, facetiousness, and a variety of other poor social skills, and I bet you are wondering just where all this came from. Well that, quite unfortunately, all came from her mother. In Rose's eyes, their lives together have been nothing but one giant clever strife. She asks for a funeral for her cat, her mother goes way over the top and builds a mausoleum for the animal, then forces them to stand in the rain for a good portion of the day before simply heading inside to pass out from alcohol consumption. She draws a picture of her pet and writes a poem on the side, and her mother not only attaches it to the refrigerator, but does so with fifteen-thousand dollar frame. And then the woman has the gall to decorate the house with wizards as if she actually likes them. Nothing she has done was viewed as genuine to Rose. That didn't, however, stop her from nearly breaking down after learning of her death, upset with herself for not seeking her out and believing so strongly that her mother was perfectly safe. She admits in that conversation with Jade that all of the passive-aggression was likely just her way of preparing her for what was ahead.

Now. I am going to ask you to remember something one more time, and this will be the last time I do this to you I promise. But, at the beginning of this section, I posed to you the question of “Why would you ever wish to interact with someone like this?” If reading this over hasn't convinced you yet, then let me put it as simply as possible. Despite her shortcomings and attitude, Rose has her light. She can be a rock when desired or a therapist when not really wanted but probably needed, but all the time? She is a friend all the time. One that cares more than she lets on, who's loyalty is stronger than she ever shows, and who would literally give her life for you.

Twice if you're a certain constantly dying Egbert.

◎ Powers/Abilities:

-Seer of Light:

-Conditional Immortality:

-Needles/Magic:

-Knitting:

-Sylladex:

-Violin:

-Pokemon:

◎ Weapons & Other Special Inventory:

Her Sylladex/Strife deck (Trees Modus; Needlekind abstratus)
One set of God Tier pajamas
One pair of needlewands (Quills of Echidna)
One set of non-weaponized knitting needles (Eevee themed in various gauges)
One Pokeball containing
One Badge Case (Containing all 8 badges from both Johto and Kanto)
One Violin

CEREALIA-Specific

◎ Element: Water
◎ Sense: Sight
Sight is most fitting for her because of her class as "Seer" and role in her group, "seeing" the most fortuitous path for her party to follow.
◎ Seven Character Traits:

+ Loyal
+ Caring
+ Intelligent

- Can be a Poor Judge of Character
- Can be Reckless
- Passive Aggressive

/ Cynic

Samples

◎ First-Person Sample: link eventually

◎ Third-Person Sample: Already in game with Mabel and Gundam!

◎ Is your character retaining any previous game memories? Yes!

Yes. Rose will be entering from the game route_29 with three years worth of memories. Route is a jamjar game set in the world of Pokemon. Characters wake up in a small town, being told by a woman claiming to be their "mother" that it's time to start their Pokemon adventure, mirroring the beginning of the video games. So they are kicked out with some trail mix and a new Pokemon companion.

Rose entered this world from a very early canon point - not having even entered SBURB proper yet - which had the biggest impact upon her. Because her life was not constantly in danger (whether due to looming failure, questionable influence or suicide missions) there was no such need to tear things to pieces or grow apart from her friends. If anything, barring a few bumps in the road, her relationship with those closest to her grew stronger than ever and very quickly.

Having been in Route for three and a half years, it's no surprise that a lot transpired. And, despite it being Pokemon Land, not all of it has been rainbows and butterflies and good morals. Likely one of the earliest events that impacted her was becoming moirails with Karkat. While that may not seem like it would do much, this put her in a sort of 'co-leader' position for the extremely large group of kids from both the Homestuck and Soul Eater canons that they were currently traveling with (16 kids strong). This is really what kick started her work ethic and need to keep an eye on her companions, because even after he was sent home (and brought back without memories, therefor ending their moirallegiance), Rose would still sort of try and keep a co-leader position, watching over the group from afar, sometimes making memos to get an idea of what they were thinking when Karkat wasn't looking. (As the game developed and they got onto their third Karkat, he actually named her the leader, relinquishing that position to her without a fuss.) And due to being stripped of their powers, the kids tended to rely heavily on one another, thus allowed Rose to open up a little more than she would have before. When you have to huddle together around the only fire Pokemon in a group of five or more to keep warm in the blistering chill of winter it's hard not to.

The first real event that made an impact was more of an event x2 combo. It started with Team Rocket using radio waves to control mass swarms of Pokemon, having them divebomb characters and drop exploding Pinecones on top of them. The large group of 16 banded together to fend them off before ducking into Union Cave - a cave they needed to travel through to get to the next city. You'd think that would have been enough disaster for them, especially for it being John's birthday, but really it was only beginning.

Following this was a player run plot dubbed "Cavestuck". Once inside the cave, they had split into groups of two - using the buddy system to make sure everyone was accounted for - and John and Gamzee were the last two to enter the cave. Unfortunately, not everything went according to plan, as Gamzee had gone off whatever sopor-replacement he'd been using a week or so before hand and...well. He has some rather murderous tendencies when sober. His first order of business was to knock John out cold with a rock, which lead Rose and Dave to go find him (because wow that was rude of John to suddenly end a riveting game of text marco-polo with his best friend, am I right?). This lead to Gamzee attacking them, Rose having fled at Dave's insistence so she would be able to come back and tend to the two of them if they needed it. And boy did they. Dave was now unconscious with John, and both would suffer concussions from this. Gamzee had moved on to "greener pastures", harassing and attacking various other members of the group until Karkat was finally able to subdue him. Rose spent a good amount of her time until the boys had full recovered watching over them, purchasing an inn big enough to fit the three of them so they could stay together. It was a harrowing ordeal and sometimes - rarely, but sometimes - Rose still has nightmares about it.

After that came the adventure which was dealing with her entire group high on Paras mushrooms. This only encouraged her budding need to watch over her travel mates, as she and Maka were the only two not to take part in the mushroom consumption and therefor had to deal with everyone else. Dealing, of course, meaning smacking them around until they kept moving, giving them loving care when they were puking whatever they tried to keep down as they came off the high, and kept them from killing themselves whilst they were rendered stupid like that. Before these events Rose deeply cared about the well being of her friends and travel group, but afterwards it only heightened her sense of responsibility for them. Her work ethic really set in and she aimed for bigger and better jobs, using the money to support anyone in her care if they needed it. Soon after that, even friends or newcomers who weren't in her care would benefit from her generosity, sending money to those who were broke or warm coats to new comers in the harsh winters of Johto. Rose always does her best to let everyone know that she's there for them if they ever need it. She doesn't want to see anyone struggle or suffer.

Remember when I mentioned radio waves? And how Team Rocket abused them? Well they did it again just after that, causing the water pokemon all across Johto to rage. Both tame and wild. It was pretty uneventful for Rose, beyond trying to help a friend who had a particularly angry water pokemon attached to his arm and one trying to tear down a good forest, until Lugia appeared. Rose had wanted to learn more about legendary pokemon before, but once she had this visual proof that they did exist?

She was all the more spurred on in her tireless research.

Thankfully, they had a bit of a break to just relax and recover from that. And for a while things seemed to be as normal as normal could be. The more relaxed, adventurous setting gives you a chance to actually...well. Relax and adventure. And the thing Rose did most while doing either one was get to know other people better. Learn about the circumstances other foreigners were taken from, talk about home worlds left behind, even swap information about Johto itself in her quest to learn why they were brought here and if they can go home. Not that she wants to by the time her first year anniversary rolls around. Now it's turned into learning why her friends disappear and how to, if possible, keep them there. Getting to meet and talk to so many different people, rather than confined to three best friends and a handful of asshole trolls (who aren't actually all that bad once you get to know them), has proven to be pretty good for her. That's likely no surprise, social interaction always is. The easy setting was so relaxing even that Rose and John decided (finally) to stop doing the awkward tango and just go out already! Of course, they were only rewarded with another event. This time a real terrifying one.

This horror event ushered in swarms of the ghost pokemon Shedinja. If you gazed into their back, your soul was stolen, and guess who fell victim to that. This girl here. Those who had their soul stolen ended up in a different sort of 'world', typically of their own mind's creation. Dreams, nightmares, everything was allowed. Rose had been whisked away to a beautiful moonlight tea party in a sprawling field. Her four best friends had accompanied her. Dave - who had been missing his arms. Jade - who had a good chunk of her head missing (brains and all). Karkat - beaten and battered and poorly stitched back up in multiple places. And John - heart hanging out of a gaping hole in his chest. To anyone other than her, however, they simply looked like squiddles suffering from similar "wounds". These all reflected her inner fears that she wouldn't be able to keep protecting those who mattered most to her. Or that it would be her fault were they ever harmed.

Upon waking up a week later, needless to say she needed plenty of food and plenty of rest.

Halloween came after this, bringing in the possession of any unlucky individuals dressed up for the holiday. Rose was a Drifloon, and the ghost in her body decided it'd be great fun to make her act like one (like all ghosts did this day.) So that involved a lot of trying to float (which ended in lots of injuries), trying to scare people, and mostly trying to lead people away. Which didn't work all that well for anyone involved...mostly because her victims were all possessed as well.

Following Halloween came a canon update. Her first one. Where before she was from just about to enter SBURB, she passed out for a week and spent...not a long time at home, but there was a lot to take in. Going from being a girl with a pair of needles to fight with to blowing up in the creation of a giant, green (and likely radioactive) sun and becoming a God in a suicide mission is kind of a lot to experience. And upon waking back up, she was pretty tired. And pretty unsure about her life and her choices to some extent. But all in all, pretty happy. And even happier when she had learned that not only would they be able to enter Kanto soon (the original setting of the Pokemon Blue game she'd played before, so very near and dear to her), but her loving boyfriend had bought them rail passes so they could do so as soon as she was feeling up to it.

She, of course, wanted to go immediately and so they did! Of course, as per usual, good things weren't always what they seemed. Team Rocket planned on riding this exact train too. Not only was the train hijacked, it was set up with a bomb. And while people were trying to desperately diffuse it, they and all the other passengers were being attacked by various Rocket members who were after their Pokemon. Everyone survived with minimal damage and Pokemon loss, Rose being lucky enough to keep her entire party on her, and they were free to finally (hopefully) enjoy the new region.

All was quiet until February, when various Pokemon began appearing in droves on Valentine's day, singing a very calming and almost...love-inducing song. While on the love-high this music brought about, John felt it a perfect chance to propose to Rose. Rose, of course, graciously accepted. Though the next day came Serious Talks and some Awkward Feelings, because they're only young teenagers after all (13 and 14!), but in the end? Rose decided she liked the idea, and John was pretty satisfied with it as well. An extended-engagement wouldn't hurt anything, right?

Again came a calm (before the storm). It was pretty enjoyable up until May, when Team Rocket put another plan into motion. And this one? This one was a doozy. It started with causing a ruckus with some of the ickiest Pokemon you can find - Grimer, Muk, Trubbish and Garbordor - filling the streets of major cities and being a general pain. While the trainers tried to deal with this stinky catastrophe, the Rockets made out to capture themselves a legendary - Suicune. But oh no, it didn't stop there. No, with Suicune raging like it was, its friends Raikou and Entei were none too happy with this development and decided to take out their anger on Pokemon World as well. Blizzards, unbearable heat, violent thunder storms -- you name it, Johto and Kanto had it. Eventually they escaped, and you'd think that would be the end of it, right? The legendaries run free, the yucky Pokemon are all cleaned up, everyone's happy, right?

Wrong.

No, see, they didn't care that the legendaries got free. Not really, anyway. Because they got what they'd wanted - at least a small portion of it - and that was DNA samples. And what did they want to do with those? They wanted to see if they could give themselves powers. And it worked for the most part! They sure did get powers! But it was neither certain what level of power they'd receive, nor if they could control it. It also had the lovely side effect of mutating their victims. To mass test it, the destroyed the Pokecenters in a few major cities with explosives carrying this mutigen and it was then introduced into the air, effectively infecting a massive amount of the populace. Rose was graced with a Level 3 classed infection, taking on Suicune's DNA. She had mild mutations to deal with - sheet white skin, a core temperature dropping to below a freezing temp (everything was too warm. Far too warm. She was ice cold to the touch), ice burns and crystals forming on her skin around areas such as her jaw, elbows, knees, knuckles and such. She had a small crystal formation growing from her forehead and her blond hair had streaks of purple throughout. - as well as finding herself with ice breath she couldn't control and the ability to freeze over everything she touched whether she wanted to or not. By the time her powers wore off (after a week but months before her mutations finally disappeared) her bed was a veritable ice cavern from which she rarely emerged. It took almost four full months for all of her symptoms to disappear, the frozen core temp being the longest lasting.

November that year came her second canon update. There was less to take in this time, jumping from ascending to God Tier to a year or so into their travels. She got to watch John's ancestor pummel a troll, claiming she was "Sea Hitler" and such. It was an Experience, but nothing was terribly new with this trip back home. Of course, riding the coat tails of this in December was the apocalypse - or what seemed like it would be the apocalypse. It was an awful ice storm, feeling very much like the world was ending. This was caused by a trio of legendary Pokemon, and the people of Johto banded together to weather this storm and they survived! With...some property damage but all in all they were okay.

After this was a real break, a stint of peace and quiet, traveling with friends as they come and go, earning badges and catching Pokemon. It was really nice right up until June, when Rose's third and final canon update took place. Again not much time passed back home - another year or so - but this one did bring some changes. Back home Rose had really gotten into drinking, becoming an alcoholic much like her mother used to be, upsetting most of her travel companions. During this time she also began dating Kanaya Maryam, though drinking and dating never really go well together. From what you could tell, Kanaya wasn't really happy with the whole alcohol problem, to the point that she ended up yelling at the Seer - with reason. If she was drunk, she wouldn't be able to steer them where they needed to go. Her abilities were impaired and they desperately needed her as they entered the new session. Rose didn't seem to understand most of this at the time, instead looking up to the girl and asking her if this meant they were breaking up. Whether or not they were, Rose wasn't getting an answer as that was when she returned to Johto. She had a lot of questions, a lot of regrets and an awful hangover. Soon after waking up, she split from John and Dave, traveling ahead of them in the middle of the night with just a note left behind to explain herself. She needed to think.

Probably unwisely, she decided not to talk much to either of them, nor many of her friends during that time, causing some of them to worry about her. Some more than others, such as John, who was still her fiancee at the time. When she saw just what effect this was having on him - John having stayed up for nearly days straight and starting a sleep deprived round of "night blogging" if you will - she finally conceded and returned to their side. Things still stirred in her head in a way she couldn't explain or sort out, but for the time she pushed them aside and focused on the friends she had here rather than back home.

In September Rose and John proved that they were maturing well as they grew older. Between the two of them, they had money to spare and put a good chunk of it to good use, purchasing a home in Ecruteak to settle down in. They would still be able to travel and such, but for the time being they just wanted to relax and wanted a place their friends could stay for free when they passed through the town. They would hold holidays and birthdays there with plenty of room for everyone, and it would be grand.

And then the next month brought another Halloween event, though this one not nearly as light hearted as the previous ones. Monsters kidnapped people away from their homes - actual monsters, not the Pokemon they've grown to know and love. They stole their Pokemon, locked them away in some spooky castle, and it was a true battle to get free. They fought monsters and bosses left and right, figuring out puzzles to retrieve their companions, working together to get everyone out. Injuries and deaths were no longer simply glitched better. It was a terrifying experience. Rose wasn't nearly as prepared as she had wanted to be, but with help from her friends it didn't end as badly as it could have.

And, of course, right on the tail of that event was a lovely tornado in November. Their house sustained minimal damage in the storm, but John had gone missing and she and Dave had been worried sick that time. It was shaping up to be the couples' first real fight when John finally contacted them again, Rose angry from fear that he was hurt or worse. Dave thankfully diffused the situation, and from there things were easy once again. Rose became very interested in a new Pokemon known as Munna and Musharna, wondering if the Dream Sand they produced - which was able to put humans and Pokemon to sleep, even on a mass scale - could be what was bringing everyone to Pokemon World. Perhaps they were all having a dream together? Her research shifted to them, performing experiments on friends and willing participants, though her interests in legendary Pokemon hadn't waned any. She was quickly becoming more of a researcher than a breeder, thirsting for knowledge and craving answers.