Some kind of bizarre cult ceremony is in full swing on the third floor!
Under a single electric bulb hanging twenty feet from the ceiling, a congregation of robed and hooded young girls dance and wave red pompoms around a black alter carved with odd angles and unearthly designs on which rests the Pokénomicon.
The cult leader, a young boy wearing a robe emblazoned with a yellow and brown visage of PikaChulu, stands behind the alter leading the girls in a cheerleader-like chant:
"Gimme a Pi, Gimme a Ka, Gimme a Chulu!"
"Gimme a Pi, Gimme a Ka, Gimme a Chulu!"
"IA! IA! PikaChulu Fatagn!"
"IA! IA! PikaChulu Fatagn!"
"‘Cause in his house at R’lyeh – Dread PikaChulu waits – dreaming!"
All the while, the girls comment and complain to one another during the chant, to the irritation of the cult leader:
“It doesn’t even rhyme… I think it’s very non-Euclidian… Yeah, squamous even… These robes are really cramping my style… How long is this gona take, my feet are killing me?!?”
Meanwhile, a telescope at a window behind the cultist points towards the ocean, the point that great PikaChulu will rise…
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When Pikachu and the Team enter, the Cult leader throws off his hood. It’s Gary Oak!
“You’re always a step behind me Ash. Let me clue you in.”
“I happened to be on Cinnabar Island when the Pokénomicon was found."
"Using my family connections, I was able to get into Professor Pine’s lab to study it. Seeing the bizarre and powerful new Pokémon it held, I decided that I should be the first Pokémon master to collect them all!"
"And I’m going to start with the most powerful – PikaChulu!”
“Stealing the Pokénomicon from the lab was easy. The fools! Ha! They don’t even suspect it was me!”
*Dramatic Pause
“Though I intended to start with the great PikaChulu, all this chanting has changed my Nine Tales – for the better. Let me introduce him to you!”
At this point, the shadows in one corner of the chamber suddenly lift off the floor like smoke and congeal into a hideous mongrel form – a Nine-Tailed Hound of Tindalos.
The very sight of the monster shakes the very foundation of everyone's soul. There is something primordial and cyclopean about it that rakes across the fibers and sinews of one's sanity!
Pikachu is unfazed by it (+1 Psychosis), but the Voice in his head is a roaring river of power! '
Now! Stand upon the Alter and take your place among the Gods!'
Ash meanwhile, has his Licking Compulsion jolted into the stratosphere (+2 Psychosis)! In fact, he's not going to be able to do anything other than head over to the Altar right now - where he's going to have to figure a way to break off a chunk. Fine Cthulhu Altars like this cannot be licked. They must be chewed and savored!
Misty is shaken and begins to see the spirits of all the dead Pokémon that have ever been (+2 Psychosis), swirling around her in the air. There's so many of them, that she's barely able to distinguish anything else around her!
Brock's Impaired Vision actually comes in handy here, buffering him a bit from what he is seeing - though what he can hear is rather disturbing (+1 Psychosis).
Nurse Joy just steels herself and accepts that whatever is going on, she doesn't really understand it. As such, her psyche manages to hold itself together pretty well (+1 Psychosis).
Officer Jenny seems to be hit hardest - perhaps not fully getting over her last bit of psychosis (+4 Psychosis) - and suddenly develops an acute sense of how unstable the tower they are all in really is (Fear of Heights).
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(OOC - Combat Round One - but also feel free to monolog while you do so!)