Storm at the Vile Villa

The body formerly known as Marcus walked right up to Maya and stopped in front of her; blocking her path. His blackened eyes seemed as if he was looking at someone just past Maya; yet he appeared to be talking to her, since he was pointing right at her for the first half of his scolding, twisting his finger around as if he was pointing at Maya like she was an object. "What do you think you're doing, young lady? You have no business in here. You're only going to end up hurting yourself and your toys. I don't have time to deal with you right now; I've got bigger problems. Leave the more dangerous fun to those of us with more experience."

---

Lex turned around and saw the Vulpix and hopped in between Sofa's belly and his arm for protection. He waited for a few seconds, then climbed out and touched the Vulpix's face to make sure he was real; and then he fell and hugged Nero's leg crying, saying a lot of garbled Wynauts that were incomprehensible, every now and then actually saying clearly a *dad* or *sleep* through his crying that Nero could have understood.

The blank flickering eyes looked at Marcus in amusement and then Maya's head cocked to the side and her lips twisted into a smile. She giggled. Dororo quickly slunk away, realizing that he needed to get her bag back. He ran back to the back entrance.

"Ara~" Though the voice was Maya's, the inflection and sing song sound of it was wrong. It also had a slight echo, as if a hushed voice was being spoken with it at the same time. "But this is so fun! She has so much spiritual power! It is like a moth to a flame and I got here first."

Maya's body swung about playfully, spinning around to some imagined music as she danced her way around Marcus. "Your kind is far to serious~" She sang, knocking an already cracked and dusty vase off a hall table.

'Marcus' was getting visibly annoyed at 'Maya' and followed after her, as if he was going to walk right through her. "This is exactly why I don't like you ghost type pokemon. You're too young to appreciate what you've got. I'm tired of being your keeper, Ellylldan." Marcus' hand grabbed Maya's arm just above her elbow and spun her around as the vase floated back up into place, all of the pieces coming back together, cracks and all; as if it had been knocked over countless times before. "If you weren't so childish, you'd appreciate that you have a priestess here and understand how dangerous it is to mess with their kind."

Marcus' left index and middle fingers reached out and tapped Maya's forehead lightly, knocking her back. "There. Now try having fun with half of her spiritual power. This is for your own good; you're lucky she's so unstable right now or else I wouldn't have been able to do that. Now you'll get out of her body before she breaks that barrier if you know what's good for you. Forced detachment is not a good feeling; I can tell you from experience, especially from someone with strong spiritual power. And stop breaking things." Marcus' body spun around quickly and walked towards the stairs leading to the third floor. -sigh- Now for the kid...

---

Lex stood up and wiped his eyes, a slight smile coming back to his face as he didn't feel quite as bad as earlier now that he had someone to talk to. Yet, he shook his body in a "no" motion at Nero waking Sofa up. *I'll do it. He won't like you if you wake him up.* Lex then walked over to Sofa, who was still laying on his side. It hadn't even been an hour's rest, and Lex was worried that they weren't going to be able to wake him up at all. He stood in front of Sofa's face thinking about what to do, and then an idea came; making his smile grow just a bit more.

He shoved at Sofa's huge body in an attempt to move him, putting all his force into shoving him. Sofa rolled onto his back like Lex wanted, but for a completely unrelated reason; yet Lex still felt triumphant at moving the behemoth, hopping up and down happily. He then lifted up Sofa's arm as best he could and stood underneath it. His balloon-like body looked squished underneath the arm; his face was scrunched up all funny. He then threw up the arm as high as possible; which wasn't that high, and as it fell, a bright orange outline started to form around Alexander.

Marcus leaned in the doorway of one of the rooms in the attic, his arms crossed and left leg crossed over the right with a devilish smirk on his face. He looked at the Misdreavus glaring at him and gave her a wink. The warped voice that came out of Marcus’ mouth dripped with sarcasm,

“You know, for being a priestess, you aren’t doing a very good job of it. You’re not putting barriers up in your mind, you’re not sporting any kind of physical protection from spirits. No amulets, blessed objects, not even a *chuckle* cross; although those sticks never work anyway unless they were held by some priest as he died. The point is, I know your name, your past, your insecurities, and your fears; which is the most important thing a priest should keep from those like me. On top of that, although your spiritual power is very high for your age, none of us would have a hard time breaking through it. Over half of us could crush your mind if we wanted to, and I'm just a run of the mill spect'; and your only protection from that is your two young Pokemon."

Marcus' body stood up straight and entered the room slightly, with two or three steps before standing still once more, arms still crossed and stance still relaxed. "Aside from all that, you do realize being exorcised isn't at the top of the list of things ghosts want, right? Why do you think we’ve been ignoring you? Why would we come to you when you try and tempt us just so you can play ghost hunter?” Marcus’ face suddenly became dark and serious; the energy in the air was palpable, saying the final sentence with gritted teeth. “Now, I don’t know why our house is so popular with the spiritually adept all the sudden, but I can speak for all of us when I say…stop trespassing. We don't like your kind. Get off our land.”

---

Lex Countered the arm as it fell and sent it back into Sofa's face, forcing him to smack himself. The arm came falling down again and out of instinct, Lex Countered again. This time the smack was audible, shaking Sofa's face and body, making it jiggle. He shook his head for a second as he came back to consciousness and looked over at Lex with glazed over eyes. *What? I'm tired...*

Lex hopped up and down while talking quickly, *Dad was hit by some scary white cloud thing, and then he hit me and I'm scared and I need you.*

Sofa groaned his disapproval of this situation as he rolled over onto his side to sit up, looking at Nero. *Slow down, what's going on? And who is this?*

"Okay...you're too young and naive to understand the gravity of the situation, so let me put it like this..." The specter walked Marcus' body forward, slowly taking steps towards the young priestess in training. "You're in a house FULL of bitter, resentful ghosts that have had friends and loved ones removed from existence by people just like you. You have practically no protection from us, no experience to protect yourself from us, and you want us to help you get better at killing our kind."

She's just a kid! She doesn't want to kill you, she even has ghost pokemon.

Marcus' head turned sharply and yelled at the wall before returning his attention to the girl, a slight smile returning to his mouth. "Back in your corner! So here's how this is going to go, Astina: You leave, I make you leave or my friends rip you to shreds."


The floorboards started to warp and the shutters shook to make the point they weren't alone in the room.

"Sound good?"