Water poured into Utopia as soon as I opened the small portal. I forgot that my go-to portal setting had been like that for Mothra, so I directly changed the setting to disallow water from passing through. With that done, I pressed mom's number and placed the phone beside my ear. A few seconds passed in silence, and I realized there was no ringing tone. After moving the phone to look at the screen, I discovered I had no signal, and I suddenly felt like face-palming.
Obviously, there was no signal, I, technically, was under water in a mountain with a lot of stones and minerals along with who knows what else between me and the signal I needed for my call. I should have realized/remembered that the moment I had the idea of calling my parents, or at least when the water leaked in. I was clearly still off my game; It seemed like I was not as calm as I wanted to be, and it came to me that that was likely why I suddenly felt like talking to Mom, (…..) and Dad.
However, realizing that did not change the fact that I wanted to talk to Mom, at least not really. I really did not feel like leaving my room, and Utopia in general, right now just so that I could catch a signal to call her. Speaking of wants and needs, I could not help but consider our channel exploration. I had temporarily rejected pausing the exploration when it came up earlier, but thinking about it, doing so actually made sense.
The exploration itself had been more of a spur-of-the-moment thing that started before we had finished our previous exploration of the main space, or more like the chambers connected to the main one. Unlike the (under)water channel, those chambers had an outlined area, so I knew how much exploring I had to do, and even if we included the Tympole tunnel that did not change much. As with the Fighting Exit before, I was not planning to really explore the area outside the mountain right now.
Ultimately, the three sub chambers had a defined finite area for me to explore, while the (under)water channel was an unknown that went on for at least ten plus kilometers, given how the recorded team broke off their exploration after 12-13 kilometers. I had no idea how long I would need to finish my probe of the channel, but I was pretty sure that I could finish with all 3 chambers in 2-3 days. Yet, even though those were true and reasonable points, I could not help but feel like going with that option felt like we (I) were retreating from the channel.
Even to me, that thought felt a bit childish; Yet, I still felt as if, on some level, that choice would signal that I had been intimidated by the ambush; Something that while not common, was still not all that rare. It was not as if we had not been ambushed before, because we had, but I also had to acknowledge that none of those had managed to take us off guard the way this one had. In a sense, this one was the first true, or at least successful, ambush we experienced.
It was in a way a warning that I may have underestimated the danger of the wild. If I could get hurt like this in a place under alliance jurisdiction, then just how much more risky was exploring the truly wild zones going to be? On the other hand, it truly showed just how broken Utopia's healing abilities were. During my observation of the recovery process of my chest, I had seen the ease with which Utopia had healed the damage to my lung, heart, ribs, and spine.
The area around the wound had essentially been frozen during the process, preventing it from worsening or me from bleeding out even without me having to interfere with my aura or psychic abilities. Having witnessed the full process, I was confident that Utopia could have healed me even if my heart and lungs had gotten blown up, though it would have taken longer to do so, which was more than fair.
Frankly, the way I saw it, I was essentially immortal unless I got one shot, and I was referring to the instant death kind here. Given the miraculous healing ability Utopia possessed, someone would need to blow up my head/brain to kill me, or at least destroy enough of it to stop me from being able to think since I was pretty sure I would be able to survive anything else long enough to move to Utopia.
It was not the highest level of immortality seen in some eastern novels or western comics where some individuals recovered as long as a single cell remained, which was actually pretty close to what some of the ghost types like Gengar could do now that I thought about it. Still, the insurance/healing capacity Utopia provided me, was still very, very impressive. There were not many who could survive losing their hearts or decapitation after all.
Admittedly I had to give myself some minus points since my situation was not innate but instead tied to the condition that I was able to enter Utopia. Even if I could do so within a second or less, time was relative, and a second could be long or short depending on who was involved. The Jellicent issue had not been one of those, which was partly why I stuck around for as long as I did after surviving the ambush.
I should probably have directly entered Utopia instead of trying to stabilize my situation, but various emotions were running high at the time, so I went with a less rational/optimal approach. I realized that my thoughts ended up straying again, so I set the self-criticism aside and focused back on the exploration issue. I decided to once again bring the issue up with the others during breakfast tomorrow. I felt that given my indecision on the matter, collectively deciding which option to go with after everyone had calmed down a bit more compared to yesterday would be for the best.
I tried to get some shut-eye after making that decision, but sleep just would not come to me. Deep down I knew that I still wanted to speak to Mom, (….) and Dad. A quick look at my phone revealed that 10:27 p.m., which meant that my parents should still be awake. Thinking of calling them, I also noticed that I had left the small portal from before open. It was a small slip that was thankfully harmless since no one could enter without my permission. Not that anything bigger than my palm would have fit through that opening anyway.
Regardless, I decided to go along with my subconscious's want to talk to my parents, so I stood up, put on my shoes, and enlarged the opening, before stepping through. I inevitably got wet even though I teleported near the entrance of the Meteor Falls, so I used my powers to dry my clothes along with my body. I also used telekinesis to draw the water from the surface of my phone before I opened the screen and confirmed that the phone now had the signal it needed to call Mom.
I made the call and I actually felt a bit excited when I heard the ringing tone coming from my phone. My breath hitched a tiny bit when the call finally connected and I heard my Mom's voice.
"Hello? Mika, honey; What's up? Is everything okay over there?" She asked sounding a bit worried, and I quickly realized why she sounded/reacted like that even though I had not said anything yet.
"Honey, are you okay? Has something happened? You usually don't call this late? Do you need any help?" Mom posed one question after the other in rapid succession. I felt a tingle run through my body hearing her concerned tone. I took a moment to take a calming breath and let out a sigh before I replied.
"Everything's ok, Mom. It's been some time since we last spoke, and I thought about you and dad, so I decided to call you," I said with a calm tone, which honestly was harder than I expected it to be. "I didn't wake you up or interrupt anything, did I?" I followed up, which got a swift response.
"No, no, no, no, you didn't. Your Dad and I were just watching some videos," Mom hurriedly replied, and I heard Dad chime in with a "Hi, son" from the background, which was quickly followed by a yelp; *ahem* A grunt before I heard Dad grumble that she didn't have to pinch him and that he just said "Hi", which put a smile on my face. I was not surprised to hear another yelp, I meant grunt after he did that.
"Your Dad just stubbed his toe," Mom said perfectly serious, which nearly had me snort. I managed to stop that and simply returned an "O". "Are you sure everything's fine? You know you can tell me if anything is up," Mom inquired again, sounding parts inquisitive parts concerned. "I know, I know," I returned, feeling warmth at her concern.
"Everything's going well on my side; We are still exploring the Meteor Falls," I followed up before I shifted the topic to them since my call was to hear her speak not to chat myself. "How are things on your side? Are you back in Kanto, or are you traveling around the western continent again?" I asked, partly because I was really curious, as it had been nearly 2 weeks since we last talked, and partly because I knew that the question would get Mom going.
As I expected Mom began to share everything they had been up to, and Dad occasionally chimed in as well from the background, this time without getting pinched. I mostly listened to her, to them, only speaking up when I had to. It was only half an hour later that Mom slowed down a bit and I realized how much time had passed. I could tell that I was already much more at peace than I had been before, so I told my parents that it had gotten late. I asked them to take care of themselves before wishing them a good night.
I calmly put my phone away after hanging up, before letting out a deep sigh that expelled a lot of the "hidden" tension I had been feeling. Hearing Mom's voice, and Dad's as well, had calmed me in a way that felt a bit foolish since I was a grown ass man, but I decided not to dwell on it and just be thankful that it worked the way it did. Feeling more clear-headed, I let my gaze sweep around for a moment. Feeling satisfied, I let no2 clad my body in a psionic film before teleporting back to the channel.
Once back to the place we had previously entered Utopia, I went back in, and after confirming that I was dry, I took off my shoes and changed into a comfy set of pajamas before settling on my bed. I closed my eyes and allowed myself to drift to sleep. My inner timer told me it was a bit past 6:30 a.m. when I opened my eyes from a restful and dreamless night of sleep. I honestly had expected to experience some peculiar dreams, but I actually ended up sleeping like a baby.
Feeling well rested and in a weirdly good mood, I decided to go to the kitchen and prepare a nice breakfast for everyone since there was still more than an hour before the others started to show up for our usual breakfast get-together. I obviously had to cheat using telekinesis since I wouldn't be able to prepare the portions I needed to satisfy everyone otherwise, but at this point, I didn't really see it as cheating. It was a reasonable use of a natural talent and a surprisingly good way to train one's control since cooking required a certain degree of finesse that rough/untrained telekinesis did not satisfy.
I had to chuckle when I remembered my first few attempts at cooking using telekinesis. Smashed eggs with egg shells everywhere, flour and condiments flying around, along with more than one broken utensil/plate. As of now, I was a pro at psychic/telekinetic cooking, and I was really proud of it, though most other Psychics would probably feel baffled at my use of their revered abilities.
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