Cassius casually added a small haunter plushie keychain to his purchases, and then headed to the counter to check out. More openly, he picked up a larger haunter plushie near the front of the store. "Maiden has a doll collection" he said, explaining the stuffed ghost. He smiled a little, thinking that he could let Pandora be the one to give the misdreavus the new addition to her collection.

"Does she really like Haunters? Or just dolls in general?" It made Sidney wonder if maybe Maiden had a thing for Cassius' Haunter. Kinda like how her Mightyena had a thing for Ginger. But Rex wouldn't be joining them the rest of their journey (to Ginger's satisfaction). She needed a balanced team and two dark types didn't work out too well, despite the fact that dark Pokemon happened to be one of Sidney's specialties.

"Dolls in general, but I've never seen a haunter doll before, and I think she might like it particularly" he replied, fiddling with the doll and removing one of its Velcro-attached hands. "Pandora and her... well, it's a little complicated, but they're pretty fond of one another."

"Do you think that maybe one of your Pokemon would get a kick out of this?" She picked up a plastic Gengar and held it out for Cassius to see. When she gave it a squeeze the toy made a high pitched squeak, its eyes and tongue popping out in a very humorous manner. "And look at this one." It was a Sableye, and when she flipped the switch on its back its eyes flashed different colors. "So cute!"

"Absol abs-absol absol absol abs-absol abs? (Aren't you two a little old to be playing with toys?)" Ginger forced herself between the two, just in case Cassius attempted to turn Sidney into a doll. Why else would he have an interest in them? She was certain that, somewhere, he had a whole collection of dolls who had once been living, breathing people.

...The Absol's imagination was startling sometimes.

"They're all kinda cute" replied Cassius, ignoring the absol. "I could get some excellent decorations here for next Halloween." He reached for Pandora's pokeball, letting the haunter out to take a look. "Wadda ya think, Pan, any Maiden would like?"

Pandora grinned, shifting dimensions so he could go through objects and diving at the shelf of toys to pick out the best ones.

Ginger immediately hid in a pile of stuffed plushies once Pandora was released. She definitely wasn't expecting that.

"Glad to see he's feeling better," Sidney said, paying for the supplies. She double-checked to make sure she had enough of everything to last her and her Pokemon to Fortree. "Everything looks good. All we need now is for Pandora to pick out a few knick-knacks and we can finally try out the food here."

Cassius waited for a moment, then reached for the shelf and pulled Pandora out by the tail, dragging several dolls and toys with him. "Well, I did say I'd bring the guys back home souvenirs. I guess a few from a town along the way can't hurt" muttered Cassius, paying for a fair number of the toys along with his supplies. Lucky for him, the cashier offered to send the gifts directly to his PC, so he wasn't too overburdened. "Ready when you are, then" said Cassius. "The restaurant back by the center looked good, the probably get a lot of trainers there so I'm sure the pokemon food must be delicious."

((I may disappear soon- I'm going to a play tonight.))

"C'mon, Gin!" the trainer called. The Absol crawled out from the mound of ghosts, one wedged between her blade and her head. "Wait. You can't walk out with that." Sidney helped her Pokemon to rid herself of the anomaly, then continued through the door.

She admired her new doll as she traveled from the mart to the restaurant. The plushie reminded her a lot of Cassius...except Cassius wasn't made of cotton and he managed to keep his tongue inside his mouth.

((I'm disappearing...now. Going out to eat. Might be back later.))

Pandora was just as excited as Cassius had been to see the former ghost town, but he was far more vocal about it. He even ignored the absol who'd confined him to his pokeball for half a day, so thrilled was he to be out in such an interesting area. "(Haunt haunt haunt haunt haunter! (that food smells delicious!)" he exclaimed, grinning. "Haunt haunter, haunt haunt haunt haunter haunt (Don't worry, I'll sneak some ghost stuff over to you)"

"Just make sure there aren't any Absols around to draw attention to you if you do," Ginger scoffed. "People might think you're a freak if they caught you stuffing Pokemon food into your mouth."

"Hey, Gin. Think you could carry this for me?" Sidney set the doll down on the Absol's back. "I don't have enough room in my bag after all the supplies I bought." Ginger looked behind her to examine the ghost toy now perched on her back, her right eye twitching a bit. How humiliating! Well, at least it shut the dark Pokemon up.

Cassius couldn't help but chuckle at the poor absol's expression when she saw the ghost plushie she'd been asked to carry. Pandora even spared her a glance and a mocking grin, although he returned quickly to sniffing out the best restaurant on the block. According to the ghost, Cassius had been right- the place next to the pokemon center was the most appetizing, and they were even advertising a special meal deal for trainers and their pokemon. "This is the place, then?" asked Cassius, speaking to both the pokemon and the people present.

"Looks good to me," Sidney replied, taking in the scrumptious scents. She had never smelt anything quite like it before. Ginger, who despised anything remotely related to the undead, stuck her tongue out in disgust. "So...did you want to let out all our Pokemon first? Or were you planning on ordering something to go and giving it to them later?"

"It looks like there are several trainers in there with their pokemon- why don't we dine in?" he said, reaching for his belt. Five pokeballs lit up at once, producing a rather squished together group of ghosts. "Watch yourselves on the way in, guys, the door may be a bit of a squeeze" he told his pokemon.

Godfather snorted, and walked through the door- literally, he walked straight through it without pausing to open it. Since he was immaterial at the time, this wasn't really a problem for the door or its frame, fortunately. He stuck his head back out, and informed Cassius and the other pokemon that it looked safe enough to go in.

Maiden giggled a little, and fluttered over to Pandora. "Misdrea misdreavus, mis misdreavus! (a formal luncheon, how wonderful!)" she said, "Misdreav misdreavus! (and it smells delicious!)"

"Haunt haunter (after you)" said Pandora, bowing to Maiden and motioning gracefully to the door. She blushed a little, then floated in after Godfather- the door still unopened.

"Sure, let's dine in, I'm famished.", Mike exclamied. "And I'm sure all my electric pals are as well.", he continued, then letting out all 6 of his electric Pokemon. He then opened the resturant door, letting his Pokemon party inside.

"It's amazing how they have enough room for both trainers and Pokemon." Ginger blinked up at her, waiting. "Alright. Time for some fresh air." She triggered the release mechanism for all her Pokeballs. The Pokemon that appeared included Taro and Lulu, the Cubone and Medicham. The rest had been replaced by a Blaziken (Suzaku) and a Ninjask (Gonzo). But wait? That only made five.

"Where did--?" Something large and green soared overhead. The Pokemon did a type of dive bomb, then twisted herself just in time to make a safe landing...or a safe crash. The Flygon hit the ground with such a magnitude that the windows rattled on the houses nearby. "Abina, you showoff, can't you see we're in a town?! You can't pull that kind of stunt here!"

Abina looked around, finally aware of her surroundings. "Flyyygon. (Whoops.)"

The Blaziken snickered, folding his arms over his chest. "Abina got in trouubllle," he sang in a mocking tone.

"Everyone inside," Sidney sighed, pointing to the door.

((I'll probably be too busy to post the rest of the night.))

The young waiter in charge of seating customers at the door turned rather pale when Cassius asked for a table for three trainers and their pokemon. Fortunately, he led the group to a large patio at the back of the restaurant, which did indeed have room for the whole company. Menus were passed out to the whole group- tan for humans, red for the pokemon.

Each of Sidney's Pokemon took a seat next to one another, the three strangers examining the ghost Pokemon across the table from them. Taro was small enough to sit in the Gengar doll's lap, which Sidney had removed from Ginger's back and set on the table. Ginger, oddly enough, chose to sit directly opposite of Cassius. She flipped open her menu using her pointer claw, and began scanning the items.

"Oh, wow. I didn't know they sold living souls here. Imagine it! Well, I heard they're very nutritious." She casually turned to the next page. "And look at this! Fresh blood! Now doesn't that sound delicious?!" the Absol said, quickly standing up and looking directly into the ghost trainer's face.

"Ginger! Paws off the table!"

The Absol took her seat again, muttering. Suzaku leaned close, inspecting the Absol's menu. "Uh, Ginger?" he said, pointing to the dish she had brought up seconds early. "That says...Pokechowder."

"Shh!" she said, elbowing the bird in the ribs.

"Ooh, Cass, look at that!" said Pandora loudly, looking over his trainer's shoulder. "Absol sausages seasoned with black pepper and oregano- sounds de-licious! Can I order from your menu?" Cassius glanced at the sheet, silently reading 'ceasar salad' from the menu where the haunter was pointing.

"Knock it off, Pan, you should know better than to stoop to her level of taunting" replied Cassius, speaking in the pokemon language. He smiled a little, then added very quietly "have some ghostly pride- you can do better than some common dark pokemon!"

"Hey, I wouldn't say anything bad about dark Pokemon if I were you--or have you forgotten about your Sableye, Stink?" She then commenced to prop up her menu, hiding her face from the rest of the table. She muttered something under breath that sounded something like 'cannibals'.

The Blaziken gave the Medicham beside him a nudge. "What's her problem?"

"Huh?" Lulu looked up from her menu.

"I've never seen her mouth off this badly before. She's making that trainer sound like a vampire by the way she's going off."

"Not vampire. Ghost." She returned to trying to decide what she wanted to eat.

"What?!"

Sneak glared at Ginger, but knew better than to attack at the table. Besides, the utensils were far more intriguing, so shiny… The sableye examined his fork, entranced by the polished stainless steel.

Cassius, meanwhile, hid a little behind his menu, trying to pick out something interesting to eat. He sighed as he couldn't help but overhear Lulu's remarks- well, at least the humans were still out of the loop.

"I'm gonna order the wisteria blossom salad" said Pandora, breaking the ghosts' silence.

"I'll have that too" added Maiden hastily, and the other ghosts soon followed with their orders.

Lulu immediately knew she had messed up after seeing Cassius

Cassius smiled gratefully, his second smile in two days that didn't make him look more frightening.

"So that's two salads, one plate of nightshade-wrapped rice, and you other three all want the burgers?" asked Cassius, speaking in human and confirming the ghosts' orders. Marionette, Sneak and Godfather all nodded eagerly. "I take you somewhere nice for a change and half of you order burgers and fries- it figures."

Mike sat at the left end of the area, 3 of each of his Pokemon on both sides of him. "Hmm...should I have the spagehtii and meatballs...nah, the ...oh wait, perfect! I'll order a huge plate of hot wings so we all can share it.", he said to his Pokemon. 5 of them agreed, nodding, except for Lighthouse, the Ampharos.

"Alright, I'll get you a salad.", he sighed. "I still can't believe you're a vegetarian."

"I want something spicy!" Abina declared, fluttering her wings. "So I'll have what the lightning trainer in having, except I want my wings 'atomic', not 'mild'."

"We'd expect no less from you," Suzaku chuckled. "But I'll have the same."

Lulu finally tore her eyes away from her menu. "Well, I want sushi. The one with salmon and sour cream, please. What do you want, Gin?"

"Hmm? Oh!" In truth, Ginger hadn't yet read her menu. She was still obsessed with Cassius. "Bah, might as well order that bloo--I mean, Pokechowder stuff."

"I'm gonna order the potato soup," Sidney said. "I'm going to be sharing with Taro and he really likes potatoes. How about you, Gonzo."

The Ninjask rose out his chair, his wings beating a mile a minute. "Iwantsomethingsweetsweetsweet. Howaboutcakecakecakeorpiepiepie?" Unabled to contain his excitement, he zipped around above everyone's heads. "Cakesoundsgood. Ireallyreallyreallylikecake."

"Or how about tranquilizers?" the Blaziken suggested, resting his head on this hand.

"Who said I'm having mild; I never settle for anything less than Ultra Spicy.", Mike retorted to the Flygon. Meanwhile, Lighthouse wandered over to the other Pokemon, politely greeting them all, even the Ghost Pokemon. His Modest Nature made him that polite, but very powerful in battle, powering up his electrical attacks.

He then walked over to Ginger and said, "Why must you be so judgemental like that; I'm sure if he wanted to do something to all of us, ddon't you think he would've done it by now?"