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POSTED ON Feb 23, 2021 10:49:02 GMT

Lulu Flint likes this

[attr="class","merrkI"]

[attr="class","merrkpokesI"]

❝It's about time you woke up.❞

Fuck.

This was much easier in the moment. There hadn’t been a need for a well thought out plan. When confronted, running on instinct is always good enough. The backlash that comes afterwards always hits twice as hard, able to find the sweet spot where regret and hindsight cross paths.

“Tch.”

Smoking doesn’t alleviate the stress. It just puts his mind elsewhere. The oral fix occupying his subconscious actions appease him in the moment but his eyes never leave her bed.

A television plays in the other room, going over recent news, as well as the recent reputation of Infinity Industries after their move into Hoenn’s domestic energy market. They liken the company as one of the new big stars set to infringe of Devon’s territory but Fernando can’t find his interesting latching on. Devon is an afterthought amidst more pressing matters.

Lulu’s Pokeballs and her gun no longer reside within Fernando’s spare apartment. The whole place is ‘danger proof’, the worst of makeshift weaponry removed well ahead of time during her short little relapse. Should it come down to it, she’s better off trying to do him in with her own bare hands, a realm that Fernando wins in every scenario due to his Avatar powers.

It’s well past ten the next morning. He’s left her undressed, stark naked in a bid to pat her down, underneath the covers of the guest bedroom. The fact she sleeps past her mandated four hours is no surprise. Much like the computers she lives on, Lulu gets a full shutdown. The quick start up that comes from the constant ‘sleep mode’ doesn’t come to play when Tapu Fini forces her to take on a full reboot. It’ll be the longest and soundest sleep she’s had in a while, completely blank as the portion of her brain that handles her dreams is ignored to push all processing power toward making sure her motor skills don’t overclock.

His own sleep is cut short due to the Comfey that remains attached to his wrist. The next best thing to creating an AI smart watch is to use an actual sentient being. The fairy Pokemon has no qualms with being his personal accessory, able to chime in when needed and always quicker to the draw. Like her preference for guns, Fernando too enjoys putting his tools to full use. The only difference is his are more practical, personable.

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POSTED ON Feb 24, 2021 4:46:03 GMT

skyler dross likes this

FERNANDO SILPH
SOCIAL

TR: This thread contains instances of severe violence between characters, mention of bodily fluids, and physical/psychological torture.

Rinc’s coin: essentially a trinket, but something that was extremely important to Lulu—just ask Captain skyler dross . It was copper, with a shoddily hand-carved dragon, a gear, and what looked vaguely like a small heart. Additionally, were the initials ‘R + F.’ It probably looked like a good luck charm to anyone who didn’t know better, but rather, it was something she kept out of a sense of guilt. Something to keep the pain hanging around, just to remind herself that his death was her fault (it wasn’t) because she didn’t deserve her own forgiveness.

Four plastic playing cards would also be found: one cheap debit from a Slateport-exclusive bank under the name “Nicole Jones”; two international paperweights (one with writing in Kantonese) under the names “Ophelia Sutton” and “Analise Palmer”; one ID again stating “Nicole Jones” (she was another existing Slateport resident presumably, if Lulu hadn’t killed the woman). Lastly, there was a flip-phone which was only outgoing, and there had never been a single call made.

Nicole Jones was fine, by the way. The mousey, spectacled woman that was pictured was living her best life in Alola, having been paid off the face of the region right around the time Lulu had come across her new fortune. She might have lacked a soul, but she wasn’t heartless.

The woman was vocal as she woke, this time, a sense of unease seeming to fill her earthly shell as naturally as life itself. The sounds started off an innocent breath; a cooing dove in her chest, before the years of liquor and cigarettes that lived in her throat choked it with a gravelly groan. The fair bit of huskiness in her Galarian voice made it apparent she had not been easy on herself in her short life. It was worse in the mornings, and after such a sleep, readjusting to a stressed body was hell.

She sounded and felt like she was returning from the dead.

“mmmmmmmM.” the sound ended sharp as her eyes fluttered open and found him staring, and everything short of her bones jumped inside her. Naked skin prickled as her mind began to come back. “Mm mm.” as in, no thanks. She shut her eyes again on him, shaking her head in denial. Maybe she was dead? If so, she was in Hell. Adds up.

A scoot back in the bed revealed the feeling of the sheets on her bare skin. Her breath hitched and she pulled the blanket more around herself, eyes opening to glare at him.

“What is this?”

It was a vague question, but in this it covered the broad area of her confusion. Any answer would be helpful—one which informed, anyways. That certainly wasn’t ever a guarantee with Fernando Silph. The man was chock full of dodgy responses. She was getting tired of pressing.

“What do you want?” Her voice sounded exasperated and tired, nearly defeated. She’d accepted death, after all. Waking up was something she needed to process.

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POSTED ON Feb 24, 2021 16:22:00 GMT

Stormy Silph and peggie vela like this

[attr="class","spiral"]His body perks but his expression doesn't dare match her movements. He remains nonchalant as his subject matter comes to. In that regard, he proves consistent, able to provide her one tether or familiarity in an environment full of new stimuli. Unlike her abode, Fernando's apartment is well taken care of, furnished but lacking any personal effects. It's an untouched showroom, fitting of a man on the move with nothing to tie him down.

"An investigation," he answers, glancing her over before letting out a deep exhale of second hand MISTY TERRAIN. "I want to know who the hell you think you are and what the fuck you think you're doing."

A cigarette sits between his fingers, glowing with the same intensity as his newfound scowl.

"This isn't Galar, Quinn. You can't afford to be this sloppy in my region."

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saoirse quinn

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POSTED ON Feb 24, 2021 18:53:09 GMT

dahlia goode, Cillian Quinn, and 1 more like this

FERNANDO SILPH
SOCIAL

An investigation. Her stare flashed down to her own cleavage and then back towards him as though to read ‘Oh, that explains things.’

Lulu's expression showed little though, besides the lingering screen of suicidality. It was like a fog in her eyes, a not-so-much-frown but rather a sad invincibleness—one that existed for its own sake rather than for any destruction. Dead eyes blinked in his direction dully. She was unwilling to admit she needed her glasses back. Dumb pride would live on in a soul that was emptied of anything else.

Sloppy. Well, Cillian Quinn had said he’d known him. They had some opinions in common.

She wondered what exactly he was talking about. Taking him home had been sloppy, right? Going to confront him… escalating… that hadn’t needed a plan. There had only been desperation to claim a different fate than deportation. Anything but that. Sloppiness hadn’t mattered—or at least, she hadn’t predicted it would.

The side of her head remained on the pillow. She made no move towards him. There was no retaliation, only words delivered on a calm, raspy morning voice.

“That’s not my name anymore.” There was a plainness in her tone that was stripped down to sincerity. “My name is Lulu Flint.” Fuck the Quinn name. Fuck every last one of them. Lulu Flint truly did feel like her identity, now. It was dissociation.

With a long sigh, she finally, slowly pushed up in the bed to sit, the blanket held up over her breasts. “In regards to what it is I’m doing, I’m not sure what you’re talking about. You decided to play a game with me, and I didn’t want to play.”

She flexed her toes underneath the covers, getting the feeling back in them. “I refuse to run around looking for you over my shoulder." She had done it enough, and history would prove that running was not a sustainable strategy. Facing things head-on got things done, one way or another.

“I won’t bend to you for your amusement. Since you have refused to tell me any other motive, I’ll just assume that’s what it was it all along.” No, she wouldn’t. She was still curious about the real reason, but letting him know that hadn't done her any good thus far. And, it took one to know one maybe, but:

“You’re just a sick fuck.”

There was still no aggression in her voice. Despite this, the words were delivered to sting like his had. To attack his pride invisibly through the air between them.

“And, Fernando… your region?” Drunkenly, she’d allowed his ego to fill the room last time, even seeming to put salt in it. She sniffed. “Granted, I don’t have my glasses, but you don’t look like dahlia goode to me.”

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silph

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POSTED ON Feb 24, 2021 20:17:38 GMT

[attr="class","spiral"]"Oh? That's your name?"

The way both end of the cigarette dangle, rotating on an invisible axis fabricated from the slightest movements of his fingers, parallel his patience.

"For how long?"

That little tidbit makes it obvious that he's rifled through her belongings. Besides her weapons, the details of her IDs come across as poignant objects of interest. The fact that she has several tell him more than he needs to, even if he hasn't had the time to go through them individually.

"Tch."

Her words fall on deaf ears. Fernando cares little about the opinion of others. Especially in regards to himself. The frequent rumors, copious insults from his peers, they all fall flat because he views none of them as relevant. Words only have power if they're true, or if you care about the source; he cares for neither.

"No, you idiot. You were sloppy, incredibly so. Enough so that I had to warn you. I gave you an out. All you had to do was duck your head and walk away. But no, you went and shit all over it."

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saoirse quinn

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POSTED ON Feb 24, 2021 20:57:15 GMT

FERNANDO SILPH
SOCIAL

She shook her head, allowing the question to fall silent. Rest of her life, she hoped—however long that might be. She had nothing to throw up against him except a pair of bare hands, and they wouldn’t take down an avatar.

Idiot. Sloppy. Nothing on her face changed.

“Sloppy, by bringing you to my apartment? Opening up to you?” In more ways than one. Of course, it had been sloppy. But it was sort of fucked up for him to point that out. “You gave me nothing but another reason not to sleep. If you’d been trying to help me out like a friend, you would have been less cryptic.”

Lulu thought for a moment, unsure if the next words were necessary; if it was an answer she was even interested in. “So… after all that, you didn’t want anything from me, but for me to disappear?”

…

“Go on and judge me for my identities. I have them because I’ve had to run to survive. I got tired of running.” She shook her head. “But I won’t be caged again, either.”

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POSTED ON Feb 24, 2021 22:42:37 GMT

peggie vela likes this

[attr="class","spiral"]"Indeed."

Just because she gives him a taste doesn't mean that elevates her to some pedestal of amnesty. Once the lust wears off and the post-nut clarity sets in, Lulu Flint is no different than any other shmuck in Hoenn. Whatever merits she holds is based off her skills, assets, and whatever other value he can derive from her. Whatever intimacy they may have had becomes an afterthought. For something as simple as that—replacements exist at the bend and break of every corner.

"Any less cryptic and I can't deny knowing. That makes me, at some levels, an accomplice."

Fernando sits on another drag, giving the illusion of contemplating his next answer. He already knows what to say but he wants her to read his 'hesitance'. "I wanted you to be less sloppy." And that was on the low-end of requests.

"If you're this obvious then eventually someone else will figure it out as well. When they find out, they'll move. And if they move, eventually I'll have to move."

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saoirse quinn

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POSTED ON Feb 24, 2021 23:54:31 GMT

peggie vela likes this

FERNANDO SILPH
SOCIAL

Her jaw set, but she hardly disagreed with him.

This made sense in retrospect, but as intelligent as she was, her paranoia hadn’t allowed her to see things from a reasonable angle. Thoughts of torture or prison (and a few shots of liquor) had been enough to panic and fold early, because fuck that. Regardless of what she'd said, Lulu did fear things in the world. What set her apart now was that there were things in life she feared more than death.

She snorted, pride getting in her way again and pulling out unnecessary words to defend itself. “I’m not, typically.” And it was true. Short of an arrest that had been, from every angle, unavoidable and no fault of her own, and the resulting national broadcast that could never be wiped away, Lulu was impeccable at working around things and covering her tracks. In the grand scheme of things, she had made very few slips.

Unfortunately, it only took one slip to fall off the edge of your own existence. When that happened, all the other times didn’t matter anymore. While her words didn’t reflect it, she knew it as well as he did.

The next bit left her silent for a long moment as she picked at it in her curious mind. It was the tense in which he was speaking that was the most confusing. Did he mean to say that others hadn’t found out yet? And, what did he mean by this? Did he mean to get to her first if ‘they’ came for her? And… who in the world was ‘they,’ anyways? Someone else specifically, as in the League? Wasn’t that him?

He did want something, surely. This scrap of an answer very nearly confirmed that, but as it did, it opened up a thousand more questions.

One thing at a time. “Am I still in Hoenn?”

Blind as a bat, she could hardly see her surroundings enough to grasp any cultural influence. There were walls, and a man she now hated enough to recognize by feeling and height alone.

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POSTED ON Feb 25, 2021 0:08:58 GMT

peggie vela likes this

[attr="class","spiral"]Her reaction and tone is less than stellar. Fernando bites back with a sharp interruption, "doesn't matter. Fact is, you were. It only takes once." Whatever history she has, whatever routine, he's not privy to the way she operates. All he knows is how she's conducted herself in front of him and so far she's posed nothing but a liability.

"It's been nine hours. Of course you're still in Hoenn." His own distaste bleeds into his tone and volume. As amicable as they were, Lulu's long poured that down the drain. All because she wouldn't walk away. So here she stand, lying down in the bed he made.

"So, tell me, Flint, what are you running from?"

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saoirse quinn

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POSTED ON Feb 25, 2021 1:28:48 GMT

FERNANDO SILPH
SOCIAL

That was, at least, good news.

There was a strange sense of relief in feeling utterly helpless. Naked, blind, prone. Defeated.

When you hit rock bottom, at least you finally got some foothold and a place to rest.

Regardless of who else was now a threat to her, this particular match had been won by her opponent. For now. And, in this, when there was nothing left to do but surrender, Lulu found the opportunity to finally confide in someone. To breathe some of the nasty details of her life out of her chest and into the foreign air, for the first time ever.

Funny how things work out.

Her eyes wandered over blurs sorely. At first, it was like the words wouldn’t come. Like they didn’t exist. They had been that tightly locked away.

“Galarian Mafia.” And police, of course, but that went without saying.

“I know what you saw.” She said this with confidence, because there was nothing else for him to see. “That trial was a joke that pissed off a lot of people. I wasn't the only one who got out early, but I was the only one to make it out of the region alive. The Mafia suspected us to be traitors and put hits out.”

“Everyone in Galar wants me dead for different reasons. That, or they want me under their thumb.” The military, namely.

“I go to Galar, I don’t belong to myself anymore.” Not that she had for a long time, anyways. What was left of her belonged fully to Team Rocket. At least, they gave her freedom. The Mafia wouldn’t offer a previous offender like her the same privileges, and neither would anyone else she'd already crossed paths with. “I go back to Galar, I’m dead—one way or another. Behind bars, under someone else’s oppression, or the bloody fuckin’ dirt.”

She looked down, blinking at the outlines of her hands and fidgeting with a fingernail. So much blood had been on them. “But no one will give me mercy. If I die, it certainly won’t be quick, or dignified.”

A pause.

“Satisfactory?”

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silph

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POSTED ON Feb 25, 2021 2:12:39 GMT

peggie vela likes this

[attr="class","spiral"]Cool story.

Most of it makes sense. Each piece added in puts together the puzzle of her narrative. Most it, he’s yet to explore. While he’s found some of this already online, Fernando hardly has the time to sift through every piece of information she has. He will, undoubtedly, over time, but not in such short notice.

Not when there are more pressing matters across the region.

As interesting as she is, Lulu Flint is a mere speck of dust in the grand mess that is Hoenn. And frankly, he doesn’t really give a shit about the ‘woe is me’ picture she paints for herself. Like the very military she’s fled from, he too only sees her as a ticking time bomb. Is she something he can use or will she implode before they make any headway?

The thought crosses his mind but he sits on it. Let’s it fester. Unlike her, he thinks before he acts and such a decision does not come lightly.

He’ll have time to deliberate, after all, she’s not going anywhere.

“Hardly.”

All that rambling explains the why but not the what.

“So what are you doing here? A person like you doesn’t it make it by without putting those talents to use.” His eyes narrow. “Not in ‘times like these’.”

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saoirse quinn

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POSTED ON Feb 25, 2021 3:14:20 GMT

FERNANDO SILPH
SOCIAL

Lulu had prepared for this sort of question. She had no desire to fight for secrets she had no hope of keeping, but those of Rocket? He wouldn’t get anything out of her. Lulu was solid on that front.

She freelanced—this was at least true in the case of oscar clayton . And she did work IT.

Fernando was already implying the worst and she caught the feel of it.

Her jaw tilted to the side a little. “A person like me?”

There was a momentary pause.

She shrugged. “Trying to live and ignore the risks I’ve burdened myself with. ‘Til you, that is.” More of what he wasn’t looking for—the kind of fluffy answers he tended to give. But, she’d elaborate, doing her best to stay the course of as much honesty as she could afford. Make it real, so it was sustainable.

“I create. Programs, machines. Systems.” Lulu could anomalously outshine experts all across the spectrum of inorganic technology, and in the perfect environment provided by Rocket, she had gradually been expanding her horizons even beyond that.

“I’m good at designing and building things—” she thought for a moment and then amended, “logically.”

“People come to me when they want something that doesn’t exist, or when they need something fixed.”

With a sigh, she popped her neck. Her eyes were getting sore, a small headache gradually settling in. “I don’t develop weapons anymore, if that’s what you’re wondering.” And this, for now, was true.

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POSTED ON Feb 25, 2021 3:55:10 GMT

peggie vela likes this

[attr="class","spiral"]Nothing too far-fetched. Nothing obvious. If she's lying, which he has no doubt that she is, she's doing a good job. On that front, she's good. Surface level lies need to be vague and plausible. It's what underneath that proves troublesome as long he knows just where to prod. Unfortunately, she's already divulged too much. His shovel is spick and span, ready to dig.

"What's with the burner phone? Had nothing on it."

A game of twenty questions begins. This time there's no dare.

"Who have you worked for since you came here?"

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saoirse quinn

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POSTED ON Feb 25, 2021 4:05:10 GMT

peggie vela likes this

FERNANDO SILPH
SOCIAL

Here it was. She knew it was coming, and she didn’t intend to dodge it. Where answers had been free-flowing, they would suddenly dry up. There were no games, here, Silph.

She’d accepted death. She would never accept being a traitor. Leave her with some ounce of pride.

“I’m protective of my clients.”

Although she couldn’t quite see him, her eyes rose in his direction again. “That’s confidential.”

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silph

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POSTED ON Feb 25, 2021 4:10:36 GMT

peggie vela likes this

[attr="class","spiral"]"Fine."

Fernando pulls at his right sleeve, inching the collar up to expose his wrist. He flips it, palm up, to view the face of his watch. It's a weird way to wear a watch but it's served him time and time again. Something about being able to see it during heated moments while not leaving it exposed to the elements.

"Good. I have a meeting in two hours."

A snap of his fingers helps amplify the MISTY TERRAIN that starts to exude from his pores. It pools around his feet, trickling in as something starts to manifests. "You'll have another eight hours to decide how much those clients mean to you. Hope that you give in before I find them. Otherwise, you'll have wasted a week for nothing."

After several seconds, she'll be able to make out the form of Tapu Fini. It hasn't manifested just yet but the imagery is the same as the night before.

"That and maybe some brain damage. I think Megalopolan's have stronger frames than we do."