“Huh… You guys really did grow.” Breath swirling like clouds from his lips, Angelo crouches down next to two plots of soil that had been forcibly dug into the seemingly unfertile tundra some days earlier. Blue eyes curiously drifting over a pair of leaves, sprouting through the tilled ground against impossible odds. A splash of verdant amongst the ice and rock. [break][break]

Illuminated by Rhea’s tail, he reaches out to stroke a fingertip along a leaf at random, frost clinging to the green foliage like tiny, intricate webs glistening with morning dew. And yet, despite the climate, the seeds seemed to be fighting through their unfavourable conditions – thriving, even. [break][break]

There’s a faraway look that falls over blue eyes then, thoughts seemingly stolen away as he crouches hidden behind stalagmites and jutting, cold stone. It’s only when his faded attention drifts over the vegetation again that the glassiness to his gaze sharpens, his lips curving through the cold in a display of quiet, self-satisfied amusement. His carrot was definitely bigger. [break][break]

Angelo’s only there for a few minutes before he’s scrambling out of the quiet nook, motivated to leave by the somewhat cramped conditions and his lack of time. This was just a stop-off, he’d have to get back to work soon… [break][break]

With Rhea floating by his side, keeping the fierceness of the cold away from them both with the heat of her flame, Angelo departs from the hidden nook to make his way back to the entrance. [break][break]

Feet crunching over the ice, hands shoved purposefully in his pockets as the cold nips at his calloused fingers, he traverses a path that’s become relatively familiar by now… About as familiar as the brunette he finds, crouched down over her own shrub of green on the way. [break][break]

“Oh, hey - Chloe, right? Small world.”


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+ carrot thread 1/3 - @chloe [break][break]

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“Hey, you remembered. Good to see you again,” he says, mouth curled into an easy-going smile as the young woman takes notice. [break][break]

Chloe was apparently a lot better at names than he was, his rolling off her tongue seemingly with confidence. Angelo was just glad he didn’t get hers wrong, even if he had to take a moment to contemplate and match through his memory of the day they’d met out at sea. He blames his job. After coming into contact with countless people a day, everyone blurred into one, sometimes.[break][break]

Her gasp doesn’t go unnoticed, what with their breaths manifesting in the air in heated furls. Angelo adds to the clouds, chuckling as the young woman and her pokemon check out the Charizard looming behind his back. At the Ribombee the fire lizard lets out a snort, smoke swirling from her nostrils before turning her attention pointedly away – disinterested.[break][break]

“That’s Rhea. She’s all bark and no bite. Don’t pay any attention to her grumpy ass.” Unlike his Charizard, Angelo stretches a hand out towards the curious little fairy, giving the top of its head a scratch with an index finger. [break][break]

Its then, as he takes note of the natural scarf around the fluttering creature, that he notices Chloe’s lack of; her features splashed bright and rosy from the cold. “You’re looking kinda like one of those carrots right about now,” an eyebrow is quirked, blue eyes dropping from her own crop sticking out of the ground and back to the brunette, standing in Shoal Cave without a coat.[break][break]

“How’re you going to Mantine surf again if your foot falls off from frostbite?” Not like Angelo could talk, he hadn’t brought appropriate clothes for the weather, either; his cold fingers clenched in his pockets even now as he remained stubbornly stuck to Rhea’s natural warmth. His nose didn’t look like it had been bitten by an angry cave Zubat, though. [break][break]

Angelo moves, gesturing Rhea to stand between himself and Chloe so they could both feel their toes as they look at her ‘garden’ plot. “No idea. They’re weird though, right?” He pauses stamping his feet in the ice a little, trying to get the blood going now they were standing idle. “What do you want to happen? I'm thinking, if anything, a blue carrot stew could be my chance to break into the culinary world and get my name out there.”



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+ carrot thread 1/3 - @chloe [break][break]

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His fingers were freezing, almost as blue as his eyes, he bet. Still, when the newly introduced Twinkle presented him with a gift in the shape of a small puff ball, he couldn’t just refuse it. Pulling a hand free from the depths of his warm pocket with the slightest crawling of hesitation, he accepts the little present in his palm with a smile. “Thanks, Twinkle. Oh hey, it smells good.” He shifts a gaze towards Chloe, leaning just slightly in her direction with a confused sparkle in his expression. “So… What do you do with it?” [break][break]

Angelo loosely curls his cold fingers around the small puff before sticking it back in his pocket, careful not to crush it as they all stood around Chloe’s carrot to contemplate. The fellow Mantine surfer seemed excited by the ideas of what bounty their produce might bring and even though Angelo had partly been joking about the culinary thing – he didn’t have any desire or real talent to be anything beyond a home cooker – he finds her enthusiasm infections. Maybe he would cook a stew, with or without blue carrots, sometime… [break][break]

“Next time we go surfing I’ll make stew for after, then.” He chuckles in a mist of breath, one that quickly disperses and fades as Chloe continues on, bringing up rumours of strange pokemon. Angelo’s lips falter for the briefest of moments, awareness prickling against his skin, before his smile is back on his face – naturally forced. “Strange pokemon appearing in Hoenn? Never.” Teeth flash with devious sarcasm, deflecting. [break][break]

“Hopefully an onion. Or a potato. Free ingredients for my stew would be pretty damn good.” Jesting, he leans back against Rhea, using her warm body like a wall with a casual air. He ignores the narrowing of the Charizard’s eyes, if she didn’t like it, she would move. “Maybe it’ll be a blue Lopunny? They like carrots, right?”




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+ carrot thread 1/3 - @chloe [break][break]

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“Oh, they can?” Angelo hums thoughtfully at the little titbit of information. Raising a flattened palm up underneath Rhea’s snout, pollen puff sitting innocently, he deliberately drifts his hand back and forth in an attempt to waft the scent under her nose. “What do you think, Rhea? Can I tempt you with a tiny nibble? Twinkle did generously make it just for us; you don’t want to look like an ungrateful brat, do you?” The Charizard would not be lured into eating the free snack however, stubbornly turning her head away with a proud tilt. Angelo scoffs and rolls his eyes, lips curved in an unoffended smile. [break][break]

“Your loss.” [break][break]

So he pops it in his mouth, instead. It’s fuzzy and sweet, tasting like a diluted spoonful of honey. Not bad, he thinks. Although, Angelo notes, there’s now bits of fluff stuck in-between his teeth. He runs his tongue over them, attempting to suck them free without much dignity. [break][break]

“We'll have to meet up for surfing and stew soon, then. I feel like my life is dictated by watching carrots grow at the moment. Nereid'll forget how to swim at this rate.”[break][break]

In his pocket, his phone begins to beep a familiar tune. [break][break]

Duty - no matter how insignificant it seems in the grand scheme of things, especially when mystical carrots are sprouting in barren ice caverns - calls.


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+ carrot thread 1/3 - @chloe [break][break]

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“Ah, it’s only work. I think they just miss me.” Angelo fishes his phone out of his pocket anyway, gaze settling on a flashing message that lingers on a cracked screen, scanning over the details of his next pickup and drop off. “I better go. Looks like I'm needed in Lilycove,” he hums, returning the device and his fingers back into the warmth. [break][break]

He can’t say he’s too disappointed to leave. Not that Chloe’s presence was an unwelcome one. It was the cold that Angelo felt not so kindly about, far too adjusted to a life of pleasant climates – tropical or otherwise – and sunshine on his skin to care much for the bite of ice. Even after venturing down here for the past few days he hadn’t quite gotten used to it, among other things.[break][break]

Pushing himself off from Rhea, he turns to give Twinkle a farewell scratch on the top of the head before regarding Chloe with a grin. Casting one last pointed sweep towards her little carrot, struggling through the barren wasteland where nothing should realistically grow. “You look like you could do with getting out of the cold, too. If you stay down here, I'll have to start calling you Carrot. You're about as blue as one.” There’s a playful grin on his lips as he pulls his hands free of his pockets, giving Rhea a pat as if to say it was time to go, before rubbing his palms together. “Need a ride anywhere? I don't mind taking a detour.”[break][break]

Whether Chloe joins him on the walk through the Shoal Cave, Angelo lets out a relieved sigh as he steps out onto the rocky entranceway, happy to finally be under a clear blue sky and the warmth of the Hoenn sun.


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+ carrot thread 1/3 - @chloe [break][break]

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