“I’ve got one diver and one pokemon...” There’s a brief pause, static signifying the coms were still open. “It’s a Lanturn. Looks like they’re still searching over here.” [break][break]

Their messages are short. To the point and hushed. Angelo doesn’t press on the curse that she had tickled into his ear, even if the weight in his chest sits uneasy. Instead, as the shadows and the light cast from the Lanturn drift away within the belly of the ship, he steals his chance to slip in. [break][break]

Clinging to the shadows, he makes to swim in the direction that the rival treasure hunter had come from, feeling the invisible brush of smooth scales against his fingertips as he rounds a corner.[break][break]

It’s then, as Angelo starts advancing deeper into the dark bowels of the sunken vessel, that Skyler’s coms flicker back to life. Engulfing him with the chilling sound of her breath catching in her throat. [break][break]

His does the same, falling still, when she finally finds her voice. [break][break]

“Where are y-” He starts, voice hard. [break][break]

A spotlight dazzles in the corner of his eye, communications cutting off as he squints through the sudden intensity of Lanturn’s glowing orb. [break][break]

Swiftly, Angelo releases a spiny creature into the water, the Pincurchin redirecting the bolt of electricity that’s sent towards him into its spines. Greedily absorbing the attack, the feast CHARGES the sea urchin’s power before returning the DISCHARGE right back.
[break][break]
In the blinding glow, Angelo lunges downwards with strong strokes and kicks, disappearing through a gap in the ship floor to the level below. [break][break]

Pincurchin follows and with a flick of his wrist in a wordless command, Nesaea swiftly advances ahead. Leaving Angelo to scout deeper into the ship, sensing for disturbed water – for a large force – with bristling fins.




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+ skyler dross // EMPLOYMENT: ACT I[break][break]

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“Flaunt? Me?” Angelo says as he swims after a retreating mermaid tail, stealing a glance over his shoulder to check if the Lanturn was giving chase or not. It doesn’t make an appearance and without sight of its trainer during the attack either, Angelo concludes he’d gotten away with it. [break][break]

Even though the ship interior is crumbling away, rotting and degrading into a skeleton cast of iron and wood, it’s still a maze. Thankfully, his Vaporeon scouts just ahead with movements that hint towards an understanding of direction, guiding him with quivering fins and a beckoning flick of her tail to signify safe passage. [break][break]

Then suddenly Nesaea is circling back, encouraging Angelo to hold on tight. A haunting wail rattles throughout the rusting bones of the ship. He doesn’t hesitate for a second.[break][break]

“I’m on my way.”[break][break]

Picking up speed with a determined surge, she takes them through winding dark corridors in a blur of bubbles and increasingly thick seaweed as Pincurchin clings to Angelo's back – focus rippling off them. [break][break]

But it doesn’t matter how fast they confidently slice through the water, when they burst into the room - using AURORA BEAM to break through a thick sheet of blue kelp that begins to block their entrance - Skyler’s already been hurled across the room. [break][break]

Angelo is quick enough to stop the treasure hunter from colliding into the wall, however. [break][break]

“Shit… Yeah. You found it, alright.” Steadying her with hands curled around her arms, having cushioned her by cutting in behind her, Angelo’s voice crackles through the coms just the slightest strained from the collision - but thankful she can’t hear a racing heartbeat. “You good?”[break][break]

Fingertips linger on her back for a moment when the courier pushes Skyler forward so they could tread water easier, catching sight of a large eye staring their way amongst a tangle of seaweed, a flash of ruby and ivory nestled within the slithering fronds.[break][break]

“If I heard it on the other side of the ship, the others might be making moves this way. We should hurry.”


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+ skyler dross // EMPLOYMENT: ACT I[break][break]

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Their distraction attempts are a success. With the Dhelmise on edge, large eye rolling as it tries to follow Angelo and his pokemon’s unpredictable movements, it’s easy for certain members of the group to slip under its radar. [break][break]

Nesaea confuses the huge anchor as she nimbly swims through its reaching kelp tendrils before vanishing with ACID ARMOR. Only to reappear somewhere else entirely with a dazzling, frigid AURORA BEAM aimed at the blue sea creeper. [break][break]

At the sight of gold flashing in Skyler’s grasp, Angelo grins privately behind his helmet. Satisfaction curls in response as it catches a weak beam of sun that punctures into the depths, although his greed today leans towards success, rather than avarice or filling empty pockets.[break][break]

“Alright, let’s get out of here.” [break][break]

He takes a moment to return Pincurhin to his pokeball, zapping up the little urchin as it nibbles hungrily on unconscious Dehlmise seaweed, before swimming towards the breach in the hull. Without pause, the courier breaks through into the reaching stretch of ocean; its grandiose, lonely expanse unfelt until the lack of a sailor’s presence is noted. [break][break]

“Sky? What're you doing? C’mon!” [break][break]

Turning, he watches her form hesitate at the edge of the vessel’s skeleton, Angelo stilling in response. Him in the vacuous dark depths, Skyler on the precipice of following or not. An expanse of water between them… [break][break]

Angelo waits for her to join him, emerging from beneath the surface of one blue to be greeted from above by another, together.[break][break]

… [break][break]

“So? How’d it go?” He’d ask her later on, unrelated. [break][break]

Instead, as he pauses on the Sotally Tober deck with a crate of neatly packed equipment in his arms, now in a t-shirt and with his wetsuit hanging around his hips, it’s about the now-absentee necklace. “They make your tangle with a Dhelmise worth your while?”



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+ skyler dross // EMPLOYMENT: ACT I[break][break]

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When Skyler returns back to the Sotally Tober, he can near taste the triumph and hunger rolling off her as she cuts across the deck to meet him. [break][break]

“Think it might’ve been…” He hums, slightly distracted from the question in his satisfaction of her undivided attention; unable to resist inching down towards Skyler as if they were made magnetic. [break][break]

But instead of brushing his curled lips against her own when she hovers tantalizingly close, a slight furrow finds its way to Angelo’s brow. Grin disappearing…[break][break]

It’s not the devilish gesture of slipping notes into his underwear that brings an uncomfortable, cold twist to the pit of his stomach.[break][break]

“I’m not taking this,” he says simply, with a slight dismissive chuckle.[break][break]

Bending down to place the crate of equipment securely on the deck, freeing his hands, Angelo reaches out to take hold of Skyler’s wrist. The fat wad of cash is fished out of his underwear and firmly returned to an open palm. [break][break]

“I just happened to be free today. It’s no big deal, Sunshine.” His gaze remains fixed on her own, resisting the urge to look down at the money proper – to count the stack that had momentarily sat alluringly heavy in his fingers – when something unsettling squirms within his gut. “It’s your payment. You keep it.”




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+ skyler dross // EMPLOYMENT: ACT I[break][break]

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“And I’m giving my half to you. I said I'm not taking it.” Narrowed, rapidly turbulent blues meet the sharp set of a jaw and the cutting ferocity of silver… Yet Angelo doesn’t flinch, his lover’s sharp tongue about as effective as a sword slicing through water. [break][break]

Skyler shoves the wad against his chest and Angelo's hands reach up to clutch them automatically, stopping the cash from awkwardly tumbling to the deck. Whatever attempts he’d made to light-heartedly play off his discomfort of accepting her money though, is suddenly blown away on the wind. [break][break]

“Stop being stubborn, Sky.” He counters, ignoring the taste of hypocrisy on his tongue with a frown of frustration. Bitterness masking the tang of sensibilities. “Just take your money.”[break][break]

Gathering the once neatly stacked bills into a crumpled mess in his fist, the man from Alto Mare sternly pushes the slips of green back towards Skyler’s hand. Defiant against his claim of a fair cut as he stands his ground, broad shoulders squared. [break][break]

And maybe Angelo trusts her a little too much – perhaps overestimates her greed or underestimates how far her stubbornness would go, even – but he lets go. Fully expecting the treasure hunter to catch the bounty before it scatters on the ground…





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+ skyler dross // EMPLOYMENT: ACT I[break][break]

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One heartbeat. Two. Angelo refuses to budge, not his feet nor his eyes, even when the money begins to dance, locked completely in his battle of wills with Skyler. [break][break]

It takes a second when the bills get snatched by the air, for reality to sink in… And when it does, it’s like a boulder splashing into a lake, an explosive collision of movement. [break][break]

“Me? What’s wrong with you? Why the fuck didn’t you grab it?” [break][break]

Nearly tripping over the crate he’d placed on the ground, completely forgetting that it was there in their frantic desperation, Alto Marean curses spill unrestrained. “Cazzo! Figlio di puttana!” Angelo bites out before inelegantly colliding into the railings; too focused on trying to snatch the notes out of the playful, ocean breeze's grasp to care. [break][break]

Only the wind is too tricky even for him and with a sudden whoosh the notes scatter higher, out of his and Skyler’s reach. They flutter innocently onto the water as Angelo’s eyes widen, the sight turning his blood cold. [break][break]

“Sei una minchiona, Sky! Move!” There’s a sudden splash followed by a string of curses. [break][break]

For a brief time, the residents of the Sotally Tober subject the Lilycove docks to an interesting display of ‘fishing’ before Angelo emerges from his third dip of the day with a soggy fistful of pokedollars. [break][break]

“Now will you take it?” He asks her dryly, dripping over the deck.






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+ skyler dross // EMPLOYMENT: ACT I[break][break]

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There’s a real temptation to throw the money – or something anyway, maybe a middle finger – at her as Skyler slaps the drenched pile of bills against his chest. If Angelo hadn’t been soaked to the bone, his frustration dampened and unease momentarily forgotten, then perhaps he might have… [break][break]

Instead, as the captain comically squelches away, he plucks the wad of cash into a slimy pile with an unhappy sigh and a scowl.[break][break]

“I’ll throw you back in the ocean, next time. The fish must be missing their resident sea hag.” [break][break]

His dissatisfaction is not made subtle, whatever practiced smiles Angelo could pull to his lips on a whim is not even considered. Skyler receiving his honest, if somewhat diluted after being waterlogged, annoyance. [break][break]

And yet the tension in the air doesn’t stop blue eyes from chasing after her as she stomps off, Angelo unable to not appreciate the way her soaked clothes stick to her curves; the sight of her ass somehow made better by her heavy-footed sulking. [break][break]

His gaze drags back up to her face when she stills, turning around. It takes but a single word falling from her irritating lips for Angelo to let out a breath of dry amusement, eyebrow raised. [break][break]

“That means you’re picking up groceries, then.” He responds as he pads after her on bare feet, leaving a trail of water in his wake. There’s an unwavering edge to his voice, his lips slightly curling with smug satisfaction. Knowing full too well on Skyler’s reliance on his presence in the kitchen, revelling in it. “Sure you don’t need the extra cash? It’s a long list.” [break][break]

He wouldn’t hand over a single wet note, even if he wasn’t happy having them in his possession, just to spitefully live up to his new nickname…

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+ skyler dross // EMPLOYMENT: ACT I[break][break]

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