the tide is low and so she manages to find half a dozen sets of footsteps in the sand. so she follows them along the shoreline, phone in her hands, zooming in on anything that might be recognizable. this was only an hour ago. the timestamp from the live video warns her of how much time has passed; too long and they'll have moved on, enough and she'll be able to catch them in the act.

her gaze lifts and she turns when she senses someone else sharing the shore with her. and then she waits patiently. maybe this one is part of their circus. 

but no, she's not. freya looks down at the handkerchief and then away, down at the tracks she'd been following. is it that bad? her senses have been askew ever since her fight with fernando. unless she's breathing through her mouth, her smell has lessened. and her hearing is...different. acute sounds are vivid; in a crowd, she can hear whispers. 

but layman's speech, this woman here, is almost muffled. she takes the handkerchief, after her moment of thought, and then raises it to her face. 

"do you know anything about the wimpod fights on this beach?"

Tara Arnnelia
mission link

☉

either this woman is fucking with her or she really just wants to come along for the ride. freya hesitates, but figures there's really no harm in allowing her to tag along. after all, if she can't count on lyune right now to get her out of a scrap. . . she shakes her head. don't think like that. you can't be scared of him now. 

now that she can feel his fury and all the hurt in his heart. 

freya draws the bloody videos up on her phone and hands it to tara. there are trenches dug in a circle in the trash-ridden sand. several wimpod are left in the ring; there are jeers and shouts as firecrackers go off, skittering against the bugs, startling them into a frenzy. 

and then they rip each other apart. 

"gruesome, right?" she says sourly. "i'd like to scare the shit out of the assholes who think this is funny."

Tara Arnnelia
mission link

☉

"because they're shitty people and the world is full of far too many of them," she says bluntly. if it were up to her - and socially acceptable - she'd have her dragons simply eat them and remove the problem. her brain has done a wonderful job of of simplifying things that way, but that still makes it a tad complicated when it comes to saving face. 

and she doesn't exactly have the arsenal to remove such burdens from society quietly. 

"slateport police cadet," she repeats with a chuckle. "you dirty yet? if you're not, the wolves are gonna chew you up and spit you out." the league is a lot of things, but they're not dumb. the police force in slateport is bought out and puppeteered by rocket. 

dirty cops are why these punk assholes are getting away with what they're doing right now. 

the dunes a few yards away from the shoreline grow in size as they walk down the beach. and eventually freya drifts from the trash-laden waves towards the massive domes of sand. and on the wind is where she can hear jeers. 

"mm, clever. all this sand muffles most of the noise. come on, cadet. we're getting closer."

Tara Arnnelia
mission link

☉

"they're not going to be able to keep it up very long because we've found them," she says. freya doesn't pay any mind to tara's trivialities. she doesn't care that slateport's cops are dirty. she doesn't care that this woman thinks she can change things. she doesn't care about much these days. 

her fingers scratch at the pokeball hanging over her heart. she unclasps it from its silver twine and tosses it into the air. 

lyune emerges. his tail slams against the ground, fins flexing as he flicks out his tongue. her own shivers inside of her mouth as his hunger washes over her. he blinks, cocks his head at her, and lets loose a low hiss at the woman beside them. 

he steps over a dune, claws sinking into the sand. freya follows and then stands atop. a gaggle of trainers stare up at them, slack-jawed. wimpod carcasses lay at their feet. freya grins. 

"have at them, cadet. before we rip them apart." her voice is a guttural snarl, melding with the intimidating roar that bursts from lyune's maw. 

Tara Arnnelia
mission link

☉