the sun is shining, the birds are singing, and nagi has had so much caffeine over the course of the day, he can taste the colour blue. a perfect time as any for a long walk.

as he approaches sandy dunes of lilycove’s picturesque beach, nagi lets watson out of his ball as well, in a (futile, he knew) attempt to walk off the shinx’s perpetual excess of energy. together, the odd pokemon-and-trainer pair meander the coastline — watson bumbling along ahead, a little ball of blue kicking up sand in its merry wake, and nagi, following behind at a sedate pace, rolling his shoulders in a vain effort to get the knots out.

despite the crowds, it is a pretty sight: the setting sun casting a hazy pink glow over the waves, the sand orange and warm beneath his feet; watson, a bouncing speck of azure in the horizon. nagi fishes his phone out, thinking absently of taking a video — when he hears someone call out to him.

he turns around to see ruslan skye  and the linoone on his lap, one raised hand curled around a phone as the young man stutters, “I-I-I…I w-was…tha- that is…”

even through lana’s stammering, the gesture is universal enough. nagi had passed by enough tourists while living in lumiose city to know when someone needed help getting a photo taken.

“sure,” nagi answers, and though his tone is curt, his hands, when he takes lana’s phone, are careful. “landscape or portrait?”

ruslan skye

☉

The trainer he stopped is quick to pick up on what he meant and didn’t push further. Lane held back a sigh of relief letting go of Garbage Baby and watching the Linoone slump into the sand. He got up quickly, unlocking his phone and handed it over to Nagi. “B-…Both?” he didn’t have a preference but…maybe victor evans did? He seemed easily pleased, and maybe this was true. Still, he didn’t want to just do something poorly. The photos were his as well to remember. “I-I just n-n-need a-a couple.” He added quickly, hoping to emphasize how fast it’d be. He dind’t want to take up too much of their time or risk annoying them. [break][break]

“Oh- uh!” he turned back to where he’d been sitting, shaking Garbage Baby as the pokemon dozed off in the heat. “Hey! C’mon-!” he whispered as the dual type lifted his head up just enough to give a surprise lick at his trainer, who let out a laugh. Fair arms scoop up the playful badger pokemon before he plopped back on the dune. Garbage Baby’s eyes where everywhere but the Nagi and his camera. The second he spotted Watson he seemed to get even more rowdy. It’s a struggle for a moment, until Lana dipped his head towards his partner and whispered some sort of bribe. Instantly, the pokemon was well behave and staring directly at Nagi and Ruslan pointed at him. “Cheese!”


[break][break]

+ nagi miwa | mission prompt: sunset selfie
[break][break]

[attr="class","pokeclass"]

as ruslan skye grapples with his linoone, nagi’s mouth curves upwards into a small grimace of sympathy. his gaze flicks up to watson in the distance, trotting in circles along the coastline ahead, chasing his own tail as he waits for nagi to catch up. behaving, for now.

lana's phone held upright in his palms, nagi takes a few steps back in the sand, attempting to fit lana, garbage baby and the glittering, evening sea behind them in the same shot. he lines the background up to his satisfaction just in time, as the squirming linoone finally turns to face the camera.

“cheese!” click.

“i’ll take one more in landscape,” he calls out to lana, turning the phone on its side and peering down into the screen again.

he has his finger held over the button when he notices something blue and blurry coming into focus in the viewfinder. running over from where it had previously been a stationary blur further down the coast, a cloud of sand kicked up behind it as it thunders down. oh, no.

nagi scrambles forward, slipping in the sand. the camera shutter clicks, his hand closing around it as he lunges to grab his shinx by the scruff of his neck. alas, he’s too late. “watson, do not—”

but, of course, watson does — leaping for garbage baby with a joyful, carefree chirrup.

ruslan skye

☉

Lana isn’t aware of the little dust devil, focused more so on staying still and staring straight at the camera and Nagi. By the time he realized something was wrong, it’s too late. The closer Watson gets, the more Garbage Baby trembled with excited barking the close the electric type got. He’s unable to escape though, and Watson crashed into them both. The trainer let out a lout ‘OOF!’ pushed back into the dune, arms loosening around his partner. The Linoone didn’t seem as harmed, easily tumbling off his trainer and with the friendly Shinx before stopping on his back as well.
[break][break]

In an instant, Garbage Baby is up and shaking himself of sand before barking loudly and running circles around the Shinx, sniffing at him curiously. Lana is worse for wear; baseball cap flung a foot away and wheezing as he lay in the sand. “Ugh…” he moaned weakly propping himself up on his elbows. “D-Did you…g-g-get the pictures?” he mumbled shaking the back of his head free of sand.


[break][break]

+ nagi miwa | mission prompt: sunset selfie
[break][break]

[attr="class","pokeclass"]

nagi gives watson a weighty look — you are in so much trouble, he attempts to say with his eyes alone. the venom in his glare slides harmlessly off watson’s back, as he throws the full force of his fickle attention span into playing with his new friend.

while watson pirouettes, spinning in place as garbage baby runs circles around him, nagi turns his attention to ruslan skye, sprawled out in the sand. he takes a few steps forward to fish lana’s flyaway cap off the ground, before returning to lana’s side. “the photos are fine.” (probably, he adds, quickly and quietly under his breath; he can make no promises about the last shot, but lana’s phone is unscathed, at the very least.) “i’ll take them again if anything’s wrong.”

he pats the sand off lana’s cap with the back of his hand, squatting down by lana to hold it and the phone out to him. “here — are you hurt anywhere?”

ruslan skye

☉

Lana took a moment to shake out the sand caught on the back of his head and on his elbows which he’d used to prop himself back up. “T-Thanks.” He said as he took back his cap and offered the other trainer a shy smile. “O-Oh, that’d b-be c-c-cool.” Lana continued as his eyes dipped towards his phone to look through them. [break][break]

His phone unlocked easily, lacking a password. He didn’t really have anything to hide when it was just him and Victor at home. Lana shook his head quickly at Nagi’s concern. “J-Just sand…n-none in m-m-my e-eyes though!” he assured as he sat on his knees and turned to watch the pokemon playing. Garbage Baby’s initial excitement dropped for a moment as he finally stopped to sniff at Watson in friendly greeting. “Y-Your cat…i-it’s uh-…i-it’s v-v-very cute.” He said, attempting to make polite conversation. He didn’t seem to have any intention of rushing Watson and Garbage Baby. For solace, he looked back down at his phone, scrolling through the phots Nagi had taken. Slowly but surely, his smile turned into a tiny grin as he saw a couple of blurry images when he assumed Nagi had come running after his partner. He sent a couple off to Victor as an update before closing up his phone. “T-They look g-g-good!”


[break][break]

+ nagi miwa | mission prompt: sunset selfie
[break][break]

[attr="class","pokeclass"]

nagi gives lana a quick once-over nonetheless, only relaxing once he's made sure that the other boy is completely intact, no limbs knocked loose in the altercation with his wayward shinx.

"what watson is, is a menace," he says, settling on his haunches in the sand beside lana. watson, hearing his own name, chirps in their direction joyfully, before returning to his mission of getting garbage baby to chase him in circles again. nagi shakes his head with a sigh and a wry, resigned smile, and turns back to lana just in time to see the smile grow on the other boy's face as he thumbs through the photos.

"are you sure? i can take a few more," he asks. "i’m sorry for — " he trails off, motioning to watson, then himself, then lana's phone in turn. " — all that. it's mostly my fault for not paying attention."

ruslan skye

☉

Lana smiled at the novelist, letting out a small laugh as he spoke of his pokemon before turning to look at the pair. He waved at the electric type before looking at Garbage Baby and giving him a small nod. At that, the Linoone carefully booped the the Shinx, encouraging the pokemon to take off as Garbage Baby got ready to chase. [break][break]


As Nagi offered more photos, Lana is already doing just that, phone in hand as he zoomed in on the two pokemon. Occasionally when they veered too close to other beach goers or joggers he would tense up and let out a quick, "WATCH IT!". They cut it close, but Garbage Baby understood the command enough to slow down and avoid ramming into people. [break][break]

He looked back at Nagi after he'd taken a little video. Lana looked away for a moment, putting together carefully what he wanted to say before nodding. "I-If you i-i-insist." there's the hint of something cheeky in his tone, but he's not brave enough to look Nagi in the face to confirm it. He met their gaze for a second before chickening out. "I-It's lucky t-t-though. Gar-garbage Baby doesn't have p-playmates." His ghosts tended to wander more than stick to one place. It was rare the Linoone could actually play with someone other than Lana. "S-So...um...th-thank you too."

[break][break]

+ nagi miwa | mission prompt: sunset selfie
[break][break]

[attr="class","pokeclass"]

“i get that. watson wears most of his playmates out,” nagi says, with the dry tone of someone who is thoroughly worn out — but despite the exasperation colouring his voice, he’s still staring out at the dunes with a small, indulgent smile on his face.

tinged pink and gold in the glow of the setting sun, their shadows lengthening over the glittering sand as they frolic, absorbed in their game of tag — it is, nagi has to admit, a beautiful beginning to a budding friendship. a picture book in the making: garbage baby and watson’s big day out!

he cups his hands over his mouth, and calls out: “you have till the sun sets! get it all out.”

watson chirrups in acknowledgement, a high-pitched excited cry, before throwing his entire being into his last few minutes of play with his new friend.

nagi hums, before turning to lana, head tipped to one side in thought. “i live nearby here. if garbage baby ever needs a playmate… we could trade numbers.”

ruslan skye

☉

Lana managed a grin at his tentative new friend. "I-I can see t-t-that..." The Shinx was certainly full to the brim with energy, but he was cute...so Ruslan would cut him some slack. He hadn't realized that much time had passed until Nagi gave his ultimatum to his partner. He looked over at him in surprise before stumbling over himself to give out the same warning to Garbage Baby. "Y-You heard h-h-him! Sun-Sunset!!" Lana called out. The badger pokemon barked twice to show he'd heard his trainer before turning back to Watson.
[break][break]

Garbage Baby, while heavy and lazy, put all his effort into chasing the Shinx. Sand is kicked up, and Garbage Baby is barking and huffing with exertion, pouncing and scrambling through the dunes for the chase. Lana caught another little video of the pair before accidentally turning he camera to Nagi. "Oh- um!" he put the phone down to stop the video and swallowed hard.
[break][break]

"R-R-Really?" Red eyes went wide for a moment before darting to the ground, to their pokemon and back. "Y-Yeah, I think G-Garbage Baby w-w-would like tha- that." he said, eyes on his phone as he unlocked it and set up the contact screen for Nagi. "I'm...I'm n-not too f-far either." he added, peeking under his bangs at Nagi, trying hard not to smile at the idea of making a new friend. Even if this was more so just a mutually beneficial thing for their pokemon. It was an in- a start.

[break][break]

+ nagi miwa | mission prompt: sunset selfie
[break][break]

[attr="class","pokeclass"]

nagi pulls up the contact screen on his phone, and — with the hesitant motions of someone who is not quite what the correct order of actions should be — slides it over the sand to set it down by lana's side.

trading numbers hasn't been a common occurrence in his life; initiating an introduction even less so. but, though lana is a stranger he has barely traded an hour's worth of words with on a beach, under the setting sun, egged on by watson and garbage baby's infectious glee — it feels right.

so he answers lana’s tentative look with a small smile of his own, and though his expression is a little stiff, a little unpracticed, it’s genuine.

“my name’s nagi.” he points the letters out on the phone’s keypad. “what's yours?”

ruslan skye

☉

Lana does his best not to swipe Nagi's phone like a feral creature, not wanting to seem desperate. But he's excited. More than excited really. This is good progress for him, and he'd done it all by himself. Or, well, thanks to Garbage Baby. "I-It's good t-to meet you." Lana began before introducing his own name. "Ruslan." He practiced enough to get it out in one go. "Y-You can c-c-call me L-Lana though." he added. [break][break]

He then turned his attention back to the phone, carefully inputting his number. He didn't want to mess this up by fucking up his own contact info. There's an option for a photo, and for a moment Lana wondered if he should take one before backing out immediately. No, instead he enabled it to take a photo of Garbage Baby chasing after Watson. It's blurry but he figured it was a good enough reminder of who he was. [break][break]

"T-Text me anytime." he said, sounding a little bit confident before backpedaling hard. "G-G-Garbaby B-Baby is a-always u-u-up for p-playdates! So-" he cut himself off, carefully handing back Nagi's phone. "Um. Yeah."

[break][break]

+ nagi miwa | mission prompt: sunset selfie
[break][break]

[attr="class","pokeclass"]

"yeah," nagi says. "watson too.” [break][break]

he takes his phone back, and smirks down at the blurry picture of garbage baby, hot on watson's tail. he raises the lens, and snaps a picture of watson — an out-of-focus smudge of blue and yellow streaking from one corner of the screen to the other, spotlighted by lens flare and backlit by the setting sun. artistic. also not recognisably a pokemon, but it’s the best he can get, given the circumstances and the shinx in question.[break][break]

he sends the picture to lana.[break][break]

in a few minutes, the sun will set, the sight-seers gathered among the dunes will make their way home, and nagi will have to bundle watson — tuckered-out, covered in a dusting of sand, but still refusing to return to his ball — into his jacket and lug the squirming bundle back to his motel room. for now, though, he sits back in the sand, points his camera out into the dunes, and lets himself breathe. [break][break]

[break][break]

[attr="class","ooc"] ruslan skye [break]


[attr="class","pkspr pkmn-shinx"]