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[attr="class","monbody"]Though Aurelie considered herself quite adept at several arts—blacksmithing, forging, welding, metal-casting, woodworking—the art of marketing, unfortunately, was one where she was undoubtedly a complete novice. Back in her hometown, the prestige of the Lefevre name alone ensured that local stores and boutiques would happily stock her family's creations on their shelves, but here, it was all Aurelie could do to wrangle even a phone call or short meeting with the buyers of Lilycove City's department stores.

Armed with only a painstakingly prepared sales presentation and a sample case full of the best examples of her work, Aurelie had attended meeting after meeting today with various buyers from the city's famous department stores. At every meeting, she met with uninterested faces and polite words on the theme of "No." Aurelie didn't have a reputation here, or a network of brokers and retail accounts, or even a successful exhibition at a trade show yet, so she simply wasn't worth the risk.

Cynically, she wondered if being a "worthy business risk" equated to "someone who could prove they didn't need the business." This is just the way the world works, though, she thought with a sigh. Ugh.

Looking down at her sample case filled with kitchen cutlery, camp knives, gardening shears, and hand-forged scissors, Aurelie started surveying the various other businesses lining the streets with a hint of desperation. Maybe the gardening supplies store would be interested in something she had? Or the clothing boutique across the street? Or the beauty parlor for Pokemon here, where...where...

Aurelie blinked in consternation as she stared tactlessly through the glass windows. Was there really a man crying next to the front desk of the beauty parlor? And—she strained her eyes, feeling incredulous—was that the elegant Elisabeth Fiorelli walking over to him, looking distinctly nonplussed and even slightly, incongruously awkward?

Drawn to the spectacle despite herself, Aurelie cracked open the door to the Pokemon beauty parlor, just in time to see Elisabeth pat the sobbing man sympathetically on the shoulder and ask him, "How particular are you about who grooms your Furfrou?" No doubt about it, the florist—whom Aurelie remembered from the cultural festival—looked noticeably uncomfortable, and her eyes were darting from side to side, as if in search of some sort of relief or assistance.

Grooming, eh? So that's what this is about? Aurelie could hardly believe the fuss the man was making! And yet, it could be an opportunity for her too, or at least an opportunity to show off her creations in an unconventional but potentially promising way. She stepped forward into the beauty parlor lobby, opening her case of samples and smiling as her hand closed on one of the delicately crafted pairs of grooming scissors stored within.

"Excuse me, but I think I could be of some help," she interjected, clearing her throat courteously. "I couldn't help hearing a little about your predicament, sir, and I would be happy to share some excellent tools to help you with grooming your beloved Pokemon."

With a flourish, she presented the pair of grooming scissors, the ergonomically fashioned handles extended outward and the gently curved, high-quality steel blades gleaming in the overhead lights.

[attr="class","cred"]VEL OF PIXEL PERFECT

[attr="class","mon"]

[attr="class","monbody"]None of this was going the way Aurelie was expecting.

When she'd spoken up, she hadn't expected Elisabeth Fiorelli to attempt to foist the ridiculous crying man upon her, considering she was only offering her equipment, not her services. She certainly hadn't expected the aforementioned ridiculous crying man to rather more successfully foist his mangy, dirty Furfrou upon Elisabeth and then rush out the door without any hint of shame. After that, though, she probably should have expected the woman at the front desk to treat them both like impromptu volunteer dog groomers and usher them toward an empty washroom with an impatient raising of her eyebrows.

And yet, even so, this turn of events left her quite disgruntled and wishing she'd never entered the grooming salon in the first place.

"You've got to be kidding me," Aurelie muttered sharply under her breath, looking first at Elisabeth's no-longer-pristine white dress and then at her own business suit, which she'd worn for her series of sales meetings. "Do either of us even look like pet groomers? I came in here to promote my work, not to spruce up some stranger's Pokemon..."

But she looked at the bedraggled Furfrou in Elisabeth's arms, which gazed back at her with soulful ruby eyes under a thick cloud of tousled, tangled off-white fluff. It craned its head to one side, as if in search of its abruptly disappeared trainer, and let out a soft, wistful-sounding whine. Aurelie's heart melted despite herself.

"Oh, poor thing! Well, all right," she sighed resignedly, meeting Elisabeth's gaze with a wry smile. "Let's get this Furfrou looking like the beauty he or she surely deserves to be."

Her single eye narrowed as she glanced back toward the salon doors. "And I swear, that man had better compensate us both very well for the help. Or else I have something much sharper than just scissors in this sample case that I could use on him."

Squaring her shoulders with an air of phlegmatic pragmatism, the red-haired smith strode briskly into the tiled washroom, which prominently featured a stainless-steel washing and grooming station with a tub quite large enough to hold the Furfrou, a faucet and sprayer, and a selection of Pokemon-safe soaps and shampoos. Aurelie was relieved to see a jar of treats on a table nearby, along with a selection of mirrors, blow dryers, scissors, brushes, and combs. Back in Kalos, she'd always heard about how picky Furfrou could be about trusting people, and what better way to win a Furfrou's trust than with treats and gentleness?

"Why don't you put the Furfrou in there," she suggested to Elisabeth, indicating the tub as she crossed the room and opened the jar of treats, "and we can see about getting started?"

Taking out a heart-shaped biscuit from the jar, she held it out hopefully toward the Pokemon. "Here, sweetheart," she said coaxingly to the Furfrou. "Would you like to be our friend?"

[attr="class","cred"]VEL OF PIXEL PERFECT

[attr="class","mon"]

[attr="class","monbody"]"Huh," was all Aurelie could think of to say in response to Elisabeth Fiorelli 's effective, if extremely unorthodox and rather excessive, solution to holding the uncooperative Furfrou still.

Struck dumb by the sight, the red-haired smith simply stared open-mouthed for a moment as Elisabeth's pitcher plant Pokemon wrapped its long vines around the furry canine Pokemon's body, like a thug tying a captive to a chair. Part of her marveled internally at how well-behaved the Furfrou was that it merely whimpered at such treatment from a stranger, rather than thrashing about in a wild bid for freedom or unleashing a loud chorus of indignant barks. Even more oddly, Elisabeth herself appeared quite smug about her solution, even though it seemed like a tactic far better suited to a Pokemon battle rather than a Pokemon bath.

Finally, Aurelie managed to close her mouth and remembered to close the treats jar. "Well. Uh. I guess that works." She glanced sidelong at Elisabeth. "Though I'd hate to see how you'd deal with an uncooperative pickle jar that you just couldn't open."

Hopefully not lash the jar with thorny vine whips until it shattered, she thought to herself with a mental chuckle.

Shaking her head briefly to clear her thoughts, Aurelie finally registered the other woman's question, whereupon she broke into a grin. "That's pretty much what I do—carry sharp objects around," she confirmed mischievously, thinking of her bladesmithing business. "Sometimes I carry heavy, blunt things around too to hit other things with. It's very satisfying work."

She added quickly, for clarity's sake, "I make custom, hand-forged knives and blades for gardening shears, scissors, saws, and tools. These," she indicated the sample case she'd been carrying around, "are some examples from my workshop, the Iron Lady Forge."

As she talked, Aurelie eyed the row of shampoos and soaps next to the washing station, before selecting one advertising a "captivating aroma of fragrant lavender and herbal rosemary". Letting out a sigh, she rolled up her sleeves and resolved to quite literally get her hands dirty, because, at least from her perspective, there wasn't much point in doing a job if she wasn't going to do it thoroughly and well. She poured a small portion of shampoo into one hand, worked it into a lather with plenty of water, and started massaging it into the now wide-eyed Furfrou's fur.

"There you go," she murmured soothingly to the decidedly jittery-looking Pokemon trapped in coils of vines. "Who's a good boy? Or girl? Uh, Furfrou, I guess? Yes, you! You're a good Furfrou!" As the scent of the shampoo wafted up, she paused in mid-rub, tilting her head inquisitively in Elisabeth's direction. "Wait. Hmm. You work with flowers, if I remember right? I hope the combination of scents in the shampoo isn't too unsuitable to the nose of an expert like yourself."

[attr="class","cred"]VEL OF PIXEL PERFECT

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[attr="class","monbody"]Aurelie eyed Elisabeth Fiorelli sidelong from the corner of her eye, trying to gauge her reaction to the red-haired bladesmith's impromptu attempt at a sales pitch, in which the mention of gardening shears had indeed been inserted quite deliberately with much hopefulness. The blond florist was such a peerless paragon of perfectly polished poise that Aurelie found her quite difficult to read, but at least she seemed to be considering the smith's words, albeit with raised eyebrows, rather than dismissing them outright. For now, that was quite good enough for the preoccupied Aurelie.

She had to admit, she was surprised when Elisabeth joined in on lathering the Furfrou, especially considering her professed dislike of dogs in general. She wouldn't have suspected that someone as well-bred and haughty as Elisabeth would ever want to get her slender, elegant white hands dirty doing anything, let alone helping with something she detested. The red-haired smith's own eyebrow rose, as did her estimation of the florist. If nothing else, it certainly helped the lathering process go much faster!

When Elisabeth turned on the faucet to rinse off the Furfrou, the dog Pokemon noticeably flinched as if surprised and displeased by the sudden splashing of warm water against its fur. It shifted its weight uncomfortably from one foot to another and hunched its head, which along with its firmly tucked tail created a perfect image of mute unhappiness. With the dog still pinned by the Weepinbell's vines, Aurelie decided to use the sprayer to douse off the parts of its body that the faucet couldn't reach.

When the Furfrou felt the unexpected torrent of water from yet another angle, its eyes went wide and its body froze in shock. Then all hell broke loose.

At first, it merely shook its head in indignation, sending droplets of soapy water flying outward in a circle. Wincing sympathetically at the sight of Elisabeth's already dampened dress, Aurelie shifted the sprayer so it was aimed at the Furfrou's back, in hopes of causing less of a mess. Unfortunately, this only made things worse. Letting out a series of hoarse barks, the Furfrou started thrashing around wildly in its vine-wrought restraints and shaking its entire body back and forth in protest.

Large sheets of water flew up through the air from the Furfrou's body at an astonishingly rapid rate. Only some of the water landed in the tub where the Pokemon was standing; a lot more water ended up all over the walls, splattered on the floor, and dripping from the hair and clothes of the two women who stared, squint-eyed and disgruntled, at the still-barking Furfrou. With a dismayed gasp, Aurelie hurriedly flicked off the sprayer. A few seconds later, the Furfrou stopped shaking itself and stood quietly again in the tub, its damp fur now standing out on end all over its body from its forcible drying-off.

Flicking drops of water from her eyepatch, Aurelie grumbled, "Now I think I understand where you're coming from about dogs." More water dripped from the crown of her head onto the tip of her nose, and she breathed out a huff of air to blow it off. "Mute and docile this thing is not, that's for sure. You, sir or madam,"" she added, addressing the Furfrou now, "are a monster, through and through. But at least you're mostly dry now, so that's...something, I guess."

She glanced over at Elisabeth questioningly. "Are you doing okay? Do you want me to take over from here?"

[attr="class","cred"]VEL OF PIXEL PERFECT

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[attr="class","monbody"]"Good question," Aurelie grumbled in response to Elisabeth Fiorelli asking what to do next. She too eyed the now-dry Furfrou with a baleful expression, noting with sardonic amusement how it almost seemed to be enjoying the blow-drying process. "Probably some brushing, maybe some trimming of its fur, and then, yes, I suppose a few bows too?"

Thankfully, the Pokemon seemed to have worn itself out or was inclined toward better behavior now, for it didn't resist or bark as the two women methodically and grouchily used large brushes to put its clean white fur in order. With some trepidation, Aurelie selected a pair of grooming scissors from her sample case and started snipping away at various mats, tangles, and other unruly, overgrown sections of the Furfrou's coat. Having never worked as a dog groomer, she decided to follow the basic principle of keeping the dog's fur mostly the same length along its body and not attempt anything fancier. The scissors snipped cleanly through the fur and the blades' convex curve made the resulting cut look smooth and uniform, if not particularly eye-catching. The Furfrou monitored her actions with narrowed ruby eyes, its expression hovering somewhere between suspicious and critical of her efforts.

In contrast to the now pristinely clean Furfrou, both women were a sight to behold, draped in once-clean clothing that was now damp and tufted here and there with loose strands of fur. Elisabeth's pretty white dress was a mess, with wet spots and pawprints much in evidence, while Aurelie's business suit was still dripping with water from the hem of her sleeves and skirt. When they grumpily tied a few pink and green bows around its neck and ears, the Furfrou almost seemed to be preening with an air of vain superiority.

Aurelie couldn't help quipping ruefully, "I can't help feeling like the dog is becoming more beautiful while we're becoming more gross and nasty. Maybe this Furfrou is a succubus of some kind, draining away our life energy and good looks. A dog-cubus!"

Elisabeth was spared the need to respond to the feeble witticism when the young man who owned the Furfrou burst through the door of their borrowed washroom. "My precious!" he exclaimed, and the dog Pokemon immediately burst into a chorus of barking. "Are you all right? What have they done to you, my sweet suffering beauty?"

"We've cleaned your Furfrou, is what we've done," Aurelie burst out in annoyance. "I admit the vines are a little unconventional, but they helped us give your 'precious' a good shampooing, a much-needed wash, some brushing, and some good grooming. And it certainly wasn't easy, let me tell you!"

Frowning, the young man reached for his Pokemon impatiently. "Yes, yes, well, you've done a tolerably good job, not too bad, though I'm pretty sure I could have done better. But now, give me back my Fluffy, please! The contest starts in five minutes!"

Aurelie glanced over at Elisabeth and smiled grimly. "Sir," she snapped, crossing her arms, "you're going to need to pay us for our work before you get your Furfrou back. A fair hourly rate for both of us, and a consideration on top of that for dry-cleaning fees and for helping you when no one else would. Pay up now, or your Fluffy stays in the vines. In which case I wish you good luck winning the contest without your Pokemon contestant."

"But! But! That's blackmail!" the young man wailed, waving his arms wildly in the air in protest.

"No, that's just good business," Aurelie corrected him. She held out her hand, palm up. "Pay up, and do it soon. I think we all have places we'd like to be."

The man paid immediately.

The next morning, with her business suit at the dry cleaners' and the ridiculous beauty salon-related events safely behind her, Aurelie scrolled through the local news before starting her day in the forge. When she saw a headline about a Pokemon contest that happened a day before, accompanied by a small photo of the winners, she couldn't help shaking her head and smiling. That Furfrou in first place looked awfully familiar...

[attr="class","cred"]VEL OF PIXEL PERFECT