"ah! poochyena!"

the cadet had been caught off-guard by the hollering that had been directed toward her. the individual whom had called her was in the company of no less than six poochyena, each appearing to be in possession of a uniquely colored scarf. 

"they're adorable." 

without having the be beckoned, the girl moved to approach and crouch before the gray-furred pups, the roserade whom accompanied her frowning slightly at the sight of the pokemon. still, the bipedal grass-type remained at her side, silently observing as she crouched before the dark-type canines. thankfully, the woman was wise enough not to reach out her hand, aware that some pokemon didn't appreciate the touch of a stranger.

"and you have six, too. six. gods." 

after a moment spent of admiring the canines, she stood up and bowed politely to the man. 

'he has a trash bag in his hand. is he picking up litter? there's quite a bit of that here, now that i think about it.' 

"cait," she said, correcting her posture and brushing aside a few stray locks of deep green." it's nice to meet you. did you need anything?" 

her roserade huffed quietly, concealing the lower portion of his face behind his roses as he continued to peer down disapprovingly at the pack of dark-types. 

"oh! uh - yes, i think i do."

she followed his gaze, noting the clumps of trash that had been carelessly tossed upon the sand. there was no doubt in her mind that a few parties had occurred in this particular location recently, their respective goers caring little for the welfare of the beach as they tossed their beer cans and plastic cups wherever they pleased. 

"every time i see stuff like this i get a bit sad," she said. "as silly as that sounds. i was raised to worship and appreciate nature and its gifts - and this just seems... disrespectful?" 

cait's smile vanished for only a moment as she fell silent before she perked up a little and nodded her head at the male. her schedule was very much free, the woman having little else to do besides train and cater to her pokemon's needs. 

"i can help clean up," she said. "and so can my pokemon." 

she glanced down at her roserade, whom's expression remained pinched - though she supposed that was just the grass-type's default expression. cait had only very recently acquired the fully evolved creature, and he seemed to be the 'high maintenance' sort. 

"most of my pokemon can help, i mean." 

cait made the wise decision of introducing her ariados and venomoth, the poisoners almost immediately peering in the direction of the unfamiliar male and his companions once released from their respective capsules. 

"ariados? venomoth? we're going to help kyle and his team with picking up a few - " 

 - her gaze flicked toward the beach - 

" - a lot of things. basically just anything that doesn't belong here like plastic and paper. you both know psychic, so you can carry quite a bit at once. you'll be depositing whatever you collect into this black plastic bag that kyle here is holding, alright?" 

That was, uh, easy.

Kyle couldn't hide his surprise, a perplexed face presented to the girl as he took the moment to digest the reality he was faced with. She wasn't some naive high schooler, he hoped, else he'd be guilt ridden until he finishes the task that he begrudgingly accepted.

You're weird.

...was what he wanted to say. He didn't though, fearing that his words might chase away the much needed help he required.

"Thanks. You're doing me a big favor here."

He noted his Poochyena's lack of caution in the face of Cait's Bug-types. All six of them quickly crowded around the new faces, sniffing and playfully pawing, but not actually touching, her Pokemon. They did not seem to do the same with the Roserade though, perhaps not sensing the Grass-type's sociability. They did not seem to yap or bark excitedly anymore though, which took a while for Kyle to take out of their system.

He has a spare, folded nicely on the pocket of his shorts, though he decided not to provide it for her. A single bag should suffice for what was needed from him, maybe. "Basically, yeah," he answered.

"I wish my boys were that reliable." For the most part, they weren't. It was to be expected of them when they were young and inexperienced though. He scratched the back of his head, pointing a finger at the nearest empty soda can a few feet away from them. "Delta, fetch!"

The Poochy with the green scarf lifted his head, eyes turning to Kyle as his name was spoken of. The head tilt that followed meant either asking a 'why' at Kyle or that he did not quite understand the instruction. He wanted to believe it was the latter.

"So, Bug-types..." He went over to pick up the can that his Poochyena failed to bring to him, the statement lingering until he managed to get the piece of trash to the bag. "I guess you're one of those trainers that don't mind an imbalanced team, huh? Is this part of your, uh, religion or something?" She did mention worshiping nature. Kyle did not really care of anything of that nature, though he needed to start small talk to keep things from being awkward.

"i was actually raised around these kind of pokemon. and they're easier for me to handle, since i'm not that great of a trainer yet."

memories of when she was little more than a child caused a surge of nostalgia to well up within her. she missed home, terribly, and it felt as though she had left a piece of herself behind when she had taken leave of it. but the young woman felt as though it was her responsibility to protect both her family her home. 

'rocket can just as easily take what little we have away from us.' 

"mama had bug-types and my daddy loved his grass-types," she continued. 

her ariados and venomoth had begun their work, wielding their respective powers to gather clumps of trash that would be gently deposited into kyle's bag. cait worked alongside them to pick up what she could, continuing to speak as she plucked up a plastic cup. 

"but i guess you can also say our religion causes us to prefer 'em," she said. "the women in my family traditionally own at least one grass-type, with my mama's being a parasect." 

her roserade remained by her side, making no move to aid the human pair and their pokemon companions whom sought to clean this section of the beach. 

"we worship the god known as celebi," she said. "my family believe our own line had been blessed by such a being. that belief has been encouraged by the fact that quite a few of us have green hair and even green eyes. ya see all of this - "

she gestured toward her rather impressive mane. 

" - it was brown before i hit puberty. but i honestly think it's just a jumble of weird genetics that triggers it."  

the girl was thankful she hadn't grown sick of what her family considered to be their favorite color. 

"so, how about you? why do you have so many poochyena? they're real cute." 

Practices of family tradition that dictated the types of Pokemon they had did not seem to surprise Kyle that much. Besides, he wasn't in a position to critique it as well since he has a mono-type team as well, which he supposed was worse than having only two types in the team. The religion part, he could understand. The changing hair, not so much.

"Cool! Weird, but cool."

He couldn't stop himself from speaking those words this time. "Didn't know it was possible to be honest - changing hair color to something other than white naturally." He was tempted to approach her to see if the color did extend all the way to the roots, but he had enough restraint this time to consider not doing so.

Eyes widened as a question was directed to him, a smile appearing on his features as he placed his index finger and his thumb around his chin. "Cute, right? Easily the best decision of my life." A thumb tilted his head upwards as he tried to remember what started it all. "They're clearance puppies basically. Super cheap and they all came in as a bundle. You know I had to take the chance."

His eyes turned to the Poochyena, all of whom were still trying to disturb the Bug-types that helped Kyle instead of doing their part. "Sometimes, I'm not really sure if they're lacking in brain cells or if they're just too smart for their own good."

"a 'bundle'?"

she couldn't help but laugh at that before proceeding to smile fondly at the pack of poochyena. despite their attempts at pestering both ariados and venomoth, the bug-types appeared utterly unaffected. but the young woman supposed this was due to the fact that they were both physically and mentally mature. 

'as well as patient.' 

the most that was ever done was ariados nudging a poochyena aside in the gentlest way with one of her long legs. 

"i'm guessing they're all from the same litter, then." 

cait was half-tempted to pick one up, but she didn't want to further distract them from their assignment.

'then again, it's not like they're doing all that much.' 

"i wanted one when i was little," she said. "almost had one, too. but when we were visiting a breeder daddy realized he was allergic." 

she smiled at the memory despite the day having ended with her in tears. 

"i wish you'd help a little, roserade." 

her roserade released a noise that closely resembled a scoff, as though picking up trash was below him. 

"you're such a drama queen," she commented, far from amused by such behavior. "so, are you volunteering or is this some kind of community service for you, kyle?" 

"Yeah," he said, confirming her statement about them being siblings. His hand pointed to the Poochyena with the scarlet scarf, who busied himself by following the Ariados closely. "Red one's the oldest, and purple one's the youngest."

He stifled a laugh at her story. "It's not like you're missing much. Being adorable is all they're good at to be honest." There were much better Dark-types for the competitive trainers, and more capable canine Pokemon than them. A personal bias for his babies may be the only reason he kept them around.

Kyle was surprised to see his Pokemon start to return the trash from the beach to him. He crouched down and let his Pokemon drop whatever item they had on their mouth to the bag. Perhaps they have been subconsciously influenced by Cait's Pokemon that they started to copy what they saw them do. While it was alright for today, it worried Kyle. He wouldn't know when they'd start copying mannerisms of other Pokemon after all.

"No one volunteered, so I guessed the task was pushed to me. And then, I kinda pushed it to you too. Guess I owe you for this."

A drop of rain from the sky distracted Kyle from furthering the conversation. The downpour has yet to come and it still was just a light drizzle, but Kyle would rather not wait for them to be drenched before they went get a roof over their heads. A whistle brought the pups to assemble by his feet, filling the bag with the last pieces around.

"We probably should get going."