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"Got it. I'll keep that in mind." Paxton said, nodding at the pair before glancing over at THEO BECKETT. He gives pause, eyes narrowing and hackles rising. Greyson moves to confront the Underboss, but Annalise steps forward. [break][break]

His eyes immediately narrow at Annalise before movement catches his eye. "Thank you for your intel. I need to check in on PENELOPE LIVY, if I can find her." He turns away to go find the Councilwoman. "I'm not here to fight Rocket. Just gather intel." But he doesn't care if anybody listens, already moving away quickly.

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"I'll add it to new security testing." he said, making a quick mental note to send over the decision and a drafted plan to their security department. "The very same. Our beloved pop idol, Melody Miro ." he said, lifting his glass in mock toast before downing the rest of the brown liquor in his glass. He sets it down next to Freya's before carefully lifting the bottle once more and filling hers and his respectively. [break][break]

"Without a finalized plan there was no need to inform the gym leaders this far out from execution." he leaned back in his chair giving Freya a moment. “I understand illeana reyes was working on it recently, but discussing it outside of AQUA this far out from execution could become a leak just like METENO. Please pass on our department’s reminder of the risks he puts our personnel under.” Being that this happened under her watch, it justifiably fell to Freya to deal with. Least they wanted Penelope to have to explain the importance of keeping quiet. [break][break]

He let out a sharp laugh. "But Councilwoman Morningstar, pencil pushing is part of your job now." he said lightly as he patted the heavily annotated report in his lap. He clinks his glass against hers but doesn't sip, letting her take a moment before he moves onto the next subject. [break][break]

"Speaking of understanding duties, I need to bring up one of your own direct subordinates. As you know, my work as PENELOPE LIVY 's deputy director makes me a direct reflection of her. Gunner Graves 's position in the HBIC makes him a representative of Penelope as well." he began as he gave Freya the wind up before the pitch. "Your own subordinate Hyakkaryōran Tsubaki , is a direct reflection of yourself. In a matter of minutes, she showcased her immaturity. I'm not impressed with her first formal appearance as Dewford's gym leader, much less a councilwoman's assistant." [break][break]

He frowns as he turns pages of her report, sticky notes assisting him as he skimmed over the report. "While her status as gym leader being revealed late is not her fault, her outbursts towards her new colleagues and superiors was detrimental to the spirit of your meeting. It’s especially embarrassing to read about when our youngest, Hideo Kino , was leagues above when it came down to his own professionalism and maneuvering his Uxie announcement.” He raised an eyebrow at Freya. The rest is left unsaid. He expected better from someone Freya had placed as their assistant. He couldn’t convince her to speak to the girl, but he also wanted to bring it up before Tsubaki put her foot in her mount in front of his own Councilwoman, or even dahlia goode . An arrogance he wouldn’t hesitate to correct, were it to happen again. He may not always agree with the actions of those above him, but he had enough sense to not make it everyone else’s problem. Clearly, Freya hadn’t passed that on to her protégé.

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Annalise looks confused to see him, but Paxton has been bothering and shaking people out of their dream stupor for a bit now. He'd trekked through the neon city searching and spreading his info on their ward, on the off chance this was real. After all, people remembered lucid dreams? [break][break]

"...That was the reward?? Looking through a mask?" he asked, eyebrows furrowing in confusion. He then looked towards Greyson. "I thought I saw you in there. Or.. heard you?" he said quickly to the E4. "Don't worry about it. Everything about this is meant to break you down so you work without defiance." he said. [break][break]

"Agreed, but knowing what the other wards are seeing is crucial." he added. He wouldn't plan their prison break just yet. "Learning what we can and staying healthy is our top priority. Minimizing the suffering." [break][break]

"You saw that thing in RKS? I barely got to see it's face before it kicked someone over." He turned to Annalise and then illeana reyes. "IF this is all...lucid, I was right about the megalopolans. When the wardens use them to speak they seem completely possessed. I don't think there's enough of them to sustain whatever work they're doing so they needed us."[break][break]

The professor speaks up and he turns to her. "It's either too strong to completely take over like the aliens, or its humiliation. Like us, they're trying to break it's spirit."

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He wakes to a neon city and feels nothing but a sense of urgency. Exploring the city and speaking with the megalopolans is strange, eerie. At first ecause he thinks they may attack him but soon after becuase its different. They're all...jointly lucid? Maybe? Maybe he's coping but...stranger things had happened. He gets what he can out of the aliens, walking briskly and trying to spread the weakling ward's status to as many people as he could find. [break][break]

He finds others not from his ward, people he hadn't seen or known about and speaks to them. Who cares if his mind is making it up. It was all he could do for now. The sound of familiar voices tug him a specific way and he heel turns before breaking out into a sprint. [break][break]

"Anna- Illie!" his eyes dart form person to person before landing on Greyson, the only one he'd seen in his ward. "Is this-" the question dies on his lips. "If this is real, I don't care how it works." He approaches quickly. "How are you holding up?" he looked to Greyson unsure if he'd managed to avoid the beatings for morale. He then turned to the other two. "We need to catch up. Quickly. What did you see in the winner's chambers?"

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The decision goes through, the pact is made. Unfortunately, Ugly Ward had voted Dummy to take a hit. Paxton felt relieved, and closed his eyes to sit with the selfishness of it all for a moment. Another choice that'd haunt his long nights. What one more terror to the horde? He felt himself slipping under the circumstances. As the horror piled up, the voices of distress began to sound like static. Almost like falling asleep. He yanks as his chain, getting it to tighten around his neck. The momentary lack of air shooting adrenaline through him. He couldn't check out now. He needed to stay alert, stay observant. [break][break]

But wide eyes don't ring him any new information on an escape. They were disposable, but to an extent. Killing too many of them off might be more of a pain than its worth. It's the only reason why, in already scary enough of a situation, their wardens had yet to kill the various dissenters around them. [break][break]

The bowl is terrifying. The smell of sweet rot mixing with the iron of blood and the stench of decay. Or at the very last, the contests of corpses evacuating out of them post mortem. The task is simple enough, but he knew better than to underestimate this prison. The chains of the Dummies around him tighten like at the cells, and something enters the fray. He only catches a glimpse of the green thing before it launched itself upon a Dummy. Paxton inhaled through his nose, jaw clenched as he froze and tried to back away as silently as he could through soft, mush. [break][break]

He finds himself near Elise Calcifet and her cellmate Noel Parker again. He thinks perhaps Remiel Calcifet has joined them as well. "You're right. Finishing the task will get all of us out of here faster. Hopefully Dummy Ward can withstand long enough for us to finish cleanup." The division of labor was set. He gets to work trying to find tools to make this easier while trying to work as silently as possible. [break][break]

His focus intensified, and his ears prick up waiting for those ominous, small steps of the strange ogre pokemon attacking them blindly, overtaken by the toxic chains. He gets ready to run, handfuls of mochi or perhaps viscera ready to be thrown to try to distract Ogerpon before it came down upon him with its fierce blows.


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The shots ring out and Paxton watches. Arms crossed, and eyes watching the distance make shift target. The glass bottles were decent enough targets but from what he observed, unnecessarily difficult for someone unsure of their shots. "At this distance against someone who can actually shoot, you're taking too big a risk for yourself." he said, having moved to an angle to look at June's form. Dirt splashes up form the makeshift barriers. [break][break]

"Or your partners'." he added. The officer silently looks over the woman, staring her down as he took her in before his attention stays on the revolver. "Your form is terrible, and I don't need a paper target to tell your breathing's bad too." he remarked. "You can't handle a six shooter." He doesn't reach for her revolver, but does look over at his partner. The Magnezone takes the hint, summoning PROTECT shields over the small targets to stop June's haphazard shooting. [break][break]

"Why are you in a parking lot?"

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The display is brutality given form. And Paxton believed it is still intended to send a message. After all, Shred looked like he was still breathing. The tera crystals display other wards and he steeled himself against the prisoner's dilemma. He felt some sympathy, and cast glances as those within his ward took a loss. [break][break]

People begin to speak up and he mulled over their thoughts before adding his own two cents. “We have to work together to get out of here. The only rewards for heroes and martyrs here is death.” He began, cutting into the current conversation. [break][break]

“Think with your head, not your heart. This is meant to divide us. This Weakling TRUSTS for now. And if we are forsaken, that determines our relationship moving forward. For now, we can only rely on each other. Our survival depends on it.” He speaks directly to his own ward, turning away from the tera crystals.that may be broadcasting him. Ideally all 3 wards get out alive. But if it came down to it, he would act for his own ward before another. [break][break]

He levies as harsh of a gaze as he can at those in his own ward showing their self sacrificial streak. Particularly, ever blackwell . “Remember that you can't save anyone if you're fucking dead.”



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All his friends move in on Matias and as Rayquaza slams into the volcano, he can only hope they make it to him. Under Mt. Chimney in the path of its rushing, bubbling black lava is still different towns that were hopefully getting evacuated. But the situation had changed rapidly, any time he could offer to the civilians below was a blessing. Whatever he could do to mitigate Groudon's- no, Matias' loss of control, the better. [break][break]

He already knew how this would look. How it'd pan out in the court of public opinion. Inside the League, within the Council, it may go even worse. Whatever he could do to minimize the damages from this mess, all the better. He knew what awaited him when they all went back. [break][break]

The FALSE SUN slowly drops further and further out of the sky, crying acidic black lava. Heat waves ripple and distort his vision. He'd give anything for a good rain, but now with that sun in the sky. [break][break]

Matias rises as if answering the call. But it's not Paxton's, but Groudon's. "No-!" he blurts out, as lava rushes out of the crater. His comms roar to life, cutting through previous static to deliver the news, right as Matias is taken by SOLGALEO. Hoenn's Champion has retrieved him. Matias is on the verge of primal poisoning. And heavy lava flows are moving down to Lavaridge and Fallarbor. He lets out his Corviknight, to better assess the situation from above. The ditches were overflowing with ease and Altan spun in wait of orders, unsure how to mitigate. Earthquakes still shake the ground as his partner takes off. "Altan, focus on diverting the flow off main pathways." he ordered, as the Solrock set to work using SOLAR BEAM to try to carve more ditches and ROCK SLIDE to act as temporary walls against the magma.

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Elise Calcifet sounds fine, for now. At the very least she's alive. He hears Noel Parker along with her and while he does not recognize them, is happy she's not stuck with someone rowdy. It's hard to describe the mix of panic and anger that bursts through his chest as he watched the LOYAL THREE come down. From his cell he watches the dog one step off, bulky and sporting the same toxic chains they all did. There's levels of control here. The megalopolans seem to be entranced, cannibalistic urges kept at bay. The prisoners were all chained, and the warden wielded the chains like accessories and weapons. But what exactly influenced the effect? [break][break]

He had a feeling he'd need to observe more to figure it out. For now, he takes in what he can see and passes it along quietly to his cellmate. He can read the crates at least. It gets a dry laugh out of him. "Weakling Ward." he stated as the dog pokemon set aside work for them. The other two disappear below. "There's more levels to this place." Though that shouldn't be surprising, in an environment like this, it's best to gather all possible information. [break][break]

The abundance of glowing blue crystal could be a hint to where they are. But then again, much of Hoenn had been plagued by it as well. They could be underground anywhere on the region. As the megalopolans speak, they make mention of the 3 day war. But as far as he remembered from the reports, these pokemon hadn't been present. And the real casualties had been Megalopolans and their Ultra Beasts. As he thinks on this, doing anything to slow down his heart rate, the ward gets rowdy, screaming and crying echoing out as people resist their current reality. Paxton is silent as the ward choses one to execute, and Paxton feels cold. The punishment is especially torturous, but it was a warning. They were dispensable. [break][break]

His eyes are on the Megalopolans. "Not gonna eat?" he asks one as they bring him and PETRA MONROE their food. But they aliens don't respond, purple eyes reminding him of the first outbreak of the toxic chains in Hoenn. He stays away from his bars should the guard get aggressive like the ones before. "It's...symbiotic?" he wondered out loud as they walked away. A willing wearing of the chains maybe driven by desperation to escape? He watches prisoners begin to eat, chains snapping forward and moving. Paxton can't quite wrap his head around it but he decides to think and work, lest he wanted the same fate as the dead puddle nearby. He eats what e can of the mochi, uncertain how often meals will come in tis shit hole, and then grimaces as his own chain is moved, allowing him freedom outside the cell. [break][break]

He moves to pick up some crystal dutifully, mulling over the mention of potential. Could it just be referring to infinity energy? He wished illeana reyes or Eva Morales were here to confer with. But then again, if they could avoid this hell hole, all the better for them. Someone had to keep watch of the region. If this was the megalopolans making a play at Hoenn again, they needed everyone on deck back at HQ. Paxton tries to find himself a place to work, hefting a few pieces of thick rock and trying to smash it onto the floors to help it crack. Guards move through and around them, with the Warden bullying whoever it likes. Paxton is no exception, shoved roughly and losing his balance as a piece of crystal flies forward and rolls a foot away. Despite the reward, the emphasis that he was disposable is not missed. He ignores the people around him that try to make plays too early on, glancing at Shred briefly before hefting a piece of rock up and tossing it back down. If he saw shards being pilfered, no he didn't. [break][break]



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