Onyx, too, ignored the wild Pokemon, insofar as he didn’t have to deal with them, quite yet. He stepped a smidge closer to Adrian, head canted down over the man’s phone as he watched, and learned.

To Onyx, it seemed… well, there was a reason he didn’t get paid to think. On the one hand, it had to be no accident. “I don’t believe in coincidences,” he said, cadence on the thoughtful side of slow, “but… where would something like this come from?” There had to be... a server, right? Someone had to upload this information. No river ran without a source. It had to come from somewhere.

It wasn’t that he was dumb. But he was so, so much better equipped for action.

Ziadem pounces on the Gardevoir from behind, pinning it and roughing it up before it can think to escape. She delivers a fierce drill peck right between its shoulder blades and it cries out, head arcing up, making a perfect target for Onyx to hit with a Pokeball.

“I think it makes my head hurt,” he said, honest.

catch attempt gardevoir
Adrian Malcolm

☉

Zia thought, at first, the Applin was a real apple, discarded on the ground, and she’d settled in for a cheeky snack. Then it moved-- not fast enough to avoid her beak slicing through its sweet, fruity flesh. She grabbed the wounded Pokemon in her talons and fluttered back to Onyx, dropping it at his feet.

He thought it was just a fruit, as well; only when it rolled over in a desperate attempt to escape did he recognize it for a living thing. He dropped a Pokeball on it and headed on his way.

catch attempt applin

☉

“Huh.” Onyx thought about the odds of finding an Unown out of all the myriad of Pokemon. Even in places where one type seemed more prevalent than the others, it was still a daunting task. It seemed a lonely one, as well, and this was coming from a naturally lonely individual.

“So when you unlock a word,” he ventured, still trying to wrap his head around it, “does it show up for everyone, or just you?”

Zia had found a Dreepy and grabbed it by the tail, shaking her head back and forth and whipping the little dragon like one of those gummy hands you win in a 50 cent toy machine outside a grocery store.

What a very bizarre and specific analogy.

Onyx made a noncommittal noise and waved his hand, grabbing a Pokeball and bagging his own prize.

catch attempt dreepy
adrian boutta make a friend
Adrian Malcolm

☉

Onyx frowned, eyebrows knitting together as his brain struggled to comprehend just what the fuck Andres was doing. He was running into obstacles at multiple junctions-- dessert comes afer a meal. They had not eaten. He was not hungry. Also, why the fuck was Andres making him dessert?

”Why the fuck are you making dessert?”

He didn’t realize until it was already well out of his mouth that he’d spoken aloud. It had been a trying day, and he always ended up sort of fucky-wucky when it came to dealing with Andres, for reasons he couldn’t quite explain (or maybe he could, somewhere back behind the predatorial survival-focused lizard brain, but didn’t really want to).

He did get a satisfactory blush out of the man after putting his dirty laundry on display. Or, rather, his conquest’s dirty laundry. Andres couldn’t even remember the name of whoever it had belonged to. If he’d been the kind of guy that gave a fuck about that stuff, he might have felt a little pride; but that was an entirely too normal masculine emotion and, as aforementioned, dealing with Andres made him fucky-wucky-- and he wasn’t normal to begin with.

He wasn’t jealous, though. Certainly not. He just liked seeing the guy squirm, was all. As far back as he could remember, Onyx had lived to make Andres uncomfortable, on their best days.

“You just throw them out?” he asked, mouth-brain disconnect growing larger as he was trying to reconcile himself with the flash of imagery of Andres wearing the thing, and putting an equal amount of effort into ignoring it and processing why it popped into his head in the first place.

Juliette was reaching down to take the toy out of Pepino’s mouth when Andres gave the command to retrieve the bralet, and then answered Onyx’s question. The red faded from his face and Onyx was sorry to see it go, which was a thought like a frying pan in his face. What the fuck was wrong with him?

He needed to get out of here. He needed air. He needed to breathe, to drink this interaction into permanent fogginess in his memory banks. The whole fucking day. He needed to disentangle himself from Andres and never, ever, ever see the man again.

So he said, “No, I’m not,” and promptly took a seat on the couch.

andres buenaventura
local jackass processes the first positive emotion he's felt in sixteen years

☉

Ah, Petalburg. A last bastion between the hick and country Hoenn that extends far beyond the modern, stone-clad city. Onyx puffs on a cigarette and ignores the angry looks. He’s staying far enough out of the way. Always gotta be conscious of your secondhand shit.

random spawn
(city)

☉