bees! bees!! bees!!!

she's absolutely buzzing with energy. it diffuses from her in thick waves of palpable vivacity. it's nearly impossible to tear her eyes away from the combees fluttering behind the man at the till—the only way he does manage to tear her attention towards his offer is through the presentation of honey mead.

not quite as good as combees, but it'll do!

the pink-haired girl, who should absolutely, technically should be on shift right now, looks up at greyson as if she has just encountered a god. her smile is exuberant and effervescent, glowing on her face in lieu of anything else to do. yes, yes, i would!" she nearly shouts before she realizes just how loud she's being. her next sentence is noticeably more reserved and soft as if she's forcing her excitement down her throat. "could i? is it very alcoholic?"

---

Greyson Connors

faction lines are nothing in the face of great need. it's a sentiment blythe has always held—when blood is spilled and weapons have been drawn, her only allegiance is to humanity, to ensuring everyone has food and water and shelter, that nobody goes left behind or forgotten. she doesn't know where she learned this. perhaps, just like she did so many years ago, it came across on early spring breezes, transported from far away, and planted in her mind to flower under duress. the idea has matured by now, but it still retains the naivety of her youth, tempered from her time in the academy.

and that naivety may be the death of her.

someone is climbing up the side of the shipment boat. she doesn't even recognize it, too distracted by the cold, cool waves that lap so kindly against her fingertips, but donmai does. her eyes lift up and towards the ship, and she immediately picks out the shadow of a white-cloaked ruffian scaling the side of the boat. donmai, alarmed yet keeping her head high, slowly unfurls a vine from the pillow of flowers her head rests within. the vine shifts towards blythe's shoulder, then gently taps down upon it.

blythe only briefly glances up from the crystalline waters. "are you seeing this, donmai?" she enthuses, blue eyes glittering just like the sea does, reflected back on her irises. "i've never been this close before!"

donmai taps again, this time with far more urgency. blythe furrows her brows, then glances back to where the florges is indicating to.

it's with a start that blythe suddenly recognizes the person climbing the side of the boat. alarmed, she calls out to the person with a frown. "hello, sir or ma'am or..." she pauses, purses her lips, then continues, unperturbed. "you can't be up there! this is a secured area!"

---

Isaac Merlo

the sea! it's the sea!!

a pink-haired woman in police slacks stands on the edges of a dock. a florges adorned in regal purple flowers is with her, wholly unimpressed as the officer, who should be stern and morose, is instead leaning down on her hands and knees to dip her palm into the sea and watch as the water curls around her fingertips. the people around her are looking and wondering if this is really the officer sent to protect the shipment coming into sootopolis from overseas. unfortunately, the shiny new badge attached to her coat lapel seems to say 'yes. yes she is.'

she was landlocked her entire life. oldale offered little in terms of aquan delights, so she distracted herself with the greenhouses, the flowers, the plants. it's only today that she finally sees the sea, that she finally watches how the sun scintillates and glints off the choppy ocean waves as they lap against the ship she's really supposed to be watching right now. as soon as she heard about this assignment back at the precinct, she literally jumped at the chance to get assigned to it, trampling nearly three other coworkers in the process. she doesn't know how to swim, never even touched a pool before, but there's no real way to convince a woman who believes she can do anything if she tries otherwise. so she's here to protect the shipment!

and god, is she distracted. it's a little sad how eager she is.

---

Isaac Merlo

a smile! she just got smiled at!

it excites her beyond belief. the past few months have all been stern frowns, hardasses, exclamations of 'be quiet, blythe!' or 'stop touching everything, blythe!', or even, 'blythe, this is against all social conventions!'. no smiles, no laughter, no sun. finally, finally, someone smiled at her!

it's exhilarating. electrifying, even! she laughs despite herself. the sound carries over right into her next sentence, forged forth even despite the hesitation the man—ash—seems to have with divulging his own name. "ash, ash, ash," she repeats to herself, if only to edify the name into the recesses of her ultimately flighty mind. she likes the way he says officer—somehow it makes her feel real, not an impostor wearing official clothes. "ash! i've got it. nice to meet you! i'm excited to work together!"

at least the job is simple. it gives her time to get to know this mysterious individual and his pokemon! he clicks something on the camera she knows next to nothing about, and though a light of curiosity rises in her eyes, she makes no mention of it. instead, she claps her hands together and grin widens impossibly further. "great!" she chirps. "no intervening. all-natural. got it! we could do this stuff in our sleep, ash!"

luckily for her, pokemon introductions come next. by the time it's all through, she's quite infatuated with bass, and spares a wave at juliette and bongo. so intrigued she is with the little bat, she cautiously reaches out a palm for the winged creature to sniff in the hope that she might make a new friend, stiller than ever before. "hello, little friend! it's so nice to meet you."

bongo makes her nervous, though. the eyes... what do they mean? what is planned? what will happen next?

oh. probably introducing her own pokemon! at this point, donmai has finally arrived, languidly strolling forward without a care for time or people, supremely focused on the appearance of being as regal and refined as possible. blythe takes the time to show off the florges and her beautiful purple flowers with a smile. "donmai's my florges," she says, then reveals the tiny fomantis curled up tightly in her arms, who curls her bladed forearms up to shield her face once shown. "and diantha's my fomantis!"

she pauses, then tacks on the next bit as if in a fit of forgetfulness. "oh, and my oricorio is in timeout. because he doesn't know how to play nice."

this is the first sign of her inimitable smile twitching into vague frustration. it seems delphinus is the only creature capable of spurring this effect on the eternally cheerful blythe.

---

Ashley Shepard

blythe laughs with her. maybe a little bit at herself. a jester must jest! "lots to work on!" she admits with a grin and a tittering giggle, just enough to mask the minute spike of shame driven through her stomach. "but, yeah, not getting lost is first on the list!"

the laughter fades but the smile remains as CALLISTA MOON mentions johto. the distant unknown, the shores callie left for. it reminds blythe of how much more traveled and wisened her friend is, and how much she has to learn. of course, johto likely wasn't all smiles for her. hard experiences, won in blood and fire. would blythe ever be ready for something like that? her smile remains, but it deepens imperceptibly.

then evaporates entirely into wide, genuine happiness that engulfs her entire being when callie hugs her! blythe holds onto the other officer like it's the only thing that matters and finally breaks into happy sobs as if to spite the other woman telling her not to. "i'm sorry, i'm sorry!" she laughs into her sobs as she is let down from the hug, residual warmth fading from her shoulders. the rosebud girl wipes furiously at her eyes with the back of her forearm, dispersing any joyful tears that collected across her cheeks. "i was just so excited!"

and then, a reminder of who blythe was.

she smiles as if protecting a locked box of mystery and memory. the telltale signs of nostalgia, wistful and misty, return to her bright blue gaze. there's a secretive tone to her voice when she speaks next, as if verging on the edge of something new and undiscovered.

"yeah. i don't know if i'm really the type nowadays either," she admits with a nervous titter, now avoiding callie's eyes. "but, you know... can't just sit around in gardens actin' like everything's fine, right?"

blythe trusts that callie would understand even if she doesn't really understand herself. she hopes, at least.

---

CALLISTA MOON

when paxton concordas speaks to one blythe rosewood, there's blood on her forehead and tears gathering in her eyes. glass shrapnel pierced right above her eyebrow, barely missing her eyes, when the bandits shot through the windows, and it hurts, but not as much as it hurts knowing that some people are much worse off.

old naia got robbed for all she was worth. her shop's broken, her plants trampled, her finances in ruin. even now, customers lie askance further away, recovering from the shock of trauma. they breathe hard, they try to gather their strength, and the officer has the gall to ask if she's okay. even now, the people who did this are getting away!

she's not going to be okay if somebody doesn't do something very soon. and if it ends up being her that ends up doing something, then...

"i don't matter!" she exclaims, mouth moving too fast for her brain (or even her lips, for that matter) to keep up with. she punctuates her next words with a pointed finger beyond the greenhouse, out into the wide open streets where she saw the two masked individuals bleed into. "robbery—they went—they—"

a pause. her hand falls. then, her mind breaks into two as a decision slashes through her head.

"i think i know where they went!" she cries out, rushing ahead as blood streams from her forehead wound and into her crystalline, clear eyes. "cmon, follow me!"

and out of the shop she goes with reckless abandon into the great wide world, not a thought except helping taking up place in her mind.

---

paxton concordas

blythe approaches too quickly, boots slamming through underbrush and bushels of new growth in her efforts to get to callie. it's difficult not to go fast in circumstances like these—lately, she's been feeling terrible at everything. this is one chance out of very few to feel like her life is somehow normal again. donmai, her florges, follows closely behind, the last remnant of oldale she still has.

callie jokes about getting lost, but blythe doesn't react like it was a joke. probably because it actually happened.

"i did!" she responds, mouth drawn down into a wide 'o', eyebrows raised up into her hairline. "this place sure is complicated! didn't think i'd ever get outta that marketplace!"

blythe's face quickly draws down into the beginnings of happy tears as she reaches her arms out in search of a hug. seeing old, familiar faces is one incredibly easy way to bring on the waterworks for blythe, so obviously out of place next to callista it's stunning. "i haven't seen you in forever!" blythe exclaims, struggling to keep the tightness out of her voice. "thanks for meeting me!!"

---

[break]

CALLISTA MOON

what approaches on the sunkissed horizon is a veritable whirlwind of insanity.

blythe herself is enough to handle. she talks too loudly, too much, too quickly, and does it all with that same dopey smile and that sense of childlike naivety that has buoyantly carried her through the lion's share of life safely thus far. pairing that with her pokemon, however, can often make her an unbearable plus one in any situation. so over the horizon, stepping through a flowered glade, comes the pink-haired officer, flanked on either side by a florges, an oricorio, and atop her head, blending into her already rosebud pink hair, a fomantis.

the florges, donmai, is inplacable. regal as ever, she steps alongside blythe as if she's always belonged there and always will. the oricorio (delphinus), however, seems quite keen on doing whatever he can to cause as many problems as possible in as short an amount of time as possible. he lunges up towards the fomantis (diantha) in a sing-song dance at any chance possible, wherein diantha quickly recoils back atop blythe's head, digging her sharp talons into whatever purchase available, which blythe cringes at whenever given the opportunity. what results is a slow walk towards where ashley lounges in the meadow, punctuated at every interval by sharp scolding, brief stumbling, and at least a few near falls. this would be so much easier if she would just recall delphinus!

...

...why hasn't she recalled him?

a few meters away from where ashley has fully set up the camera, blythe pauses and, with a vindictive frown, pulls out a Pokeball from her belt loop. "time-out, delphinus!" she huffs, and the oricorio vanishes in a flash of light.

finally free of distractions, the pink-haired officer transfers diantha to her arms and rushes towards ashley with a wide smile upon spotting him and his pokemon in the glade. she waves emphatically, enthusiastic down to every last atom on her person. "hello!" she calls, exuberant in her approach. she arrives soon thereafter, skidding to a stop and nearly stumbling to the ground. her voice comes again as she regains her balance, buoyant even despite her near-fall. "photography thing, right? i'm blythe! i've been assigned here!"

and then the woman stares deeply at ashley, curious. it's like she wants his name or something!

---

[break]

Ashley Shepard

modernity scowls in the face of a little temple on the outskirts of a bustling city center. though slateport rages beyond it's hallowed walls and stern statuettes, reverent silence reigns supreme within. only the clang of bells interrupts what serene quietude spreads throughout, rolling across untempered glades of nature and well-worn sandstone pathways.[break]

blythe's never been in a place such as this. spiritual reverence never truly captured her attention in the way plants and flowers had. as old humphrey explained to her a very long time ago, even kyogre would cringe at her proclivity for talking, talking, talking. so she kept away, terrified of bothering those who relied on outside influences to be happy, and it's only today that she finally enters one such hallowed place after many years of avoidance. her skin feels tingly, her eyes blown wide, her hair scuffed and mussed and otherwise unbrushed in the lackadaisical late summer breeze. goodness, she's certainly never belonged in a place such as this, and there's no denying that such a sentiment has changed since she declared it in her wild, rambunctious youth.[break]

today, though, she's not here for pleasure. it's business![break]

the business being the extreme amount of wild pokemon thrashing everything in sight!! goodness, there's no end to it! lillipups, audinos, liepards... the list goes on forever!! and as blythe is attempting to herd a wild starly away from what must be a very sacred box full of... bells?... all her partner, donmai the florges, can do, is stand there and look pretty! blythe, sweating from top to bottom, looks up, red-faced, as her hands get pecked by the overzealous flying pokemon. "donmai!" she shouts, puffing out her cheeks. "heeeelp!"[break]

if a florges could sigh, she would. one long, snaking vine uncoils from the bed of flowers her head rests in and nonchalantly slams down in front of the starly—not hitting, but certainly scaring. it takes off in a flurry of feathers, leaving blythe panting victorious over a poorly protected wooden box, complete with bleeding wounds from the starly's beak. a tepid smile rapidly approaches her face.[break]

"thanks, donmai!"[break]

donmai's eyes roll.[break]

ah, but there's still so many pokemon here! how will she possibly get rid of all of them in a timely manner? where does she even start? against her own will, blythe winds up feeling terribly useless once again.[break]

---

Tam Fawley