“Sure am.” She didn’t offer any pleasantries. They were there to do a job, right? So they should get it over with. Though, admittedly it was nice to not be dealing with someone concerned with justice or the importance of procedure and due diligence.[break][break]

Pulling the handle, Blue slipped out of the van. She dropped the cigarette on the ground and stamped it out underfoot, then stretched herself out, fingers linking as she stretched her arms up above her head. “Damn, that’s a drive.”[brealk][break]

She didn’t bother smoothing the wrinkles that had formed in her uniform throughout the duration of her ride. It was pointless, she’d just get them again. Plus, she didn’t really care about any actual formality. Wasn’t like she had to pretend out here in the rundown outskirts, nary another cop in sight.[break][break]

Blue slunk around the back to where Bishop stood, “Yeh, that’s right. A whole bunch.” Lucky none of them had evolved into boltund in the time since they’d been rescued. With a spare key, she unlocked the bolt and pulled the latch, easing the doors open. “All sound asleep and accounted for.” She was pretty sure.

[break][break]

[attr="class","ooc"] @bishop | m: poke-trafficking[break]


[attr="class","pkspr pkmn-lucario"]

Something in the flattery the woman offered rang familiar to Blue. Not in the exact words or comparison, but in the act itself. The twist of her tone that said I could use you. It sent a thrum through Blue. The memory of her previous handler (or manager, or whatever he’d been to her,) the day he found her in the shady alleys near the docks in Slateport, competing for leftover scraps just to be able to eat. The following years of molding, shaping her into the fighter, the winner she had become. All to hear those scant words of praise, or be offered fleeting affection. “You’ve done well, Bluebell. Now do the same again tomorrow night.”[break][break]

Somewhere in her mind, Blue knew that she should be leery of it. Take those words about precious gems and hidden potential with a grain of salt. “Dunno anything about any alexandrite,” she grumbled back, but the bite had dulled. She should know better than to walk herself into traps. It was how she’d landed herself in the rings before. It was how rocket had drawn her in after that had fallen apart. Of course, she didn't know this person's actual intent. So she could suspend her final judgements for now. Maybe it would turn out to be nothing, after all.[break][break]

But Blue didn’t know how to be untied. So used to the chain that she hovered within the range of it. She didn’t know what to do with herself without a tether, and that was why she so easily walked into open jaws, waiting for the snap. At least the yank back of restraint was familiar. Someone had to hold the leash. Maybe she didn’t trust herself if she broke loose. Rein her in. She was all sharp teeth and blunt force. A tool. And that was a trauma she should have processed, but didn’t. She just carried it with her, because it was the only thing she knew.[break][break]

She didn’t know how to be without it.[break][break]

So the shiver of apprehension was swallowed up, and her wary stare didn’t dissipate, but she didn’t turn on her heels to stalk away from the stranger either. Feral dog or not, praise was praise, and Blue lapped it up. Allowed it to draw her in for the time being. The offering was one she was grateful for, and she turned the cigarette in her fingers. “Don’t care what’s bad for business,” she muttered with a shrug, cramming the cigarette between her teeth. She shoved her hands in her pockets, and rather than remove the cig again, she leaned toward the one Toni offered, lighting it while it was still perched in her mouth. It muffled her speech as the tip flared orange in the dim light. “Damn right next time when I win.”[break][break]

At least they shared that ideal.

[break][break]

[attr="class","ooc"] Antoinette Spina | m: putting on a front[break]


[attr="class","pkspr pkmn-lucario"]

What Blue had hoped was that her prickliness would have startled off the stranger who’d had the boldness to approach her. That was not the case–whoever she was, she was made of sturdier stuff and Blue’s temper seemed to roll right off of her back, much to Blue’s chagrin.[break][break]

The woman watching her was unfamiliar to Blue. If she’d been in the crowd, as her remarks revealed, Blue hadn’t seen her. When she was locked into a fight, everything outside that square was a blur. Even more so than the whirling, chaotic movement of the fight itself. The ruby gleam in her eyes sharpened as she watched Toni, eyebrows pinching together in a deepened frown. “How do you know if I underestimate myself or not?”[break][break]

It was instinctive to bristle like an unsettled and wary cat. But Blue was still tired after that failed match, and really she just wanted like, a burger and a smoke and to sleep it off until she had to drag herself back to Fortree for whenever her next rotation at the station started up. So she pushed herself to sit up, glance narrowing at the offered kerchief. “I know that,” a petulant, childish grumble as she snatched it to drag across the skin on her face. Of course it came away smudged with blood.[break][break]

The sight of it was even more familiar than the act of winning.[break][break]

“Yeah, and what’s that then?” she muttered, hands on her knees before she stood. There was immediate regret as her joints cracked and her muscles protested with ache. “What’s it to you, anyway?”[break][break]


[break][break]

[attr="class","ooc"] Antoinette Spina | m: putting on a front[break]


[attr="class","pkspr pkmn-lucario"]

The van rumbled down the empty stretch of road, high beams bright and cutting shafts of light through the dark as she navigated the Slateport outskirts–no longer her home, but still a place that Blue knew like the back of her hand. She didn’t care for the night driving, let alone having to come all the way down from Fortree. It made her restless. Even more restless to know little more than a name for the man she was set to be meeting for the secondary leg of this run.[break][break]

She felt a bit bad for the little pack of yamper in the back of the van, all sedated and sleeping soundly. They were being shuttled from one bad situation to what was likely another. And hey, a tiny part of her could commiserate. Or a big part, really. But Blue’s empathy only stretched so far, and at the end of the day, she’d do her job.[break][break]

Any guilt she felt rolled off of her shoulders, and fell to the wayside. Ignored, untouched.[break][break]

So what?[break][break]

She just wanted to make the drive and get the transfer taken care of so that she could then set the back half of her job into motion. The part where she acted like she’d been doing the right thing, and it was someone else who’d overtaken her. She could make her sad sob story report to the chief back in Fortree, and return to her crummy apartment to crash.[break][break]

One cannot live on redbulls alone. Or so some might say, but given that Blue’s blood was probably about seventy-five percent energy drink and twenty-five percent sheer spite at that point, she was out to beat those odds. Mostly, she just wanted to be out of her stupid uniform.[break][break]

At least the guy was punctual. She had to admit as much when she found him exactly in place as she rolled to a stop behind the old market.[break][break]

Before bothering to get out of the van, Blue threw the gear into park and rolled down the driver’s side window. Her arm propped on the empty frame, cigarette dangling between her fingers. Ruby eyes watched him coolly, reserved. “Bishop.” More an assumed statement than a question of his identity. She lifted the cigarette back to her lips, orange tip burning in the low light.

[break][break]

[attr="class","ooc"] @bishop | m: poke-trafficking[break]


[attr="class","pkspr pkmn-lucario"]