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Something told her that she didn’t have him fully fooled. Maybe it was the easy way he replied to her remarks, or a certain air to his expression that was a little more clever than the average league dope. As long as he didn’t try to contain her under something stupid, like a citizen’s arrest or whatever, Sidney didn’t really care.[break][break]
Luckily, this wasn’t her first rodeo in Area Zero, but he didn’t know that. Nor did she go out of her way to let him know as much. She gestured around at the cavern, and the glow of tera crystals in the walls.[break][break]
“Why not here? Look at this place,” she replied, smiling. Perhaps a bit more genuine than before. That softness was quickly smoothed over by the wrinkle of her nose. The twist of her features into something teasing.[break][break]
“‘Course I’ve seen the news. What? Ya think I’m fragile? Helpless all by my lonesome?”[break][break]
She shrugged, taking a few steps past him before spinning on her heels to face him again. “Well then, Caleb Harcourt, elite ranger. How do you plan on doing that?”

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It was true, she could have been playing coy and flirty for the purpose of extraction. But that had never really been Sidney’s style when it came to work. Unless she was trying to wiggle out of a situation, that was.[break][break]

If she chose to press her luck further, it would be because she was chasing a whim. And that was entirely her own business. And she very much had half a mind to do exactly that.[break][break]

“Sidney,” she offered simply. No last name, just Sidney. “Exploring, on no one’s business but my own.”[break][break]

It was mostly true, anyway. Sure, if she found anything of interest, she might report that back to her powers that be, but she wasn’t on duty.[break][break]

Fun could be had.[break][break]

“You seemed in a pretty big hurry,” she said lightly. “Wouldn't want to keep you from your league business.” A subtle lift of one brow. Curiosity as to whether or not he would scramble to find some reason to stay.

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She’s already a couple drinks in when he sidles up alongside her.
A slow smile spreads across a cherry-painted mouth. Toothy and saccharine, eyes crinkling at the corners as she recognizes him.[break][break]
“What a sight for sore eyes,” she answers instead.[break][break]
Absently, she pushes the thin straw around in her glass with the tip of her finger.[break][break]
“You found me, so I would say maybe it’s the other way around.” Her nose wrinkles. “You’re right, the chase is much more fun.”

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[attr="class","text"] It was only a matter of time before she bumped into someone, wasn’t it? Massive as the tunnels were, curious souls had been flocking here en masse, whether out of a sense of duty or adventure.[break][break]
Unperturbed by the sudden presence of another person, Sidney’s glance flit over him quickly. Surveying. Tall, built, undeniably cute, in a charming sort of way. And also stressed? Angry? given the tension in his posture. Her job meant it was important to read body cues, and even if he tried to present as friendly… well, something had him riled up.[break][break]
Sure as hell wasn’t her though, so she could roll with it. “Hello!” she chirped back, and her hand rose to mirror his wave. But her fingers waggled at the tail end–playful, maybe a bit flirtatious. Anything to look cute and harmless in her exploration, should he press the subject.[break][break]
Tipper was just as keen–skeptical of the man’s lucario. Hooves pawed the earth, but it was the girafarig’s tail that belied any protectiveness. The rotund head twisted toward the canine, drawn by the scent of wariness, chomping its sharp teeth in warning.[break][break]
The question prompted the lift of a slender brow. Her arms folded loosely, and her head canted to the side as she gave him a more obvious appraisal. Pale eyes traveled down slowly, then back up, lashes batting. Voice twisting into something curious, but coy. “Who wants to know?”[break][break]
She wasn’t here on official business, so what was the harm in playing a bit loose and fast now?

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Between the two of them, they cut down the spawned horde with good time, but it did little to diminish the manifestation of new ones. How long could they keep this up? Her attention swiveled down to the Genesect below as it fired off volley after volley of impressive offensives.[break][break]
Shrieking, Noct fired a hefty DRAGON PULSE at an Iron Jugulis that swooped too close for comfort, its multiple mechanical heads snapping at out him. The plasmic blast of draconic fury at close range cut a wide hole through the paradox pokemon’s abdomen and the glowing, technic light in its eyes flickered before dimming entirely. As its primary functions ground to a total halt, its wings stopped and the hunk of lifeless metal plummeted to the ground below like a boulder. It caught a nasty looking Scream Tail in its shadow, making a powder pink splat of the rotund creature.[break][break]
But it wasn’t the carnage that Sidney’s eyes had settled on, but the smudge of brighter pink and purple nearby. The floating wisp of magenta that streamed from a napping pokemon’s head. Umbilical in nature.[break][break]
“Oscar!” she called down to him, a hand cupping around her mouth. “Over there!” she pointed with her other hand. There, through the shroud of petal pink mist, hovered the sleeping musharna. Somehow, through all of the chaos, it slumbered peacefully and undisturbed.

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Tsumugi clacked her mandibles in response to the man’s gratitude and continued her work, adding more webbing to the rig as she fortified the tether. Eventually the machinery groaned as it settled back into place.[break][break]
“Now you’re gettin’ the hang of it!” Sidney chimed in as the krookodile managed to take a successful swing at the angry paradox. It backed the beast up into a waiting HYPER FANG from Noct—his needle teeth sinking into its shoulder.[break][break]
Not that it did much to stop the rampaging attack that followed. “Yeah!” It wasn’t like she had anyone that came to immediate mind, but she was thinking on the fly. Maybe he had, like, connections or whatever.[break][break]
Maybe they were being watched after all. Swathed in the pitch dark of a shadowy embrace, they were sucked up into the void of it. She had to fumble to call her pokemon back, but eventually the sound of their assailant sounded far away, and then gone altogether.[break][break]
When light and scenery filtered back into view, a wild grin had pasted itself on her face.[break][break]
“That got the blood pumping, huh?” She puffed out a heavy breath of relief, then clapped Frank on the back. And then she laughed.[break][break]

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“Of course you’d say that.”[break][break]
Her voice lacks true spite, though she is still quite proud by nature. The smile on her lips curves wider.[break][break]
“You’re probably right, but ya won’t know if ya don’t try, hm?”[break][break]
He doesn’t seem keen on backing down, though, which is all well and good to her. Not that she intends to make things easy today. He won’t find the immediate results he had at that late nite shopper.[break][break]
With ease, she slips up on the back of her noivern, grin toothy. “I know I am.” She salutes him with a flick of two fingers and Noct takes off. Leaving him to wonder if she’s bluffing or not.

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[attr="class","text"]The descent into Area Zero brang relief. By far, it beat lingering under the hot sun and the drape of humidity in the outer part of the Great Chasm.[break][break]
For a moment, Sidney lagged and lifted a hand to fan at her face. Her girafarig trotted around her, eager to lose themselves further in the expansive, cavernous area. “Here,” she rummaged in her pack and tossed out an apple to Tipper.[break][break]
Failing to catch it, the girafarig nudged the fruit with her bright blue snout and then snatched it up–munching contentedly. [break][break]
“Think we’ll find anything good?” she asked aloud when they finally set off down the tunnel. For the most part, she was just out there to snoop today. No projects, no assignments drew her to the area.[break][break]
Just a nosiness that demanded to be satisfied. Curiosity killed the delcatty, she reminded herself before the rest of the rhyme came to mind, but satisfaction brought it back.[break][break]
Around them, tera crystals glowed in the dark. Lighting the cavern in prismatic glow. Well, even if they didn’t manage to find anything good, at least it was scenic.

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If he’s exasperated with her, she isn’t fazed by it in the least.[break][break]
It is much too hot out here to keep up the good fight, though. The humidity hangs heavy on her, and she puffs out a breath.[break][break]
“That so? How scary?” He basically denies the fact that he’s still capable of failure, but that’s fine. She would, and often does, do the same. “Of course I think I could do better.” She catches people as a gig, after all. It’s a profession.[break][break]
She lifts a brow as he attempts a catch with his styler. Her eyes flit to his, then down to the line draped at her feet, then back up to him. “Ya tryina catch me?” she asks skeptically. Then her mouth curls in a smile and she takes a step backward, away from the tangle. “Do better, hot shot.”[break][break]
Sid mimics the nickname he used earlier, just a little adapted.[break][break]
Her noivern coos low in his throat as he shadows her. Sidney leans against one folded wing. “You’re just lucky I already called my spider back.”

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“Musharna…really?” she echoed, head tilting as she glanced over at Oscar. “Hard to imagine one lil guy making all this.” And while taking a nap (probaby) to boot. Sidney considered her own Munna–how harmless it always appeared and acted. “Interesting. Got it. Might be kind of hard to see in all this pink fog, though.”[break][break]
The Interdream Mist sifted through the carnage, seeping into fill in the cracks that weren’t consumed by slashing claws and fangs and blood spray. [break][break]
“I want one of those..” she blurted, eyes round at the sight of his Genesect. It was gorgeous. And lethal-looking. “Bet that took a lot of work to wrangle.” She palmed a pokeball of her own, and out came her noivern who was, perhaps, more than a little less foreboding. But Noct hissed and flashed needle teeth all the same–eager to join in the fight. “Close, got it.” As the noivern crouched for her, she slipped up on his back and swooped down after their partners.[break][break]
Mechanical heads swiveled in the direction of Oscar and his technological masterpiece. Under the din of battle, Sidney could begin to make out the cacophony of wires and compressed air hissing to create the robotic whine of heavy limbs moving toward them. Noct circled above the genesect, yellow eyes darting to and fro as he searched for any blind spot the Genesect’s TECHNO BLAST missed.[break][break]
She could feel his chest inhale and swell– Sidney braced herself as the loud, decibel jarring clap of a BOOM BURST rocketed from the noivern’s throat. Sure to stun some of the mechanical functions of nearby Iron pokemon.

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“Weird lookin’ thing,” she whispered back, shoulders rising and falling before her face twisted in comedic menacing (in spite of the situation,) and her hands rose, tucked close to her body to mimic tiny velociraptor arms. “All mean and monster-y.”
But the time for jest was soon over, and she quickly decided that she liked this one much less than the Walking Wake.[break][break]
The SUPERSONIC worked, but it also didn’t work, given the way it increased the beast’s rampaging. More flame spewed from its open maw as it stumbled and howled. Before Noct could do anything else, the Paradox Pokemon bellowed as the Krookodile practically turned the place upside down, “Oh, no! Kathy!” she echoed the croc’s name, frantically looking over at her partner like, do something, man![break][break]
Only to find him preoccupied. A hand flashed to a pokeball at her hip–for the second time in this stupid big chasm, summoning her ariados to come in clutch.[break][break]
“Tsumugi, help Frank!” The ariados scuttled to where Frank was stuck trying to push the rig back up. Passing around to the other side of the machine, a shot of SPIDER WEB was quickly threaded around a support beam to pull the heavy equipment back into place.[break][break]
The strands of webbing pulled taut from the effort, and Sid’s attention diverted back to Noct, who screeched and flapped around the Gouging Fire before blasting it with a plasmic DRAGON PULSE.[break][break]
“You got back up on speed dial??”

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She scoffs. “Uh, if I remember correctly, you screamed louder than I did. Really high pitched girly-like scream, too.”[break][break]
It’s half-goading. But he was more scared than she was. There was no denying the fact that she’d reacted because of how strongly he had. Chain reaction![break][break]
Sidney’s eyebrows climb at his arguing. “Dunno, I think it’s the styler.” She taps her chin. “Or maybe it’s user error.”[break][break]
Her ariados crawls back to her side on spindly legs and she recalls the spider back to her pokeball. Nearby, her noivern blinks at the scene—bothered by the shrieks and furious sounds that had come from the beast.[break][break]
“Oh, yeah, you totally had a handle on it.” Her voice is rich in sarcasm, “you really showed that…thing.”

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