[Fin] Digging up the Past

[TawnyAngel]

Well that was it then. Dith closed the door to his apartment, leaving six of his pokemon and one Mewtwo inside. He'd said they were there to help her settle in - she was more comfortable with other pokemon than with him after all - but honestly he'd left them behind to keep an eye on her. He sort of trusted Lovelace but only sort of, not enough to leave her alone in his home yet by any means.

"Well then, that's done!" Dith shoved his keys into his pocket and turned to Sera with a smile. "Thank you for your help, I can't imagine the fuss there would have been without Jacques' illusion." A lot. A hell of a lot.

Now of course there was another pressing matter on Dith's mind; it was lunchtime and he was starving! "So did you think about where you'd like to get lunch?" he said to Sera, starting to saunter towards the lift at an unhurried pace. Doing lunch had seemed like a good idea for a number of reasons: a) let Lovelace settle in without humans around, b) to say thanks to Sera for her help, and c) because he hadn't spent any real time with her in ages. It was about time they had a proper catch up, past time probably but as always life was busy and it was hard to make time for socialising.  

[BlackFireKitsune]

"It's done," Sera echoed in agreement as she folded her arms over her chest, kind of glad for it to be over and done with. The Mewtwo seemed kind of... a lot of things, but she didn't think she particularly cared for it too much, and was having a hard time understanding just why Dith had invited it to live with him. But either way it was his decision, so her opinion didn't really matter too much.

Jacques, who had stopped the illusion once Lovelace was through the door, offered Dith a smirk and a salute, though he had a different reason than Sera to be glad for it to be done with. Escorting a Mewtwo and keeping it hidden through the whole city, with its numerous and various buildings and cars and people, was quite a taxing feat, and so he was more than happy for it to be over and done with. The brunette offered him a pat on the shoulder and a "good job, take a break" before recalling him back into his ball. The Zoroark didn't seem to mind. Isabella made a noise to attract Sera's attention; she had tolerated the legendary pokemon long enough to help guide her to Dith's place and serve as a warning to passersby not to bump into them, and now that their task was complete, she wasn't too eager to go back out and wander around the busy city again. Thus, when Sera presented her ball to her, the dark-type tapped her nose to it and disappeared inside.

Unlike her teammates, Anastasia eagerly circled Sera's feet, ready to continue onward to wherever they headed next - to food, from the sounds of it.

"No problem," Sera finally replied with a shrug once she put the balls away, then followed Dith's lead towards the easier way down to the main floor. "I guess people still get really excited when they see legendary pokemon, so yeah, there probably would've been a pretty big fuss. But, hmm... Not really," the brunette admitted with another shrug. "As long as it isn't somewhere super cheap, it's up to you."  

[TawnyAngel]

"Heh, no," Dith grinned. "Super cheap is only any good if it's also super fast and after a super long shift, otherwise I'd rather have sometime good." He'd been frugal about things like eating out once upon a time but he no longer had any need to be and saw no reason to be either, you spent your money on what you loved after all right? "Hum though. Well there's a little Italian place about five minutes walk from here, and there's a French place and a tapas place on the same street. Any of those sound good?" A bottle of wine sounded in order to him wherever they went, celebration and unwinding from the tension of the trip.  

[BlackFireKitsune]

"I wouldn't know," Sera replied with an excessive shrug, "I've never had a job. I have spent hours training pokemon and battling though, does that count?" Not that it was the same, but it was the closest experience she had to an actual job and thus the only thing she could really think to compare it to. Something good though... The first suggestion she heard was Italian and so as Sera pressed the button to summon the elevator and awaited the doors opening, she asked of Anastasia, "Italian?"

The dark-type offered an eager nod of her head, and so Sera nodded as well and repeated with a more definitive tone, "Italian."  

[TawnyAngel]

"Sure, I think so!" Dith agreed with a grin and a slight nod. "It's hard work even though it's not a job, right? My team and I are always ready to eat as soon as possible after a long session, and the same with the gym." The lift door opened with a cheerful 'ding!' and Dith stepped inside, waiting for Sera and Anastasia to join him before pressing the button for the ground floor. "Italian it is then; I haven't been there in a while so it will be nice to visit again, their pizza is very good. And their pasta. All their food actually." It was always difficult to decide what to have, so many choices!  

[BlackFireKitsune]

"It is!" The brunette agreed with a firm nod, and Anya offered her own "eon" as if she agreed how much work it was, when in reality the Umbreon trained the least out of all Sera's pokemon. Long training sessions? Yes, absolutely. Long session at the gym? Yet another thing she didn't really partake in, but that was irrelevant. "But training does work up an appetite. I think I might've been there before but I can't remember," she added with a thoughtful frown as she and her dark-type stepped inside the elevator and waited patiently for it to reach the main floor. When she couldn't recall any specific memory associated with the place, she simply shrugged and said, "I'll probably remember once we go inside. And I think most Italian food is very good anyway." What to have, what to have... Pizza was good, but that might be a bit much, so maybe pasta? Did it come with salad, soup, or bread sticks - or all of the above? ...maybe she should wait until actually seeing the menu before trying to decide what to eat. Menus tended to be just a little helpful, after all.  

[TawnyAngel]

"Seriously!" Dith agreed enthusiastically with a nod of head head, stepping out of the lift as it reached the ground floor with a feeling of mild relief; he really didn't like lifts at all but taking all of those stairs was a pain. "I think Italian food might be my favourite, you really can't do better than a good Italian."

Once out in the fresh air Dith indicated the direction they needed to take along the street and set off. "So you guys have been training a lot lately?" It sounded like it from what they'd just been saying but he was interested to hear more; who she was working with, any particular goals and so on.  

[BlackFireKitsune]

Once the elevator doors opened, Sera stepped out of it and followed Dith across the lobby and outside the front doors, then turned to walk in the direction he indicated. Anastasia trotted along at her trainer's heels the whole way. "Well," Sera began with a thoughtful frown, "we've been training about the same as we have been for.. however long we've been training," she finished with a shrug. "We'll usually battle at least a couple trainers every day, it's a nice way to get some extra money. Isabella and Jacques love training and battling more than any of my other pokemon, though Anya likes it the least. What about you?"  

[TawnyAngel]

"Humm, well, working and training and battling," Dith replied with a nod. "It depends on my shifts really, though in the last couple of years - since the desert really - I've cut my hours at work quite a lot to train more. I'll often have ten days on when we can't do all that much work together but then four off that we spend at the northern center together in their obstacle courses and battling other trainers. It doesn't leave a lot of time for other things though, like seeing friends," he concluded with a small smile and a nod to Sera.

Dith looked as though he'd been about to say something else then but at that point a man crossed the road diagonally, talking quickly on his phone, and not looking where he was going all that well once he was back on the pavement. Unfortunately as he was on Dith's right the towering man was completely unaware of him and the preoccupied man's shoulder collided with Dith's bicep.

"Hey, watch where you're-" The man stopped mid sentence and stared upward in shock. "Uh- uh-!"

"Ah, sorry!" Dith looked apologetic. "Are you?- Oh. Okay." The man was already hurrying away. Dith sighed and turned back to Sera. "Alright, make that working and training and battling and walking into stuff that appears unexpectedly on my right."  

[BlackFireKitsune]

Working and training and battling; that sounded like her schedule, minus the working part of course. "I haven't really visited the northern center," the brunette admitted. It hadn't really seemed like something she'd be interested in - and even if it was, being one-handed kind of put a damper on running obstacle courses, unless they were entirely leg-based or something she could do with one hand. Not that she'd ever really put much effort into figuring out if they were or not, though.

She opened her mouth to comment again when someone who quite obviously wasn't paying any attention ran right into Dith and tried to blame him - really, you'd have to be legally blind not to see him - but he was off again just as quickly, so she aimed a reproachful glance at his rapidly departing back. "How often does that happen, I wonder? And yeah, I guess lots of people are busy, I haven't hung out with too many people lately either," Sera said with a frown. Like Nate; why was he always so busy working? No, scratch that, she knew why, but that didn't make her wish they couldn't hang out more.  

[TawnyAngel]

Dith huffed and gave a mildly irritable frown, an unusual sight on his usually open friendly features. "залу́па." He then sighed, the frown fading to a rather resigned expression, and shrugged at Sera. "More often than I'd like! Both running into people and them hurrying off before we can have a mutual apology. Egh, it's not like I could see him there! Seriously, he's got two eyes and I'm gigantic. Humph. Anyway," Dith shook his head, "I guess life has kept all of us busy lately then? I'm not sure when I last saw Rosie and Luke, but I ran into Citrine not so long ago and I hadn't seen her in years until then."  

[BlackFireKitsune]

At Dith's continued irritation, mild though it was, Sera frowned at the retreating figure once more for good measure. "Well, if nothing else, at least you know it's their fault. How could they not notice someone so tall? Because they're blind or stupid, that's how," the brunette said definitively and nodded as if that alone would affirm her statement.

"Anyway," she agreed, then frowned a bit. "I see Rosie and Luke once in a while, but I have no idea who that is. Citrine?" The name did ring a bell, albeit a very distant one... Sera couldn't help the niggling sensation that that was a name she should recognize.  

[TawnyAngel]

Dith snorted and shook his head. "Blind I could excuse! Stupid I think is the answer though, wrapped up in his own little world of whatever the heck he was barking on about on his shiny phone." Apart from the rudeness of the man the problem he had with it was basically embarrassment, pretty much anyone else would have seen the guy coming and either got out of the way or deliberately walked into him. He knew it wasn't his fault but that didn't stop it being a pain.

"But da, Citrine," Dith continued with a nod. "I didn't remember at first either but she was on that trip we took to Hoenn! Can you believe that was almost four years ago now?" Sera had been a very different girl back then, she'd been... well, she'd been a girl rather than a young woman and how much s**t had she been through since? Losing her status, her father and her hand, not to mention the rest of the crap. Life was never simple was it? Back then though.... Well he couldn't have imagined things ending up like they had, that was for sure.  

[BlackFireKitsune]

"Definitely stupid," Sera agreed with another firm nod. As Dith had said, too wrapped up in his own world to pay attention to this one. Not that she had any experience with that at all, of course. Her? Never.

"The Hoenn trip?" Had that really been four years ago now...? That long? She remembered Rosie and Luke, of course, and Dith... There was another blond guy there, wasn't there? Yeah, there was, with some kind of weird name... Dude? No, no, Guy, that was it; he'd been friends with Luke. Citrine, though... "I don't think I remember her still," the brunette finally ceded with a frown.  

[TawnyAngel]

"Mmh," Dith shrugged his massive shoulders expressively, "she was very young, I think she was only twelve or something? Thinking back hell if I know what that Steven character thought it was a good idea to let her come." What had he been again? Some champion or...? Something like that, he was bad with the identities of any kind of celebrity including those of the pokemon world. "She seems to be doing well though which is good to know; I can't say I got to know her all that much but all the same, good to know." Dith shrugged again and then indicated that they should turn left at the end of the block. "It doesn't feel as though it was that long ago to me though, does it to you? A lot has happened since but... humm, well it just doesn't seem that long ago."

A lot of people had come and gone from his life since then, some of them he saw pop up online at times but others.... Well others just seemed to have vanished. Maybe Sera would have some answers though? She'd always had her finger on the pulse of social stuff, maybe she knew what had happened to Dove? He still thought about her quite a lot, worried about her more to the point. Had she gone home and done... whatever it was her family wanted? He'd never quite understood how the whole situation fitted together but it had clearly been a big deal to her.