[ORP] Don't Get Cold Feet!

[Suudonym]

[Pulse]

The trainer held out his Porygon again, using the already-confused pokemon as a shield against the Supersonic. When the Dragonair fell out of the air, he returned it to its ball to cure it of the ailment.

The transformed Ditto would wait for nothing, not even to see if its attack had hit, before bolting off into the blue. The Electro Web that just barely managed to reach its toes dangled there only briefly before being torn off by the wind.

The elite's reply came quickly - Ditto/Porygon/Voltorb are not worth it. Return to base camp.  

[Shaddaling]

[Pulse= Return]

"I hate people." Pulse sighed and recalled his pokemon, leaving out his Serperior. "I really do Glit." He sighed and started back, chalking out another loss and some what peeved at it. "Def some hair dye, don't you think?"

Glit shook herself giving an annoyed Seerr and followed her trainers foot steps.

"It is really too bad your sweet scent didn't attract anything, then we could have played off ooh, Roulette and Grims are a bit new at this, soo sorry sort of thing. Could have worked."  

[Suudonym]

[Pulse]

Rook waited by the van, paying closer attention to her handheld screen than to anything going on around her and bouncing a foot against the ground. When Pulse returned to the area, her silver eyes flicked up to him. "I'd like to hear your thoughts on that, if that's all right," she said in a neutral tone.  

[Magician Arcana]

[Beauty]

Adam responded mournfully, "I'm afraid we are just passing through... it's a shame," he knelt and reached out to the Growlithe. Maki whined and refused to move.  

[Shaddaling]

[Rook/Return rockets]

"That it was a cluster of bad decisions that wouldn't have happened if I passed him by when I learned that Articuno was a ditto. Major flying troll. Might have worked if Grim's and Roulette's attacks had hit or had a lot less trouble is Slip managed to get that Ditto to transform." Pulse headed to the van to find his pack for more healing supplies. "Only two of my team is weak to ice, but that includes the only flyer I had brought along. If I hit him right when I came up to him, I wouldn't have learned one of the legendary birds have been sighted here and I would have gone thinking that trolling ditto was one." That would have been more embarrassing then getting beaten.

He sighed and released most of his pokemon, Roulette was remaining in her poke ball till they got back checking for frost and bruises. "But going to be using a lot of hair dye and switching out this eye for one of my more in your face pieces." Total purple eye? Yes, he was going to wear it.  

[Suudonym]

[Adam]

The young woman's gaze fell to the ground. "I'm sorry, I really shouldn't..." she replied. "There are all kinds of awful rumors about this region, and Mother would be positively beside herself if I were late coming back. It's simply not meant to be, I suppose..."


[Pulse]

As usual, Rook listened with full attention, her screen lowered to her side for the time being. When Pulse finished his report, she gave her response, "As an acquisition, I don't think you did anything particularly poorly. I usually advocate stealth first, but in this case, a direct approach was necessary in order to quickly figure out if the Articuno was real or not. You had a difficult target; it was unfortunate that the Ditto had found such a powerful form. Perhaps it would have been better to excuse yourself and take up a stealthy approach from there, maybe sending your pokemon out under the guise of wild pokemon so that your face wouldn't be associated with the attack. As I always say, there's no way to know for sure what actions will lead to success.

"What I find more troubling," the elite continued, placing her arms behind her back with her elbows at sharp angles, "is that you believe that your first mistake was that you didn't give up. The Ditto didn't interest you. The other trainer's Jigglypuff and Butterfree didn't interest you. You're not out here to be choosy about your targets and cherrypick the pokemon that you personally like best. Missions like these or any other are for the benefit of Team Rocket, not for your personal benefit. Going forward, you should continue to go about your assignments the same way you went about your second attempted acquisition: with relentless tenacity."

She lifted her chin just slightly, adding a bit to the illusion of increased height, "There's something I'd like to clarify. At exactly what point were you planning to report that there was, presumably, an Articuno in the area?"  

[Chibi_Kokoro143]

[Rook with Rockets, Clancy, KO, and anyone else]

Michiko looked at Clancy and laughed a bit. "Of course. There are still police officers still about. It is a risk and our instructor, Rook, did say to stay put."

And she smiled a genuine smile. "Water Pokemon are the best. They can be calm as the river but as wild as a hurricane at sea. My feraligatr, Snap, is like that. Lazy when he wants to but in battle, he is ferocious."

She then turned to KO. "Of course it is just in a name. It fits others but not all."

She looked at her pokeball. "After healing, I though Oktavia was ready but I guess not yet." She sighed and rubbed the pokeball with her thumb, smiling. "Every Rose has their thorns. Maybe Oktavia isn't a rose, maybe more like a daisy and that's okay."

She looked at the third Pokemon and saw a potential in the deerling. "But there are still some roses out there. Just need to nurture the sprout you have and see."

Michiko went to pet Zacharel. She nurtured Zacharel, took him in and he is the most sweetest, yet one of the strongest Pokemon she's known. Yet even if Oktavia is a daisy, a daisy can withstand the harshest of winters and still stand. And she is the only one who can touch this daisy and no one else can.  

[BlackFireKitsune]

[Returned Rockets]

Sync made a pointed gagging sound, though started coughing shortly after. Whether the gagging was because of the conversation going on or because his throat was still burning from pepper spray was anyone's guess.  

[Gwennythe]

[Returned Rockets]

"Well, when it ain't on y' side, it's bloody terrifyin' and probably about to kick your arse, right?" Clancy replied with a shrug to KO "I dunno 'bout all this 'respect' and relationship building stuff- Long as my fish stays useful, we'll get along. She ain't never let me down so far so I guess we bloomin' well get along as much we can. I respect her savagery, it being on my side, and her usefulness, cuz she is -bloody- useful, there's truth..." He clarified and admitted; Mircalla was probably the only one of his pokémon he'd admit to respecting in some form.

"What the 'eck's a Furgalator?" Clancy asked when Michiko mentioned the pokémon, apparently having trouble placing the name.
"Calm ain't no bloody interest t' me unless the damned thing's 'elping me fix summat. Ain't many 'mon I met who can fix up a plumbin' system though."
When Michiko started talking about flowers, and roses, and daisies, the redhead stared at her, apparently confused for a moment, or incredulous, and then shook his head with a frown.
He might have been about to reply when he heard Sync's gagging sound, and he couldn't help but smirk. Either Sync was demonstrating he shared Clancy's opinion of the flower metaphor, or he was about to throw up from being pepper-sprayed. Either way, it made Clancy feel a bit better; sharing an opinion, or someone else's misfortune- both were some kind of comfort.

Speaking of someone else's misfortune...
Clancy's eyes had fallen upon Pulse, and he perked up to listen in to what was discussed between him and Rook. He couldn't help but twist a little, darkly satisfied, smile; at least he didn't feel anywhere near like he'd had the worst failure anymore among the rest of them, though the thought of the two 'worms' still burned a little.  

[Chibi_Kokoro143]

[Rook with Rockets, Clancy]

Michiko shrugged at Clancy, brushing it off. She was pretty sure she didn't make sense, and not everyone was suppose to get it.

She took out a her phone and went through her pictures. She then turned the phone around to show Clancy without looking at him. "This is Snap. He has been with me from the very beginning, before I was a Rocket."

There in the picture, was a 7 foot tall looking white crocodile, dwarfing her barely 5 feet.  

[TawnyAngel]

[Rockets >> KO takes Flabébé!]

Uh... okaaaaaay then. KO stifled a chortle at Michiko's description of her pokemon and shook his head slightly. "Only flower I'd say I have is this one," he said with a little wave of the Flabébé's pokeball; the other two went quickly in with the other acquisitions for the team.

"I don't go in for it much myself but it's been the only way to get my Sharpeado to be useful," KO continued to Eel, who seemed mercifully sane and normal, especially compared to the fairy princess. "Until he had some respect for me he'd sooner bite me than bite other people for me. Thankfully most of my other pokemon are a lot easier to handle." The only one he supposed he really had a relationship with per se was Duke but his Raichu wasn't like most pokemon, and they'd been together many years after all.

But wait, wait, what? "I'm sorry, Articuno? It's around here somewhere?" KO turned to Rook with a quizzical, perhaps faintly concerned look on his face; he'd missed most of the conversation but he'd heard the legendary's name. They weren't going to mess with a legendary were they? Sure they had an elite with them but only the one, that didn't sound like enough to him!  

[Shaddaling]

[Rook/Other rockets]

"I'm not cherry picking pokemon," Pulse replied voice darkening. "I approached my first target attempted multiple times to retrieve the poke balls without blowing my cover. When it became impossible to retrieve my query without blowing my cover I bowed out. You were not impressed with that, so next time though I should not have attacked, because a pseudo flying legendary kicked my a** and I knew it was highly likely it was going to. I attempted it anyhow though I had no interest in Dittos. "

"As for the Articuno, It turned out to be a Ditto. I doubt you wanted Oh, sorry, the legendary turned out to be a ditto. Lol, secondary message. As for not going hey there is an Articuno in the area, I'm still not sure how long this sighting was. There was no snow in the area and frag if I knew how long Dittos can hold their shape and it is a flying legendary. In truth I was hoping to bring them all down for better questioning on where it went. And steal the team." Pulse snorted passing out berries and poke blocks to his team.

"Now Roulette is fainted, I'm going to have to pick up hair dye and all the info I have is a Scientist had his Ditto turn into a Articuno because he saw one and couldn't get a good picture. I wanted that camera, because it could have gave me clues of where but when I asked for help, I was told it wasn't a priority." Pulse finished his rant and sighed rooting in his pack and took our several items. "So, I'm trying to figure out what you want me to say Rook."  

[TawnyAngel]

[Rockets. Message to Pulse]

When Lex launched into his rant KO groaned internally and closed his eyes for a moment. Why? Why had he done that? There was literally nothing to gain by getting shitty with an elite, and to do it to one who hadn't been biting your head off? Why? Ugh, well for Lex's sake he just hoped she kept being as oddly reasonable as she had been so far.

Fetching out his dex he quickly tapped out;  

[Suudonym]

[Pulse]

The fact that KO was asking her for clarification temporarily went over the elite's head as she continued to address the discussion at hand.

"You are the one who decided it was impossible to complete your objective the first time you tried," Rook corrected. "I was not impressed because you decided to take the easy way out and just throw in the towel rather than think of a way to deal with your situation. It was possible to acquire your first target's pokemon without revealing yourself as the culprit. I'm disappointed that you still haven't figured that out. I'm even more disappointed that what you took away from my advice amounted to 'attack even if you don't think it's a good idea.' Subduing the enemy through force is not a sound battle strategy. Once the element of physical violence is introduced to the situation, failing is the most lenient potential outcome. You risk being subdued yourself and ending up arrested, being injured and forced to retreat, or even being killed. You want to be the grunt who was killed on a training mission because your best strategy was to go in guns blazing without even knowing your enemy's capabilities? Then learn to think."

Rook moved as she spoke to keep herself placed in such a way that if at any time Pulse looked up, she would be directly in his line of sight. As he went about fishing through his pack, the elite began to lose her patience and raised her voice just enough that it shifted from neutral to angry, "You're making it abundantly clear right now that you don't value my input. If that's not the impression you want to give me, Grunt Pulse, I suggest you look me in the eye while speaking and while being spoken to.

"What I want you to say is where that man saw the Articuno, how long ago he saw it, what direction it came from, and what direction it went. Failing that, I want you to say why you thought your judgment was so much better than mine that you felt confident waltzing into a situation that was miles outside of your mission brief without once consulting your supervising elite on how to proceed - and I'd like to hear it without this shitty, holier-than-thou attitude you're giving me right now."  

[Gwennythe]

[Michiko, KO, Rook/Returned Rockets]

"Ah!" Clancy responded, his eyebrows rising as he turned to view the image Michiko was showing. "I seen one of 'em b'fore! Bloody monster tried t' eat a Goldeen while I was fishin'! That one's a whole different colour though... Now one of 'em'd be damned useful in a fight."
When he'd seen one, when he'd been fishing, the stress of the scare, and the embarrassment had prevented him from appreciating the beast, but here he could look at the picture and see the power in such a thing. Of course, it was no Sharpedo, but this crocosaurus or whatever it was called was pretty neat. He often felt like that about water types though.
He nodded a little at KO.
"Ah, I get it. Yeah. That kinda respect; bloody hell of a lot better than getting a chunk bitten outa ya..." He supposed he agreed, though in his opinion pokémon should just obey humans without question. That made them useful.

KO asked about Articuno and Clancy frowned; which one was that again? Hm. Clearly a legendary; there was a bit of an argument going on now. Whatever, legendaries were still pokémon and, not -actually- having any personal experience with any legendaries, Clancy didn't really see the big deal. Team Aqua always made a huge deal out of Kyogre, and yeah, sure, the thing looked bloody impressive and, well, even -cool-, in images that Clancy had seen, but eh. Still just a pokémon, he thought.

Well, this was good.
He smirked a little more. Pulse was just... digging himself a hole here. This was entertaining. He had certainly cheered up.