[FIN] Identical Arrangements; Important Changes

[TawnyAngel]

"Well when I first met him he tried to strangle me with his cute pink feelers soooooo." Aulus gave a lopsided smile and gestured vaguely in the air. "Trained him out of that, but yeah he likes to fight. Suppose we'll just have to see how they get on.... Uh." Err. "So... where would the kitchen be? Where's the canteen?" Aulus fumbled for his dex with its handy map, which he had completely forgotten in the past couple of hours or whatever it had been.  

[Gwennythe]

"Well. That sounds like a perfect match." Tambrey was completely serious, despite the joking tone; she had a hunch that the two pokémon truly would get along well. "Cute pink feelers. Sylveon? I've met one, but not a violently aggressive one before... Was he from one of our labs or shipped in?"

She found herself searching out her 'dex as he did.
"Oh, Arceus... We're goin' to get lost, aren't we? There's a café and a caféteria... both of this floor... erm. That way. No. Wait... That way." Pointing 'as the murkrow flies' had led to her pointing at a wall.  

[TawnyAngel]

"Oh, yes, that looks like it," he agreed with a nod, squinting at his own dex a moment longer before setting off.

"And yea, that's right," Aulus nodded, "he's was shipped in, one of the first batch we got hold of before we got a steady source for fairy stones. I don't think he can have been all that close to his last trainer though, he wasn't all that happy when I first let him out but he warmed up to me pretty quickly... well after he tried to kill me anyway." Shaking his head Aulus gave a rueful grin. "Teach me to underestimate cute things, though you'd think I would already have learned that lesson... I suppose I got cocky. Anyway he seems to like me now, nearly as much as he likes battling..... Err." Aulus paused as they reached a branch in the corridor and checked his dex again. "Left, looks like?"  

[Gwennythe]

"If it's not left, then we're probably holding these upside down." Tambrey decided, agreeing with with the directions.
"Huh. That must be pretty interesting. The fairy typing is rather intriguing, especially it's strength against dragon types, and the steel weakness. With a lot of types, it's extremely easy to understand the biology, but fairies are... I have to admit, kind of a mystery to me, moreso than a lot of pokémon. The genetics aren't especially difficult to replicate and modify, from what I can tell, but there's a difference between being able to reproduce, or change, something and fully understanding it. I suspect there's a lot of potential we've not fully grasped yet... Or, if someone has, they've not released it into our knowledge yet." Tambrey rambled a little; if there was ever -any- motivation for trying to be promoted one day, it would be scientific security clearance, for her.
"Anyway, sorry. 'S good he likes you though; maybe the.. uh... attempted murder thing's his way of bonding?"  

[TawnyAngel]

"Attempted murder is love," Aulus agreed with a lopsided grin, rubbing his neck as he spoke. Lessons learned, indeed. "I was glad to get my hands on one so soon, they'll mix things up interestingly. He's not ready for work in the field yet but we'll get there, especially with these fancy new facilities; looking forward to having that advantage over dragons, and dark types too. I haven't got anything else with an advantage there, not that I've got a big weakness to dark but it's good to have the upper hand over as many types as possible right?" It was a rhetorical question of course but there it was.  

[Gwennythe]

"Mhm. Definitely," Tambrey agreed "especially with our... field work. I really should train more... I've put so much into the lab work lately. I know I'm not -awful- at it, and... I feel like you've taught me a lot in training myself... But I probably do need to work more on my team's abilities. I'm not even totally sure just what I have an advantage or disadvantage against right now... I mean, typing is obvious, but I guess I should study- or, train, more than study- just how well they can all... erm... utilise just what they can do aside from how strong they are... If that makes sense?" So, she supposed, having the new facilities was, after all, just as important to her as having a lab after all.  

[TawnyAngel]

"Yeah," Aulus nodded, "you mean like... not just hitting hard, having strategy and utility type things as well for protecting yourself, getting past obstacles, sneaking, all that sort of thing." A lot of people didn't seem to understand that flexibility and 'practical' applications of moves were just as important as power in battle was. Those people would not find themselves becoming useful Agents in the field.

"Ah, here we are." Aulus nodded to the doors they were approaching and pushed them open, glancing around as he stepped into the canteen. "Not bad." Not fancy but not bad. "Looks like the kitchen's through this door," he added, heading towards it with purpose; he was getting really damn hungry by now!  

[Gwennythe]

"Yes, I suppose. I've focused a lot my team's moves on... well... espionage, almost, accidentally, and, um, moves to hinder opponents rather than take them down or properly defend myself and others. Like Sand Attack." Tambrey explained. "I have tried to drill some offensive moves into them, moreso than defensive, I suppose- and with Neph... she pretty much picks up anything rather quickly if she thinks it'll help her take down something big one day. I really need to work on utility though. Pygi has Fly, and I can hide behind Ella like a shield with her Iron Defense, but Octavia would be worse than useless in battle right now, for example."

Tambrey smiled, agreeing as they entered the canteen.
"Nice. Better than picnicking on the floor at Ambergris. Hard... not to be, but still." She followed toward the kitchen. "Still feels weird that this -isn't- the old desert base... Weirder that it's under a lake."  

[TawnyAngel]

As Tam started talking about her team, Aulus' mind started drifting off along a tangent to that and he totally missed most of the rest of what she said.

"What?" he blinked as his mind snapped back to the present. "Oh, yeah, being underground is weird. Makes more sense though I suppose, as a hidden base I mean." Aulus said this with a thoughtful frown and, scratching an itch on his shoulder, he went back to the line of thought he had been chugging down before he made himself focus and reply.

"A lot of my lot are focused on strength in battle," he said after a pause, looking thoughtfully at Tam. "Discord and Paul are more focused at support and utility but.... Listen, we're living across from each other right? What do you say to being official partners? We could train together, get our teams to work together, I mean think how versatile twelve pokemon could be together! We'd still need our teams to work as their own separate entities of course but if we could also mesh them to be a greater whole - like partners are meant to be - I think we could be pretty damn epic." He'd missed having a partner since Alex had moved onward and upward, but if he was honest they hadn't worked their pokemon together that much. If Tam was interested though maybe the two of them could.  

[Gwennythe]

"A lot more sense." Tambrey agreed, then, with some (pleasant) surprise widened her eyes and immediately nodded.
"I would be very interested in that, absolutely. I mean, if you're sure? I guess you don't have a partner since Hayes moved on up? I'd like that, if you're sure about it... And I'm absolutely certain we could get our teams to work together well. Paul might even be a good influence on a certain spider of mine."  

[TawnyAngel]

"Great!" Aulus grinned and stuck his hand out towards Tam. "It's a deal then, partner. I don't know what we do about officalizing it but I'm sure we can find out easily enough." Couldn't be complex, idiots did it all the time.  

[Gwennythe]

Tambrey put her hand out to meet Aulus' and shake.
"Absolutely. Deal," She agreed with a grin back "I'm pretty sure it's just a matter of filling out a form or something. We can ask once we've eaten, maybe?"  

[TawnyAngel]

"Great!" he replied, still sporting an open genuine grin. It would be good to have somebody to work closely with again even if it wasn't Hayes.... He missed his partner, and noted abruptly that he needed to message him again when he got a moment away from Tam's gaze. He hadn't heard from his friend in hours and the lack of contact was starting to niggle at his nerves. He'd told Alex they were off, why hadn't he replied?... He'd text again in a bit, just in case his message hadn't got through.

"Right," Aulus shook himself, grin no longer present, and nodded. "Let's see what we've got here then shall we?" Food first, then message. He could send a picture of their efforts, too.  

[Gwennythe]

"It'll give us a real chance to test the new training rooms too... and definitely give me a more immediate reason to train. I mean, I know it's important but now I know you c'n bug me if I don't do enough of it too."
Tambrey grinned, then nodded, starting to open cupboards, and generally explore the place to set up properly.
"It's bigger than I remember the ones at the old place being but... a lot of my old kitchen memories have probably been a little touched on by Ambergris' dinkiness..."  

[TawnyAngel]

"I can do that, I'm good at bugging people to train," Aulus replied, the start of a smile coming back to his face. Training was his thing after all; himself, his pokemon. Sometimes he felt a bit inferior for not being all up in science and computers like Hayes and Tam for example but at other time, and at the moment, he remembered that he was damn good at what he did and felt better about it.

"I dunno," he continued, "it's set out a bit differently... might well be though? I suppose our expectations have been lowered by that s**t hole thought." But at least there had been natural light, dingy natural light through the windows. The lack of it was like an ache or an itch, he didn't notice too much when he was busy but when he went still.... He'd get used to it. It would feel normal after a while.