[PRP] Talking Time #2 (Fin)

[lZAYA ORlHARA]

At Tortie's display of aggression, the grunt cautiously reached for a mop handle as if to defend himself. Not like it would have been much use against the experienced Absol, but he felt better with something between them, even if it was basically just a stick. He looked up at the whistle that that kept the pokemon from advancing, wondering faintly to what degree Tortie had understood his words to her trainer. Perhaps she had just been reacting to the way Aulus was toward Nakura.

Loosening his grip on the mop, he let his hand slide down it as he obeyed his superior and listened. He also watched, his own expression blank. It really did intrigue him that Aulus was one of the more passionate agents who actually let his emotions show on his face. Most of the others seemed either too caught up in keeping a 'professional appearance' or even just being indifferent to do the same.

'Long streak of piss,' he thought with some measure of amusement. That was a new one. The agent's unfailing wit with insults still couldn't distract Nakura from Char being sent to guard the door. What on earth...? A slight anxiety at the concept of being trapped began to gnaw at the grunt, but he pushed it aside for the time being.

When the scarred man was done, Nakura put back the mop and bowed his head, presumably in apology, but it was as difficult as ever to tell whether or not it was sincere or mocking. "I'm sorry for misreading, then," he said, raising his head again. "Maybe that was just my unconscious reaction to what I perceived as a threat. I'm sure you understand why someone like me can get to be a little paranoid, especially around twig-snapping ape - I mean, agents - like you." His thin smile broadened. "Or maybe I was just sick of hearing about your strength. It reminds me of a muscle-headed neanderthal I abhor even more than you. Either way, my mistake."

Casting Char a dubious, sideways glance, he said, "Regarding those 'cards' of mine, I assumed you were already aware of them, so I didn't see the harm in using them as an example. Furthermore, I thought I implied well enough that I don't intend to be enemies with you - at least not any more than you already think of me as one. That means I don't care if you do or don't know what's up my sleeve because those are tricks I'm saving for others."

Aulus' smile caused Nakura's anxiety to increase, reminding him just a little of that off look he'd seen on the agent's face right before he'd given chase in the cafeteria. This time, though, there was a full-grown, completely capable Charizard blocking his exit.

"They're all just guesses," the grunt assured his superior, his smile turning sheepish. "True, I tend to be more accurate in guessing than most others when it comes to people, but that doesn't mean I don't know my limits. Or the dangers of underestimation." He laughed shakily. "Like just now! Didn't you tell me I was wrong about the 'threat' thing? You know me. I run my mouth just to keep it running; half of what comes out is just to unsettle people. I don't think you need my help for that, though."

TawnyAngel

 

[TawnyAngel]

Kitomyx

lZAYA ORlHARA

O...kay? Okay. That had... that had actually sort of worked. Wow! Big shock! Not being a complete raging bull in a glass museum got people to listen to you! This should not be news, and it wasn't really, it was just hard- so hard to remember that when he was angry. He'd managed it this time though and that was something to be proud of right? Not ashamed of anyway.

Aulus relaxed a little, grunted, and waved Char away from the door again. "Okay, fine." He certainly understood why Izaya could be paranoid given their last meeting but that hadn't even crossed his mind until now which probably went to show just how inward-looking he got when he was angry. He didn't think, he just reacted and- but he hadn't this time. Maybe he could have thought a bit deeper but he hadn't flipped out and that was progress.

"I was," he continued, "the cards I mean so, fine, an example... and I haven't got any interest in being your enemy either. We're teammates in the end." Much as he might love to mash the little s**t into a fine paste they were on the same side and might be required to work together, and that meant that he needed to be able to deal with the grunt. Aulus took another swig of his water, giving himself time to think of what to say next. "Why do you do it?" he asked eventually. "Run your mouth off I mean, deliberately try to unsettle people. Do you get a kick out of it? Are you just trying to get the upper hand? Prove some kind of superiority?" He chose not respond to Izaya's last comment because it was dead on target. His silence would probably confirm that in the grunt's mind but Aulus was pretty sure that anything he said about it would only make matters worse.  

[lZAYA ORlHARA]

Nakura's relief was almost palpable as Char stepped away from the door. "See what happens when you're not scaring people within an inch of their life?" he asked Aulus cheerfully. "We actually get a chance to reason things out and communicate."

'Teammates'. The grunt was still not entirely sure what that word meant. At least not to himself. But he recalled the topic having come up during their last discussion and how trust was involved. It was a tricky thing to consider, but luckily for Nakura, liking one's teammates wasn't a requirement. Not that Nakura didn't love all his humans, but he wasn't sure the feeling was mutual.

"Neeeh, Aulus-saaan," he began to answer in a 'you should know better' tone. "Haven't you heard by now? I love humans~! I love them for everything they are as a race. I love to study and watch them and predict their actions. If I say or do things to see how they'll react, they make the most fascinating expressions and reactions. The confusion on someone's face when they think they're suicidal, but then are put into a life-threatening situation and then are saved...? Or the look of hate and realization when someone thinks they want to die with someone, only to realize the person they wanted to die with doesn't intend to join them - there's nothing else like it," he said blissfully, his eyes adopting a dreamy, distant look. "You won't find that kind of face on any pokemon, I can tell you that."

He chuckled softly, shaking his head. "I guess that's right in a way; that I might have a superiority or god-complex. Really, though, I just want to observe humans forever. Even if I die, I don't care if there's hell or if only suffering exists there as long as I, too, can exist and continue to watch humans. That's why I stole my first pokemon - because she was being used for research regarding ghosts and how they continue to live even after death."

Casting Aulus a meaningful grin, he lowered his voice to a near whisper. He might have attempted to get closer to the man, but with him surrounded by pokemon who were apperantly looking for any excuse to attack, Nakura thought better of it. "I'll tell you a secret, Aulus-san, since you've been so good at sharing with words instead of fists today." He leaned down on his cart. "Sometimes, just with a mere suggestion, people manage to convince themselves I'm right about them even if that wasn't the case to begin with. Because they start to believe it and their opinion is the only one that matters, though, it quickly becomes reality and the truth. Then all I have to do is play along like I knew it from the start."

He made another extravagant gesture. "So you see," the grunt said, "I don't always know as much as I act like I do. I'm vulnerable, too, and I make my own bluffs. Whatever 'power' I might have over people is often power they give me themselves. They just don't always know it."

TawnyAngel

 

[TawnyAngel]

Kitomyx

lZAYA ORlHARA

Quite frankly Aulus had no idea whether or not to believe a single word that had just come out of Izaya's mouth, and he half suspected that this was the intended effect.

"You have weird hobbies," Aulus said aloud with a scowl because he really couldn't think of any other way to respond. The examples Izaya had given sent an unpleasant chill down his spine though he managed not to actually shiver; had the grunt actually observed the things he described? He had orchestrated the situations for his own pleasure? Had he just made it up? No matter what the answer it was deeply unsettling, which was probably the whole point.

The rest of what Izaya said was food for thought but really no more pleasant than his earlier talk. Power through emotional manipulation was one of Aulus' least favorite things ever along with deception and betrayal of trust. People who could get inside your head and turn you against yourself or turn you to their ends - people like that were dangerous, dangerous and hateful. Aulus quietly resolved to be a lot more careful not only about what he said and did around Izaya but also about how his own thoughts ran in the man's presence. Power they gave him themselves.

The Agent took another sip of his water to try to cover his discomfort but to an eye like Izaya's it was probably still plain to see. "So is it just the negative emotions you get a kick out of then?" Aulus asked after a brief pause, keen to move on and hoping that Izaya hadn't noticed the effect his words had had. "Pretty morbid couple of examples you just gave there."  

[lZAYA ORlHARA]

Snorting with laughter at the agent's frank response, he held out his arms, shrugging, and answered, "I get that a lot."

"I also know you're likely to be more wary around me now that I've told you that secret of mine," he continued, "but I hope you'll consider that I told it to you because I want to earn your trust. Honestly, of course; not through deceit." He raised his index finger pointedly. "And before you start deciding that either of those things is impossible, I hope you'll remember what I said before." He met the brunet's blood-red eyes.

"I respect you, Agent Aulus. We might not ever be friends, and that's fine because I don't wa - I don't need friends. But I'd at least like to help you in any way I can." The smile that returned to his lips disrupted the seriousness and sincerity of his prior expression. "You're one of the most fun humans in Team Rocket, you know."

Grinning at the continued questions, Nakura rubbed his hands with hand sanitizer. "Of course not," he protested, though his pretense of having been hurt by the suggestion was obviously false. "If you were listening and paying better attention, you might have noticed that. By having been put through what she was, the girl in the first situation I spoke of soon realized that she wasn't actually suicidal. Shouldn't she have been grateful to me for that?" He glanced at the ceiling. "Sure, she might have tried to jump off that building after just to spite me - maybe to show me that she actually did have the guts to die - but Celty saved her and she went back to her old life."

"As for the pair who thought I planned to die with them, I only scared them a little. I drugged their drinks and, right before they passed out, I made them think I was going to sell their corpses when they died. Ultimately, though, they should have been grateful to me, too." He inspected his fingernails before replacing his grunt uniform gloves over them. "One of them hated me so much, she vowed to kill me before she lost consciousness. With the intensity of that kind of hate, she found the will to live. I didn't actually kill them, after all; I just had them left on a park bench to wake up when the drugs wore off."

"I'm not that bad a guy," he claimed with a look of innocence. "In the end, all I really did was help a bunch of suicidal people whom I found online realize that they didn't actually want to die. I saved them."

TawnyAngel

 

[TawnyAngel]

Kitomyx

lZAYA ORlHARA

Well that was... good? If it was true anyway and Aulus wasn't convinced that it was at all. He also wasn't convinced that Izaya actually wanted to earn his trust, in fact he was pretty sure that the grunt was just playing with him. So long as he remembered that however it wasn't a problem, he would be guarded... but not defensive? Something like that, he guessed, but now he was doubting himself again.

"I'll bear that in mind," Aulus said after a brief tight-lipped silence. How could Izaya honestly expect anyone to trust him?... Aila had trusted him. He didn't often think about her anymore; he hadn't known her all that well, time had passed and so much had happened that it almost seemed as though he'd met her in a different lifetime.

"We recovered Shaymin DNA and some files," he added apropos of nothing, figuring that there was no reason to withhold his take on the mission now. "The ship was full of bodies; some guy called Fenrir had taken over leadership after Tethys," ugh, "disappeared on a mission. He then went nuts and started killing everyone apparently. We found him dead with a weird symbol painted behind him in blood.... Perhaps you can look into that, mister information." Worth a try, right? Aulus gestured at Char and then at his Dex; the fire type brought it over and Aulus pulled up the grisly picture he still had saved on it. A dead man seated as though on a throne, his throat torn out and that symbol daubed behind him in blood. Aulus tried to avoid looking too hard at the image but he swore he could smell the stink of death in the air as though he was back on that damned ship. It was gone now though, blown to pieces. They could never be taken back there.  

[lZAYA ORlHARA]

Wiping his features free of emotion as easily as wiping a slate, the black-haired grunt once again fell silent when Aulus began to speak. His attention only faltered when Char brought over his Dex. Why anyone would ever trust such a device to a pokemon, he wasn't sure, but he said nothing of it as he came closer for a better look. Naturally, Nakura didn't limit his observation to the image pulled up for his benefit.

"Strange," he murmured, pretending not to notice the agent's aversion to the sight. "I'll try to look into it. Would you mind sending that to my Dex? Actually, my tablet might be better. The porygon that Faleen-chan gave me can analyze it. May I see that for a minute, please?" He held out his hand for the device. "It'll be faster if I let him know it's me."

TawnyAngel

 

[TawnyAngel]

Kitomyx

lZAYA ORlHARA

Aulus' first instinct was to refuse and to jerk his possession away from Izaya but he managed to suppress that reaction and instead he sat still for a few moments scowling deeply. What was the worst that could happen? There was nothing personal Izaya could easily access on here, so he should stop being a paranoid idiot. "Alright." Aulus passed the dex over with some reluctance but still counted it as a minor victory that he'd done it at all.  

[lZAYA ORlHARA]

The few moments of hesitance were not lost on the grunt and he almost had to smile at the agent's caution. He was actually surprised when he was allowed direct contact with the Dex, but he was careful not to let that show, either.

"Thank you," he said graciously, dipping his head in gratitude before quickly sending the image to his tablet with a pass-code that Chrome would recognize. That done, he deleted the original - at least what he assumed was the original - from Aulus' Dex before handing it back.

TawnyAngel

 

[TawnyAngel]

Kitomyx

lZAYA ORlHARA

What the-?

"Hey!" Aulus glowered as he took his dex back, only just managing not to snatch it. "Why did you do that?" He could retrieve the file - that would be easy enough - but that didn't mean he wasn't annoyed, and he definitely wanted to know what the hell Izaya thought he was doing.  

[lZAYA ORlHARA]

"You don't need to have that on your Dex if you can't even look at it," Nakura replied evenly, going back to his cart. "For all anyone knows, it's just an accidental smear of blood. Don't you have more important things to worry about as an agent?" He turned back toward the door. "If that's all, I'll be leaving now. Thank you for sharing."

TawnyAngel

 

[TawnyAngel]

Kitomyx

lZAYA ORlHARA

"I don't like looking at it, that doesn't mean I can't. And as an Agent I can't just dismiss and delete things because they 'might' be nothing. It might be important later, and so I don't intend to just forget about it," Aulus replied, waving his dex dismissively as he spoke. "Fine though, run along if you're done here and let me know right away if you happen to find anything out about the symbol."  

[lZAYA ORlHARA]

"You could just as easily leave it to the ones who weren't affected by all the dead Galactic bodies," the grunt remarked matter-of-factly. "Oh, but I forgot. What a burden agents have, not being able to completely trust a difficult matter even to their fellow agents without feeling incapable themselves," he sighed, almost to himself.

Standing to attention, Nakura gave a stiff (mocking?) salute. "Yes, sir!" he answered. "I'll do my best." Turning around, he wheeled his things out back the way he had come.

TawnyAngel

 

[TawnyAngel]

Kitomyx

lZAYA ORlHARA

As Izaya departed Aulus moved to collect together the rest of his things and muttered something under his breath. It was not polite.