[PRP] Up For The Challenge

[Suudonym]

As he'd said earlier, it wasn't anything fancy - just a plain frying with vegetable oil, flour, and a bit of salt - but it certainly looked more properly prepared than if they'd just put the whole thing into a pan and heated it until it was edible. Killua had carefully cleaned his knife and returned it to his bag after Gon finished using it, but the rest of the kitchen area was still kind of a mess from the cooking preparations. Killua was used to cooking to satisfy his cravings, but he wasn't accustomed to cleaning up after himself when he was done.

"Looks good to me," Killua remarked as he observed their handiwork and pushed his sleeves down, brushing traces of white flour from his black shirt. He supposed he should probably save a portion for when Zorua returned. He pulled his new pokedex partway out of his pocket to glance at the screen, "It's starting to get a little late. Guess we should eat up and start figuring out what we want to do with the bedding stuff."  

[Blood_Goddess]

Gon glanced over as Killua pulled his pokedex out and looked at the time, for a moment he had forgotten completely that he had one of those too... he hadn't even look at his since he got it, so he wasn't entirely sure what one of them did, or how it worked.
but first! Food!
As promised, Gon stepped over to cut off the fare over the portion of the fish that he had traded Killua for his help.
"Oh... do you think you're pokemon would want some too?" Gon added as a thoughtful after thought.

Excited about the fact that the food was finally ready, Treecko perked up, leaping over the flour to hop over and watch was Gon was doing.
Only he wasn't paying attention to what his tail was doing as he swung it with a happy force.
With a dull "Pumph!" flour was flung in a big dust cloud, to engulf both the boys and the fish.

Shocked at what just happened, Gon stood wide eyed, his tan skin and black hair sprinkled with a layer of white, along with the fish.

Treecko stared in horror at what he had just done, crouching on the counter and hugging his large leaf like tail, the kitchen that had just been clutter and slightly messy was now significantly more dirty.

"Oh for goodness..." A voice from the hall said, as the elder women who managed the place put her hands on her hips. "that's it, you kids get out out out of the kitchen." She said stepping in and waving her hands. "You've caused enough mess today, shoo shoo." she quickly ushered the three out brushing off their clothes and hair as much as she could before they got into the hall.  

[Suudonym]

"Won't know until he's back," Killua replied with a shrug. "He might find something to eat outside. I'm sure he wouldn't mind having some either way, though; I'll save a bit for later."

He scooped up his bag and settled it back upon his shoulders, ready to relocate, when they all were abruptly swallowed up by a cloud of white. Killua's immediate reaction was to tense and prepare to evacuate the area, but the flour settled quickly enough that he was able to identify the cause. Ah, they'd done it now - there was no way that old bat was going to let this slide.

As if summoned by the thought, the woman appeared, and Killua prepared to make his escape. When it became obvious that she wasn't going to force them to clean the whole place up, he obediently allowed himself to be steered into the hallway, letting slip a mischievous "lucky!" when he was sure that he was out of earshot.  

[Blood_Goddess]

Gon had managed to collect his belonging and the plates with the fish on it, snapping himself out of being frozen when the woman running the rest out caught the mess they made and ushered them out.

He seemed to have a much different reaction to Killua's though, as she stood a little stiffly, flour still clinging to his face and hair.
"I wonder if she's really angry with us." He pondered aloud with a guilty voice.  

[Suudonym]

"Nah," Killua replied nonchalantly, almost dismissively, spearing the fried fillet with a snagged fork, "I bet she's seen worse. It's only a bit of flour; it'll clean up in no time with a damp rag." And as long as he wasn't the one who had to do that cleaning, then he felt that the situation was pretty much resolved.  

[Blood_Goddess]

"Yeah...I guess." Gon said, glancing back toward the kitchen, but deciding that he should probably actually finally eat something and get some sleep. After all they still had the test to finish.

The main room was a large room that took up most of the rest home's interior. the flooring was some kind of mat, a rugged carpet, and was easily large enough to support a good number of people sleeping.
there was a sliding door closet set on the far end, left open to show a collected of folded mats and blankets with pillows.

Already some of the other applicants were sleeping in their own mats, while others were sitting up and talking, or taking care of various pokemon.
Though there was still plenty or room to find a place to claim as his own. thus Gon made his way over to a clear aria, dropping his backpack again and plopping down himself with his fish, Treecko scrambling into his lap.  

[Suudonym]

Near where Gon claimed a place, Killua lowered himself to the floor and crossed his legs to sit comfortably, setting the plate of fish upon his knee as he shrugged his backpack off of his shoulders. He wondered when Zorua would return and if he should have grabbed some saran wrap or maybe even if he should just store the dark-type's portion in the refrigerator. For the time being, he chose to address his own portion, separating a piece of the fish from the rest.

"Say," he began with an intonation of mild curiosity, "was that fifty bucks for the application fee all of your money or something? Seems like an awful lot of trouble to go fishing just for dinner, and after all that running around." It wasn't the only instance in which Gon had opted for the free option either, but considering they were selling food right there at the facility, it was the one that stuck out the most.  

[Blood_Goddess]

To the back of the rest house, a safe enough distance from the building so that they couldn't be overhead, the small group of men that had organized the whole test stood together, watching from the darkness as the small boy dressed in green from the test come out of the bushes leading into the forest, and made his way back into the cabin. The group watched carefully until he was securely out of sight before turning to one another.

“What in the world is going on here James?” One of the accompanying men who had remained silent during the whole exchange with the trainers, stood with his arms crossed in defense of the cold, their breath coming on puffs of steam as a deeper cold set in on the darkening world.
“I thought you said you were a good marathon runner.”

“I AM a good marathon runner.” The lead examiner retorted with a bite to his voice.

“You could have fooled me!” He hissed back, “A lot of people made it this far with you, including a couple of kids.”

The look on the examiners face showed the disdain he had for the comment. “I guess this batch is just used to this, as for those kids; Your guess is as good as mine, they’re crazy.”
“I don’t see why any of this matters.” Muttered one of the others through the cold. “We have the money, we might as well bail now while they’re all asleep.”

“And discredit this scam?” the first man pointed out. “The point was that no one would pass, they fail out “fare and square” so then we can do this again.”

The third man feel silent at this explanation, though the group continued to linger in a stillness after the man’s words, though from the air of their silence there was a stiff uncertainty, until finally the first man turned his eyes up to the examiner. “stick to the plan, it’s a longer run tomorrow, just run them hard and make sure they drop out before you get to Ambergris.”

The second man nodded in understanding, reaching a hand up to rub it down the length of his jawline and chin, doubt weighing on his features.

“We’ll give you some support… we’ll go ahead and set up some obstacles to help cut down on the numbers quicker.” The first guy added with a grumble, “We should be in there now sharing a couple of beers, and a good chunk of money we conned off of those idiots, but I guess that can wait till tomorrow.”

The examiner gave an absent wave of his hand to his associates, then without much of another word at the recurrence of the backup he headed back in toward the rest house.
While the other two got back onto the pokemon and took off again, This time toward the direction of Ambergris.
Back in the cabin, Gon was wasting no time in digging into his dinner, the day’s events made the young body quite hungry, especially since they had been running nonstop for most of the afternoon.
It was a pretty fun test he though, and he was determined to do a good job no matter what they threw at him, but it certainly left him wondering just what they had in store for him tomorrow.

“hm? Oh- yeah, kinda” Gon answered with his mouth full, taking a moment to swallow hard and clear his mouth. Reaching a hand out into his pocket where a few stray bills were folded. “I didn’t think that it would cost anything, but it’s what I saved the money up for anyway, it’ll be worth it when I pass.”
In all honesty he hadn't given a whole lot of thought to his money situation, He was used to just not having or even using money, he lived off the land when he could... though he probably should have researched the kind of weather before he left.  

[Suudonym]

Zorua watched the exchange from the shadows, his teal eyes fixed on the group and his large ears swiveled forward to best catch the conversation. Their words confirmed what Zorua was sure Killua suspected to have sent him to keep watch, but it also seemed that his master was in no immediate danger of being swindled. Satisfied with what he had learned, he turned to return to the two boys when the group of con artists began to disperse.

When Zorua returned to the rest house, a found berry in his mouth, his trainer was speaking, "Mm, I see." Killua didn't remark any further; perhaps it would have been better of him to make Gon aware of the likely nature of the situation, but for the time being, it sounded more interesting to watch how things played out. He separated a bite of fish and speared it with his fork, "Well, if anyone's going to pass out of this sorry bunch, it'll probably be us. I guess some of the others might make it, but adults sure can be quick to give up-- Oh, Zorua, you're back. Got a berry, huh? You can have some fish too, if you want it."

Zorua trotted over to his trainer's side and sat himself down, placing the berry at his paws and giving a short bark in greeting.  

[Blood_Goddess]

Gon took a moment to glance around the room at the other contestants at Killua's comment, wondering for a moment himself who looked like they might pass as well. "I wonder if we're going to have to fight each other at some point." His musings were matter of fact, his tone didn't imply that the idea worried him or upset him in the slightest. Heck, if he had to fight everyone he would in order to get a license... though he did have a little feeling that he didn't really want to have to fight Killua, is he didn't have to. Maybe. He supposed he would wait and see when the time came.

His head snapped back toward Killua when the boy voiced that Zorua had returned, Gon blinked and leaned forward to look at the berry that it had brought back with him "You found a Wiki berry. That's so cool! I couldn't find any berry growing out there." Gon commented with arched eyebrows. He was going to have to learn what berries grew here and how to find them for sure.

Delighted to see the other pokemon return, Treecko hopped off of Gon's knee, landing in front of the Zorua in a bold greeting, making a gesture to the fish and looking rather proud of himself.

Gon let out a long and loud yawn, placing a hand over his mouth and setting the empty plate on the ground next to him.
There was still some flour clinging to the side of the boy's nose and hair, though it seemed to go unnoticed as she boy unzipped his jacket and started to pull if off of his arms, showing a dark colored tank top tucked into his shorts underneath  

[Suudonym]

"It's possible," Killua said with a one-shouldered shrug, "but I guess we'll have to wait and see. If they wanted us to be a certain skill level with training, they might have just required us to have badges or something." He thought it unlikely that the self-proclaimed examiners would battle them themselves - if they were good enough trainers to be confident about winning so many battles, they wouldn't be resorting to scams to earn their cash - but he supposed it was possible they would make the participants battle one another tournament-style so they would have fewer fish to shake.

"Zorua's good at finding berries if there are any around," Killua remarked as the dark-type lowered himself to the floor to bite at the fruit. "Pokemon have good senses for that kind of thing, I think." He took the portion that he had separated for the fox pokemon and offered it, giving some context to Treecko's gesture, "Gon went fishing, so we fried it up. Eat up; you could use the protein after all that running around today."

Zorua munched his berry quietly and gave a nod of acknowledgment.  

[Blood_Goddess]

It was hard for Gon to think of what could be coming next, the unknown was a bit unnerving, but he couldn't help an excited shiver from running up his spine. He was excited.
At Killua's assessment though Gon blinked at him, tossing his jacket off to the side with his bag and leaning back onto his hands. "Yeah- I guess so." He replied, looking up at the ceiling for a few seconds in excited thought before pushing himself back forward.

"So have you and Zorua been a team for very long?" Gon asked, squirming where he sat for a moment, in an attempt to pull his boots off with some difficulty since he didn't untie them.

Treecko watched as Zorua continued to chew on the berry, glancing from him to the fish, then back.
"Tree" He muttered, shifting forward and nudging the fish closer to Zorua "Treecko"  

[Suudonym]

Killua set his finished plate aside and rested his elbow against his knee, leaning forward to prop up his chin on his palm. "Not that long," Killua replied, blue eyes falling to the dark-type. "He was a new pokemon my family's security was training to guard our property. I thought it sucked that they just went and decided his life for him, so I took him along when I left."

Zorua blinked at the grass-type, looked to the fish, then returned his gaze to Treecko and pulled off another bite of the berry's dry flesh. "Zrru."  

[Blood_Goddess]

Again Treecko shifted forward when Zorua didn't pay attention to the fish, with him he scooted the fish forward toward the fox, his eyes widening again. "Cko-"
He cooed pointedly nearly pushing the plate right onto the Zorua's paws.
They had caught these, Zorua should really really try it!

Successfully getting one boot off of his foot, Gon paused to place it to the side, looking back at Killua "Woow, you're family must be pretty important to have security and trained pokemon huh."  

[Suudonym]

Zorua picked up the berry in his little mouth and stood, took a step backwards, and lay down again. He wasn't particularly annoyed by the grass-type's persistence, but he did want to keep a certain perimeter of personal space while he ate. "Rua." He'd get to the fish. For now he had a berry to finish.

Killua gave a snort of breath. "I guess you could say that. A lot of people depend on us, but a loooot of people have good reasons to hate us, so security's kinda important."