[PRP] Tundra

[Gwennythe]

It had been nice to have a little time off. A nice breath of fresh open air after the adventure, although slightly head-ache spoiled, of being on a submarine crew again. Now, he was back underground (oh, sure, there was a lake up there somewhere, but that wasn't much fun) in the base, and back with the duties of any grunt as usual.

But at least, today, things might be a tad more interesting. He was to assist one Agent Frost with a project. Of course that just meant lifting things and doing what the agent said, but this was engineering; Clancy was sure the agent might appreciate something he could offer during the course of things.
Maybe he'd prove himself incredibly useful, even, and be on a fast track to promotion? Who could say?
The man he'd met and passed a few times on submarine duty hadn't exactly been the friendliest sort, but sometimes people just weren't in those spaces. This was different; dry land and the base- it wasn't to his taste, but perhaps he'd meet a different Agent Frost.

He waved his 'dex (he was certainly far more used to this door system now) to show he was supposed to be where he was trying to go, before entering through the door with a grin.

"'Ey up? Grunt Clancy Lucan, Codename Eel, reportin' in to assist?"  

[TawnyAngel]

Unfortunately Frost expected to meet exactly the same person he had met in the submarine, though perhaps those cramped unpleasant quarters had made him less tolerant than usual. When the grunt approached and greeted him however any hope of that vanished.

Frost gave a reptilian blink, his lips set in a thin flat line that a ruler would have envied. "'Ey up'? Am I to assume that you meant 'good afternoon Agent'?" Just as he'd shaken off that headache too. "But in any case, come," Frost continued, turning away and motioning for Clancy to follow him. "Today we are going to be working on one of the generators, its power output has dropped and basic maintenance has failed to resolve the issue."  

[Gwennythe]

"Yeah, sure- afternoon, mornin', the lot," Clancy grinned, despite the 'Frosty' (sorry) welcome "but 'ow can y' bloody tell down 'ere, eh? It's almost like bein' on the submarine still, just with more room. Least that 'eadache's gone, though, eh? Same f'r yours?"

The redhead perked up, following Frost while he talked.
"So. Gennie's flatlined a wee bit, eh?" He looked interested, and felt somewhat hopeful. Frost seemed fairly much the same, but perhaps this was some big test. He sucked on his bottom lip for a moment.
"Ain't a Rotawotsit or doodlebug thingummy inside it, 's there? I heard there were some gurt ol' issues with 'em buggers before?"  

[TawnyAngel]

It took a few moments to mentally translate everything the grunt had just said into English; when he finished Frost raised his eyebrows. "By means of a watch, naturally, and I believe you mean a Rotom. If there were a rogue pokemon on base our security systems ought to have detected it, however I am not discounting such a possibility until I've taken a look; that little palaver with the Joltik when the base first opens goes to show that our systems are not foolproof."

The headaches though, the headaches. Unexplained, clearly caused by the artifact but how had they been caused and why had his faded? Frost nodded to Clancy as they headed down the stairs. "In answer to your question however yes, it has. What are your thoughts on the matter?" Clearly the man had thoughts, it was just unfortunate that he articulated them with slightly less skill than an average person two thirds of the way down a bottle of vodka.  

[Gwennythe]

"Haha! 'With a watch'; I knew you had a bloody sense o' humour!" Clancy exclaimed appreciatively, apparently taking the remark to be a joke. "Aye, that's them things. Rottens. Yeah, that's that other thing! Joltix... Watchyer thinking if it's one o' them buggers? D'ya want me to get m' Pikachu out; maybe he can, I dunno, zap the energy outa them or summat, right?" He was an alright engineer, but a terrible pokemon strategist...

"Hum. I'm glad you asked!" The red-head raised his eyebrows. "I reckon, you see, that's it was some kinda bloody radiation thing! And I also reckon that we're all bloody lucky we ain't dealing with our hair fallin' out or us collapsin' dead like an ex-parrot! 'Course, it could still 'appen, but I'm just bloody glad the headache's buggered off right now."  

[TawnyAngel]

"Humm, yes, it seems that nobody has shuffled off their mortal coil as yet." Dima had loved those movies and he had not been averse himself, some of the humour was clever and the puns diverting. "I don't think that brain scans would be a waste of time however, effects could be delayed."

As for the rest... oh the rest. Perhaps it was better not answered, he didn't know where to begin unravelling the man's train of thought in order to correct it. Hopefully he was as decent an engineer as reputed to make up for his... his... mmh, his personality.

"I hope that 'zapping' will not be required, however should we run into trouble it would be of use to know what else you have at your disposal," Frost said after a slight pause.  

[Gwennythe]

Clancy pulled a face at the suggestion of having a brain scan; sure, it would probably end up being required or something, knowing his luck, but he just really didn't like the idea of anything messing around with his brain, even if it was 'just looking' or 'for medical reasons'.
"Bloody hope not. Don't trust 'em brain-scoopin' machines."
He liked mechanics, the physical engineering of things like pipes, but he'd never enjoyed the idea of the human body being much the same as an engineering project.

"Oh, sure, sure!" The redhead brightened up considerably about being asked about his team, and nodded agreement that zapping hopefully wouldn't be required.
"Aside from me 'lectric rat, I got a bitey-fish and one of them bloody 'whopply' things; y'know, them ground-water wotsits."  

[TawnyAngel]

Frost blinked again. "Brain... scoop... I think you are misinformed about how MRIs work. Severely misinformed." This man was utterly baffling, and he didn't even appear to know the names of the pokemon he trained. Good grief. "Bitey Fish," Frost echoed in tones that made glaciers seem warm by comparison. "I see."

Shaking his head slightly Frost tapped a security code in to a pad on the wall, held his dex up to a scanner beside it, and pushed open the door to the generator room. "Am I to expect a similar level of linguistic acuity in relation to our work?" he asked dryly, waiting to close the door again behind his companion.  

[Gwennythe]

"Ah, I dun really need t' know how the bloody things work though do I? Not unless I'm fixin' one, and I don't need to know jack about the science o' mind reading to run m' wires without frying somethin', eh?"

The redhead stepped through the door with a nod of confirmation as Frost echoed 'Bitey Fish'.
"Aye, she's the best of 'em." He then looked puzzled as Frost mentioned linguistic acuity.
The grunt shook his head, slowly, as he stepped in to allow the door to close.
"Nah... Nah, I don't bloomin' well think so. Ya can order me to cart stuff about, but I'm pretty bloody sure you're not allowed to ask me t' cook for you..."  

[TawnyAngel]

Frost stared at Clancy with complete incomprehension as he played the last few seconds over in his mind a few times in the hope that they would somehow begin to make sense. They did not. "How," he began deliberately, calmly, "did you get cooking from what I just said? Please." He blinked slowly, his mouth set in a neutral line. "Enlighten me. Elucidate. Explain. Did you understand at least one of those words? I do feel as though we have hit a... language barrier." Quite how this had happened he wasn't sure, in fact he wasn't entirely convinced that the grunt wasn't playing some kind of elaborate joke on him.  

[Gwennythe]

"Eh? You askin' for 'Ling-weeny avocado' or 'owever it's s'posed t' be pronounced... I ain't gonna be anyone's chef, y' know. Heck, I don't even know 'ow to bloody cook more 'n toast!" Clancy sounded almost proud of the fact and grinned, but it fell away to take on his previous puzzled expression as Frost talked about a 'language barrier' and he thought back to the words- including one that, yes, he didn't understand at all- Frost had used in entreating an explanation.
He shook his head and smiled reassuringly.
"Ah! That explains it! Don't you bloody worry mate, even if it ain't your first language, you're doin' mostly fine. Coupla words that I've never even bloody 'eard of, so maybe drop 'em, but otherwise, I'm unstandin' you alright, Agent Frosties."  

[TawnyAngel]

Frost was now beginning to question his earlier assumption that Clancy must be reasonably intelligent. He sighed. "English is my first language, the language barrier in question is not a matter of speaking a different tongue but in... proficiency. You wield English like a blunt instrument and appear to struggle with words of more than two syllables. Linguistic and acuity mean 'of or pertaining to language' and 'sharpness; acuteness; keenness'. Are we 'on the same page' now?" Frost made little air quotes as he headed over to the offending generator in order to scan the nearby readouts and check for any obvious external issues, cracks in the housing or similar.