smash_logs | Planted it once

Entry tags:

Planted it once

Who: Char, Vinnie
What: SECRETIVE SECRETS
Where: The forest
When: Futuredated to April 22
Warnings: Char. Vinnie. Do I even need to.

March. He'd owed it to Naoto's cunning (and Persona, too); with that extra bit of backup, Char no longer had to deal with unwelcome company mucking up his territory. There was no more worry about anything inflicting another chemical burn on Rasputin.

When that creature had fallen, though, its toxic taint had lingered. The place it had once made its home was now an ugly bare patch in the middle of the forest, an expanse of scorched earth sticking out like a scar in the middle of all that greenery. Char never really had cared a lot about that hippie bullshit, and it wasn't like he was particularly attached to the forest itself, anyway -- this was, after all, the same forest he'd set ablaze a couple years ago. Any other time, he probably would have just left it be.

March, however, had been a month that left a lot of things on Char's mind. He wasn't sure exactly where the idea had sprouted from, or why he'd actually decided to go through with it. It seemed incredibly out of his scope. Maybe he was just trying to prove something to himself. Prove he really was capable of it. He'd quietly gathered up the things he needed, and stupid though the entire thing was, he'd quickly become a regular back at that little pocket wasteland.

March passed, and April plodded by. Char had kept up the typical Charizard tenacity all throughout, endeavouring in secret over his little pet project.

In the end... he had nothing to show for it.

Should have known. He really hadn't been capable of it after all. He couldn't do it alone. So... what now?

He'd waffled on it for days, but finally, he resigned himself. On the morning of the 22nd, Char went to the last place he'd ever thought he'd set foot: looking thoroughly uncomfortable and on-edge, Char intruded into the school greenhouse.

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Vinnie, in the meantime, was in the very back of the greenhouse with plans of his own this day. He was focused on digging up something from one of the earthen plots on the ground, using what looked like a mechanical boat oar with its paddle end in the shape of a shovel.

Thanks to the pair of headphones over his ears, he neither heard the door open, nor the sound of footsteps walking in. It'd been so long since he had been introduced to any new music outside of the pop stylings of Justin Biever that the Venusaur had been holding onto Sonny's discman and Bulba's borrowed CDs a bit longer than he needed to. This was just good music to work to, he found. Stimulating, without being distracting.

He'd planted the bauble in question weeks ago, and Vinnie was very much hoping that there would be something to show for this experiment. Even if he was flat broke, he wanted his family to have a present that was at least somewhat respectable. Couldn't gift them Berries every year, after all.

Edited 2012-04-19 00:35 (UTC)

This wasn't sitting right with Char to begin with. Every single part of him was just screaming to trash this incredibly stupid plan and get the hell outta here. This bothered him a lot more than it should, and Vinnie, by association, did too. When he finally found the guy he was looking for, it was just heralded with a huge stab of irritation. That irritation only grew when he snapped his fingers to get Vinnie's attention, and absolutely nothing happened. What, was he too good for... oh, wait. Earbuds. He was listening to... well, given the ancient-ass piece of cutting-edge 90s technology he had with him, Char could only guess it must be the Backstreet Boys.

Char wasn't in the mood to wait around for Vinnie to finish up with his incredibly stupid-looking shovel and notice he had company. He briefly considered an Air Slash, but as satisfying as that would have been, he was here for a reason other than picking fights. Still, Vinnie, let's hope you notice the safety orange stepping into your peripheral vision, because his mood was only worsening with each passing second. "Hey!" he snapped.

The Charizard-hued intrusion definitely did not go unnoticed - a Fire Type anywhere near the greenhouse was already a threat, but for Char to just waltz in and demand his attention put Vinnie on high alert. It'd been almost a month since he had wet his claws in Marie's blood, but the memories were still too fresh in his mind for him to think that Char was here for any reason other than a fight.

His eyes went wide, and every fibre of the Venusaur switched to the defensive. On reflex, toxic bile was already beginning to rise in his throat as Vinnie drew his shovel out of the soil and brandished it like some kind of weapon. Too long to be a sword and too short to be a spear - a naginata, if anything. As ungainly as it looked, the thing was surprisingly lightweight in his hands and shifted back into its oar form with a fluid twist of the handle.

Through bared teeth, Vinnie all but spat, "Get the fuck out've the greenhouse." He cared not a whit that their last fight taxed his body to the point of illness - if Char was threatening these plants in any way, he was not going to hesitate taking him out.

Wow. Great idea. Char actually would have liked nothing better than to take that suggestion right there. It seemed really pertinent to just reiterate, again, that this was tremendously stupid and he was an idiot for even coming out here in the first place. He was gonna say it, Vinnie would say no and probably laugh at him, and all it would accomplish was a further demolishing of the sad, sorry little remains of Char's pride.

He took a step back, as if he really was going to get the fuck out, but reluctantly stopped himself there. "I got a right to be here, assfuck." If he posted to Plumbr about being driven out of a school facility just because he was a Fire Type, that social injustice would be reblogged all over before you could blink, Vinnie. Check your privilege.

"Anyway, put your stupid transformin' dildo away," he snapped, nodding at the oar. "If I was here to beat you up, I woulda just set you on fire while you were diggin' around."

Vinnie narrowed his eyes. There was a distinct lack of trust here, even if Char spoke with a semblance of reason. Drive-by cruelty was not something that was beneath the Charizard, so there had to be a specific motivation at hand. He wanted to be here for some reason.

(If that Pumblr post came with a list of all the school facilities that Char had also reduced to cinders, the public outcry would be diminished somewhat.)

The oar was lowered, but its tip remained pointing in the Fire Type's direction. There was no less venom in the Venusaur's expression, no less fire. A snarl twitched at the edge of his lips as he growled, "Then get t'the fuckin' point. Whadya want."

Edited 2012-04-19 04:29 (UTC)

"Reduced to cinders" is total overaggeration, okay. They were slightly singed at best.

Anyway, looked like there wasn't going to be any dancing around the subject. At first, Vinnie was greeted only by silence. Char crossed his arms, tense fingers clenching around the fabric of his sleeves. He... didn't want to do this. He had staunchly refused to ever lower his guard around his rivals. While he and Sasha had both nurtured up the Route 10 Charizards, he didn't see it as working together in the least -- they, after all, tended to argue every step of the way whether it was better to enforce their solitary instincts and attune them to the wild or push them to get along like Charmanders and adopt the civilized discipline of the dojo. Char neither wanted nor sought her help -- hell, anyone's help.

He was, after all, a Charizard. Pride was the one thing they valued most. They perservered in the face of a challenge. They didn't go crawling to someone else with their tail between their legs; they accomplished things on their own strength. His place in the hierarchy had already been yanked out from under his feet during last month's little Max misadventure. He'd been trying to ignore it as much as he could, but to actually willingly surrender meant accepting some very uncomfortable things as cold, indelible fact. There were things he desperately wanted to hold onto, and the thought of letting them go on such a pathetic note filled him with a bitter self-loathing more disgusted and condescending than it had been since his Kerosene years. This was what that oh-so-independent Charizard amounted to, was it?

The fact that Vinnie likely wouldn't understand the depth of the gesture didn't do much to make it any less humiliating. The first sign, unsurprisingly, was his tail: it dropped down to the dirt with a soft tap -- not the vicious whipping that accompanied his more agitated moods, more like the entire appendage simply went limp. The flame itself scaled itself back a little, dropping down to something smaller and stiller. Finally, with an air of bleak finality, Char bowed his head, exposing his horns to Vinnie.

"I need help."

There was a sinking suspicion in the Venusaur's mind that he, at some point, must have been transported to Bizarro-land. Vinnie shifted from animosity to just staring openly - no, he was gaping. His mouth might have even hung open a bit, without him realizing.

The finer details of Charizard body language might have escaped him, but he had never seen Char bow his head like that to anyone - not even Green. Nor had he ever heard him sound so... defeated? No, that wasn't the right term. Even after the match that stripped them of their championship title, Char still snapped and seethed for all he was worth. But this, it was like someone smothered out all the fire from him - and it boggled Vinnie's mind how that would even be possible. He couldn't picture anything on earth being enough to subdue the Charizard's dickish temperament.

If Char had asked for help in any other way, Vinnie's first reaction would've been to bite back. Kick some sand in his face in return for the endless jabs he'd received from the dickbag. But this was just too weird for him to register as real, much less for him to step back into his usual role in their rivalry.

Unconsciously, he took a step backwards, as though this surreal submissive behaviour might have been contagious. Held his weapon a little closer to his chest, maybe. It took considerable effort for Vinnie to pull enough coherence for a single word.

"...What?"

Char, honestly, had been expecting to be laughed out of the greenhouse. He may not have been aware that the marks he'd left on Marie wouldn't be going away, but he did know that Vinnie wasn't likely to have forgotten their last encounter. If there had been anyone else he could have turned to, then he would have in a heartbeat; shelving his pride was difficult enough to begin with, but to do it in front of his rival half-expecting it to have been futile was ten times as painful. But Erika had already left the school, so the ones putting in the time running the place were Vinnie and Bulba; it may have been a cruel twist of fate, but this was the only option he could see.

He kept his submissive posture, though he lifted his head a fraction of an inch -- enough to look up at the taller Venusaur. "Don't make me say it twice," he said quietly, almost pleadingly. He'd already taken the plunge, and he knew full well there was no taking it back; tempting as it was to ditch the whole idea and leave this situation behind, it would have just meant he'd bowed down for nothing. Still, dragging it out like this was agonizing. He'd almost welcome getting shot down over waiting for it like this.

Oh god, now Char was looking at him. That just made things twice as unnerving now.

Vinnie was starting to get agitated by the whole scenario - the idea of Char pleading at all was more abhorrent to him than the idea of actually having to lend him assistance. He swallowed, forcing the bitter taste in his mouth back into his stomach as he loosened the grip around the hi-tech oar.

"I don't--" want to hear it twice? Ever again? Hrm. Vinnie cut himself off with a grimace, biting down on his words. After a second, he tried again. His voice was on edge, but it was still frustration born of bewilderment. "Just tell me what the hell y'need me for."

You know, out of every other possible person in the entire school, or world for that matter. Why wasn't he asking Bulba?

A very reasonable question, but not an easy one to answer. Char was an extremely private person by nature; he would have balked at sharing what he'd been up to even if it hadn't been anything special. This particular project was one tied to something immensely personal, something significant enough that he wasn't sure he had it in him to bare that corner of his heart to the likes of Vinnie.

Even if he wasn't willing to let his reasons show, they were also significant enough that he'd let go of his pride. The "why" of it may have been off-limits, but if he was gonna see this through, he had to say something,at least. Char averted his gaze again, hoping to hide the embarrassment creeping into his expression.

"I got somethin' I need to grow. S'obvious an amateur can't do it, and you're the closest thing this place's got to an expert."

Vinnie raised a brow. Well, now the obvious question had to be asked: "That's what you've got Bulba for, isn't it?"

There was no way that Char was so out of touch with his little brother than he was going to resort to asking a rival for help instead. From what brief glimpses he had, it felt as though the Charizard had actually made some progress on that front. So why this, suddenly?

The Venusaur couldn't deny there was some small part of him that was intrigued, though: what kind of plant did a Fire Type want help with growing?

"Don't you think I woulda gone to him instead if that was an option?"

That explained absolutely nothing, but it was apparently all the explanation Char was willing to give. His relationship with his team fell very much under his "share nothing personal with anyone" clause, Vinnie, so sorry.

Ugh. Vinnie rolled his eyes. It only took a flick of his wrist to retract the oar into a a much more compact form, which he tucked away despite his better judgment.

"You're gonna have t'tell me a bit more 'bout your freakin' vague-as-hell gardenin' request." There was an understandable air of incredulity that came with the statement. Giving Char an annoyed, half-lidded glare, he grit his teeth and added, "This isn't exactly a lot t'go on."

"It's a bunch of dirt, I need shit to grow in it, and shit ain't growin'. What the hell else do you need to know?" Char snapped. He might have bowed down to Vinnie, but tact still was definitely not something he was good at.

Still, getting snippy might have worked well for picking fights, but this was a situation where Char was in the unfortunate position of having to mind his manners. Char backed up a pace and tried again. "...How about I just show you?"

Vinnie raised a brow as he removed the ear buds and wrapped the cord around the discman. Mentally, he tallied up the bits and pieces of information that he was getting out of the Charizard: this was a job that Bulba couldn't help with, for whatever reason, and covered some expanse of land that couldn't simply be brought to the greenhouse. He doubted that it was a plant requiring such expertise that only a Venusaur could handle - Vinnie's powers as a Grass Type had been severely diminished, worse off than an Ivysaur, and they both knew it. So what could it possibly be? Something dangerous? Or something he simply couldn't let Bulba know about...

"Fine," he snipped. The CD Player was tucked safely away with the rest of the Greenhouse bookkeeping, and Vinnie brought out a pair of worn, green gardening gloves - a present from Erika some Christmases ago.

There was enough curiosity here that it sheathed his resentment enough to go along with this - or maybe it was curiosity born of resentment? Vinnie slipped the gloves on and kicked some dirt back into the unfinished hole he was digging, for whatever good it would do.

"Get on with it, then. I'll guess it's a big job."

"Yeah, y'could say that." Char, apparently, was done talking; he turned and walked out of the greenhouse, simply assuming Vinnie would follow.

Reaching the place took only a matter of minutes by air, but that wasn't an option; the only way Vinnie was ever getting a ride off of Char was if he happened to learn Sky Drop. That meant a bit of a hike through the forest -- one spent in silence. Char was in no mood for small talk; even if Vinnie hadn't outright rejected him, the humiliation of presenting his horns to a rival was still hanging over him. It was only going to get worse from this point on, too; Char'd had some low, desperate moments, but this might have been the first time he'd genuinely surrendered without a fight.

A few telltale signs dotted their path; even if the bodies of the creatures that monster'd killed were gone, there was still the occasional bare patch or corroded husk of a tree where its poison had left its mark. The damage was relatively minor overall, though, until they arrived at their destination. Char drew to a halt at the end of the trees, letting Vinnie observe for himself what lay ahead: a patch of bare earth almost the length of a football field, where the poison had reduced a chunk of the forest to nothing but scorched earth. The results of Char's own efforts studded the contaminted ground: a pathetic scattering of bare, skeletal saplings and limp brown ghosts of sprouts.

Char said nothing, head down and face burning in shame. This lifeless mess spoke for itself; putting his failure on display like this was hard enough without pointing out what was already incredibly obvious.

The lack of conversation didn't bother Vinnie in the slightest. In fact, he was thankful for it. That made this whole surreal experience less of an awkward team up and more straight cut, no-nonsense professionalism. The Venusaur didn't have to think about how much he resented the guy in question, he just had to focus on... well, being a Venusaur. No grey lines. No loyalties. Just something that needed growing.

The trail of corrosion that they seemed to be following was a subject of worry though, even for a Poison Type. Vinnie knew all too well how the corruption of his toxic nature worked, even if he wasn't himself affected by it. When they finally arrived at the field in question, however, he was shocked to find it far larger than he had expected. A big job, definitely. It broke his heart a little to look at it.

But grief could come later. Vinnie hadn't been called here to mourn the land, he was here to reclaim it. What good was he as a Grass Type if he couldn't do that? To his credit, perhaps, he barely spared a thought or a glance for Char's shame and went straight to work. There was a pop! as he shifted to Pokemon form - it was much easier to get a feel for his environment when he wasn't wearing a human shell - and walked into this no man's land of desolation.

He could feel the corrosion of the earth against his feet, he could smell the dead soil. There was almost no life for his flower to pick up at all - everything had been burned away by the contamination. With barely any nutrients left, it was no wonder that all these attempts at reforesting had failed.

The assessment didn't take very long, but before he was done, the Venusaur bowed his head for all the withered saplings in an unspoken prayer. Your lives were short, but not in vain. That done, he lumbered over to the Charizard's side.

"It's not impossible... but it'll take a lot've work t'get anything t'grow here," Vinnie warned him. "I'm gonna need a lot more compost than I got, 'mong other things."

Part of being Char, apparently, meant making things unnecessarily difficult with stupid petty conflicting lose/lose bullshit. He wasn't sure if Vinnie's complete lack of notice towards his humiliation was a relief or somehow made this whole thing even more crushing to his pride. Maybe part of him felt he deserved to be mocked for failing this badly. Maybe he was quick to jump to the thought that this was more of that stinging "this rivalry isn't even worth my attention anymore" Red Team mentality. Then again... if that was what it was, then that was only the reasonable reaction on Vinnie's part, wasn't it? Wasn't much of a rivalry if one of the parties in question had admitted the other's superiority.

Maybe he was just making himself miserable for the sake of being miserable. Whatever, not wasting time thinking about it. Vinnie... actually seemed to be okay with this. Char had kind of hoped that the Venusaur wouldn't be able to ignore whatever hippie-Pocahontas-bullshit instincts this dead-ass mess stirred up in him once he laid eyes on it for himself, and judging by Vinnie's answer, it had worked.

Still tense, still kinda busy hating himself for doing this in the first place, he kept his gaze glued submissively to the ground in front of him. "Just tell me what needs doin', and I'll make it happen." Not quite a thank you, but expecting thanks from Char was a bit like expecting a Hyper Beam from a Magikarp -- he doubted that Vinnie was holding his breath for that to ever happen.

Okay, there was only so much Vinnie could take of this. Whoever thought that not being on fire would be so annoying? At this point, he was certain that reseeding the entire forest was favourable to bossing around a lifeless Charizard. The Venusaur's ears were already pointed backwards, twitching in agitation, and he sat his warty rear down on the ground with an unimpressed grunt.

"Al'right. First you can pick your damn eyeballs off the ground," he growled, baring his crooked, studded fangs. "You really think you can grow anything here when you're the most lifeless thing in this whole forest?"

Char thought he'd more or less figured out what to expect from all this, and had steeled himself accordingly.

He definitely hadn't steeled himself for this response, though. Oh, for fuck's sake... Char's stare flicked up toward the Venusaur for a second, a little ripple of annoyance putting some movement into that limp tail. Char couldn't begin to imagine what would possibly inspire Vinnie to tell Char to actually be less docile. Okay, it was obvious that he couldn't have been more ignorant as to what the presenting of Char's horns had meant, but even barring that, wasn't this the same guy who'd gone all high-and-mighty on him about it being time to ~grow up~ and ~quit the fighting~?

"Fuckin' hell, you're hard to please," Char muttered, keeping his stare glued stubbornly earthward. His reply had more in common with resigned grumbling than the usual heated snapping, but at least the familiar note of eye-rolling irritation was still there. All the pride-stomping in the world, apparently, would not be enough to make Char stop being pissed off by Vinnie. "I pick fights, you bitch. I play nice, you still bitch? This is exactly what you want, ain't it?"

Vinnie bristled at this gross misunderstanding, twitching some more. He should've figured that this was some bizarre Fire Type reasoning that propelled Char to act so freakishly submissive - but it was no logic that he subscribed to. It wasn't that the Venusaur lacked pride, but it took an entirely different shape. Different standards and virtues. To Vinnie, what he gleaned of the wild Charizard mindset seemed lonely and pitiful and angry more than anything else, capable of cultivating nothing.

"Yeah, I got a problem when you run around pullin' shit cuz you don't know what the fuck else t'do. But you've got somethin' you actually have t'accomplish here, don't you? You want t'grow something!" As incredulous as the Venusaur sounded, he spoke as though it as something to be proud of. You know, setting apart the fact that he needed someone else's help to do it. "So where the fuck's your resolve?"

Oh, okay, here we go. This was what Char had steeled himself for: lecturing. Vinnie's reply did at least earn him eye contact, but it was a flat, apathetic stare. Yeah, uh-huh. A big sparkling disappointment when he's burning, a big sparkling disappointment when he isn't. What an absolutely novel plot twist.

"D'you really think I'd have asked anyone for help if I didn't wanna see this through?" Let alone you-- unspoken, but very clearly implied. Finer points of Charizard psychology aside, it must have been clear that this was not a situation Char subjected himself to lightly. "I didn't ask for a life coach, Vinnie, I asked for a gardener. If you're gonna do this Venusaur-knows-best shit again, at least tell me what I should be doin' to this fuckin' dirt pile while you preach."

The Venusaur rolled his eyes. Of course even submissive Char wouldn't give a crap about admonishment - even when it basically summed up to 'you're freaking me out, go back to acting normal.' It didn't really matter, in the end - Vinnie's main concern had nothing to do with the Charizard's attitude right now.

"Gardening's just another kind've life coach," he said, trying to ease himself into feeling less on edge. "If y'want me to preach about dirt instead, that's fine with me."

He stood up on all fours and padded around to face the wasteland. "There's barely any life left in the ground here. Poison's killed it, obviously. That's what the compost's gotta put back in the soil. Problem is, it's slow t'make and the bought stuff's usually pretty shit.

"Even if we used all've the stuff from the greenhouse, it probably wouldn't cover half've this field - and Bulba'd probably miss it. If you wanted this place seeded, it's not gonna happen until the soil's been treated."

Tough luck, Vinnie. It's a lot easier for Char to assume he was simply falling under high-and-mighty expectations than deal with the weird thought that they might give a crap about each other, annoyed and backhanded though that crap might be. He was very much used to his hot-headed ways being frowned on; it really didn't occur to him that anyone'd prefer him that way, especially considering how long he'd let that dad-lecture of forever ago simmer away in the back of his head.

Anyway, it's even easier to just talk about dirt instead of all that noise. No big surprise that Char knew absolutely nothing about gardening; he might have plenty of experience with nature, but that was with nature that was already there. He hadn't had a clue why all his efforts had failed to flourish; as obvious as it sounded now, it hadn't occurred to him that something like dirt could be regarded as alive. As... anything but dirt, actually, to be honest. He scratched under one of his horns, sullen look fading to vague bemusement.

"The sooner this place is growin', the better." Char hadn't expected this to be a one-off job, but he'd much rather not spend months working with Vinnie on anything. "Still... guess it ain't like I can force it," he admitted. How long we lookin' at to make enough stuff for all this?"

"You wanna make compost from scratch, well... smalll amounts can take a few months. But enough for this? Usual practice puts it as a year. A full seasonal cycle t'return to the earth after death."

But Vinnie was willing to bet his last two leaves that anything longer than a few weeks was already out of Char's parameters. He absently padded his feet against the earth in thought - if mass production compost was out of the picture, what places would already have amassed enough for them to use?

After a pause, he glanced back at the Charizard. "Might be that we can get some off some local farms, or garden depots, or recycling plants. Probably won't be cheap though."

Edited 2012-04-29 08:51 (UTC)

Yeah, a year was definitely way out of the question. The alternative did not seem to be dazzlingly appealing either, though. Paying? For dirt? This was a thing humans actually did? Arceus almighty. No wonder dragons of old used to just set fire to thatched-roof cottages and take what they wanted.

This could also present a bit of a problem, depending how pricy it got. Char wasn't averse to hard work, but a job... Char had one boss and one boss alone. A sentiment both he and Green shared; he definitely hadn't forgotten the shock of that sudden horn-grab in front of Max. Still, there were other avenues of income, right? He still remembered how well that little plunge into the illegal fighting ring had paid in his Charmeleon days, and that had just been a one-off misadventure.

Well, there was always a way. He'd work something out. Char hadn't gone to the trouble of turning to Vinnie just to give up at the first roadblock. His tail hit the ground, kicking up a little puff of dust. "If that's what's gotta be done, I'll get it done. Am I gonna need anything else, or is it just compost for now?"

"Manure an' mulch too, but that's easy enough." There was a steady supply of that to the school, especially with the new agriculture class - but even if they ran low, plenty of garden stores carried it. Compost just happened to be a much more delicate balance - it was the very essence of death, after all. Hell, it was almost a spiritual thing.

Vinnie shifted back to human form in order to pull out one of Char's withered attempts from the ground. It was such delicate plant, and introduced to the harshness of the soil too quickly. Far too young to retake the contaminated earth. "The sprouts are gonna have t'get started in one've the seed beds in the greenhouse, so that can still be done. They'll get transplanted here once they're strong enough t'take it."

Rolling the dry husk in his hands, the Venusaur eyed its roots, its lifeless stem. Pretty hard to tell what it should've been from this poor thing. "What kind've plant were you goin' for here?" he wondered out loud.

"Anemone." Char looked away when he answered, feigning disinterest. "Most've 'em are berry plants, though. Pecha, Mago, Leppa... was lookin' for an Occa or Custap to plant, but they ain't too common around here. The saplings're just regular apples, nothin' special." He was a little reluctant to go listing off what he'd gathered, but... well, c'mon. Common sense. He couldn't exactly grow a field's worth of this kinda stuff without Vinnie knowing what they were.

He glanced back over to Vinnie, the hand that'd been scratching under his horn out of confusion now looking a lot more nervous than thoughtful. "It's cool if you start 'em in the greenhouse or whatever, I don't give a shit. Just... think there's a way to keep anyone else from knowin' about 'em?"

Vinnie raised a brow at the mention of the flower, but didn't comment on the reasoning behind the choice of extremely sweet Berries and delicate pink blossoms - the exact same he'd seen Bulba tending to in his personal time.

"If you're gunnin' for anemone, some've them take this kinda soil better than others. They usually prefer loam - Berries, too - but they can tough it out," he told the Charizard as he bent down to pull out a few more tragic sprouts from the ground. Once he had gathered a handful, the Venusaur set them aside in a small pile and glanced at the Fire Type. "Help me pull out the rest've these an' they can get added t'the school compost." That was easy enough for him to not screw up, right?

Char's request, however, was pointedly unanswered. At this point, it wasn't hard to figure out the Why - but the Grass Type had his brows furrowed in contemplation as he wondered if it was just better to go on pretending he hadn't figured it out. After all, agreeing to do all this meant putting aside the divisive nature of their teams and focusing on his job as a Venusaur. Bringing up Bulba, even as a passing remark, seemed counterproductive to that. At the same time, however, keeping anything secret in the greenhouse very much concerned Bulba - they were both technically its caretakers. And the size of this secret would be considerable.

Edited 2012-04-29 11:40 (UTC)

He didn't know what to make of his request going unanswered. With Bulba so secretive on the nature of his relationship with Vinnie, it was hard to tell how much was rooted in fact and how much was just Char's insecure not-good-enough-you're-gonna-be-replaced paranoia. If they spent a bunch of time in the greenhouse together, this was probably a topic that'd come up at some point or another, right? Still, Char had no intentions of saying it out loud -- putting it out in the open was just giving other people something to aim at. At least if he held his silence, he could pretend that Vinnie was still in the dark.

...Wasn't like him to be so indirect, though, was it?

He wasn't sure whether to take it as a sign things would be okay or be unnerved by it, so for lack of a better idea, he busied himself following Vinnie's order. It wasn't all that hard to rip out the remnants of his failed solo attempt -- none of the roots had anchored fast enough to put up much resistance, and destroying, at least, was one thing a Charizard was good at.

The uprooting didn't take long at all, but the verbal silence did give him some space to think. That, and being busy with something always made it easier to say whatever was on his mind. The fact was, he assumed that Bulba preferred to keep their friendship out of any sort of spotlight for his own sake - it wouldn't do much for his team's image if Green's starter was fraternizing with the enemy. It wasn't as though Vinnie could possibly be hated more than he already was anyway (right?), so he didn't exactly care about his standing with the Ivysaur's teammates getting worse.

Bulba never disclosed details of his relationship with teammates, beyond a feeling of longing whenever they were gone. It was roughly the same on Vinnie's end, as well. They were Saurs. The fact of their team allegiances really didn't come into the picture - not until recently, anyway.

It had forced some things into light. Because Vinnie had simply taken that friendship as a natural thing was just one of the factors that caused Marie's jealousy to eat him from the inside out. Perhaps the Venusaur couldn't help feeling the way he did because of his blood, but it had been some neglect on his part not to address it either. And if he didn't say something (because it was pretty obvious that Char would not), then it would go on being unsaid.

Once all the dead plants had been gathered and piled up, Vinnie dusted off his hands and turned to Char. "Bulba knows every inch've the greenhouse as well as I do. If this is stayin' a surprise for him, then the seed beds need t'be hidden somewhere else.

"We can sneak out the supplies and build it all here. Probably better for the sprouts t'get used to the forest climate if they're gonna get transplanted here in the end. If he notices anything missin', I can point fingers at the new farmin' class or somethin'. Never liked agriculture anyway."

Well, there it was. Vinnie, unsurprisingly, had figured out exactly what (or whom, to be exact) Char had decided to undertake this whole crazy idea for. Char begrudgingly had to give Vinnie credit for not addressing it beyond that brief drop of Bulba's name; he'd kind of figured it wouldn't be possible to go through with this without Vinnie eventually catching on, but there was still something kind of... embarrassing about it. He actually kinda preferred that Red Team just see him as an entirely irredeemable asshole, even if that meant holier-than-thou lectures from the lot of them about not knowing what it was like to feel alone or have obligations.

To go from that to trying to nurture up a garden for his little brother... he couldn't help but think he was making a joke of himself. Bowing down to a rival, setting aside that all-important "you can do it yourself if you try hard enough" mentality, placing this eventual gift into the hands of someone he worried was taking his place in Bulba's heart, trying to nurture up some fragile little plants like some kind of frilly-skirted Bellossom... none of it was very Charizard at all. "Stupid" really was the only adjective Char could think of for the whole thing.

It was likely just a combination of ignorance about Charizard nature and a complete lack of giving a shit about Char, but... the fact Vinnie wasn't touching the very obvious punchline did at least ease the humiliation a little bit. If it could stay secret a while longer, that was nothing but a relief to him. Char straightened up, likewise brushing the dirt from his hands. "You can leave the haulin' up to me. Won't take more than a few minutes to fly, and it ain't like it's outta the ordinary for me to be makin' trips out to my huntin' grounds."

To-the-point, professional, impersonal. Would have been fine to just leave it at that, but that mumbled little tail-end of Vinnie's reply didn't quite fit with his (not exactly complete or accurate) understanding; curiosity had him blurting without a thought. "...How come you don't like agriculture? Same thing as runnin' a greenhouse, ain't it?"

Vinnie shrugged and began to explain as he gathered up an armful of uprooted sprouts to transport back to the greenhouse. "They just rub me the wrong way. A greenhouse's for maintaining an ecosystem. Most farms're just humans sucking the land dry an' dumping chemical shit everywhere t'mass produce food. It's like the difference between the Safari Zone and an Eevee breeding mill."

But he still had to note, "I can understand why they exist, an' there's good ones. They're just not an idea I grew up accepting."

Once he was gone collecting the dead plant matter though, the conversation went back to business. Time to head back to the greenhouse - and to hope Bulba wasn't anywhere around. "I'll show you where the compost is an' we can take a bag or two've the stuff to spread around today. It'll be the easiest drop off point for any other supplies that need t'be flown in, too."

Mentally, Vinnie twitched with a small, ironic smirk on his own behalf. He had been so focused with trying to outgrow the antics of his wild Ivysaur years, and yet here he was, gears turning in his head for another secret mission on behalf of the forest. There might have even been a quiet part of him that was excited by the challenge of the surprise. It'd been a while since he could put these particular skills to use.

Char just nodded, for lack of anything worthwhile to say. It was hard for him to get worked up about the difference in what a plant was grown for -- even if he'd had a little taste of life as a Serperior, it still felt weird to personify a bunch of weeds and dirt. It was a little easier for him to get, at least, if he focused on the Safari Zone comparison Vinnie was nice enough to provide. Then it was just the difference between people growing something for the sake of seeing it thrive and prodding something along until it was molded into something convenient for them.

...Made sense for a wild Pokemon to think that, he supposed. It wasn't something that a creature who'd grown up within the safe sphere of human influence would have thought to be bothered by. If he'd dared to dwell on it further, he might have considered how odd it was to have something come out of Vinnie's mouth that was not only easily understood, but something he could agree with -- a phenomenon that'd been altogether scarce ever since they'd progressed beyond a pair of middle evolutions just trying to whomp the hell out of each other.

But only if he'd dwelled on it; Char had very quickly figured out that thinking too hard about things was a great way to make a weird situation even weirder. He was more concerned with the obvious: he didn't particularly want to be seen with Vinnie. Not just by Bulba, but by anyone at all; the two of them doing anything other than hitting each other was bound to stand out as exceptionally suspicious. "Fair enough. If anyone asks, I'm only there lookin' for Bulba. You got nothin' to do with it."

Another little twitch of his tail, and a hesitant hint of motion -- it was pure reflex to want to lead the way, to hurry up and get on with it already, but again, horns had been presented: his gut was just as quick to suggest that he should be the one walking behind Vinnie, not the other way around. Impatience won out over decorum; though he did give a look back Vinnie's direction to see if he'd be slapped back down into his place, Char headed off back down the familiar path back to the school.

Well seeing as how they were both headed to the same place, Vinnie didn't particularly care who lead the way. Instinctively it felt more comfortable to him to keep the Charizard in his sights, watching the open tail flame especially. Having a Fire Type in a blind spot behind him, where his back was completely exposed, was a bad idea on all accounts. He wasn't so self-assured that he would consciously invite that kind of vulnerability.

There was the lingering fact that despite their scuffles, Char had never aimed a cheap shot at Vinnie's scars - but that was also something he avoided dwelling on. It was an uncomfortable feeling, having to question the long-standing truths he thought he knew about his rival, and it was one that had been surfacing more often than he'd liked. His opinion had already shifted somewhat from his initial impression of the Fire Type being a pointless, thoughtless, utterly selfish bundle of spite and cruelty, though the Venusaur couldn't exactly place when it happened.

He was nowhere near forgiving, but blind resentment was harder to maintain when Char's behaviour was just so perplexing. And trying to understand it only made the lines between their expected roles even more blurred.

"That's what a drop off point is for, genius. Don't need t'be seen around each other t'get shit done." With a small snort, he added, "But I could hurl on you for realism, if you're really that worried."

As far as Vinnie saw it, the only person who would really suspect was the only person who mattered: Bulba. It was getting things past him that would be the real challenge. The compost bin was innocuous enough for simple deliveries - it was situated outside, behind the actual greenhouse and by the edge of the forest. The dense vegetation inside made it enough of a blind spot that even if the Ivysaur was in, he wouldn't notice sufficiently sneaky Charizard visit.

Once the greenhouse was close enough to be visible from the trees, Vinnie snapped at Char in hushed tones: "I'll bag the compost an' start roundin' up supplies, you stay here an' wait until 'til I'm inside before flyin' stuff back t'your Garden. Quick in an' outs. How much can you carry?"

Today was clearly a day of willpower for Char; it took a surprising amount to keep from snapping back with a hotheaded insult. It was a good spot, Char had to admit; his presence in the greenhouse would have been questionable in and of itself. This was near enough to the forest that it kept him inconspicuous, and out of the way enough that it wasn't likely to see much foot traffic anyway.

"What do you think I am, some kinda fragile fairy princess?" Okay, so he didn't quite succeed in his quest to stay civil. Points for trying, right? "I'm a Charizard. We can haul shit that weighs as much as we do across regions without battin' an eye. I can carry as much as we need. You just make sure you ain't makin' me wait too long." Boastful? Yeah, pretty much, but that inner competitiveness never quite went away; a stubborn vestige of that old prideful spirit refused to allow even the faintest possibility of looking like he might potentially be weaker than Vinnie. If he could handle hauling a human from Sinnoh to here, he could handle carrying a few things.

"...You can find your way back on your own?" He added after a while. It might not have been a huge effort to fly back to the forest's edge to guide Vinnie back to the scorched garden-to-be, but he was reluctant to go out of his way to play tour guide. Surely Vinnie could just ask a redwood for directions or listen to the mournful cries of the earth spirits or some hippie thing like that.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Planted it once

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I am sorry about lack of dialogue. u__u snap: actually the worst

snap actually not the worst

toni: actually in bed sleeping right now I hope

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