smash_logs | BLIND DATES GROUP 2

BLIND DATES GROUP 2

What: BLIND DATES!
Who: Anyone who was sent a note with an C# &D# table numbers.
Where: Off-campus restaurant. AND BEYOND!
When: November 19th
Warnings: Who knows depending who is here.

[The second group's restaurant is Asian Fusion Dinning. The rooms looks fancy but down to earth and the menu is very varied. Still expensive, however, but you've been given a 100$ budget for eating each!

The lighting is dim, with flickering, oil candles on every table. The place is decorated in stylish black and browns, with Japanese and Chinese wallscrolls and paintings. The overhead music is traditional yet somehow futuristic Asian music, to fit with the theme. Your servers are all dressed up for the occasion, and speak broken English.

Beside each candle, there's a card. Each card has a different letter-number combination.

Find your table!

OH YEAH AND FEEL FREE TO LEAVE THE RESTAURANT AND GO ANYWHERE ELSE!]

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Oops. Falkner had been sipping water, was encountered by the appearance of a tall man with a big hand extended out to him, and stared up at him, his eyes pools of confusion. He glanced from the hand to the face. The hand, the face. Hello hand. Hello face.

...Gingerly, and with some uncertainty, he took the hand in his and shook it, then corrected his mistake. "I'm Falkner, not Hawk. ...I don't recall meeting you anywhere, either." Wait. Maybe he had seen a man like him at the school before. How could anyone forget that telltale mowhawk? Well, that didn't matter; they weren't acquainted anyway, so they were basically meeting for the first time.

Why was he here? Where was his date? He waited for this pseudo-stranger to say something more, appearing expectant.

"My name is Hawke." He corrected. The CO studied this Falkner for a moment or two, noting that the youth looked somewhat puzzled. It eventually dawned on him that this blue-haired-boy was probably wondering where his date was.

Oh, what a tragedy.

Hawke flashed the card he'd received. "Table C3?"

It was good he swallowed his sip of water already, because he feared it might have inadvertently come shooting out. Instead, his perplexity only increased. Directing his eyes to his own card, the symbols matched. He stared dubiously at the man in front of him and suddenly found he could not close his mouth.

Dryly, and with every syllable spelled out, he wanted to clarify one last time in hopes that he could possibly be mistaken. "You're. My date." His face went deadpan. But inside, he was flopping around like a pidgey with two heads.

It was almost amusing how flustered Falkner had become over the situation. Hawke, having been through this once already (without monetary compensation, at that), seemed much more nonchalant. "Don't think of it as a date. I certainly am not."

He sat down. "Think of it as conversation. The last time this happened, I had an unexpectedly tolerable chat with the guidance counselor."

And thus, Falkner settled down. Arceus only knows what sorts of reactions he would have tried to keep tethered had Hawke not spoken such consoling words- his face had already begun to heat up and the knuckle of his left hand had paled in color from balling it up against his thigh. Of course, now he could breathe a sigh of relief and loosen all the tension that had occurred in such a fleeting set of seconds.

"Sounds fair enough to me." He smiled for the first time. "So your name's Hawke, eh? Not a bad name. What position do you teach?"

Well, with that awkwardness out of the way, they could get down to...awkwardness. Hawke already knew he wasn't the best conversationalist, but hey, there was a hundred bucks in it for him, so he could at least pretend to be interested.

"I teach a course on Tactics and Strategy. What do you do?"

"Well, I'm a student, actually. I was meant to teach a class, but there was a change of plans. Aerial combat and strategy. Beyond that, I'm the gym leader of Violet City. It's in the Johto region As you might have gathered from the name of the class I would have taught, I specialize in flying types." Maybe Hawke would know what he was even talking about, maybe not. But sometimes, it was a little hard to remember that people didn't understand much about the Pokemon world. It was the only one he had grown up in, after all.

"I must admit aerial tactics aren't my specialty." He said, idly perusing the menu. "Perhaps you could show me your lesson plans sometime." Well...what would have been his lesson plans, at any rate.

Ah. So Falkner was one of those Pokemon-types. Flying types, even. Hawke almost hesitated to ask his next question, but he figured it was worth a shot. "Like Xatu?"

"I will gladly show you, if you're interested."

Falkner's smile notably enhanced one small level as the mention of Xatu hit the table. "Ah, yes, like Xatu. One of many flying-type Pokemon out there. Do you have a special interest in them?"

"I am." It could never hurt to absorb more knowledge, especially in something he wasn't quite an expert in.

Hawke admittedly liked that particular Pokemon. "You could say that. I find that particular evolutionary line rather fascinating."

"I can't blame you for that. They really are great Pokemon. I have never focused on training one myself, but I know enough about them. They are very mystic birds that are said to see the future, as well as the distant past. I wish I could so much as have a glimpse of what their visions must look like. They stand so still..."

Hawke almost answered Falkner's question, seeing as he had been a Natu very briefly, but ultimately thought better of it and kept quiet. Much of his time being a little green poofball of a bird was spent trying to move pencils with his mind, to little success.

Well, if that was his inner Pokemon, he really couldn't complain.

"It's slightly unnerving, really."

"Unnerving?" He pondered that very quickly. "Well, maybe. But they're seeing something so incomprehensible that their behavior almost halts to a standstill. Maybe I should be thankful I don't see the future like they do."

Not having trained one, Falkner tried coming up with instances where he had shared experiences with Xatu. There weren't many, since nobody at his gym trained any, and none sparkled out to him. Xatu's style was different than his own, and his dad never had one as... far as he knew. Oh! He should ask. Falkner was almost tempted to call him right then and there but his dad was notorious for not answering calls. It must come with being so busy all the time! Well it sure wasn't because calling your dad in the middle of a date is weird or anything, Falkner. At least, in the end, he didn't reach for his Pokegear.

Natu were more common. They were the pre-evolved form of Xatu, and the Ruins of Alph nearby were littered with flocks of them. "I'm more accustomed to seeing Natu than Xatu. They don't stand so rigidly, so my best assumption is that they haven't fully developed their psychic intuition yet. They aren't very good at flying, so they mostly take to hopping." Unnerving... Falkner could actually agree, as much as he liked Natu otherwise. "You... can't sneak up on them, though. They will already know you're coming, so you have to wait for them to come to you.

"But... once they spot you, they won't stop staring until you make a move." Whether he meant to or not, Falkner's eyes did not waver from Hawke's, like he was copying Natu's profound stare.

When Hawke was a Natu, he didn't get to see the future at all and it was totally unfair. Maybe it was a Xatu thing. That also wasn't fair. Why hadn't he turned into a Xatu? It wasn't like he was a little kid.

Man.

"There was a Xatu here, if I recall. Before you arrived. He more-or-less fit that description."

"Is that so?" He rested his elbows on the table and folded his hands together to rest his chin upon. "A shame I could not have the pleasure of meeting him... I would have loved to have spoken with him. Were you well-acquainted?"

"I mostly knew him through Lash." He said, shrugging and trying to recall this mysterious Xatu creative writing teacher. "They were good friends. He taught an English class, if I remember correctly."

"Lash is the girl who hatched that Skarmory, isn't she? And caught Zapdos..." A faint longing breathed through his tone. Admittedly, he was a little envious of her position. While she sounded completely foolish when talking about training Pokemon, it appeared to someone like Falkner that she had some kind of rare knack for bird Pokemon without even trying, one that he would sacrifice much to have.

Not that he would ever admit hers was better than his. He was his father's son! Nobody could understand the hearts of birds better than anyone that came from his family! She just happened to have a headstart...

Hawke shook his head. "She hasn't caught Zapdos. I believe they have some sort of accord, yes, but there was no capture involved."

Falkner was a gym leader. The CO could easily see that Lash's training Zapdos was more than likely a threat to him.

"She lost her first gym battle."

"Ah." It made sense to him now. His folded hands briskly descended from his chin to the table. Lash hadn't managed to catch Zapdos after all, but the fact that she was able to contract such workable terms with him still remained. That called for hooking Zapdos's trust before capture, something that sounded even more difficult than performing it the opposite route.

And yet, she still lost her first gym match. "What it sounds like to me is, while she knows how to acquire a Pokemon's trust and respect, she still lacks the experience needed to earn a gym badge. Which gym did she challenge, if I may ask?"

It took Hawke a moment to remember. All this Pokemon business seemed to blur together, after all.

"She tried for the...Boulder Badge, I think it was called. Sort of unimpressive boy with the squint and the rock-creatures. He flattened her."

Even more curtains were pulled away from his understanding of Lash's circumstances. Falkner was quick to point out, "Flying-types have a weakness to rock-types, so... that makes a win with Brock all the more difficult to achieve..." Which also meant that it was too soon to judge her capabilities as a prodigal trainer. Brock totally didn't count. Rock slide is cheating.

Falkner continued to reason out the situation, because he was engaged and didn't want to stop thinking about it. "Many rock-types are also ground-type, so that would make it even more difficult for her and Zapdos. Its electric attacks wouldn't stand a chance." He folded his arms and nodded sagely at that statement. "If she used her Skarmory, she may have more leverage against him, but that Skarmory is young and in need of more training. It isn't ready to defeat strong opponents without a stroke of luck yet."

Hawke probably didn't care, Falkner. Stop while you're ahead.

ON THE CONTRARY. Hawke totally cared. The more he knew about Pokemon, the more he could understand and figure out how to HARNESS THEIR POWER FOR THE GLORY OF BLACK HOLE.

Or at least be able to pay attention when Lash rambled on about Zapdos.

"Actually, he refused to give her the badge when she used illegal items. Though I'm not sure why he even bothered to disqualify her when he flattened her anyway. Perhaps to set a precedent."

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

BLIND DATES GROUP 2

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suddenly he's holding a pidgey (no)

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