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BUDDY COP BUDDY COP

Who: Char, Samus
What: Buddy cop adventures: THE THRILLING SEQUEL. Buddy Cops vs. the Space Bees.
Where: a smidge of FDC combined with a hearty helping of Sinnoh
When: December 7/10
Warnings: He's a trash-talking fire-breathing reptile from the wrong side of the tracks. She's a deadly bounty hunting bombshell schoolteacher.

Although Char never really spoke of his Kerosene days or his former team, ever since the Aparoid War, he'd kept in touch with them. There was a tension, a forced sense of distance, still lingering between him and Aiden -- and it always would be there, he suspected -- but he remained on good terms with Adrenaline and Alkaline, the Primeape and Raichu that had once been his teammates. Although the two of them lacked fingers, they still did their best to mash their way into phone calls, emails, and incredibly unintelligible letters. One such letter had arrived only recently, accompanied by a small package.

It was a sweet gesture, really. Char had mentioned the impromptu trip to Sinnoh that had led not only to Nyx's evolution, but Green's return, and several happy celebrations ~~some of which involved liederhosen~~. Although they'd never been, they'd picked up on a Sinnoh trend, their letter explained (in large, crude letters), so they'd ordered some sweet-smelling honey from Sinnoh. Apparently, trainers there were in the habit of putting it on trees, and all sorts of Pokemon went absolutely nuts over the taste of it. Aiden's merry little household had fallen in love with the stuff, and their most recent acquisition was a new extra-special royal variety that came from a secluded place near Floaroma, and that stuff was alleged to be the best honey around. They'd decided to pass a small jar onto Kerosene, to remind him of his good times in Sinnoh.

Definitely a sweet gesture. But... it wasn't that he didn't like sweet stuff, but he really didn't know what to make of it. What was a guy like him going to do with honey? For lack of any better idea, he'd eventually settled on "annoy people with it", so he slouched his merry way into the school, jar in his pocket. His original plan had been to go dump some on chairs or in textbooks or on heads, but when he happened to notice the door to Biomech's room juuuust slightly ajar, the temptation was too great to overcome. Naturally, he stuck his head into the room. "Knock knock, Biomech."

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With winter break quickly approaching, Samus had as of late become more engrossed in filing away the seemingly never-ending stack of paperwork that came with being part of this faculty. Slightly frustrating, especially when she had a bike to finish modifying back home and a race against Captain SmugFaceConfidentSmugFace to eventually win, holiday plans aside [or current lack thereof]. Her thoughts were admittedly elsewhere, not noticing she hadn't closed her classroom door completely.

Naturally, a visitor approached. Naturally, it had to be, "...Char." She didn't even lift her head.

"Don't get too excited there, sweetheart." As warm a reception as ever. Not that Char seemed to be particularly discouraged by Samus' lack of interest, mind you; he didn't even hesitate before sauntering in, plucking one of the lurker-chairs from the back of the room, and sliding it over to her desk. Once he'd managed to arrange his wings and tail comfortably, he leaned back, far more at ease than any student disturbing a busy (and probably armed) teacher had any right being.

"Put those papers aside, Biomech. I got a little somethin' for you."

Her attention was caught the moment he grabbed one of the chairs and dragged it across the linoleum flooring with a loud, obnoxious scraping sound. Her stare was as harsh and cold as the ice frozen and splintering on the classroom window.

"..." For it was quite a disturbance he just made.

"Oh good." She was also very armed... with the usual dry sarcasm. "Homework."

That got a derisive snort of laughter out of Char. Yeah. Total keener on that biomechanical engineering.

"Better," he announced. "I got the answer to your prayers. You don't gotta spend any more cold, sleepless nights pinin' and yearnin'." Char reached into his pocket, producing the little jar like it was some kind of trophy and laying it on top of a stack of paperwork. "They say us Pokemon can't resist a little of this stuff smeared in the right place," he informed her. "I been puttin' up a real strong front against all your advances, but I thought you oughta know."

That got something between a raised eyebrow and a sneer. She eyeballed the jar as if it were containing vomit instead of, "...Honey?" His explanation went duly noted and the pen she had in her hand finally rested on the desktop.

Clearly she was humoring him and was probably only going to give him one chance to do so as she tried to make sense of what he was saying. "You're telling me that this... jar of honey... is irresistible to Pokemon."

Edited 2010-12-08 08:59 (UTC)

"It's some kinda foreign thing," he explained, as if that made the whole thing perfectly clear. "I ain't tried none yet, but that's what I hear." He shrugged -- it sounded like Addie and Alkaline had liked it, anyway, and that was good enough for him. "Anyway, that stuff's s'posed to be special. If the regular Combee stuff's irresistable, then that's s'posed to be freakin' ambrosia. It's some kinda royal... thing."

The letter, admittedly, had been kind of vague on that point, but it had said enough to get Char thinking it was fancy as heck, and fancy as heck impressed chicks. Admittedly, it probably would have been more impressive were he not just showing her it in hopes of setting up a very bad honeypot joke, but the point still stood.

After October, Samus was pretty certain she had had her fill of Pokemon bees and whatever royal honey could come out of the damn things.

Irresistible to Pokemon...

So it was entirely morbid curiosity that had her slowly reach for the jar to better inspect it, her facial expression hardly changing nor did her skeptical stare relent any off the redhead. She turned it in her hands as if it were still containing vomit instead of honey. Hot, chunky, disgusting vomit just waiting to burst out of the jar. "So if I go and slather this all over Bowser's chair, and he goes and sits in it..."

"Don't think he'll find it that irresistable," Char replied, though not without a vaguely pleased grin. Go figure that ice-cold Biomech would jump to the same first thought he did -- use it for stupid, juvenile pranks. "After he pries himself loose, he might run into a few Weedles that can't keep themselves off his ass, though."

Or, heaven forbid, Sonny Moe.

"Maybe other species go crazy for this stuff too, though. Who the hell knows, right?"

Bowser deserved any and all juvenile pranks, and even better if she could get someone like Char to enact upon it for her. Supposedly this honey was irresistible, but she had a difficult time imagining it would be to the extent of having one fiery reptile follow around the other fiery reptile's butt with unyielding infatuation. In fact, the more she thought about it, Char was probably just pulling her leg and here to waste her time.

"Right." The jar found it's way into the garbage can on the side of her desk with an unceremonious plop. "I think it's better no one ever knows."

Get out.

"Whoa, hey! Y'can't just toss that out!" Okay, so yeah, he totally was just there to waste her time. But still, even if it was kind of a lame gift, that honey was a present from Addie and Alkaline -- he wasn't gonna just sit there and let someone dump it like yesterday's news. He plucked the jar back out of the wastepaper basket, checking it for cracks. The last thing he needed was honey all over the inside of his pocket.

"I know better'n to expect a sense of humour outta you, but c'mon. That was a present," he grumbled as he inspected it. "You musta been sick the day they taught all the kindergarteners to respect other people's shit." Ironic words coming from the mind behind The Enchanted Ballerina. Finding the jar thankfully intact, he moved onto unscrewing the lid. Just to make sure nothing gross had magically seeped into it during its few seconds in Trash Land. An almost cloyingly sweet smell wafted into the air almost immediately.

...Huh. That was it? It wasn't bad but... Char wasn't sure that he'd call that irresistable. He definitely wouldn't go climbing any trees to get at it. Maybe it tasted better than it smelled.

It's fall would have been cushioned by crumpled papers papers and thankfully nothing more unsanitary than that. Char's reprimanding did little to move her, especially since she found those words very very ironic.

The sweet scent drifting into the air was subtle and she imagined it was much stronger for a half-animal such as Char, although his facial expression betrayed that. He looked disappointed.

"...not what you expected?" Samus raised an eyebrow and stared at the label again, already imagining how much 'foreign' probably meant 'fake'.

He gave it another sniff, just to be sure. Yep. Still smelled the same. "Don't see why they're so wild about it," he replied. It didn't... look all that irresistable either. It definitely wasn't the stuff that came in the plastic bears; it was very pale, and far closer to opaque than translucent.

Okay, yeah, a little dubious, but he knew that Adrenaline, at least, wasn't the type to send him something horrible. He dipped a finger into the jar and stuck it into his mouth.

Whoa. Not what he'd been expecting. There was that honey sweetness, sure, but with a strange, horrible, undercurrent to it. Something sour and almost... medicinal tasting? Or... no, maybe not that, but something hard to describe and very out of place. Like licking a pot of skin cream. Either this honey was a Natural Health Product that was Very Good for You, or something had gone horribly wrong while it was in the mail. Char wasn't exactly fond of sour things, but even if he had liked them, he definitely would not have called that impossible to resist.

Slowly, he set the jar down and pushed it toward Samus. "Try some of that and tell me what you think." Maybe he was just a defective Pokemon or something. It was hard to believe that this stuff was so popular in Sinnoh.

"No." She leaned back from the jar as it slid over the desk to a stop in front of her, as automatic of a response as you could get from someone who barely trusted any edible items that came out of this school anymore, let alone a substance Char had never tried and was currently having doubts about. It screamed foolish.

Samus had no desire to taste test it but with the jar closer again she was better able to inspect it's label; namely the ingredients and the tacky emblem on the front with a crudely drawn silhouette of what it boasted to be a new, rare, Pokemon.

"..."

...that wasn't a new Pokemon.

A noticeable change in the blonde's demeanor occurred as she started to suspect there was more to this jar than either of them realized. From skeptical and perturbed, to serious and considering, her brow furrowing perhaps even in concern. She picked it up and examined it in full, sniffing it and even daring to stick the tip of her finger in and taste test the honey.

"...Where did you get this jar?"

Edited 2010-12-09 17:39 (UTC)

Char wasn't entirely sure what had provoked the switch from "no chance in hell" to suddenly taking a keen interest in the terrible honey, but it definitely wasn't hard to notice that the gears were suddenly turning in Biomech's head. That meant something was up. He had no idea what that something could possibly be, unless Samus had secretly developed a passion for quality control in imported ingredients.

At any rate, there was absolutely no chance he was going to explain who had given the honey to him. Samus may have been lucky enough to meet Kerosene once before, but he preferred to convince himself that Biomech didn't even know that Charmanders eventually evolved into Charizards, let alone that the sunny little Charmander she'd met could conceivably be the same as the cantankerous Charizard she knew now. Even if she did know that he was Kerosene, he had no intention of letting her know where the name had come from or what it carried with it. Any mention of Addie and Alkaline was absolutely not gonna happen.

Especially if there was more to this than a simple concern for honey. The last thing he wanted to do was somehow cast suspicion on his teammates for... whatever... Biomech was suddenly so serious over.

"I just told you it was a present, didn't I?" Char replied. "What, you like it that much?"

"Where did you get this jar." She asked again with an added level of impatience.

She had never personally tasted the Royal Jelly of a certain space-faring bee she was more familiar with, but she imagined it would taste just like this. The silhouette on the jar, while crude, was certainly not resembling any of the bee Pokemon she had become familiar with inside and out. Char's confusion over the product... the ingredient listings... it just wasn't adding up. The possibility that this was all just a strange coincidence didn't settle well with Samus.

And Char's noticeable dodging of her question was not making that possibility any easier to believe.

Charizards had a reputation among trainers for being hard to raise due to their stubbornness. Samus, thankfully, didn't have to worry about raising any Charizards, but this one could still be plenty stubborn when he wanted to. He stuck his hand out, motioning for Samus to return the jar to him.

"Who cares? You were ready to toss it a second ago. Don't see why it'd be such a big deal now." There was a quiet challenge lurking behind Char's pointed stare. He was withholding information that might be of use to her, sure, but there was obviously something she wasn't mentioning, either: the reason for the sudden urgency surrounding the stupid honey. He knew about Biomech's fondness for being vague and mysterious, but he had someone to cover for, and frankly... he didn't owe her anything.

It would have been ironically fitting then that Samus had turned into a Charizard for a week this summer as she could easily match that stubbornness. She did not relinquish her hold on the jar.

"This didn't come from a Pokemon." She did however, spin it in her hands so the outline of the not-Pokemon was visible, and she pointed to it for emphasis. "This. Is not a Pokemon."

"'Course it is," Char snapped. "That sure as shit wasn't honey from a normal bee." Admittedly, whatever he'd just eaten didn't taste like anything he'd ever call honey. He leaned forward a little despite himself, taking a closer look at the label. He hadn't paid much mind to the silhouette on the label at first, but now that he thought about it... maybe it was a little strange that they should only just discover some new species of Pokemon, especially if Combee honey was such a big moneymaker.

But... no, it definitely had to be a Pokemon. "Biomech, this stuff was made in a Pokemon region. If it ain't a regular bee, it's gotta be a Pokemon. They don't got nothin' else over there."

Samus knew information would beget more information and unless she wanted to seriously interrogate Char over a jar of honey, she could instead offer him a taste of what she knew [quite literally].

"Tell me where you got this jar, and I'll tell you what you really just stuck in your mouth."

"I can't." Stated flatly and plainly. No matter how much be liked Biomech, no matter how much time and distance had separated him from Adrenaline and Alkaline, once that thorny heart finally decided to trust someone, he wouldn't leave them hanging.

That didn't mean he couldn't help Biomech out, though. He wasn't entirely sure he liked the way that offer had been phrased, but he'd had a glimpse of the sort of business Biomech got up to in her free time once before. It had been strange and jarring -- and painful. Not that it was the pain that had stuck with him. He'd seen a human die. He hadn't breathed a single word of it to his team; secret-keeping was, sadly, nothing new with a guy like Kerosene. Even so, something like that... you didn't just forget it overnight.

The more Char studied that serious look Biomech was sporting, the more he got the feeling that things were heading down that road again. If he told her where to go, she would probably rush off after these mysterious honey-makers and their alleged not-Pokemon. And she'd do it alone.

It was no business of his, anyway. Biomech could take care of herself. He wasn't even sure if he'd been more help or hindrance last time they'd bumbled into something together. It was just honey -- this was worlds apart from an illegal Pokemon fighting ring. No way that could possibly come down to life or death. It'd probably just come down to a stern warning and a fine or something. There were a million reasons for Char not to care, not to get involved.

But once that thorny heart finally decided to trust someone, he wouldn't leave them hanging. Even if they neither wanted nor needed any backup.

"...But I do know where it was made." Roughly, anyway; Addie and Alkaline's letter had mentioned someplace near Floaroma. "You tell me what this stuff is and what you're plannin', I just might take you there."

As obvious as her change in demeanor had been earlier, she noted one within Char as well. She knew he could very well become tangled up in whatever adventure she was planning on embarking [which was very unplanned], even if it was none of his business at all. She had no idea if this little jar of honey would actually lead to anything at all... or if it did, how big it could be.

"..." Samus would have been just as easily satisfied to try and find that out on her own but the more she considered that... under the strange and rare circumstances, they had actually made a very formidable duo last time. Considering to not dismiss him as she would have so easily if this was only earlier in the year. That his help would actually be... well, helpful. Considering that while Falcon would have been her prime [and probably only] choice to willingly take on such an investigation--if it involved bees of any sort, that would just be a recipe for disaster.

"War Wasps, native to Tallon IV... not Earth. Potent with venom and prized in some parts for the Queen's jelly." She only hoped Char was taking her seriously. She handed the jar back to him. "They don't belong here, and they don't belong wherever you got that."

Edited 2010-12-11 05:23 (UTC)

Char waited a bit, obviously expecting Samus to follow up with a "just kidding" or explain where this honey had actually come from. When no such explanation was forthcoming, he leaned back, turning the jar over in his hand as if there would be some kind of fine print somewhere explaining that the product in question may contain traces of alien secretions.

"So they ain't bees, they're wasps. From space." Char had never heard of the first three Tallons, let alone Tallon IV, but that sounded incredibly dumb to him. He remembered thinking his first misadventure with Biomech had been something out of the world's worst B-movie. That had been a mistaken belief: this, hands down, was definitely the real plot of the world's worst B-movie. Still, as stupid as it sounded, it somehow wasn't that hard to accept as possible. If there was one thing that Char had come to understand by this point, it was that Biomech and the unexpected went hand-in-hand.

"And you think this stuff's got their royal jelly in it." That'd explain the funky sour taste, at least. If any of this was actually the case, then, the question was how in Arceus' name a bunch of alien wasps had managed to set up camp in a Pokemon region. Char's wings shifted against the back of the chair, flexing subconsciously as the thought of the uncomfortably large span of ocean between FDC and Floaroma already started drifting into his head.

Oh. He was already thinking about getting there. Right. Sure. Why the hell not. He'd already bought into all of it almost as soon as he'd heard it, no matter how silly it sounded. He'd decided to force his way into the situation, no matter how chilling the idea of seeing another human killed may have been. His tail flame was already quivering at the idea of rushing off into some stupid, potentially life-threatening adventure with Biomech... and hell, if that flame had made up its mind, then it was a done deal already.

"Let's get to it, then. Ever heard of Sinnoh?" No point in beating around the bush. If he was set on going on some enchanted escapade searching for poisonous stinging things from the stars, then he wasn't gonna waste time questioning what (or more importantly, why) the hell.

Edited 2010-12-11 08:50 (UTC)

Samus nodded, her expression not changing at all, except for perhaps a slightly raised eyebrow at realizing he was actually taking her seriously. Or... at least it appeared to be that way.

And it seemed like there wasn't getting around the fact he was going to have to show her the way. "It's north of Kanto and Johto, that's all I know." Anywhere more specific than that she would have to be playing tourist; something that resulted in an awful lot of unforeseen chaos last time.

She was already estimating how much faster her bike would be than the primitive trains she took to the region last time, or if Char, by any strange chance, had an alternate method of transportation.

"Yeah, that's where we're goin'."

They could get to Sinnoh by boat, sure, but that was not only expensive, but slow. The closest place to dock would have been near Sunyshore, halfway across the region. Canalave was closer to Floaroma, but that would mean the boat skirting along the coast -- a process that would take far too long for his tastes. Char was quick to dismiss that option; he hated sea travel, anyway. Besides... he had his pride. He'd made that flight twice before, and now his torn wing had healed up. Taking a boat was, as far as he was concerned, pussying out.

But again, there was that pride of his. He liked Biomech. Genuinely liked her. But he was a Charizard, not a pony. The right to sit on his back wasn't something he planned to hand out to just anyone. Somehow, Biomech had also landed into the very small circle of people Char considered worthy of trust, but...

Char said nothing at first, just giving Samus a long, searching stare. "How long you gonna need to get ready?" He asked, wings giving another involuntary flex. Maybe she had that sparkly pink magical girl whip already in her pocket, but maybe not. "We got an ocean to cross, so leave the heavy shit at home."

Had she known what Char was thinking she probably would have expressed the exact same sentiments--Samus had her pride, and rides on her bike were reserved for Special People only and only otherwise given at her discretion. Her gunship was even further restricted for dire emergencies... not joyrides with students. That, and she didn't really want hear the dozens of new heckles Char could possibly come up with if he knew Samus had an advanced space ship and that that by technicality made her an alien. From outer space. Although her knowledge of space wasps kind of already alluded to something of that nature... didn't it?

Furthermore her experience as a Charizard over the summer had given extra understanding about what it was like to be a flying mule. Sympathy for that matter on Char's end, however, was another thing entirely.

But, given the apparent available options [that Samus was aware of as hitching a ride on Char hadn't even crossed her mind], she was still favoring her bike. Char had already been given a ride before albeit, when he was a much smaller Charmeleon, and switched into G-Diffuser mode, the bike would hover safely above the water and cross whatever ocean in record time. Although she had never tried such a feat before, and was probably the largest reason she hesitated in her answer.

"...Twenty minutes." Samus finally said dryly and stood. "I'll just run home and powder my nose real quick. Meet me back in the parking lot."

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