This world is inhabited by creatures that we call pokemon. People and pokemon live together by supporting each other, but now the scourge threatens the safety of the entire region. Kohaku has become a dangerous place, where children stay at home and only brave souls go adventuring.
Welcome to KOHAKU. Come for the nightmares. Stay for the tea and crumpets.
The season is SUMMER. It is easy for survivors to forage for food from the land, as there are entire abandoned farms ready for harvest. On the downside, you can smell the corpses.
swarms
GRAND OPENING !
Welcome to KOHAKU REGION's grand opening! If you're interested in joining, come check out our grand opening giveaway!
the restaurant is a reputable sort with waiters who would actually take her coats, but not fancy enough to give anyone the wrong ideas. petilil dance in a corner of the restaurant as altaria sing on the perches above. what wonderful lives they must lead, away from the bloodbaths at bellona.
sophia cannot help but regret that this isn't the case everywhere. she truly wishes that the disaster at pax didn't happen, but now that it has, the situation must be dealt with responsibly. if only she had the power, that is.
(she only regrets that she didn't)
the table that she sits at is by the far corner. there's enough chatter in the room for conversation to be disguised, should aaron wish to converse during dinner.
Aaron would have preferred to stay home and try to hack into Eos' system, but Sophia had insisted on taking him to the "La Luna Isk Ipo" (Aaron didn't know the significance behind the name, but he had a feeling that Cameron would know; below the sign's name is an extra line of text reading "Typo Nation"). In his lap is his briefcase, and nestled in its contents is a slender black laptop. Aside from the briefcase, the man appears to have no other possessions.
He nearly forgets about the wake of the Scourge.
"It's nice here," he says with a small nod, as if they hadn't just been trying to curb stomp trainers trespassing into Pal Park a few days ago.
(Aaron wanted to pretend that they weren't the ones who had been curb stomped.)
if by "insisted", aaron meant "dropped an open invitation for free food in his voicemail", then that would be pretty accurate. maybe it seemed like an insistence when the woman asked anything of anyone at all.
they had already placed their order a few minutes ago. sophia actually feels better about the laptop. at least there will be no need to make awkward small talk. at the same time, she can't avoid the conversation forever. there are things that sophia needs to make right.
"thanks for pal park" she doesn't look him in the eye. "how did things end?"
Aaron would not turn down food. That was one way to coax him into doing something.
"Iskander sent Hyde in," the other Agent replied, only a slight tremor of irritation in his voice. The Aaron and Iskander had something of a reluctant friendship, even if Aaron was the other Agent's senior. "We didn't stay for too long either." Just as Sophia had managed to slip away using a Ghost sign, Aaron had drawn a psychic sign when the going had gotten a little too tough. Eos was growing stronger, then.
On the other hand, he'd noticed that Byte grew at an astonishing speed.
sophia's worked with enough men at pax to understand how much more agreeable they were when food is involved. she can't say that the evening wasn't calculated.
"did he?" sophia accepts the tea that the server had brought out. "to the actual fight?"
she's never heard of such a thing. then again, sophia doesn't exactly track her colleague's activities. "what did you think?"
"Yes." Aaron lifts the tea that the server set before him, taking a small sip of it. "Hyde never seems to be too far away." It's a little uncanny, but he supposes he should be grateful that Iskander's Metagross does keep an eye out for him. A nearly nostalgic expression flits over his face. That was how it had been all along. Suddenly, having helped Iskander with his homework didn't seem nearly as helpful as the way that the dark-haired Agent provided an extra helping hand during fights.
"Yes, he did, to the actual fight. ... Quite frankly, it isn't very uncommon."
The dinner could have been a casual outing between two coworkers after work. Aaron supposed that, in a sense, they were still coworkers.
"They're quick learners and managed to debunk my harddrive." Aaron responded. "On the other hand, I found there were great improvements, exponentially, in the way that data is now handled by the machine."
They're strong and left a dent on Byte, but his fighting potential's increased exponentially.
sophia doesn't comment when aaron talks about iskander. she has never been particularly concerned about him. he seems plenty reliable for what the agents are doing. he isn't quite as showy as few of their other members.
"hard drive?" sophia sets her tea down before continuing. "...i presume that you are referring to your projects, and not the battle"
Aaron lifts the tea, takes a sip of it, then sets it down again. "Both," he responds. "Both is good."
He glances over Sophia's shoulder at an ice sculpture of a Swanna. Pity it would be all melted away and gone after the evening was through. It's the sculpture that actually reminds him that this is a relatively high-class restaurant. "What did you order anyways?" Aaron asked Sophia.
And then the dreaded question: "... how is Zahir?"
efficient, just the way that the employees of pax preferred it.
the sculpture is already melting, but a beautiful dewgong is brought in to refreeze it. a particularly artful weavile takes care in carving out the swanna's delicate features. sophia wonders what it would be like to touch beautiful things without breaking them.
the server answers aaron's question by bringing his dish and sophia's pasta, mixed with a spicy berry glaze. it's not particularly ceremonial - just enough to get her through another all-nighter, really. she doesn't have many luxuries when she has medical school and agent activities to balance.
"...he seems fine" sophia wonders if their association is so obvious, but zahir never really looks away from her for long, does he? "life is on crunch time for me lately. can't say that i see him too often"
The only reason why Mordecai would ever go back to school now was out of boredom. On the other hand, the Scourge were far more interesting than what any college or university could offer him. Besides, he had also decided that working with Scourge, seeing them for himself, was a better education than any of the other professors could offer him. Still, he admires how well Sophia appears to be able to balance both her higher education and her Agent duties.
Quite frankly, Aaron thought that Zahir and Sophia's relationship was a little one-sided.
He feels his stomach drop, and he's not sure if it's out of envy or nostalgia.
"Exams?" he asks her, serious expression replaced by a playful light in his eyes. Well, that was one aspect of school that he would never miss, though he did admit that it kept him on his toes. He'd enjoyed grading his students' papers. Those were fun, seeing what silly answers they would put down. Aaron had quite enjoyed tearing their feeble explications apart.
A second server appears carrying a single dish on a tray. It's piping hot, and as the server sets it down, Mordecai studies every detail of his bowl that sat in its center, carved from bread. Floating inside was a deep purple berry soup. Such was what La Luna Isk Ipo specialized in. He lifted a spoon and broke the surface of the berry soup with it. Aaron gave it an experimental blow, sipping the soup from the utensil.
sophia smiles slightly, as jarred as it is. "exams stop for no one" not even revolutionaries, giratina's children, misanthropists, or whatever they were now. zahir was the more imaginative one (she had always been charmed by his stories, as reluctant as she was to admit it). "should i tell them the truth?"
quite frankly, she would rather drop out than tell them - and sophia would never drop out. not after daniel had sacrificed so much to put her there.
"zahir gave me an excellent restaurant listing" sophia starts to dig into her meal. as aloof as she was to zahir at times, she does give enough thought to his career to promote it every now and then. "he would be happy to share"
Aaron remembers exams. He also remembers that they sucked. The man does not envy Sophia at all. "It would be best not to," the man mused, taking another sip of the soup. It's sweet and sour all at once. If someone ever asked him to describe the taste in five words, he would not know what to say. It was a good sort of bafflement, and certainly not the bad sort.
"I'm sure he would," Aaron said in something of a blasé tone. He broke a piece of bread off the bread bowl, dipping it into the soup. He wondered what Byte was up to and hoped that the Porygon-Z would stay out of trouble. If he was lucky, Fantine would be chasing after him. Still, the Porygon-Z did mean well. He, at least, helped Aaron with all of his net dives. Aaron was confident that he'd have little trouble with hacking into systems without the Pokémon, but the creature did help with bypassing securities when he felt like it.
Aaron sets his spoon down briefly. "When are your exams, then?"
"i was teasing" she says, although her expression gives nothing away. sophia used to be that kind of girl, toying with the assumptions and whims of others. it's sad, how hard she tries to be what she once was. so maybe her grades and lab reports were the same as ever, but there's something that isn't quite right under the surface. something essential that daniel's departure left behind. or maybe the fracture was always there, and her brother only covered it up.
"...next month" hopefully she can achieve certification soon. sophia is reluctant to admit that she was relying on her time at pax to transfer as credits. the school saw no reason to refuse her when pax was associated with such prestige despite the tragedy.
Aaron does not doubt that any academy would be happy to take Sophia under their wing. She's a very smart girl, and Pax Institute's merit was a force to be reckoned with. He also had a feeling that he could find a new job, something other than a systems and database analyst, but he needed a job that could be done without being tethered to an office. If people needed his help, they knew very well which number to call.
"I am confident you will do well," he says, and Aaron really does believe in those words. Having a doctor among the Hades Agents would be rather beneficial, but also, he hopes she can pass for herself too. He's seen the bags under the woman's eyes from studying, and Aaron hopes that all the time and effort the woman has poured into this work will pay off in the end.
"I don't envy you," he tries to joke, but probably failed miserably.
sophia begins eating in earnest. she won't have the time to do so later. she minds her manners, but there are less pauses in between.
once upon a time, the rosenburg name may have meant something in the medical community. like pax institute, it now carries a bloody history that cannot be erased. sophia holds much burden, none of them secret for those who are old enough to remember.
