Magna City Shining Congress – Main Lobby

[Sinderella]

I’m late. I’m late. Fuck, I’m late.

As Odette scurried up the steps to the hall, she repeated this to herself on loop. Though, it was more to block out Guzma’s foolishness rather than remind herself that she was late because of his foolishness.

“I asked the shopkeep for assless chaps, and bro looked at me like I had testicles growing out of my ears,” the former Skull boss whined. “Pokemon have asses right? Therefore, you’d think assless chaps would exist in a place like this, but nOoOoO! That’s asking for way too much!”

She whipped around to face him, stopping him before he could continue. “Guzma,” she said sharply as she pointed up to the gargantuan structure. “This is where I’ll be for the next few hours or so. If you need me for any reason, just come in here and ask one of the nice non-Zoroark looking ‘mon to go find Odette.”

Guzma scoffed. “What am I, five?”

“Yes.”

“I’m older than you, you fucking dwarf!”

Odette pressed her lips into a tight line as she nodded. “And yet my answer remains the same. In the meantime, for the love of all that’s good and fucking holy here, stop asking innocent ‘mon for assless chaps. You already found a jacket and a hat, so please make better use of your time.”

Guzma rustled his shoulders beneath the yeehaw-ass jacket he made Odette buy for him the day before. Nike didn’t exist in this world, something he was still coming to terms with, so this was the next best thing. Though, he couldn’t lie—he did feel badass in the matching cowboy hat he picked out, too.

“Doing what? Chasing fucking tumbleweeds? Chewing on straw and spitting on things?”

Odette was already halfway through the threshold. “Sounds great, have a wonderful time!” she called back before pulling the door shut behind her. She barely had time to catch her breath before she had to hustle to find her group. Luckily, they weren’t too far ahead, and with little direction, she eventually made it to…Calyrex?

Well. That explained…things. She slipped into the room, careful to not make her presence too known as she took note of Kimiko, Mhynt, Owen (gods, fucking Owen), Laura, and…shit. Steven.

Instead of opting to insert herself into the conversation at hand, she made herself a little more sparse and managed to locate a sugar cube for Spectrier.

 

[Namohysip]

Mhynt was about to grab a sugar cube herself, but nodded when Odette entered to handle it. She turned her attention to the conversation again while Owen silently contemplated his current lack of a corporeal ass. Zena seemed to be thinking of something similar while staring at Mhynt's shadow. They must have faintly overheard the conversation from a distance, being closer to the entryway.

"Forlas has been a culture shock at first," Mhynt said plainly. "I come from a land where the sun was lost to clouds and darkness ruled the land. I brought some of my troubles with me, but we took care of that problem as of now. As it stands, our main focus has been on the sources of imbalance that plague the land. For a time, that was some... rogue Legendary Pokemon."

Hey, Mhynt. This is their ruler? He's awfully... frail, huh? I'm gonna see if some of that is an act...

And from the darkness, Owen silently tried to get a read on the room, especially the bodies within...

 

[Ambyssin]

Odette and Guzma were not the latest ones. And they actually knew how to make a stealthy entrance. Because a crash from outside the office, followed by a couple of angry shouts, preceded Nova entering the office in a nowhere-near-stealthy manner. His dark memory was in, because given everything he'd heard about this building and recalled from last time why the hell wouldn't it be? Other memory drives were tucked away for good measure. He'd been working on trying to jury rig a device that'd help him swap the drives faster, but it wasn't ready yet.

"So, this is where you ran off to," Nova mainly addressed Mhynt. "I thought maybe you were looking for something to grow your fish into a noodle, but this seems," he paused and looked around the office, "decidedly not that."

He spotted the bulbous-headed guy lying in the bed. Nova didn't recognize the species whatsoever, so he shrugged.

 

[Namohysip]

"We're going to go for a beauty pageant later to trigger that," Mhynt replied, and it was utterly impossible to tell if she was serious or not. "But some important discussions come first."