Downstairs from the Geo Soc building

Walter, in Ivan's phone: Ivan, it's just down the road, we don't need to take a cab, we can literally just run there and— dude, seriously, organize your folders.

The Streets of Lumiose City, near the Yonut not far from the Geo Soc headquarters

A guy wearing gloves, glasses, and a Phenac City Fearows hoodie runs past Ivan and Walter. His earphones, colored orange, float out of his head, which promptly reveal the aura of a familiar young man and his mechanical and mechanically augmented organs.

Headphones, now revealed to be a rotom: <You'll need this.>

The rotom drops the headphones it possessed on to Ivan's hands. It was still playing a Simple Plan album. From a distance, Dave and and his Beheeyem could be seen shrugging; from his aura they're clearly more confused than angry or frustrated. He zips by and catches up to Dave.

Rotom!Jonathan, re-possessing his dex: PC told me that you'll definitely thank me later.

PC, telepathically: <Had to be done. You're welcome.>

Dave: I'm sorry, what part of helping that little—

PC: <Clown dude's a psychic. Easier for our little friend to dodge his archnemesis this way.>

Dave: Stop pulling stuff out of your asses. We're not a charity and we're going to have to ask for those back.

PC: <The psychic clown villain is Ivan's father.>

Dave: Daddy issues. I totally relate.

Edited by MasterJayAM on Mar 17th 2019 at 12:49:47 AM

Textspace - Before the Raid

-Marigold glances curiously over at Skadi, before glancing down at her phone as it buzzes.-

-She fades into the background without another word.-

Road to Castle Lycanrow - Infiltration Day

-The next day, Marigold looks over at her driver, her expression utterly impassive save for the bags under her eyes.-

Marigold: Marigold Taylor, born to middle-class parents in Galar, M.Sc in Infinity Energy and Mega Evolution. Signed up with the Devon Corporation out of grad school, but was soon headhunted by the Galarian Signet Association as part of a Pokefutures recruitment initiative. Fully aware of the company's reputation, and willing to do whatever it takes to be recognised, ethical oversights be dammed.

Prost

-To Christina-

As far as I can tell it's a bit of a coin toss as to what Persona or Pokésona you'll get.

Crochet: <I guess we should figure out some codenames now then.>

Doc: <Yeah I guess.>

Hmm...

Doc: <What if I went with Medic?>

Crochet: -Looking at Doc- <Medic seems a bit too obvious... what about... Pink?>

Doc: <Like the singer?>

Crochet: <It's descriptive without being revealing.>

Doc: <Yeah I can see that.>

Edited by rmctagg09 on Mar 16th 2019 at 11:54:46 AM

The Prost, Front-of-House

Artoria: <No real names... Then call me Saber.>

-Wait, that sounded familiar.-

...

-Isaac's totally using the a-salt and battery joke again, isn't he. Ivan could never forget the sound of metal and salt skittering across the ground.-

Jubilife Prost - Front of House

"... Rage and Love," Colton decided. "Call me Rage and Love," he clarified, looking at Princess and Runaway, nodding as if to say he approved of the nicknames.

The driver gave a small smirk, "Perfect. The Earbud is set up and everything."

"Alright everyone pay attention, we're about to dump a lot of exposition here."

The screen showed the castle itself, "This is Lycanrow castle, finished in 926 for King Helmuth the 1st, the castle has a longstanding history and is quite frankly our largest target due to the sheer number of paths and secret passages."

~Yes it is stuck on top of a mountain, when you are a king and warlord you want to be extra like that.~

The slideshow rolled over to pictures of the castle under a different banner, "In the 1940s it was opted by you all know who for the war effort, a commando team was sent in on june 3rd 1943 to stop whatever crazy jetpack research they were working on. The commando team was the Iron Starraptors, lead by a Adam Grant... yes there is a relation. He was my great grandfather."

~Not helping was that Delilah Paige was also there on a secret mission to grab vital intel.~

"Also relation, she was my great grandmother, the two hated each other. The Castle itself has a strange history in that there were reports of secret chambers, and a few later generations reported strange noises, hell the town of Eddisberg has people reporting reoccuring nightmares, though infrequent enough to be nothing of worry beyond similarities."

The slide switched over to the GSA logo, "Our target is this Pokefutures Front, normally anyone doing a archeological dig would not be worth time, but it's pokefutures and they are looking for what they claim to be "the secret to immortality". Nonsense normally if I was not fully aware that the castle is probably actually holding something dangerous. Thus, we get to the meat and potatoes of this operation."

Bishop floated over, "The goal is similar to our usual ones, disrupt and ruin."

"Normally this would be a simple job, I could send in Gaia and Rogue and expect clear results... were it not for the castle's sheer size. Thus this is a full team job, and I know everyone here can work sneaky just fine. This raid isn't going to be a single day or few hour raid as our previous ones have been, this is going to be a difficult job. So here is the plan-"

The Driver stopped at the door, "Here is your stop Miss. Good luck on the new day."

A armed guard stepped over, "Ah, a new comer. Can I help you madame?"

"Gaia will be sent in undercover as Marigold Taylor, again she frightens me with how good she is at this disguise stuff. There's no Rafter and Floor teams this time."

Fox spoke up, "Wait, what about us then?"

"We'll be parked up in Eddisberg, unfortunately we don't have many paths in and most of them are locked, I could fly the wing in, possibly even fire a few potshots but that causes trouble. We want to avoid that as long as possible, especially with these up."

A large machamp like machine walks over.

"My Machomei-2 here can take your bags if you have any."

"More cyborgs, cloned this time thankfully..."

~We figure Pokefutures probably realized how much trouble trying to catch actual living mons are to convert into cyborgs, and they probably figured from their Futurecario series that cloning cyborgs is easier. Yeah they're still twisted.~

"They'll be trouble, we can probably smash through them, and this is why I made sure I brought muscle along, but we do want to avoid breaking them as long as possible. And as I was saying, Marigold has a very important job, she's got good credentials and nobody will notice she doesn't belong, so her job is to find the alternative entrances, secret pathways, and general document grabbing."

Silas tossed "Marigold" a pDroid, "That's your quick scanner," he said holding up his and demonstrating the scanning function on a lorum ibsum document.

"Once we get in, we split up and cover as much ground as possible, end goal is to remain uncaught, but if you get seen, take out the guards as fast as you can, cyborgs can be dismantled but we're still running a no kill policy here on any actual humans."

Snakeye sauntered in, <Fresh from the biolabs. We got forget me powder,> he said handing out canisters of a green sleep powder like substance.

"That stuff is difficult to make so don't waste it, one whiff to a unconscious guard makes them forget the past 30 minutes, and yes it only works when they're unconscious."

<We figure if the guards don't see any trouble, they'll presume what they forgot was minor or deja vu, and move on.>

"The end goal is to make sure they don't actually find what they might be digging for. From there we weigh our options, Bishop, if you would."

Bishop nodded and entered the ship, it shuttered and then was off. Silas looking back over everyone.

"Any major questions?"

The Prost

-Christina listens to the singing for a second.-

Christina: "Just call me Songstress..."

Not Primadonna? Oh, well. We'll just show off later, huh? Not that you aren't right now. Calling yourself Songstress? Really? With Sarah here? Tsk. Not to mention...sounds a lot like Sorceress. Won't you ever leave her shadow?

Go to hell.

We're already there.

Oblivion Wing

Phantom: "Standard bag-and-tag on anything we find?"

-Vulpecula muses anout having Jackal develop a more lightweight helmet for her. And a Paralyzer.-

stormchaser

-Cady and Lila are about to walk into a closet, when they are approached by Danny, as a Phantump. Cady is wearing a large leprechaun hat-

Cady: Top o' the mornin' to ye!

Danny: <What the?>

Lila: We're just going over to Cady's place to celebrate Saint Patrick's day!

Cady: Mostly by eating loads of food.

Danny: <Cool!>

-There is a loud noise from a nearby room room-

Kat: EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!

-They run into said nearby room to find Kat jumping around looking excited-

Cady: Are you ok?

Kat: Yeah! Guess what? I think I just used shadow claw for like half a second!

Danny: <Wait, was it something like this?>

-He demonstrates, his arm becoming surrounded by a dark aura in the shape of a claw-

Kat: Yes, yes that was it!! It was like a bigger version of my hand, but really sharp! Trouble is, I have no idea how I did it...

Lila: Sorry to crash the party, but time is ticking.

Cady: Yeah, we really should go. Good luck with the shadow claw thing!

Kat: See ya!

Danny: <Au revoir!>

-Lila and Cady leave-

Cerulean City

Bastion: I actually stayed here a while back. It was nice.

They noticed that Misango was suddenly wearing a leprechaun hat.

Bastion: Misango, wha- Oh...

Misango and Bastion: [in unison] <HAPPY ST PATRICK'S DAY!>

Edited by Routeferret on Mar 17th 2019 at 3:44:06 PM

Cerulean City

-I suddenly remember this and hi-five the air while making a whip-cracking sound-

Me: -as loudly as I can- TOP O' THE MORNIN' TO YA, CERULEAN CITY!!!

Piku-chan: <It's almost hard to believe that you forgot all about Valentine's Day...>

Me: Wait, I did what now?

Piku-chan: <You heard me. You were so caught up in Deskman's Challenge that...>

Me: -I look at Bastion- Bastion, Misango, Piku-chan... can you please excuse me for a second?

Edited by AnimeboyIanpower on Mar 17th 2019 at 3:59:49 PM

Cerulean City

Bastion: Ah, of course.

Lumiose City

Lester would throw a punch at Greaser's face, only for the latter to block it. However, the former would punch him in the stomach, creating an effective feint attack.

Greaser would follow this up by kicking Lester in the balls, resulting in the latter letting out a short squeal.

Edited by Routeferret on Mar 17th 2019 at 4:11:56 PM

Cerulean City

-I place Piku-chan on Bastion's head and run off-

-I then take a deep breath, and scream so loud that half of Kanto can hear me-

Me: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!

Edited by AnimeboyIanpower on Mar 17th 2019 at 12:16:02 PM

Cerulean City

There was a short pause.

Misango: <You okay there?>

Edited by Routeferret on Mar 17th 2019 at 8:17:57 AM

Cerulean City

Me: -crying- Just gimme a sec...

Oblivion Wing, Lounge - Pre-Raid

-Marigold catches the pDroid scanner and smiles.-

Marigold: Whilst I am undercover, I will also attempt to find an alternative entrance for our stealth operatives so that we can avoid having to resort to a direct assault. I'll endeavour to check in every few hours; if I find myself in distress, the warning phrase will be "Kreisau".

Castle Lycanrow, Cable Car Station - Infiltration Day

-With one last smile and a nod to her driver, Marigold steps out of the car and turns to face the guard, speaking with a clipped, received pronunciation Galarian accent.-

Marigold: Thank you, but I can carry my own luggage just fine. I travel light.

-She gestures toward the briefcase she's carrying.-

"Bag-And-Tag, there's a lot of secrets down in that old castle, I doubt a gold goblet or a ancient knife would be much missing. As for calling in, I forgot a little something," Silas responded.

He tossed Alice another object, it looked like a earbud, "It uses similar optical camo to Rogue's cloak, so you'll be able to hide that in your ear easily and communicate with us. Best we can tell the easiest way in for everyone else is via the waterways, they are locked up and we think there might be security preventing us from just cutting open any grates."

Tae smirked, <Make sure you have water types to share, I'm not carrying everyone.>

"This raid may take us a day or two, depending on what we can find, until then we'll be camped out in Eddisberg."

The driver gives a wave and turns around, driving off down the road.

The Guard nods, "Ah, here on executive orders then, well follow me, we have a private room set up for you in the castle itself."

They step into the cable car, the Futurechamp staying behind, as the car jerks and takes off.

"So, Miss Taylor is it? Why did corporate send you down here? It can't be just for the hunt for immortality."

A Charizard appears among the others, coming from the kitchen with some food in his mouth. He swallows.

Hazard: <...So hey.>

Stormchaser, Room 713, St Patty's, Morning

He stirred, looking at the time on his phone before groaning in minor frustration. He eventually dragged himself out of bed, using his free hand to conduct the kettle into putting on a cup of coffee for him. Removing his dirty shirt, dirtied from both the events of the raid as well as having slept in it, he made certain that the shirt he picked out had some amount of green on it.

His eyes, half-lidded, eventually drifted to a shirt that was mostly a solid green, save for two equine figures he recognized as characters from My Little Blitzle. He shook his head, realizing it's been a while since he last watched the show, but he didn't say anything, instead electing to have his jacket unzipped just enough to show the green collar.

<We're not going to do anything, are we?> A voice asked after three Pokeballs opened. Roy, Helmsman and Julius had appeared, the latter two resting in front of the bed while the Blaziken sat down on it. <We didn't do anything last year, why would we do anything today?> Helmsman asked.

"... Do you... want to do anything?" Colton asked, shoving his socked foot into one of his sneakers.

<I'd be lying if I said I wanted to do nothing,> Julius allowed. <but who are we to decide on your behalf?>

"It's no problem," Colton allowed, yawning as he grabbed the coffee. "Really, we all know I have cash to burn. If you want to do something without me breathing over your shoulder, all I ask is that you try to keep everyone in check."

Roy, Helmsman and Julius all looked at each other in confusion.

"Yes," Colton said succinctly before coughing up a little coffee. Summoning a little Obscuric Ice to cool it down, he turned to them.

Oblivion Wing, Day Before Lycanrow

"Kreisau," Lamb echoed, only vaguely aware of what she'd be asked to do. Hopefully she could tag with someone again.

"Wait, bring a water-type?" She parroted, confused. She hummed, considering her options.

Oblivion Wing, Lounge - Pre-Raid

-Marigold catches the earbud and fits it in her right ear, nodding at Lamb as she does.-

Marigold: Keep me informed if you are attempting to enter through the walkways, since I may be able to assist with opening up a way in.

Castle Lycanrow, Cable Car Station - Infiltration Day

Marigold: Excellent. I'd expect nothing less.

-She steps into the cable car with the guard.-

Marigold: I don't suppose you would've read my thesis paper, so I'll try to put it in simple terms. I have a keen interest in history and a skillset well-suited to analysing that which we hope to find, so naturally headquarters decided I was a natural fit.

"Interesting. I heard that King Helmuth practiced dark arts and alchemy in this old castle, that he was trying to come up with a unstoppable army. That's as much as I know," The guard commented.

"I doubt there's anything in there, but even then, if there's not. This place will still be a great future lab, large, fortified, plenty of future opportunities in this."

"Water types, nobody moves as quickly through water as they do. Waterways will get us to the catacombs of the castle faster than walking in or swimming ourselves, especially against the stream that connects to a waterfall."

Bishop displayed the next image, of the cablecar bridge, and the running water it overlooked.

"Also joining us is one of my original raid partners, the mon that was there when I lost my left arm, Hazard."

Hacks blinked, ~Wait you are putting a lot of pressure on Alice, I understand she's good at what she does but it's not like you to leave out a insurance policy.~

"Correct, I had to do some thinking, especially as Gaia is officially my Number 1 on this team."

Roxy grinned, "Congrats on the promotion by the way~!"

"So, I will be assigning at least one party to tail her, and that party is Rogue."

Oblivon Wing

Vulpecula: "T is..."

Phantom: <At base. I'll see about having her come help us.>

-Phantom nods and walks off with his phone. Vulpecula waves at Hazard.-

Vulpecula: "Hi friendo. Unless you'd prefer honorary step-brother."

Oblivion Wing, Lounge - Pre-Raid

-Marigold gives Roxy a slightly forced smile.-

Marigold: Thank you. I... appreciate the support, but I assure you that I am more than capable of operating alone.

Castle Lycanrow, Cable Car - Infiltration Day

-Marigold nods at the guard.-

Marigold: Helmuth's methods were primitive and crude, but his theories had some merit to them. With the technology we have at our disposal today I predict that we will accomplish great things here. I'm very much looking forward to starting work.

-She gives a wolfish grin.-

Silas gave it some thought, "True, you are one of the most experienced people here, and you are free to ignore my orders are you are the second in command."

~Are you sure this is a good idea?~ Hacks asked.

"Gaia has been a hero longer, I trust her abilities and let's face it, her acting skills are terrifying with how easily she vanishes into a role."

Hacks nodded, and then turned to Alice, ~Sorry if I sound pushy, I'm just worried considering my best friend did lose a limb, I just wanna make sure we have all bases covered.~

"We do."

-Rogue tenses slightly.-

Rogue: ...Yeah. "Marigold" will do just fine on her own. But, uh, I guess backup never hurts, as long as care is taken, yeah?

-The car seems ever-so-slightly off its usual balance, for some indiscernible reason. It's plenty stable for this trip, but perhaps the maintenance staff should check it before its next use?-