Urban Amends

Finding herself actually make her way to the Small Pond with about six hours of sleep under the gruelingly hot sun alone felt like a major accomplishment for the jaded Zangoose, it even surprised her that she had gotten her daily chores out of the way, which obviously consisted of going out for a meal, taking a few laps through the town and back, and backseat law-enforcing, also known as being a superhero-- even though nothing really ever happened when Mocha went on patrols. The Cat Ferret Pokemon, still flabbergasted on how quickly she'd gotten here and done her errands, went by the border between water and land before looking around and dipping her head downwards, lapping up the water in a suspicious manner in which her pupils had turned to slits and searched the area around Mocha. She'd bring her head up and gasp for a breath of air, still ignorant on if it were against the rules to drink from the lake.

Then, Mocha would quickly scuffle from the pond to the space under a small tree, where she would lay down on her stomach and close her eyes, needing to rest them from enduring the shimmering sun's gleam. She breathed in and out. It was quiet, and Mocha was accompanied by not but her thoughts. The rest of her life was now and she was lollygagging and doing absolutely nothing about it! Here Mocha was, cutting her ties off from her family for cultural differences, and then just barely even talking to the most friendly-looking folk in Grassveil! She "humphed" out loud, so if anyone heard such a humph, they would likely be confused as to why the humph was made. Quietly would Mocha think out a plan to become more than "the Zangoose I always see but never really does anything" in the eyes of the citizens of the nearby town. Deep in thought would Mocha gently fidget, changing her stance every so often from laying down to sitting up to pacing around, mumbling suggestions and exclamatories expressing curiosity.

The Small Pond. Accurate in a relative manner of speaking, perhaps, but it was an impressive size compared to anything you would have seen in the dreadful, dry Scorchfall Desert to the east. That arid terrain was what Maxie was used to seeing when not hidden away in the caves that were her home. She was visiting the Small Pond as part of her efforts to familiarize herself with the local points of interest surrounding her new home. That new home being the Grassveil Guild, which she had joined along with her new partner, an emolga named Arlo, quite very recently.

Arlo was not with her today. The two had opted to do their own things for the time being before taking on their first mission. For Maxie, that meant visiting the more tame spots in and around Grassveil, such as this pond. There weren't too many Pokemon around today, it would seem. There was one of particular interest, however. Maxie had noticed the white and red Pokemon move from the shore of the lake to the base of a nearby tree. She found the mannerisms of the Pokemon—a zangoose, she recognized—to be a tad peculiar but nothing more. Deciding that the zangoose wasn't likely to be a threat—and assuming that if they were to become a threat that she could handle it—the mawile approached.

As she began her approach, Maxie noted the zangoose's apparent agitation. Agitation, she noted, not aggression. With her jaw-like horns behind her, she entered the stranger's peripheral. "Hey, stranger," the mawile started, with a casual, friendly tone. "You seem a tad frustrated. Need to vent?"

The Zangoose, still deep in thought, almost completely neglected to examine the nearby area for any bystanders, so it came as a shock that a sudden visitor had entered her personal space. She immediately hopped up onto two legs before toppling over onto her side, as she'd been caught off guard. She huffed and puffed, closing her eyes before scratching the back of her ear with a back paw. "Um... Hey! Howdy!" Aside from the confusion of which end of the Mawile to talk to, Mocha was not sure why such a person would approach her. She regained her balance and treaded around the Mawile in a predatory fashion, trying not to look at any mouth or set of eyes. "Vent? Why would I need to vent? I'm not that frustrated- uh... It might just be the face." She gave a shrug with her notably longer front legs. Mocha came a little closer to the end she thought was the right end-- the one with the eyes-- and spoke a little more, "It's not as much frustration as it is- uh... Just trying to decide. You see- uh... I've been in Grassveil for a little while, and I kind of want some notoriety before I move on to better things, like the guild. Would you have such an idea? Sorry for pelting you with the question right off the bat..."

Maxie was a bit surprised that the zangoose hadn't noticed her sooner. The mawile found the rather awkward display that unfolded upon the stranger's sudden realisation that they had company actually quite amusing, in spite the fact that she was being circled like prey by a predator. Most surprising—and equally amusing—however, was the sudden rush of one-sided, stuttering conversation the zangoose had launched into the moment it—she, Maxie now knew—the moment she had apparently decided the sudden mawile was not a threat. A bit bumpy, but more or less to the point. I like it.

"I was going to mention that I didn't mean to pry my way into any stranger's private business, but I suppose with your sudden question I have no need to," Maxie started. "Not that I have any issue with it." She offered a hand to shake as she continued. "I'm Maxie, by the way. And I should say that seem to be in similar yet different circumstances. I just arrived in Grassviel very recently. I came here with the express goal of joining the Grassviel Guild. And I did, see?" Maxie Gestured to the yellow scarf around her neck, upon which the Grassveil Guild badge was pinned. "May I ask why you're so interested in gaining notoriety?"

Mocha sure did take her sweet, sweet time to get up from all fours to her feet. She stood up with a little stumble and gave the Mawile a somewhat firm three-fingered handshake. She'd quickly pull back afterwards and tumble back onto all fours. "Hey- uh... Trust me, you can pry your way into my private business any day." She gave a comedic pseudo-flirtatious wink, such a statement was obviously a joke in an attempt to lighten the mood. The Zangoose let out a big yawn and sat down, looking up at the Mawile. "I am Mocha! It's great to meet you! I know, it's an odd name 'cause I'm not brown." She let her shoulders rise and fall loosely. And then Mocha learned of Maxie's manner of joining the guild. "Wait, what? You can just walk in and they give you a badge? I thought you needed to do something cool or be strong enough before they even let you in! I've been too caught up in that thought that I never even approached the entrance! That's crazy, I've been here for, like, weeks and I didn't know that, you'll have to show me later!" After that short monologue, Mocha had talked so much that she needed a moment to breathe. She'd inhale then exhale, gripping at where she'd always thought her lungs were located, at the chest. "Well," she panted, "now I don't even need the notoriety, since the guild was my first stop after I gained such notoriety." She stared unblinkingly with her dull pink eyes at the badge on the Mawile's scarf, admiring the overall shape it was in.

Mocha; nice name, odd or not, Maxie thought after the zangoose's brief aside. She gave no thought to the other comment or the wink. "I'd love to show you around the Grassveil Guild! And have you meet my partner, an emolga by the name of Arlo. I don't want to be too forward—and I'd have to talk to Arlo about it, though I doubt he'll complain much—perhaps you could join my team, Team Tenacity?" Although she hadn't know Arlo for a particularly long time, Maxie was fairly sure her teammate would be okay with adding a third member to the team. Regardless, Maxie herself was absolutely in favour of bolstering her team's numbers. She was pretty confident in her own ability to handle challenges—as was Arlo—and together they had more or less dealt with the threats they encountered in Shadowhue Forest pretty well.

Still, though, expanding the team could only further bolster their ability to handle greater challenges. Maxie found herself wondering just how capable a fighter this Mocha was; what moves did she know? How much combat experience did she possess? It occurred to the mawile that she tended to think in a rather combat-centric manner. Perhaps a side-effect of being raised in an inherently hostile environment. Still, it surely couldn't hurt to often be thinking about how to win a fight—might just save her or her team at some point. "I should note that when I say recently joined, I mean very recently. Like, 'we haven't actually gone on a mission yet' recently. If Arlo is cool with it, perhaps you could help us with that?"

"Honestly?" Maxie started, "There was about as much luck involved in meeting Arlo as there was with us meeting each other. I had just arrived in the Grassveil area a few days prior and was doing what I'm doing now—exploring the area. We ran into each other in Shadowhue Forest. He was heading towards the Guild head quarters with intentions to join the Guild. I told him I was planning on doing the same and we decided to form a team. We explored Shadowhue together, got into a few scraps, got out more-or-less unscathed and later that day we joined the Guild together." The mawile moved to the nearby tree and sat against it, removing her Explorer Bag and laying it beside her. "Arlo himself... He's energetic, confident, brave... Maybe a little bit too much of those things at times. But all in all he's a good guy. Pretty clever, too." She paused for a moment, looking directly at Mocha. "But the best way to get an idea of who he is would be to meet him. What about you? Who is Mocha the zangoose? What is her ambition?"

Vigorously would Mocha nod, soaking in every word Maxie said, letting it all process. She herself kept her in moving poise, her only movement being the rising and falling of her chest through her quiet, yet obviously heavy, breathing. Also, the nodding. Mocha spent some time collecting the information about Arlo and creating a mental image of who they could be, which was some kind of hyperbolized hyper, screechy child. Mocha's grin turned into a little smirk the more she thought about this caricature of Arlo. "Oh, yeah yeah. Sounds like a fun guy to be buddies with, hopefully I'll get to know him better. Y'know, from the primary source." Mocha eyeballed Maxie's bag, starting to brainstorm all the stuff that could be in there. She chuckled gently and immediately straightened her back when Maxie began to interrogate her. "Oh- uh... That's not a tale you want to hear, Maxie. It's- uh... Not cool, really. You know my folks, right? All these backwards-society savages. Snake hunting. Gross stuff. Trust me." She gave a quiet sigh and closed her eyes, dipping her head. "Sorry." She then went back to normal for whatever reason and puffed out her chest proudly, "But if you'd like to disregard my mysterious history... I fight for nothing more than to break barriers between species, learn a little more about the days of yore, and smite evil wherever I can! When I need to, of course." She sounded super duper proud of herself when she made that little tiny speech, like she was some sort of superhero badass introducing herself to the city she was to protect for all of eternity. She even stood up and did a little pose, standing up, placing one paw on her hip, looking down straight into the Mawile's eyes, and pointing her arm straight to the sky, her paw open like she was gripping some kind of orb. "That's pretty noble, huh?"

"I suppose that's fitting to a definition of the word," Maxie responded, a slight smile on her face. It didn't bother her in the slightest that Mocha withheld details of her past—she wasn't going to pry for details about a person's past, especially one she had just met. Additionally, Maxie was not so much concerned with Mocha's past as she was about who the zangoose was today; and that zangoose sounded a tad bit similar to the mawile herself. "Tales of yore, smiting evil... You sound like the kind of Pokemon I'd want on my team. I think we have aligning goals and ambitions. I read and heard lots of stories about explorers back at home. I've wanted to become a Guild Explorer ever since I can remember. Fame, fortune, discovery—and of course the heroic parts."

((Sorry for the very short post I'm tired but don't want to leave ya hanging. Also, Maxie just isn't as expressive as Mocha :P))