Reading The Room

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Zorua wasn't too aware of how she left the Wigglytuff Guild. There wasn't anything too important that caught her subconscious attention, so her and Absol's exit was smooth and unimpeded. By the time they got outside, it was a hair short of noon and the morning chill cut down to just a mild nip. The wind still tried its best to steal her warmth, but the fur coating her does a surprisingly good job at stopping that nonsense. It's probably the same for Absol too, considering that coat of hers. Which is good, considering that they're still sitting at the top of the stairs going down to the town proper. The smell of the sea also drifts on the wind, salt sending a shiver-

("It's Too Cold For This." She Thinks, Shaking Off The Salt Laden Breeze. "Why Did Someone Have To Light A Fire In This Town Of All Places?" But Nobody Answered.)

-down her spine. The shiver breaks her thoughts long enough to thank The Voice Below for their hard work and lack of bias, then the smell of salt makes her thoughts drift again.

She wished her thoughts didn't drift.

Why? She starts again, feeling herself as a shell of her former self.

In more ways than one. A feeling quips.

Why is my life like this? She starts the loop of questions… again. Why couldn't I just get a nice beach house to recover in? Why did it have to be some creep following me around while literal children are the only helpful people in town? Just… just why?

Because we're the sort of creature that lives to get in trouble. A feeling answers.

Maybe you're just cursed? A feeling suggests. Cursed feels like a good word for everything that's happened.

A more serious feeling cuts in before she could think about that last one. Based on Sunflora's interview, this is not uncommon behavior for the racist rodent. He would follow around an individual that suddenly showed up and nobody knows the exact species of pokémon that they are.

Both internally and externally, Zorua lets loose a groan filled with embarrassment, shame, disgust, and feminine anger that is common in those who find out they have a stalker.

The feeling, being the cool, calculative part of her mind, continues as if she isn't suffering. The true question comes to this: how long did he follow you?

That is the question she needs to ask aloud, but some part of her doesn't want to acknowledge this situation. There's something indignant in her that's not a feeling that's equal parts angry and fearful of that rat following her around the whole town. She almost doesn't want the answer to be "The whole day," just so she can be rid of this feeling.

Absol, unfortunately, asks The Question. "How long would Patrat have followed you, yesterday?"

Oh, great. I'm gonna have to say it, aren't I?

A soothing feeling sinks into her, a vague scent of lavender worming its way into her nose. Don't worry, just be professional about this. List out the possible options, but make sure you say the worst one first; like ripping off a band-aid.

Zorua considers the feeling, before sighing. "There's a good chance that he might have been following me for the-" She stops to swallow a lump in her throat. "-the entire day. I don't like that option."

In a rare show of open emotion, Absol's nose wrinkles in discomfort. "Right. Then," She paused for a moment, then continued. "What other options are there?"

She's throwing you a bone here. Take the out, if you want. A feeling tells her.

Gladly. "However, at minimum, we can only guarantee an hour of his whereabouts. That being him foll-" She stops to swallow down another lump. "Following me and Shinx from his place over there," She points a paw to the west, in the direction of some cliffs that have a prominent point. The town's buildings have a noticeable gap before those cliffs, from their vantage point.

"Then," She drags her paw through a path, dredging up her memory of walking through town. "He would follow me here, waiting for me, then possibly f-following me when I went to look for Shinx."

Absol's head tries to follow the moving paw's directions, but her head tilts at the end. "You didn't leave with Shinx?"

"Yeah, uh, remember that whole thing with Shinx earlier?"

A beat, before Absol looks off to the side for a moment. "Right, I forgot. Apologies."

Zorua's eyes stare at her for a moment longer, but shrugs. "Anyways, that's what we can confirm about his path yesterday. Additionally, he could have moved through the market, cut a path around here," She lifts her paw to trail another path, soon ending where Booty Lane is located. "And then I spent a couple of hours with Litleo getting a reality check. Either he got bored and left…"

Which I really, really hope he did. She tells herself. The last thing the pale fox wanted was something like this happening to her, which is also somehow connected to a murder. But, if it would help the two of them catch the murderer, then she'd take a bullet for the team.

"...or," She continued slowly. "He was watching us, in an abandoned neighborhood, for multiple hours. In which case, we went over to the beach about that direction," Another dragging of her paw across the air. "And then stayed over there until dark, then went back to Booty Lane along the same path as before, before I holed myself up in one of the houses. I didn't leave until just before sunrise, where I visited Litleo and then heard the commotion."

Absol nodded along to all of her words, but she had a look about her that-

She's been holding back a question about the beach.

-okay, I guess it's a question then. Spoil my fun, why don't you?

"May I ask why you and Litleo went to the beach?" Absol asks predictably, much to Zorua's chagrin.

Then came the part where she had to explain what happened. She really, really didn't want to explain what happened, but…

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Zorua lets loose a loud, raw scream at the rock in front of her. She tenses her muscles, trying her damndest to strike this rock with the Dark type energies that she's supposed to have.

Scream harder. A feeling whispers in her mind. The louder it is, the darker it should be.

When she finishes her valiant yell of defiance at the rock, she can clearly hear the hysterical laughter from Litleo. He gets a hold of himself long enough to say "T-try screaming louder, maybe it'll do something this time!" before laughing again.

He's being sarcastic. A feeling tells her.

Still, she closes her eyes and tries to catch her breath. She feels tired in a way, but she supposed that this is probably exercising those 'magical muscles' or whatever organs or spirits holds power over this Dark stuff in her. She figured this would be like solving a mystery, too, but no matter how she went about trying to make a Move nothing worked. She tried hitting the rock, focusing on the rocks, 'willing' the rocks to explode, doing some sort of odd dance before posing in front of it, even asking some sort of divine entity to smite the rock before her for god crimes. And yet nothing worked, which was disappointing that she couldn't dance her way to victory, but reality had to be harsh on her.

So she started screaming at the rock. It went about as well as she expected.

This time, she tried to force herself into pure muscular focus, preparing her body for a yell to shatter the heavens itself with the force she's about to evoke upon this stupid rock. She coils like a tightly-wound spring, her legs burning with some kind of tension as she took in a lungful of air-

Fuck fuck fuck, abort abort- A feeling tried to warn her.

-then something curls in her right hindleg, sending her to the sand with a pitiful yelp.

"Fuck, cramp cramp cramp-" She hissed, cutting herself off to curl closer to her leg. "Ah fuck this hurts, oh sweet baby Dolores-"

Litleo, instead of helping her, laughed at her harder. It didn't matter that she can't remember anything, she just knew this was one of the most embarrassing moments of her life.

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"I tried to remember a move." Zorua said curtly. "It didn't work."

Absol was quiet for a long moment.

This is her 'surprised at how absurd this is' reaction.

Another awkward moment passed, before Absol clears her throat and looks away. "Okay." She takes one last second to sigh and gather herself before looking back to Zorua. "Okay, so we have options now. This is good for a request like this; the more possibility to encounter evidence, the better chances we have of catching the killer."

Zorua nods. "Yeah, that makes sense."

"Right now, we only have two. The first is to follow Sunflora's directions and investigate Patrat's home for any evidence of his activities. The other is to follow along his path yesterday and ask questions if someone had possibly seen him, and if anyone else was following him."

"Hm."

Absol hummed right back.

It's a simple case of whatever you think would be important now, rather than what would follow later. A feeling observed. One could have options that are quickly closing off, while the other should be a constant, unless the killer had tampered with the racist's home.

So a case of whatever I do is important, no matter which one I pick first. Got it.

A sort of purple smoke started to seep into her eyes, covering over the path she walked yesterday. The people in this town are both observant and talkative. It shouldn't be hard to find someone who saw the victim.

Then a yellow flash makes her eyes dart towards the edge of town, close to where Zorua entered from. You could also search the rodent's home. Homes hold the secrets that people hide behind closed doors, and better yet, stuff.

Zorua could agree that both options are pretty good, which is the problem. Both options have potential to be time-consuming, and the invisible timer of forty eight hours is still hanging over her head. So while she and Absol could get some headway into one, the other is going to fester in some way in time. Either she works on the off-chance that someone in town has seen something that will tip off Absol and herself, or there's something important in his home that will hold a clue to his odd behavior before his death. Well, not including the stalking, which she really, really wants to put a restraining order on his corpse, but still.

Her eyes drag over to her partner. Perhaps she would have, what we call in the business, an 'opinion' on the matter.

She looks Absol over. "Which one do you think we should cover first?"

The blade dog doesn't waste time thinking about it, probably because she used the time Zorua was deliberating to do some brainstorming herself. "Both are good options, and could help us a great deal. Either one would work, as long as we act quickly."

Frustratingly, but also understandingly, neutral. A feeling bemoans.

Another one follows up right after. She's used to following other's leads, it seems. Just point her in a direction and she'll get the job done, that's her type.

Absently, she nods and thinks over the situation once more-

Then pauses.

"Hey Absol," She starts slowly. "You wouldn't happen to have a coin on you, would ya?"

Her partner gives her an odd look, but slowly takes off her bag and sifts through it, pulling out a singular poké after a bit. "Why do you ask?"

Leaning over, but not too close, she gets a closer look at it. On one side is the letter 'P', while the other side has a sort of symbol that looks like a circle with a line cutting it in half, but with another, smaller circle dead center inside of it cutting off the line. Deciding that the letter 'P' is heads, she nods. "Heads we go and talk to the people, tails we go search the house. Heads' the letter, tails is the weird circle."

Absol was a combination of skeptical and curiously blank, but when she finished explaining herself her partner in crime fighting looked over the coin in her clawed paw. She turns it this way and that, seeming to debate something with herself.

The look in her eye is nostalgic, almost. A feeling tells her.

Almost too fast for her, Zorua noticed a quirk of Absol's lips twitching up before, just as quickly, settling back into the stoic look that is her resting face. "A strange way to let Victini guide us, but with a decision this even I wouldn't blame you."

As Absol hooks a claw under the coin, Zorua furrows her brows. "Who's Victini?" As soon as she stopped, she realized something. "Wait, was that a name?"

Absol stopped fiddling with the poké to look down at her. "No, Victini is not-" Then she cut herself off.

After a moment, her own head tilts slightly. "I don't know if Mythicals have names or not. Victini is both what and who she is." Then she shakes off the question. "To answer your first question, Victini is known for good luck in competitions. If you are in the favor of Victini, then victory is ensured."

Is that a goddess? A feeling gasps. That sounds like a goddess!

No. Another one denies. It has to be some sort of Myth, nobody can control something like luck.

Says you. Yet another feeling snipes.

Deciding to prod a little further, she asks "What sort of folklore did that come from?"

Yet again, Absol is left staring at her.

Her ears fold back. Her feelings can't interpret this look. "Why are you staring at me?"

Without removing The Look, Absol nods once. "Yes, she is real, along with a number of others. There are few records of them showing up, but when they do they tend to make waves. I even heard that a Legend was called upon to deal with a massive meteor a few years back on another continent."

The pale fox was quiet for a moment.

"...was there something wrong with the meteor?"

"From what I heard, it was big enough to destroy the entire continent. The Legendary destroyed it." She shakes her head. "Or so they say, I don't really pay attention to current events. Distracts me from the job."

…I'm sorry. A feeling starts quietly. Did she just say a creature just annihilated an entire meteor big enough to destroy a continent?

Somehow, being the only part of herself that isn't shocked to the core, Zorua herself answered herself. Yes, yes she did.

Hmm… Another feeling starts. Let's say that it's a fairly small continent, let's say about eight million square kilometers. The amount of kinetic energy required to devastate the entire surface, along with having an impact on the surrounding land, would roughly equate to…

A small headache starts to form in the following silence in her head, and Zorua has a hard time focusing on anything else. She has just enough attention to wonder if this is just the side effect of her mind, or if everyone has a problem with their feelings too.

The feeling tunes back in. About two thousand megatons worth, which means the meteor had to be around three hundred meters in length to generate enough force, if it was falling at terminal velocity. If something destroyed it, it must have the power to perfectly do so without any major damage to the surface of the planet.

…

Zorua was speechless.

So speechless, in fact, that she missed the coin toss. It took a nudge from one of the backside of Absol's claws to get her attention. Even then, she jumped a little at the touch. "What?"

Events passed in front of her, and Absol is currently messing with her bag once more. The coin is conspicuously absent. "You looked deep in thought. The coin landed on… 'tails', although it hit the ground first."

She gestured to her eyes. "I don't have the best eyesight."

Tails, huh? Zorua thought. Guess we're searching houses first. I wonder if he will have anything important hidden away.

Then another feeling cuts her off. So we're just going to ignore the fact that there's a thing out there that can dust meteors big enough to change maps?

And yet another one cuts that one off. It's no use worrying over it. It's come and gone, and it doesn't seem antagonistic by the sounds of things.

There's a vague grumbling in her skull, but no words she bothers to focus on.

But there was another thought that came up, and one that was sparked from Absol asking about the beach. "Hey, how much do you know about these things?"

"What things?"

"The weird 'mythicals' and 'legends' or whatever it is."

A frown tugs at her lips. She doesn't like being pulled away from the job. "Later. We have a request to fulfill, and we're burning daylight."

"Just one question?"

"No."

"Please?"

"..." Absol stares long and hard at Zorua. "...one."

Zorua smiles. "Thanks. So," She tries to dredge up the name, then nods to herself. "Alright, is there one called 'Dolores'?"

Absol goes to give a remark almost immediately - it was meant to put down your question and move on - but something stops her. "I… don't know." She shakes her head again, blade horn slicing through the air once again. "But I don't go out of my way to learn about the Mythicals and Legends; I'm not the one to ask this sort of thing. Besides," She finishes slinging her bag back onto herself, then makes her way down the stairs. "We need to get going."

Zorua follows her down, having to pace herself to keep up with the bigger woman. "I wasn't hoping for a miracle…" She pauses. "Okay, maybe I was hoping for one, but still. Thanks."

"Don't mention it. We have a house visit to attend to, and it's not getting any closer the more we talk."

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There were no strange happenings on the way to Patrat's home, which was a bit of a relief.

What wasn't a relief was all the stares she kept getting from the town residents. She could almost feel every single eye poke into her skin like a needle, but she took it without reacting. She didn't let it bother her while she was on the job, because good Detectives don't let hooligans and gossips take her attention away. She especially didn't look at Absol, who had shot her a few glances that she expertly ignored.

Oh, she knows. A feeling tells her. She just embraces the silent camaraderie. Like a strong wall to lean on, she is.

…well at least Absol lets her pretend she's strong, if nothing else. Good, I needed this.

Then, finally, they arrived at the house.

It's a giant partrat head.

"...I'm starting to get creeped out by these heads." Zorua says absently. "Litleo's house makes sense at least, but even Shinx's home is set into a cliff shaped like… well, I don't know what pokémon it is, but it's definitely the head of one."

Absol agreed. "Yes, it is something that many towns have adopted on Grass, and a few other continents if I remember right. I've always found it…"

She trails off, looking over the house with an unreadable expression.

"...morbid."

Zorua agreed, too. It looked like an awful blend of narcissism and tradition that just ends up looking unnerving. Having those focused eyes of a giant rodent glaring at everyone who walks by is horrifying, not to mention the sort of ego one needs to live in your own head.

The pale fox has enough going on inside of her normal-sized head, thank you very much.

Damn right you do.

But, first thing's first, Zorua takes the time to observe the surroundings. The road is packed dirt - like every other road around here - and has signs of little foot traffic.

Only one bend away from the main road, and yet it's so empty. A feeling bemoans.

Not too empty, considering how Patrat had a much more lively neighbor. Right across from the home is yet another head, this one a predominantly blue color. She can't really place what it looks like, but the tall, blue dorsal fin atop and the odd orange protrusions at the side are significant. There's no eyes on this building, but she can't tell if that's because it's meant to be more building-like or the species it's based on has no eyes.

Either way, the one who seems to live there is tending to a pond off to the side, raking some sort of skimmer through it every now and then before depositing the contents of it into a basket. They look similar to the building, but the two dark gray fins atop their head are enough to cast doubt on that notion. There's another one off to the side, but this one seems less clear and with a muddy bank surrounding it. The mud has dried slightly, but it seems like someone just splashed around in it this morning.

Beyond the blue house, there's a large amount of space before some more - thankfully - duller homes that almost look like permanent tents.

There's a wide berth given to this place. Perhaps people knew that Patrat was a bit zealous and didn't want to stay around him? A feeling suggests.

"Good question." Zorua mumbled to herself.

"What's a good question?" Absol looked at her with a sidelong glance.

Zorua suddenly felt like flushing. She didn't mean to be heard… "Sorry, just talking to myself."

The side-eye seems to stick to her, now. "Why are you talking to yourself?"

Zorua pursed her lips, thinking. "It's how I think? My head and body just drops in every now and then and gives me advice on stuff. Like," She waves a paw at the mostly empty street. "One just asked why so few people live near Patrat, other than that blue neighbor."

Absol's tone turns dry. "What." She couldn't even voice it as a question.

Zorua's starting to feel concerned at how common of a response that's becoming for her explanations. Still, her ears pin back again and she looks at her partner curiously. "If that's so strange, then how do you think?"

Slowly, Absol's look loses its dryness. "I tend to not put my head in the clouds, for one. Experience tends to do the thinking for me, if nothing else. Lets me focus."

When Zorua tried to think how that could translate, her feelings answer for her. She lets her past define her actions. If there are repeated events, then no extra thoughts are required, the constants of trial and error being her guiding star. Efficient.

If she didn't know better, the feeling almost sounded approving. Actually, no, she doesn't know better, but the approval is still there in her mind.

"Still," She tears her eyes away, ears still pinned back. "The road's still fairly empty for some prime real estate. The only other place I've seen this was on Booty Lane; people tend to avoid Litleo for some reason."

She swivels her head around. "Though this is miles better than the kid's situation. Accepted, but distant," She glances across the road, to the blue head. "Mostly."

Absol hums absently as she takes in the sight along with her. "Lines up with how Sunflora described his personality. So most people are aware of his… determination."

Zorua snorts, which almost sounds like a squeak of some sort. "That's one word for it."

She then peers back to the neighbor, seeing them still focused on their task.

Her eyes dip down to their limb, watching it as it dips into the water. It's deeper than just a pond. A pool of water, kept clean for some reason.

Zorua looks over the unknown person for a moment longer, before leaning towards Absol. "Think we should talk to the neighbor first? Seems odd that they're the only ones here."

Absol seemed to deny almost immediately, but a quick glance behind her and a second of hesitation had her sigh. "It could be better to search the home first. We could speak to the swampert later if we need to, but we also might find something within Patrat's home."

"True, but," She drags it out, turning back to the blue creature. "They could tell us how he's been. Maybe if they saw him doing something, that would help us look for anything specific."

Absol eventually conceded the point to her, after a minute of silent deliberation. Her feelings on the matter didn't suggest anything, so she took her minor social victory and moved on. The 'swampert' most definitely knew that the two women were approaching them, on account of all the glances they shot them with before fully turning away from their work.

And when they did, Zorua realized how small she was. The swampert was easily twice her height (and then some) and many more times her size. The pale fox probably wouldn't even weigh one of their arms if she was soaked to the bone. Even Absol stands head and shoulders lower than them, and she's already twice as big as Zorua.

Don't shrink back. A feeling coaches. You're here on business, keep yourself lax.

Then another one pops in, this one shooting up her heart rate. Be quick about it, though. You're on a time limit, and business needs to be fast.

Following her inner advisors, she makes sure to be one step ahead of Absol, ever so slightly closer to the looming swampert. "Hello, may we ask you a few questions? It's Explorer business."

The larger one of them smiles motherly at them. "Oh, of course I can, dears. I was wondering why you two were loitering around this old bend." Swampert had worn crinkles around her eyes as she looked down at them.

There isn't any obvious recognition in her eyes. A feeling observed. She appears to be honest and, perhaps, mildly confused about your appearance.

Which is fair, considering I'm a bit of a freak.

Hell yeah. A feeling whispers to her.

Absol takes the awkward pause that Zorua spent with herself to clear her throat. "We would like to ask you about your neighbor, Patrat. How well do you know-"

Swampert cuts her off with a snort. "Oh, I know him alright," She said, her smile dropping to a displeased frown. "That rodent doesn't know when to shut up, I tell you!"

Zorua's ears pin back at the volume of the much larger creature. Okay, she's certainly spirited about him. And also most likely knows he's an ass of some kind.

There's an old wound in her. A feeling says softly. Patrat had done something more than just stalk people, it seems.

Absol, thankfully, takes over for her while she converses with her feelings. "What do you mean, exactly?"

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

"Oh, I'll tell you," The tall woman waves her hand around, the skimmer slinging a bit of green muck into the air. It hits the ground with a wet splat. "That good-for-nothing waste of air keeps spreading nonsense about random pokémon to whoever will listen to him. Did you know that, last year, he tried to convince my little kipper that phantumps were made of evil dead children?! I had my daughter run up to me, crying and saying that she doesn't want to turn into a ghost stump and that she'll be a good girl for Arceus' sake!"

…wow. He was a special kind of asshole, wasn't he? No sane person would tell children to be nice or suffer a horrible existence as punishment.

Yeah he was. I don't know why I imagined him sounding so sad and relatable, but he really isn't.

Another feeling drops in. You should get the questions back on track. You have a job to do.

Right.

In reality, Zorua nods. "Right, absolute jerk he was. But-"

Swampert continues. "And don't get me started on what he does to certain pokémon that travel through here. This one time, I caught him following around a morpeko for longer than he should have. When I tried to get him to stop, he got angry at me for exposing his watch, saying that you can't trust a morpeko to not turn on you! And he has the gall to say that I believe nothing but nonsense when he-"

While it certainly didn't sound good, mostly because of all the stalking, Zorua had no idea what a morpeko even was. If the expressions on the other two mean anything, it must not be, so she frowned as well.

Then she stops faking her frown when she realizes that she was cut off. Deciding to pull this rant out back and shoot it, she said "He's dead."

"-told me that…" The larger pokémon slowed to a stop, looking back down at her with wide eyes. "What?"

Absol takes the reins from there, face mostly blank as usual. To Zorua, she almost looked relieved that the small fox cut Swampert off. "His body was discovered this morning, at the end of Booty Lane. From what Zorua and I could discern, he was murdered sometime in the night."

From the way that the swampert was ranting, she was half-expecting the woman to cheer in some small way. Right afterwards, she would probably apologize for it, seeing how this was a small town and wishing death on your neighbor is frowned upon. That, or she would apologize for seeming to look too happy for seeing someone she hated die, and it would look incriminating to do so right in front of (what Zorua is assuming they are) law enforcement. It just made sense to her, as if she's been through this song and dance before.

What she wasn't expecting was the suddenly lost look on the larger woman's face. "He was… murdered? Right here, in town?"

Absol only nodded to her.

"Oh." Slowly, the swampert slumps, the skimmer slowly slipping out of their hand and falling to the ground. "That's… do you know who killed him?"

She's trying to change the subject. A feeling told her. Trying to buy time to figure out how she feels about this situation.

This is the perfect opportunity to get neutral answers out of her. Keep her off-balance with questions and you can get what you need quickly. Another feeling advised.

Taking her internal advice, she shakes her head and starts with a half-truth. "We want to narrow down our list of suspects, and any information that you might have on his habits and routine would be helpful." She sits down, which she immediately regrets as she feels even smaller in the face of the taller woman. "Have you interacted with him recently?"

"Wha- no, no I haven't…" Swampert shakes her head. "No, I try my best to avoid his daily antics. He's not the most lovable 'mon, and if this wasn't my childhood home then I'd move just to get away from him."

Zorua nods absently, forming another question to ask her. "You said that you occasionally go up to him to stop him from doing his… stalking. Did he have any reason to go out to B-Booty Lane - excuse me - or follow someone out there?"

The frown was coming back, but she still seemed off-put by the fact someone died in town. "As I said, I don't make a habit of following him around and I haven't seen him recently. If anything, I think he tries his best to pretend that I don't exist, not after the whole phantump nonsense with my little kipper."

Seeing how she's starting to get back on her metaphorical feet, Zorua continued. "Is there anything that he might've done within the past month that was outside of his daily routine? One that doesn't involve, well, stalking people?"

Swampert started with another shake of the head. "As I said, I haven't interacted with him recently. But…" She visibly mulls it over, head rocking from side to side. "There were a couple of days where he went to Electivire's place while carrying something, but I had no idea what it was about. I've never actually seen him use many moves and I can tell he doesn't fight."

Zorua's brow furrows. "How can you tell that?"

"A zoroark came to town one day and caught him following, gave him a beating when he wouldn't stop being, you know, him. An Explorer broke up the fight, but all he did was curl up in a ball and weathered the blows." A pause. "Also, I had to confess to the Explorer that the zoroark was in the right, but that's neither here nor there."

"So…" Zorua said at length. "He was just a loser who stalked people and scares children."

Swampert didn't miss a beat. "Exactly."

Absol stepped closer. "If I'm correct, you're talking about the electivire who helps others learn moves?"

A nod from the tall woman. "That's right."

"Thank you for clarifying," Absol nods, glancing at Zorua.

That's cop for "we are going to investigate that later", if you didn't know.

Zorua thanked her feelings, then nodded to Swampert. Then, slowly, her eyes drifted over to the skimmer. "Hey, before we go back to super important investigation things," She pointed at the skimmer. "What's that about?"

"Oh, this?" She gave it a look, then seemed to notice the mess she made around herself. "Oh, I'm sorry you two- I didn't get any algae on you, did I?"

Algae. A feeling says. A simple, nonflowering, and typically aquatic plant that exists in the same group as seaweed.

…okay, didn't know why you had to tell me that.

It's educational. It replied simply.

"No, you didn't." The small fox answered. "But why the… algae pond?"

"Oh, it's nothing much," The large woman shimmies in place slightly. "It's more of a garden, really, but I just quite like the taste of it. Very healthy for me and the kipper, and easy to grow."

Slowly, she looked down at the small pile of green slime. It might've been her imagination, but she swears it twitches slightly.

Lick it.

Wha- no, I'm not going to lick the slime.

Come on… The quiet feeling says softly. She said it tastes good, and you only had a couple of berries the day before. It would be good to eat something now.

Sure enough, her stomach decided to make itself known and cause an uproar. It growled, and part of her seemed to notice the hollow feeling in her gut. She doesn't notice the odd look she gets from Absol, and the larger woman seemed to not hear a thing.

…okay, I'm a bit hungry, but I'm not going to eat floor algae.

But you need it… It says, slowly getting quieter. You'll starve yourself, lass…

"-need to be going."

"Huh, what?" Zorua's head snaps up, looking around herself.

Absol is a couple paces behind her, while Swampert seemed to try and get back to her… pond of slime. When she had her outburst, Absol turned to give her a look. "The house, Zorua. We need to keep moving."

There was a minor pause as Zorua processed the small jump in time, shaking her head slightly. Maybe she really was that hungry, but it's not like she has the money to buy anything to eat. And no matter how much her brain tries to convince her, floor slime is not something she wants to sate herself with.

"Right," She muttered, joining Absol in walking over to the creepy head house. "So, it's not Breaking and Entering if we're law officials, right?"

Absol absently nodded. "As long as we don't abuse that power, then we're fine."

Oh, we are so going to break into everything that isn't locked. A feeling says excitedly. Actually, maybe even the locked ones, too. That's where all the 'fat loot' is found, after all.

"Fat loot." She nods to herself. "Right."

"...okay." Absol gives her a side-eye, but returns her ruby gaze to the front door of Patrat's abode. Sadly, to a handful of her feeling's disappointment, Absol just pushes the door open.

I'm surprised; a man this paranoid hasn't locked his door. A feeling notes. Patrat had to have been an amateur.

I wouldn't be so sure, Another feeling counters. This strange new land we walk upon has people who can breathe fire and whatnot. What could a lock do to safeguard those who can just break a door in half?

…that's a good point, actually. Zorua mused. Locks really only stop honest people, don't they?

At this point in her internal debate, Absol makes her way inside, and Zorua didn't want to seem as if she's one to leave her partner behind. Shaking off her feelings, she strolled in after the taller woman.

The interior of Patrat's home was bland.

For one, she's starting to see a running theme for packed earth floors, because she hasn't seen a single wooden floor yet. The walls are slightly more masoned, but only to the point that the weather wouldn't break the walls down in a few months. The ceiling is also deceptively low, and for some reason she feels as if she should be ducking- despite that even Absol has enough room to stand on her hind legs and not scrape the ceiling with her horn-blade-thing. Still, unconsciously, Zorua feels herself duck down as she walks in.

There wasn't much in terms of furnishing; a brown jute rug covered about a third of the floor, and there was yet another table off to one side (she was starting to see a pattern in the one-table format, like the packed-earth-floor format) and if she was stretching the definition of 'furniture', the straw pile on the opposite side was the last of it. If she was desperate, then the red drapes covering the eye-windows of the patrat house counts as the last one- which explained the red 'eyes' of the patrat head.

I'd agree… A feeling started. But the rug really doesn't go with the drapes. I want to disagree out of pride.

Fine, the drapes don't count, then.

But we need to account for everything in the room! A different one shouts. They could be vital to the investigation- an important clue.

Okay, fine, I'll half-count the fucking drapes, then! Happy?!

Yes./Of course. They both agree.

Zorua wonders when her head started to mess with her, but that's a question for another day.

From there, there really wasn't much else. There was a clay bowl on the table, but that was as far as decoration went. She went up to the bowl, seeing the uneven brown container listing to one side, and lifted her upper half to put her forearms on the table to look inside.

Nuts. A feeling says. Looks to be about three different kinds; pistachios, peanuts and almonds.

Sure enough, a small bit of nuts were left, filled to about half full. And, going by the ratio of the three nuts, either Patrat got jipped on a deal and got mostly almonds, or he really, really doesn't like almonds. Or, well, really likes almonds instead and got some of the others for free.

Shame. The quiet feeling states. Almonds are good for lowering your blood sugar, blood pressure, and cholesterol levels. Not to mention that it helps you "mag it up" and "fibes you through the day", among other healthy vitamins.

…okay, if that isn't a sign from my stomach to eat something, then you're just a shitty voice in my head. Zorua thinks. Wait, weren't you telling me to get drunk this morning?

Yes. Getting drunk helps you deal with the shit reality throws at you, which is a very good health benefit to not perish in the face of your mental health issues and job stresses. Speaking of, why aren't you holding onto a bottle right now? You should go get one.

She narrows her eyes at the almonds. Well I haven't found a bar yet. Can't drink if I can't find one.

Maybe you should ask tall, sharp, and fluffy over there for some directions. The feeling purred.

Oh, yeah, good idea. Zorua turns her head away from the almonds, looking back to Absol- who was looking at her oddly. "Hey, is there a bar around here, Abs?"

Absol blinked once. She wasn't expecting the question. "Uh…" She glanced at the door, then back to her. "No, actually. Did you think that he frequented one?"

Ah, that would explain the almonds. A feeling, one that is fairly clear in her mind, says. Some say that cramming almonds help deal with hangovers, too.

Oh shit, really?

No.

…oh.

Zorua shakes her head. "No, but maybe he kissed the bottle at home," She pointed at the almonds. "It would explain why he has so many almonds."

"...almonds." Absol said dryly. "Why would that explain anything, exactly?"

"Because almonds supposedly help stave off hangovers."

"Ah." A pause. "...do they?"

"No."

"Ah. Okay." Another pause. "Why did you ask about the bar, then?"

Zorua shrugged. "Was thinking of getting a drink. The stress of existence kind of sucks, and my body asked for it to cure my stress."

There was a break in the conversation, one where she saw Absol freeze for a moment. Before she could wonder if she crossed some sort of line about mentioning her 'problems', Absol slowly leveled a glare at her.

Ah, I should have mentioned this, but…

But what? Zorua gains a sudden feeling of anxiousness, and it took a great feeling to keep herself composed. What should you have mentioned?

So. Alcohol, right? It can help you relax, but it also has the issue of turning you into a useless delinquent whenever you imbibe the concoction. You know, what you shouldn't be doing while on the job.

Ah. I see. Zorua lets the quaking of her limbs happen, in that case. I might have made a mistake.

"You," Absol said slowly. "Are not going to get drunk on the job."

Zorua tried to think fast, which ended up with her voice coming out much louder than she intended. "Joking! That was a joke- I'm not a delinquent!" She starts to smile nervously, her lips twitching. "My brain is just full of practical jokes, you know?! Oh, classic whispers in the back of your mind tempting you to do things that aren't good for you, haha!"

Then, to her utter horror, the nervous smile on her face starts to fall into the horrid Expression. The painful face of a lost woman plasters itself onto Zorua's own visage, and now she has to live with the consequences of having terrible facial expressions.

Coward, The whispering feeling hisses. You should go and get drunk, NOW!

NO! She shouts back at it. I don't wanna disappoint Absol! She's so cool and stuff, you don't disappoint cool people!

Coward… It hissed one last time, before going quiet.

There's one final stretch of a few seconds, one where Absol looks at The Expression with that glare of hers, before she relents. "Okay. Just try to keep those "jokes" of yours to a minimum."

"Deal!" She says through The Expression, trying her best to peel it off of her face. "I like being sober and eating almonds!"

As if to show her newfound love for nuts, she buries her face into the bowl of mostly-almonds.

The almonds were not salted, nor roasted. In fact, none of the nuts have salt or are roasted, and might in fact be a bit too stale. It was hell in her mouth, but she persevered to keep her cover up.

She heard Absol sigh. "Anyways…" A shuffling sound of claws on packed earth. "This might have been an uninformative trip. I don't see any written paraphernalia, nor anything else. It's just so…"

Plain. A feeling says.

Zorua lifts her head. "Plain?"

"Yes, exactly," Absol nodded, her body turned to observe the room. "Other than the decoration there's nothing. I was hoping that someone as paranoid as Patrat would have some hint inside of his home, but perhaps he doesn't appear to be as bespoken to keeping physical items."

Zorua furrows her brow. "Well, sure, but maybe he just has it hidden around or something? He could have buried something out back, or has someone he trusts hold onto something."

Absol gives her a sideways look. "Do you think Sunflora kept more information from us?"

Zorua didn't immediately think so, so she asked her feelings on the matter.

One piped up immediately. I don't believe so. She was honest enough with everything, and the part she wasn't honest with directly involved you. If there are any more details, it's probably what kind of slurs Patrat called you.

Oh joy, slurs, my favorite. Zorua thought glumly.

"Not unless I feel like expanding my vocabulary on how to insult myself, and I don't need help with that. As for the possibility of him burying something, somewhere, that's something I'm all for."

Absol let her head tilt to the side in thought. "...that could be a possibility. I don't know why he would, but it wouldn't hurt to look."

And so the two went back outside - Swampert was still messing around with the algae pond, for some reason - and the two split to investigate the ground around the house. They scoured the earth for about fifteen minutes, but when neither of them could see any signs of disrupted earth they reconvened at the entryway.

Zorua was extremely put off by this. "Damnit, I was hoping for buried loot."

Absol sighed. Again. "We are not going to loot Patrat's items. It's evidence, if we find any, and we are going to call it evidence."

"Okay, okay, I hear you," Zorua frowned. "Still, I thought there would be something. There's no way he isn't hiding some sort of dark secret in his basement."

"Basement?"

"Metaphorically speaking, I mean."

"Ah."

"Right. So," Zorua peeked back inside, beginning to mutter to herself. "If I was into super secret hidey holes, where would I put said hole?"

Her eyes roam over the interior once more, scanning the bland clay walls and dirty dirt floors. There was something off about the place, so much so that even Absol was sensing it. The minimalism didn't seem to fit the mental profile that she was building for him, but yet again he could have thrown a curveball at her and be such a clean freak that he keeps his one room excessively clean.

Unless there's more than one room he owns…

Ah, you're onto something there. A feeling agrees.

Still, there's nothing to show for it here. It's all just one room, everything easily visible and made to be… huh.

She looks at the arrangement of the furnishings- minus the drapes. The rug is in the exact center of the room, with the table and bed at direct opposite ends of the room. Not only was it easy to see every feature she needs to see, it fits in an almost perfect line. If she had a protractor, she could probably see if the rug was perfectly parallel to the entrance or not, but it looks even enough…

You're beginning to see it, Detective, The feeling says. The metaphorical writing on the walls. Obsessively clean paws; perfectly organized, minimal furnishings; even the position of the drapes tell us something about Patrat.

What, that he has OCD or something?

Correct, Detective. The feeling swells with pride.

…okay, nice to know, I guess. Zorua turns to Absol. "I think he has OCD, or something."

Somehow, yet again, she managed to bring out more than a blank stare from the stoic blade-dog. There is a visibly bewildered look on her face as she turns to the shorter fox. "He has a what?"

"OCD," She says slowly. "Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder. He has oddly clean paws, and all of his furnishings are arranged to be parallel with each other instead of being tastefully placed. If he was even a little bit more decorative, he'd probably choose something that isn't jute for a rug, for one," She waves her paws at the drapes. "I'd probably grab something that'll look better with those, honestly."

"..." Absol in quiet as she takes in the room once again, squinting at the three main pieces of furniture. "...that's an absurd way to put it. And why did you call it oh-sea-dee in the first place?"

Zorua feels her brows furrow. "It's an acronym. First letters of the words go into it, so you just say the letters in order of the words. Like," She looks down at the dirt path outside the door and shuffles over to it. With a claw, she puts it down to the ground-

Normal, or cursive?

Normal: I don't want to show off.

Aw…

-and draws out the letters 'O', 'C' and 'D' from top to bottom, then quickly spells out the words next to it. Over her shoulder, she could feel Absol looking down at her handiwork.

When she finishes, she points at the first bit. "See? Didn't know I had to spell it out to you, but it's probably something that's common from where I'm from… wherever that is. Do you get it?"

Zorua looked up to the taller woman, a small smile on her face at showing someone a new thing about her possible past that's locked behind a fog of amnesia.

The smile falls off when she only sees confusion written clearly on Absol's blue face.

"What?"

"...this isn't Pawprint."

"...I mean," Zorua looks down at her paws. "I wrote it out with my paws."

"That-" Another sigh. "That's not what I mean, Zorua. I'm saying that this isn't Pawprint, the alphabet."

Is she calling you illiterate? A feeling says. Because it sounds like she's calling you illiterate.

"I'm not illiterate." She says with a frown.

"I'm not saying that you are!" Absol exclaimed, then pointed at the words in the dirt. "I'm saying that you wrote that with an entirely different script."

"Oh." She looks down at the words she just wrote. "...well that sucks. What does Pawprint look like?"

Absol, with much less dexterity than Zorua thanks to her larger claws, drew something in the dirt next to what Zorua wrote. It looked a lot like a series of scratches, one that an animal could make with a claw. And, after a moment, Zorua's feelings noticed something.

It's not meant to be dexterous.

What do you mean?

Both your own paws and Absol's aren't as mobile as, say, a hand's would be. It's meant to work if one lacks the advanced appendages that a hand owns.

Absol pointed at the 'pawprint' writing. "That's what we use around here. Can you understand it?"

Zorua looks down at the writing.

The jumbled mess of scratches stare back up at her.

"...no?"

Absol's face went through a complicated series of micro-changes in emotions, ones which even her feelings couldn't keep up with.

Unfortunately, Zorua probably knows what the issue is. "So I'm not illiterate," She waves a paw between the two sets of scripts. "Just functionally illiterate. Fantastic. Awesome, even."

"...we should get back to the investigation. Or," Absol turns to the open door. "What's left of Patrat's home, anyway."

She's giving you an out of this awkward conversation. You should take it.

"Right, right," Zorua turns away from the writing on the floor, not caring in the least that she stepped on her hard work. "So we have a neat freak in the extreme, and his throat was slit in the middle of the night, and that it was probably done by someone who really doesn't like the fact that he stalks people at night. At the moment, if we don't get a sudden plot twist of Swampert being the killer, we have no suspects of those who dislike him enough to rant about him."

"We also know that the attack was Normal in nature, and that the killer can cause Psychic meddlings, too. At least we don't have to worry about the Psychic part, if we find them." Absol adds.

"Right, so we're just-" Zorua paused. Blinked once. "What do you mean that we don't have to worry about Psychic stuff?"

"...Dark types are immune to Psychic."

"Ah." She looks to the entryway. "Right. Didn't know that."

"Right."

"Mhm."

In the ensuing awkward silence, Zorua busies herself with looking over the room again. Sure, it's organized and all, and they have some extra information on what Patrat is like, but there should've been something in here. The two of them didn't come all the way out here for something so little; they're on a time limit, and knowing the victim's poor choice of furniture isn't going to point them to the killer. If only she could tell what was wrong with the whole picture so she doesn't leave feeling so empty-handed.

Ask, and you shall receive.

Suddenly, a familiar, cool sensation washes over her mind. The colors of the world seem to gray out, leaving only the details that she's noticed. All of the furniture - including the drapes - are left with whorls of blue and yellow accenting them. It almost looks like they were painted onto the world, just for her to notice them.

Welcome to being 'In The Zone', Detective. Be careful; you can still screw this up, but focusing like this should help.

Her eyes darted over the room, organizing her thoughts. The bed seemed normal, but with this new clarity washing over her she noticed how… fresh it looked. As if the straw was placed there this morning.

Maybe he's an insomniac- no. Her eyes squint. He doesn't sleep there, does he?

It does look entirely undisturbed, The feeling mused. Perhaps it's just for show, and he sleeps elsewhere?

Zorua points to the bed. "He doesn't sleep in that bed. It looks too fresh."

Absol made a neutral humming sound, but didn't make any further comments.

Zorua puts her paw down and continues to look around the room. The table was next, with the bowl of nuts sitting on top. The lopsided, strangely placed bowl.

Not strangely placed.

Why's that?

Sometimes, a bowl is just a bowl. But the fact that it leans like that probably drives him up the wall.

Right, it would. So why does he keep it around?

Why would anyone keep something that doesn't fit them around- for a reason. A reason that'll show you the way forward.

So the bowl is hiding something. It's one of the key elements to this puzzle, right?

Correct. Now keep looking while you're on a roll.

And so Zorua did, looking to the last two parts of the room: the rug, and the drapes.

…I know that it has nothing to do with this investigation, but I really hate how that doesn't match. It just rubs me the wrong way.

Maybe it's for some other unknown purpose, like the bowl on the table?

Maybe. And even if it doesn't match the drapes, I just don't like the fact that it's sat right in the middle of the room. It needs more asymmetry.

…or you could take the rug. The guy's dead, what's he going to do about it?

Zorua thinks about that, perhaps for too long.

…I'll ask around, see if he has next of kin. If not, that rug's mine. Even if it's jute…

Score, sïster. The twitchy feeling cheers softly.

…right. The sharper feeling sounds disappointed. Well, if you must, it wouldn't hurt to place it in a better location in the meantime. How about rolling it up to the back?

Sounds good.

Without another word, Zorua walks back inside the house-head. She stops at the rug, then fiddles with it with her paws to try and flip it over.

Zorua hears Absol walk up next to her. "What are you doing?"

"Moving the rug," She grunts, muttering a curse as the corner flips oddly. "I hate how it's placed, I want to move it. Maybe everything will look better when it's moved."

There's another judging pause from Absol, one that almost (almost) had Zorua second-guessing herself.

"...alright."

Zorua, for the first time in a while, sighs. "I know it's weird, but I can't think right when it's just sitting there. Half my thoughts just want me to steal rugs and drink wine, while the other half spout facts about mental disorders and nutrition." She finally gets the rug rolled just right, so all she has to do is push it with a paw and move after it. "It's starting to get annoying, but at least I can remove some problems easily."

"...I can only imagine." Absol says dryly.

"Well it's easy for you to say, miss 'I have all of my memories and cool moves and ability to be normal around-'"

Her paw catches on something, stubbing it inwards with a small knock.

"-ffffffffUCKing…" She jerks backwards, bringing the digit up to her mouth. "...ow?"

There should've only been dirt floors here. Mostly flat, packed earth covering the foundation. The only oddities were the rug, table and bed. Nothing should be here to hurt her paws.

She looks down at where she stubbed her paw. Right along the edge of the half rolled-up rug, covering about half the distance of said edge, is wood. It… doesn't look well taken care of, but it's such a stark difference to all of the dirt that she's seen that it gives her whiplash for a moment. A glance to Absol shows her looking down at it oddly, too.

Without another word, both of them roll the rug off, revealing-

"A trap door?" Zorua said blankly. "Really?"

A square frame of wood, holding a trap door. It's almost entirely sunken into the floor, but there's just enough for her to trip her paws over it when she was trying to roll the rug off of it.

"...this feels too cliche, but I was asking for something more."

"I'm surprised that it really was something buried," Absol said, staring at the closed frame. "You were adamant about it being something he dug out, too. Ironic, no?"

"Yes. Very." She looks down at it. "Alright, how're we going to open this without grippers?"

The answer, funnily enough, lied with Absol. The latch had a small loop to use, but it was too small for Zorua's paw to enter and lift. What it wasn't too small for was the tip of Absol's horn-blade. Working together, Zorua helped her line it up to the latch, then Absol easily lifted up the door, resting it against the mostly rolled-up rug. Both of them looked down the open trap door.

A basement greeted them.

"...I'm so fucking smart."

Absol gave her a dry look. "You found this by accident."

"Still found it, Abs." It wasn't a far drop, so she started to shimmy herself to the edge. "That makes me the smartest."

A short drop down, followed by Absol, revealed… well, it felt more like a fallout shelter than a basement, but even worse somehow with only carved dirt surrounding them. But there was so much more than just dirt. The ceiling was short, forcing Absol to half-crawl around, but the walls were entirely lined with burlap sacks. The smell down here was an assault of salts and spices, which told her that it was a bunch of food inside of them. Next was another bed of straw in the corner, surrounded by more sacks of preserved food, and a wooden crate that looked odd to her. The straw bed itself seemed much more compressed than the one upstairs.

He slept in his secret basement, hidden away from the world as his last sanctuary.

The last thing that stood out to her was yet another table- breaking the one table per building rule she was getting used to. For one, it had more than a bowl of nuts on it. There were stacks of paper and an inkwell, with an odd black feather set next to the ink. On the table itself are an assortment of oddities, too: an old, worn, green-ish scarf; a pile of large seeds with one halfway eaten; and a thin chrome disk with a hole in the middle.

Zorua decides to break the quiet examination first. "Guess he was a pack rat after all."

"Indeed," Absol took in a breath. "Seemed like he was preparing for a disaster of some kind. Why else would he hoard food like this?"

Because he's a greedy little fuck. A feeling growls.

"Because he's a greedy little fuck," She parrots with much less malice. "Or maybe he knows something we don't."

"Maybe."

"Now what I want to know," Zorua trots over to the table and sits up, putting her paws on the edge to lift her head over the side. "Is what he's been writing. This is the sort of clue I've been waiting for."

She hears Absol crawl over to loom over her shoulder, but the pale fox is zeroing in on the papers. The stack is left in the open, but they appear to be left upside down, so she drags off one page and carefully flips it over to read it.

A somewhat familiar mess of ink greets her. One that looks like an animal went ham with their claws on it.

It appears to be inscribed in Pawprint

"...fuck." Zorua slumps. "Pawprint."

It takes a moment for Absol to look over the page with her, but a concerning hum greets her ears first. It makes one of Zorua's ears twitch from the proximity.

It makes you want to quiver.

Zorua wonders why her breath hitches, so she starts breathing manually.

"It's… certainly written in Pawprint," She says slowly. "But it's just a bunch of nonsense."

"What do you mean?"

"It's…" Zorua watches one of Absol's paws dig into the dirt as the larger woman thinks. "It almost looks like it wants to be a poem of some kind, but whatever it's supposed to mean escapes me."

Zorua blinks, then looks down at the ink-marked paper. "Kinda wish I could read Pawprint; it sounds interesting," Then she frowns. "Actually, no, nevermind. I don't know what kind of poetics a racist like Patrat waxes, if you know what I mean."

"That could be true…" Absol says, still looking over the paper. She must've finished, because she delicately used a claw to flip over another piece of paper. It reveals nothing new to Zorua. "But… yeah, this one's just like the last one. They're numbered, too, but there's a few repeats so I can't tell what they mean."

Zorua's frown deepened. There definitely was something off with the papers, but not knowing the written language is going to be a roadblock for her. "Can we pass these off to the Guild, see if anyone can make any sense of it? Every little bit helps."

A third paper joins the upright crew, but Absol only scans the page for a few seconds before nodding. "I can't make any sense of it, but with a request like this the Wigglytuff Guild can have someone look these over."

Maybe Chatot? He seemed to be the kind of bird to like paper.

Zorua considered the thought, then floated it Absol's way. The blade-dog shrugged- which was odd, considering her crouched position. "Maybe, I don't know. I'm from another guild entirely, and I don't know the inner workings of Wigglytuff's very well."

With that settled, Absol busied herself with carefully putting the papers into her shoulder bag. Zorua, meanwhile, looked over the rest of the contents of the table. The disk was odd, considering that it seems to be the most modern thing in the entire town. It almost looks like some kind of plastic, frail and thin with a false metallic sheen to it. The scarf, on the other hand, caught her eye more somehow. It was old, that was for certain; the material is thin in some places, and stretched oddly. Zorua bets that if she were to lay it out flat, it would probably be very uneven.

But, when the light coming from the open trapdoor hits it, it seems to almost sparkle slightly. She squinted at it, but she can't seem to find any sort of glitter or added material that would explain the scarf's properties.

Oh ho, is that what I think it is? A feeling swells.

What, is it special in some way?

Oh yes, sïster, it's very special. This scarf right here? The one hidden away like a little treasure that you dug up?

Yeah?

It. Is. Loot.

The very word send her skin crawling, as if a breeze suddenly sent a shiver-

(-Smell Of Cologne Clinged To It Like A Tick But The Cloth Waves In The Spring Wind As She Leaned In Closer And-)

-down her spine. Here it was: the promised fat loot that she was really, truly looking for. All of the investigation, all of the hard work looking at corpses and buildings, all of the horrid people that she had to deal with (except Abs, she's cool) led to this very moment in her career.

A weird, well-worn scarf that sparkles.

Mine.

It took a minute, but she silently put the scarf around her neck. It was awkward to work it around her mane, seeing how it was basically a natural scarf of its own, but she managed to pat it down enough to throw it over top of it. She had to incorporate an extra loop, seeing how it was much longer and seemed to be sized for someone twice her size. It might've fit Absol perfectly, but goddammit this scarf was her score!

After it settled itself onto her shoulders, she drank in the feeling of clothing on her body and felt a rightness settle over her.

Mmm… A feeling hums. It appears we are a creature of fashion. It really does feel good to wear clothes. Maybe wear some more, see if it works out for you.

Yes, sïster, The clingy feeling agrees. More clothes means you own more stuff, and being dressed means that you get to own the illusion of 'having money' and 'being able to eat food every day consistently'.

Zorua nods, agreeing with her feelings. "I'm a fashion goddess. A hybrid Detective-Fashion deity."

"...I'm going to ignore you stealing that from the murder victim." Absol says, having finished stuffing away the papers. Oddly, the quill was stuffed away too.

She has a desire for loot, too. Don't worry about snitching, sïster.

Zorua nods, then looks at the weird disc. "So, what's that thing?"

Absol follows her gaze, then does a visible double-take. "A TM? What is Patrat doing with one of those?"

Zorua feels the familiar feeling of confusion. "This is one of those things I don't know, isn't it?"

"Yes- well, considering your lack of knowledge on how to use a move, I wouldn't expect you to know what a TM is, either," Absol leans in close, a single claw carefully picking it up and beginning to make room for the disc in her bag. "It can teach a pokémon how to use the move that it's set to, but you have to get it appraised to see what sort of move is on it, then see if you are capable of learning it in the first place. It didn't look used, so either he was saving it for something, or Patrat got his paws on a move that he couldn't learn."

As Absol kept talking, Zorua's intrigue kept climbing higher. That dinky little thing of plastic could teach her a move? What, does it magically speak to you the wonders of Moves and tell you how to do a specific move? It didn't seem to do anything by looking at it, so how does it work?

You need it.

The feeling was that whispering, compulsive one. She let her brows furrow as she saw Absol try to make room in her bag for the disc. Why's that?

You know that you're weak. You can barely run down the street without getting tired. You can't make any Moves magic happen. You're a detriment to Absol, being so weak.

Hey, I'm not a detriment! I do all the cool investigation stuff, and she said she's usually the muscle anyways!

But she still looked put-off when you said you knew none. You need to know how to attack, to defend yourself.

And Absol said she was good enough, now shut up so I can-

What if you need to defend her?

Unbidden, the idea of a crimson smile opening up the blade-dog's neck crosses her mind. Zorua tried to shake it off-

What if the killer went for Shinx? He lives outside of town; it would be easy to miss him for a whole week before someone finds the body.

A red smear, trailing off a dirt path she walked yesterday that led to a horrible stench of old meat.

S-stop-

What about Litleo? Nobody likes him in this town, he said so himself. Nobody would miss him.

(Her Voice Was Raw As She Screamed _ Name. Her _, Her Sweet _ _, It Shouldn't Have Happened Like This. It Was All Her Fault That M_ Was-)

Zorua shivered.

…

"Hey Abs?"

"Hm?" Absol looked up from her bag, then lowered her head when her blade scratched some dirt off of the ceiling. She shook off the loose dirt. "What is it?"

"What's on the TM?"

Absol gave a half-hearted shrug. "I don't know. It has to be appraised by someone who knows how to teach moves."

Zorua sits, letting one of her front paws lie onto the other. The claws start to dig into the other paw. "Is there someone like that around here?"

"If I'm right, then Electivire might be able to. He's someone that's known Patrat recently, so maybe he can tell us more about the TM."

"Right, that's a good idea. We should go there next."

"Sure," Absol finally closed up her bag, then started to crawl over to the trap door. "We have plenty of time today before we can return to the Guild for the papers. Now let me get out of here, it's too small here."

Zorua nodded, waiting for Absol to leap out first before scrambling out herself. Neither of them bothered with closing the trap door, nor the rug that was rolled up halfway. The most either of them did for courtesy was close the door behind them when they left the house.

Zorua's eyes never left the bag.