HUNTER’S GUILD:  LENS FLARE

DATE JOINED ||  April 6th, 2014
CURRENT FUNDS ||  0✪
MERITS ||  0
STRIKES ||  0

---

CORIANDER

POKEMON SPECIES ||  chimchar
NATURE ||  careful
CHARACTERISTIC ||  alert to sounds
GENDER ||  female
AGE ||  16
ABILITY ||  blaze

STRENGTH ||  [X] [X] [  ] [  ] [  ]
AGILITY ||  [X] [X] [X] [  ] [  ]
INTELLIGENCE ||  [X] [X] [X] [  ] [  ]
CHARISMA ||  [X] [X] [  ] [  ] [  ]

POINTS REMAINING  ||  2
TYPE BONUS ||  [ fire ] > [ charisma ]

MOVESET ||
Flamethrower
Acrobatics
Dig
Overheat

INVENTORY

  TEMPLATE SHAWL
         a brown shawl. it looks rather well-worn and is fraying at the edges.

  ITEM 2
         description

  ITEM 3
         description

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DUSK

POKEMON SPECIES ||  sableye
NATURE ||  rash
CHARACTERISTIC ||  very finicky
GENDER ||  male
AGE ||  adult (??? years)
ABILITY ||  keen eye

STRENGTH ||  [X] [  ] [  ] [  ] [  ]
AGILITY ||  [X] [X] [X][X] [  ]
INTELLIGENCE ||  [X] [X] [X] [X] [  ]
CHARISMA ||  [X] [  ] [  ] [  ] [  ]

POINTS REMAINING ||  2
TYPE BONUS ||  [ dark/ghost ] > [ intelligence ]

MOVESET ||
Hone Claws
Poison Jab
Shadow Claw
Sucker Punch


INVENTORY

  TEMPLATE ARMBAND
         a simple black armband Coriander picked out for him. he has a tendency to chew on it.

  ITEM 2
         description

  ITEM 3
         description

---

Café Obscurité. Coriander shivered as she hesitated at the door. She had never dreamed of stepping foot in such an acclaimed (and expensive) establishment, much less receiving an invitation, so she had nearly died of shock when the desk clerk had directed her to meet with a representative in only the ritziest restaurant in town. Apparently the Hunters had a reputation to maintain as the classiest guild in Andalusst. She prayed that they didn’t expect her to foot the bill.

The chimchar felt a pull on her cloak, and she turned to meet the blank gaze of her companion. Dusk stared for a moment before gesturing to the sidewalk; Coriander was holding up the line, and a queue stretched at least fifteen Pokémon long behind them. Many of the patrons wore glares.

“Oh, I’m sorry!” she said hastily. “I’ll just--I’ll go in now.” She hurried through the doors and away from the heated looks that followed her, Dusk trailing after.

Coriander was immediately met with the aroma of sauteéd berries and fried chanterelles, and it was all she could do not to drool. Dusk didn’t seem impressed, although in hindsight that wasn’t very surprising. She doubted they served sapphire over obsidian here.

As she was distracted, a bisharp approached with a none-too-patient expression.

“Miss?”

She jumped, clutching her cloak closer around her shoulders. This must be their maître d' for tonight, she realized, and it dawned on her she’d been standing in the middle of the room gaping like an idiot for some time. Coriander rather felt like sinking into the floor. “Y-Yes?”

“I’m afraid we are booked at this time unless you have a reservation.”

“Oh, um…” What name would the Hunters guild put them under? More importantly, why hadn’t they told her what to say? She looked to Dusk for assistance, but he was no help; he was looking blankly at a spot on the wall. “W-we’re Team Lens Flare. We’re here to meet with a representative…?”

He glanced at his paper for a moment, and when he looked up he was marginally less cold. “Of course. This way.”

The bisharp guided them to a table at the rear of the restaurant, tucked in a remote corner where the occupants were not easily seen. It was already attended by a furret wearing a navy newsboy cap--the representative. Coriander thought he looked vaguely familiar, but she couldn’t place him.

When he saw them approach, he grinned slyly and waved the bisharp off. “Hey, pull up a seat. Order your favorites; this one’s on the Guild’s checkbook.”

Well, that was a relief, at least. Guild’s checkbook, eh? She wondered if the Hunters often made a habit of blowing their money on new recruits. With that thought, Coriander seated herself and folded her cloak neatly on her lap while Dusk took the chair closest to the wall.

Not a moment after they had situated themselves, their waiter arrived and began to pass out an ornately-decorated menu. The representative didn’t so much as glance at his before pushing it back. “The usual,” he said flippantly. The empoleon rolled his eyes in a decidedly unprofessional manner and turned to the pair of newcomers. Coriander was puzzled by their dynamic; he was a regular? Why treat him so...rudely? Not that he was bothered, but...

Keenly feeling the waiter waiting for her order, the chimchar opened the menu...and blanched at the prices. All those star coins...She should order the least expensive item on the menu, she knew, but she was hungry and even the appetizers were in the double digits. At length, she chose something relatively middle-of-the-range. “I suppose...I’ll have the butter-roasted aguav and fried polenta, please.”

“Certainly. And for you, sir?”

He was addressing Dusk, who had not so much as touched the menu. Rather, he was worryingly fixated on the water glasses.

“Um, with all due respect, sir, I don’t think you serve anything he’s interested in,” Coriander said by way of apology, reaching over and moving his glass so he wouldn’t get any ideas. It must have been crystal.

The empoleon didn’t look particularly put-out, but he shot the furret a dirty look before making his way to the kitchens.

Said furret was unfazed. “No sense of humor,” he remarked, slumping in his seat and staring off into space. He appeared to be one step away from propping his paws up on the table.

After what felt like an unbearably long silence in which Coriander played with her utensils, he finally spoke. “The name’s Cuffin, but I’m sure you’ve already heard of me.”

The chimchar hadn’t, but she didn’t say so. “Pleasure to meet you, sir. I’m--”

“Ah, no need for introductions on your part. I already know who ya are.” He waved dismissively. Coriander let the words drop, a little unnerved. Had he somehow gotten his paws on their application, perhaps? He was a Hunters representative, so maybe they’d given it to him as an overview of the Pokémon he would be speaking with. She hadn’t quite gotten her thoughts together when he went on: “So I work for this kid, Sundance. He made me promise to ask ya a few things before I go off on my own thing. He’ll get his feathers in a bunch if I don’t, so humor me. First thing’s first: why do you wanna join the Hunters?”

He recited this spiel with exaggerated intonation. Just a hunch, but Coriander figured he wasn’t at all pleased to be conducting these interviews.

As for the question...she had considered it, and often, but joining the Hunter’s guild was Dusk’s ambition, not hers. She looked to him to answer, but he didn’t seem at all involved in the conversation. He was staring at the water glasses again.

Haltingly, she said, “Well, um...Dusk wanted to, I don’t know why. I’m just here to help him get reintegrated into society.”

That likely wasn’t a reason Cuffin was looking for, but at least he appeared interested. “All right. That’s respectable, I guess. Down the list…”

He picked up a piece of slightly wrinkled parchment, as though to read, but after squinting at it for only a few seconds he promptly crumpled it up and tossed it over his shoulder. Coriander resisted the urge to leave her seat to pick it up--no wonder the waiter wasn’t overly fond of him.

“Okay. What can you bring to the Hunters? What skills or talents can you utilize for us?” His tone was still mocking. She tried not to take it personally.

“Um, Dusk is good at creeping around unnoticed, and he can find gems very well. I…” She faltered. “...can dig well? For...treasure...and things…” Hunters were interested in treasure, weren’t they? That’s why they were called Hunters.

“Yeah, yeah, I gotcha. I guess we’ll get to see some of that soon enough.” Cuffin looked rather bored now; Coriander shrunk a little in her seat. Then, as though he saw her dismay (or perhaps this was just more recitation), he added, “Don’t get me wrong; your answer doesn’t mean you’re gonna get taken or thrown out. This is basically...formalities. Yeah, formalities. I think that’s the word he used. Whatever that means.”

Quite randomly, or at least so it seemed to Coriander, he grinned slyly and lowered his voice. “This one’s more interestin’, to the little guy’s credit. Are you against doin’ things that the Royal Guard ain’t gonna like if they catch ya doin’ em?”

The chimchar stayed silent. How was she supposed to answer that? She couldn’t...the Royal Guard…

To her surprise, Dusk spoke for the first time all evening. “No.”

There was a pause, and Cuffin’s ears twitched. “It ain’t me, just sayin’,” he explained at length. “I know well enough that if yer here, then you an’ I are prolly already aware of the answer to that question. I just needed somethin’ to tell the kid.”

All at once, the atmosphere lightened, and the furret tossed his hands in the air. “Whew. All right, enough of that stuff. The kid is on the right track, but sometimes it seems like the royals crammed a stick really far up there, if ya know what I mean. All these ‘formalities’ and junk...anyway, the rest is straight from me.”

Coriander was tempted to remark that he really enjoyed harping on these “formalities,” but she wasn’t able to get a word in before he said, with the first hint of sincerity that he’d displayed in the entire interview, “You already know the basic stuff, so I’m gonna level with ya. Truth is, the Hunters are all about knowin’ things about everybody else. Yer gonna learn secrets that nobody else will know. It’ll change the way you look at this whole city, and yer prolly not gonna like what you see, but you’ll always know what’s goin’ on under the coat of sugar.” He leaned forward over the table, looking at her directly with those odd eyes. “I wouldn’t blame ya if you’d rather go hang with a Guild that doesn’t deal in the worst of what Andalusst can offer.”

There was nothing for Coriander to say to that. She was tempted, sorely tempted, to hang the damn thing and go to the Researchers like she initially planned. But...she wasn’t like that. She sighed. “No. I’m...I’m already committed to this.”

She didn’t know if he was fooled by her lukewarm response, but maybe, maybe, he felt an ounce of sympathy for her, because he jumped immediately back to the jolly, somewhat irritating fellow he was at the beginning. “Is that so? Well...to be honest, I would’ve blamed ya, actually,” he joked. Coriander squirmed in her seat. “Who doesn’t wanna know everything about everybody? Life is all about keepin’ yer options as open as possible ‘til the right moment.”

At that moment, the waiter (finally) returned, saving the chimchar from responding. He put down the platters with a clatter, Cuffin’s last. Coriander thought he looked tempted to upend it over his head. She wasn’t too surprised.

As the empoleon wandered off, the furret focused on them once again. “Before we eat…” He held up a glass--Dusk’s. “Let’s toast, to the new recruits!” Cuffin leaned conspiratorially over the table. “...That’s you, just so ya know.”

Coriander lifted her water glass, and Dusk did the same with what was technically Cuffin’s. “To us,” she said softly. Dusk said nothing.

They clinked their glasses together, and then, to her horror and Cuffin’s amusement, Dusk tipped the glass and the entire thing, expensive crystal and all, disappeared into his mouth. The furret exploded into uproarious laughter.

As Dusk crunched at his (expensive!) treat, Coriander turned helplessly to Cuffin, eyes wide.

“Y-You don’t suppose the Guild will pay for that, do you?”