Giovanni and his faithful pet dog were almost always late. It wasn't a large deal when the annoying midget dragged her overly exhausted trainer through the doorway and pushed her into a chair. It wasn't a large deal. They were a minute late and Mika knew that Sonechka, the poor girl who was sipping at coffee and trying to stay upright, knew that factor as well. It suprised her, as an eye opened and drifted towards the vocal slaughter going on between Amethyst, (Parse if her memory served her correctly) and Jade, (Khael, wasn't it?) that this girl, Parse, was so overtly concerned with people's timely arrival when it was obvious she should know that Giovanni was never on time to a single bloody event.
Sighing, she pulled herself up out of her chair and, after placing her hands on the table for a moment, listening to the crap being slung back and forth. Khael had a point. It was well known he had a togepi that he doted on near constantly and infants, be them humans or pokemon, don't like to always stay asleep when they should as their little tummies or other various baby parts say otherwise and, as they aren't exactly the vocal type, this can cause them to cry uncontrollably until these demands are met. The overall disproval wasn't what was starting to wear on the exausted girl's nerves however, but the comment that such an 'obnoxious' little thing should be just shoved in computer storage. The key dangling over her hands, she stared at it for a moment before her eyes narrowed and, raising her hands up slightly, she slammed them down, rather hard, her eyes opening to stare at the duo, a bit of amber flare trickling behind them, "Parse, I suggest you keep your mouth shut on topics you cannot possibly comprehend as you have never experienced raising a pokemon from a hatchling and therefore do not understand the energy that a child can draw out of its parent simply by existing." Sighing, she sat back down, flopping back against the chair, "My father is late. He's always late. All of you who arrived a tad on the late side, I understand it is early, I dislike these morning meetings as much as the next person and I appreciate the effort you took to get out here. Just relax for a moment, and-"
The door behind the largest chair, the chair of Giovanni himself, cracked open, and Mika tiled her head, straightening herself up before her hands fell to her sides and there was an obvious look of disgust and shock all over her face as, instead of Giovanni and a Persion slipping into the light, it was a man who looked nothing like Giovanni at all, a man almost twice her height that was walking past the doorway directly towards her with a giddy little smile on his face. Dressed in a pair of black dress slacks, shiny black dress shoes and a black shirt matched with a stunningly bright silver tie, the long black haired man whose hair was pulled tightly into a professional looking ponytail at the nape of his neck, was a bit out of place in this room, as to those who did not know him as the master's pet dog would be slightly confused why, when all the chairs were full aside from Giovanni's, there was a random man who looked seemingly like a mobster with the silver ring on his hand in the room.
With a smirk, he tucked a stray hair behind his ear and stepped up behind the obviously displeased to see him Emerald, leaning down, his lips just inches from her ear as he spoke almost silently into it, causing the girl to lightly flinch once before shooing him away with a pinch to his nose, her face slightly flushed with embarassment, "What do you mean he's not coming?"
Raising his hands in the air, he shook his head flippantly before crossing, sitting down in Giovanni's chair with a little flourish, crossing his legs and tapping his fingers together in a random order, laughing lightly, "Nono children, Giovanni decided he wasn't going to get up this fine morning and put me in charge of your briefing instead. Isn't that just lovely?" His smile faded, his amber eyes flickering behind the wire rimmed half glasses as he sat forward, "So let's get down to buisness, shall we? First off, let me introduce myself." he cleared his throating mockingly, "I am Dr Double Master Kain Soliony Ivanhov-Sensei, chief scientist of Rocket Enterprises and the surrogate owner of your souls when the master is away. But you can call me Kain or Dr Romano. You, my beloved little gems, are the best that Rocket has to offer, you, my beloved little gems, are the strongest force here. You come from your own areas of expertise, the Tactician, Lady Parse for example who has devised methods to crack even the most uncrackable bases to steal technology and the, well, I like to call him my ickle little Hot Shot, the brutal Khael if you don't mind me saying so, by far one of the strongest trainers Rocket has even seen, able to defeat the Elite Four, if he wanted, without breaking a sweat. I could go on and on about most of you if I had the time but, sadly, i don't."
Coughing, he took a swig from the flask, what was in it wasn't certain, from his belt and smirked, sighing softly before standing, snapping his fingers to reveal a hologram of the Johto Region, "This is Johto. I know, I know, basic primary school knowledge, but these-" he pulled his hands together and out, a small holographic keyboard appearing under his fingers. Tapping a few keys, six indicaitors appeared on the map at eight locations, the Burned Tower, the Dark Cave, the Whirl Islands, Mt Mortar, the Ruins of Alph, the Lake of Rage and the Dragon's Den, "Are the locations of Ancient Seals. Ever heard the story? of the tree that used to exist on the top of Mt Silver? It's said that if you unlock the eight seals on each main island and the four seals on the hidden continents, you will unlock the doorway, given you have a Chosen amongst you, to the sacred tree. That tree will give you the power to control things beyond what human minds can grasp conceptually as, if one could find a way to control the tree, the tree that fills the whole bloody world with mana, well, it's impossible for us to grasp. However, the ideals of such power is not why we're sending you out." he pressed a few more keys, bringing up an image of a barren field, "This field used to be like Florama Town, in Sinnoh. As you can see, there's nothing left. This is because, after the seals on two of the smaller continents were broken, the other seals began to waiver, the balance of power being knocked off its axis in most places giving some seals incredible boosts of power and other areas saw a near complete reduction. In short, the land is going mad with decay. If the seals are not broken so that the path of mana is restored, we're going to have an environmental catastrophe on our hands."
Snapping his fingers, all of the graphics disappeared and up from the table, infront of each individual, popped up a chip for a pokegear or pokenav or whatever other personal device the person might have, " This contains what i've just shown as well as the leaders of your mission. It should come to no surprise that our resident Chosen, the Emerald, Lady Mika," he gestured to Mika who was looking slightly more annoyed and slightly more awake than before, "Will be the head of this unit. However, should she become incapacitated, the Amethyst, Lady Parse, will take over and if she for some reason," his gaze, cruel and blank, on the girl lingered for a moment before he turned over towards the boy on Mika's left, the gaze still the same "He, Khael, will take control of the unit but neither of you will take over for Mysterica unless I am explicitly informed of the situation as soon as sanely possible. Any missteps from this protocol and well, you'll be looking at the treason paperwork unless you've got a damn good excuse. And, may I remind you that the Global Police will know the moment the first seal is broken what we're up to and the stakes will be raised. They might offer you money. Rewards. Power. Take it and, well, we'll find you. And then?" He smirked, clapping his hands together, "We'll become the best of friends." Sitting back down, he crossed his legs and lifted a hand towards the table, "You'll be leaving here via the underground transport to Saffron City by then which you will transfer to the Magnet Train to Goldenrod. From there, the path is determined by Mika and Parse with help from others if they so ask for it. You leave in two hours. Any questions?" Smiling, he leaned back in his chair, spining form side to side like a child, "There's no such thing as a dumb question, only dumb people who don't ask questions."
As he took the questions, Mika let out a heavy sigh, her eyes closing for a moment. Well, she hadn't been expecting this. Not in the least bit. There was nothing she could do, complaining wouldn't do anything but tarnish her reputation. Yawning, she opened her eyes and sipped at her pop, her expression blank and unreadable as she observed her new unit discussing the questions any might have over this little scandal. Fun fun.
