lieutenantantichrist | [5]Video/Action for Violet City

[The feed comes up on Blake outside the Violet City gym. He's holding the Gear in one hand and tossing something small in the other. Behind him his Snubbull is sitting on his Mareep, both looking proud of themselves. For his part, Blake doesn't look so thrilled.]

Hell of a loaded word, "badge."

[He catches it on the toss and holds it up to the camera.]

Look at that. Does it looks like much use to you?

[He sighs and slips it in his pocket.]

Zap the crap out of a kid's birds and get a medal that lets you fly.

You know what the worst part is? It's not until right now I realized there's anything wrong with that. I'm getting used to it.

[He starts walking aimlessly down the street, Pokemon trotting after him.]

It's baseball season, not that you'd know it here. Can't remember the last time I missed Opening Day. But hell, now it's been more than a month. Just went right by. How's it even May if you're not arresting drunk idiots on Cinco de Mayo? It's not right.

[Blake looks troubled.]

It's too easy to get caught up in this animal fighting crap and forget about the real world.

[His expression shifts toward its more familiar flinty pugnacity.]

Almost everybody here's been here longer than me. Give me some proof you haven't forgotten. Tell me something about home. Anything, I don't know, something you miss.

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Times were pretty rough for everyone.

[He smiles nostalgically.] Sure is.

Yeah. Gotta say, so far this place seems like a pretty big improvement. Attack-happy little fuzzy monsters aside.

Yeah, the recession hit everybody hard.

[Steve is now convinced that there are college teams named after her.]

I wouldn't go that far. The real world's not a picnic, but at least nobody's dog breathes fire.

[Yeah, the recession. Right.

There should be a Johto team called the Fighting Snubbulls. If there's not, someone needs to start one.]

Honestly, I'll take fire-breathing dogs over the walking dead any day.

[Damn right there should be. The little things are tough.]

Pain in the ass, but once you get used to how to deal with...

[Carter trails off as the rest of the sentence sinks in.]

What.

[Wait for it. Wait for iiiiit.

And there we go. Lee gives a wry smile.]

I wish the worst we had to worry about was some dumb recession. Shit like that feels pretty meaningless after the whole world goes to hell, hold the handbasket.

You're telling me you had a fucking zombie apocalypse, like one of those movies from the 80s.

[Blake looks terribly depressed.]

That look's exactly why I never mentioned it, but yeah. Something like that.

[SORRY BLAKE.]

I should've known somebody sane was too good to be true. You know the last time I ran into somebody who didn't claim to be a ninja or a space pilot or a zombie fighter?

[Blake tries to remember, then looks deeply depressed.]

I don't.

[Besides Jayden, but he doesn't count.]

[Lee's expression sours a little at that.]

Man, believe me I wish it wasn't true even more than you do.

[Though life in prison isn't much of a more cheerful alternative but HEY DETAILS.]

I've seen shit you can't just make up.

[And what's more, the little girl he talked about in his first broadcast went through it all with him.]

[Blake's expression is pure skepticism.]

[Lee doesn't sound like the kind of guy who'd be making this up to make himself sound like a badass, but zombies still aren't real.]

You'd be surprised at the shit people can make up. Hell, I should be glad I haven't run into anybody calling themselves a werewolf yet.

[He gets a dry, humorless chuckle out of Lee at that.]

Would it help if I told you I almost ended up becoming a walker?

[Blake doesn't like the sound of that.]

Not even if I knew what that was.

A walker. [Vague gesture.] You know.

I got bit. Not long before I ended up here, though the two are obviously unrelated. A bite is as good as a death sentence, even if they don't get hold of anything too vital. Just means you get a little more time. Turned out it was all I needed, even if it wasn't even close to what I wanted.

[After a second, Blake puts it together.] You mean a zombie.

[The rest is harder to figure out. Getting bit is bad news, that much he knows.]

[He humors the guy a little.] If that's true, how come you're not dead? You look fine from here.

...Yeah. A zombie. Walker gives it a little more dignity, you know? It's different in the movies when they're just monsters in face paint, but when they're people you knew while they were alive...

[Like his brother. Like that cop, like the band teacher, like Mark, Duck, Brie. Like Clem's parents.

The gravitas of deep loss tints Lee's baritone.]

Dunno. Must have been brought here just before I turned.

[A little white lie. He's asking Blake to swallow a bitter enough pill already.]

[Blake'll stick to thinking about it as people in makeup.]

[He'd say something about how funerals must be a goddamn mess, but Lee's voice warns him off. He looks like he's lost somebody, somehow, zombies or not.]

That's standard enough. Whatever brings us here fixes injuries, from what I've heard.

I'll keep an eye out if you start groaning about brains.

[That. May be the wisest thing you've ever done, Carter.

The joke takes a second to sink in, and the smile it earns is strained at best.]

Reckon my traveling party's more in a place to judge that.

...Anyway. I miss living in a world that made sense.

[TO GET BACK ON TOPIC.]

[even a stopped clock is not a complete idiot once in his lifetime]

You should be fine. I haven't seen any zombies around here yet. Groundhog-things with skulls for hats, yeah. Zombies, no.

[and you now have Blake's sympathy forever.] You know, it's nice to run into somebody who notices it's fucked up.

[reassuring, in a way]

[Lee raises an eyebrow.]

You mean there are grown-ass people who don't think that Michael Vick's Saturday Morning Candyland is fucked up?

I know, right?!

[Blake's so glad to find somebody who notices how fucked up this all is that he's willing to overlook the zombie thing]

All of the natives act like making lizards breathe fire at each other is the most natural thing in the damn world.

Well, as far as worlds full of fire-breathing lizards go, I can't say this place is that bad, but...damn.

[He runs his hand over his hair.]

The natives here are bad enough, but are there really, you know. Outsiders who believe this crap too?

[Blake's about to say the nicest thing he ever has about this place.]

Could be worse.

Yeah, a lot of people've bought into it whole hog.

[A brief pause.]

Some of the hogs breathe fire, too.

[That gets a smirk and a chuckle out of him.]

Bet you'd be hard pressed to name one species of animal that doesn't have a fire-breathing counterpart.

[Blake takes that as a challenge]

Chick--- monkey-- porcu...

Damn.