Welcome to Gaia! ::

It was mid-afternoon at Headquarters during one of the most bland days Damon could remember experiencing in his entire life - not counting school, of course. He'd spent the entire day thus far running back and forth as the delivery boy between two divisions (ones situated on opposite sides of the base, no less) and hadn't eaten since the dinner he'd had the previous night. (Breakfast had been skipped today, in favor of getting Badru some exercise while he had the chance.) By his count, it had been a solid twenty hours since he'd eaten.

Normally, the "nutrition" provided by the cafeteria was enough to make any Grunt question when, if at any point at all, it had ever been considered food - as was the general rule with cafeteria food. But today, it looked borderline appealing. Between the rather insistent grumbling in his stomach, and the borderline exhaustion of running around all day, he couldn't bring himself to care about how bland the food normally was. It was food, and that's all that mattered right now.

For the first time after coming into the cafeteria, Damon paused to look away from his food. He still needed a place to sit, and it looked like despite the late lunch, there weren't that many spots left unoccupied. Was the building being run ragged, or was this the normal lunch hour for most Grunts? Or maybe it was an early dinner... Either way, he needed to find a spot fast - preferably without too many people nearby...

There were a few moments that Damon spent merely standing with his tray, staring blankly out into the room in search of a spot. At least, that was his course of action until a grunt behind him none-to-gently prodded him between the shoulder blades with the edge of his tray. He winced and quickly began walking in a random direction, silently hoping he came across a free-

Wait, was that a Jirachi?

Damon very nearly stopped mid-stride and choked on air. In fact, it as probably a small miracle that he hadn't. A Jirachi? Here of all places? What in the name of- How did they- Sweet Arceus this was just plain crazy! Maybe he was hallucinating. That steamed broccoli last night had looked fairly suspicious... Well, there was only one way to find out.

Mind made up, Damon strode over to the corner table Hayes had claimed, gripping his tray in an attempt to keep some sort of grip on reality. Maybe this was a dream. That would certainly explain why the food on his tray almost looked appealing...

"Mind if I join you?"

Okay. Maybe he was being too polite. But it didn't hurt. Especially when you weren't 100% sure on the rank of the Rocket in front of you because of them being out of uniform.

It took all of Damon's self control not to simply stand there and gape at the Jirachi. His eyes weren't deceiving him. The fact that the little Pokemon had just spoken to him telepathically was enough to confirm that. It was obvious that he was in mild disbelief. Even back in Hoenn he'd never come close to seeing a Jirachi. The most he'd had to go on was old legends and illustrations... So maybe his (rather simple) reply of "Hey" was a little late. But it was perfectly understandable.

Fortunately, the other man's reply was enough to snap Damon out of his mild trance, and he was quick to sit down in the designated seat and shoot Hayes a grateful look. It was almost frustrating having no indication of the other man's rank. He had no clue if he was being too polite, but then again it wasn't like that could hurt.

"Sort of. I've been around for a couple weeks, but I haven't really been out and about much. Mostly just running errands for whatever division needs a spare set of arms and legs that day," Damon replied. At least being an errand boy meant he didn't have to be out in the field just yet. If he was to be honest with himself, he still needed a little time to learn how to ignore the little voice in the back of his head that told him everything going on in this organization was wrong. "I'm Damon."

"It's nice to meet you Hayes," Damon said quickly, leaning forward to offer the other a quick but firm handshake. Once again he found his eyes drifting to the young Jirachi, but this time he quickly trained them back ahead of him. The other was divulging something important, and all at once it seemed to make sense.

So the little guy was a clone then? He'd heard rumors briefly that the labs had been working on creating duplicates of legendaries, but he'd thought they were just that. He'd never imagined things would come this far.

But soon enough, there had been a significant enough pause that the subject of the labs would have passed, so he pushed the thought aside. He could always ask around about it later - out of curiosity of course. It was quite fascinating, and he had to wonder if cloned legends would act any different than the originals. Of course, he wouldn't know for certain. All he had to go on were old myths from dusty old books he'd poured himself over multiple times into the wee hours of the morning.

"Yeah, mostly. But I don't mind it too much," Damon replied, shrugging and absently taking his first bite of food - sliced peaches that had no doubt been discovered in a can at the back of the pantry this morning. This was chewed and swallowed before he continued.

"I haven't really looked into the individual sectors just yet... But I do know I'd rather stay away from the action if at all possible. I don't really have the guts for it."

Damon was quick to take another bite of the peaches, chewing on them thoughtfully and nodding as Hayes spoke. Being a field agent was one of the quickest thing he could rule out and he had a feeling going into demolitions would only end in disaster. He took a moment to think about what else he could possibly go into, only to very nearly choke when the other man mentioned being shot at.

"Shot at!?"

The sheer horror on his face could almost be hilarious were it any other situation. Being shot at was serious! His mind rather helpfully supplied him with suggestions on how everything could possibly go wrong for him. If there were guns involved, there was pretty much no way he would get out unscathed. How would he tell his parents? Hiding his involvement with Team Rocket from them was one thing - but an injury like that wasn't exactly something he could cover up too easily.

It took him a long moment to realize that he was, to be quite blunt, gawking. Almost instantly he shook his head, grabbing his drink and taking a quick gulp of it. Only once he was certain the lump in his throat had successfully been cleared did he chance speaking up again, although it was fairly obvious that the mention of being shot out had shaken him a bit. Enough that he hardly even noticed the Jirachi's antics.

"Are you alright? I know that's kind of a stupid question, but it doesn't hurt to ask... Right?"

He was pretty sure any and all chance he ever had of being seen as a tough guy had already come and passed. And really, how much worse could it hurt his reputation to be considerate?