I Want To Lay the Very Best!

208 – Team Cameo-flauge

208 – Team Cameo-flauge

Brandy walked into the belly of the cruise ship and had to shade her eyes immediately. She'd been expecting something a little fancy, but this glittered. It was like she'd fallen headfirst into a box of fairy lights.

Her marvelous eyes at least did the work of adjusting quickly to the light, turning the colorful blur into something a bit more comprehensible. She was on the balcony overlooking a room of little tables, bright lights strung between them to make a swirling miasma of color. There was a dance floor with a Deerling on it spinning madly in circles, absolutely freaking out about how festive it looked. A massive bar covered an entire side of one wall, sections of it walled off with some fish-patterned partitions to give people some privacy if they needed it. It was both immensely tacky and also very expensive looking. Like a casino floor if you stripped out all the gambling and replaced it with a dining area.

Brandy's eyes locked on to the outfits the servers were wearing immediately. Sharp white teeth painted onto the sides of their cheeks like a demented clown and tight-fitting blue dresses with a white stripe up the front and a nibbled-on fin at the back.

"This is awesome," Sparky gasped, hopping up to swing on the railing, feet kicking in the air. "Oh shit, Sharpedo waitresses? Brandy, do you fancy a nibble?"

Brandy leaned over and nipped Sparky's ear, teasing it with her teeth as the Joltik flailed underneath her. She let her go with a lick through her buzzing yellow hair and rested on top of her, trapping her between Brandy and the railing.

"Trust you to remember the Sharpedo posters from my room. That was forever ago!"

"When it comes to Brandy lore, every moment is archived forever." Sparky grinned, "So if I'm ever dumb, it's because my head is full of moments like when you tried to eat that hot dog without us snickering."

She'd failed. Miserably.

Brandy scanned the bodies below as she felt up Sparky, making the Joltik giggle madly underneath her. The tournament wasn't huge, but even if there were only twenty entrants, that meant forty people in this room plus staff. It filled the place up fast. No purple armband, though. Was she in a booth? Or were they early? That seemed unlikely. They'd not exactly been bright and early.

"We got a great view, but I don't see our opponent."

"Me neither," Sparky said breathlessly. "But holy shit, you won't believe what I do see."

Sparky pointed out, hand wavering with excitement. Brandy followed the line to a table with a few drinks piled atop it. Two golden armbands looped over the golden candlesticks in the middle. The trainers were both a colorful pair, but Brandy didn't have time to give them a proper glance because one had a Pokémon that was simply breathtaking.

"No fucking way." Brandy swallowed, "Glad we're not fighting her."

"You kidding? I want to fight her so bad!"

One of their Pokémon was standing on the table, eyes glowing a bright purple, her shaggy grey hair almost hiding two bouncing cat ears with white tips. She looked spaced out, rocking on her feet in her oversized cardigan as she stared down her absolutely breathtaking opponent.

She was tall, really tall, and bent over the table to stare down the cat who was giving her looks. Long white legs poked out of a flowing white dress with a green inside trim. Not white like pasty skin, but pure marble white, so spotlessly bright it outshone the tacky furnishings. She was resting her head on the balls of her fists, elbows on the table as she stared down the wild-eyed catgirl. One eye glowing a bright red, while the other was covered by an artful sweep of green hair.

Someone here had a Gardevoir! Not exactly Legendary, but among Trainers, it certainly was a big deal. Gardevoir only bonded with the most pure-hearted souls, and they threw around as much power as they did mouthwatering curves.

"We're gonna go say hello," Sparky said, worming out from under Brandy.

"What? No, we can't bother them."

"We absolutely can! I love bothering people, and you want to meet them," Sparky grinned as she grabbed Brandy's arm and gave her the big sad bug eyes. "You can come with me and look after your precious bug, or I'll go say things that'll make that Gardevoir snap me in half with those lovely legs."

"I'm feeling jealous now!"

"You should be. Look at those pins she's got. They're almost as good as yours."

"It was nice to meet you all. I'm Brandy, this is Sparky." Brandy chirped.

"The big deal," Camila said, giving Sparky a once over.

"The biggest," Brandy nodded, trying not to look down the Gardevoir's top. It was hard. It was right there.

"Fiona," the Gardevoir's Trainer said. "It's lovely to meet you, Brandy! Your outfit is incredible, you'll have to tell me your tailor sometime. And this isn't a competition; Camila is just excited to fight, and Telly's an interesting puzzle for her. We thought we'd get the other team out of their head, but Telly's tough."

"I can do it," the Gardevoir said, staring at the Espurr. "She'll crack."

"Psychic types, right Brandy?" Sparky said with an eye roll. "Too stuck in their own heads. One of Annie's Pokémon is obvious if you think about it. Brandy knows it."

Oh shit, she did? Brandy was pretty sure she didn't. But Sparky seemed to believe in her, so there must be a way of knowing. Brandy turned her Joltik eyes on Annie and Telly, looking for a clue. There was a little of Telly's shedded fur on Annie's suit, but that didn't help. Telly looked snug in her cardigan, but it was a little stained on her swinging sleeves. A purple blotch that hadn't dried yet. None of their empty drinks had purple dregs, so where had it come from? A Muk was too viscous to stain like that. It needed something thinner. Something Brandy had actually washed out of their clothes before.

"Tea," Brandy said, "Telly has tea stains on her cardigan. You have a Sinistea?"

"Wrong," Telly grinned, reaching out and going on tip-toes to pat Brandy's head. "Super good guess, though."

"Polteageist," Camila's trainer piped up. "Annie's eyes widened a little when she said tea. She was surprised you got close."

Brandy had seen that twitch in the blue and pink haired Trainer's eyes, but she wouldn't have guessed it was giving anything away. The connection just wasn't something she was used to making. Psychic types were good at understanding humans, so it made sense their inheritance would make their Trainer good at reading people. That and a generous scoop of incredible hotness. Hardly fair.

"The Bug Ace is a better Psychic than I am," Camila sighed and took Brandy's hand, kissing the back of it. "Sexy maids can go with a Gardevoir's blessing. Clover's going to tease me so badly if I can't get into an Espurr's head."

Gardevoir kiss! Brandy could feel her Steam Engine stir to life in her chest. Warmth flooded her veins as her heart started to thunder.

"That's our Bug Ace Brandy," Sparky cackled loudly, hopping into Brandy's arms, hanging off her as she looked upside down at the table. "Anyway, thanks for meeting ladies! We have an opponent to find. Good luck on your match; don't blow the whole cruise ship up."

"No promises," Telly and Camila said at the same time. Matching eyes, then smiling thinly at each other. Aw, they were bonding; that's sweet.

Brandy staggered off with Sparky, who climbed onto her shoulders after a few tricky steps. "The Gardevoir thought we were a Bug Ace," Sparky whispered into Brandy's ear as she balanced on one shoulder. "We can totally hoodwink this chump when we find her."

That and keep a close eye out for clues. She'd gotten a lesson about the benefits back there; it'd be a shame not to learn from it.

Brandy walked with one arm under Sparky's butt so she could sit like the most well-cushioned parrot. "Should we check at the entrance? I can throw you up there."

Sparky's crackling fur stung her arms.

"Ow! What was that for?" Brandy hissed, "I wasn't being serious."

"Sorry, sorry. Just I see our opponent," Sparky said, slowly looking down at Brandy. "But we have a bit of a problem. She's with one of the Celebrity Judges. Oh shit, I guess she does count as a celebrity."

"Why is that a problem?" Brandy said as she turned to look where Sparky was pointing. Straight at the bar, a woman in a lab coat with cute half-moon glasses looked up in awe at a tall, boisterous, rainbow-haired Pokémon stroking her cheek. One with a massive purple spiraled horn on her head and a self-confident smile that Brandy had been expecting to see for a while, though not like this.

How the heck was Mercury a Competition Judge!?