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Sylvi "Boss! Boss! What should we do with this?" Is an aesop repeated a lot. Bandanna-masked youths asking Plumeria or Guzma about what to do, or just bumbling about. Issues about whose turn it is on the NINTENDO WII's latest SUPER BRAWL FAMILY game have to be settled. Inane nonsense is fielded and dispatched.

Serious questions are asked about how many Team Skull members it takes to screw in a light-bulb.

All is well and peaceful, though, until one unmasked pink-haired SKULL GRUNT carrying four of a six pack of COLD ONES soda (Because minors and alcohol? How COULD they? They're delinquents, not lawbreakers!) approaches Guzma.

"Boss, Boss! Why're you replacing yourself with some new hotshot?"

The female Grunt smirks an uncharacteristic smirk, her yellow-green eyes ophidian-slitted.

She tosses him a soda - lightly, and thumbs off the cap on her own glass bottle. "How come you've got a new side piece and didn't show him to me?" the 'Grunt' asks, chugging the bottle with a single, heroic set of airless gulps.
Guzma Rain patters on the boarded up windows of the Po Town mansion, splashing against it in a town that always rains. The bus stop and recently stolen bus are set up outside, painted in garish colors. Hip-hop blares through the house, as a new blonde-haired youth, with a terrible haircut, who refuses to wear the Team Skull colors, hangs out in a corner of the mansion alone waiting for the time he can actually go home in a few days instead of running errands for them and therefore being accosted to 'crash here'.

Guzma, meanwhile, is working in his office. The door's open, luckily, so it's not 'please knock' time. Probably because the other grunts left it open.

As the grunt comes in, Guzma's half-broken swivel chair missing a working lever and having duct-tape keeping it working is forcibly, painfully spun around, as he catches the soda.

Guzma isn't dumb, but he trusts his men. So when this grunt acts out of character, at first, he brushes it off.

And then he notices the eyes as he takes a drink, because those are very weird eyes. But, he says nothing, despite the flashbacks to nightmares he had after that encounter. Is he just seeing things? It's possible.

"You get these from the grocery store run?" Guzma asks, only the faintest of mischief in his voice as he pops it open. "I ain't replacing myself with no one. I told you all last time one of you asked. Gladion's here because he's a weird misfit and that's everyone here, and he's got the power to change things for us. I can't be everywhere at once, y'know? We get more guys like him, we can break any barrier. Maybe even get some fancy steaks more often."

Guzma takes a cautious sip of the soda, and then speaks. "Why, you think I'm replacing myself? Speak freely."
Sylvi "I get them with money, duh." Sylvi shrugs, dragging a chair in front of Guzma's desk and dropping into it, legs up and feet on the table. She gets comfortable, producing a red plastic cup and placing it on the desk near her, without an explanation.

"But Gladion isn't like all the other yukkos you pull in, is he? He's special. He's a *hero*. Dark hero or light hero, he's got that spark that makes him special. You see it, you feel it. Fighting him is a struggle, even if you can win."

"You worry, don't you? Every time you think about fighting him, you've got to think about 'if I win, does he get stronger?'."

"If I win, is that the last time I win?"

Sylvi shrugs, gesturing with her bottle that sloshes near-emptily. "You get more guys like him, and you'll split up into families like the mob. Or, just split up. Only one king of the jungle - only one dealer of destruction."

Adjusting her feet pointedly, so she rests on 'the other foot' on the table, Sylvi reaches down to get another bottle of soda. "And you don't get to tell *me* to 'speak', unless you *really* don't know who I am. Do you even talk to your crew that way? 'Speak'! What a *joke*!"

Sylvi-Grunt starts laughing at Guzma's expense. "That's so awful!"
Guzma Guzma takes a long chug of his drink as Sylvi goes on. Yeah, that's her. As she lays into him, putting feet on his desk, he listens, eyes closed, before he cocks his head to the side and frowns. Yeah, this is gonna be a night. Part of him wants to play chicken. Part of him worries that'd destroy him and his house and his crew. But, he goes with his gut.

"Do I look like a big fan of uninvited guests? I give you and your 'Cold Ones' a pass because we're in the same org and you're a real danger, but I ain't gonna kiss up to you in any way." There's a bit of sting in his voice. He's probably said 'Speak' a few times and never realized how it sounds, though at least it's not common lingo. He thought it made him sound more mature, like someone else he looked up to.

"But, alright, I won't tell you to speak. Let's address the topic. I'm not afraid of him. He's what, thirteen, fifteen? His power's in his Lycanroc. He doesn't got the big boss brains. He doesn't got the heart of iron. He might be 'special', I see it, but so am I."

Another gulp of the drink, holding back any trembling. "And I ain't one to believe that the designated hero's gotta beat the designated villain."
Sylvi "Nah, nah." Sylvi drawls, tongue pointedly forked and coiling around the bottle's glass length for Guzma to see as she drains it in another airless pour. With a loud 'puah!' she pulls the bottle free, holding the empty in her hand. "I'm not uninvited, and I ain't a guest. I'm *family*. You don't get to get out of your oath as easy as an 'as-you-please' do you?"

The glass doesn't shatter in her fist - it contorts, such force exerted on it that the glass fuses in her hand. The acrid scent of burnt-shorn adhesive flares into the air.

"So it doesn't matter what you're a fan of! And that's."

She drops the fist-fused bottle, the imprint of her palm impressed into the still-warm glass in exquisite detail, and it clatters on the floor loudly.

"... Just facts."

Gladion's traits are explained, and Sylvi messes with something in her lap before placing her closed-but-not-clenched fist over the red plastic cup. There's a glimmer like a rainbow as she tenses, a liquid dripping into the cup from her palm. "You remember my blood, right? Well, for people who aren't of a certain class of garbage entity - ay kay ay, 'the gods and their stains' - drinking it can give them power. Of course, it'll probably be torture while it purges out all the weakness from you, but, you know..."

Her eyes light up. "No pain, no gain, right?"

Readying another bottle that she thumbs the cap off from, Sylvi-Grunt tops the red plastic cup off with soda and slides it over to rest in front of Guzma. "Drink it. Or don't. But I dare you to."
Guzma Well, that act of confidence backfired. Guzma isn't sure he considers her family, but he gets what she's driving at. As she fuses the glass, he flinches, but otherwise keeps his cool, as she pours her blood into a cup of cola. It'll purge his weakness, right?

But he hesitates, as she dares him. The variables flicker through his head. If he rejects, will she finally leave him alone? Or will it take accepting? If he rejects, will he lose any and all goodwill he's earned from his allies in the Concord? She'd certainly tell them how he's a coward. But if he accepts...that's going to hurt. But...

She mentioned family. And a thought crosses his mind. What will it cost him to reject?

Guzma takes the cup up to his nose. It smells like cola. Closing his eyes, he moves to down it in one drink.

No pain, no gain.
Sylvi Sylvi watches very, very intently as Guzma considers the cup. There's a hunger there, for certain. Something that slithers in the way she sits, sussurates behind her breaths. She's eager for him to make a choice.

Which choice?

Perhaps, any choice.

And as he slugs back the cola, he tastes...
Sylvi Spice. Not even hot spice. Like, mild spice. It's not a pleasant flavor in cola, for sure, and the second burn rattles down his throat, popped against by the cola. It's unpleasant, but not painful per-se.

Sylvi raises her palm - the one she had 'speared' to bleed into the cup, to reveal... A cheap spice single-use plastic crimp-container, from a taco shop. It's their hottest blend - which means it's white people hot.

She doesn't even laugh at him! "Damn, you do have guts. Or you're an idiot. The Eitr is a poison, a venom. The only way it'd purge your weakness would be if you were actually my kin - or if you knew some way to replace some pre-tty core parts of yourself with some other parts."

She snickers, dropping the hot sauce packet on the table. "So you're an idiot, but you've got guts. That's a lot more than before, I guess. Why'd you do it? Because I told you to? That's not ever got you before. Because you want power?"

"Do you really think you're weak?"
Guzma Guzma downs the cola. It does not burn his insides, but he coughs and sputters, the unpleasant feeling not what he expected yet worse somehow because of that, in his head. "Guzma, *damn*! I don't know anything about your venom!" He wipes his mouth, leaning forward in his chair, taking a moment from the sheer adrenaline.

Now he's vulnerable. He took the bait, revealed he's weak. He could lie to her, easily, but she'd sniff it out of him, probably. She's a snake. So, he'll just try and be a little honest. "Everyone's got their baggage, skeletons in their closet. I ain't perfect, so...yeah, I feel weak. I had other reasons - like the fact I can't predict what you'll do anytime we interact. So, I just go with my gut. What'll keep me and my crew alive." Guzma points at her.

"Because, even if we're 'family', your idea of how family interacts is pretty messed up, yo."
Sylvi It's now that Sylvi laughs - an unkind, vicious sort of laughter. Just a little unhinged, but more than that - breaking. Like a dam shattering, it pours into the room, rising to a fevered near-sobbing pitch as Guzma protests.

Perhaps it's something about her tone, but unlike before there's a character to it that isn't 'laughing at Guzma'.

Sylvi just laughs until she's blue in the face - laughs like a thunderstorm breaking and pouring down until it's over. And when it is over, she heaves the last Cold One bottle on the table, the cap popping off the top with a bullet-like 'pkew!'. "Ahh, Guzma. Even when you're so very, very wrong, you're impressive! You're so... adorable. Ahhh." Sylvi wipes at her eye with a free hand, toppling forward to pour Guzma a refill of soda into his red plastic cup and leaving the bottle besides it. "You're a little bet I'm running! Purely for my amusement. You see, I'm not the damsel in distress or the frightened princess - I'm the threat. I'm the Bad Guy. And you're trying to be, well, me! But I don't think you're *cut out* for this gig. When I..."

She rests a hand on the lip of Guzma's desk and slooowly squeezes, each finger tensing. "Sssqueeze something, when I feel it break in my grasp, every little pop and snap and crunch is this wonderful music to me. It's a symphony being played just for my ears. And the greatest side-dish is the terror, the inevitability of it. I am absolute. There's nothing and nobody stronger than me. But when my cute cousin from another universe, a softer universe, tries to be me?"

A fist-sized chunk of desk caves in, sawdust drifting from between her fingers. "It's so novel! I want to see if you can do it. And part of that is accepting facts: You're weak. You have to *try*. Maybe you don't even hear the sounds! The exquisiteness of being so very, very bad."

She opens her fist, and a ball of charcoal clatters onto Guzma's desk, rolling next to his drink and 'dop'-ing against the plastic cup. "You have to have that disgusting 'Fighting Spirit', hard work, guts, whatever. You want to be bad. You're not 'the bad guy'."

"Not like me. I'm the bad guy. Well..." She smirks. "Girl. You get the picture. So... Guzma, dealer of destruction. What does all this mean... for you?"

She leans forward, hands spread on Guzma's desk, body halfway across the intervening distance, eyes maddened with intent. "Speak."
Guzma Guzma clamps silent as she laughs. The cold one is poured into the cup, as Sylvi monologues at Guzma. It's an impressive monologue - backed by the force of turning wood into charcoal. As he's finally told to speak, he takes a drink, to show that he will even though there's still the taste of spice lingering inside the cup, and then exhales. He's clearly anxious. But he also clearly wants to be strong.

"I can't even imagine what sorta answer you might want outta me, so I'll substitute my own. This means that I need to stop being such a coward if I'm gonna even near your level. I doubt I can reach it - you've made that clear enough, and hubris kills - but even if that's weak, I'll watch myself struggle to do so. I need to be my own man, my own boss."

"What does this mean for me? In the end, nothing different about what I'll become. I'll be the baddest guy in the world. But I won't stop there. I'll make people know the name of Guzma outside this world too." He plants a fist in a palm.

"Big bad Guzma, the Dealer of Destruction!"
Sylvi Sylvi watches. She waits. She thinks, sitting back down.

With finality, she raises her feet to settle them back on Guzma's desk. The 'Grunt' auspice had fallen off of her as Guzma had spoken, leaving just 'Sylvi' in a (rather tight now) black top, black bike shorts, and white feetwraps.

There's a lot of words! About attaining her level. About being the baddest.

She musters herself. It takes an effort, stifling laughter.

"Alright, alright. I'll give you all that, you earned it. You weren't a little baby about the drink, too."

She shoos with a hand, fingers flicking up. "Not that I'll say some of that ain't some shit, but... I'll give it to you."

"Not really what I asked. But I'll just tell you: You ain't me. That means you gotta be you. And what it is stupid pinheads in this world do is train. Fight. Struggle. Lose a lot, but win more. You're yellow, I can taste it. You need to want to train like a 'Trainer'. A hero. A legend. Elite One. That's what I see in your eyes when I hear 'Gladion'. That's the reflection in your yellow soul. You see someone willing to do that - to train harder, and longer, and bust his chops and *want* it more than everyone else. You see that in him, but not yourself."

"Figure it out, Guzma. Do you wanna be some pissant gym leader? Some Route Whatever jag? Or do you want to be the big bad, like no one before you was?"

"Mmm? Ready to do all that?"
Guzma Guzma finally laughs. It's not happy, and it's short, but it's a laugh. "See? I never know what to say around you. But, that's fine. Can't base your words off how they affect someone else." He's visibly starting to calm, as Sylvi tells him what he needs to do. "Train. I've done that for years...but I did that the sucky kiddy way. There's a Multiverse out there to grind against, chisel myself sharper. I'm ready to do all that. I need to do all that."

Guzma pauses, fiddling with his chains, and nods. He affirms himself with a small smirk. "But first, I need to kick Gladion's behind. If he's going to be in my outfit, and I'm going to train myself, I can't have a rival. Ain't that right?"
Sylvi "Oh, you can have a rival. But it's baby stuff. Baaaby. See, heroes?"

She thumbs back at the door. "Guys like Gladion? They have one rival. They define themself by having a rival, they struggle to beat them, let it consume and fuel them."

Her feet drop to the floor as she leans forward, arm on Guzma's desk, bicep bulging as she closes her fist. "Morons. This is why they get to beat you: they don't exist without you. Rivals are for heroes. Real villains - real titans - refine themselves by their own rules. For their own benefit. They become strong because they want to, because it's pleasurable to be 'themselves'."

Finally standing, she dusts sawdust off her lap. "Call yourself a 'god' again, and I'll snap your neck, Guzma. You're not allowed to be in my family and play to that title." She smiles sweetly, lips only parted enough for a slash of white in her smile. "Have some class."
Guzma Guzma grits his teeth at the threat. That's easy enough to avoid doing, but, man, she /really/ hates gods. That might...actually be a shared thing, he thinks. Common ground? Not that he'll broach it any time soon - and she almost certainly has it worse.

"...yeah, got it." Is all he says, though it's unclear to what, if not all of it. Sylvi can see herself out - no one's gonna stop her, though if she looks to see Gladion as she passes by, she'll notice he's been watching the big doors to Guzma's quarters - not the office - very closely. Interesting.
Sylvi On her way out, Sylvi pauses next to Gladion, sizing the kid up for a few moments. She doesn't say anything for a few long moments, sidling up to him casually. At a conversational distance she stops, smiling lightly - just on the cusp of speaking.

More unsettling, as she stands between Gladion and the door, is the tangible spiritual pressure she exudes, like a heat-aura of barely restrained yet venting harmful potentia and vicious violence.

The first step she takes is rattling simply because they lock eyes and hers draw his in like whirlpools - the movemet is sudden, as she closes the distance to embrace him.

As her arms lightly wrap around his chest, her chin rests against his shoulder as she cants her head and just draws in a long breath from 'behind his ear'.

"--Gladion." Is all she deigns to say, as if committing the boy's scent to memory.

She breaks away after, swaying away with a clearly mischevious slant to her steps.

"Love the hair!" Calls the walking mountain that exits via the door she hadn't entered from, to the bafflement of everyone in Po Town.