Whoo, finally, chapter three! I'd been hoping to go faster with this story, with its shorter-than-my-average-updates chapters and all, but I guess you–never mind, I'm not going to make that lame joke.
Ho-oh: What, you can't rush perfection?
*facepalm*
Oh, and yes, I know that Resident Evil Code: Veronica is a video game. I don't care. It should have had a movie adaptation.
"I've had a perfectly wonderful evening. But this wasn't it." ~Groucho Marx (1890 - 1977)
It took the remainder of the day to get home, and by the time he had arrived at his front door he was exhausted from walking. He had sent Latias away when the sun was beginning to descend from its throne at the top of the sky, despite her protests, and finished the journey miserably alone. Trailing his metallic claws through the dirt, much like a Slaking dragged its lengthy arms, he was a sight for sore eyes as his eyelids slid halfway shut. When I get in, he decided with a groan, I'm taking a nice, long bath. Delighted at the thought of a long period of relaxation, he picked up a claw to rap on the door three times, hoping Palkia wasn't in his room watching reruns of The Bold and the Beautifly. Waiting impatiently to gain entry to his house (he had forgotten to place his key under the mat before he left), he was not expecting the door to open so quickly.
Or to see the person that had opened the door wasn't Palkia.
"Wow, you're quite the sight for sore eyes."
"Wha–Ho-oh?!" He took a step back in shock and horror. "How'd you–what are you doing in my house?!"
Amused by his exasperated tone, she twittered merrily, "Your brother let me in." As Dialga scowled, she continued, "He's cleaning up the imperfect disaster in his room, since I've taken it upon myself to do the rest of the house." Ignoring his alarmed expression, she gestured a wing in welcome and told him, "I figured you'd want to relax, since you seemed agitated today, so I took the liberty of cleaning the bathroom first. No thanks necessary."
Like I was going to thank you, he mentally replied, keeping quiet as he entered and looked around at the cleaning equipment scattered about the hall. Everything from mops to dusters to glass-cleaner clustered around windows and tables, and he began to wonder if she was enlisting the help of magical elves or if she was going to use it all herself. Shaking his head at the perfectionist, he made his way to the bathroom and had to blink as the sparkling cleanliness stunned him. Whoa, she wasn't kidding when she said she was cleaning. This place is spotless! Turning on the hot water, he glanced in the mirror and grimaced at the fatigued dragon that stared back at him. And I am a sorry sight. I need this bath.
A knock on the door interrupted his thoughts, and he looked to see Ho-oh stick her head in momentarily. He noticed the feathers atop her head were a bit ruffled, and some sort of black dust covered one side of her face, probably from cleaning. "I don't mean to bother you, but do you know where the bleach is? You have horrible, imperfect stains on your walls that I must get out."
Rolling his eyes, he mumbled, "Here, I think it's under . . ." Sticking his head under the sink, he carefully gripped the white bottle by its handle with his fangs and awkwardly passed it to her. After a moment of clumsily moving their mouths, he finally had her balance it on her wing so he could let go of it. A bit perturbed by the embarrassing experience, he growled, "Having no hands sucks."
"I'm afraid I'll have to agree on that one." Shaking her head as if disapproving the idea of Legendaries having petty problems, she was turning to leave with the bleach when she caught her reflection in the mirror and gasped, just now seeing how dirty she was. "Oh! Now this won't do at all!" She cast him a hopeful, silent question, causing him to sigh exasperatedly.
"After you're done cleaning, and I'm done with my bath, you can use the bathroom."
"Oh, bless your soul!" Sighing gratefully, she thanked him before stepping out and closing the door behind her, careful not to drop the bottle. Rolling his eyes and muttering about women, he turned off the water and carefully stepped into it, hissing at first at the intense heat but soon giving his own satisfied sigh.
If I close my eyes and think happy thoughts, I bet I can drown out her annoying chirping . . . Determined to not let the perfectionist's criticism get to him, he tried to block out any thoughts about her and ponder about other, more important things. Like the upcoming event Arceus had suddenly thrown him and Palkia into. Didn't he figure that after the whole Team Galactic incident that it would be smart to hide instead of strut our stuff? Or is he hoping that the humans will be in awe and simply bow down to us instead of capture us? He snorted at the thought, scrubbing his claws clean of the dirt from the regions he had crossed on the way home. I don't have that sort of faith in those wretched mortals. They've caused so much damage, it's not even funny.
After rubbing away at his scales until he finally felt clean, he submerged himself almost completely underwater to let the tension in his muscles melt away. Closing his eyes and dipping his head under once, he shook away the water threatening to impair his vision and looked at the sparkling tiles that covered the three walls around the bathtub. His thoughts returned to the rainbow-feathered bird, unable to ignore her any longer. You know, she's been acting strange since I've been here. Not "nicer," per se, but . . . different. Frowning, he wondered if that was because her attention was focused on getting the house clean. Maybe she has such a one-track mind that she can't keep her attention on multiple things at once. Or maybe, because she isn't "on the job," she's relaxing her perfectionist ways–or some of them. It was all too confusing, and he shook his head to cast the puzzling thoughts away. No, I'm going to relax, not worry over why Ho-oh is such a weird bird.
Ten minutes later, he was drying off and marveling at the way his scales shone in the bathroom light. Every inch of movement created a carnival light show, and he eyed the reflected lights on the walls and muttered, "I'm like an enormous disco ball . . ." Satisfied with his handiwork, he stepped out and gave a whistle for the bird. Instead, he came face-to-face with his brother as he stepped out of his room holding a duster. Furrowing his eyebrows, Dialga growled and questioned, "What were you thinking, you idiot? Letting her in here? She'll perfect us until there's nothing left of us!"
Looking a bit uneasy, as if expecting Ho-oh to appear around the corner any moment, Palkia whispered to him, "But, dude, have you seen her when she's mad? She's scary!"
"Young man, open this door right now!"
The pink dragon paused on his way to the kitchen, frowning as he recognized the voice on the other side of the door. "Where's Dialga?"
"He stomped off a while ago, isn't he home yet? Whatever. I have important business to discuss with you, so open this door!"
Palkia crossed his arms as he leaned against the wall beside the front door, a small grin forming on his face. "I don't know, my bro might be a bit mad if I let you in . . ."
"Your brother? Palkia, if you do not let me in, I'll Sacred Fire this door and your tail and then we'll see if your brother's wrath is all that intimidating. I've learned from the best torturing minds, and I'm not afraid to make them perfectly proud."
He gulped.
"Which minds?"
"She threatened to find the deepest, darkest hole on the ocean floor," he explained, "where I'd only have the company of the ancient Relicanth and hungry Sharpedo, and many, many other things that would give you goosebumps." He shivered at the thought, looking as if he'd rather have his memory wiped of her threats, causing Dialga to raise an eye-ridge at his brother's behavior. Palkia wasn't the bravest dragon he knew, of course, but he wasn't a giant Combusken. It took quite a bit to creep him out.
"Alright, fine, I'll kill you later for it." Shaking his head and giving a reluctant sigh, he was about go to his room to sulk in solitude when his brother stopped him with a claw on his shoulder. He glanced at him curiously and muttered, "What?"
The Spacial Pokemon gave him a thoughtful once-over, as if examining his posture to determine his thoughts. "You know, although she's terrifying when mad, she is cleaning our house. You could be, I don't know, grateful for that."
When Dialga snorted at the thought, his brother frowned, but the quadruped shook off his claw without a second thought and retorted, "Let Shaymin deal with gratitude, but keep me out of it. All that bird causes is trouble." He then went off to his room, ignoring the eyes on his back as he grumbled to himself about how the entire world was against him. Even my own brother! Some karma this is.
He frowned when he saw his door ajar, but when he stepped inside his jaw dropped in surprised horror. "Ho-oh! Get out of my room!"
She raised her beak without missing a beat, sweeping trash from under the bed as she told him, "I'm cleaning, remember? This place is utterly disastrous." She seemed to have gotten over her "hand"-icap rather well as she held the broom in one talon while balancing the other on the dustpan's handle. Brushing debris into a pile and making a thorough job of sweeping it up, she released the broom to lift the pan from the ground and gestured to him to grab it. "Here, be a dear and get this for me."
Wanting to snarl but remembering his resolution to not get riled up again, he reluctantly gripped it with his teeth and tossed the trash into the garbage before reprimanding her. "I know you're cleaning from the goodness of your heart," he almost spat out the words but kept cool, "but you can't just barge into my room! It's my room!"
"Yes, and you hideously neglect your chores." Clicking her tongue in disappointment, something he was sick of hearing, Ho-oh turned to face him and seemed to notice his displeasure at her intruding. She gave a subdued sigh and slowly shook her head. "Oh, alright, I'll leave the rest to you. I suppose you'll have to learn to clean sometime. I'm certainly not going to do it all of the time."
He scoffed, mumbling, "Well, good. I don't want you to be here all of the time."
She gave him a curious look as she collected her cleaning supplies and shuffled towards the door, and as he stepped aside to let her through she paused. "Actually, Dialga, I've made up my mind."
He blinked. "Come again?"
She turned to face him, placing the supplies on the ground momentarily. "If you believe your lifestyle is perfectly fine . . ." She raised her beak and gave a small smile. "You're so proud about it that I want to see it for myself." When it didn't seem to sink in immediately, she clarified, "I'm staying here until I've fixed you up for the big day."
"What?!"
Dialga glumly watched as the microwave reheated the leftovers of the dinner from the night before. "I hate my life."
His brother stepped into the room just as he said that, and he asked curiously, "Why's that?" He had a pillow and blanket under one arm that he was preparing for himself, since he had given up his room to Ho-oh for her stay. He was going to be sleeping on the couch, meaning now he was never going to leave it–he spent so much time there watching his soaps, and this was just an excuse to stay in front of the television.
Dialga scowled and snapped, "Why do you think?" He glared at the food as if it was the source of all of his problems, but in reality he was imagining he had stuffed Ho-oh into the microwave and was watching her cook like Thanksgiving dinner. He opened the door when there were twenty seconds left on the timer, testing the temperature before figuring that was enough and taking it out carefully. He took the plate to the table before he noticed his brother staring at him, and he growled, "What?"
After a moment, Palkia shrugged. "Just wondering how to cheer you up, without killing anyone."
"Then it's not possible," the Temporal Pokemon muttered, watching the steam rise from the plate before leaning down and beginning to eat. Having no hands meant no using utensils, so he just had to submerge his face into the food and eat that way. He hated to admit he envied his brother's hand-like claws, but it would have made a lot of things simpler for him. He would live, though.
Palkia shrugged again. "If you say so." Then, after watching him eat his pitiful dinner, the pink dragon suggested, "Hey, the spoof of that zombie movie is on. Wanna watch it?"
"What, Resident Evil Code: Chikorita?" Dialga thought it over, remembering what he had heard from the other legendaries about the movie. "Eh, I guess. It's not like I have anything better to do, anyways." Finishing his dinner, he followed the Spacial Pokemon to the living room and settled himself on the couch as the movie's beginning credits ended. The opening scene showed a rather confident Roserade raiding a base, and Dialga felt a sadistic pleasure when her world fell apart at the seams.
"What are you two–oh, Resident Evil." He was surprised to look over his shoulder and see Ho-oh watching the television screen, resting her "chin" on the back of the couch. "You're both such boys."
Palkia grinned. "Yep. Wanna watch it with us?" He ignored Dialga's glare as he gave the bird a curious glance.
Mulling it over briefly, the bird tilted her head to the side in what he supposed to be a shrug. "Sure, why not?" Choosing to stand behind the couch instead of the seat offered to her, she was curiously quiet as the movie progressed, even through the several jumpy moments attempting to scare you. As the two dragons laughed at the hilarious deaths, she remained silent up until the last scene where the Roserade ended up dying for some reason. She frowned and asked, "Wait, was that in the original?"
Palkia shook his head and reminded her, "This is the spoof, so they have to mess everything up."
"Hm. I guess you're right." Then, she yawned unexpectedly and lifted her head from the couch, wincing as she got out of the position she had been in for well over an hour. "Ooh, I'm tired. Good night, boys."
"Good night." Taking the remote control to turn off the television, he caught his brother's glare after Ho-oh had left the room. "What?"
Dialga scowled. "Don't be nice to her! You'll encourage her!"
Palkia gave him a mischievous grin. "Oh, and I wouldn't want to do that, now, would I?"
I hope you enjoyed this chapter! It was fun to write, to say the least. ;P Read and review, if you please!
Lots of dragon-y love (and cookies!),
~DL ("Dragon Lover")