To say it had been a long time since Adrien had played UNOVR would be an understatement. He'd made his character on release, of course - it would have been horrible form for him to just let the Cheshired name go unclaimed, after all - but the instant he'd realized Nintendo had gone back on their policy shifts regarding streaming, he'd abandoned the game. He'd just had too much to do, too many games to play, and it had just... seemed like a waste, really, when he could be using that time to edit old vods or plan for the next stream. But he had a couple of editors now, and he didn't know, it had seemed like a fun idea, getting to play around in the world he'd grown up in without an audience watching his every move or any expectations of being good or funny or anything else, so. Why not?

Even so, he still wasn't expecting this - the bright pinks and yellows that made up Cheshired, the heavy weight tugging at the edge of his spine as he turned and- ah. Yeah. He'd almost forgotten about that piercing there. Now that had been a stylistic choice he'd not been glad to lose a year ago. (But, that being said, it definitely made the fact he couldn't stream the game all the more weird, since let's be real, why the heck would Nintendo have included that kind of promotion for one of their regular streamers if they were just going to turn around and lock them all out?)

Bright yellow eyes narrowed at the offending appendage, his ears flicking back without his notice, before an unexpected voice startled him, and his head whipped around, the fur of his tail fluffing up immediately as the ears shot upwards. "Well.... you're not Juniper," he remarked unthinkingly, the quip slipping out of his lips before he shook himself, ears flattening expressively for a moment before lifting again to their default appearance. "I... think I'm good, thanks," he stated, eyeing the clutter that was scattered about before stepping forward, the tip of his tail trailing over the edge of a pile of books.

.... Questions? Huh. Looks like Nintendo had gone for a different format than the usual. He supposed that explained why Juniper was nowhere to be found. "Sure. I'm ready when you are."

What are your views on lying? Well, wasn't that a real philosophical question right off the bat? Pink ears twitched thoughtfully as he mulled over the question - if he'd been live, he probably would have quipped something about Only all the time, constantly. If I'm not gaslighting chat, what else am I here for?

But he wasn't. And, after a moment, he decided to be honest - to give Adrien's answers, rather than Cheshired's.

"I think it's something with shades of gray," he answered. "People getting up in front of a microphone and lying all the time has caused a lot of our problems, but... it's not exactly hurting anyone to tell a kid that Santa's real or letting an old person believe that their parent is coming home soon." It was... probably an answer far deeper than someone would have expected, given that deep pink hair and the obvious gimmick of the cat ears and tail, and yet... it was true. Something based more on outcome and intent rather than a hard line in the sand.

And then the Professor went even deeper down the rabbithole. He'd thought Nintendo went about as deep as they were going to get into that with Ocarina of Time, but... huh. Apparently not. "Are you asking if I believe in ghosts or what I think happens to us after we die? Because those are two entirely separate questions." He knew what his mother would have said, muttering under her breath about Hell, but... he hadn't been brought up in the church the way she had.

"Though I guess it doesn't matter all that much. If you need a book or the fear of ending punishment to be a good person, you probably aren't exactly some beacon of goodness or anything like that." His tail swished behind him. "I'm not sure if I give a lot of faith to ghosts or anything, but there's also some things that are just so... powerful that they stick around, if that makes sense." He remembered that field trip to that mummies exhibit when he was in high school, and that was... The heaviness in the air had felt wrong, in a way it hadn't in other parts of the museum. Even just thinking about it now saw the fur of his tail rising up.

Thankfully, the third question was a lot easier. "Uh, get myself out of it?" he answered glibly. "What? I got bored and taught myself how to pick locks. It's not that hard, really, most locks are pretty crappy these days. Chat really seems to enjoy when I pick one for them on stream, for whatever reason."

Wait... "... Please don't tell me you're pulling a like, nya," he groaned, his ears flattening back and tail flicking sharply behind him, as though it were trying to shake off a blanket or a long rope, the sound of the piercing at the tip of his tail jingling. But no, no. That was absurd. This was an NPC, there was no way it would have been programmed to make memes like that.

With his eyes tipped up to the ceiling, it's not really a surprise that he ends up fumbling the Pokeball with a loud noise that was decidedly not a yip (it was definitely a yip) as it bounced off his fingertips and tumbled to the ground, only to burst open to reveal-

A Totodile.

Adrien stared at the little crocodile before him for a long moment, incredulous - because honestly, out of all the possible choices, he'd never have expected to be given a Water-type to start with, never mind a Totodile - before he bent down to pick up the Pokeball that had fallen. See, it's just your imagination. If she had been doing the meme, she would've given you a Litten, he thought to himself as he closed his fingers around the ball and straightened up, phasing right through the window that popped up in front of him.

Would you like to nickname your Totodile?

He considered it for a moment - it had been so long since he'd nicknamed Pokemon that weren't just his latest subscribers - before, with careful fingers, he tapped out a name and pressed the enter button.

"Uh. Thanks," he mumbled, feeling a little sheepish thanking an NPC but feeling entirely awkward to just... not acknowledge her at all. "I'll just... let myself out. So you can go back to... whatever it is you're doing." (Hopefully tidying up a little bit - with all the clutter, it wouldn't have shocked him if she'd intended to give him something else entirely. Though he didn't mind. He'd liked the Johto starters, so he'd roll with it for now.)

_{ooc: now watch me beg for bunya to remember he called her juniper and did a "like, nya" reference, if only because i will always support the funniest option whenever possible}