[ti]open[/ti]Negative Space

Zac had been to church exactly seven times (not counting his baptism). Three times as a groom, twice as a best man, once as a bride (long story), and one more just last year when The Great Pope-ini from his Circle of Magi in Vegas had agreed to trade him a fake boating license in exchange for some holy water.

In none of those 8 situations had he escaped with his dignity or full liver function.

He stood across the street from the Church, watching the summer rain sluice across its roof. "Okay. Quick in and out, right?" he said to his Chikorita. "We'll scope the place out for jewels, see where they keep all those Jesus disks and the mid-tier booze, and best case scenario there's a weird basement that we can take some pics of to 'convince' the priest to give us a pass into the Good Place. Sound good?"

Chikorita shivered, terrified of what was happening. Petal had only a basic grasp of the law, but she was learning to trust her gut when she felt something was Wrong.

Unfortunately, Buzzster's question had been hypothetical, and before she could stutter out a complaint he had burst from the cover of the wooden awning and was sprinting up the steps of the church.

She squealed and galloped after him, her head leaf shielding her face from the worst of the rain.

Zac dodged the front doors and slipped around back, entering through the side door. Inside, he was instantly hit by a familiar smell.

Not the usual church smell of octagenarian perfume, crumpling prayer books, and ass-polished wood, but something fresher.

He noticed a young man was painting the wall.

"Oh! Sorry to bother you, mate!" Buzzster said, "I thought we'd scheduled the painter for midnight tomorrow"

His brain spun as he tried to salvage the situation. Only a fool cased the same place twice.

He took two cautious steps into the room. "Mind if I, uh, check out your work so far? The priest is pretty picky about his color palettes."

"uh...hey!" Buzzster said, frowning a little at the strange greeting. Well, it look all types to make a world, and if the church chose to hire some hyper-tattooed, socially awkward teenager to do their interior decorating then that was their business.

"The weather is great!" Chikorita chimed in, before Zac could reassure Vanta that he wasn't about to kill him. Petal hurried over to Bulba Fett and offered one of her vines in a strange, floral handshake. "I love the rain, don't you?" she asked.

Zac wandered closer, and though his stature and posture bespoke power and confidence, Vanta would never be in any real danger. Buzzster had never been in a fight he hadn't staged beforehand (or escaped from with a smoke bomb and a change of clothes). His hands may be huge, but that just made card magic easier. Strangling was just a one-way ticket to cramped joints.

He peered up at the wall, primed and ready, and at the trays of paints, swatches, and half mixed pigments. "Well, looks like you're deep into this." He dabbled with some of the pigment, combining them poorly into a color that looked like a ripe peach. Spontaneously, he dipped his finger into the tray of 'Sunset Mirage'. He sniffed the paint, and then licked his finger. Surprisingly, it didn't taste as good as it looked. Few things ever did.

"That one needs some work," he said, wiping his finger on a nearby cloth. "So what are you going to paint first?" Buzzster asked, realizing halfway through the question that he was about to display his absolute lack of artistic knowledge and religious iconography. "The, uh, backup dancers?"