Chapter Text
“You want us to do what now?” Cliff frowned, glancing between Arlo and Sierra before looking back at Giovanni questioningly.
“VMI is having some sort of gift giveaway for their trainers and these “stickers”,” Giovanni raised his hands to use air quotes. “Are becoming quite the sensation. If we’re going to keep up with the times it’s only reasonable that we do the same.”
“From my understanding they’re cartoon illustrations of various pokemon. Trading them to get a complete collection is what has become so popular.” Arlo stated smugly, ignoring the not so subtle eye rolls the other two gave him.
“Way to be a suck up.” Sierra leaned over and whispered so only the three leaders could hear while Giovanni carried on.
“Precisely! But a prestigious organization such as Team Rocket needed something more on brand than just pokemon.”
“Oh?” Sierra smiled pleasantly at the boss. “I’m sure you came up with something ingenious, no doubt.”
“Who’s the suck up now?” Arlo whispered back, flinching when Sierra kicked him under the table. Giovanni was pulling three rather large envelopes out of his desk drawer with a grin, continuing on oblivious to their bickering.
“I thought to myself what is the best Team Rocket branding we could put out there. There is, of course, the logo but VMI has dozens of designs so we needed something more. Here.” He pushed the envelopes across to each of the three, watching them to see their reaction.
“Us?!” Arlo was the first to react as he opened the envelope and dozens, no hundreds of stickers depicting the three of them fell out.
“Of course! You are the faces of Team Rocket after all!”
“Aw, mine is so cute!” Sierra exclaimed, holding a sticker of hers up and imitating the gesture on it.
“Now, you’ll have to divy these out between yourselves BUT I don’t want you handing out your own. This is advertising after all not self promotion. Use them with your teams, or recruits, or however you see fit. I trust all of you to handle this efficiently.”
“Whatever you say boss, consider it done.” Cliff nodded trying to sound serious while biting back a laugh.
“Good.” With that Giovanni stood and exited the room, his Persian trailing dutifully behind him.
“Oh my Mythics, it looks just like you!” Cliff burst out as soon as the door closed while holding up a sticker of Arlo.
“It does not!” Arlo retorted, crossing his arms as he glared at the other man.
“That’s it! That’s the face!” Cliff roared with laughter as Sierra snickered.
“You make it too easy for him, dear.”
“Oh, and this,” Arlo grabbed a sticker of Cliff from the pile. “You’re saying you’re happy with this!?”
“Course I am!” Cliff flexed his arms towards his chest like the sticker. Arlo rolled his eyes.
“You two can’t be seriously considering giving these out?”
“Are you questioning the bosses orders?” Sierra raised a delicate brow at Arlo.
“No.” He glared at her before rolling his eyes, his arms folding across his chest once more. This caused Cliff to burst out laughing again.
“Oh, man. I can’t wait to hand these out.” Cliff managed to get out after catching his breath.
“Don’t be such a sourpuss.” Sierra smirked, gently peeling back an Arlo sticker and slapping it on the arm of his uniform. She ignored his protesting and continued. “Now you heard the boss, let’s split these up."
Despite the boss’s order all three managed to sneak a pile of their own, although Arlo suspected he got the least of his own as the other two grabbed handfuls from the envelopes. Not like he was planning on handing them out anyway. Or he wouldn’t have if Sierra hadn’t made it her mission to make sure he was. He also suspected one of them of sabotaging his stash so he was forced to hand on his own stickers. If Arlo had to choose one he would bet on Cliff since he had blown through his allotment the first week; although Sierra had assured them that she had spoken with Giovanni and more were coming, much to Arlo’s dismay.
“It’s all in good fun, dear.” Sierra had explained at their next meeting. “And it is causing quite a stir at VMI so the boss is thrilled.” She didn’t mention that she had heard that Candela, Spark, and Blanche were collecting them and may have made a dart board with them. And that she may have specifically given Candela a few of Arlo's. But some things were best left omitted.