Police (SkullShipping; one-shot; PG-13/T)

[AmericanPi]

"Police"
A SkullShipping one-shot
by AmericanPi​

Spoiler: Author's Notes

This is a completed dare from the SPPf Shippers' Truth or Dare Thread. Stardust dared me to write a SkullShipping (Guzma x Plumeria) one-shot with a murder mystery theme. I know this one-shot is pretty loose with the prompt, but once I got the idea for this I had to run with it because it was so funny. Please enjoy.

Guzma and Plumeria walked in silence in the Alolan forest, searching for a Pokémon that they both liked, Venipede. Guzma glanced at his former charge and sighed softly to himself.

Truth to be told, he invited Plumeria on this outing so that she could think it was a date and provide the perfect opportunity for him to confess his feelings for her. Guzma had been crushing on Plumeria for a while now, ever since the fusion. The two of them may not have been part of Team Skull anymore because the team disbanded, but Guzma still greatly admired Plumeria and hoped that she returned his feelings.

But he couldn't act all different out of the blue. He would have to wait for the right time, and now, with Plumeria focused on looking for Pokémon, was not the right time.

Plumeria stopped short, causing Guzma to bump into her.

"Hey, what gives?" Guzma yelled, but Plumeria quickly put a hand over her friend's mouth.

"Shh, I see something," Plumeria said, pointing to a dark blue shape on the forest floor in the distance. "What's that?"

"Lemme check it out," Guzma said, grabbing one of his Poké Balls and hurrying over towards the still shape. As he neared it, though, he was met with an awful smell, and his heart dropped into his stomach as he found out what it was.

"EEK!" Guzma shrieked in terror, bolting back to where Plumeria was and grabbing her hand. "It's a freaking dead body!"

"Don't pull my leg, Guzma," Plumeria huffed, rolling her eyes.

"I'm freaking serious," Guzma said, his voice scared. "It's the dead body of a policeman lying in a pool of blood."

"You can't be serious," Plumeria muttered as she let go of Guzma and jogged towards what Guzma had seen. When she turned back to Guzma, her eyes were wide.

"Holy ****, you were right," Plumeria said quietly as they made their way slowly towards each other. They ended up standing about thirty feet away from the dead body, staring at it.

"Told you so," Guzma muttered, though his heart was racing because he had no idea why a dead body would be in the middle of the forest.

"It can't possibly be a natural death," Plumeria said thoughtfully. "Look at all that blood."

"Hey, don't touch him!" Guzma yelled, swatting Plumeria's hand away just as she started reaching out. "You can't just touch a dead body. Plus, if you get fingerprints on him people will think that you killed him!"

Plumeria stopped short, took a step back, and smiled at Guzma. "You're right," she said. "I didn't expect that coming from you."

"Hey!" Guzma exclaimed angrily, crossing his arms and scowling. "What are you implying?"

"That I expected," Plumeria said, grinning. She frowned at the dead body and pulled out her phone. "Let's call the police."

"Are you crazy?" Guzma exclaimed, his eyes wide as he grabbed Plumeria's arm.

"Wait, what?" Plumeria asked in confusion.

"We can't call the police," Guzma said, shaking his head vigorously. "Look, one of them is dead in a forest, and the people to call them are former criminals. That's going to go great."

"Hmm, I get you," Plumeria said, putting her phone away. "Should we try to find the killer ourselves?"

"Yeah, it can't be too hard," Guzma said confidently, "and once we've found them we'll serve them justice."

oOoOo​

Guzma threw his hands up in frustration, glaring at the dead body of the policeman as if that would bring it back to life. He muttered angrily and incoherently to himself.

"Well," he finally said after a few minutes of stomping around, "we tried, but after all this time we still don't know who killed this guy."

"Fine, I give up," Plumeria huffed, taking a step back and grimacing at the corpse. "Let's call the police."

"What is with you and the police?" Guzma asked loudly. "I already told you, we can't call the police, they'll think it was us!"

"Guzma, calm down," Plumeria said, placing her hands on her friend's shoulders. As Guzma took deep breaths, Plumeria continued, "Let's think for a bit. If we call the police they'll do their own investigation with their fancy stuff, right? And their investigation won't point to us. When they find the answer of who killed this person they'll acquit us - I mean, we didn't even touch the guy."

"Thanks to me," Guzma said, smirking.

"Guzma, focus," Plumeria said irritably, though she smiled a little. "What I was saying is, let's call the police and let them figure it out themselves, and most likely we'll be fine. They'll find the killer, who won't be us, and confirm that it wasn't us."

Guzma nodded slowly as he took everything she said in. "You're right, Plumeria," he said as Plumeria smiled and stepped back. "Alright, let's call them. Aren't you glad that I stopped you from touching the body?"

"I guess I gotta thank you," Plumeria huffed, smirking slightly. "So thanks."

"You're welcome," Guzma said proudly as he pulled out his phone. He turned to Plumeria and hesitated.

"Plumeria, I'm going to make the call," he said, his fingers hovering over his device. "That way, if by any chance the police do wrongly accuse someone, it'll be me. You should run or you might get caught up in this."

"Guzma, don't be silly," Plumeria said, crossing her arms. "There's no way I'm leaving you to handle this alone." She frowned. "Why are you worried about them wrongly accusing me, anyways?"

"I dunno," Guzma yelled, throwing his hands up in the air. "I know that most likely we'll be fine. But just in case they do pin the blame on me or the both of us and lock me or the both of us up, I want you to know that I love you."

"Well, I love you too - wait what?" Plumeria responded, her eyes wide.

"Ah, well, it's out now so there's no bother dancing around it, right?" Guzma said awkwardly, blushing furiously and scratching his back. "Plumeria, I meant what I said. I really like you. Lusamine turned out to be stupid, so…"

"So you settled for me," Plumeria said flatly. "How romantic."

Guzma blushed harder. "No, no, that's not what I meant at all," he said, forcing himself to look into Plumeria's eyes. "It's just that after the Ultra Space incident I did a little thinking, which I usually don't do but that's a different discussion. But anyways, I realized that I'm only like this because I want people to love and respect me. I thought I got that from Lusamine, but of course she was only using me. But you…" He looked down, annoyed at how much he was talking, but he couldn't stop now. "You've always respected me for real, as a person and as a trainer, not just as some service."

"Gee, what tipped you off?" Plumeria asked, her face unreadable.

Guzma felt like something had punched him in the gut, which was silly because he was supposed to be a tough guy. But he couldn't help but feel a million things at once at Plumeria's unexpected reaction to his confession. He stammered, trying to form a coherent sentence, and then gave up trying to articulate his feelings.

"ARGH!" Guzma yelled, stomping away. "That's not how I expected this to go! Guzma you're such an idiot, you've ruined everything!"

"Guzma, wait!" Plumeria exclaimed, rushing over to his side.

"I'm sorry Plumeria, I know I'm-" His response was cut off by Plumeria, who threw her arms around him and kissed him hard on the lips.

Guzma's eyes widened in surprise, but inside his heart was fluttering as he embraced Plumeria back and returned the kiss. Guzma was surprised at how right the whole thing felt. He had gone through many scenarios in his head about how things would feel when he confessed to his former charge, but he hadn't expected the moment to feel like this.

He wasn't complaining, though.

"Uh, look, I'm really sorry," Plumeria said as she ended the kiss. She was blushing hard but still looking at Guzma. "I didn't know how to respond so I responded with my usual sarcasm, which wasn't the best idea but you know how I use snark to cover things up. But if you want to know my true feelings…" She took a deep breath and gave one of her rare smiles. "I love you too, Guzma."

Guzma smiled at Plumeria and kissed her again. It was too easy to forget that there was a dead body lying just a few feet away from them. But Guzma knew that it was there, reminding them of how they got into this situation in the first place.

"So…" Guzma said as they broke the kiss, glancing at the policeman's corpse, "I guess that means we're in this together?"

"Yeah," Plumeria answered, taking Guzma's hand and giving it a squeeze. "Whether we are recognized as innocent or are wrongly accused, I'll be with you."

"Thanks for letting me count on you, I guess," Guzma said, giving Plumeria a hug. "But I want you to know that you can count on me too. I've promised to protect those I care about, and your boy Guzma is going to do his best to do just that."

"You've changed so much, and yet you're still the same," Plumeria said with a quick smile as she pulled out her phone. "Alright. Let's do this."

-END-