Writing Mysteries of the Forgotten Island (Version Zero) (Complete)

"It's the fire field! Surely not the battlefield Windra was hoping for.
lol rest in pieces Windra


the last section gives me such powerful secondhand embarrassment/devastation because the notes were switched (this means you did a fantastic job PMJ, I'm not scorning it or anything)
Scarlet, please see that the notes were switched, Windra, please forgive her
i hope the guy that switched the notes gets proper retaliation
 
lol rest in pieces Windra

Rolling the fire field was probably the most hilarious part of this entire battle. I'm just really glad that Lenny won because I really did not wanna write out a Windra victory.

Now that that's out of the way, the only other match that could possibly be as disastrous is Lenny vs Cody, but in order for that to happen, they'd have to meet each other in the semifinals, which means does Cody need to beat both Alex and the winner of Jethro vs Kyro, but Lenny also has to beat Frisk. That's a 12.5% chance of happening I think so I like those odds.

the last section gives me such powerful secondhand embarrassment/devastation because the notes were switched (this means you did a fantastic job PMJ, I'm not scorning it or anything)
Scarlet, please see that the notes were switched, Windra, please forgive her
i hope the guy that switched the notes gets proper retaliation

Windra doesn't forgive easily; you told me that ;) In fact, I incorporated a lot of your private notes into this chapter.

NinjaPenguin thought it was odd that Scarlet didn't bring up the note at all, which I agreed with to a point; however, I think that it's within Scarlet's character to just go with it because she is still attracted to Windra and she only resolved to pursue Rose earlier the same day. Plus, I told him, even if Scarlet did ask about the note, Windra would either say "yes I got it" which, to Scarlet, would sound like Windra got the rejection note and didn't care; or Windra would just give a noncommittal answer and continue trying to get Scarlet naked.

The end of chapter 6 was the fun and sexy romp. In chapter 7, it's back to reality, and everything comes crashing down. All aboard the drama train! Woo woo!
 
With so many of the characters having secrets, I guess we are bound to get a drama chapter eventually. I’m looking forward to it.:p
All of these characters have some kind of secret:
The Jewels (more so Ruby and Esmeralda with their crushes)
Windra
Scarlet
Frisk
Alex
Rose

... and every single one is important enough to get blown up eventually.
 
Next up is Jethro vs Kyro, which I know Firo has been dying to read
Can confirm.

You'll both need to follow me to my office to file an incident report. Not negotiable
Ugh, I hate writing incident reports

"I'll tell everyone someday. But it'll be on my terms."
Yeah... I don't see that ending well.

Unintimidated, Eldan rose to meet his gaze, disgust dripping from every syllable of his reply. "And I could never be friends with His Royal Highness Edge Nightdoom, someone who stoops to despicable levels just to win a Pokemon battle, and look horrendous while doing it."
While I'm admittedly not particularly fond of Eldan (not how he's written, but his actions), I will give him props for this. Probably his best line... Ever?

you'll get to help determine what three she uses
Eyyy, here's the part that I helped with! :D

All right, Chomper, Thunder Sword!
This whole bit reminded me of He-Man. "BY THE POWER OF GREYSKULL."

"Come, Tyranitar!"
Come, Reuniclus!
"Come, Cacturne!"
Ooh. That seems like an interesting team she has. I wonder what the other three are.

"Because I let her win."
Oh snap o: Admittedly a rather interesting way to boost self-confidence. It didn't feel faked, either, which is nice.

Ms. Whitemore had suicide switches secretly installed on every model
Well, that got dark. :T

Were all kids as energetic as he was?
Yes, yes they are. So much energy. x.x
 
One of her other Pokemon should be easy to guess. The others are a little harder, but if you can figure out the theme I used, it gets a little easier.
 
Happy birthday, motfi! \o/

Today marks one year since I decided to steal Athena's cool idea and make it decidedly worse. :D

It's been quite the journey. I wanna thank you guys who have stuck around this long. I don't expect everyone to be around by the time this story is actually finished, which is understandable. I kinda let this story sleep for a bit and that was way too long. I don't plan on having any breaks that large again unless something really bad happens.

Also, with this addition, motfi has cleared 100,000 words. Holy hot damn, you guys. We're not even at the halfway point yet. Here's to 200,000 - may it not take me an entire year to do, lol.

SO ANYWAY. It's motfi's birthday and for the big anniversary I got some art I've been sitting on for a few weeks now, made up by my homie @OzoneFruit. I am super thankful to him for offering his services free of charge and giving a visual aspect to some of the characters. If you like this dude's scribbles then go commission some stuff from him, his art is da bomb, yo.

Obligatory @TheSceptileMaster tag, figure it's only fair.

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I hope you guys are as excited about his art as I am. Hot dog.

Now that that's out of the way, it's time for what you all came here for!

Interlude 3 highlights:

- Chara watches a snuff movie
- Frisk gets her body back
- it's friggin dope

Despite the few highlights, this interlude could have gone on a lot longer than I ended up making it. Like Quayle, Frisk and Chara could easily have an entire game fic written about just them; as existing characters, there are a couple Undertale references, but none so obscure that it should detract from the story. If you've never played Undertale before, you should at least have a general idea of who the characters are. If you have, then you'll have to forgive me butchering the canon.

Obligatory @PikaMasterJesi tag because this installment hopefully answers all the questions she had about Frisk but I was unable to answer in this old-ass post, where I said that I would much rather put into the story the relationship between Frisk and Chara instead of just explaining it in a post. So what could have been like 50 words became almost eight thousand. \o/

Next battle is Jethro vs Kyro. After that we finally have Alex vs Cody, and that'll mark the end of the first round.

One last request, I know I keep telling you guys to leave that sweet, sweet feedback, but at the very least could you like this post once you've read it so I know you've read it? Just so I know who's following along. kthx <3

Word count: 7988

Interlude 3: Purple Progress

What's going on?

Chara, still fully inhabiting Frisk's body, could not see anything in front of him. He tried opening his eyes, but realized with a start that they were already open; the entire surrounding area was simply pitch black.

Hello? he called into the darkness, and immediately, there was a bright flash of white. He shielded his eyes as an image formed in front of him, of water and rocks and trees. He recognized the scene all too well, and an uneasy feeling settled in his stomach.

This is... this is where I... why am I seeing this?

In the vision, the sun had just barely reached its highest point in the sky for the day when Frisk had decided that they had arrived at their destination. Lake Valor was a popular spot for tourists, and there was a path that traveled around the lake, allowing spectators to see the entire lake from the cliffside road. One day, while Frisk had been chasing after a Pokemon that she'd been sketching, she'd found a spot on the cliff that jutted out several feet, and Frisk was in awe at how much better the view was here; the Pokemon all but forgotten, she'd turned to a clean page in her sketchbook and ended up drawing the entire scene.

Naturally, she'd wanted to share the sight with her brother, who was less than enthusiastic about seeing the lake, even if it was "a way better view." So she enticed him by inviting him on a picnic. He wasn't too excited about that, but when Frisk promised to make him some of his favorite foods if he went, he relented. Currently, he was lagging several paces behind her, carrying a large basket that was heavy with food. "Finally!" he complained, dropping the basket of goodies to the ground with a thud. "You know, you could have carried it some of the way, you know."

"Sorry, Chara," Frisk apologized, unrolling the blanket she was carrying along with her sketchbook and colored pencils. She stood a few feet from the edge, inhaled the warm summer air, and smiled. "But isn't it beautiful? I've never seen anything like it. There's a cave in the middle of the lake, too. Can you see it?" she asked, pointing towards the large structure. "I wonder what's in there?"

"Beats me, sis," Chara replied, more interested in the food than some cave. He pulled out a sandwich from the basket. "Here you go," he said, offering it to his sister.

Frisk took the sandwich and sat next to her brother as he continued to unload the basket. "Sorry, Chara," she apologized again. "You're doing everything."

"I don't mind," Chara happily stated, content that the trek was over and he would finally get to eat the delicious food that Frisk had made for them. He took two large bottles of water from the bottom of the basket and placed them both on the side of the blanket, and Chara took a moment to take in his version of a beautiful view. Peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, assorted fruits and berries in all colors of the rainbow, and plenty of cold water with which to wash it down. He picked up a sandwich of his own and bit into it, enjoying the familiar taste and the company of his big sister. He smiled as a warm breeze rolled through the area, making the leaves of the trees rustle quietly. Chara looked out over the lake, and even he had to admit - yeah, the view here was pretty sweet.

"Where should we go next?" Frisk asked, biting into a piece of fruit. "According to the hotel receptionist, we're about a day from Sunyshore City."

"That's the city with the lighthouse, right?" Chara inquired. "That seems pretty cool. I wouldn't mind visiting it."

Frisk reached for her backpack and flipped through the pages of the brochure she'd taken from the hotel lobby. "Visit the Vista Lighthouse - saving lives for over 150 years," she read. "It says you can even see the Pokemon League from the observation deck."

Chara took a large drink of water, relishing the feel of the cool liquid going down his throat. "Speaking of the Pokemon League, isn't there one of those Pokemon Gyms in that city?"

Unsure, Frisk turned to another page, where the Gym in question was prominently displayed, along with a picture of its Leader. "Yeah, here it is. 'Do you have what it takes to best the best? Sunyshore Gym Leader Volkner Taren awaits your challenge! Earn your Beacon Badge and the right to challenge the Sinnoh Pokemon League today!'" she recited. "So I guess we couldn't challenge him, even if we wanted to. We haven't earned seven badges from the other Gym Leaders yet."

"You're interested in all that?" Chara asked, making a face at the idea of becoming a trainer professionally. Though the two were required to pass an exam in order to be licensed to capture Pokemon, neither of them had considered actually becoming trainers; both of them felt like becoming professional trainers would mean they'd have to abandon their plans on going back to their own world, never mind the fact that neither of them had any idea how to do that.

"Kinda," Frisk replied honestly. "I mean, it doesn't look like we're going to be going home any time soon... I don't even know how we got here in the first place."

Chara's face fell at Frisk's reminder that they were strangers in this world. "I miss our friends," he said forlornly, taking solace in his sandwich.

"I know. I miss them too," Frisk replied, moving closer to her brother. "It was a good idea to nickname our Pokemon after them. It kinda keeps them in our hearts, you know?"

"Yeah..." Chara took a moment to remember their lives before they'd ended up in this world. "I hope Dr. Alphys is okay."

"I'm sure she's fine," Frisk said, more for Chara's benefit than her own. Dr. Alphys, the Underground's Royal Scientist, had been the one responsible for sending them to this world; though the machine she'd asked them to test was intended to send them back to their home on the Surface, something had obviously gone wrong, and the two of them had ended up somewhere in Sinnoh instead. Just before the machine had sent them away, the two children saw the massive form of King Asgore, ruler of the Underground and their adoptive father after they became trapped in the Underground, enter the laboratory. Frisk could see the horror in his eyes turn to anger as he tried freeing his children from the machine, demanding an explanation that a nervous Dr. Alphys wasn't too keen on giving, as she'd been carrying on her research without his knowledge.

Though Frisk knew Asgore to be a kind and benevolent ruler, she also knew he had a fiery temper, especially when it came to matters of his family. And so seeing his only surviving children vanish before his eyes, seemingly betrayed by a woman he trusted, Frisk couldn't help but fear for the young monster's safety as Asgore pointed his massive trident at her, with Alphys pleading for her life as Frisk and Chara vanished.

Frisk didn't want to dwell on this subject too much longer; Chara had watched the scene unfold, as well, and he in particular had worried for the good doctor's safety. And although they both wanted to keep their hopes up, it was entirely possible that Dr. Alphys had met a terrible end at the hands of the king.

"So we'll head to Sunyshore City next," Frisk said, changing the subject and grabbing another piece of fruit. "After that, we should be able to take a boat over to the other side of Sinnoh. There's a library in Canalave City that I want to visit. Wake said that there's all sorts of books on Sinnoh myths and legends there... maybe there'll be some information on how we can get back home."

The two sat in silence and ate, the mood slightly sobered somewhat with the thought of whether or not Dr. Alphys was safe, or even alive. Frisk pursed her lips and frowned, watching Chara look over the cliff across the great lake, unsure of how to brighten her brother's mood.

The Chara on the outside watched Frisk watch him, feeling angry at the fact that he already knew how this 'movie' ended, and still had no idea what the purpose of seeing this vision was. But we never made it there, did we, Sis? At least... I didn't.

Frisk took a seat next to her brother and wrapped a comforting arm around him. "Hey. It's gonna be okay. We're in this together, right? We'll find a way home. And if we don't... then at least we'll have each other. I'll never leave your side, Chara. That's a promise."

This was none too reassuring to Chara, who'd heard this same speech from Frisk many times before, but he could still appreciate the sentiment. He nodded, sighing forlornly. Perhaps becoming a Pokemon trainer wouldn't be the worst thing in the world. There were a couple of them that he really liked - maybe he'd ask Frisk to help him catch one, and teach him how to battle. That way, they'd have something else to bond over. He wasn't nearly as gifted artistically as she was, so he'd feel left out when she'd go off on one of her drawing binges that would last hours or sometimes days at a time.

Deciding to go with that idea, he turned to her to speak. "Hey, Frisk, do you think you could--"

Chara paused, turning his head towards the forest. Frisk turned, as well, but saw nothing out of the ordinary. "Chara, what--"

"Shh!" he quieted her, getting to his feet. He listened as hard as he could, and could hear voices in the distance. "Someone's coming. I got a bad feeling about this, Frisk, we need to go, now!" He grabbed her arm and yanked her to her feet as they dashed into the forest, moments before the voices became clearer.

"Commander, I know it's around here somewhere!"

Frisk and Chara hid behind a large tree off in the distance as two men approached the clearing. One was of average height, wearing a striped black shirt and pants. Over his shirt was a striped white vest. Around the man's neck was a necklace with a large golden capital G dangling from the chain. "A picnic? Is this your idea of a joke, Sergeant?" He brushed a hand through his jet blue hair, annoyed. "Where is this hidden path to the realm where Azelf lies?"

The sergeant flinched, not liking the direction this conversation was headed. "I dunno what's with the food, Commander Saturn, but I had good intel that said they came across a cave somewhere along the cliff." He looked out over Lake Valor. "View's pretty nice from way out here. You can see the cave in the center pretty clearly." He inhaled deeply, taking in the afternoon lake air, but it was masked by the scent of the food that Frisk brought. "Food smells good. It ain't ours, though."

Saturn looked down at the blanket with the half-eaten foodstuffs haphazardly dropped onto it. "No, it isn't... and yes, it does," he noted, picking up the remnants of a sandwich. He examined it, gave it a cursory sniff. "It's still fresh." He glanced around the immediate area, but couldn't see anyone. He took a Poke Ball from his belt, threw it down. "Kadabra, I need your help."

Chara went wide-eyed at the large, intimidating Pokemon. "Shit! We're dead! What do we do?!" he frantically whispered, only to be shushed by his sister.

"Don't say anything," Frisk mouthed, putting a finger up to her lips, turning her attention back to the two men.

"Kadabra, we have some unwanted guests. Use Miracle Eye and flush them out for me."

Kadabra nodded, closing his eyes and focusing for a moment before opening them, revealing a bright blue glow. Kadabra scanned the area and quickly spotted the two children hiding nearby. He motioned towards them with a finger, and Frisk spoke one word: "Run."

Immediately, the siblings broke cover and took off in the opposite direction, but they were instantly stopped in their tracks by Kadabra, who telekinetically grabbed them both and lifted them off the ground. Noting their small size, Saturn noted, "Children? Bring them here, Kadabra."

Kadabra did as he was told, reeling the youngsters in and placing them on the ground in front of Saturn and confirming his suspicions. "What brings you here, little ones? Why are you hiding in the forest?"

"We were just having a picnic and enjoying the view!" Frisk offered, standing protectively in front of Chara. "Right, Chara?"

"Yeah, until you guys came along and freaked us out," Chara finished. "What's your deal, anyway? You guys like scaring little kids or something?"

"Chara, be quiet!" Frisk scolded. "Please forgive my brother. He's kind of on edge. My name's Frisk, and this is Chara," she said, pointing to Chara. "What's your name? Your necklace is pretty."

Completely ruin everything in three... two... one...

"That guy called him Commander Saturn," Chara noted, pointing at the sergeant.

Saturn raised his eyebrows in surprise before his face turned deadly serious. "That he did, young man. What else did you hear?"

"Nothing!" Chara blurted, stepping out from his sister's shadow. "We didn't hear anything you guys said!"

"Yes, he's right!" Frisk insisted, nodding. "Chara just got scared when he thought he heard someone coming, so we ran and hid. That's all, I swear!"

Saturn considered her words, a sly smile slowly coming across his face as he did so. "I see. So the only thing you heard was my subordinate addressing me?"

"Yes!" both children shouted at once.

"That's good to hear," Saturn replied calmly, and Frisk and Chara visibly relaxed, sighing. "But," he continued, causing the two of them to stiffen again, "Sergeant, correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe I said something... important, before you addressed me by name. Do I have that right?"

"Yes sir, you did," the sergeant replied, grinning evilly. "Something little kids ought not be knowing."

"Agreed, sergeant," said Saturn, directing his gaze towards Chara. "And I can't help but wonder how you two didn't hear that part of our conversation."

Chara took a few steps back, getting closer to Frisk. "Okay, so we might have heard a little bit, but we don't know anything about that! We aren't from around here, we don't even know what Azelf is, right, Frisk?"

Saturn cut off Frisk's reply, rushing in and grabbing the boy by his collar with both hands. "So you do know of the legendary Pokemon Azelf that is rumored to sleep somewhere in this lake!" Saturn effortlessly lifted the panicking boy into the air, shaking him as if that would make him respond quicker. "Answer me! You're spies, aren't you? Who sent you?!"

Frisk made a dash for Saturn, but she was stopped by Kadabra, who used a bit of psychic energy to plant her feet to the ground. She fell with a wail, smashing face first into the rocky ground. She crawled to her knees and grabbed her now-broken nose, crying out in pain. Hearing Frisk cry and the sergeant laughing at her misfortune only made Chara thrash in Saturn's grip harder. "N-no one sent us, you idiot! We're just kids! We didn't find out about your stupid Pokemon until you said it just now, you dimwit! Let me go!"

Saturn was stunned momentarily at the young boy's statement, but quickly regained his composure. "Kadabra, hold his legs, will you? This brat is starting to piss me off," the Galactic commander groused. Kadabra obliged, shackling Chara's feet together the same way he'd done to Frisk. This didn't dissuade Chara, though, for he reared back and spit as hard as he could in the man's face. Saturn simply smiled at the boy's attempt. "So, you want me to let you go, do you?" Saturn walked over to the cliff edge and held Chara out over it. "How about now, you little shit? Want me to let you go now?"

"NO!" Frisk shouted, her pain forgotten at the sight of her brother dangling over the cliff. She tried getting to her feet but only wound up on the ground again, as her feet were still locked in place. She looked up to Saturn pitifully, her face dirty and wet with blood and tears, and pleaded for her brother's life as best she could. "Please, sir, we don't mean you any harm, we were just having a picnic, we don't know anything about any legendary Pokemon, the lake is pretty, that's all! I didn't know this spot was important to you, sir, and if you let us go we promise we won't say anything to anyone or tell anyone about this spot, just please don't hurt my brother, he's all I have in this world, sir, I'll do anything you ask, just let us go!" By this time, Frisk was on her knees, her hands clasped together and her head bowed, praying to whoever would listen that Saturn would spare Chara's life.

A wicked smile came across Saturn's face. "Anything?"

Frisk's head shot up, grasping onto Saturn's word like a life raft. "Yes, anything!"

Saturn turned to Chara, who was breathing heavily and sweating in Saturn's grip. "Do you love your sister, boy?"

Chara nodded as fast as he could, hoping that that would be enough to get Saturn to put him back on solid ground.

It wasn't. Saturn continued holding his now-limp body over the cliff's edge, but turned so Chara could better see his sister. "Say it. Tell your sister you love her."

"I love you, Frisk," he said obediently, and did mean it.

"I love you too, Chara," Frisk replied immediately. "So much," she continued through her tears. "I promise you we're going to get out of here, okay? I'm sorry I brought you here, if I'd known that these men needed it so badly I wouldn't have--"

"Quiet!" Saturn barked, and Frisk shut her mouth. "Now, you said you would do anything if I let you and your brother go. Is that correct?"

Frisk nodded, unsure if Saturn wanted her to answer verbally after telling her to be quiet.

"Okay. Do exactly as I say. If you or your brother disobey, well... the consequences will be dire. Understand? Both of you?" Frisk nodded again, and Saturn looked to Chara, who gave another uneasy nod, not knowing what the blue-haired man had in store for them.

"Good. Kadabra, let the girl go." Kadabra released the hold on Frisk's feet, and she resisted the urge to stand. She would not do anything to endanger the life of her brother any further. "Do you two know the Pokemon Combee?"

"Yes, sir," Frisk said, not taking any chances by appearing disrespectful.

"Good," Saturn said with a smile. "I want you both to act like the best Combee you can be." He turned to Chara, "you can just buzz like a Combee. That will do fine. Now, buzz for me, my little bees!"

Frisk hesitantly got to her feet, tucking her arms to her sides and quickly flapping her hands up and down. "Bzzzzzz," she muttered, too afraid to upset Saturn to do much else.

"Come on, I know you can do better than that!" Saturn mocked her. "And you! I don't even hear your buzzing, little bee!" he shook Chara a little, causing him to panic and let out a loud buzzing noise with his lips, as loud as he possibly could. Frisk followed suit, running in large circles around the area, buzzing loudly and adding in a few instances of the Pokemon's name for authenticity. "Hahahaha! Excellent! Keep it up!" Saturn cheered, and he and the sergeant laughed at the two children making fools of themselves. "I knew you two had it in you! All right, you can stop, both of you."

Frisk ceased her act, faced Saturn, and took a few tentative steps closer to him, but did not dare speak.

"You two make excellent Combee! But there's one last thing I want to ask you before I let your brother go."

"What is it?" Frisk blurted, hopeful.

"Do you know how Combee evolves?"

Frisk's eyes went wide. Combee was a very common Pokemon, but as much as she searched her mind, she couldn't recall seeing any of them evolved. Maybe it didn't? Was this a trick question?

Saturn saw the panic spreading across Frisk's face, and he continued. "That's okay if you don't. After all, you're just children, and Combee doesn't evolve like normal Pokemon. You see, when a female Combee gains a certain amount of experience in battle, she will evolve into Vespiquen and rule over all the Combee in her hive. This honor, as I said, is only reserved for the female of the species. The male," Saturn went on, tightening his grip on Chara, "will never evolve, no matter how much experience he gets. For someone looking to raise a Vespiquen of their own, this is a problem, and it is because of this problem that you see so many male Combee in the wild."

Saturn paused for effect here. "Do you know what trainers do to Pokemon they have no use for?" He smiled triumphantly at Chara, then answered his own question loud enough for Frisk to hear.

"They release them!"

With that, Saturn kept his word, and let Chara go.

The Chara on the outside braced himself for the impact of the water. Though he couldn't feel anything the Chara in the vision was experiencing, it still made him uncomfortable remembering it. Kinda weird seeing it from the outside...

As Chara disappeared below the cliff, Frisk screamed, "NO!!! CHARA, NO!!!" Scrambling to her feet, she ran right past Saturn and leaped off the cliff after her falling brother, her hand already on one of her Poke Balls. "Undyne, save Chara!!!"

Geez, sis... I still can't believe she jumped off after me. Did she really think she could have saved me?

Frisk's Empoleon materialized and threw a Protect barrier up, extending it as wide as she possibly could around her, but it wasn't large enough to also envelop Chara. Chara reached out futilely towards Frisk and Empoleon, too far away to make any difference.

On the outside, there was a brief moment of static in the vision as the Chara in the vision crashed into the water. He rubbed his neck, remembering the angle at which he'd struck the water, which had killed him on impact. Ouch. Man, just remembering that gives me the creeps, but seeing it is a whole other level of creepy.

He watched as Empoleon fell into the water next; unable to align her body properly for a dive, and with Chara just beneath the surface, she landed awkwardly on her side so as to not potentially land on him. Her hard body meant she was able to escape without much damage, but Frisk was not so lucky; as she was right above Empoleon as she fell, Frisk fell through the Protect barrier and landed halfway on top of Empoleon, shattering her leg. Had the barrier not been up, she would not have survived the fall.

Empoleon worked as fast as she could, diving down to find Chara's body. Once she located him, she grabbed him by the shirt and turned around, jetting towards Frisk, who was on the verge of losing consciousness from her injuries. Empoleon brought both of them to the surface, allowing Frisk to take a few precious breaths of air. She looked around for land, and spotted some a few hundred feet in the distance. It would be easy for her to make it, but she had to be careful not to further injure her precious cargo. Moving the siblings to her back, she swam slowly, although safely, towards land.

Empoleon finally made landfall some time later, on a beach in an unknown location. There were houses nearby, but no one was around. She dragged herself out of the water, far more tired than she thought she'd be. With a cry, she fell to her knees, rousing Frisk, who had fallen asleep while riding Empoleon. Careful not to put any pressure on her demolished limb, she grabbed Chara and gently placed him on the sand. Her load finally delivered, Empoleon collapsed face-down on the sand, all her energy spent.

"Thank you, Undyne," Frisk said to her unconscious savior, before gently kneeling down to Chara. "...Chara?" she asked, not knowing the boy was already long gone. When she did not get a response, she called his name again, pulling his face up so she could look into his expressionless eyes. Tears started to form as she started to assume the worst. "No, come on, Chara, wake up, please wake up..." she shook him by the shoulders and was horrified to see the movements his head made, his broken neck made blatantly apparent by her shaking. Frisk collapsed into a heap on top of her brother, wailing and screaming until her throat was raw, clutching Chara's body to her and ignoring the pain shooting through her leg. She was well and truly alone now, her last link to her home lying dead in her arms.

Outside the vision, Chara watched as his sister cried. I guess you really did care, huh? He watched Frisk look at Empoleon, then at his body, then at Empoleon again.

"I can't live without you, Chara," Frisk said with an air of finality. "I won't. You were all I had in this world... and now I don't even have that." She crawled over to Empoleon's unconscious body, bruised, bloodied, and broken, and placed herself at her head. She grabbed onto either side of Empoleon's crown, pointing the long center piece towards her stomach. "I'm sorry I couldn't protect you in life. But don't worry," she said with a sad smile, casting one last look at her fallen sibling, "Big sister's on her way! I'm coming, Chara! Please wait for me!"

Frisk thrust herself forward, impaling herself on her own Pokemon. She could say or do nothing as her body went into shock, collapsing on top of Empoleon, the shouts of several people who'd finally come to investigate falling deaf on her ears.

As the vision faded to black, Chara stared dumbfounded at what he'd just witnessed. I can't believe Frisk did that. She tried killing herself just so we could stay together? Chara felt around on Frisk's stomach for any sign of the wound. He couldn't tell if he was really feeling a scar or if his mind was playing a trick on him.

The scene of a hospital room came into Chara's view. Frisk was in bed, hooked up to several machines which monitored her health. She slowly opened her eyes, took in the unfamiliar surroundings. Huh? Where am I? She tried thinking back to the last thing she remembered. They were at the picnic... then Saturn came. He took Chara and... and he...

Tears started coming down her face, her mind unwilling to accept this horrible truth for even a moment, but there was no denying it. Chara was dead.

He's dead, she thought as she wiped her eyes. Chara is dead, and Saturn killed him. And for what? A spot on a cliff overlooking the lake? He didn't have to die for that. It was all one big misunderstanding, and Chara paid the ultimate price for it. "Hello?" she called, her voice coming out as weak as she felt, but no one answered.

How did I get here?

She remembered realizing that Chara was dead, and attempting suicide. She lifted the hospital gown she'd been dressed in and sure enough, there was a large scar right where Empoleon's horn had pierced her. She briefly wondered where her Pokemon were when she noticed a button near her bed, with a label that read "push for help." So she pressed it. The light lit up red, but didn't make a sound. Was it broken? Apparently not, because a woman who looked to be in her twenties burst into the room not a minute later. "You're finally awake!"

"Yeah. But I really, really wish I wasn't," Frisk admitted, causing the woman to frown as she approached Frisk's side and pulled up a chair.

"Please don't say those things, Frisk," she began. When Frisk looked confused, the woman opened a drawer nearby and pulled out a laminated card with Frisk's photo. "Your trainer's license." She put the card back, and Frisk noticed her Poke Balls sitting next to it, but there was one missing. "I have a lot of questions, and I'm sure you do as well."

"Yeah..." came Frisk's half-hearted reply.

"I'll start by answering the obvious ones first. My name is Liza Phren, and I'm your new doctor. You're in Jubilife General Hospital in Sinnoh, and you've spent the last two months or so under my care."

"The last two months or so?" Frisk picked up. "I've been sleeping for two months?"

"About that, yes," Dr. Phren clarified. "You're very lucky to be alive. You have to understand, Frisk, when you were brought in, we didn't think you were going to survive at all. You were in surgery for nine hours just to extract your Empoleon's horn from your stomach." She took a breath. "I'm sorry to tell you this, but there were some complications with the anesthetic. Your Empoleon had a violent allergic reaction to it, and she died on the operating table. I'm very sorry, Frisk."

Frisk wanted to cry, but she was feeling so depressed that the tears just wouldn't come. "Great. Another someone dear to me who I will never see again. Where is my brother?"

Dr. Phren hesitated, not knowing that Frisk already knew what she was about to say. "Your brother... the one who was brought in with you?"

"Yes. He died. Saturn killed him. What did you do with his body?"

"He was cremated along with the other unclaimed bodies," Dr. Phren blurted, not wanting to prolong this girl's pain any longer. "We issued reports of a child found dead and encouraged any families with reports of missing children to come claim him. Many came, but they were all relieved when it didn't turn out to be their little boy lying on that table. I have a question for you. Where are your parents?"

"The Surface," she answered. She knew Dr. Phren wouldn't have a clue what she was talking about, but she didn't care. "Dr. Alphys sent us here with her machine, but Asgore probably killed her. Boy, was he pissed. Can't wait to get back and tell him that Chara's dead. If he hasn't killed Dr. Alphys already, he sure will then..."

Predictably, Dr. Phren had no idea what Frisk was going on about, and made a note to up the dosage of one of her medicines. "Let me try something else. You came in with a broken nose, a broken leg, and three stab wounds. We found you soaking wet on a beach next to your brother, who had already been dead by the time we got there. There was water in his lungs, but the coroner said that the broken neck is what actually killed him. According to the report, he fell, but that doesn't help much. What happened to you two?"

Frisk relayed the entire story, from finding the spot to setting up the picnic to their meeting with Saturn. She told her about Saturn dropping Chara off the cliff, and her and Empoleon's attempt at saving him, finally ending with her passing out after stabbing herself. "Why did you rescue me? I didn't ask you to save me."

"It's what we do, Frisk. I'm sorry about your brother, but you were already unconscious when you were found on the beach. They heard you screaming and called emergency services. After we learned you were still alive, we did everything we could to keep you that way."

Frisk sighed. "Well, I'm awake. What now?"

"In the immediate sense, you rest. Thanks to your coma, your bones have all had time to heal, but you've been off your feet for so long that walking may prove difficult. You're very weak right now; I want to monitor you here for at least a couple days while you get your strength back, and then we can start getting you cleared for discharge."

"Fine," was all the young girl replied, turning to stare at the machine that monitored her heartbeat.

Dr. Phren, not knowing how to cheer her patient up, rose from her seat. "I'll be around for a few hours yet," she said, glancing at her watch. "Push that button if you need anything, and I or one of the nurses will come assist you. Otherwise, just rest, all right? You've come a long way, but there's still a long way left to go. Hang in there, okay?" Smiling at the bedridden girl, she left, leaving Frisk alone in the dimly lit room.

She sighed deeply, feeling more alone than she ever had in her life. It just wasn't fair. Chara didn't deserve what happened to him. She just wanted to share something nice with him, and she'd ended up getting him killed and landed herself in the hospital. She didn't know when she was going to get out of this place, and she didn't particularly care. Without Chara, life was empty.

She turned onto her back again, staring at the ceiling. "I wish you were here," she said to one in particular, but she meant it with every fiber of her being. "I wish I could see you just one more time... hear your voice one more time..."

She closed her eyes, trying her hardest to imagine her brother's face, his hair, his voice, all the seemingly mundane things she'd taken for granted while he was alive...

A voice was heard inside Frisk's head. Frisk?

Frisk's eyes shot open, unwilling to believe what her brain told her ears they'd heard. She sat up in bed, looking around for the source of the voice. "Chara? Chara, is that you?! Where are you?!"

"Inside your body," Chara replied through Frisk, panicking when he realized he was controlling her body. "What the hell? I'm you! Or are you me? Frisk, what's going on?!"

It really is you! But how? Wait, why can't I move my body? What did you do to me?

"You think I know?" Frisk retorted. "I'm just as clueless as you are, Sis!"

I don't understand, you died! I held your corpse! But... it really is you, isn't it? You're really here, with me?

"Sure seems that way." Frisk looked around, taking in her surroundings. "Where are we?"

The scene started to fade here, its message seemingly delivered to Chara, who'd been watching intently. He vaguely remembered the last part, when he felt his soul rush into Frisk's body as if drawn to it like a magnet. Once the area had gone black again, Chara drifted back into dreamless sleep.

He was jolted awake only moments later. A look around the room revealed that he was actually awake now, and, much to his dismay, still in complete control of his sister. He frowned in the darkness, hoping that the problem would have fixed itself by now. As much as he hated to admit it, he'd grown used to sharing Frisk's body, and not having her around was starting to take its toll on him. More than once, he'd gone to ask Frisk a question only to get silence in reply. And while she was constantly hiding his existence from everyone, she was right in saying that in this world, all they had was each other. And the vision made perfectly clear that Frisk was deadly serious about them staying together.

Chara begrudgingly respected Frisk a little more for that. The gap between Chara's death and his rebirth in Frisk's body was not something they ever discussed at length; Chara never thought it was important, and Frisk went out of her way to avoid talking about it, like she didn't want Chara to know what she did in order to keep them together. Was it her wish that brought him back from the void? He didn't know. He hadn't experienced any passage of time while dead; once he hit the water, the next thing he knew, he was a part of Frisk.

He hugged himself under the blanket, feeling terribly lonely. What could he do?

He thought of his sister, how she willingly gave her life in the hopes they wouldn't be separated, even in death, and how much it meant to him that she would do such a thing. He found himself missing her and her companionship; even when they were furious at each other, she always forgave him and had kind words for him. Far kinder than he deserved, sometimes, he realized with a guilty heart. The thought that he might never see her again bothered him tremendously, and he found himself wanting to apologize to her.

"I'm... sorry, Sis," he said, knowing Frisk wasn't there to hear him, but he pretended she was. "I had no idea how much I meant to you." He paused for her to reply, and felt worse knowing she couldn't. Still, he could feel a sense of calmness come over him, and it comforted him in the absence of his sister. He smiled. "I know I've done some terrible things, and... well, I guess it'd be a lot easier to apologize for it if you were here."

Alone in the dark, he silently wished she were, and the feeling of calmness he was experiencing before seemed to come over him tenfold.

Chara?

"Frisk! Where are you? Are you back? For real?"

Yeah. I... I wasn't expecting to come back, to be honest.

This confused Chara. "What do you mean? Where did you go? What took you so long?"

During the battle, when I let you take over, there was something important I should have told you, but I didn't really have time to. Have you ever noticed that even when I'm really mad at you, you can always feel me close to you?

"Yeah. Does that matter? I just figured it was part of us sharing a body."

It is... and it also isn't. To put it simply, you're a part of me because I want you to be. When you took control of me, you pushed me out of your mind completely. I forgot to tell you how important it was for you to be careful about doing that, because the only way for you to bring me back was to want me to come back. You can worry all you want, but unless your heart truly wants me back... I won't come back.

Chara took this information in. "So you mean to tell me that all those times I made you cry and pranked you and got you in trouble, you could have just erased me from your body and that would have been the end of it?"

A pause. ...Yes.

"Then why didn't you?" he asked, the guilt washing over him like a wave.

Because I love you, Chara, she reminded him, and Chara again felt that same feeling of intense calm that came over him before. I don't want to be alone in this world any more than you do. I may have made new friends since coming here, but I will always only have one brother... No matter how mad we may get at each other, I would never want you gone forever. I will never erase you from my mind, Chara. Not in a thousand years.

"Those times when I took over your body... could I have erased you?"

This was a dangerous question Chara was asking. Once he knew the truth, there would be nothing stopping him from doing just that... but the way she was now, Frisk had no choice but to trust in her brother and be honest with him. Yes. You already did, during the battle, remember?

"Why didn't you tell me about that earlier?!" he shouted, fresh tears in Frisk's eyes. "I was so worried. I thought I'd lost you forever."

Chara, I couldn't tell you that! Do you have any idea how scary it is knowing that you could wipe me from existence with just a thought? It's bad enough dealing with you hijacking my body, but that on top of it... I couldn't handle it.

"I wouldn't have to steal your damn body if you'd let me out once in a while!" he retorted, clenching his fists tight. "Damn it, Frisk. You wanna talk about scary? Imagine waking up to find you don't have a body anymore, and you're now stuck spending the rest of your days stuck to someone else's mind. You'll never walk, or play, or laugh, or feel the sun on your face or the wind in your hair. And the person you're stuck to could let you experience those things if she wanted to, but she never, ever, does."

Because you don't care! You just want to have fun and play jokes, but you never stop to think about who has to deal with it all after you're done! When you prank someone, they don't see you, they see me. When you make me say horrible things to people, they don't hear you, they hear me. And knowing that you could have just erased me from my own body... I couldn't trust you, and that just made me feel worse because if I can't trust my own brother, then who can I trust? She paused here, willing herself to calm down. It was time to change the subject. I heard everything you told Taikyu. About how you think you're a burden to me, and that you think I tell you I love you because it's what I think you wanna hear.

"Yeah, and? You can't tell me it's not true. I've done nothing but cause you problems since we joined. I wish the old man's spell would have worked."

You have never been a burden to me. You don't know the lengths I've gone to to try and keep us together, she said, unaware that Chara did, in fact, know.

"You tried killing yourself. Ran yourself through with Undyne's horn," he stated, and he took Frisk's silence as a sign that what the vision had showed him was accurate. "I guess that explains this scar you never bothered explaining. Why didn't you tell me?"

Would you have believed me if I had?

Chara considered this, and shrugged, conceding the point. "Probably not."

What else do you know? How did you find out? she asked, curious.

"I saw it in a dream," he explained, recounting it for his sister. "Is there anything else you've been hiding from me?"

No, Frisk replied honestly, and Chara could tell that she was telling the truth. Chara, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry that I haven't been a better sister to you. It's my fault you were killed, and I--

"It was that bastard Saturn who killed me," Chara growled. "Don't blame yourself for that."

But if I hadn't dragged you to that spot, then Saturn wouldn't have found us, and you'd still be alive, she countered. I remember you telling me how boring it was, but I really wanted to share it with you... so I thought up the picnic and made all your favorite snacks so you'd go. If I'd just respected your decision... none of this would have happened.

Chara didn't say anything, begrudgingly accepting that Frisk was right in that regard but unwilling to voice his agreement. But, as he quickly learned, he didn't need to; Frisk read his thoughts like a large-print book. It's okay. I know I've been a bad sister. I haven't done a good job of practicing what I preach. And that's part of the reason why I let you finish my battle against Scarlet. By the way, how did it go? You erased me almost immediately after taking over, so I don't know anything that happened. Was it as awful as I feared?

"Heh. For her, maybe. Magearna kicked her ass all by itself!" Chara grinned, proud of what he'd done.

What?! We... we won??? Really???

"Hell yeah, we did! We're onto the quarterfinals, Sis!"

Frisk couldn't smile, but the surge of warmth that Chara felt made it clear to him she was happy. Oh my gosh, Chara, thank you! I... don't know what to say except thank you! I don't know what you did, but... wow. You'll have to tell me about it sometime.

Chara took a deep breath, enjoying the feeling of air filling his borrowed lungs. "I suppose you'll be wanting your body back, huh?"

Yeah. I could force you out, but I'd prefer it if you gave it back willingly. It makes things much easier on both of us, don't you think?

Chara nodded, remembering how simple it had been during the battle to assume control once Frisk allowed him to do so. "On one condition."

Name it.

"Let me out every once in a while, huh? I kinda like hanging out with the old man. And... I promise not to prank you. As often," he added with a smile.

If Frisk could have, she would have laughed. I love you more than anyone in this world. You know I mean it - just search your mind. But you will also see that I still am not completely over the idea of you taking control of me. There are a lot of bad memories there that will take time to heal. But if you promise me, really promise me, that you'll rein it in, and that you won't take over without asking me first... I'll let you out more often. Deal?

"Deal," he said, jokingly holding out a hand to shake, and was surprised when he felt Frisk move her other hand to grasp it, shaking it. "Whoa! So that's what it feels like, huh?"

Yeah. Do you feel a little violated right now?

He considered this. "Actually? Yeah, a little. Feels like I'm not in control, and - okay, okay, you've made your point," he conceded, rolling his eyes, slipping back into Frisk's mind and allowing her to take control of her own body again.

The first thing Frisk did was stretch. She stretched her arms and legs out as far as they would go, wiggling her fingers and her toes just because she could.

Heh. Bet you missed those.

"I did!" She hugged herself, feeling happy just to be back in her own body again. "How long was I gone for?"

About half a day, he said, explaining the things she'd missed.

"I missed Esmeralda having a battle?! Awwwwww, I would have loved to see it..." she said forlornly, pouting a little. "It's hard to believe that it's only been half a day, and that I've missed my body this much. I can't imagine how you feel, Chara."

Yeah, well, don't forget, we have a deal.

"I won't," she said solemnly. She yawned, tired from being awakened by a dream she didn't have. "Tomorrow is a new day, Chara. For both of us. Goodnight..."

Yeah, Chara agreed, it was. Things weren't perfect, but they were better now, and that counted for something. If Frisk was serious about her promise, then maybe this life wouldn't be such a hell after all. Night, sis. I'll see you in the morning.
 
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she shook him by the shoulders
The First-Aid knowledge in my brain is making this very painful to read. If he wasn't dead, he sure was after that.

Apparently not, because a woman who looked to be in her twenties burst into the room not a minute later.
Damn, at the hospitals here it takes much longer to get service. Must be well staffed.

Overall, an interesting little interlude. I'm, as you're well aware, very excited for the next chapter. I've been eagerly anticipating Jethro's battle for awhile now, and would especially love to learn more about him from your perspective.

I'll edit this post with an updated word and page count after.
 
It was night. There weren't many people there, and Frisk had been in a coma for the past two months.

One thing I didn't mention, that may have explained the lightning fast response time, is that Frisk is sort of a mystery to everyone in the hospital. Her discovery and subsequent admittance to the hospital definitely would have been local news, especially since she has no parents who would claim her. So they have an unclaimed, likely orphaned coma girl, and they have no idea when she is going to wake up - if she will at all. So naturally, when the help button from her room lights up, they're like HOLY SHIT SHE'S FINALLY AWAKE and rush to the scene.
 
It was night. There weren't many people there, and Frisk had been in a coma for the past two months.

One thing I didn't mention, that may have explained the lightning fast response time, is that Frisk is sort of a mystery to everyone in the hospital. Her discovery and subsequent admittance to the hospital definitely would have been local news, especially since she has no parents who would claim her. So they have an unclaimed, likely orphaned coma girl, and they have no idea when she is going to wake up - if she will at all. So naturally, when the help button from her room lights up, they're like HOLY SHIT SHE'S FINALLY AWAKE and rush to the scene.
That's fair. I was more making a joke about the health care system in my home province, which I guess is kinda... Obscure. Oops.
 
Chapter 7 highlights:

- What did the five fingers say to the face?
- Scarlet and Windra wake up - hilarity does not ensue
- Kiria and Alex find common ground
- Jethro and Kyro have their match
- it's friggin dope

I actually don't have a lot to say here. It's been a month, so hey, not bad. There was a bit that I was gonna put after the battle but I'm gonna save it for chapter 8 instead. Look forward to it. Next battle is Alex vs Cody. Cody has probably fallen into last place in terms of screen time, but I think that's okay for now. There's a bottom to every list. I've got sort of a workaround planned that should get him, and a few others, a little more action in chapter 9 or 10. We'll see how that goes. Shout outs to me for getting this out well before 2019.

Please like the post once you've read it so I know you've read it. Once you're done, leave summa dat sweet, sweet feedback. Then, if you haven't already, go read Athena's new story, it's cool and PMJ-approved.

Word count: 14,378

Chapter 7: Playing Dirty

Windra woke up, but she didn't open her eyes. She had no desire to do anything but lay there on the bed, completely relaxed. She smiled, recalling the events of last night, feeling victorious, satisfied, and content.

How long had it been? Eh, too long, she decided, sighing happily. She decided Scarlet hadn't done too bad for her first time, although she realized, after a moment's thought, that she took direction almost a little too well. Once she'd finally let her guard down, she was much more eager to do whatever Windra asked, and Windra liked that a lot. It was a welcome change from her past flings, mostly brutish men who'd been the one telling her what to do. This time, it was Windra giving the commands, and watching Scarlet obey without question was quite the turn-on.

She slowly opened her eyes now, catching the time on the clock and seeing that she still had about an hour before breakfast. She went to get out of bed, intent on cleaning up and getting her Pokemon fed, but quickly found that she could not move as Scarlet had both of her arms wrapped tightly around her. The attempt at escaping woke the younger girl, and she made a contented noise as she squeezed Windra tighter, one hand absently tracing a circle around her bellybutton.

"Mmm, morning, honey," she said into Windra's hair, causing the older girl to cringe slightly. Now she remembered how it went. After they'd finished, Windra had gotten up immediately, intent on leaving, but Scarlet had begged her to stay, asking her to cuddle with her. It wasn't something Windra liked doing, but she figured she'd reward Scarlet on a job well done, so she had climbed back in bed and allowed Scarlet to spoon her. Soon, her tiredness overcame her, and she'd fallen asleep right there.

Damn. I shouldn't have gotten back in bed. How did I not notice her arms around me? she wondered as Scarlet stirred. Ugh, there's no getting out of this. Better make it quick. "Morning," she said, quickly tearing Scarlet's arms off of her, throwing the blanket off the two of them, and stumbling out of Scarlet's bed. Though it was well into the morning by now, there were no windows to let natural light in; as such, the room was still completely dark. She felt her way along the wall to the light switch, flipping it and covering her eyes as she searched for her clothes on the floor.

Scarlet stretched her muscles, lying on her side and resting on her elbow. "Leaving so soon, babe?" she cooed. "I was hoping we could start today the same way we started last night."

Finding her pants, Windra quickly pulled them on as her eyes looked for her top. "No, Scarlet, I feel gross. I need to feed my Pokemon and I need a bath. I shouldn't have--"

"Ooh, that's a great idea. I like the sound of that," Scarlet said with a lecherous grin, getting out of her bed and cutting off Windra as she went to pick her shirt up off the floor. "We can get clean, then get real dirty, and then get clean again." She pulled Windra to her, unashamedly squeezing her rear as she did so. "God, I'm getting hot just thinking of it, aren't you?"

She went to kiss Windra's neck, but Windra pulled away, peeling a hungry Scarlet off of her. "No. Now move, you're standing on my shirt."

She did, taken aback by Windra's behavior. "What's gotten into you, sweetie? You're acting weird."

Windra pulled her shirt over her head, dangerously close to having a conversation that she knew Scarlet wasn't gonna wanna have. Taking a deep breath, she went to leave, but Scarlet's next words stopped her in her tracks. "I love you."

Windra closed her eyes tight, gritting her teeth. Those were not words she wanted to hear first thing in the morning, let alone ever again. She'd given love a shot once and he seemed perfectly fine without her. Would it have been so hard to stay in touch? "No, you don't," she said evenly, not opening her eyes.

Predictably, Scarlet recoiled as if struck. "How can you say that, after last night?" she uttered, aghast. "We... we made magic, and we--"

"We had sex," Windra said plainly, irritated both at herself for putting herself in this mess and at Scarlet for acting like this. "That's it. Last night was fun, but it didn't mean anything."

Those last four words cut into Scarlet like a knife; shocked and confused, she could hardly form words. "I... but... th-that's just not possible, Windra, I know you felt something! How could you not?! I could see it in your eyes. I could hear it in your voice as we made love." She pointed to her empty bed, her confusion giving way to insult and hurt. "My bed is full of evidence of your feelings, Windra, so don't you dare stand there and tell me that you feel absolutely nothing for me!"

"Fine. Where would you like me to say it, then?" Windra retorted, gesturing around the room. "Take your pick. You know, I should have known you were going to act like this."

Scarlet actually gasped, incredulous that Windra could even suggest that she was the one at fault here. "Me?!"

"Yes, you. Acting all cutesy and lovey over me after I showed you a good time. I should have known you were gonna do the same exact thing everyone else did, but... god, you just looked so delicious, I couldn't help myself. I knew you wouldn't say no. Your note didn't make things any easier for me, either."

"What are you talking about?" Scarlet asked, back to confused now. "I thought I was pretty clear."

"Oh, you were very clear," Windra replied, remembering how excited she'd felt upon finding the note. "You know, 'I'm yours, let's do magical things' or whatever? Sound familiar?"

Did it ever. Scarlet's eyes widened as she realized the implications of what Windra was saying. "Where did you find that note?" she asked hesitantly.

Windra looked at Scarlet skeptically, not sure where this line of questioning was headed. "On my door. You telling me you didn't put it there? You signed it and everything..."

"Were there any other notes there?! Did you see anything else on your door?!" Scarlet yelled, quickly becoming hysterical and beginning to pace around the room.

"Uh, no. It was just that one," Windra carefully offered. "What's the big deal?"

"It was the wrong one!" Scarlet cried out, grasping the sides of her head in panic. "I don't know how, but somehow you got the wrong note. I left one on your door and one on Rose's door and I was waiting for her last night and then you showed up and I thought you were her but it wasn't, it was you, and you came in and started kissing me and it was so freaking hot, like, I asked myself, do I really want to do this, like, if Rose was going to show up, wouldn't she have done it already, and maybe you decided that you liked me after all which is why you still came after getting the rejection note and --"

Windra physically stopped Scarlet from pacing, planting her in front of her. "Wait, whoa, whoa, whoa, hold on just a second, rejection note? You mean that you invited Rose to your room for sex and not me? Then what the hell does my note say?"

"I don't remember exactly, something like 'my heart belongs to another, let's still be friends.'" The panic in her eyes quickly shifted to horror as she thought of one possibility. "Oh, god, Windra, what if... what if she got your note? What if that's why she didn't come last night?" She brought a hand to her mouth, shaking her head in disbelief at the realization that her plans had been unraveled in such a spectacular fashion.

"What are you suggesting, that someone switched them or something?" Windra thought about this. "Heh, if that's true, I gotta thank whoever did. Got me laid and another v-card to boot."

"Get serious!" Scarlet, who was still stark naked, scolded her. "This is serious, Windra, I was going to ask her to be my girlfriend! Now she probably thinks I hate her. What are we going to do?"

"We?" Windra asked with a smirk. "What makes you think this is at all my problem? I didn't change your notes. I just came and did my thing. And I thought you loved me, huh? Sure makes me believe that when you just admitted you were going to ask Rose out if she came here. Let me guess, you're in love with her, too, am I right?"

Scarlet could hardly believe what she was hearing, hardly manage to stammer out a defense. "Well, no, I mean, love is such a strong word, and we just met, and-"

"Wow, so you don't love me after all, what a surprise, I totally did not expect that response at all," Windra deadpanned. Scarlet looked at her with hurt in her eyes, on the verge of tears, and Windra rolled her eyes. "You're gonna cry now? Really?"

Scarlet wiped her eyes before she really did start. "Why are you being so mean to me? I, I don't understand, last night was... it was amazing. Special. I really felt a connection with you, Windra, I--" she went to grab Windra's hand, but Windra yanked it away before she could, causing Scarlet's pained frown to come back in full, and this time when the tears threatened to come, Scarlet did nothing to stop them. "Do you really not feel any different towards me?"

Windra looked into Scarlet's hope-filled eyes as her tears came down uninhibited, and sighed. "Yes, I really don't." When this only caused Scarlet to cry harder, she sighed again. "Look, I know you think this is the end of the world or whatever, but can you please stop crying?" Of course, she didn't, and Windra groaned. "Geez. I don't think anyone else ever cried this much."

That got Scarlet's attention, and she quickly dried her eyes. "Huh? Anyone else? There have been others besides me?"

Windra's mouth opened in genuine shock. "Oh, that's right, you didn't know! Yeah, I've been nailed loads of times. Hundreds, even." This was an exaggeration, of course, but Windra pushed out of her head the fact that it wasn't much of one. "It's cute that you thought you were my first. That's okay, though. I look so young that most guys think the same thing only to get their minds blown in bed after they realize that I'm more experienced than they are."

"So... so I'm just another notch on your belt? That's all I am to you?"

"You catch on quick," Windra said, crossing her arms. "I wanted to bang you, so I did. I mean, you're still hot and all, so if you promise not to get all sad and depressed about me not being head over heels in love with you after a few hours in bed then I'd be down to do it again sometime."

"What? No!" Scarlet shouted, feeling cheap and used, and she quickly covered herself with her blanket, suddenly much more conscious of the fact that she was still naked. "I can't believe you! How can you just... use me like that?"

"Aw, what's the matter?" Windra mocked her, pouting. "Don't seem so special now that you know I'm used goods, do I?" She laughed at Scarlet's continued look of indignant rage. "This is exactly why I don't give a shit anymore. Everyone always reacts the same way once the past comes out."

"I don't care about your past!" Scarlet screamed. "I care about basic human decency. I care about honesty, integrity, faithfulness... all qualities which you seem to lack," she finished, her tears beginning to dry up at this cold realization. "Rose wouldn't have treated me this way."

Scarlet saw anger flash across Windra's face for only moments before Windra slapped her hard across the face, sending her tumbling onto the bed. Scarlet clutched her face in disbelief, new tears spilling over. "How dare you," Windra spat, taking a step towards Scarlet.

"Get away from me!" Scarlet shrieked, scrambling onto the bed, getting as far away from Windra as she could without falling off. She grabbed the blanket and covered herself, crying softly, her face hot and stinging.

Windra didn't move from her spot. Scarlet wasn't looking at her, but the venom in Windra's voice was unmistakable. "You hypocritical bitch. How dare you pretend you're somehow better than me when your whole plan was to lure Rose here for sex. How dare you call me dishonest when I've been nothing but open with you about my feelings. How dare you call my integrity into question when you admittedly wrote me a rejection note - never mind how juvenile that is - but had sex with me anyway after it was clear I had the wrong one. But most of all, how dare you suggest I'm unfaithful. Just because I've had a lot of partners does not mean I'm unfaithful. How faithful could you possibly be if your plan all along was to seduce Rose, but you screwed me just because I showed up? That right there takes the cake." She chuckled humorlessly. "You're a real piece of shit, you know that?"

"I don't have to take this from a girl who's been with more men than there are Pokemon. Get out," Scarlet ordered.

Windra nodded. "Yep. Here come the insults. Thought my past didn't matter, Scarlet? Gotta give you credit, though, I haven't heard that one before. Most people just call me a slut or a whore. Try that next time, it'll save you time and breath."

"Just go," Scarlet said, not wanting to prolong this conversation any further.

"Yeah, I'll be doing that. And don't worry, I won't tell your precious Rose about this, even though I should."

"Then why don't you?" Scarlet asked, her curiosity getting the best of her but still not making eye contact with Windra.

"Because I promised you I wouldn't. That's the only reason I need. Even though seeing the look of disgust on her face when she learns what you planned on doing would be incredible, and even though you're a clingy, whiny ex-virgin who doesn't know a thing about relationships... I made you a promise, and I'm not going to go back on it just because I'm pissed off. That would be untrustworthy, dishonest, and unfaithful."

She headed to the door and took the handle in her hand. "But don't think this means everything is okay between us. I'll be civil towards you in public... but we are not friends by any stretch of the imagination. Enjoy your present," she finished with a smile, one that went unnoticed.

Scarlet said nothing at this, just pointed towards the door. Satisfied with what she'd had to say, Windra wordlessly let herself out, closing the door behind her. Once she'd gone, Scarlet finally let out the tears she'd been holding in, gingerly holding her face where she'd been hit. She was furious at Windra for having the audacity to actually hit her, but at the same time, she couldn't deny that Windra had made some decent points.

Just decent?

All right, fine, she conceded, they were good points. She couldn't deny that if she'd been more honest with everyone, then this wouldn't have happened. She pictured Jethro looking at her disapprovingly. 'I told you so,' she imagined him saying, giving her a stern look.

It was a good plan. It should have worked. I'm the one who messed it up. She continued to cry softly into her blanket, wondering how she could possibly fix this blunder. She took a deep breath, letting it out slowly as she got out of bed, heading into the bathroom to draw a bath and wash away all her troubles. As she set the temperature and let the water fill the tub, she looked at herself in the mirror, her eyes going wide at the obvious and dark red mark just above her left breast. "That bitch!" she yelled, examining it. "Oh my god! Guess that's what you meant by present..." Thankful that it at least would be easy to hide, she turned off the water, climbed in the bathtub, and sighed, relaxing in the warm water.

* * * * * * * *

At breakfast, Kyro could hardly sit still, so excited was he for his battle against Jethro. He looked at the clock for the third time in as many minutes, anxious to get out there and show his stuff. His loss to Thresher the day before didn't faze him in the slightest; in fact, he was happy that he'd had to use his other Pokemon, since they hadn't gotten to battle at all since arriving. He shoveled another impossibly huge bite of Pollen Puff Pancakes - blue, of course - into his mouth, getting thick syrup all over the sides of his mouth. He looked at the clock again and groaned, much to the humor of the other competitors.

In fact, much of the other conversation centered around the child prodigy and his Pokemon. They'd all heard about his one-on-one victories against both Jethro and Cody, of course, and that made Thresher's win over him all the more impressive. Jethro, sitting at a table by himself, did his best to push out the small talk and focus on his breakfast. Wouldn't do any good to start worrying now. People won and lost battles all the time. It didn't matter that his opponent was young enough to be his son. Surely no one would be paying any attention to the fact that he was the youngest major tournament champion in history, hailing from a country that had no organized play to speak of; and there was no way that he was still brooding over the fact that, three days ago, he went up against a Pokemon he had a type advantage against and lost - badly.

He pursed his lips, the only visible sign that he was troubled at all. No, it really wouldn't do any good to start worrying now, so it was a good thing he'd already been worrying for the past half day or so, right? Right. Made perfect sense.

He went over his battle plan in his head. Archeops was so damn fast. He'd made sure to focus on speed training, mainly running drills and practice evading. It wasn't perfect - none of his Pokemon were particularly agile, after all - but any practice was better than nothing. He also picked up the identities of the other two Pokemon Kyro was using - Anorith and Clefairy. It didn't change his plan; he was still going to lead with Ennis, and he was confident that Kyro was going to lead with Archeops. After all, why wouldn't he? It was far and away his strongest Pokemon, so powerful that it carried him through the entire qualifying tournament alone. It destroyed him in their practice match and took Cody's Primarina out as well.

Another Pokemon that had a type advantage, he noted, a bit grimly. He would be lying if he said he wasn't nervous, but he was definitely more prepared now than he was a few days ago. Scarlet's battle against Frisk was particularly interesting to him; he got an idea during that match that he made sure Ennis got practice using, since it would be invaluable in clipping that demon bird's wings before he got too out of hand. He hoped it would do the job, because Ennis was the only one of his Pokemon that didn't have a type disadvantage against Kyro's remaining Pokemon, and she'd need to keep her energy as high as possible. Another reason for the speed training - the attacks would hurt if they hit, so the simplest solution, then, was to just not get hit.

He continued eating his breakfast, sipping at his cup of coffee. It helped him get alert in the mornings, since he never seemed to get enough sleep during the night. He noticed Scarlet finally entering the cafeteria, and he gave her a nod of acknowledgement as he took another sip of his drink. She barely made eye contact with him before quickly heading in silence to the food table, getting a stack of orange pancakes, and sitting down at a table by herself.

Huh. That's weird. Oh well, he thought, shrugging. He figured a motormouth like her would have been chomping at the bit to tell him all about how her plan went, but if she wasn't gonna tell him, he wasn't gonna worry about it. He had bigger problems to deal with. Ain't my business anyway...

At a different table, Alex sat and ate with Eldan. After they'd realized that the both of them had a love of gambling, the two had placed bets on every match since Taikyu fought Thresher, with a gentleman's agreement not to place bets on their own matches. Their debates over who would win were quite animated sometimes, each trying to get the other to increase the bet.

"There is no way my boy Kyro is losing this one," Eldan said confidently, taking a sip of juice. "Or have you not heard about him taking down both an Electric-type and a Water-type single-handedly with Archeops? Jethro doesn't stand a chance. Kyro already beat him once, and in a couple hours he's gonna seal up victory number two against him."

"Yes, I have heard that. But," Alex countered, pointing a fork at Eldan. "Kyro is a fool if he thinks that one Pokemon will carry him all the way to victory, and you are an even bigger fool if you believe he will win. I admit I do not know the extent of Jethro's abilities as a trainer, but it stands to reason that he is far more experienced than a child, does it not?"

"Pfft. Using a single Pokemon to carry him to victory is exactly how he won his qualifying tournament. Did you forget that?"

Alex hesitated in his reply. He hadn't known that. "It is of no consequence. Even I know that relying only on one Pokemon can be highly risky, especially for a Pokemon as fragile as Archeops. Its Ability, Defeatist, means that it becomes significantly weaker once its health becomes low enough," he recited. "Because of that, it is only a matter of time before that happens and Jethro gains the upper hand. Once Archeops is out of the picture, defeating two unevolved Pokemon will be... child's play," he finished with a smug smirk. "Ten says he does it."

"Ten? Didn't know you were that broke," Eldan needled him as Kiria approached the two guys.

"Hey, you guys. Mind if I sit here?" she asked, grinning.

"Hell no," Eldan answered immediately, pulling out a chair for her. "Please, join us," he said, before Alex could object. "How are you today?"

"I'm good! Thanks for asking." Placing her plate on the table, she took a seat and scooted herself in, her breasts bouncing slightly as she did so. Eldan, thankful that his sunglasses made it impossible for Kiria to see exactly where he was looking, struggled to keep his promise to Nye and say nothing inappropriate... but he did it. "Eyes up," she said anyway, delighting in the nanosecond of panic on his face as he played it off. "Actually, I'm here to talk to Alex."

Alex, who'd been silent up until this point, spoke up. "Me? What business do you have with me?"

"It's nothing major, I was just thinking about something and wanted to see if it was true. Is your father Reginald Croft?"

"Why, yes, he is," Alex said proudly, although he wondered why Kiria was asking. Kiria did not at all look like the sort of person his father would associate with, and he furrowed his brow to show his confusion. "How do you know my father?"

Kiria hit one of her hands on the table. "I knew you looked familiar! I worked in one of his restaurants a long time ago. I'd only recently gotten to Kalos at the time," she explained to Eldan so as not to exclude him from the conversation. "I had used most of what I'd had saved up on the plane ticket and hotel room, so one of the first things I did was check the papers for job openings. Lumiose City is the largest city in the world, so I didn't doubt it would take long for me to find something."

Alex breathed a sigh of relief, hearing that she was only employed by his father instead of one of his associates. "My father employs hundreds of people in his restaurants," he bragged. "He has received acclaim for how well his company treats his employees."

"You're not wrong," Kiria added, cutting into some of her own pink pancakes. "He paid surprisingly well. I worked there for a few months as a waitress, and was able to save more than enough to continue my travels. The day I quit, your father took me aside and thanked me for 'making him even richer.'"

Alex smiled. "Yes, that does sound like Father."

"He gave me two grand." At Alex's wide-eyed stare of disbelief, Kiria said with a laugh, "Yeah, that's basically what I said, too! He told me that it had been quite some time since he'd seen someone with my work ethic and that he was sad to see me go... you don't remember?"

"Remember? Why would I remember such a thing?" He searched his memory anyway, coming up empty.

"You were there the day I left," she revealed. "You were sitting at your father's desk, watching something on his computer screen. You weren't really paying attention to us, and you couldn't have been more than four or five at the time, so maybe it's not so surprising you don't remember. But after he'd given me the check, he brought you over and introduced you to me. He said he hoped that you would grow up to become as hard a worker as me, so he could feel comfortable leaving his business to you." She laughed as she recalled the memory. "You held out your hand and said, 'Hello, my name is Alexander. My Piplup is very strong.' and I was like, 'Wow, really, that's so cool!' or something like that. I dunno exactly."

With this information, Alex again tried to remember the encounter, but couldn't. "I am sorry, but I do not remember."

Kiria shrugged. "No big deal. Like I said, you were really little. And cute," she added with a wink. "How is your father doing?"

"In good health, thank you for asking," Alex replied. "He is very busy running his restaurants." He went to take a bite of his own golden pancakes. "These are... very good," he begrudgingly admitted, as though it physically pained him to do so. "Yours are pink. And yours are... green," he said, disgusted at the thick, green mess that was the leftovers of Eldan's breakfast. "I cannot imagine how they taste."

"Mine are kinda sweet. It's a very slight sweetness, not overpowering at all, but definitely noticeable. Still tastes like pancake though. A cute, fluffy, pink pancake," Kiria explained. She poked the food with a fork. "So pink and so cute! Hello, Mr. Pancake. Oh, hello, Kiria, how are - oh nooooo, aieeeeeeee!" she wailed as she cut into the pancake with a knife. "No, please don't eat meeeeeeee om nom nom nom," she said, putting the sliced-off pancake in her mouth.

Alex and Eldan simply stared at her, mouths slightly open in disbelief, as she chewed. When she noticed them watching her, she stuck her tongue out at them. "Don't judge me. You have to enjoy life's simple pleasures whenever you can. If you're not smiling, you're not living." For effect, she smiled at them, and Eldan flashed a grin back at her. Alex simply rolled his eyes at the display.

"Exactly," Eldan agreed, turning back towards Alex. "And speaking of simple pleasures, surely you can afford to put more than ten on today's match. Come on now."

"Are you guys betting? Oh, I love gambling! Probably a little too much," she admitted nervously. "You guys are betting on this morning's match? That sounds fun!"

Eldan's grin went from ear to ear at learning that particular tidbit about Kiria. "Yeah. Brokey McPoorhouse over here only bet me ten that Kyro was gonna win and I'm trying to get him to go higher."

"Whaaaaat? Aw, come on, Alex, surely you can put down more than that," she taunted. "I'll bet you... twenty that Jethro wins."

"What?!" came both men's stunned reply.

Kiria nearly jumped out of her seat, shocked by the sudden outburst. "What? What did I say?"

"You may have worked for my most generous father for a time, but I do not believe for one second that you have that kind of money, Kiria," Alex stated, crossing his arms.

"What are you talking about?" she asked, almost upset at Alex's implication. "I probably have at least thirty or forty on me right now. Never know when you need a bit of extra cash!"

"No way. I am calling this bluff," Eldan said, facing Kiria. "Show me."

Kiria reached into her bag, pulling out a small billfold. Taking a bill out, she placed it on the table in front of the two guys. "There. Twenty dollars."

Eldan and Alex looked at the money, then at each other, then each of them burst out into uproarious laughter.

"What is so funny? You wanted to see twenty, there's twenty!"

This only caused the two of them to laugh even harder at her. Eldan patted her on the hand. "Sweetheart, not twenty dollars, twenty thousand dollars," he managed through fits of laughter.

"You thought we meant twenty dollars?" Alex wiped his eyes clean of the tears that had formed. "Oh my, that is the best joke I have heard in weeks!"

Kiria was less than amused. "All right, all right, that's enough laughing at the poor lady."

She went to put her money away, but Alex held out a hand to stop her. "Now, wait a moment, I thought you wanted to bet?"

"I do, but I don't have anywhere near that amount of money, Alex, you know that," she said, a little annoyed now.

"Yes, I am very aware that I am far richer now than you will likely ever be. However..." Kiria could see the wheels turning in Alex's head as he paused, not knowing what he was getting at. "Let me make you an offer. I will bet you one hundred dollars that Kyro is victorious against Jethro."

"What's the catch?" Kiria asked, suspicious now. It couldn't be that easy.

Alex smiled, genuinely impressed that she knew there was more. "You are correct. There is a condition. As I have said, I have no need for your peasant money, but I believe there is a way I can benefit from this. If Kyro wins, you are to be my servant girl for the remainder of the tournament. You will address me as either 'Mr. Alex,' 'Mr. Croft,' or 'Sir.' You will be responsible for the feeding and grooming of my Pokemon and tending to anything else that I or they deem necessary. In exchange, I will consider your services provided as payment, and you can keep your hundred dollars."

Kiria balked at him as Eldan looked on with interest. She didn't know what other duties Alex would have planned for her, but she did take comfort in knowing that it was Alex proposing this deal and not Eldan. She'd probably just clean up after him or something... which the Indigo Plateau staff were already doing. How exactly was Alex benefiting from this deal? And how long was this tournament, anyway? Today was the last day of the first round, and then what? She looked around for one of three people that would know this information, and spotted one of them as she was preparing to leave. "Hey Safiri!" Kiria shouted, causing the woman in blue to flinch as if caught committing a crime. "What happens after the matches today?"

Safiri turned towards Kiria, looking at her watch to make sure she was not falling too far behind. "There will be no official matches on the weekend. Indigo Plateau will be closed to the general public, so you are free to head outside if you wish," she finished, glancing at a confused Frisk. "Quarterfinal matches will begin Monday at the normal time."

"Sounds good. Thank you!" So that's two extra days of 'hard labor.' Four quarterfinal matches, two semifinal matches, and the finals... who knows how long they would drag this tournament out? That was a lot of time to be calling some smug little brat 'sir.'

The hundred bucks sounded tempting, though. Was it worth the risk? She decided, a little reluctantly, that it was not. But just as she was about to audibly decline, a thought entered her head.

Wait a sec. This kid is loaded. Even if he loses, he's only out a hundred bucks. Like he said, peasant money. Well, let's see if he's willing to put his money where his mouth is.

"I have two conditions of my own. Just to keep things interesting... for both of us," she said with a smile. "We don't know exactly how long this tournament lasts and I'd be a fool to agree to be your slave without knowing that information. My first condition is to shorten my sentence to one week. We are guaranteed at least that much time here."

"Fair enough. I accept. And the other?"

"If you think that I'm going to risk purposefully lowering myself to be a servant for something you consider to be 'peasant money,' you've got another thing coming. If I'm gonna take a risk, then so are you. Lay me..." She thought of a number that sounded big, but not too big. "Ten to one on the match."

Alex pretended to give this some serious thought, but in reality he was trying to mask his amusement. That is rich. She thinks a thousand dollars will put a noticeable strain on my wealth. I could offer her ten thousand and still feel nothing. But what she does not know, as they say, will not hurt her. "After careful consideration, I have decided to accept your terms. If Kyro wins, you will be my servant for one week. And if Jethro wins, I will pay you one thousand dollars. Do we have a deal?" He held his hand out for her to shake.

Kiria hesitated. He wasn't supposed to take the money! A thousand bucks, though... that could definitely do some good. Well, I mean, I'm still in the running for the hundred mil, but... oh, what the hell. We're practically on vacation here anyway. What's the worst that could happen? "We have a deal," she agreed, shaking his hand.

"You should have gone higher," Eldan noted. "A thousand bucks is still pretty much chump change for both of us." Alex glared at him, who only shrugged. "Hey, don't get mad, I waited until she shook on it," he said with a grin.

"It's okay," Kiria said in a tone that questioned whether or not she believed it. "A thousand dollars might not mean much to you two, but it means a lot to me. I've worked a lot of jobs in order to pay for my chosen lifestyle, and it hasn't always been easy. You don't really learn to appreciate the value of a dollar until you barely have any to your name."

"Ah, can't really say I relate much," Eldan admitted. "I wasn't destitute or anything, but I never wondered if I was gonna go hungry. Since joining Team Flare, my life has been amazing. I have money and prestige. I can be my own man. The boss is doing his best to preserve the Kalos region's beauty for people the world over. It's noble what he's doing, and I am honored to be a part of it."

"Are you sure you aren't just being fed a line?" Kiria questioned him, his speech an echo of one she used to convince herself that joining Team Rocket had been the right call. "You have to be aware of all the bad press that Team Flare gets. I remember reading in the paper just last week that some Team Flare grunts were arrested for harassing a boy and his Pokemon."

"Not everyone in Team Flare shares the boss's values," Eldan explained. "Some, like those grunts you mentioned, are only after the notoriety that being a Team Flare member brings. We have already done many great things for the people of Kalos. You from around there?"

"I guess you might say that. I was born in Johto, but I've been living in Malie City for a couple years now."

"So you're familiar with the Holo Caster," he said, laying his trap.

"I'm familiar with it, yes. I bought one the last time I was in Kalos, thinking it would be helpful for staying in touch with friends, but it doesn't even work outside of Kalos. I packed it up and haven't used it since."

"It does now. We reverse engineered it and made huge improvements. It's smaller, broadcasts a cleaner picture, and has improved sound and connection capabilities. We gave this technology back to Lysandre Labs, and they implemented our changes immediately."

"I don't buy that," Kiria said, shaking her head. "Nuh uh. Team Flare just gave away all their hard work? For nothing? What's their angle?"

"That knowledge is above my pay grade, I'm afraid," Eldan offered with a shrug. "The boss has his reasons, and unless he decides it's information worth sharing, I'm not worried about it."

Kiria frowned. Eldan sounded almost exactly the way she did, once she'd told some of her childhood friends that she had joined Team Rocket. They were appalled at the idea of it, and didn't buy into the hype like she did. They were nothing but a group of Pokemon thugs. Gangsters, she remembered her friends calling them. At the time, Kiria had been ready with a fresh denial of their accusations, but it didn't take long for her to start seeing Team Rocket in a different light. It wasn't until she'd been shipped off to Azalea Town and taken part in the subjugation of the Slowpoke there did she realize that perhaps her friends were right. The admin in charge of the operation had promised her that what they were doing was humane - that Slowpoke hardly felt the pain of losing their tails, and they grew back within a few weeks anyway, so no permanent damage was done. On top of this, the tails were massively popular, and farming them here would make the corporation a lot of money.

What Kiria would later realize that the admin left out of this reassurance was while losing their tails hardly hurt physically, it had a much greater effect on them psychologically. Losing their tails meant they could no longer fish for prey; Kiria witnessed one of them backing itself up to the water's edge, trying to dip its nonexistent tail into the water. It made a confused sound as it struggled to understand why its tail hadn't found water yet, waving the stump where its tail should have been side to side. Feeling sorry for the poor thing, Kiria offered it some of her own food, which it reluctantly accepted, and left.

When she came back to check on it hours later, she noticed the Slowpoke still hadn't moved from its spot by the water, still trying to fish up its own breakfast. Noticing Kiria, it let out a pleading noise. Was it asking for more food? Was it asking for help? Maybe it was asking for an explanation as to why it still hadn't fished anything up yet. Whatever the reason, it made Kiria's stomach turn. This Slowpoke was obviously in pain. Maybe not physical pain, but it was entirely possible that it did not understand that its tail had been removed, and its whole way of life had been upended for seemingly no reason at all.

She brought this information to her superiors, but they were uninterested and refused to bother the admin about it. When she went around them and confronted the admin directly, he promised that something would be done. Satisfied, she went back to her normal patrol duties, visiting the Slowpoke every day for a week, just to chat with it and reassure it that everything was going to be okay. After a week went by and nothing noticeable had changed, she asked the admin what he had done to ensure that no more Slowpoke would lose their tails, and he laughed.

"Who said anything about not taking their tails?"

"You did!" she yelled, her rage temporarily making her forget her place.

The admin did not forget, however, and he slapped her hard across the face. "Watch your tone when you speak to your superiors, girl," he warned.

Her face stung, but she put on a brave face, standing up straight and willing herself not to cry. "Yes, sir," she apologized. "Forgive me, sir, but you promised you would do something after I told you about how much the Slowpoke are suffering. It's been a week and I have not noticed any change in protocol or heard any word of when we are leaving this town."

The admin smiled. "Oh, but I did do something. I made a decision, and that decision was to ignore the pleadings of a twelve-year-old girl who doesn't know her ass from a hole in the ground. I have more important things to worry about than some Pokemon too dumb to know when it's missing a part of its body. Now get back to your post and don't bother me unless it is worth my time."


That, Kiria decided, had been the last straw. She excused herself and went back to her barracks, and packed her bag with as much as she could fit. She went back to the well to say goodbye to the Slowpoke she'd fed, and it surprised her by leaving the water's edge and slowly approaching her. She leaned down and pet the poor Pokemon.

"Sorry, buddy, I don't have any food for you. I'm getting out of here."

Slowpoke stared vacantly, and Kiria couldn't quite tell if what she'd said had registered with it. It was always so hard to tell with them.

"I'm sorry for what we did to you and your friends. I... wish I could have done more."

Kiria stood up, preparing to leave, and hesitated. Maybe there was something more she could do. She may not have been strong enough to force Team Rocket out of Azalea Town, but at least she could take a small bit of their profits away by taking one of the Slowpoke. It seemed to have taken a liking to her anyway... she kneeled back down, a Poke Ball in hand. "Do you want to come with me? I promise no one will ever cut off your tail ever again, and I'll take good care of you and feed you every day."

Slowpoke blinked.

That was good enough for her, and she tapped the Pokemon on the nose with the Poke Ball. Kiria held the ball as Slowpoke was sucked inside; the ball made almost no movement in her hand, and finally came to rest in her palm. Pocketing the new Pokemon, she climbed out of the well, sneaked through the trees outside of town, and into Ilex Forest.


"Hey, Kiria, you all right?" Eldan shook her shoulder, bringing her back to the present. "You were kinda zoning out there."

"Oh. Sorry, you just got me thinking about the past. Eldan, are you sure that Team Flare is the right path for you?"

"I've never been more sure of anything in my life," he answered confidently, if not a little offended at her question. "Team Flare has given me everything I have ever wanted and we have a leader whose vision I will support with all my strength."

Kiria's frown returned. She was hoping he could be more easily swayed. "When I was in Team Rocket, I found myself thinking the same thing."

Now Eldan frowned. Team Flare and Team Rocket didn't have any bad blood between them, as far as he knew - in fact, his information on the organization was minimal at best - but if they were anything like Team Flare, the very idea of leaving made no sense at all. "Why were you discharged?"

"I wasn't. I deserted." At Eldan's obviously offended look, she held a hand up. "Hear me out. I left them because I learned they weren't what they seemed. I joined them almost twenty years ago. The recruitment officer was really nice to me, asking me if I wanted to see the world, meet new Pokemon and be a part of something bigger than myself. I'd spent the first twelve years of my life on a farm outside of Olivine City, so I was definitely ready to get out. As far as seeing the world, it might have been true if I'd stuck around longer, but I did get to travel around Johto and see new things in that regard."

She recounted the story of getting stationed in Azalea Town, and the Slowpoke, and her eventual desertion. "My only regret is not getting to say goodbye to my friend Barry. He joined right about the same time I did... wonder what he's doing now."

Eldan shook his head in disgust. "Kiria, I am sorry for what you went through. That admin of yours is despicable. Hitting a little girl? The idea of it boils my blood. Were he in Team Flare, he would be stripped of his rank and title, demoted below even the lowest grunt. Knowing that, I can't blame you for leaving."

"Then please reconsider your membership in Team Flare."

"No," he said flatly.

"Eldan..."

Now Eldan held up a hand. "Listen. I'm not going to say that Team Flare is perfect. Are there bad people in Team Flare? Of course. Just because we have a few problem people doesn't mean we're all thugs. Take yourself, for example. You were a part of Team Rocket. Does that automatically make you a terrible person? Of course it doesn't," he answered for her. "When your superiors made it clear that their inhumane treatment wasn't going to stop, you held your head high and walked away. Was that the best choice? I don't know. I don't know if Team Rocket has the same transparency that Team Flare does, but Lysandre is a very kind and fair leader. He has always instructed us to come to him if we have any problems with our superiors."

"How do you know that Team Flare has your best interests in mind? Some of the things I've heard have been pretty sketchy."

"Like what? I've been a proud member of Team Flare for four years now, and I've never been asked to do something I didn't agree with."

She tried thinking of something, but came up empty. "Maybe they lied to you like they did me."

"Or, maybe not everyone is as disgusting as your admin," Eldan countered. "I understand your point, Kiria, but I won't leave when there is no evidence that they aren't who they say they are. Lysandre would not stand for such ugliness in his organization. Please don't let one bad experience define us as a group."

Kiria opened her mouth again, ready to continue trying to convince him that he was on the wrong path, but could not help but admit that he was right, at least in the sense that not everyone who was part of an allegedly villainous group was bad. She herself was proof of that, and it wasn't fair for her to pass judgment on all of Team Flare for the actions of a few. Eldan himself wasn't awful, she admitted. He was a bit of a pervert, sure, and wouldn't know subtlety if it kicked him in the rear, but that was it. He cared very much for his Pokemon and their well-being, pushed them to use their moves in innovative and unique ways, allowing for stylish and visually impressive displays in battle. And while she didn't know Team Flare's motives or goals, it was obvious that Eldan trusted in the team and its leader, and strongly held in the belief that his path was the right one.

"All right," she finally conceded. "It's clear you've given this a lot of thought, and you seem smart enough to know when to quit, so... promise me, if that day ever comes, you'll get out."

"My dear," Eldan said with a grin, taking Kiria's hand into his, "You have my word." He leaned down to kiss her hand, gesturing grandly with the other.

"Ahem," he heard.

Eldan looked up, meeting Kiria's gaze. "Yes, my dear?"

Kiria smiled. "I didn't say anything." She looked past him, where the person once again tried getting his attention.

Eldan sighed. "Nye is standing right behind me, isn't she."

"Mhm. You gonna let me go? I don't want to get blood on my clothes."

Quick as a flash, Eldan released Kiria and spun around to see the object of his affection, looking very cross. She slowly tapped a foot on the ground. "Hello, Eldan," she said evenly. "What is going on here? I thought you said you would not act this way anymore..."

"Ah, hello, Nye, you're looking as radiant as ever, you, uh, seem to have caught me in the middle of something, I was simply promising Kiria here that I would look out for any questionable activity in Team Flare. As you know, of course, I am a perfect gentleman, and I was simply showing her that I take my promises quite seriously."

Nye crossed her arms. "So you weren't serious about your promise to me? You didn't kiss my hand."

Eldan could not tell by her tone of voice if she was more upset that he just implied he wasn't taking his promise seriously, or that he hadn't actually kissed her hand when he made it. Not wanting to risk forfeiting his life if he made her even more angry, he looked behind him for backup. "Hey, Kiria, assistance if you... please?" But she was not there, having taken this time to slip out and get some more food. "Oh, okay, um, Alex, buddy, back me up here?" he pleaded.

Alex just continued eating. "You did not even kiss her hand? How dreadful," he lamented, shaking his head.

"You can't be serious right now," Eldan said, turning back to face Nye. "Look, I'm sorry, I'll kiss your hand if you want, just please don't kill me!"

Nye turned away from him, but put her arm out with the back of her hand facing him. He wordlessly took it into her hand and gently kissed the back of it. "Say I am the most beautiful woman you have ever seen," she commanded.

As if he needed to be told twice to state such an obvious truth. Even though Eldan could only see Nye's long blonde locks, in his mind's eye he could recall every detail of Nye's pretty face. "You are the most beautiful woman... I have ever seen."

"Now kneel before me and say you are not worthy to be in my presence," she instructed.

"Huh?"

Nye whipped her head around, deep blue eyes glaring hard at the man in red. "Did I stutter, Eldan?"

"N-no! I am not worthy to be in your presence!" he cried, kneeling as he was told, taking her hand in his and bowing his head.

"Very good," she praised him. "Now, say gotcha."

"Gotcha. Wait, what?" He looked up, confused, to see a giggling Nye. "You... you weren't serious?"

"No. I caught the last part of your chat with Kiria, and thought I'd have a little fun with you since you two were so engaged in your conversation. It was clear that Kiria was okay with your doing that, so you are off the hook."

Eldan slowly shook his head in disbelief. "Well, damn. Gotcha, indeed. You had me going for a minute there."

"Well, I've got to keep you on your toes somehow," she said with a smirk. She turned her palm open to him. "Are you going to stay down there all morning?"

He took her hand and she pulled him to his feet, and they remained with hands held for a few seconds as Kiria came back to the table. "Cute," she commented before Nye yanked her hand away. "You guys sure are getting along better."

Nye was lightning quick with the denial. "Please don't misunderstand, Kiria, there is nothing going on between us."

"I didn't say there was," Kiria countered. "All I said was that you were being nicer to each other."

"Well, um, when one does not act like a total lecher, it becomes much easier to be courteous in response. That's all. Now I have... things to do. Excuse me," she said, briskly turning and leaving.

Eventually, Jethro and Kyro were paged to report to their respective waiting areas. Kyro sprinted over to Jethro as he got up from his table, hoping to catch him before it was too late.

"Hey, kid," the one-eyed man said, an easy smile on his face. "Sorry about turning you away yesterday. I hear Thresher helped ya out, though. That was nice of him. You ready to get things started?"

"Yeah," Kyro replied, a lot calmer than Jethro expected. "I just wanted to say good luck. You'll need it." This unexpected response caught Jethro off guard, and the face of confusion he made caused laughter from a few tables away. Kyro looked back at them, smiling, then back at Jethro. "Mr. Thresher told me to say that last part. But I really do wish you good luck! I've been practicing all week, and Mr. Thresher gave me some advice yesterday, too, but I'm still reeeally nervous."

"Is that right?" Jethro inquired, scratching his chin. "Well, I tell you what, Kyro, I'm nervous, too, but I try not to let my Pokemon see it. You can't help it if it slips out sometimes, and that's okay. Just gotta keep pressin' forward, believe in your Pokemon, and don't ever give up. It's not over until Esmeralda says it's over, you hear?"

Kyro nodded obediently. "Absolutely! And hey, guess what? I've got a surprise for you in our battle. I know I shouldn't say anything, but it's such a cool idea, I just had to tell you! But don't worry, I won't tell you what it is until I do it, so you'll definitely be surprised!"

Jethro resisted the urge to groan audibly, instead settling on an uneasy smile. Jethro wasn't a fan of surprises in general, and the last thing he needed before what was sure to be the toughest fight of his life was being told by his opponent that he was going to surprise him. Great. "You don't say? Uh... well, I uh... gosh, Kyro, I dunno what to say to that. I'll have to be on my guard then so I'm not taken by surprise by... your... surprise."

Kyro just giggled, wanting so badly to share the plan that he and Thresher had come up with. But as long as things didn't go too badly, he should have enough time to execute it, and then Jethro would really be in trouble. "I promise I'll let you know once it happens."

Jethro raised an eyebrow. "Yeah? What makes you think I'm going to just sit back and let you do it?"

Kyro rolled his eyes at the older man. "Because it's a surprise, Mr. Jethro! It wouldn't be a surprise if you knew when it was coming!"

Jethro nodded in concession. "Got me there, Kyro. I'm looking forward to seeing what you've got in store for me. Now, we best get going before Safiri has our hides, hmm?"

"Oh! Yeah!" Kyro thrust his hand out for Jethro to shake. "Good luck again, Mr. Jethro! I hope to give you a battle that you'll never forget!"

Jethro smiled, genuinely this time, taking the young boy's hand and shaking it firmly. "Of that, I have no doubt."

* * * * * * * *

"Happy Friday, ladies and gentlemen! Ruby Erthgrand here, reporting live from Indigo Plateau, where we're just about to get started with our first match of the day! The other competitors have been buzzing about this matchup for days, and I'm sure you've all been just as eager to see it! Let's not waste any more time and bring out today's battlers! Folks, just a few days ago, we had the eldest person ever to do battle in this sacred arena, and today, we've got the youngest! This kid is nothing short of amazing, ladies and gentlemen; not only is he the youngest person ever to battle here, he's also the youngest person to win a major tournament, and he did it all with just one Pokemon! He's traveled a very long way to be with us today, so please join me in welcoming the cutest competitor, your Castelia City tournament champion, Kyro Remington!"

Kyro burst from the waiting area at hearing the first syllable of his name, unable to contain his excitement. The crowd's cheering swelled to impossibly loud levels at his appearance, and he waved all around, acknowledging everyone that was rooting for him to win. He took his place at his podium, an enormous grin plastered on his face, ready to see the look on Jethro's face once he revealed his starting Pokemon.

He hadn't known what Jethro's other two Pokemon were before Safiri had told him five minutes prior, but knowing what they were made his decision of who to start with painfully easy. If Jethro started with Luxray like Kyro thought he would, Kyro's choice would force him into a very bad spot right from the start.

He thinks I'm going to use Archeops first, he thought to himself as he bounced in place, unable to sit still. He's gonna be super surprised! I can't wait!

Jethro, from inside the waiting room, could hear the crowd chanting Kyro's name as he came onto the field. It didn't make him feel any less nervous, but he did his best to dismiss it. Course they're excited, he's practically a baby. I suppose I'd be excited too, if I was watchin'. He turned to each of his Pokemon, who he'd let out for a last-minute pep talk. "Y'all ready?" A few grunts of confirmation, and Jethro sighed. "Good. Cause I sure ain't. Heh." He leaned down, scratched his Luxray's fur by her chin. "Ready to get even with that Archeops?"

Ennis purred happily, nodding. She'd been made a fool of in their last battle, and she was going to make sure it wasn't going to happen again.

"Good. Just remember what we practiced and we'll be in great shape. And that goes for you two as well," he said, acknowledging Prince and Aisling, his massive Hydreigon. "You know I trust you all. Use your best judgment out there. Win or lose, I'm proud of you guys. Now let's get to work."

"Coming now to the east platform is his opponent, a man who is considered by many to be the underdog in this fight. Known for his hands-off approach to Pokemon battling, his Pokemon seem to know what to do in any situation! Will that bond be enough to give him a win today? Or will Kyro's massively powerful Pokemon be too much to handle? Please welcome your Viridian City tournament champion, Jethro Duffy!"

Jethro took a breath as he made his way to his platform. He'd hoped this would satisfy Prince's desire to battle for a good long time; all this stress was starting to get to Jethro, and he honestly found himself not caring if he lost. Of course, conceding was out of the question; it would be a slap in the face not only to Prince, but to Kyro as well. He would give the battle his all, and deal with the result later.

He saw Kyro waving madly to him, and Jethro raised a hand in greeting back. I thought he was nervous? Or maybe he's just hiding it real well. Ah, no matter, he thought, taking out his first Poke Ball. Hope this works...

Esmeralda was introduced, and the battlefield was revealed to be the ground field. Jethro cursed silently to himself as the battlefield came into view. He hadn't even considered the terrain when forming his battle plan. He didn't think any of Kyro's Pokemon could take advantage of the terrain specifically... none of his Pokemon looked strong enough to lift those huge boulders. Then again, he remembered, both Anorith and Archeops were Rock-type. Would that type allow them enough power to move those rocks? He hoped not. He might just have Aisling blast them into rubble.

"Trainers, release your Pokemon!"

"Let's do it, Ennis!"

"Let's go, Clefairy!"

Kyro made sure to watch Jethro's reaction as Clefairy was sent out and was disappointed to see that he hadn't looked to be all that worried. While it was true that Jethro was stone-faced on the outside, he was wondering exactly what he should do here. Even Ennis, not expecting to see this Pokemon, turned to Jethro, awaiting instruction.

Of course, he realized, far too late now. Prince and Aisling are both weak to Fairy-type attacks. If I switch out now, I'll be sending them into danger. But if I don't switch, and Ennis gets worn down, she won't have the strength left to fight Archeops. Now that I think about it, that's actually a really smart move. Damn, kid. You got me. He shook his head and smiled, giving Kyro the exact reaction he was hoping for.

"Surprised, Mr. Jethro?" he asked, already knowing the answer.

"Yeah, you surprised me all right. Wait. Was that the surprise?"

"Nope!" Kyro declared happily. "After Miss Safiri told me your Pokemon, it just made a lot of sense to start with Clefairy! The Fairy type has gigantic advantages against both the Dark type and the Dragon type, not only offensively, but defensively, too!"

A moment passed as Jethro tried remembering the type chart. Was that true?

"And I knew that you'd think I'd start with Archeops," Kyro continued. "It's true that he's a lot stronger than my other Pokemon, but why waste his energy when I can just have Clefairy wear your team down? She's more than strong enough to do that."

"I guess I underestimated you a little," Jethro admitted. "But it won't happen again, I promise you that. Thunderbolt, Ennis!"

Ennis roared, loading her body with energy. She hurled it straight forward in a massive shot that Kyro was barely ready for. "Use Protect!"

Clefairy braced herself, surrounding herself with the protective barrier. Ennis's powerful Thunderbolt glanced harmlessly off of it, but Ennis didn't give her any time to prepare a counterattack; Clefairy's barrier dropped seconds before she rushed in, gripping Clefairy in her jaws, lifting her into the air, and electrifying her with Thunder Fang. Ennis whipped Clefairy out of her mouth, sending her flying, but she was able to stop herself in midair, alighting onto one of the large boulders. "Clefairy, use Gravity!" Kyro commanded, and she closed her eyes, focusing, and a purplish gray aura permeated the battlefield. Ennis had been mid-dash when the increased gravity took hold, and she fell straight to her knees, unable to even move.

She snapped her head back to Jethro, clearly worried; even standing on her feet was taking an absurd amount of energy. Meanwhile, Clefairy looked no worse for wear. Kyro took this opportunity to recall his Pokemon. "Nice job, Clefairy! Now it's time for part two. Let's go, Anorith!"

Anorith landed with a shriek, causing Jethro to temporarily freeze at the sight of it. Goddamn bugs. Why does everyone have these goddamn bugs? Ennis roared, breaking him out of his daze. Damn it, I gotta stay focused. I gotta swap Ennis out here... but Kyro knows that. He knows that no matter who I use, they're gonna be at a disadvantage. Fact is, I'm going to need to save Ennis for Archeops, and Kyro knows that too. And then there's that damn surprise. He recalled Ennis into her Poke Ball, and the smile that had come across Kyro's face as a result proved to Jethro that yes, he predicted this play.

Jethro shook off the doubt that slowly started setting in and tried remaining positive. Ennis had landed a strong hit on Clefairy, who hadn't actually counterattacked. Anorith didn't look too threatening, and as long as Archeops stayed away, Ennis could get her strength back and then he'd be able to clip that bird's wings for good.

"Let's go, Aisling!" Jethro's huge dragon came onto the field with a roar, a roar that was stopped short by her unexpectedly crashing to the ground, rooting her to the spot.

"I thought you'd send Hydreigon out! It's the most susceptible to Fairy-type attacks, so it makes sense to bring it out when Clefairy's gone."

That was true, and Jethro hadn't even thought of it. He just wanted a Pokemon with a wider variety of attacks to take on Anorith.

"But I thought of that! That's part of the reason I used Gravity, so she can't just fly around and dodge everything! Cool, huh?"

"Actually, Kyro, I--"

But Kyro was way too excited to actually wait for Jethro's answer. "Anorith, use X-Scissor!" Anorith skittered toward the grounded Aisling, seemingly unaffected by the intense gravity, and raised a glowing claw. He delivered a large slash across Aisling's midsection, making her roar in pain. She fired a Dragon Pulse down at him, but he rolled out of the way, dodging it easily. "Awesome job, Anorith! Looks like Mr. Thresher was right about training under the effects of Gravity! Go for another X-Scissor!"

Anorith scurried forward, intent on delivering another blow, but this time, Aisling was ready for him; she fired a Dragon Pulse from her mouth before he could get too close. Anorith leaped out of the way, but another head fired another Dragon Pulse, smacking him him in midair and sending him tumbling to the ground.

"That's okay, we can fight long range, too! Use Rock Blast!" Anorith circled around Aisling as several small stones were summoned around Anorith's body. He took aim and fired them off like like little bullets, but Aisling fired huge Flamethrower attacks from her two smaller heads, burning most of the attack away, and what little did hit home did minimal damage.

Jethro saw Anorith crawl beneath the fire, preparing an attack unbidden. Realizing that Aisling couldn't see Anorith coming, he did his best to help. "Aisling, look out! Aim downwards in front of you!"

Aisling obeyed immediately, but it was too late. Anorith barrel rolled to the side, slicing Aisling hard again. She winced, falling over; after another slash to her face, it was lights out.

"Hydreigon is no longer able to battle! The winner is Anorith!" Esmeralda declared as the effects of Gravity subsided, and Kyro was overjoyed. The young man congratulated his Pokemon on a job well done as Jethro did the same, recalling his Pokemon.

Maybe using Prince would have been a better call there, he considered. Aisling would have been much better if she'd been able to fly and - well, hell, what I am I making excuses for? I got outplayed, plain and simple. Gotta give him credit for that.

"Gotta say, Kyro, that Gravity was a pretty neat trick. Can't remember the last time I've seen a Pokemon use it. And your Pokemon did that last attack on his own, too. You takin' a play outta my book now? Is that the surprise?"

"Hehe, nope! I told you, Mr. Jethro, I'll tell you when it happens! But I'm glad you liked it. It was Mr. Thresher's idea for me to do some training while under the effects of Gravity. He said it would give me an "extra legup" in our battle. I don't know what a legup is, but it seems to have helped!"

"Yeah, seems that way, huh..." Jethro mulled over what to do. He didn't like sending Prince to fight an uphill battle... but he needed to keep Ennis healthy for Archeops. That, he kept telling himself, was the endgame. Once it was her and Archeops, he could enact his own surprise, one that would definitely give him a win over the damn bird. He took Prince's Poke Ball and decided all he could do was trust in his best friend and longest partner. "Let's do it, Prince!"

Prince came onto the field, gauging his opponent cautiously. The two Pokemon circled one another, staring each other down, each waiting for the other to make a move. Finally, Kyro decided to take the battle into his own hands. "Use X-Scissor!"

Anorith made another dash for Prince, who stood his ground, readying an attack. When Anorith got close, Prince used Double Team to make a dozen copies of himself, and Anorith's attack only hit a mirage. Then, Prince and all the copies used Baby-Doll Eyes, dropping Anorith's strength. While only the attack from the real Prince had any effect, neither Anorith nor Kyro knew which one that was.

Unfortunately for Jethro, that didn't seem to bother Kyro at all; in fact, he seemed to know exactly how to handle this situation. "Rock Blast again, Anorith!" Anorith summoned the circle of rocks around him again, and this time, instead of firing them off like a gun, he exploded them outward; all the clones vanished as they were struck, leaving the real Prince to get damaged by the attack. Once Anorith saw the real Prince, he darted towards him, attempting to close the gap and attack with another X-Scissor. Prince was able to get his bearings back just in time and sounded a horrible screech as Anorith got close, causing Anorith to flinch and giving Prince enough time to deliver a solid Faint Attack to Anorith.

Jethro counted on his fingers. Was that four or five?

He knew what Prince was doing - it was a good idea, and his best chance against Clefairy, to be honest. But his count had to be right; if he was even one move off, the whole thing would be for nothing. Using some of his less common attacks against the least threatening opponent was going to make things a lot easier later.

Despite Anorith being severely wounded, Kyro was on cloud nine, because it was finally time for him to unleash his surprise. If this worked as well as it did in practice, Jethro was going to be in big trouble. "Anorith! It's time for the big surprise! Do it now, do it as much as you can, and don't stop for anything!"

Jethro's gaze hardened. "Stop him, Prince! Whatever he's planning, I don't wanna see it!"

Prince didn't need to be told twice. He ran as fast as he could towards Anorith, who was currently focusing energy into his claws. Suddenly, a seemingly endless stream of mud issued forth from them, covering Prince in the stuff and halting him in his tracks. Anorith ignored his dazed opponent and sprayed more and more mud over the battlefield, covering the entire arena. Prince shook the mud off of him and fired off a Dark Pulse, hitting Anorith and knocking it out, but not before he had covered the battlefield in seven inches of goopy, thick, viscous mud.

"Surprise!" Kyro yelled, happily recalling his fallen Pokemon. "What do you think? It's called Mud Sport."

Jethro was silent. This... was bad. Prince's mobility was shot. Ennis wouldn't be able to move in this, either. The mud weakened Electric attacks, which, Jethro deduced, was likely Kyro's goal the whole time. Archeops was a flying Pokemon, though, so the mud wouldn't really affect him. All Ennis would have to do is aim up and Archeops would still get zapped out of the sky. Still, he remembered back to the disastrous battle from before, remembering Archeops flying so fast across the field that Ennis hadn't had any time to react. Now, with all this mud added into the equation, dodging Archeops's aerial attacks was going to be all but impossible now, and all of this was on top of the fact that it had distracted Jethro from his counting. Was Umbreon at four or five now? He hated that he'd lost track. Hopefully Prince was counting.

But I'm gettin' ahead of myself, Jethro realized. He still has Clefairy. Is he going to keep her for later, or... his unanswered question received an answer as Kyro indeed did send out Clefairy, after Esmeralda had gently prodded him to choose a Pokemon. Clefairy stood on one of the rocks, out of the mud, as Prince prepared to respond to anything Clefairy did.

"Cosmic Slam, Clefairy!"

Prince froze. He had plans for just about everything, but not knowing what Clefairy was doing caused him to hesitate. His offensive set of moves didn't consist of much outside of Dark-type attacks, which would have little effect on Clefairy. If he could stall long enough, he could emerge victorious, but it was difficult to know what to do when he didn't recognize the attack Clefairy was using. Deciding to watch and see, preparing another Double Team just in case, he waited as Clefairy summoned a pink ball of energy, tossing it into the air over the two battlers. Prince braced himself, looking up at the ball, preparing to dodge; what he wasn't counting on was Clefairy leaping up into the energy ball and using it to fall directly onto Prince, too quickly for him to react. An explosion of fairy energy and mud followed, raining mud all over the two battlers as Clefairy landed itself on one of the large stone boulders.

"Damn!" Jethro exclaimed, awestruck by the attack. Prince immediately went on the defensive, using Moonlight to start restoring his health. This caused Jethro to bring his focus back to the battle, and he tried thinking of Prince's attacks. He'd gotten most of them out of the way already... did he use Baby-Doll Eyes already? Jethro couldn't remember.

Kyro continued commanding his Pokemon, unwilling to let his carefully planned advantage slip away. "Use Moonblast!"

Clefairy summoned another ball of energy and this time flung it straight at Prince. Instead of trying to leap out of the way, Prince used Quick Attack to do it instead. Prince yelled at Jethro as if to signal something. "Was that the last one?" Prince made another noise as he Quick Attacked again, positioning himself right in front of Clefairy. "Last Resort!"

Prince smacked Clefairy right in the mouth with a glowing white paw, sending her crashing into the invisible wall with a bang. Clefairy was knocked out cold by the powerful attack; Esmeralda made Prince's win official, and now Jethro started to show signs of worry. Archeops was all that was left now. Prince was fairly healthy, but a little worn. The mud also wasn't going to make things any easier. Hopefully Prince could get in a few hits before he went down - the more energy Archeops had to use to beat Prince, the better.

Kyro took out his last Poke Ball. He was grinning from ear to ear, not only because his surprise was a rousing success, but also because Jethro had given him a good fight so far, and he was looking forward to the conclusion - especially because the young man had one more trick up his sleeve. "Let's go, Archeops!"

The demon bird materialized in the air above one of the rocks, looking down on Prince, who was busy trying to keep from sinking further down into the mud.

"Use Head Smash!"

Archeops flapped his wings once and then dive bombed towards Prince at an alarming speed, prepared to tie up this battle. Prince immediately used Double Team the moment Kyro's command was heard, forcing Archeops to abort his attack midway. Each of the Prince copies started charging a Dark Pulse, and Archeops flew to each copy in turn, smacking it with a hard wing, hoping to find the real one. There were only a few left when Prince finished his attack; the dark wave shot out and Archeops flew straight up, high above the attack's range. Prince looked skyward for his opponent, the bright sun making it hard to see clearly.

His ears barely picked up the sound of Archeops zooming downwards at an angle in Prince's blind spot, catching him off guard and defenseless. The impact drove Prince through the mud and into the wall, fracturing two of Prince's legs from the awkward angle of impact. Archeops landed on one of the nearby rocks, using the down time to top off his health with Roost.

"Umbreon is no longer able to battle! The winner is Archeops!" Esmeralda declared, to uproarious cheers. So it was going to come down to this after all. Jethro wondered if Kyro had planned this from the very beginning. After all, Jethro wanted a good fight just as much as Kyro did, and their last meeting had been decidedly one-sided.

He recalled Prince into his Poke Ball, trying hard not to become emotional at the sight of his broken partner. He'd have to finish this battle as quickly as he could. "Let's do it, Ennis!"

Ennis came back into the battle, hating the feel of her paws in the mud, and she took a few moments to get used to trying to move around in it.

Kyro's mood had fallen a little after seeing Jethro so sullen. He, too, promised he would try to end things as soon as possible, and he knew just the attack to help him do that. "Head Smash, one more time!"

Ennis snapped to attention as Kyro gave his order, watching Archeops rise from the boulder and rush towards her. Suddenly, she loosed a massive wave of electricity from her body, so much that there was no way for Archeops to avoid it. He fell to the ground, the volts causing him to lose control of himself for a time, and Kyro was quick to give his next command. "Roost, Archeops! Get ready!" As Archeops scrambled to alight himself on one of the stone boulders, Ennis wasted no time in continuing her assault. From across the field, she readied an attack. Just before she fired, Kyro continued executing his plan. "Okay! Jump into the mud!"

Before he could heal off much of his damage, Archeops leaped behind the rock he was standing on, plunking himself as far down into the mud as his weight would allow. He rolled around in the stuff, caking his entire body in the slowly hardening mud. Ennis, thoroughly annoyed, shot another Thunderbolt. Kyro cringed as the attack struck home - his entire endgame rested on this plan working, and it would become apparent very soon if it was successful or not.

Much to his delight, the mud did have the desired effect; by covering his body, he'd given himself what amounted to a temporary immunity to Electric attacks. There were a few small parts of his body not covered in mud that were affected by the attack, but with the special mud already weakening Electric-type moves, the damage it did was inconsequential. The crowd roared in excitement at this development, and Kyro was beside himself with glee. It worked. It really worked. Fueled with new confidence, he continued his assault. "All right, Roost again! We should be safe this time!"

Archeops did a leap into the air, struggling a little bit to stay airborne with the additional weight of the mud covering his body. He still managed to land on the same boulder as before, beginning to heal as Ennis charged him as best as she was able.

She sure is determined to beat that bird, Jethro thought with more than a little pride in his heart. He watched Ennis leap and slash at Archeops, who was doing all he could to evade her surprisingly frequent attacks. But I don't know what she's gonna do about that mud. Lots of Electric and Normal attacks, but they don't amount to much against that mud, and Archeops bein' a Rock-type. A clump of mud fell off of Archeops's tail, and she hit the spot with a focused shot of Thunderbolt. Archeops yowled in pain, falling back into the mud, and Ennis leaped onto a nearby boulder. Her feet finally finding purchase on solid ground, she crouched low and sprang off it, tackling Archeops into the mud, dunking his body further and giving them both a fresh coat of mud. Ennis' eyes glowed blue for a moment and she suddenly thrust her head into the mud, pulling out a flailing Archeops by the tail.

Ennis bit down as hard as she could, electrifying her mouth and doing her best to shock her opponent into submission.

"That ain't gonna work, girl!" Jethro yelled. "You got some non-Electric moves in your arsenal! Crunch, or something!"

Ennis decided on 'or something.' Archeops's tail still tight in her mouth, she ceased trying to electrify and instead filled her mouth with an entirely different kind of energy. Archeops screeched in pain as the ice coursed through his body, rapidly hardening the mud on his body and causing it to fall off in chunks.

"Huh? Ice Fang? Well I'll be damned, I didn't even know you knew that!" Jethro exclaimed, genuinely surprised by this.

"Ah, this is bad," Kyro admitted. "But we're not out of it yet! Use Endeavor!"

Archeops was still yowling and crying in pain from Ennis's relentless attack, but he still managed to turn around and bash Ennis in the side of her head with his stony wing. Ennis stopped her attack immediately as her strength was depleted in an instant. Her limbs suddenly ached with Archeops's pain, and she found it difficult to even stand. She and Jethro both surmised that she had very nearly knocked Archeops out before Kyro gave his command.

"Wow, that was close! Endeavor is a strange move, isn't it, Mr. Jethro? It's not affected by Defeatist, either, which makes it really useful in bad situations like that!" He turned to his Pokemon. "Roost, Archeops! Just a little more and we'll be winners!"

"Ennis, darlin', you can't let him heal up! Use Wild Charge and get in there!"

Ennis was already halfway there when Jethro gave the order; she was determined not to suffer another embarrassing loss to a bird Pokemon. She glared at her opponent, who was beginning the process of healing his many wounds. She hopped out of the mud, cloaked in electricity, and Archeops immediately countered with Double Team. Suddenly there were a dozen Archeops scattered around the arena, all of them slowly restoring their HP.

"Again! Do it again!" Kyro commanded, and Archeops did it again. Now there were nearly thirty copies of Archeops, and it was all but impossible for Ennis to find the right one. She slashed at one, but it was only a copy. She leaped at another and ended up with a face full of mud. Her patience and her time running out, she threw caution to the wind, took a deep breath, and fired out a Discharge, not caring to aim and being unable to see clearly in any case. The attack coursed through the entire arena, zapping all of the clones into nothingness and, of course, hitting the real bird and interrupting his healing. The attack hurt badly in his weakened state, compounded further by the fact that much of the mud had dried and fallen off of him, exposing larger and larger portions of his body. He squawked, leaping into the sky, somehow still standing after the attack.

"Archeops! That's the way! Ennis is really weak now, so one more hit should do her in! Before she attacks again, use Thrash!"

Archeops gave a weak cry in response, geared up to attack, and fell straight down into the mud as the last of his strength left him. Ennis looked on warily, heavily panting, her bloodied fur crackling in case Archeops decided to get up, but Esmeralda intervened when it was clear that Archeops was not going to be doing that. "Archeops is unable to battle! The winner is Luxray, which means victory goes to Jethro Duffy!"

"What a battle, ladies and gentlemen!" Ruby was beyond impressed with the battle she'd just witnessed. And though she was secretly rooting for Kyro and was disappointed that he lost, she still wanted to make sure that Kyro left the stadium feeling like a winner. I want every single one of you to show some extra love for Kyro, who kept us on the edge of our seats until the very end! He might not be moving on to the next round in the tournament, but surely he's moving on to the next round in our hearts. On behalf of myself and Diamant Industries, Kyro, congratulations on making it this far. You're an inspiration to us all!"

The two trainers recalled their Pokemon, heading towards center stage. There, they shook hands, and Kyro wiped his eyes with his sleeve. Jethro leaned in close, placing a hand on the young boy's shoulder, and said something into his ear. Then, Kyro nodded and turned around, standing a little straighter, and walked proudly back into Indigo Plateau to massive cheers, and several thousand people chanting his name.
 
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Windra wordlessly let herself out, closing the door behind her.
Kinda glad that that triangle is done for a bit. The whole "drama by miscommunication" bit isn't a particular favourite of mine, but I am glad that it was at least addressed. Scarlet really dropped the ball.

I admit I do not know the extent of Jethro's abilities as a trainer, but it stands to reason that he is far more experienced than a child, does it not?
He's not exactly one to brag, which probably serves to his advantage to some degree.

delighting in the nanosecond of panic on his face
Always satisfying to see a jab at Eldan, heh.

"No, please don't eat meeeeeeee om nom nom nom," she said, putting the sliced-off pancake in her mouth.
I don't really have a comment on this. It just really amused me.

If Kyro wins, you are to be my servant girl for the remainder of the tournament.
I would've been fine with either, but after this bet, I wanted my boy Jethro to win so hard.

joining Team Rocket had been the right call
Might be best if Jethro doesn't learn this little tidbit of info

A moment passed as Jethro tried remembering the type chart. Was that true?
I've done that... more times than I care to admit to. >.>;;

Prince smacked Clefairy right in the mouth with a glowing white paw, sending her crashing into the invisible wall with a bang.
HAH. So much for Fairy beating Dark. Hehehe.

"Archeops is unable to battle! The winner is Luxray, which means victory goes to Jethro Duffy!"
Man, I was goin' on about this to you in PMs on Discord, but this was a wicked battle. I know I mentioned multiple times that I didn't mind who won, as long as it was a good battle, but damn, I'm still pretty happy that Jethro won. I'm more happy, though, that it was an "edge-of-your-seat" kind of battle that had me guessing until the very end.
 
Kinda glad that that triangle is done for a bit. The whole "drama by miscommunication" bit isn't a particular favourite of mine, but I am glad that it was at least addressed. Scarlet really dropped the ball.

There are three sides to a triangle, you know.

I don't really have a comment on this. It just really amused me.

That is the point

I would've been fine with either, but after this bet, I wanted my boy Jethro to win so hard.

I was hoping it wouldn't telegraph Jethro's win too hard because a week-long slave-a-thon seems a bit... much.

Might be best if Jethro doesn't learn this little tidbit of info

:>

Man, I was goin' on about this to you in PMs on Discord, but this was a wicked battle. I know I mentioned multiple times that I didn't mind who won, as long as it was a good battle, but damn, I'm still pretty happy that Jethro won. I'm more happy, though, that it was an "edge-of-your-seat" kind of battle that had me guessing until the very end.

ayy I did a good

now if only everyone else would say words.
 
It's been a little over a month since chapter 7, and I can't complain about that. I don't have the time to crank out new chapters in four days like I did with chapter 2 (okay maybe I could if I just wrote non-stop), but at least I'm making progress.

Since we're at the end of the first round, here's how I'm currently planning out the next few chapters. Interlude 4, when I figure out how to write it, is going 'to focus on Diamant Industries. No ETA on that, but I haven't really written much about their side of things and my goal is for their motives to become a bit more clearer. Right now I have no idea how I'm going to do that because I inadvertently ruined the endgame I had planned from back when I started writing this fic. I did disclaim that dope-ass battles were always going to be the focus though and if the story elements happened to make something great then cool. I don't plan on using that as a get out of jail free card, I'm still gonna try, it's just gonna require me to think a bit more.

Chapter 9 won't have any battles in it, but it is the chapter where Motfia takes place, so those of you who played that hot garbage can have a pleasant reminder of it. The unanswered questions from the game's epilogue will also be answered in that chapter.

There's a small battle planned for chapter 10, and I've already hinted at it in a previous chapter, so if you look back, you might be able to figure out what it is. There's also a thing I have written down that I have planned for chapter 10 that I'm still not sure I wanna do yet. The idea behind it was to make the tournament more interesting, but the battles are already decided randomly, so it would only be interesting from a character's perspective. I'm like 30-40% on board with the idea, so... we'll see.

Quarterfinals start in chapter 11 (or possibly 12), which will see Rose face off against Thresher. I won't be asking for you to submit leads to me, mainly because only a small handful of the people in the tournament even follow this story anymore, and planning the battles will be a little easier if I'm not shackled to your chosen lead.

Other fun facts about chapter 8:

- This is the first chapter where Safiri is mentioned but has no dialogue
- Windra is the only competitor without any dialogue - everyone else has at least one line

Tagging @double o squirtle because while may not be following this story closely anymore, I want to give him the opportunity to at least see his created character in action (finally). Sorry it took so long, buddy.

Chapter 8 highlights:

- said is dead; the amount of 'he said' or 'she said' with no added description of how it was said has been greatly reduced
- Scarlet confronts the final boss of her story arc
- Kyro has a great idea
- Frisk and Taikyu finally catch up
- Alex and Cody have their match
- it's friggin dope

As always, ignore this thread completely like this post once you've read it, and leave that sweet, sweet feedback.

Word count: 15,046

Chapter 8: Wrapping It All Up

As was normal by now, the other competitors chose to watch the battle from wherever they felt most comfortable. Most stayed in the cafeteria, although a few retired to the comfort of their rooms. Scarlet had stayed in the cafeteria, but only because Kiria did. In the bath this morning, Scarlet had decided to ask Kiria what she should do. It was a better plan than wallowing in despair about the whole thing, and it was preferable than telling Jethro how gloriously her plan had backfired and listening to him yammer on about honesty and how this never would have happened if she had just been honest.

A fat lot of good being honest did. She was honest with Windra, and look where that had gotten her. If anyone was going to have a sympathetic ear for her, surely it would be Kiria. The woman of the hour was intently watching the battle unfold alongside Alex and Eldan. Scarlet approached the group, nudging Kiria as she spoke. "Hey, Kiria, do you have a minute?"

"Just a second, honey," Kiria dismissed her, far too interested in the fight to pay any attention to her. Alex was on his feet as the battle slowly came to its conclusion, both he and Kiria watching nervously as Archeops fell for the last time. Esmeralda announced Jethro as the winner, and Kiria jumped from the table and did a dance. Eldan laughed, though Scarlet couldn't tell if he was laughing at Kiria or at Alex, who looked visibly angry that Kyro had lost.

"Woo! I'm rich! Pay up, Alex!" Kiria declared, holding out her palm in front of him.

Alex rolled his eyes, sighing dramatically. "If I must."

"You must. Cha-ching, baby! Mama needs a new pair of shoes!"

Alex reached into his pocket and pulled a pen and small book out of his pocket. He scribbled something into it, then tore off a page and placed it in Kiria's hand. "There you are, Kiria. One thousand dollars. Congratulations," he sneered, as if he'd lost a part of himself.

"Ah, hey, don't forget me, buddy," Eldan reminded him, grinning. "Jethro won, which means I just made ten grand. You can make the check out to 'The Suave and Stylish Eldan Faradel.'"

"I think not," Alex shot back, pointing the tip of the pen at Eldan. "You are still indebted to me from the fight earlier this week. Ten thousand dollars. Or did you think I forgot?"

"What? Aw, come on," Eldan complained. "Taikyu barely lost, I shouldn't have to pay for that!"

A smug smile made its way onto Alex's face. "Very well. I will make the same argument. And so, our debts cancel each other out."

Eldan opened his mouth to fire off a rebuttal, but couldn't argue against what Alex said. "Damn it. You're right."

Kiria smiled at the two. "Guess you'll have to make it interesting for the next one, huh?"

"Nah, we agreed not to bet on each other's matches. Besides, no one here is wealthy enough to keep up with our bets anyway," Eldan informed her. Noticing Scarlet standing there, he acknowledged her with a nod. "Hey, Scarlet. What's up?"

"Scarlet!" Kiria turned to the young lady, apologizing profusely. "Sorry! I'm so sorry I ignored you. I just got so caught up in this here that I completely forgot you wanted to talk to me! What can I do for you?"

Scarlet hesitated, a little uncomfortable. "It's kinda private. Girl stuff," she added, hoping the boys would lose interest in her conversation.

"Oh! Oh, of course, honey," she said, pushing her chair in and bidding the men goodbye. "Come on, let's head to my room."

The two ladies excused themselves and left the cafeteria, heading to Kiria's room. The two ran into Kyro and Jethro on their way; Kiria gave Jethro a big hug and thanked him for winning. Jethro and Scarlet made eye contact during this, and she waggled her eyebrows suggestively at him. Jethro glared back at her, but didn't say anything to her. The two guys headed towards the Pokemon Center to get their Pokemon healed, and Kiria and Scarlet resumed heading to Kiria's bedroom.

Once they were inside, Kiria went into the bathroom while Scarlet took a seat on Kiria's bed. Kiria quickly reemerged with something in her hand and handed it to Scarlet. "Here you go. If you need anything else, just let me know."

"What?" Scarlet asked, confused. "No, Kiria, that's not what I wanted, I just wanted to talk. I... I messed up pretty bad."

Kiria took a spot next to Scarlet on the bed, putting a motherly arm around the young girl. Apparently this was more serious than she'd thought. "What's wrong?"

Scarlet took a deep breath and then recounted everything she'd done yesterday, from her realization with Rose, to writing and leaving the notes, to the night she spent with Windra, the fight they'd had the morning after, and the 'present' Windra left her.

"Wow," was all that Kiria said.

Scarlet sighed. "What do I do, Kiria? I've ruined everything. Rose hates me; Windra hates me; when Jethro finds out what I did, he's going to hate me; and I'm not feeling too great about myself either."

"Now that's enough of that," Kiria consoled her, pulling Scarlet closer to her. "Okay, so, let's take it one problem at a time, starting with what I think is the smallest one. Do you really think Jethro is going to hate you?"

"I... I don't know," Scarlet admitted. "He thought the notes were a dumb idea. He said I should have just told Rose how I felt."

Kiria paused, considering her words carefully. "Honey, I know it might not be what you want to hear, but Jethro was right. Do you remember when I told you about Merrick? He came to see me every day, but he never made the effort to come and talk to me. When I was working at the lighthouse, I would see hundreds of people a week from all over. Not just from Johto, but tourists from other regions as well. If he hadn't showed up so often, he would have just been another nameless face in the crowd and I might never have noticed him. I can't imagine what he must have thought, coming every day to see me, wanting to get to know me but never having the courage to say hi. If I hadn't gone up to him myself, we might never have dated."

"But it didn't work out anyway," Scarlet pointed out.

"No, it didn't, but that's not my point. If you see something you want, you have to go get it. I was flattered that a boy had come to see me so much, and I found his shyness endearing, so I approached him. If you want Rose to know how you feel, just tell her. I've talked to her a bit, and I think she's a nice girl. If you explain the situation to her, she might understand."

Scarlet paid attention to the floor, doubts swimming in her head. "She might not."

"Are you willing to let that question remain unanswered?"

Scarlet sighed. "No, I guess not. I'm just scared."

Kiria nodded knowingly. "I know. But you won't know until you try. As for the hickey, I wouldn't worry about it. No one in polite company is going to see it, and it will go away eventually."

"Should I tell Rose about it?"

Kiria thought about this for a moment. "I don't see why you would have to. It's not relevant to your situation, and like I said, the only way she's going to see it is if you show her."

"What if she asks about what Windra and I did?" Scarlet asked.

"Then you do what you should have done in the first place and be honest with her. Wouldn't you want the same courtesy from Rose if she'd been the one interested in you?"

Scarlet rolled her eyes. "Jethro said the same thing. But there was no reason that my plan shouldn't have worked! Except... it didn't. Someone had to have switched the notes. That's the only thing I can think of. But who would do that?! Who here hates me that much that they would do this?" Her voice fell a little at this, saddened by the knowledge that some of her fellow competitors disliked her.

"That I don't know, honey, I'm sorry," Kiria apologized. "Don't worry about that. Focus on what you do know." She counted on her fingers. "Rose thinks you aren't interested in her; you need to fix that. You offended Windra, and you should apologize to her for it."

"She hit me!" Scarlet blurted indignantly.

"Don't interrupt me," Kiria scolded. "Yes, she did, and that was wrong. I'm going to have a talk with her about it. That doesn't mean you shouldn't take the high road and apologize for saying something to upset her. Even if she doesn't accept your apology, it then becomes her decision to repair your friendship."

"What if she doesn't want to?" Scarlet asked.

Kiria shrugged. "Then that's her decision. You can't keep worrying about 'what if,' Scarlet. If you keep letting that hold you back, you're never going to be happy."

Scarlet took in Kiria's words, nodding in agreement with her. "Yeah, maybe you're right," she admitted, getting to her feet. "Thanks, Kiria. I'll go find her right now and I'll--"

"Why don't you go talk to Rose first?" Kiria suggested. "Let me handle Windra. Take the edge off her for you, you know?"

"Ooh, yeah, that's probably a good idea. Thanks again, Kiria. I feel a little better now," she said with a smile.

As she headed to the door, Kiria gave her one last bit of advice. "That's good. Don't forget, be honest, be direct, and you'll be fine, no matter what she says."

Scarlet nodded. "Honest. Direct. Got it. I'm not gonna screw it up this time," she answered confidently, saying her goodbyes and exiting Kiria's room.

Remembering that Rose had went to her room before the morning battle, Scarlet headed over there and knocked before she could convince herself not to. The door clicked open, and in the doorway was not someone Scarlet was expecting to see.

"Oh, hey, Gardevoir!" she greeted the Pokemon. "You're looking well. Is Rose here?"

Gardevoir answered her with a scowl, placing her hands on her hips and staring intently into Scarlet's eyes.

"That's enough," Rose admonished her Pokemon, getting up from where she was seated on her bed and coming to the door. She moved Gardevoir out of the way and embraced her fellow Ranger and friend. "Hey, Scarlet. I'm sorry about Gardevoir, she's a little upset right now." Gardevoir rolled her eyes, shot Scarlet one last glare, and headed out of the doorway and into the bedroom proper, earning a shocked gasp from her trainer. "Gardevoir! You will do no such thing! You've earned yourself a time out, young lady!" Rose recalled her Pokemon into her Poke Ball, then did the same with Lucario before he could voice any protest.

"Was I interrupting something?" Scarlet asked, suddenly uncomfortable. "I could come back another time."

Rose shook her head. "No, we were just talking about the battle. Won't you come in?" Rose waved Scarlet in with a hand, closing the door softly behind her. Rose took the remote control and shut the television off, leaving the two girls in silence. She sat down on the edge of her bed, and waited for Scarlet to find a seat. While the three of them had been watching the battle as Rose claimed, Rose hadn't mentioned that the time after the battle was spent talking about Scarlet and her note. When Rose brought Gardevoir up to speed on what had happened, Gardevoir was furious at the second time another human had seemingly mistreated her. Despite Rose's insistence that Scarlet wasn't trying to hurt her on purpose, Gardevoir still harbored some anger towards Scarlet, and likely would for some time. Of course, both Lucario and Gardevoir had sensed Scarlet coming from a mile away, and Gardevoir's rage had very nearly gotten the best of her when Scarlet knocked. It was only after a stern warning from Rose did Gardevoir calm herself enough to open the door and not instantly psychic choke Scarlet out. Still, Gardevoir made it very clear to Scarlet how she felt about her.

Scarlet decided to sit in a chair, not daring to make herself at home on Rose's bed. She glanced around the room, cursing how it looked exactly like everyone else's. It didn't give her much to look at. The clock on the wall ticked the seconds by, seemingly becoming louder and louder in the reigning silence. She noticed Rose's bed was messy - of course, Scarlet reasoned, Rose was just in it. Lucario and Gardevoir were most likely sitting next to her, watching the battle.

Gardevoir. What was up with her? She'd only said hello, and Gardevoir acted like she'd spit in her face. She was terrified of the way Gardevoir glared at her; if Rose hadn't been around to rein her in, would Gardevoir have hurt her, she wondered?

Rose noticed Scarlet scrutinizing her bed, and she cleared her throat, aiming to derail that particular train of thought before it ventured somewhere dangerous. "So, what brings you here, Scarlet?"

"Oh, sorry. Just lost in thought. Nervous," she amended. "Gardevoir looked like she wanted to kill me."

Rose simply nodded. "Yeah, she said if you ever showed your face here again, she would."

"Why?!" Scarlet asked incredulously. "What did I do to her?!"

"Nothing to her personally. She's mad due to a different reason." Rose went to her bedside table and picked up the reason for Gardevoir's ire, and realization hit Scarlet like a ton of bricks. "I like you, but the flirting between us has to stop. My heart belongs to another, and I can't risk losing her. Please understand," Rose read aloud.

Scarlet leapt to her feet in protest. "Look, about that, I'm sorry, I--"

"No, listen, Scarlet, it's okay," Rose interrupted her. "Really, it is. It's my fault for pushing you." She put the note down, sighing. She sat on her bed again, and motioned for Scarlet to sit. "I like you, Scarlet. I like the way you treat me. Or maybe it's more accurate to say, I like the way you don't treat me." At Scarlet's puzzled look of confusion, Rose smiled, and continued. "Even after learning of my accomplishments, you didn't let it color the way you saw me. I don't mean to brag, but I'm sick of being famous. I get recognized in public all the time. I get hit on constantly by people who don't seem to care at all about me personally. They just want to be associated with someone famous. And then you came and... just... didn't care, for lack of a better word. You wanted to be friends with me, not my accomplishments. It was nice. I honestly wasn't sure what to make of it at first, but the more we got to talking, the more I realized that... there might be something more there."

Scarlet's heart nearly skipped a beat. She remained quiet, however, and let Rose talk.

"It wasn't something I really thought about... not until I found your note. I had a talk about it with Lucario last night."

When Rose paused here, Scarlet asked hesitantly, "What did he say?"

A sad smile crept across Rose's face. "He asked if you made me happy... and I said yes. He said that I should fight for you then, and to hell with whoever this other girl is. He said I should have marched right over to your room and told you exactly how I felt."

Boy, did that sound familiar. "Why didn't you?" Scarlet inquired.

Rose gestured towards the note. "As I told Lucario, it wouldn't be right. You made it very clear that your heart belongs to another, and I'm not so immature as to try and come between you two. If things were different, then I might be willing to--"

She was stopped by Scarlet suddenly standing. "What? What is it?"

Honest. Direct. Don't leave until she knows how you feel. Scarlet took a deep breath, marched right over to Rose, and kissed her square on the lips.

Rose, shocked, pushed Scarlet off of her immediately, getting to her feet as well. "What are you doing? Have you lost your mind?"

"I'm taking Lucario's advice," Scarlet announced, fueled by hope. "I want us to be together, Rose. You're all I can think about."

"Your note said there--"

"You got the wrong one!" Scarlet declared, giddy. "There were two, and someone found them before you guys did, and switched them! That's why you got the rejection note!"

Rose thought about this. "There were two notes?"

"Yeah!" Scarlet said, grinning. "Don't you see? The one who has my heart is you!"

This didn't register at all with Rose, who was on an entirely different and much less romantic tangent. She picked up the note and read it again. "She's a competitor?" She nodded to herself. "Of course, she has to be. That's why there were two notes, there wouldn't be if she was someone from outside the tournament." She faced Scarlet. "Who is she?"

"Windra," Scarlet huffed, frustrated that she'd come up. "But she doesn't matter, I don't want to be with her."

"So... this note was meant for Windra?"

"Yes!" Scarlet answered. "She's a huge flirt and has been trying to jump my bones since I accidentally told her and Kiria I had a thing for you but that's not important either what does matter is that you and I can be together now!"

Rose frowned, and Scarlet frowned too. That was not the facial expression Scarlet was hoping for. "So," Rose deduced, "that must mean that the other note was meant for me."

"Yes!"

"And Windra got it instead."

"Yes!"

"What did it say?"

"I--"

I'm yours. Come to my room and let's make magical things happen.

Scarlet gulped, suddenly feeling very sick to her stomach. "I..."

"Scarlet, I shouldn't have to tell you this, but lying is very unbecoming of a Ranger. But even if we were civilians, I'd be making you the same request I'm about to make: don't lie to me. The fact that you're hesitating means you don't want to tell me, and if you want to be with me as badly as you say you do, I can't understand why telling me would be a problem. But whatever it is, lying to me about it is only going to damage my trust in you. Don't lie to me, Scarlet. Please."

This was bad. The sadness in Rose's voice only made Scarlet feel worse. All she could think of was Windra taunting her about how disgusted Rose was going to be when she found out about their fling. Still, Rose deserved the truth, right? Here she was, right in front of her, asking her plainly to be honest with her.

She couldn't say no to that. "I don't remember the exact words, but the gist of it was, 'I'm yours. Come to my room and we'll make magical things happen. If not, I still want to be your friend.'"

"Magical things? What does that mean?"

Scarlet looked blankly at Rose. Was she serious?

Rose frowned, a little offended at Scarlet's assumption that she should know this. "What? Don't look at me like that. What did you mean by magical things?"

Scarlet let out a breath. "You know... like... bed stuff."

Rose went wide-eyed, realizing what Scarlet was getting at. As her mind worked, Rose's expression changed from surprise to hurt as the implications of this became clearer. A question bubbled to the forefront of Rose's mind. "So yesterday, Windra found the note, meant for me, which was a note soliciting me for--"

"Yes," Scarlet interrupted her. She was already regretting writing the stupid notes - hearing Rose talk about how cheaply Scarlet had thought of her was like a javelin in her heart.

"Did she come to your room last night?" Rose asked with a little more force in her voice. She was starting to put the pieces of this puzzle together, and Scarlet was afraid of what Rose was going to see once she'd completed the picture.

Don't lie to me.

"Yeah," Scarlet admitted. "Yeah, she did. I honestly thought it was going to be you. I was sitting there thinking how dumb it was to write those notes in the first place, especially after--"

Rose stopped her with a hand. She started breathing a little heavier, and Scarlet could tell she was hesitating in asking her next question. Scarlet knew in her heart of hearts what that question was going to be, and she was hoping she'd get lucky and Gardevoir would burst out of her Poke Ball and actually kill her before she confirmed what Rose was already thinking. She decided not to jump the gun, just in case Rose wasn't about to ask her the question she wanted to not answer more than anything in the world.

"Did you have sex with her?"

And there it was. It was the moment of truth. Lie now and save both of them some heartache? Or be honest and risk losing Rose forever? There was a convincing argument for both. Lying was easy. A simple no and, with a little luck, this whole thing would be swept under the rug. With Windra swearing herself to secrecy, the only way Rose would ever find out is if Scarlet's conscience got the better of her and she came clean, and Scarlet wasn't sure there was any chance of that happening.

She closed her eyes and allowed herself a few brief moments to imagine a relationship with Rose, and what that might entail. Going on grand adventures with their Pokemon, teaching new Rangers, working hard to improve the lives of everyone during the day and coming home to unwind and take care of each other at night. It made her smile momentarily before she saw the ensuing fight if Rose ever learned of this secret, years down the line. Horrible things said. Bags packed, tears shed. Trust broken, never to be mended.

That was a scary thought, but was it worse than being honest now and possibly never getting to experience those lovely years, side by side with the girl of her dreams? Was she really willing to risk losing Rose over something she might never find out anyway?

Scarlet surprised herself when she opened her eyes and answered both her and Rose's questions with the same word. "Yes."

Rose blinked back tears, and something told Scarlet she'd made the wrong decision. When she went to embrace Rose, Rose stopped her cold. "Don't."

Scarlet started to panic, desperate to rectify the situation before all hope was lost. "Let me explain, okay?"

"I don't know what else needs explaining," Rose said, wiping her eyes. "But since you were honest, I'll hear you out."

"Okay, look, yeah, we had sex, okay, but it didn't mean anything. She took advantage of me! She came in and I was like, 'Hey, what's up?' and she was all, 'Kiss time!' and then she pushed me up against the wall and it was so hot, and the next thing I knew we were in bed and--" she paused as she realized that tears were silently falling down Rose's face. "And I'm not helping." She sighed. "Okay. There is... was... a part of me that wanted to have sex with Windra. I spent the last week going crazy wondering if you'd felt anything for me. Jethro told me that I should have just gone up to you and said, 'Rose, I think you're the prettiest gal in all of Kanto! Will you be my one and only?'" she poorly imitated his signature drawl.

Rose stared at her, incredulous. "You should have! God, Scarlet, if you'd done that, I would have gladly said yes!"

That was a little painful to hear, and Scarlet could see Jethro staring disapprovingly at her in her mind. She shook it off - now wasn't the time for that. "I almost convinced myself you would have," Scarlet continued. "But I guess something in my head told me you were just being nice. And then there was Windra, who made it abundantly clear that she wanted me. And it felt nice to be wanted. I wrote the notes because I was afraid of being rejected in person. I didn't know if you had someone waiting for you back home, or if you were even into girls. Then Windra showed up, and I was so shocked by how bold she was, it didn't take long for me to convince myself that you weren't interested, or else you would have come, you know? Even just to let me down."

"You had sex with her even though she had the wrong note?" Rose asked.

"I didn't know she had the wrong one until this morning. We got into a huge fight about it," she admitted. "I don't wanna talk about it, it's not important now. Honestly, I thought she was just being Windra. But I told her that I wanted to be with you," she said, taking a risk by reaching for Rose's hand. When she didn't move it away, Scarlet held it gently in her hands, bringing it to her lips and kissing it softly. "What I did was dumb. I know that now. And I know I could have told you I didn't do anything with her, but I'm willing to risk everything because I don't want to keep secrets from you. I'd rather you hate me for my honesty than love me for a lie."

"Scarlet, I don't hate you... I don't hate anyone. But..."

Scarlet's heart sank. She'd made her pitch and that 'but' could only mean one thing: Rose wasn't interested in buying.

"But what?" Scarlet offered, gripping Rose's hand tighter.

Rose gently pulled her hand away from Scarlet, and opened her arms, inviting Scarlet in, but when she went to kiss Rose, Rose moved her face past Scarlet's and hugged her tightly instead. "But we can't be together. I'm sorry." She felt Scarlet tighten her hold, and Rose did the same. "I know that's not what you want to hear, and I'm going to tell you something else that's going to hurt: you aren't ready for a relationship."

Scarlet pulled away, fresh tears in her eyes. "What are you talking about?"

"You jumped through so many needless hoops just to get my attention. Instead of coming to me like an adult, like a Rank 4 Ranger should know, you wrote a note and left it in the open for anyone to find - which, apparently, someone did." A breath. "And you didn't even mention wanting a relationship with me in it, just 'hey, come over and let's have sex.' I don't know what kind of girl you think I am, but I'm not--"

"I don't think that at all! You know I value you for so much more than just your body, Rose, that's not--"

"And you keep interrupting me!" Rose looked at Scarlet as she took this in and realized that Rose was right. "You don't know how to listen, Scarlet. I can't be with someone who won't let me get a word in edgewise whenever she feels like she has to shoot off whatever thought enters her head at that moment."

Rose stopped talking here. Scarlet didn't say a word, thinking this was some sort of test. She'd prove herself worthy, one way or another.

When it became clear what Scarlet was doing, Rose sighed, using her thumbs to wipe away Scarlet's tears. "You are a lovely and sweet lady, and a very accomplished Ranger for someone so young. I meant every bit of praise I gave you when we first met, and I say that not only as a senior officer, but as your friend. You have a natural fire that few others have. I see it in your eyes all the time. You've got some rough edges, but so do we all. They'll get smoothed out over time, and you will be a better Ranger - a better person - for it. I'm sorry, but I can't be with you right now. Please don't hate me for this, Scarlet, I-"

"Never!" Scarlet blurted, wincing the moment the word left her mouth. "Damn it. Sorry. Forgive me."

"You're forgiven," Rose said tenderly, a small smile coming across her face. "You see? You're already improving."

Scarlet automatically smiled at the praise, but it still felt hollow to her. It was small consolation, for missing the grand prize. She looked in those bright green eyes, eyes that she could get lost in for days. "I really like you, Rose. I'm sorry I screwed things up between us, but I'd like another chance. Will you wait for me?"

Rose flashed her a grin that warmed Scarlet's heart. "I really like you too, Scarlet. And... I'll think about it. Hey, close your eyes for me?"

Scarlet was reluctant to break her gaze with Rose's beautiful eyes, but she did as she was asked. She only a few moments to wonder before she felt Rose's breath on her face. She froze as Rose slowly, hesitantly pressed their lips together, and Scarlet was in heaven. This was nothing like when Windra kissed her; that was forceful, hungry, needy. Scarlet shuddered as she savored the feeling of Rose's soft lips on hers, and returned this kiss.

This was the first time that Rose had kissed another human in nearly a year (notwithstanding the peck from minutes ago), and she'd nearly forgotten how nice it was. When she broke it off a few blissful moments later, she pulled Scarlet close in a hug. "Don't make me wait forever," she whispered into the junior Ranger's ear.

"I won't. I promise," she replied.

They held each other for a few moments more before Rose separated herself and composed herself. "Thank you for being honest with me. About... everything. Fair warning, Gardevoir might still want to kill you, even after I tell her about our talk."

Scarlet groaned. She'd completely forgotten about the instrument of (her) death sitting idle just a few feet away, but she was surprised to learn that she wasn't afraid for her life - at least not as much as she was when she'd first arrived. Instead, the majority of that feeling had been replaced with a new emotion - what it was, Scarlet couldn't put her finger on. She wanted both to earn Gardevoir's favor and stay as far the hell away from her as she could; she wanted to dare Gardevoir to tell her no, but at the same time remain among the living. Whatever it was, it gave her newfound confidence, and Scarlet found herself smiling. "That's fine with me. Getting Pokemon to trust us is what we Rangers do, right? If I can get Gardevoir to trust me, it'll be one of the highlights of my career."

* * * * * * * *

Jethro and Kyro entered the cafeteria to applause from everyone save Alex, who was bitter from losing even a small amount of money from the fight. Whatever sadness that had been on Kyro's face was obliterated when he saw everyone clapping, and his infectious smile was back in full force as the others greeted him on his return.

"Wow, you guys, thanks!" Kyro beamed, no longer upset about his loss. "It's too bad we lost." He turned to Jethro, literally jumping in his excitement. "But oh man, Mr. Jethro, that battle was so cool! First there was the gravity, and Hydreigon couldn't fly around, and it's probably a good thing, too, because long-range special attacks are a big problem for my team, and Anorith was like zoom, pow, and got her! And the mud!" He turned around, spotting Thresher, and ran at light speed over to where he was sitting. "Mr. Thresher, did you see?! It went perfectly!"

"Haha, aye, that it did, lad!" He held an arm out and hugged the boy as Jethro meandered over to them. "I hope yer not too mad for me goin' over some strategy with the boy," he told Jethro with a smile.

"Nah. Made for a great battle. I tell you, Kyro, you really had me worried with that Mud Sport attack. Don't think I've ever seen it used quite like that before."

Kyro giggled, overjoyed that his plan had worked, despite still losing the battle. "Mr. Thresher was also the one who suggested that I practice fighting under the effects of Gravity, too. It's not a common move at all, so a lot of people can't handle it when their Pokemon get stuck!"

"Well, ye did marvelous, Kyro, I'm real proud of ya. And what did I say to always remember about losing?"

Kyro paused, trying to remember. "It doesn't matter whether ye win or lose, but whether or not ye did yer best."

"Aye," Thresher said with a chuckle. "Dya think ye did yer best, Kyro?"

Kyro paused again in a moment of seriousness, considering it. "I think so, Mr. Thresher. We had a plan and we did the plan and we did everything we could to try and win, but Mr. Jethro managed to beat everything we threw at him. He even said himself that I should be proud of getting this far, and no one could ever take that from me."

Thresher nodded sagely. "I couldn't agree more, lad. Now run along while I have a chat with ol' Jethro here, will ya?"

"Sure! Thanks again for the great battle, Mr. Jethro!" Kyro turned to the others, wondering what to do now. He felt his stomach rumble, and he looked at the clock. Lunch would be soon, but if he didn't get something into his stomach now, he might keel over and die. Finding Tsomu and Quayle at another table, Kyro decided to find out what the hold up was. "Hey, Mr. Tsomu, shouldn't you be in the kitchen making lunch? I'm starving!"

"You do know I don't actually work here, right? I'm a competitor just like you," Tsomu explained with a laugh. "Anyway, I tried helping, but they threw me out. 'Don't come back until Monday,' they said."

"Oh no! That's terrible!" Kyro wailed, unable to fathom going without Tsomu's delicious cooking for even a day.

Tsomu laughed at Kyro's naive sense of despair. "No, Kyro, it's nothing bad, they gave me the weekend off." This did little to lift Kyro's spirits, so Tsomu tried a different tactic. "Tell you what. I'll see if they'll let me whip you something special, just for you, huh? After all, you did amazing out there today."

Kyro's eyes and mouth widened at Tsomu's proposal. "Wow, really? You think they'll let you?"

"Of course! Just gotta work some of my Tsomu magic, that's all," he replied with a wink, getting up and heading towards the kitchen.

Kyro sat down where Tsomu had, excited at the prospect of eating Tsomu's cooking again, and his mind raced with possibilities. Quayle regarded him with interest - he, too, had come to Tsomu with the same inquiry of why he wasn't in the kitchen, after all. Kyro caught Quayle staring at him, and he smiled, waving at the older man. "Good afternoon, Mr. Quayle!" he greeted him. "You look really different with the glasses." Noticing Quayle's eyes, Kyro leaned into get a closer look. "Your eyes aren't purpley gray anymore! Whoa... what happened to them?"

"This is my natural eye color," Quayle explained. "I was wearing contact lenses that made my eyes appear that color."

"Why did you get rid of them? I thought they were cool!" Kyro wondered.

"Yeah, so did I..." Unwilling to get into the details of all of that with Kyro, he decided to change the subject. "Hey, great job on your match today! Sorry you lost, you were really close. Jethro's Luxray was on the verge of defeat, I could tell. One more attack and she would have gone down."

"Aw, thanks, Mr. Quayle, but I'm not mad about it. It was a really fun battle!" He thought back to Quayle's battle at the beginning of the week. "You almost won your match too, didn't you?"

Quayle winced. He'd avoided spending any time thinking about that particular battle, and all the consequences that had come with his actions. Apologizing to Rose had been hard enough. He still thought about Candice, of course, but hadn't considered calling her after the heartbreaking message she left him. Would she talk to him if he told her he was a changed man? He hadn't thought of that. "Ah, yeah, I did. But listen, Kyro, don't ever do what I did, okay? There's a line when it comes to Pokemon battles that I came dangerously close to crossing. What I did was wrong, and I made sure to apologize to Rose for it."

"That's good," Kyro said solemnly, recalling Quayle commanding his Pokemon to drown Rose's Gardevoir. "Please don't do that again, okay?"

"I won't, you have my word on that," Quayle reassured him.

"Good." That seemed to be good enough for Kyro, because he was all smiles a moment later. "Hey, I just thought of something really cool! Wanna know what it is?"

Quayle shrugged. "Sure, what is it?"

"We should totally form a club!" Kyro declared, hitting his hands on the table in excitement. "It can be for people like us who almost won, but didn't!"

Quayle wasn't thrilled with the idea, since it would mean he would be constantly reminded of the battle that changed his life, but he figured he would humor Kyro and learn more about it. "You mean like a support group?"

"Yeah, you get it! We can talk about the things we did wrong, and maybe how we can fix them so we can start winning again!"

That was actually a good idea, Quayle admitted. Having Kyro judge his failures as a trainer was a little off-putting due to his age, but there was no denying the kid knew his stuff, even if he wasn't entirely aware of how good he really was. And Quayle definitely felt like he could offer some insight. There was just one small problem with Kyro's idea. "But we lost. What's the point in talking about how to win when we're out of the tournament?"

Kyro's face fell a bit at that. "Well... I mean, I just thought that just because we aren't in the tournament anymore doesn't mean we can't help each other get better as trainers. But maybe you're right, it was a bad idea. Sorry for bringing it up."

Before Quayle could say anything else, the two were approached by Nye and Cody, each taking a seat at the table. "Hey guys, what's up?" Cody greeted them. Noticing Kyro's sad look, he put a hand on the boy's shoulder. "Hey, don't worry about your match, yeah? You still did amazing. You almost had it!"

Kyro sighed, reminded again of just how close he'd come to victory and Quayle shooting down his club idea fresh in his mind. "I guess so."

"What's the matter, sweetie?" Nye asked him. "Something on your mind? You can tell us. We're here to help."

"It's nothing," Kyro grumbled. "Just a stupid idea, that's all."

"He wants to start a club, a support group for people like him who very nearly won their matches," Quayle explained. "The idea is that members can discuss strategy and where exactly they went wrong so they can be more prepared for the future."

"Really? I think that is a splendid idea!" Nye turned back to Kyro. "Why are you sad about that?"

"Mr. Quayle said there was no point because we're not in the tournament anymore," Kyro muttered.

Nye whipped her head back towards Quayle. "Oh, I'm sure he didn't mean that. I'm sure what Quayle meant to say was that it doesn't matter if you're out of the tournament since everyone can always improve, and he would love to be a part of your group, right?"

"Y-yes, of course, Kyro, I didn't mean to disparage your club," Quayle apologized. "I, uh, would be honored if you would have me."

"Really?" Kyro asked, hopeful.

Quayle smiled at the boy. "Yes, really. Nye is right; we all lose sometimes, and there is always room for improvement. What do you say? Shall we form a club?"

"Okay. Yeah, let's do it!" Kyro exclaimed, his energy and mood back to their normal maximum levels. "The first thing we need is a name! We can't have club meetings if we don't have a name!"

"Is it okay for non-members to submit ideas?" Cody asked Quayle.

"I don't know, let's ask the club leader," he answered, turning to Kyro. "Well, Leader Kyro? Are non-members allowed to suggest names for the club?"

"L-leader? You want me to be the leader?" Kyro asked, astonished.

"Of course, little one," Nye answered. "It is your club, after all."

Kyro beamed, honored to take on the responsibility of running his very own club. "All right! Sure, Mr. Cody, what's your idea?"

"Well, it's your club, yeah? And it's for people who very nearly won, so my suggestion is 'Kyro's Close Calls Club.'"

"Ooh, I like that. Clever use of alliteration, Cody," Nye complimented. "What do you think, Kyro?"

Kyro considered the idea. "I like it, but there's one thing I want to change, if that's okay with you, Mr. Cody. I don't want it to be named after me. It doesn't matter that I came up with the idea, and I don't want anyone thinking that I'm better than anyone else because the club is named after me. Like Mr. Quayle said, we all lose sometimes. I just want it to be a place where everyone feels welcome, where everyone can have a good time and chat with their friends. So, if it's okay, I think it should just be called 'The Close Calls Club.'"

"Well, let's put it to a vote," Quayle suggested. "All in favor of naming the club 'The Close Calls Club,' raise your hand."

Kyro's smile grew even wider when four hands went into the air.

"Then it's official!" Quayle declared. "Congratulations, Kyro. You are now the leader of the Close Calls Club." He clapped, and Nye and Cody applauded with him.

"Wow, awesome! This is gonna be so cool! I can't wait for our first meeting!"

"We will need members to attend this meeting," Quayle pointed out.

"Oooh, you're right!" Kyro looked to the others at the table. "Oh my gosh, Mr. Cody! Your match is today, isn't it?"

"Sure is. I've been training hard all week and I'm ready to get out there and show my stuff!" Cody confirmed. "Hopefully I'll be sending Alex to apply to be a member of the Close Calls Club instead of myself, but it's going to be a good learning experience no matter what happens, yeah?"

"Yeah! Good luck, Mr. Cody!" He turned to Nye, frowning a little. "Miss Nye, you won your match, so I don't think you need the Close Calls Club's services just yet."

Nye nodded in understanding. "That's right, I did. But Quayle and I aren't the only ones who fought." She counted off on her fingers. "Taikyu, Tsomu, Scarlet, and Windra all lost their matches. All those matches were pretty close, weren't they?"

"Sure they were! I'll have to go ask them about joining. Hey, wait a sec! Mr. Eldan lost to you, Miss Nye! I should go ask him if he wants to join!"

Hearing Eldan's name caused Quayle to perk up. "Wait a second, Kyro," he began, but then stopped to consider. Eldan was the last person he wanted in the club; if nothing else, it would mean that he would be forced to closely interact with him, and that was something he was keen to avoid. The very sight of him, in his bright red outfit, annoyed Quayle, and he was ready to try to convince Kyro not to let him join.

But he didn't. Maybe it was Kyro's innocent, questioning gaze as he waited for Quayle to finish his thought. Maybe it was due to Nye sitting right there next to him. Maybe it was some combination of the two. But Quayle simply shook his head. "Never mind, Kyro. I'm sure he'd be a great addition," he acknowledged, sighing.

This was completely lost on the young boy, who was excited to find his next member. "Yeah!" Kyro scanned the cafeteria, hoping to find him, but he wasn't there. "Oh well. He'll be here for lunch. Speaking of, I'm starving! Hey, Mr. Tsomu!" he yelled, getting from his seat and rushing to the kitchen, remembering the dish that Tsomu had promised him.

While Quayle's disappointment didn't bother Kyro at all, Cody did take notice of it. "You're okay with Eldan joining the club?"

"Of course not," Quayle stated plainly. "I can't stand him. He's a player, he hits on Nye all the time, his entire wardrobe is red - just thinking about him and that stupid grin of his makes me angry."

"Then why didn't you say that to Kyro? I'm sure he would have listened to you, yeah?"

Quayle nodded in agreement. "Yeah, he probably would, and that's the point. It's Kyro's club, even if his name isn't on it. I'm not going to tell him who he can and can't have join." He sighed, defeated. "I'll just have to tell Eldan - should he join, that is - that we will remain civil and on topic during meetings. As much as it pains me to do so," he muttered.

"That's very big of you Quayle, thank you," Nye said, smiling warmly at him. "I'm glad to hear you say that."

"Yeah, for sure," Cody agreed, just as Tsomu and Kyro emerged from the kitchen with carts of food. "Oh, sweet, perfect timing! Gotta fuel up for the big battle, otherwise I'm gonna be putting in my own application to the Close Calls Club!"

* * * * * * * *
"Ladies and gentlemen! I'm Ruby Erthgrand, and we're here live at Indigo Plateau, getting ready to kick off the last match of round one! We've seen a week full of intense battles, and we have two gentlemen here ready to close out the week strong! As a reminder to all of you out there, we'll be taking the weekend off to let our competitors get some well-deserved rest, but we'll be back Monday morning at the usual time for the first match of the quarterfinals! All right, I can't wait anymore! Let's get right to it! Coming to the west platform is a young man from Unova who, according to this sheet he filled out, is richer than everyone here! I don't know if that's true, but what is true is that he triumphed over all his opponents in his qualifying tournament, and he's here to put himself one step closer towards padding his wallet with some more cash! Wave those flags and make some noise for your Nimbasa City tournament champion, Alex Croft!"

After making sure his ear plugs were in correctly, he stood up straight and briskly walked onto the field in his pristine white suit, acknowledging his fans. The roar of the crowd was dulled by the ear plugs, and Alex smiled at their efficacy. Loud noises always bothered him, ever since he was a kid. His parents went through a horrible divorce, often arguing directly in front of their him, each screaming insults and obscenities at the other. Hating to bear witness to his parents fighting, young Alex would start bawling whenever they fought. It didn't serve to rein in his parents' behavior, though, and Alex was eventually conditioned to cry whenever people around him would start yelling. It was one of his darkest secrets - he would surely be a laughingstock if people found out - and so he took to wearing ear plugs to help drown out the noise. The dulled noise also allowed him to hear himself think, and made the crowd one less thing to worry about.

"Fantastic!" Ruby exclaimed, keeping the hype train moving as best she could. "And his opponent, coming to the east platform, is a man who hopes to use the money to find his parents! Aw, that's sweet. He may come from a small town, but he's got big dreams, and he's determined to put himself closer on the path to realizing them! Everyone keep those cheers going for my man, your Coumarine City tournament champion, Cody Kwan!"

Cody casually strode out of the waiting room to cheers from the crowd and surprise from Alex, who noted that Cody was wearing a very expensive-looking black suit. Alex couldn't tell who designed it from where he was, but he made a mental note to ask later. The sharply dressed Cody waved to Alex, taking notice of his opponent's stunned look.

"And now, here's Esmeralda Rayvenflight, the referee for this match! To our fans in the stands, get a good look, because after this battle, you won't see her until next week! What's the battlefield going to be today?"

As the cursor spun around, Cody had his fingers crossed for the water field. If he didn't get the water field, he'd have to do a lot of improvising. Like Thresher, Cody's team was much better suited for battles in the water. It wouldn't be correct to say Sharpedo would be completely worthless if he had to fight on land - after all, Cody considered himself a veritable expert on Water Pokemon, and knew ways to get around something as trivial as land - but he would be breathing a hell of a lot easier if the water field came up. He didn't like his odds, though.

"It's the grass field!" Ruby announced. "This is the first time this week we've seen this field! I can't wait to see how our competitors will make use of it!"

The floor between the two men opened, and it was replaced with a wide field of soft dirt and grass. In the center of the arena was a large and imposing tree, with thick branches and leaves which shook in the afternoon breeze.

All right, so it's not the water field, Cody groused internally. Guess I should count my blessings, though, yeah? Could have gotten the fire field... He continued to study the battlefield as Ruby finished her opening monologue, hoping that his chosen starting Pokemon was the right one. He had cringed upon hearing that Alex was packing a Heliolisk; not only was it an Electric-type, but it commonly had the Dry Skin Ability, which would make it extremely difficult for his Pokemon to do any damage at all. On top of that, he was also using an Oricorio. Safiri wouldn't tell him what style it was in, and that worried him. He would love to see Baile Style, of course, but he wouldn't complain about Pa'u or Sensu, either. But if it was Pom-Pom Style as he feared, then things would surely go downhill fast. It was going to be a tough battle, but he believed in his Pokemon, and that was going to have to be enough.

"Trainers, release your Pokemon!"

"Oricorio, prepare for battle!"

"Showtime, Araquanid!"

The crowd cheered harder as the two Pokemon hit the field. Cody breathed a sigh of relief as Oricorio was revealed to be in Sensu Style. Ghosts were annoying to fight against, no matter what Pokemon you had, but at least now he would only have to fight against one Electric-type instead of two.

Oricorio posed, ready to begin, and Alex made the first move. "Use Teeter Dance!"

Quick as a whip, Cody was spitting out commands. "Wide Guard! Infestation!" Cody liked employing a prediction-based battle style; rather than give a command and then react to it, Cody typically gave two in quick succession. The first would be a typical command, and then the second would be given as a prediction of the outcome of the first. It didn't work all the time, of course, but the psychological effects it had on opponents when it did work couldn't be ignored. Many lesser trainers would get flustered from having to defend against such frequent strikes, either preparing for the first and not the second, or being more prepared for the second at the cost of taking the first.

Araquanid summoned a massive barrier that was nearly as wide as the entire battlefield, effortlessly blocking the confusion-inducing waves of pink that were issuing forth from Oricorio's dance. Once the shield was in place, Araquanid dug two of his feet a few inches into the ground and gurgled something incomprehensible, and hundreds of tiny black bugs rose from the ground, crawling at high speed towards Oricorio as the barrier went away.

"Disgusting," Alex spat, deciding to go on the offensive. "Fly up, Oricorio!"

"Spider Web! Liquidation!" Cody commanded as Oricorio leaped into the air. Araquanid shot a thick strand of webbing from one of his arms, hitting Oricorio mid-flight. The string opened on impact into a web which enveloped the bird, taking her by surprise; Araquanid swung his arm down, sending Oricorio plummeting back to solid ground, right into the infestation. Oricorio scrambled to her feet, squawking in a panic as she tried to shake off the bugs as well as the webbing. As she did this, Araquanid charged forward into her, scoring a direct hit and sending her crashing into the tree.

Alex growled as Oricorio, in an attempt to catch a reprieve from Araquanid's attacks, phased into the tree. The silky web fell harmlessly against the bark, but the infestation persisted despite Oricorio's type and current position. With care not to let too much concern appear on his face, Alex gave his next order. "Tailwind, if you would!"

That wasn't something Cody wanted to hear. As long as Oricorio was infested, she wasn't going anywhere, but the last thing he wanted to see was Heliolisk moving under increased speed. "Spider Web! Crunch!" he commanded as Oricorio shot out from the tree like a dart, black bugs falling off her body as she flew, but many persisted in sapping her energy. Araquanid fired off another string of webbing, but Oricorio was able to dodge the attack. Getting into position, she flapped her wings once, hard, and a massive wind blew from behind her.

Alex nodded approvingly. "It is about time things start going my way. I have had quite enough with your annoying bug." He held out a Poke Ball. "The time for my victory is at hand."

"Not yet it isn't!" Cody reminded him. "Oricorio is still under the effects of Infestation. You can't switch her out yet!"

Alex's grin grew wider. "Oh? Watch and learn, amateur. Baton Pass, Oricorio!" The return beam shot out, hitting the bird and sending her back to her Poke Ball. "Baton Pass is a move, and I can use any move I please. The Pokemon I send out will, of course, be affected by anything the previous Pokemon was, but it is a small price to pay to ensure my victory." He held out a second ball. "Heliolisk, prepare for battle!"

True to Alex's word, the second his Heliolisk set foot on the ground, Araquanid's Infestation took hold of her, but Alex paid it no mind. He was angry at having been made a fool of thus far in the battle, and he was going to pay back Araquanid's damage in spades. "Electric Terrain!"

"Soak! Leech Life!"

Heliolisk stood on her hind legs, opening her frill as wide it would go, extending an electric aura across the battlefield, tinting the inside of the arena a dull yellow. Knowing the attack would take some time to complete, Araquanid sprayed Heliolisk with a shot of water that looked normal, but was anything but. This was Cody's ace in the hole against Electric-types. Electric attacks still hurt, but they would do significantly less damage now that Heliolisk's Electric type was suppressed.

At least, that had been the plan. With Electric Terrain in play, those Electric attacks would be back to doing their full, painful damage again, and there wasn't anything else he could do about it. With her attack finished, she was easily left with enough time to dodge Araquanid's attack.

"Now," Alex commanded, "Volt Switch! Oricorio needs her revenge!" Heliolisk summoned a ball of electricity and whipped it at Araquanid at a speed too quickly for him to follow; Araquanid collapsed to the ground as the attack wracked his body, and there was a bright flash as Heliolisk returned to her Poke Ball. In her place came Oricorio, free of Araquanid's infestation, and she disappeared into the ground before the light from the Volt Switch faded, without Araquanid (or Cody) being any the wiser.

"Stay on your guard, Araquanid!" Cody called. "She's around somewhere..."

Alex allowed himself a chuckle at his new advantage. "Let's try this again, shall we, Oricorio? Fly up!"

Araquanid steeled himself, looking around for Oricorio, but there was nothing. For a minute, Cody thought that perhaps Oricorio hadn't heard him, but suddenly she shot out from the ground from behind her opponent, flying high into the air. "Araquanid, behind you! Spider Web! Soak!"

Araquanid turned around as Cody spoke, feeling the rush of air from Oricorio emerging, and fired another shot of the sticky silk webbing; thanks to the Tailwind, however, Oricorio effortlessly dodged it, and before Araquanid could get his second attack off, she dive bombed into him, crumpling him into a pile on the ground. Oricorio twirled in midair and landed softly a few feet away, posing proudly as the audience roared in approval.

Esmeralda declared Araquanid knocked out, and Cody returned him to his Poke Ball. He let out a quiet sigh, pursing his lips in contemplation as Alex looked on with a smug grin. He ran through several different scenarios in his head, trying to determine which of his Pokemon would be best used here, and, perhaps more importantly, saved for later.

"Are you giving up?" Alex asked with feigned interest. "I was hoping for a good fight, but maybe I overestimated you..."

Cody frowned. He didn't hate Alex, or even dislike him, but his holier-than-thou attitude was starting to get at him, and that annoyed Cody more than Alex's attitude did. "Maybe you're just a little too cocky for your own good, yeah? You need to be taught a lesson in humility." He smirked, taking his second Poke Ball in hand. "And I know just the Pokemon to do it. Showtime, Sharpedo!"

Sharpedo materialized on the ground, balancing precariously on his side. Alex laughed openly at the sight of Sharpedo trying to balance himself, and several people in the crowd joined him.

"Go ahead, laugh," Cody invited. "Your Oricorio's about to faint, though, so you may want to reconsider not doing anything."

At this, Alex laughed even harder. "What are you going to do without water? Sharpedo is worthless out of the water! Oricorio, Feather Dance!"

"Aqua Jet! Crunch!"

A barrier of water exploded around Sharpedo's body, providing him with more than enough water to move around in; he rocketed forward like a bullet, mouth wide and fangs dripping with dark energy. Before Oricorio was anywhere near ready with her attack, Sharpedo crashed into her, chomping down and sending the both of them tumbling through the grass. Lying in the center of the arena, Oricorio could do nothing but take the attack, as she was still firmly gripped in Sharpedo's mouth. When Sharpedo released her, she didn't move, put out of commission with alarming ease.

The crowd's cheers surged to new heights, and Alex was struck dumb at the display. Cody filed the look on Alex's face in the place in his memory where he stored the looks of trainers just like him who had thought Sharpedo completely helpless on land and then were summarily defeated. It was especially satisfying to do it to someone like Alex, who by now had composed himself and returned his defeated Pokemon to her Poke Ball.

Alex took his second Poke Ball, a look of haughty indifference on his face. "So you beat one of my Pokemon. I suppose that I should expect the three of your Pokemon to do be able to do that much. But now your luck has run out. Heliolisk, prepare for battle!"

Darn. I was hoping to stall long enough to end Electric Terrain, Cody complained silently as he noticed that the field effect was still active. He did take a small bit of comfort in the fact that the Tailwind had petered out by now, though. Cody tried thinking of plans for as many contingencies he could in the precious few seconds he had, but he didn't think Alex was going to give him very much time to -

"Parabolic Charge!"

Not the best case scenario, but it would have to do. Parabolic Charge had a wide range, but it was a lot weaker than something like Thunderbolt, which would probably get the KO even outside of Electric Terrain. If Sharpedo wasn't able to dodge the hit, at least he'd survive it. "Take cover, Aqua Jet! Skull Bash!"

Heliolisk's neck frill opened wide and Sharpedo jetted up and away as fast as he could. Heliolisk fired the attack upwards, and it shot lightning in random directions. One of the bolts caught the tail end of the water stream carrying Sharpedo and it zapped him, causing him to cry out. Hearing Sharpedo's pained cries, Alex pressed the advantage. "Chase him down while he is weakened! Giga Impact!"

Nodding, Heliolisk's body started to glow orange as she gathered the energy required for the move. Once sufficiently powered up, she dashed forward, leaving a purple, orange-streaked aura in her wake. Just as she passed the tree, Sharpedo lunged forward with Skull Bash, colliding hard with Heliolisk and sending her flying into the wall. The Giga Impact was not wasted, however, and Sharpedo reeled from the massive hit. For a moment, it looked as if both Pokemon were knocked out, but each of them started showing signs of life after a few moments.

"Your Pokemon lives?" Alex asked incredulously.

"Thanks only to the extra defensive boost that using Skull Bash provides," Cody answered honestly before his eyes went wide. The Electric Terrain effect slowly evaporated into the air, giving the field its natural color back. And now Heliolisk has to rest! This is my chance to turn this battle around! "Aqua Jet! Crunch, Sharpedo!"

"No! Heliolisk, get out of the way!" Alex ordered, but Heliolisk was far too winded to actually move; as such, Sharpedo was able to make a clean hit, biting down hard into Heliolisk and eliminating what remained of her energy.

"Heliolisk is unable to battle! Sharpedo wins!" Esmeralda announced, and Cody was beside himself with relief. He let out a long breath, shaking his hands in an attempt to shake out his nervousness with them. Hard part's over, but that darn Empoleon is gonna be a headache for sure. He looked at Sharpedo, who was just barely standing after the attack. Primarina's definitely got his work cut out for him...

Alex's facade of coolness crumbled ever so slightly at this second defeat. He scolded himself mentally for his misplay; he'd forgotten about the Skull Bash. Despite this loss, he was still as confident as ever - his last Pokemon was also far and away his strongest and most well trained, and Alex would see to it that she ended this fight with a win. "Empoleon, prepare for battle!"

Empoleon stood proudly before her opponent, sizing him up. Sharpedo was breathing heavily and it was clear he didn't have much fight left in him, but Empoleon would not take things easy on him. "Use Swagger!" Alex instructed, and Empoleon struck an intimidating pose, her body glowing in a red aura. Sharpedo fell for it, as evidenced by his unnaturally red eyes, and thrashed about on the ground in his rage. Sharpedo suddenly flew forward with Aqua Jet, crashing head first into the tree, where his unconscious body tumbled ungracefully to a stop several feet away.

Yikes, that looked painful, Cody cringed as Esmeralda declared Sharpedo fainted. He deliberately took his time in recalling Sharpedo, allowing a few extra seconds to plan. First things first: stop the Swagger shenanigans. After that... I don't know. If his Empoleon is female, and specially inclined, Captivate can really put the hurt on. I don't know if I want to rely on that, though. One botched attack could be the difference between victory... and the Close Calls Club, he realized with a gulp. His eyes flashed to Esmeralda, who gave him a gentle prod to send out his Pokemon. "Right, sorry about that," he apologized aloud, taking his last Poke Ball in hand. "Showtime, Primarina!"

Cody's Primarina appeared with a flourish, striking a graceful pose. Empoleon stared on, unimpressed by the display. "Swagger!"

"Shut your eyes, Primarina! Misty Terrain! Captivate!" Cody decided to risk the Captivate after all, mainly because there wasn't much else he could do in the current situation. The main goal, as he thought before, was to stop Primarina from suffering the same fate as Sharpedo. Once that was done, he could react to whatever Alex threw at him. With speed born of practice, Primarina covered the entire floor of the arena with a thick blue mist, his eyes closed to slow down the effects of Empoleon's attack. Soon, the terrain was set, and Primarina was free to open his eyes, Empoleon's attack rendered obsolete by the lightly sparkling fog. While Empoleon awaited Alex's next order, Primarina blew a kiss towards her, vibrant pink hearts visibly floating towards their target. Empoleon tried hitting them away, but upon making contact with one of them, it was absorbed into her body, revealing to a shocked Cody that Alex's Empoleon was indeed female.

Alex paid it little mind. Sure, the Captivate worked, but only in the strictest sense; he hadn't planned on using any special techniques against this opponent. "Swords Dance!" he cried, and Cody gasped, eliciting a boastful laugh from the young man in the white suit. "I see you have realized how futile your attack was."

"No, just the opposite! This is perfect! Primarina, Moonblast! Encore!"

Primarina stood on his tail, his arms spread wide. Over his left flipper, a pink ball of fairy energy; over the right, a white, static-looking ball of something mysterious. He flung the Moonblast first; Empoleon continued her dance, using the back of her steel-like fin to bat the weak attack away. Primarina used this distraction to whip the second attack at Empoleon, and it struck home, causing her body to sparkle with a thin white aura.

Realizing he'd been tricked, Alex grit his teeth as Empoleon finished her attack. With no Pokemon left to switch to, Empoleon was forced to endure the Encore until it was over, meaning Alex had essentially given Cody carte blanche to attack however he pleased. He made sure to continue giving orders - if Empoleon didn't attack, the Encore would technically never end. Alex hoped that Empoleon's natural resistance to Primarina's attacks kept her alive long enough to retaliate. "Drill Peck," he commanded, but he was not surprised to see Empoleon ignore it, dancing the same dance she'd done previously, sending her now useless physical strength into the stratosphere.

"I don't want to sound like a spoilsport, Alex, but you can't win now. You know the second the Encore effect wears off, I can just hit her with another one, yeah? She's gonna be using Swords Dance until Primarina knocks her out."

"Drill Peck!" Alex commanded as Empoleon danced her heart out.

Cody sighed. "Hydro Pump until the Encore wears off, then hit her again with Encore!"

Primarina nodded, inhaling deeply. He fired off a massive beam of water from his mouth, smacking into Empoleon and interrupting her dance only briefly. Undeterred, Primarina kept the pressure up, trying her best to force Empoleon to stop attacking.

"Throw some Moonblasts in there, mix it up! You're doing great, she's getting weaker with every hit!"

Primarina barked in compliance, scooting around to Empoleon's back as she still continued dancing, peppering her with repeated Moonblasts, carefully watching for that white glow to start fading. And shortly after Primarina finished a particularly strong volley of Moonblasts, it did just that.

Both trainers' eyes went wide. "There it is!" Cody exclaimed. "Encore! Moonblast!"

"Use Aqua Jet!"

Empoleon's body exploded in a watery aura, and she zoomed towards Primarina with a razor-tipped fin raised. He barely had enough time to react, aborting the Encore in favor of saving his own skin. For a moment, Cody thought he was in serious trouble, but the Misty Terrain had started fading away, and he risked everything on a move that he prevented himself from using until this very moment.

"Sing! Hydro Pump!"

Primarina inhaled and sang out one loud, crisp, clear note, adjusting his pitch to help it sound more appealing to Empoleon. To Alex's dismay, the attack had its desired effect, and Empoleon fell to the earth, fast asleep. Primarina began his assault anew again, confident that it wouldn't be much longer before Empoleon fainted. Cody was having similar thoughts; now that Alex had found a way around getting locked into Swords Dance (and now that his Empoleon's attack power had been boosted to truly obscene levels), he couldn't risk Encore again without getting slaughtered. So he'd risked trying to put Empoleon to sleep with a usually inaccurate Sing attack, and from the looks of it, it was paying off. Empoleon was getting battered by powerful, albeit resisted, attacks, and Primarina showed no signs of stopping. Just a few more and -

Cody was brought out of his thoughts by the sound of Alex laughing. His curiosity getting the better of him, he asked, "Something wrong?"

"I win," Alex stated with an air of finality. "Empoleon, Sleep Talk!"

"Encore! Moonblast!" Cody blurted, and Primarina responded immediately, but Empoleon suddenly sprang to her feet, scaring Primarina and forcing her to stop the attack. She began to charge it again as Empoleon leaped high into the air, still sound asleep, her beak and crown glowing bright white. She spun her body at high speed as she fell towards Primarina, and landed with a crash. Primarina screamed bloody murder for nearly a second and a half as the artificially powerful attack tore into his body, depleting all of his energy with that one decisive blow. When the attack was finished, Empoleon fell to the ground, lightly snoring, and completely oblivious as to what she just did.

"Primarina is unable to battle!" Esmeralda declared, raising her hand towards Empoleon. "Empoleon is the winner, which means the winner of this match is Alex Croft!" Cody wordlessly recalled his Pokemon, nervous about the damage that Empoleon inflicted. He could see streaks of red on Empoleon's horn, and he feared the worst.

Black met white in the center of the arena for the standard post-game handshake. Alex was looking quite pleased with himself, as Cody expected. "Good game," Cody said, stone-faced.

"I won, so it was a wonderful game," Alex replied, grabbing Cody's hand. Cody noticed that the boy's grip was almost laughably weak; it felt as though he were shaking hands with a little girl. "I will give you credit, however; I was fully expecting Heliolisk to rip your team apart. I would get to the Pokemon Center right away if I were you," he added with a knowing look in his eyes. "Your Primarina especially looks to be in rough shape."

"Thanks, I will," Cody replied, gripping Alex's hand a little tighter. When Alex went to pull back, Cody held firm, causing Alex to squirm a bit in his grip. This gave Cody a little satisfaction, and a ghost of a smile appeared on his face. "Good luck on your next match."

* * * * * * * *

By the time dinner rolled around, everyone was back in high spirits. Cody's Primarina was fine, though he had taken quite a vicious beating from Empoleon's final attack. Jethro's Umbreon was good as new as well, having benefited from a few extra hours in the Pokemon Center. The battles were over for the week, and everyone was looking forward to a relaxing weekend.

The topic of conversation was, naturally, the battles they'd witnessed earlier. Alex spoke at length about his victory, gloating like a school boy. Kyro expressed his condolences to Cody, but was overjoyed to have another member in the Close Calls Club. Quayle and Eldan joined him and Cody for the club's first meeting, held right there in the cafeteria during dinner. The Team Flare grunt and the former Team Galactic admin honored the truce Quayle suggested, and the meeting was hailed as a success by everyone involved.

Windra made good on her promise to keep her tryst with Scarlet a secret, though she was unaware that Scarlet had already come clean about it to Rose. Her promise was put to the test when Nye, who had been sitting with Rose and Windra, invited Scarlet to sit with them. Scarlet hesitated at first, but agreed after Nye insisted. While they ate, Scarlet kept stealing looks at Windra, who chatted with Nye as though nothing was wrong. Rose managed to keep Scarlet busy with Ranger talk, and before long, she managed to put Windra out of her mind and enjoy herself.

At Chara's request, Frisk ate with Taikyu, Thresher, and Lenny, just so Chara could be closer to Taikyu. Frisk was especially happy to be back in her own body after being out of it for so long, and she didn't care that she could barely follow the conversation the older men were having. She had her own reasons for wanting to talk to Taikyu, so she dealt with it and stayed engaged as best she could.

The men chatted well into the evening, long after they'd finished eating, and eventually, the four were the only ones remaining in the cafeteria. Lenny pointed out Frisk, who'd fallen asleep at the table, her head held up by one of her hands. "Looks like someone was up past their bedtime."

Thresher yawned himself, stretching and checking the clock. "Sure I can't be sayin' the same ta you, Lenny? I'm shocked that yer still going. You too, Taikyu," he added, noticing neither of his elders seemed to be any worse for wear.

"Oh, I still have a while left in me," Taikyu remarked with a smile. He looked over at Frisk. "She reminds me so much of my daughter."

"Biological, or the one you told us about earlier?" Lenny asked.

"The latter. I don't have any biological children," Taikyu answered, with just a hint of sadness in his old voice. "But that's okay. Beatrice and I stayed in contact over the years, and her family and I are very close. All of her children treat me as their grandfather. When she died, I gave a eulogy at her funeral. Aside from that, I've lived a rich and fulfilling life, helping countless troubled souls find their way. I couldn't ask for a better life." He regarded Frisk lovingly, his memories flooded with the images of the little girl he'd rescued and raised as his own.

"She must have been a real sweet lady," Thresher noted quietly.

Taikyu sighed heavily, finding himself missing the woman who was his daughter in all ways but by blood. "She was. I see in Frisk a lot of the same attributes Beatrice shared: a love of the arts, a zest for life, and... being forced to deal with death at a young age."

Thresher's face sobered a bit, and now he too was watching the young girl sleep. "Did she lose her father, too?"

Taikyu paused before answering, feeling a slight pang of shame, as though this was not his story to tell and he'd done something wrong by hinting at it. After all, it had taken a great deal before Frisk hesitantly revealed it. It was then that Taikyu realized that he had no idea where Frisk's parents were. She made no effort to mention them, so maybe the two children were orphaned as well? Taikyu hoped with all of his soul that it was not true. "No... her little brother," he eventually answered. He kept the part about Chara inhabiting Frisk's body to himself. He saw no reason to go into such details with them without Frisk's knowledge.

Suddenly, Lenny rose from his chair. "No parent should ever have to bury their child. I'm calling it a night. Night, fellas." He then turned and left, not bothering to wait for goodnight wishes from the others.

Thresher glanced at the clock again and decided he was going to turn in as well. "I think I'm gonna do the same, old man. Whadaya wanna do about Frisk here?"

"Would you carry her to her room?" Taikyu asked. "I would do it myself, but I'm afraid I'm not as strong as I once was."

"Aye, sure thing," Thresher agreed, smiling.

"Thank you."

Thresher got up from the table and very gingerly reached under the table, supporting Frisk's legs as he deftly scooped the girl into his arms. "After you," he said to Taikyu, and Taikyu nodded, leading the way out of the cafeteria and holding the door open for the young man and his charge.

They were halfway down the hallway when suddenly, Frisk awoke with a start, nearly leaping out of Thresher's arms. "I wasn't asleep! I'm not tired!"

"Oh, is that so?" Thresher inquired, stopping to set the girl on her feet.

Frisk answered with a massive yawn. "Nope."

Thresher grinned knowingly. "Well, my dear, in that case, I'm sure ye'll have no problems walking the rest of the way. Taikyu, can I count on you to escort this not-at-all-tired young lady ta her room? This is my stop."

"But of course," Taikyu replied, offering his arm to Frisk. Frisk looked confused at the gesture, so Taikyu simply held a hand in front of him. "Shall we go?"

They all said goodnight to each other, and Frisk walked with Taikyu until they reached her bedroom at the end of the hallway. "Would you like to come in?" Frisk asked her escort.

"Are you sure?" he asked in reply. "It's very late. If you want to talk, we have plenty of time tomorrow."

"I know, but..." she muttered something else that Taikyu couldn't hear.

"What was that?"

"I kinda like our late night chats!" she blurted, embarrassed. "It's kinda been a thing with us, you know? And... I don't know, it's dumb."

Taikyu smiled warmly, touched by her words. It was definitely a far cry from their first encounter, when Chara had told him to piss off and she'd run off in tears. "I disagree. It's not dumb at all, and it would be my honor to keep you company."

Frisk nodded, and she shifted nervously in front of her door. "Okay, great. Um, could... could you just wait out here while I change into my pajamas?"

"Of course."

Frisk disappeared into her room for a few minutes, and eventually opened the door again to let Taikyu in. Once he was inside, she climbed into her bed and got under the covers. Taikyu pulled a chair up next to her bed and sat with her. He decided to start the conversation with the most obvious thing. "I see you're back in your own body again. I'm glad to see that."

Frisk nodded. "Yeah, me too. Chara told me about everything that happened while I was gone, and we talked. About... us. Me and him, I mean."

She told Taikyu about what happened since his failed attempt to exorcise her. She relayed to him that she could hear everything he and Chara talked about when Chara took control of her, and how she was glad that his spell on her failed. She informed him about Chara inadvertently succeeding in erasing her from his mind once she let him take over, why and how it happened, and how she managed to come back. She told him about Chara's death, even going so far as telling him about her attempted suicide after the event. She concluded with the promise she made to Chara to let him out more often, and his to her about taking it easy on pranking her. When she was finished, Taikyu filled in the gaps Frisk left, including his botched attempt at accompanying Chara outside, the fall he took, and being disciplined by Safiri for trying to leave.

"I'm sorry you got into trouble," Frisk apologized.

"No apologies necessary. It was my fault for making the suggestion to him. But tomorrow, I plan on taking Safiri up on her offer to go outside. You two should join me."

After a moment, Frisk answered, "Yeah, that sounds like fun. Chara says he thinks so too."

"Glad to hear it," Taikyu replied. He looked at the clock. It was definitely late, but his curiosity was getting the better of him, and there was one thing in particular he wanted to at least bring up while he had the opportunity. "Frisk, you don't have to do it right now, but would you do this old man a favor?"

"Of course, Taikyu," she responded immediately, excited that he would ask anything at all of her. "What is it?"

"Over the past week, I've gotten to know both you and your brother. I consider myself honored that you would trust me enough to share the knowledge of his possession of you with me. And yet, I am ashamed to admit that I don't have any idea what he looks like. Do you have any photos of him I could see?"

Frisk shook her head. "We didn't exactly plan on getting sent to Sinnoh, and of course I didn't plan on getting him killed. Taking a picture together seems like such a simple thing in hindsight, but we never did, not even once." She got an idea, and threw the covers off her, surprising Taikyu a bit. "But I know the next best thing!" she exclaimed, getting out of bed and opening the drawer of her bedside table. She took her sketchbook and colored pencils out of it, and sat up against the head of her bed, crossing her legs and setting the book in front of her.

"What are you doing?" Taikyu asked, curious.

"I'm going to draw him," she answered, not looking up at him. "I may not have any pictures of him, but that doesn't mean I don't know what my own brother looks like. It won't take that long, but if you want to come back tomorrow for it, that's fine."

Taikyu stifled a yawn, watching Frisk sketch with purpose, all her tiredness from before seemingly gone now. He did want to go to sleep, but since he had been the one to put the idea in her head, he felt obligated to stay awake with her and see it through. Besides, he reasoned, I can get more information from her this way. "That's quite all right, young lady, I'll wait. I hope you don't mind if I ask you a few things while you work."

"No, go ahead," she responded, swapping pencils, completely focused on her drawing.

His first question was easy, and the one he most wanted an answer to. "Forgive me for being blunt, but are your parents alive?"

"Yeah. At least, they were the day I fell into the Underground. Dr. Alphys was trying to find a way to send us back to the Surface to we could go back home."

Taikyu found himself wishing he'd had his notes with him, and tried to commit all of this to memory. "The Surface? The surface of what?"

"Our world. The monsters call it the Surface."

"Monsters? What kind of monsters? Are they like Pokemon?"

"No, not really. Well, I guess some of them are. Some of them are more monster-like, and some are more human-like and can speak the human language."

Taikyu was engrossed by her words. How fascinating that there existed entire worlds separate from this one, with strange creatures capable of communication! "That's incredible, Frisk. What is the Underground like?"

"It's not that bad, not as bad as some humans think. I miss my parents, but if I had to live my rest of my life in the Underground, I wouldn't mind. Asgore is a very nice ruler, but sometimes I think he wasn't all there."

"What do you mean?"

"He's kinda dumb," Frisk said plainly, pausing for a second as she considered the shape of Chara's face. "After the war, he and the other monsters moved to the farthest reaches of the Underground and Asgore called their new settlement 'Home.' After they stopped fearing the humans, they moved out of Home and spread out all across the Underground. They eventually settled again and Asgore called it 'New Home.'"

Taikyu picked up on one part of that statement in particular. "There was a war?"

"Yeah. It was thousands of years ago. Really long story, I don't know all the details. Asgore could probably tell you more about it. I think he fought in it."

"Monsters have that long of a lifespan?" Taikyu wondered.

Frisk didn't reply as she continued coloring in Chara's shirt.

"Frisk?" he prodded.

"Huh? Oh, sorry, I don't know. I'm just about finished. Give me a minute." The next few minutes were silent but for the sounds of the two of them breathing, and the scratching of pencil on paper as she drew. Finally, she ripped the page from her sketchbook and presented it to Taikyu. "Here you go."

On the paper was a drawing of a young boy with shoulder-length brown hair wearing a long-sleeved shirt with lime and cream horizontal stripes. He was smiling, Taikyu noticed, and he had bright blue eyes in contrast with Frisk's (and his own) deep brown. "This is quite good," Taikyu complimented Frisk on her drawing.

"Eh, it's decent," Chara answered. "My hair wasn't that long."

Surprised at that sentence, he looked up and saw Frisk's eyes had indeed gone red. "Good evening, Chara."

Taikyu watched as her pupils faded back to brown. "That's it? That's all he wanted to say?"

"He wanted to see if I was telling the truth about letting him out. He asked me to let him say something, so I did."

"Aren't you worried about him erasing you again, after everything he's done?"

"Of course," she replied honestly. "But I have to trust him and start showing him that he really is important to me."

"I see. Thank you for the drawing. I'd be interested in seeing what some of your monster friends look like, if you could draw them for me. My brothers will be shocked when I tell them about what we've discussed. Oh, and on the subject of my brothers, they think that the reason my exorcism failed is because it's because Chara isn't a Pokemon. They've researched other methods, and one of them looks promising, but it wouldn't put your brother's soul at peace, only... move it. If it worked, Chara wouldn't be shackled to your consciousness anymore, but he'd be stuck to someone else. That's not a desirable outcome. So I'll continue doing my research and--"

"No!" Frisk blurted, stopping Taikyu mid-sentence. "I'm sorry, but no. You don't have to do that, Taikyu. Things have changed between Chara and me. We'll find a way to coexist peacefully."

"I see," Taikyu replied, rising from his chair and placing it back at the desk. "I'm happy to hear that things are going better between you two. Well, Frisk, it's past this old man's bed time. I'll see you tomorrow."

He turned to make his exit, but Frisk stopped him again. "W-wait!"

"Hm? What is it?" Taikyu inquired, turning back towards the young girl.

Frisk jumped out of bed and ran into Taikyu, throwing her arms around him in a hug and squeezing him tightly, being careful not to hurt him as she did so. "Thank you, Taikyu. I haven't thanked you for helping me deal with my problems with Chara. You're the first person I've told about him, and it means a lot to finally have someone I can talk to about him. And I'm sure Chara feels the same way. You treated him with respect and kindness when all I showed him was fear. You're the first friend he's made in a long time. So thank you. I don't know how I'll ever be able to repay you."

Moved by the young girl's words, Taikyu wrapped his long arms around Frisk and hugged her back. "You're welcome, Frisk. Knowing what little I've done has brought peace to your mind and your soul is the greatest reward I could ever hope to receive. My door is always open if you need me."

She squeezed him one last time before finally releasing him, taking a few steps back so she didn't have to crane her neck up so far to look into his kind eyes. "I know. Hopefully it'll be on more pleasant terms. Goodnight, Taikyu."

She put her pencils and sketchbook on her bedside table and tucked herself in as Taikyu headed for the door. He took one last look at her and was pleased to note that the evil aura that had permeated her body was greatly reduced. It would deplete over time, Taikyu deduced as he turned the light off and exited Frisk's room. The siblings had a lot of work ahead of them, but from the way Frisk described it, and from the genuinely happy look he saw on her face as he left, Taikyu believed the two of them would be just fine.
 
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"All in favor of naming the club 'The Close Calls Club,' raise your hand."
lol poor Windra wasnt even close to winning
she cant even be in the club
rip windra
maybe she should start a We-Completely-Lost club xD
 
Thresher nodded sagely. "I couldn't agree more, lad. Now run along while I have a chat with ol' Jethro here, will ya?"
I'm incredibly curious as to what this will be about. I do hope you write more about it.

Overall, quite the entertaining chapter. The battle was pretty interesting. The image of Sharpedo flopping around on the grass greatly amused me. Took me a little while to read because of work and all that. (This is one of my smaller comments, because I've already mentioned a lot to you.)
 
Sorry to break your heart, but it meant nothing, just a plot device to get Kyro to go to the next scene. We can pretend they talked about whatever you like, though :eek:
 
Sorry to break your heart, but it meant nothing, just a plot device to get Kyro to go to the next scene. We can pretend they talked about whatever you like, though :eek:
Ahh! Gotcha. I was wondering if it was some set-up or somethin'. It was probably the battle that they talked about, given the circumstances.
 
Also!

With the edits you sent me, Mysteries of the Forgotten Island is now 299 pages long, with 133828 words!

 
Interlude 4 highlights:

- it's not written in first person, or present tense, two things I am going to do at some point but just don't know where or how yet
- Diamant tries to go to sleep
- Helmi appears
- two new characters are introduced
- they, along with Helmi, will probably only appear in this interlude
- it's friggin dope

I finished the first draft of this the day after I posted chapter 8. I am really glad I didn't post it then because despite actually being inspired for once, I found I wasn't all that happy with the finished product. Over the past few days, I've made changes here and there, added some things, ended up increasing the overall word count by almost 2000. While the spirit of the first draft remains the same, a lot of things are more fleshed out, including the 'twins' referenced in the title.

I'm starting to feel like I'm spending too much time with this interlude. I don't want to go into this elaborate side story for two minor characters (and once you read, you'll understand how I could want to do it), but I also don't want to just introduce them and let that be the end of it. Since I've given them both a bit of back story, I'm gonna leave it at that and post this so I can get started on chapter 9.

Like/subscribe/review whatever none of you read this anyway on with the show

Word count: 6290

Interlude 4: Pearl's Twins

The Isle of Tajna was a small island located, most would say, in the middle of nowhere. It was far enough away from any region's mainland that most of their governments didn't care to claim jurisdiction over it; they simply assumed that it belonged to someone else, and left it at that. The island itself wasn't that large, only about twenty or thirty square miles, the majority of it covered by forest before Diamant purchased the entire thing and built an enormous building complex on it. It was here that Diamant Industries carried out its secret research into what they termed as biological robots - biots - machines, created with human DNA, that made them appear and act more natural than any artificial intelligence ever could.

Lucas Diamant was alone in his office, which was awfully small considering his status and wealth. While it wasn't large, it did have an amazing view of the ocean. It was slightly dulled by the fact that it was well past sundown right now, but the view was still pretty impressive nonetheless. He was tired, having spent the last few hours going over reports from Safiri. She was meticulous as usual, color-coding all the data he asked for, and even some things he didn't. There were charts and graphs and numbers representing everything from total attendance to how many gallons of each beverage was sold. He greatly appreciated the work she put in - all three of them, really - but he hadn't known that there would be so many numbers involved. He felt his eyes glazing over as he went from spreadsheet to spreadsheet, anxious to just be done with it already.

That's not fair. Safiri worked hard on this. I need to give this the attention it deserves.

He rubbed his eyes, forcing life back into them, and sat up a little straighter in his chair. He turned his desk lamp on at a low setting, illuminating the room and easing the strain on his eyes from having stared at a computer screen for so long. He started focusing on the report again, lasting only a few minutes before he felt himself nodding off again.

This isn't working. I'll read the rest of this tomorrow.

He leaned back in his chair, taking a minute to think of how Safiri was doing. This was the first major project she headed since he became president, and felt a surge of pride in his heart when he thought of how far she'd come. The robotic, nameless drone he'd inherited from President Whitemore was little more than a slave. It had taken him months just to break the conditioning that Whitemore instilled in her, to get her to really come out of her shell and be her own woman. Over the years, Safiri did eventually open up to him, and while she would never be as outgoing as Ruby or as flirty and sweet as Esmeralda, he loved her and was proud of her just the same.

It was impossible for him not to be; from what he saw on television and heard directly from Safiri, the tournament was going to be a resounding financial success, putting Diamant Industries well into the black for years to come, even after the winner's payout.

Diamant breathed a sigh of relief at this thought, running a hand through his hair and taking a moment to appreciate where he was. Ten years ago, he was just a guy with a lot of money, interested in unique projects to finance. When he heard of Chroma Corporation's biot program, he was intrigued. He was skeptical of the ethics involved in manufacturing people, but after then-President Whitemore assured him the new S1 biot was not human despite its looks, and convincing him of the good that selective DNA tampering could do, he agreed to help finance the project.

As the first weeks passed, Diamant started suspecting the biot was more human than Whitemore let on. She smiled when he bade her good morning, for example, or laughed when he told her a joke. Whitemore dismissed these as programmed reactions, nothing more. One time, when she was orally delivering to him a report on the biot program, she got a paper cut when shuffling her papers around, which lead to an impromptu conversation where S1 revealed she not only bled like a human, but her overall makeup was 85% human in origin; only her skeleton was truly synthetic. In Diamant's mind, this gave Whitemore's argument no leg to stand on, and he was angry at her for deceiving him.

Imagine his surprise when only five months later, a new, smarter biot had been created that had enhanced capabilities from the first. It wasn't until a few weeks after that did he learn the monstrous way with which the first biot was disposed of, and he used the power of his money to force President Whitemore to play by the rules... or so he thought. What he didn't know was that inside each successful biot, Whitemore had had suicide protocols embedded in their code. With the entry of a certain string of data, the affected biot would initiate the suicide protocol and it would end its life however it could find the means to. His face hardened as he remembered reading about each of their deaths, and it made his blood boil to think of the woman that caused it.

Diamant's eyes glanced to the safe built into his personal desk. There were no buttons or switches anywhere on it, just a simple fingerprint scanner, and a small handle used to pull the door open. Inside the safe was a tiny remote control with a single button, labeled 'S7.' Safiri's suicide switch. Once it was discovered that the suicide orders were unable to be removed due to being code rather than a physical object, he ordered the safe built to house Safiri's switch. He didn't dare destroy it, for fear of activating any possible fail-safes built into it and accidentally killing Safiri. He refused to let his team even analyze the switch to determine if such a possibility existed; it was better, in his eyes, to simply lock it away, never to see the light of day.

Under Diamant's watchful eye, the biot program flourished - in secret, of course. It was too risky to go public with this technology just yet - not until they had the perfect biot to show off. While they could make the biot look, sound, and act any way they wished, one thing they could not yet do was make it a Pokemon trainer. It wouldn't do to call the biot perfect if it wasn't also the perfect trainer, and in that regard, Diamant was stuck. No one in the company considered themselves a trainer by any measure - sure, a lot of them had Pokemon they kept as pets, but that was the extent of it. Everyone on the board had backgrounds in business and finance, not Pokemon battling. To Diamant's surprise, this was something that President Whitemore had been trying to achieve with the earlier Sapphire models, but she and her team of scientists didn't get very far. The best they could do was implant all the facts about battling they could and hope the biot filled in the gaps itself.

To help R&D further improve the biots' battle intelligence, Diamant called in a favor to his little sister, Helmi. A biological engineer of many years, she was more than happy to help once Diamant filled her in on what she'd be doing. Soon, she started working on other aspects of the biot program, not just making them more proficient in battles, and Project Ruby started a few months later.

A rapping was heard on the door to his office. This didn't startle him, as his biots didn't sleep often, and even with the Jewels gone, there still remained a couple in the facility. "Yes? It's open, come in."

"Mr. Diamant!" a child's voice, bright and cheery, sang as the door opened. The owner of the voice was what appeared to be a human female of around twelve years old. She was short, with flawless creamy white skin and big round eyes. Her short curls were a rich and vibrant gold, sparkling in the low light of his office. They bounced to and fro, casting strange shadows on the walls and ceiling as the girl bounded into her boss's office. "You're still awake, sir?" She stared at him with those innocent doe eyes of hers, with irises as golden and shining as her hair.

This energetic young girl was Aura, and she was intended to be Helmi's first biot.

Shortly after Ruby was born, Diamant approached Helmi about concerns he had with her running the biot program; specifically, about why she hadn't hired anyone else to help. People, she'd said, made mistakes, and she was too prideful in her work to feel comfortable trusting it to anyone else. In response, Diamant built her a biot, one made from her DNA and, he explained, would have even better attention to detail than she did, because it was impossible for one person to bear the weight of such a massive project alone, even for someone as brilliant as she was. She objected, but when Diamant made it clear that it wasn't open to debate, she relented, and that was the end of that.

Except, as Diamant would later be livid to find, it wasn't. Helmi read over the biot's proposed dimensions and balked at the idea of making her some eternally young and sexy-looking model. She'd be younger, smarter, and prettier than Helmi, and she couldn't stand the idea of being upstaged by a robot. She secretly changed the biot's age and looks, which wasn't difficult to hide since she was the only one working on the project. Knowing that Diamant wouldn't destroy the biot once it was created, and unwilling to risk the chance he'd force her to work with it anyway, she erased the part of her DNA that gave the biot Helmi's aptitude for bioengineering before going forward with the creation.

The result of this was Aura, a cute little biot who now had no purpose. Upon finding out how Helmi intentionally sabotaged Aura's creation, he nearly fired her right then before realizing that he still needed her, and that getting rid of her would only endanger the project. He would end up with the last laugh, however. He marched Helmi to the laboratory, forced her to undo what she'd done to her DNA, and was about to have her change the rest back to his designs before he changed his mind and had her simply change the biot's hair color while keeping the same age and body type. He then supervised the creation of this second biot himself, equal parts angry at Helmi for ruining Aura's creation, and himself for not keeping a better eye on his sister. With vastly differing views regarding the humanity of the biots, Diamant felt like he should have seen this coming, and now he was stuck with a little girl, completely innocent but completely useless in the sense that her use had been robbed from her.

He was up front with Aura about the circumstances surrounding her birth, and she was rightfully upset with Helmi for it, but she was more happy that Diamant still found a use for her as his secretary. She dove right into her work, thankful for the chance to make her new boss happy and prove herself worthy of his love.

Diamant rubbed his eyes, checking the time on the computer. It was nearly midnight there, which meant in Kanto, the second tournament battle for the day was probably over by now. "Yes, Aura, but I'm about to turn in for the night," he answered amiably.

"Good! I worry about you, you know?" Aura went behind Diamant's desk and hugged him in his chair, her golden hair tickling his nose and face and illuminating the surrounding area nearly as much as the lamp did.

"I know, and I appreciate that," he replied with a smile, ruffling the young girl's hair. "You always look out for this old man. I'm very glad to have you on the team, Aura."

Aura blushed prettily, reveling in the praise. She didn't always get a chance to get this close to Diamant, since Safiri would usually send her away, finding the intimate contact inappropriate. But now Safiri was gone, gone for a long time, and Aura liked that a lot. "Thank you, sir! I... I hope to continue making you proud of me. Goodnight!" she said, boldly giving Diamant a quick peck on the cheek before running out of his office.

Diamant was touched by how much Aura was attached to him. She was a sweet girl, disowned by someone who thought she was a joke, and he couldn't bring himself to terminate her and simply write her off as a mistake.

Speaking of mistakes...

He wanted to check on how Helmi was doing, but knew very well how much she hated being disturbed while she was running tests. He pursed his lips as he picked up his phone to dial the extension for the laboratory, but hesitated. He knew it was wishful thinking that Helmi would actually pick up the phone - he'd had a better chance of sprouting wings. He put in a call to Helmi's assistant instead.

"Yes, sir?" a quiet voice answered.

"Argenta, it's Lucas. Do me a favor, will you? Tell Helmi to give it a rest for today, she's been at it all day. You can keep an eye on things while she sleeps."

"Yes, sir."

He let out a breath, relieved that the task of interrupting his sister was now the burden of someone else, but at the same time guilty that he was throwing Argenta to the wolves... again. "Thanks, you're an angel. I'm going to head to bed. I'll check in tomorrow morning."

"...Okay."

"Is something wrong?" Diamant asked, noting the pause she took.

He couldn't see it, but Argenta was fidgeting, fighting with herself, trying desperately hard to summon the courage to speak out while simultaneously telling her that she should keep quiet. She took a deep breath before asking, "Can... can I speak freely, sir?"

Memories of his conversation with Safiri came rushing back. He wondered how many others had opinions they were afraid to voice, and made a mental note to put out a memo tomorrow regarding that. "Of course, Argenta, anything," he said, and meant it. "What is it?"

There was another moment of silence on the other end as Argenta's internal battle reached its conclusion. "Never mind, it's nothing," she finally replied.

Diamant frowned at her unwillingness to talk, but he had to respect whatever reason kept her quiet. "If you say so, Argenta, but know my door is always open to you. If there's anything you need, or have any questions about anything at all, please don't hesitate to ask. Is that understood?"

"Y-Yes, sir. I'll head to the laboratory now. Argenta out."

Diamant turned his phone off, leaned back in his leather chair, and sighed heavily, weary from a long day and looking forward to sleep. He begun to pack up his things, offering Argenta silent apologies in advance for taking the brunt of his younger sister's inevitable wrath.

* * * * * * * *

In the laboratory was a middle-aged woman, working tirelessly. She was tall - she'd find she was a few inches taller than Thresher, if the two met - and very lean, in fine shape for someone her age. Her platinum blonde hair was bunched up haphazardly, held in place with a single giant black clip. She was hunched over, gazing into the large electron microscope that was the centerpiece of the enormous laboratory, and humming a nameless tune to herself as she chewed a piece of gum.

It was quiet, save for the hum of the nearby machine and her impromptu song, which was something she preferred. Though Diamant had forced her to make a biot according to his specifications, Helmi quickly realized he couldn't make her use it; the majority of the time, Helmi had her biot off doing tasks that would keep her away for hours at a time, just so she could spend more time with her true love - science - without being bothered by a robot child.

"All right, sweetie, talk to me," she cooed at the slide she was viewing.

Helmi let out a breath, examining the strands of DNA carefully to see if there were any abnormalities which would yield further tweaking and retesting. Stepping briefly away from the microscope, she double checked the notes she was given on each competitor. The DNA she was currently looking at was a mixture of Cody's and Jethro's, but to her, they were just numbers - three and nine, respectively. She didn't dehumanize them this way because of any sort of malicious intent; it was simply easier for her to remember them this way.

She was acutely aware of how much this bothered her brother, and the two had had frequent arguments on the subject before Diamant finally relented after she threatened to quit if he didn't lay off once and for all. The fact was, Helmi was the brains behind the entire biot program, and without her knowledge and expertise, the whole project would crumble. She knew this, and tried not to lord it over her big brother's head too much; it was because of him that she had the job of her dreams, after all.

Helmi didn't understand why Diamant was so insistent on pretending the biots were human. In Helmi's eyes, it wasn't even up for debate; each and every one of them was created in that very laboratory, with the power of science and human ingenuity. They were objectively not human. Could humans hear at 50 kHz or scan a Pokemon's complete data with merely a thought? Could they slow down the march of time so much that they could be easily live for hundreds of years or more? Could they turn the human genome into their playground, altering anything and everything they wished, creating something as ridiculous as glowing hair, for no reason other than their whim?

Actually, Helmi realized with a grin, they could do that last thing. But the rest of it was horse shit. Even the biots themselves knew that they weren't human. Who was Diamant trying to kid?

A beep sounded alongside a green node on the machine to her left lighting up - another compatibility test complete. Excellent! She carefully removed the slide from the microscope and set it back in its proper location among the other test slides, then briskly walked to another huge machine, nearly twenty feet long and ten feet high. This massive construct was responsible for much of the work she did; not only was it used to combine DNA, but it was also used to build the finished biots, once they were ready. The beep and green light meant that the combination of DNA had been successful, and was ready for her to check manually. She opened a small door, carefully extracting the slide which held the combined DNA, and placed it under the microscope. She wrote in her notes that this was a combination of subjects ten and sixteen, then picked up two more slides, each with a different competitor's DNA. Placing them gently into the machine, she shut the door, hit a few buttons, and the machine was off with a low, satisfying hum - music to Helmi's ears.

She didn't know how long she'd been at this. Hours, easily, but when she was deep in her work, time was irrelevant. The computers all had clocks with which she could have kept an eye on the time, but she paid them no mind. The important part was that her usual request - to be left alone - had largely been honored since she started splicing... who cares how long ago. A satisfied smile crept onto her face as she reminded herself that not only was her biot nowhere to be found, Safiri was thousands of miles away and wouldn't butt in with yet another request from someone, usually her brother. The thought of not having to deal with her for at least a week and a half put Helmi in high spirits, improving her already great mood. She took off her lab coat, tossing it over a nearby chair, revealing a dark pink blouse and matching pencil skirt. Her heels clicked as she practically sashayed to the microscope, ready for another examination. She referred to the competitor bios Diamant had supplied her with to learn more about subjects ten and sixteen. While their names weren't important in the grand scheme of things, learning what kind of people they were was actually vital to determining possible compatibility pairs. The more compatible two people were, the easier it would be for the machine to splice them together.

"Quayle Vincent Meredith Valentine," she read. "Hell of a name..." She skipping over much of the other information, but one note in particular caught her attention. "Oh, a man of science, huh? I like you already... yeesh, never mind," she amended when she saw his picture. "Twenty years old?" Kid's old enough to be my son, she silently added, as though refraining from speaking it out loud made it less true. Though Helmi was in her forties, she looked to be much younger; someone meeting her for the first time could be forgiven for thinking she was in her early thirties, or even late twenties if she wore the right makeup. She continued skimming over Quayle's bio until she got to a note at the bottom that Diamant had added. "Violent. Do not use in preliminary compatibility testing. Keep DNA on file and await further instructions." She chuckled. "Way too late for that, Lukey," she remarked as she flipped to Windra's profile. "Let's see... EWW. Heh. Wonder if she got teased about that as a kid..." She frowned when she didn't find anything else that was too interesting. There was another page stuffed behind Windra's bio, a page she barely remembered shoving back there. "Oh yeah," she recalled, looking over the copy of Esmeralda's report. When her eyes came across the words 'punched subject 10 in the nose,' she raised her eyebrows in genuine surprise. "Damn, girl," Helmi said approvingly, studying Windra's photo. In it, she looked cute, flashing a bright smile with Tyeaf on her shoulder. Not exactly the kind of person Helmi would expect to hit anyone.

She belatedly realized that the 'subject 10' Esmeralda's report was referring to was the same person whose DNA she'd just combined Windra's with, and she let out a short, amused laugh. With her 'research' finished, it was time to get to the real work. There was a small tink sound as her glasses hit the eyepiece lens of the microscope, and she began to examine the combined strands of DNA, hoping to find something fascinating.

Just then, the doors to the laboratory opened, taking Helmi out of the zone she was in and killing her good mood. She didn't have to look up to know who it was; excluding herself, there were only two people on the entire island with the credentials required to simply waltz in the lab unannounced, and one of them wouldn't have left his cushy office chair to do it. To prove herself correct, Helmi looked up now, and she was indeed correct in her guess. The intruder timidly approached Helmi, trying uselessly to hide in her short curls, which glimmered in a bright, shining silver. She tried not to pay attention to the irritated look Helmi shot her as the lab doors closed behind her. "What is it, Argenta? I thought I made it clear I didn't want to be bothered."

Please don't yell at me, please don't yell at me, please don't yell at me, I'm not here to fight...

"Mr. Diamant wants you to give it a rest for today," her biot reported in her usual soft voice. "I can hold down the fort for a while."

Simply hearing the word 'rest' ignited feelings of tiredness that Helmi had suppressed for hours now, and she removed her round thin frames to rub at her eyes sleepily. Helmi was more than a little jealous of the biots' ability to go so long without sleep, and wondered if she'd be able to change her own DNA to make that possible. Helmi replaced her glasses, giving Argenta an accusing stare. "Yeah, no chance, kid. You're still on my shit list for what happened last time I let you stay here unsupervised."

"I told you, that was Aura's fault, not mine," Argenta protested, crossing her arms and pouting slightly. To an outsider, this display might have looked cute, but to Helmi, it was just annoying.

Not in the mood to have this conversation, and more than anxious to get back to work, Helmi went to physically shoo Argenta out of the room. "Yeah, and she's on the shit list too, but it's still your ass because you should have been watching her. Out," she ordered, turning Argenta towards the door and physically pushing her towards the exit. "Tell Lukey I'll rest when I'm--"

A red light lit up on the combination machine, and alarms began sounding. "What the hell?!" Helmi scrambled to her computer, typing in alarm shutdown codes and making a request for an error log as Argenta headed to the combination machine. "Damn it, get away from there! Don't touch anything!" Helmi barked, running as fast as her heels would allow over to the machine and inspecting it for herself. The alarms stopped, and the red light remained on as Helmi pushed some more buttons on a touch screen, which shut the red light off and sent everything back to normal. The error report was printed, and Helmi read it over, her face twisting in anger the more she read.

"What's it say?" Argenta asked, curious, unable to see over the paper Helmi deliberately held at a height that made it impossible for her.

"Is this your idea of a joke?!" Helmi suddenly snarled, snatching the paper away and shaking it in Argenta's face.

"I, I don't understand, what is the problem? I haven't done anything wrong," Argenta softly replied, her face a mask of genuine confusion.

"Bullshit!" Helmi screamed, grabbing Argenta by the wrist, causing her to cry out in fear as Helmi yanked her to a nearby table. With a sweeping motion of her other hand, she sent folders of papers crashing to the floor, their contents spilling out and immediately forgotten as Helmi slammed the error log down. "You screwed with my experiment! Is this supposed to be payback for not letting you and Aura treat my lab like some sort of playground?!"

Argenta quickly scanned the document, finding the relevant error code, and knowing immediately what it was. "There were three DNA samples?"

"There were three DNA samples?" Helmi repeated mockingly. "No shit, there were three DNA samples. Now Mother's pissed, and when Mother's pissed, I'm pissed. You set me back hours, you stupid, second-rate, thing. I hope it was worth it." Helmi's eyes were slits as she glared pure hatred at her confused and hurt biot. "Now get. Out," she seethed, pointing towards the door.

"But ma'am, I swear I didn't--"

"Now!!" Helmi screamed, raising her hand toward her assistant.

Argenta flinched for fear of being struck, and fled before Helmi could make good on her unspoken threat. The second the doors closed behind her, she collapsed to the ground, taking slow, deep breaths in an attempt to calm herself down and wait for her heart to stop pounding nearly so hard.

That was scary...

As awful as she felt, she took a small bit of comfort in knowing that she hadn't cried this time. She hadn't cried in many months, not since... then. She knew the time. The one time Helmi wasn't content with scathing words or the occasional slap. Helmi asked Argenta to bring her some coffee; when she came back, she accidentally tripped and spilled it onto Helmi. The shock caused Helmi to drop a tray of cultures she was carrying, forcing her to restart the experiment she'd been working on for the past two weeks. Helmi responded by pinning Argenta down and beating the hell out of her, so badly she was knocked unconscious.

A small, traitorous part of Argenta's mind wondered why Diamant would deliberately design her this way. She was made from Helmi's DNA, but Argenta lacked any of the flaming hot temperament that her source human did. Instead, she was meek, submissive, and subservient, never standing up for herself. She was every bit as smart as Helmi, but designed to kowtow to everyone around her without a second thought by a cowardly old man too afraid to confront his subordinates. Why else would he constantly send her to face his sister, knowing how she'd react? Why wasn't she confident like her sister? Diamant did say that Argenta and Aura were almost completely identical genetically - they looked exactly the same but for the color of their hair and eyes. Everyone even referred to them as 'the twins.'

So why did she feel so different?

She'd asked herself that many times, but never had a good answer. She very nearly asked Diamant about it on the phone earlier, but once again couldn't muster the courage required to ask.

Probably would just lie to me anyway...

Argenta clamped down on that line of thought, getting to her feet, feeling a little bit more like normal. She found herself curious about the things Helmi had said. Two DNA samples from one subject? How is that possible?

That question was on Helmi's mind as well as she all but stomped her way over to her phone. If her stupid biot wasn't responsible for this, then there was only one other person who could explain things. She punched in the extension to reach her brother, impatiently waiting for him to pick up. It took him a few rings, but once he did, she let him have it:

"Helmi? How are the tests--"

"YOU RUINED MY SAMPLES!" she screamed, with no preamble.

Diamant could hear his sister's heavy, angry breathing on the other side of the line, and the first thing he wondered was what Argenta could have possibly done to evoke this response from Helmi. "I'm sorry, Helmi, what?"

"Don't play dumb! You sent that worthless 'assistant' of mine into the lab when I was asleep and combined two of the subjects' DNA without my knowledge!"

There were a lot of things that Diamant tolerated from his sister. Calling him screaming when he was very nearly in bed was one of them. Accusing him of tampering with her work, while preposterous, was another. Disrespecting the biots, however, was not. "First of all, Argenta is not worthless, Helmi. She is made from your DNA and is every bit as capable a scientist as you are."

"The hell she is!" Helmi shrieked into the phone. "I studied for years to get--"

"Enough," Diamant said sternly, effectively ending that tangent there. "Now is not the time, Helmi, I'm very tired. Now, please explain, what is this about?"

"I just told you," Helmi uttered through clenched teeth. "You, or your precious Argenta, or both of you for all I know, came into my laboratory and messed with my samples. I tried combining DNA that was already combined. Mother said there were three samples when there only should have been two."

Diamant had no idea what she was going on about, but at least he understood a small part of her rant. 'Mother' was what Helmi called the DNA mixing machine; since it was also used to give life to the biots, it was, in a sense, their mother. It started off as something of a joke, but Helmi got such a kick out of it that she continued to refer to it as such, and eventually, the name stuck.

"So now I have to throw out both samples and extract more. Who knows how long that could take?" A pause. "Hey, are you even listening to me?!"

"Yes, Helmi, I am. I'm trying to think of ways that your samples could have been contaminated."

The fury was back in Helmi's voice as she shouted, "I TOLD YOU, YOU GUYS CAME HERE AND--"

"We did no such thing!" Diamant snapped back, shocking his sister into silence. Finally, after a few moments, he continued. "I don't know why you aren't nicer to Argenta, Helmi. Never mind the fact that she's your assistant whether you like it or not, she has your intellect, your attention to detail, your thirst for knowledge... she would be a fine partner, if only you would let her be one. I bet right now she's off doing research, trying to figure out what went wrong with the samples."

Helmi was beyond done. "Good. I hope her brains leak out of her ears."

Diamant ignored the comment, tired and wanting to get as much sleep as he could before he met with Safiri again. "I'll see what Safiri can do about securing a new sample for you. Give me the name of the competitor whose sample was corrupted and I'll relay it to Safiri."

There was another pause as Helmi reluctantly checked the information on the offending slide. "Six," she said.

Not this again. "Helmi. Please tell me their name, I would like to get to sleep."

"Six," Helmi repeated. "Go to bed. I have work to do."

"Please get some sleep," her brother pleaded. "You need to rest."

"No, what I need to do is manually inspect all of these samples again to make sure no more of them are corrupted. That's going to take at least three hours. And if I so much as sniff Argenta or Aura poking their heads around here before I'm finished, there will be hell to pay. Am I clear?"

"Perfectly," he replied evenly before continuing, "Now let me be clear. You are my sister, but you are also my employee. I expect you to treat your co-workers with respect, both human and biot alike. Sabotaging Aura's birth was disrespectful not only to me, but to her as well. When you put Argenta in the infirmary just for spilling some coffee on you, I could have - I should have - fired you on the spot." He sighed, worn from having to repeat this song and dance so often, like a parent scolding a child. "I want you in this company, Helmi, but I will not stand idly by while you continue to verbally and physically abuse the--"

"Hey, I haven't hit her in a long time!" Helmi protesed.

"Quiet!" Diamant roared. "Even once is one time too many! You are free to disagree with Argenta as much as you like. In fact, in doing so, I hope it drives home just how like us they are. But if I ever get wind that you've laid a finger on either Argenta or her sister again... you won't like what happens."

Helmi held the phone in silence, unable to believe her brother was speaking to her in such a way.

"Am I clear?" he finished.

"Yes," she spit back.

"Good. I'm going to sleep. Goodnight."

Diamant clicked off his phone and sighed, his heart heavy with guilt over threatening his own sister. It wasn't the first time it happened, he noted grimly, and it surely wouldn't be the last. He'd hoped that having Argenta around, having someone to share the workload with who she could trust as well as she could trust herself, would have loosened his sister up, but it seemed to have the complete opposite effect. Thinking of Argenta, he turned his phone back on and dialed her extension. It rang several times before she finally answered it.

"Yes, sir?"

She sounded normal. That was good news. "Argenta, it's Lucas. I just spoke with Helmi. Are you all right?"

"Yes, sir," she answered in a voice that was quiet, even for her.

He didn't want to pressure her any more than that, and he was completely exhausted, so he left it at that. "Good. I know I can't apologize enough for what Helmi did to you, but I promise you that she won't lay a hand on either you or Aura anymore, okay?"

"Yes, sir," Argenta repeated. Was she upset with him? He couldn't tell from her voice alone.

"Very good. I'm going to bed." He caught himself as he thought of something. "Argenta, do you know who subject number six is?"

"Not off the top of my head, sir, I don't," Argenta admitted.

Diamant nodded in acceptance. It was a long shot anyway. "That's okay. I'll have Safiri find the information for me. Thank you again, Argenta. Goodnight."

"Goodnight, sir," she replied courteously before hanging up the phone.

Diamant made a note to bring up subject six with Safiri the next time she made her report and finally climbed into bed, glad that the day was finally over. He enjoyed what he did, but he hated days like these where he felt like a father in a house full of children instead of the president of a company.

But, he conceded as he drifted off to sleep moments later, it was all worth it for the sake of the program. Version Zero was a success so far; if things continued on this path, Lucas Diamant was going to change the world.
 
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