Pokémon Roost, a gift fic

[K_S]

She’d had one… one bad episode in public. Well sorta public. There’d been an ice ring attached to the school gym, nearest to the lockers and changing rooms. It was a seasonal thing, inflicted on the students in the summer to make their exercise curriculum “different”. As it was Green had missed it her first semester, but come the second, they’d had a day with no gym classes and then the grand unveiling of her school's pet indulgence. An Indoor ice rink …

And Green, she hadn’t prepared, in her head or out of it, for this. Which was stupid, so so stupid…

She had thought, (prayed even), that her folks would have the kindness, the sense, to pull her out of gym for a term. Make her take some biology classes or something. When she realized they weren’t going to she’d begged them, volunteered to take the nastiest classes with dissections and everything, and… nothing...

They hadn’t budged, with Mask being a “delusion” and everything, seen a problem. Just them helping her face an “unreasonable” phobia head-on.

The clang of metal doors and the chill of an overenthusiastic AC system was enough to set her nerves to jangle. But the fact that she’d been ordered, not asked, not nodded along and accidentally shenghighed into this, but ordered, to be here had scaled her nerves up from mere irritant to a near omnipresent pressure about her shoulders. Anxiety started as a pressure, that shifted into an itch under her skin, and Green knew not to scratch at her back.

Because once she started, she’d never stop, just be frozen, chaffing and scratching at ice that wasn’t there, choking on screams while she fought to not cry.

Slumping onto a bench, the solid near warm metal helped her remember, she was here, not there… but she didn’t want to be here and..

And she was curled into herself, rocking a little, and that’s how she’d been found.

The adult may have freaked out a bit. Her crying, coiled, lack of response, was understandable. But with time, and gentle nudges, Green was coaxed up… away from the lockers, the halls. Her peers, jeered out, had swung to indifference and shuffled off to their ice skating class, content to leave her behind for more entertaining things.

She hadn’t been missed until roll call; the person who found her had been an Aide…

But those were facts for later.

Green’s world was felled to memories, and she got reality back in stages. The sun warmed cement on her back, the crackle of pavement as she was eased down to sitting on the edge of the sidewalk, the gym doors a world away. She tilted he head to the sun, looking up at it until a hand nudged her, coaxed her to look down. Green did, following orders out of habit, ignoring the babble of hurting her eyes; she stared unthinkingly at the bit of pavement between her legs. Breathing air that was warm, a bit muggy, and nothing like Mt. Mortar or her cell.

“Back with us now?”

She seemed a nice woman, the aide, and Green nodded, not looking at her, just trying to breathe. The woman a bright-colored blur at the edge of her sight, her hands splayed then clenching and splaying against the cement beside her, Green timed her breathing to each motion until the blurriness and tears stopped.

“Feeling like going back in, Green?”

No, never.

Gravel scraped, the aide shifted beside her, in seeming solidarity though the woman’d never get it and Green was sorta suspicious that she’d try to coax her with the “rest of the class” to “just watch” if Green gave her any leash.

“Can I… have some space… I… I need to call… them.”

She couldn’t get anything out more affectionate. Picking up the pieces of her composure, facts and situation had his just right and… and after this something was broke, irreparably, and she wanted to cry, her voice warbled, but the loss wasn’t a new thing.

This was just the realization that, at this moment, the rift between her and them was irreparable.

There weren’t enough "sorry"s to fix this, and honestly, Green didn't want to hear it.

“I’m sorry sweetie, I don’t have a cell phone…”

And her’s wouldn’t work, even if she confessed to having it, anti-tech school clause and all that.

Scanning the parking lot, the brunette jerked her head, some distance away was a payphone… and while tight spaces weren’t great it’d be hot, stifling so, so she’d be… well a bit better than going back at least.

“I can use that…” Then, even though she had the money, some habits were just that hard to break… “Can I borrow some change? I can call them from there and...”

And she’d be seen, visible, and it’d only take one-moment inattention or Jiggly sent out to slip behind the woman, and Green’d be gone. But first, she wanted her call.

“Of course dear, here you go.”

“Thanks,” Green took the coins and tipped a small smile at the woman beside her. She was pretty, in a not-quite old sort of way, though she had too many flowers on her shirt, and that flower beret was a bit much. Still, there were smile lines about her lips, and Green felt a hair guilty, just not guilty enough to change her plans about knocking her out. “Be right back.”

XXX

“Ice skating,” Green’d been vibrating, furious from head to toe, near seeing red once again. And only Mask and Giovanni had gotten her that mad before. Them… that was a new low, and this call was honestly an exercise to see how deep They were going to dig the hole than to get a resolution or promises to change… or anything really. Just a sentimental handover, Mask’d beat her for it.

“To help you with your phobia, dear, remember?” It’d been a wonder She had picked up, on the second ring even, which made this call expected, anticipated.

“I remember saying I didn’t want to.”

“And sometimes we have to do things we don’t want to.” She snipped back.

“You mean that phobia about the guy you don’t believe in who liked to lock me up in a freezer, Mask?”

“Whatever the source, Mask, or otherwise…”

Green slumped against the wall of the booth, ignoring the grimy feeling of the not too clean grass, soaking up the near burning warmth of the metal edge, the phone’s cord taunt before her. To that temptation, Green twanged it with a restless hand, even as she unshipped Jiggly’s pokeball from her belt with the other. The phone tucked against her chin.

“You only remember what you want, when it’s convenient, to you.” The girl accused, tone flat, previous anger draining away into resignation. “Nothing I say matters, doesn’t it?”

Nothing was going to change, why did she think it was going to get better in time? Why did she have to be so stupid?

“Green this is ridiculous, you’re supposed to be in class.”

Getting immersed in trauma that Green didn’t want to deal with, not that She cared. Not that She responded to the real question.

“I’ll see you at home.” Green huffed. They’d only see her if She or He were very very lucky, but whatever…. Green owed no one nothing, and she should have kept it that way.

“Stay after class and I’ll have your Dad swing by and pick you u-“

Hanging up, Green huffed a laugh she was sure She hadn’t heard. Stay. After school. Yeah, that’d be a no. She cracked open the door and flicked Jiggly’s pokeball, summoning the fluff ball as she stepped out of the telephone booth, Green swiped at her eyes, straightened her shoulders, and cracked the teacher’s aide a near friendly smile.

Well, Green figured she’d get herself expelled, somehow someway, might as well get it over with.

XXX

They left the door unlocked because of course, they did. Green shrugged off her backpack as soon as she got in, dumped its contents into the trash, and trooped upstairs. She’d fallen out of the habit of having a complete getaway bag on hand but kept the essentials, getaway money, her trainer’s license, and the like, in one spot. A quick check under the dresser confirmed the flat taped envelope was unbothered, the dust confirmed it, and she peeled it off, taking a moment to shake it off, before slitting the package. A quick tally and there was everything accounted for. She put that into her backpack and pulled open her closet. She packed her sturdiest clothes, skipping most of her dresses, for hiking gear, long-legged, extra padding, things built to last and take damage. Warm things, a few light things for variety, Silver’s coat and scarf and gloves he’d sent along via Giovanni, and a hat, not her lucky one, just something big and a bit shapeless to cover her head and help with sunburn. She took a moment to loos spares, spare sunscreen, spare toothpaste, and she snapped up an unopened toothbrush, and her hairbrush and some towels and rags and… things were looking a bit full. So she took one of His old camping satchels and used the extra space to raid the pantry. Taking cans and dried things from the back, tightening the rows in the front so the loss wouldn’t be so obvious. Then, because They hadn’t thought she knew, but she did, she helped herself to their “secret” money stash for emergencies. Tarps and ropes and stakes were the last thing to go in, she popped those on top, to give some protection for her food from the wet and zipped the bag up. She could lift it, and walk with both on, though slowly, but she wasn’t going to be carrying it long term, and worse come to worse she had enough in her backpack to replace anything in the satchel.

Packing done, she dropped her bag and backpack by a chair in the living room, tucked out of easy view beside a back chair, and paced a bit, trying to get her racing thoughts in order. She had an hour, perhaps two, unless someone panicked and came home early. But barring that and considering Giovanni’s tales, of search Sharkpedo and Arcanine, Green decided to muddy the trail a bit. She snapped up the rest of her clothes and shoveled them into trash bags, stripping the bed, bundling the pillows, stuffies, anything and everything she’d touched, owned, and loaded down with everything with her scent and psychic traces she called Blasty and Jiggly and they made a quick donation to the local homeless shelter. They had a self-donate sector, unsupervised, and without cameras because… well it was shady. Not Rocket shady.

But Green had to wonder a bit…

Regardless she had privacy and she used it to shovel everything of hers deep and in the back. Between being jumbled with everyone else’s stuff her scent, psychic auras, and whatever was used to track would be a blur. If things took long enough her stuff would be sorted and passed out or put on the shelf, and all the better.

She did keep one stuffie, a teddiursa Yellow’d gotten her at that street fair that one time, that got privilege spot pinned to her backpack when she nipped to their home one final time and set that up, recalled Jiggly and consulted the clock. Half an hour before He got off from his new job, there was just a little more time to plant a few more false leads. Popping open the computer, unpassworded again… Really They were being beyond stupid with this… Green flipped through a few travel sites. Made it look like she was studying routes to Johto, checking ship times, and shipments from companies, she left a bit of a hurried trail that might be damning if she were going to Surf to Johto.

Good thing Kanto was nearly as close by.

The only tell she left of her real plants was to dig up a multinational weather and storm report that showed Kanto and Johto. She’d needed some information after all… Then, because she was feeling petty she flipped into his email.

And froze, as again she was shocked. She skimmed through a few, then screw it, and the computer's camera if it caught her, she flipped open her phone and brought up Giovanni’s number. She texted, not wanting to risk his voice being recorded.

“They’re trying to commit me,” she typed in the name from the acceptance letter that’d been on the top of the ‘mail. Autocorrect made a mess of it, so she snapped a picture and sent him that. Because this… this was something they hadn’t planned for. Police incarceration, an intervention, perhaps house arrest, but a mental facility? Green wasn’t going to get caught by people who had the right to drug her brainless because the second her parents had signed that paper they were divesting Green of her Team, her rights, and a quick dig through the letter stated her stay was going to be “indefinite” with “long chemical and electrical based treatments approved for the purpose of reverse brainwashing”.

“Pickups tonight.” And Green was trying not to shake, not to just call and yell at him to get her out of this, right now. Make everyone forget or disappear her right now because this.. this was too much.

Green could hear a car approaching, time was up, just as she was about to slip her phone away it hummed. She flipped it open.

He’d set her a date and time for extraction, ordering her to go to the “boxed” beach for pick up. So clearly this was going to be a Rocket thing, not a gym leader thing. Wonderful. His tabbed on a promise to get her out if she couldn’t avoid the police or medical authorities didn’t hold the assurance he’d get her Team, so getting caught wasn’t an option.

But not getting caught, Green could last a few days, maybe three weeks with her supplies and luck, so… no problem.

Green read the message, memorized it, then deleted her history and shoved the phone into her pocket. There came footsteps up to the door, and she waited, no point in running off without her supplies. Padding up to her backpack she slung it on. Then leaning on the chair beside her other bag she waited, listened. It was… his voice he was talking to someone. “I’m glad you agreed to meet with me before I picked her up and brought her around... I had some questions…”

So this was why he was going to pick her up? She almost drew Blasty then and there, only held back by a hair. The door opened and she saw him and his back was towards her, leading someone else in. She saw a white, stereotypical coat and name tag and company name stitched in the left breast pocket. Dr. Anderson, Green read, and the good doctor was more observant than he was but then he was the type of man who had trouble talking and walking all at once. So, understandable.

“Mr Azule is that…”

“Your patient?” Green sneered the rest of the thought, near spitting. And hating herself and how her eyes flicked to her father. Cataloging each and every one of his features she shares with him. Just… not able to stop. And she’s praying the man will show some remorse, shame, to flinch, or something.

And for her expectations she got nothing save a moment’s startlement and a warm smile in response to her less than warm words.

“Green, honey, you got out early today?”

“No, I left.” She looks pointedly at the doctor. Over the doctor, there’s motion at the windows. Probably aides and orderlies, bulky types with bulky ‘mon to take her and her team out of she fought against the pickup. “I’m leaving. I gave you how many months, I trusted you with my best friend, my little brother… and for what? Nothing, that’s what. Fat lot of good you’ve done for me or him. I’m done.” Snapping a glare at the doctor she snarled. “Get you and your friends out of my way or I don’t care what happens.”

And he he is frozen in shock, the Doctor eases in, sidling to the side, making Green have to pick a target and Green…. Hates herself for admiring the move a little bit. But the feeling’s there… And the Doctor, Anderson, is soft-spoken and trying to soothe her. This doesn’t need to get ugly, she’s sick, and…

“I didn’t do this…” Green gestures to her face, to the thin lines around her face because having something iced o your face will do that. And no matter how she grows her hair, styles it, she can see it in every reflection. Green rolls up a sleeve, pointedly not showing her knife off, flashing her off arm and its broad bars of off-colored skin. “This wasn’t self-inflicted. You can’t ice-claw yourself. I don’t consent and I’m an emancipated minor because I still have my trainer’s license and earn income through battling. Which a call from the league can verify. I only lose it the second I willingly go with you, and I don’t. So. Get.Out.”

And there’s an orderly and she can see a yellow and black striped electabuzz and fuck, of course, they’d have electric types. Her trainer profile said she favored water and…

And she drew Blasty, barking out an order, and the earth split under the force of an untampered earthquake, knocking everyone off their feet and leaving a fissure on the floor and jags in the wall. The house wasn’t a battle arena after all. Blasty, who was more than braced, didn't take a tumble and Green was up in a second, held up by one of his paws.

Pipes ruptured, gushing stinging pillars, some at her, some at them, and though soaked, Green smirked at the fallen and flailing and she could kinda see why people did crappy things like join Team Rocket. Swinging her other pack, around Blasty’s neck, Green swung up on the turtle and flashed orderlies and doctors and him her best Mask of Ice smile, the one that burned and promised those around her that they would too.

“Surf!”

And every source of water shifted and surged, overflowing and roiling. From sink to pipes even the toilets, they overflowed and surged to form a wall in front of Blasty. Then the ‘mon made tidal wave did what water normally did, and surged ahead, throwing the debris, human and otherwise out of the paths of least resistance and taking out a few windows while it was at it.

“Hydro canon us out the back.” She growled, not wanting to risk having missed a ‘mon or orderly with a stun gun or something. And while they could just take the door, Green didn’t want to risk withdrawing Balsty, something, somehow, getting the drop on her in some unforeseen way. And since Blasty couldn’t manage the Azule home’s doors… they’d make their own. “We’ll take off from the yard.”

They were gone in seconds, leaving nothing but ruins behind them.

 

[K_S]

It was scarily easy to fall to old habits. Break and enter, oldest hat there was. She picked a hotel that was cheap more than anything else, with wide halls that were able to be seen by a nearby tree and a lack of cameras. Once the cleaner finished with the top floors and head down Green used Jiggly to flit from her perch to the farthest room, and though Jiggly bobbled a bit she was able to hold a pattern level with the window long enough for Green to pry it open and get herself in. Inside she re-summoned Jiggly and let the puffball get a nap in while Green called dibs on the shower. Once clean, she wrapped up the cuts she hadn’t noticed in her flight from their place, draped her old clothes to dry in the shower, and settled in something soft and warm all the better to comb Jiggly while the fuzzy Marshmellow napped. After an hour or so she shook Jiggly awake and took her turn at a nap.

While it wasn’t fully rested, she felt a bit better, a bit calmer, when she woke. Repacking her stuff, it was as easy to break out as it was to break in. Three controlled falls later and they were set and Green was waddling down the street with her too big packs and thinking up regular things. Places to set up camp, not on the beach, she wasn’t that stupid, but somewhere that trainers and police wouldn’t think to go.

She picked an old building that was going to be “completed soon”, it’s lack of footprints, cig butts, and discarded lunches affirmed that “soon” was probably a lie. But what was one more lie when it was useful? After another span of letting Jiggly fly the heavier packs up, then herself, they had… well a nest Green guessed. It wasn’t much; steel beams as a ceiling, partially completed walls, and a floor more holes than anything else. Still, people didn’t think to look up, except bird watchers, and Sevii had nothing but winggul. And winggul didn’t like to perch so far away from their sandy nests, so no worries. Green covered the floor with a tarp, making the nook look a little more homely, and settled in to get a start on dinner before the sun dropped too low for her to really see anything.

Because she wasn’t using light up here, not for anything, not unless she had to get down in a hurry. Piling Nido’s food in a neat pile, dried berries and protein nibbles, and the like, she let the ‘rina dig in. The rest of her team had had breakfast and so long as she kept them in their pokeballs they wouldn’t have to eat until tomorrow, but since Nido’ was going to be on guard duty better to feed her now than later, and it’d be a treat for a potentially sleepless night since Green’d splurged and swiped some sugar packets from the hotel and sprinkled it on Nido’s pile.

“Rin rin!”

“Welcome.” Patting the poison type on the head Green settled her packs like the most awkward pillows ever and settled in, and on whim flipped opened her phone.

Huh, two missed calls, one from Yellow and one from Silver. A quick stint of “ink-a-bink, inkay in mink” led to her finger over Silver’s number, so she called him back first.

“Hi Sil’.” And she was able to speak normally, not to whisper and look over her shoulder and Arceus was that nice. Blinking back stinging warmth behind her eyes Green smiled, aches and pains a step removed. “How was your day, do anything interesting?”

And he was so happy, because with a lead in knew he could talk, and he clearly was itching too and so he plowed into it. About his day, and his newest prank and Green could imagine him bouncing and gleeful and…

“Holy Sweet Arceus… you didn’t…”

But he’s been humming that song because it was in his head, which meant he had…

And suddenly Green wasn’t too thrilled about her extraction, and sorta wished her parents could have held off their crazy for like… a week, week and a half…

But he had pictures and…

“Can you send me the video?”

“Yeah, hold on a second.’

And of course, he lost the call while doing it, still, the files come in and she’s popped them open, playing them at half volume while she’s sifting through her travel bars while Nido’ finishes her dinner besides her. Green’s waffling on strawberry vanilla or choco-peanut butter crunch when he calls back. They both taste like cardboard, gummy cardboard, but the crunch is a bit bitter and she’s in the mood for bitter she decides.

“Awww… so his Rhyhorn’s super friendly.” Green cooed, between bites. The Silver on her small screen has snapped up something small off of Giovanni’s league desk and is playing fetch with the ground type “accidentally” trashing the man’s room all the while.

“I have no idea why he has that thing on guard duty.” Silver sniggered, “It’s really agile for a rock type though… see it does that spin thing in the air…”

More like a double axel, a meld of rollout and a jump that a Persian might do, not a rhyhorn.

“You did not… Silver… what have I said about rubbing strange ‘mon’s on the belly?”

“He was friendly!” The redhead wined. “And he kept whimpering when I didn’t… and…”

And Silver was whimpering, just a little bit and… “Well so long as it wasn’t his Rhydon…” Green folded.

She’d seen Rhydon try to crush Blue, and while Green didn’t like Blue, she’s seen the ‘mon try to kill another kid. And there was something in her that felt sick just thinking about Silver being near it.

Silver’s following silence is a bit worrying and Green really really missed her newer phone, the one that would let her see who she was talking to.

“Silver, you didn’t play with Giovanni’s Rhydon when it was on league guard duty, right?”

“Noooo… He only had his Rhyhorn as his “ceremonial guard” for his workstation. There weren’t even people guards around, which was weird.”

And probably planned, Green wondered what Yellow’d said to tip Giovanni off on the “prank”.

“Alright.” That was good, right? “So what did you play with?”

“So… Surge had a cage of joltiks in his office and Yellow felt bad for them because they were hungry and sad and… We opened the cage… well I dropped it… and they got out and.. well we thought there were like five or so…But the others were really really shy I guess. And, well they squealed and skittered over me and Yellow as thanks and um… they went into the wiring and sockets and computers and… I lost count after… fifty of them?”

“Sil’.” Green groaned, flopping into her packs; hand over her face, blushing from secondhand embarrassment. Because rookie mistake number one was, playing with a targets pokemon. And while Green could understand playing with Rhydon -it was a bit cute for a ground type- but Joltik? Really?

“But we were able to get them to break Lance’s door and we fed them Sabrina’s brand new computer to keep them out of the speakers and stuff when we set up Lance’s computer to.. you know… play the song.”

“The song stuck in your head, right now?”

“Yeah….” Silver groaned the confession.

“You know Giovanni’s going to ground you for like the rest of your life for infesting the Kanto League with parasitic electric roaches, right?”

“Yellow said that too. Even though it was her idea, but… I.. I didn’t want to ask her but… what’s grounding? It’s not like… that exercise Mask did, with the rocks and the pit and we had to dig out or he’d leave us buried, right?”

Only Ditty’s ability to shift to a shovel had saved them. Snea’s claws were too soft, not fully frozen which made sense since she wasn’t more than three at the time and shouldn’t have been away from her parents in the wild, Jiggly had been too young to properly puff… that “exercise” had been scary.

And luckily was nothing like grounding…

And she told him, soothing his fears and he’d huffed about how stupid grounding really sounded.

“They just take nice things away?”

“Yeah to make you think about what you did, less distractions and more chores, especially the ones they don’t want to do themselves. I had to clean out a grill once, an outdoor cooking one and...”

And had Silver ever ate anything off of a grill before? Green tried to remember, kicking one foot idly into the floor as she went down memory lane, and figured it was a no. Something to set up then. She was old enough to do the burning charcoal thing and set the food up properly, and if not they could swipe a Charmander or something to do it for them.

That sounded like fun.

“Sooo… I got a new ‘mon…”

“Alright, what’d you catch, you overachiever?” Green laughed.

“Well, I found one in my hair after we left….”

“Silver… you did not bring home a joltik.”

“Yellow’s home, not mine…And she’s got nine of them, they’re out eating at some neighbor’s house who keeps blasting his music too loud. I gotta pick them up around midnight to bring them back so they don’t get caught.”

Clearly Green’s being a bad influence here, and… and she’s not minding it in the slightest, not really.

“Silver, they can’t even attack anything, they’re like… itty bitty.” And she’s pinching her fingers even though Silver’s not there.

“I’m going to train mine to hide in my pockets and bite people who go for my wallet.”

And… that didn’t sound like a bad idea. Not at all.

“So how was your day?” And Silver’s calm and happy and Green’s tempted to lie. But he’ll catch her, sooner rather than later, and Green’s sorta hating that she’s going to make his day worse by being honest. Really, her life is just a case against honesty. The more she sees it in action, the less she likes it.

“Pretty bad, thanks for the videos, they helped. Hey, what’d Yellow name it?”

“Jojo…” Something chirrups in the background and Silver’s talking to the joltik Green’s sure. “It’s pending… and stupid and… not your name. You aren’t jojo, I’m going to find a cool name and name you that one we get you to the ‘center and figure out if you’re a boy or a girl.”

Another chirp, it’s like listening to static gargle. Then there’s interference and Green’s sure Silver just rolled over.

“Alright, so bad, how?”

“Well, I got expelled.” And Green’s kicking one foot and Silver can hear it if that hurmph means anything.

“Congratulations… you hated that school. That’s what the gloves were for. The coat was for passing whatever you wanted to pass, the scarf for failing whatever you wanted to fail, and the gloves are for getting expelled. Did you punch that really snooty viridian fat cat girl in chem?”

“No, I had Jiggly sing a teacher to sleep and slipped off.”

“Oh.” He sounded disappointed a bit. “But I thought you wanted to really punch that purugly girl who shoved that boy with the crutches around until he was crunched into a locker?”

Alright, so Green may have brought it up, five or six times, but… it felt like an opportunity lost thinking about it now. Still, to quote Yellow, life kinda had happened and…

So Green tells Silver everything, and the only thing she’s sorry about is how much of a bad mood it puts him in.

“They deserve worse.” Silver snarls, sounding as mad as she’d been. Reminding her of Giovanni a little bit, when he’d yelled at them. Right now Green’s more tired than anything and once she’s safely gone she sorta thinks the rest of the anger is going to go away.

They lost her, and while they could lose other things losing her was the biggest loss in their lives though they’d never know that. And were all the more fools for that.

Green can hear the wheels turning. Mask had always said there was something innately malicious about Silver. Mask had hit him and hurt him and let others do so to bring his “potential” out, or rather he’d tried. But Silver was one of those types that curled around his own hurts and wouldn’t say a word. It’d never crossed that old fool's head to hurt Green, granted if he had Silver’d of tried to kill Mask and then Green’d of been burying Silver.

Silver’s… badness… as it were, was something they had both discovered once they were out of Mt Mortar, a trainer had tried to pin Green down and wasn’t making sense. Really hadn’t made a lick of it. But Green hadn’t liked him, his closeness, his touching, and she’d yelled at him to get off and he hadn’t. The man had tried to get a grip on her throat to “shut her up”.

Silver’d moved faster than Sneasel that time. And while a little melted his ice knife had worked, well had worked after the fifth swing. When the body had stopped moving they’d had a long talk, about how to do things better so there was less blood because Green knew this even if Silver hadn’t. And then they’d cleaned up and then after picking the pockets had left the body for whatever ate whoever on Mt. Mortar. Some hiking had led them to find the trainer’s camp and they had stayed in his camp for few days, eating his rations, before moving on and taking his blankets with them.

“No ice knifing.” She scolded because it’s the first thing that’d going to pop into Silver’s head, she knows it. “Really Sil’ once I’m gone… I’m never going back and… they lose me, losing anything else is just… overkill. And it’s more effort than they deserve.”

“Yeah,” and that hard anger in his voice is dimming. “You are the best after all.”

“Yep, and don’t you forget it!”

“Ok so… I know Yellow’s sorta telling F- Giovanni about you know.. the things I’m doing but… You think there’s a way you can find out how grounded I am when he gets you off of Sevii? I figure if I hide that long I can avoid being instantly grounded when he runs into me or something?”

“Sorry Silver, the grounding starts when you get home, staying out late makes it worse.”

“Ung, why are parents so… so weird?”

Well, Green didn’t have a good answer for that so they both fall quiet, Nido’s snuggled close and enjoying her chin tickles if her scrunched-up eyes meant anything. Then… it’s soft… quiet… and so very familiar… Silver’s humming, a stiff sort of embarrassed hum that meant…

“It’s still stuck in your head, isn’t it? The song?”

“Yes! It’s been hours….”

“You know, if you spin it like that… that you had to suffer a lot too… maybe make it sound like the song was Yellow’s idea, you might be able to make Giovanni not ground you for forever. You might even be able to scale it down for like, a month or something.”

“A month?”

“You infested the indigo plateau with little electric roach ticks Silver. Yeah, I’m guessing a month here. At least. Might be more. I mean aren’t Sabrina and him dating?”

“No, no they aren’t.” Silver sounds horrified, and after a mental rewind, Green’s sorta too and regretting quoting that tabloid she read. Sabrina has mental birds that she inflict on people her being with anyone else could lead to the possibility of there being more people with mental birds in their heads to throw at people and… Green’s snuggling Nido just from that thought alone.

“Alright, they aren’t dating.” Green ruled.

“Or together or anything else gross like that…” And it’s quiet as both of them consider that horrifying thought and the realization that they’re both running out of things to say that aren’t sappy or silly and then Green remembers, with a wince, that shes’ going to have to find an unwatched socket to charge her phone, so she probably shouldn’t let it go too low and it’s at seventy right now…

“I probably should…”

“Hey, do you think you can ask him about you know.. my Mom?”

And ohh boy is Green not even going to promise anything about that… Because that sounds like walking up to a tauros covered in red ribbons and flags and capes and kicking it in the face if all the red fluttering didn’t make it go berserk. Yeah, no, Silver can ask that question all on his own…

“I really need to go…”

“But could you?”

“Wow it’s going red, gotta go, bye Silver talk to you tomorrow!”

Green hangs up, it’s not a good save, or an elegant one… but it’d do for now.

XXX

“What’s wrong?”

Giovanni had stormed off, and after a while and there being no yelling or him returning Sevii’s mayor had hunted him down out a mix match of curiosity and boredom. She’d found him beside the mens’ bathroom, making incoherent noises in the back of his throat. Back stiff, gaze riveted on his phone, strangling on sheer indignation.

Which considering everything was.. Distinctly odd.

He’d warned her when they started their outing, after recalling his Kangaskaun that was going to be carrying no one, thank you, that he might have a “family” emergency. And she’d understood. Until a quick polygon one search had affirmed he’d had no living family that he was on speaking terms with, and she’d confronted him about it.

She’d been a bit hurt until he’d confessed to the utter insanity of his personal life.

Of a son thought dead, found, abducted by a mad man and utterly poisoned against him as his abductor had been a Johotian Xenophobe with a slant for ice types.

And no wonder the scene at the restaurant had been so... borderline violent…

Her heart softened as she listened to his present campaign of how he was trying to use the boy’s friends to get him to warm, first to civilization, to trying to live a more mundane life… than to perhaps meeting him. Making some sort of relationships. The results thus far had been made with decidedly mixed if the disaster with his first friend, a Green, had gone as badly as Giovanni had hinted.

And like all doting parents he’d actually had a few stills of his boy, security camera stills, but… it was the thought that counted… right?

He was leaning against the wall, biting on a hand to keep from articulating… horror… rage? She couldn’t tell. And taking her life in her hands Sevii’s mayor eased the phone down so she could see, he limply going along with the pressure.

She’s seeing a hall… with a carpet of dancing yellow.. joltick rise from the floor to spell out lyrics in time to music that’s pounding though the phone's speaker, a rather irritating song that she only sorts of recalls….

The scene shirted to a guard Rhyhorn following the boy from the stills like a happy puppy, Silver, she assumes, tossing something and the beast is bounding down the hall leaving craters and…

There’s a doduo running amuck in a room, bouncing off walls and crowing…

And there’s a whole hall iced and snowmen and the view flicks again to another disaster, a door ajar, papers scattered far and wide serving as carpeting, silly string looking like fangs from the entryway and before she can focus on the room in full he’s closed his hands over the phone and killed the image.

“Oh my God.” Because he hasn’t said anything but looks seconds from losing his mind… “…I think your son’s friends need help with that whole taming him and bringing him back to civilization thing…”

And he’s still not responding.

So Sevii’s mayor does the only sane thing she can think to do. She takes his arm and leads him out of the gallery before his delayed reactions break and he causes some social disaster all his own. It’s a bit, she thinks, like walking an explosion happy voltorb, one fond of making high-pitched strangling noises.

 

[K_S]

AN: Need to run through gramerly


Green alternated between construction sites, hotels, and abandoned apartments. Steering clear of the beaches, only nipping into small mom and pop fish markets to get fresh feed for Blasty, because he’d earned it. She even bought it, skipping her usual means of stealing, because… well the emergency money and this was one, just not how they intended it. Glasses and a hat his most of her features, and she’d slicked her hair to the side instead of leaving it down or in a braid like normal, another layer, and she was set to mingle for short spans. So mingle she did, getting the odd and end supplies and since it was an odd day it was Blasty’s treat day, so off she went to the fish market.

Pushing open the door of one without a camera, it jingled at her coming, she looked around. It wsa the same as the two others she’d visited. Hanging fish, and boxes of unshelled cloyster, there was only a counter at the front, a block of knives and a slew of papers, and that was it for the front desk. A radio played form some corner, set to a music station, slow and old without chatter, still she kept an ear towards it just in case some blurb about a missing girl kicked in.

“Wha’ can I get for you?” The clerk grumbled, before she wandered up, looking up from her previous interest, a magikarp on a hook, eyes cloudy, gutted and salted and reeking in a way that screamed too old to safely ear. Green smirked at the man, amused, because he probably was noticing that she was noticing his falsehood and was a bit surely about it.

Well the “freshest caught fish in Sevii” sign out at the front was a bit of false advertising since all Sevii had was shellfish, unless the ‘karp was farmed, but this wasn’t that type of place.

“I’d like to get eight pounds of slivered Cloyster please.”

Because Sevii only had Cloy’s and Shell’s, and Cloy had a higher nutritional value than Sellders, though it tasted a bit worse for the extra calcifications in the ‘mons body. Making any cooking with it tedious as the boneless things had spurs on it’s rim, where shell spikes were rooted and connected to the nerve system so special attacks could be a thing. Not that many non-trainers knew or cared about that, they just wanted an easy dinner.

Still, Blasty loved crunchy things, and Cloy’s were cheap because most people didn’t want to do the extra deboning, so win-win for Green.

He named a price per pound, she accused him of being a Rocket because that was the price for a deboned-Seaking fillet, and did she look like Mayor what’s-her-name?

“You going to argue or you going to buy?”

Green whipped off the sign for the Seaking section, because it was paper, and flimsy, and trooped it over. "See, same price. I could rent a slowpoke from a professional breeder, take it fishing, and after it evolved get a shelder, a slowpoke tail, and it’d be… like nine dollars cheaper.”

And the clerk’s lips were twitching. “Probably.”

“So how about we start at the beginning and say… five dollars per pound?”

“Well considering its six….”

The man had a funny way of talking. Like the man who’d buy what Green’d snatch off of tourists back when she sold off most of what she’d stolen. So her Rocket jab was a bit of a test. The man behind the counter, no name tag, and a bit of a swagger to go with the words, maybe passed, maybe didn’t.

If this was Rocket joint Giovanni needed to get a hobby besides taking everything over. After all, what could you do with a fish shop?

Then Green considered the block of knives, and a back she couldn’t really see, and decided she didn’t want to think about that too much.

She read the papers that he splayed her cuts on. Nothing about missing children, her or otherwise. She listened to the radio, and more of the same, just music and static. Granted the papers were day before, but…

But she wondered, about why she wasn’t hearing anything, in the news, in the papers. She wondered if the medical people had called the league and her papers had rung true, or if they hadn’t cared enough to report her missing…

That last thought made something in her chest go tight and she swallowed, tried to pick out Silver stories instead, while the man wrapped, making her reading a problem. It was something to do while he worked that didn’t make her heart hurt.

Money passed hands, she had to get on tip toe to get to reach far enough not to put it in any goop, and he took it after peeling off a glove, counting it twice, while she adjusted to the weighty package.

“You played me fair, now get out.”

“Yeah,” well she’d played him, and he’d played back, so fun for them both, right? “Thanks.”

“Grazie.” The man behind the counter grumbled. “Don’t go spoiling this by being a dumb ass tourist about how you say something, Little Miss. Thanks is Grazie.”

“Graze-ie” Green parroted flashing him a grin when he smirked, telling her she’d either gotten it right or said it so wrong it was a profanity. Win either way. Heading to the door, about half way there, Green stopped.

“Hey, what’s bye?”

“For someone your age, a “bye” like this, it’s chiao.”

“Its chiao. Got it.”

And the guy barks out a laugh… “No, kid it’s literally…”

But he’s talking to the door and bell as it sings out, swinging shut behind the departing little girl with a clatter.

XXX

Blasty took his breakfast on the park, a purloined and cleaned off plastic plate to hold his meal of the day in a nest of paper, sprinklers going full blast because he needed the extra water and kicking the park sprinklers always set them off. While weird Blasty took his breakfast in the shower well. Wolfing down the slivers, slurping them like noodles. It wasn’t a swim and hunt but it’d do. He looked better, his scales gaining a bit of luster for the hydration. Though, since things seemed calm for whatever reason Green decided, watching Blasty go wild in a muddy patch of ground, that she’d take him and ‘Sea for a swim tonight. Even risk camping on the beach so they could get a good soak and hunt in.

But that was for tonight, until then there was some sprinklers going off without anyone running through them, and Green really should do something about that.

So she did.

XXX

She had to move twice. Sevii’s beaches were surprisingly exciting at night.

The first time was because of a truck. Not that monster of a truck that mowed down sand dunes around the Rocket Box Spot, or so Green’d started calling her soon-to-be-extraction spot. No it looked like a moving truck with it’s company writing scraped off. It stopped near her sandbank camp site, the back popped open while she was swiping sleep from her eyes, and she was half a mind to climb that sand bank and tell Archer off for waking her up, or whatever Rocket was there.

She was not expecting a bunch of men dressed like overcooked hotdogs to tumble out. Their features lost in high neck shirts and blocky red and orange visors, their garments were near skin tight, and she watched as they puled out barrels with weird symbols on them with a mean sort of anticipation. Nothing ripped, or tore, which was a shame. Still, like any self-respecting teenager, Green had her phone out and on record and caught her own grumbling about no “tears” in the soon to be anti-dexters video share group. Watching the mystery ‘dogs load, then wheel off, and dump… something… Whatever it was stunk, she could smell it from here, and she left her phone on the bank, letting it record without her as she packed up her stuff and slung everything in place. Summoning Blasty so they could make a quick getaway, she went back for her phone, and picking it up, she accidentally took a picture and the flash went off.

That’s what got her almost caught.

And chased.

By hotdog men.

The second time she nearly plowed into a search and rescue group looking for her.. Which, she really really had to just not laugh, because they were using her pre-kidnap picture and kept mispronouncing her last name. Still, she’d been seen, so she joined them on the edges with a shy wave, announcing she was Argent, when one of the youngest asked her name. She hung out among the scattering of trainers, teens, and officers, lurking among the youngest of the volunteers. She nodded and looked solemn and serious, biting on her cheek so not to giggle, while they went on about the dangers of someone being so young, so lost at sea… And speech done the police officer passed out flares for them to line the beach with so that they could “help” by making sure the rescuers could find the shore… Well Green did scatter her share, and then just kept on going.

But that marked off that patch of beach for.. well anything really.. and she hiked a lot longer than she’d wanted too. Crossing over a thin line of a wire, and a rocky outcrop that marked this patch of beach as someone’s private property.

There was a sign, all visitors will be psychically scanned, and Green just ignored it.

It was like one of those “electric signs” that just weren’t electric. After all who’d be rich enough to afford a psychic ‘mon security service? You’d have to own… most of Sevii, be Giovanni rich to do something like that.

Her head did tingle when she pulled the string up and slipped under it, but it was likely some pseudo mind read thing, and it was gone one step later, so nothing was wrong. Confident of that, Green poked around and found a perfect spot, with raised rocks and no hint of a path. The ground was sandy more than rocky and… and a squint at the sky confirmed that she had at least nine hours before the tide became a problem.

So, until then, Green, drew Blasty and Horsea with a grin.

“Last one in is a rotten eggsecute!”

They cheered and raced for the waves, Blasty a thunderous, ponderous, runner, Horsea coiling into a spring and “spoink”ing towards the waves… And Green was content to be left behind to make camp for a second time.

When the waves woke her, ten hours later, after sleeping in waaaay too long, Green decided no more beaches for a week. She’d steal coins and hose her team down at a car wash or something.

She crawled from her ruined camp, just glad that she’d set her stuff on top of the rocks via Jiggly before going to bed. Dragging her water logged blanket behind her, sputter and flailing after one spectacular wave tried to drag her out to sea, she shambled further towards the shore, spitting profanities she’d heard Red, and Rockets, and Karen used. Her ranting didn’t make sense, but she felt a bit better for yelling about something.

It figured that the fat-cat who owned the beach was out on her morning run jsit then. Green’s luck was just that bad. The woman had pretty red ahir, almost Silver pretty, and a jog suit that looked like it cost more than Green’d ever earned, stolen, and conned in her life. The number gizmo caught Green’s eye, she could snatch and grab and run… but a longer look confirmed it was melded into the suit, and thus wasn’t something Green could swipe.

Really, it just figured.

“Sweetie… what in Kygore’s name are you doing out here it’s…” And Blasty hunkers out of his shell, the waves waking him up, and he’s shuffling after Green. The woman’s eyes go wide, then thin, as she assumes “trainer” and probably “lost little kid” while she was at it. “The pokecenter’s-“

“On the other side of the island.” Green finished, confirming she hadn’t washed ashore late last night or something. “I know.” And she’s twisting her hair out, trying to ignore the grit of salt to… everything.

Above the sky rumbled, a few drops sputtered down, and Green flicked a glare at Blasty. A bit suspicious as the sudden drizzle and darkening sky. But the turtle only yawned, looking down at her saturated form with obvious amusement form the tip of his scales around his eyes. So the rain wasn’t due to him, nice to know. She orders the turtle to take his smugness to the rocks and get her stuff, all while the pretty lady watches on, a few moments and its’ more than spitting, it’s a steady drip that’s going to turn into a downpour, Green’s sure of it…

And she’s pretty sure the woman is too.

“Look…’ And the woman is considering Blasty with something like caution. That’s understandable, she doesn’t have a pokeball on her, Green gets it. Blasty’s big, still it’s a bit insulting how the woman relaxes when she scrolls her regard down to Green. Because Green’s not helpless, not one bit. “The pokecenter, h- heck,” and when wasn’t adult censoring lame, never, that’s when, “even getting to the edge of town’s a good half hour walk… But if you want, my homes about three minutes from here …”

Perhaps Green should feel bad, about her first thought is that this woman’s too trusting and that this could be one heck of an opportunity. But before guilt or anything more than acknowledgement can kick up in Green’s head, above her head the sky rumbles. Blasty rumbles encouragement at the sky, wags his tail in anticipation. That’s an old warning for Green, because the turtle loves it when it storms, and in about ten minutes he’s going to be having the time of his life. And while Blasty might like it, Green’d rather not court a cold, or worse.

“It it’s OK?” Green folded, wondering why Ms. Pretty Red-Head looked familiar. “Until this blows over.”

“Alright…” And she’s turning about, a glance to confirm Green and her bag toting turtle were following. “You know, I never did introduce myself, I’m Silvia.”

“Huh,” A pretty name to go with a pretty face and Green’s hands itch, wondering what she might have in her property she might not miss. “Nice to meet you, I’m Green.”

And it’s a bit… odd… the woman’s double take, but she’s at least adult enough not to make one of the many many color themed jokes Green’s heard her whole life. Which is a bit of a relief really and makes Green decide not to take too much.

Just enough to get sell off to get a treat, maybe a raincoat, a good set of boots, and nothing else…

But only if they got to her place before the storm really hit, if it took longer than three minutes everything’s fair game.

 

[K_S]

The nice thing about avoiding storms is they left little opportunity for chit-chat. Thus Green didn’t have time to berate herself for saying her first name or have to stammer out a fake last name, or anything equally exciting. It was just running, (well trotting for Blasty but the turtle was just dragging his shell because he wanted to get wet, the weirdo), not quite side by side, the pretty lady leading for obvious reasons. Green staggered a bit as her backpack threw her, but they made it before the water really came down. Tracking muck and sand and water over a pristine porch, but oh well. Shivering under the sanctuary of a wide, white, porch with an overhanging roof that looked something out of tales about westerns and Orre, the look was pretty and transplanted. Wringing her hair out, Green let her gaze comb over the porch. Potted plants, most which Green didn’t recognize, and a wind-chime clanging like mad that was more abstract art than anything recognizable. There was no rocking bench, like in the movies, no chairs, the overall effect was a bit… bare. But maybe this was a place to stand and look at the surf before going off to do other things. There was a carport off to the side, locked and sealed, but Green wasn’t quite so bold as to be eyeing.


Really it wasn’t like she could drive, or even reach the peddles.


Swinging her packs a bit more comfortably, over her back, Green shook her head, stomped her feet, dealt with the little things while she planned.


This lady was fat-cat Viridian rich, she’d likely not miss too much and there were a few spots in Greens’ packs she could fluff up, having burned through a few days of food. She had a few ideas where there might be a few Rocket-owned pawn shops… but why guess? She could just call Giovanni after she left the pretty lady’s home and offer him the goods. Novelty alone might get her a straightforward answer.


Thunder crackled above, and Green hopped, just a tiny bit, mind. Besides her, the pretty redhead gave her an understanding smile, scraped a hand over her head in a way that was far too familiar, and dug out a key card from a pocket so close to her skin it looked near skin tight. A flick over a slit in the front door and some mechanism inside clicked. The knob rattled, and the woman reached out, turning it and the door worked, normal-like.


Why… it seemed so extra… but considering a card would be harder to pick… and forget pickpocketing it out of that skin-tight running onesie she was wearing, Green sort of got the idea. But still, how could you get in if there was a power outage or something?


“Go on, I’ve company but he doesn’t bite, I’ll be in a bit after I feet Atticus.”


“Who’s?“ Claws clicked, shuffling sideways from a dune besides the carport came a Krabby, thus the Atticus mystery was resolved. “Alright, if that’s alright… Um just have Blasty leave my packs by the door and he can just take a shower in the storm. He knows to knock if he wants to come in.”


And he’d hydro pump the door down if he hears Green scream, not that the lady needed to know that.


Pulling off a few berries off of one of the unknown trees in a pot, the woman’s clucking at the Krab whose taking the stairs with a peculiar hopping sideways scuttle, and Green smirks a bit at the sight before poking her head into the door.


“I’ll just put my stuff by the door if that’s ok?”


No response, but then the Krabby’s doing a really good job of clicking and dancing, wanting his food right now, the ladies got her hands full. So Green shrugs off her things and scoots them off to the side. The floors are bare wood, and habit has her kick off her shoes, flip open her stuff so it’s “accidentally open” and thus easy to drop things into later. Manners appeased, and with a loose plan in place she straightened, scanning the room. It’s big and branched off in two directions as well as goes forward into a hall. The main color of choice is white, and cream, supposedly soothing, and makes Green think of milkshakes and marshmallows. Closest to her is a couch and a TV “floating” against the wall, it’s one of those paper-thin ones that boast three-d effects she supposes. There’s not a remote to be seen, but then rich people have voice-activated stuff, and since it’s bolted to the wall it’s a firm no-go for her packs. Twin bookshelves holding knickknacks rather than books bracketing each side of the screen most looked like awards, photos, and personal mementos rather than small anonymous things that would be easier to sell off… and to that Green huffs in disappointment.


Seriously, there was nothing in this room unless Green wanted to find a tool kit, work down the TV and…


And her train of thought is interrupted by a blur of white on the edge of her vision one thump and frictionless skid across the warm wood floor and Green finds herself pinned under a huge rag’ breed Persian. Her face is bracketed by widespread paws, claws clicking millimeters from her throat and face, and the cat’s stupid heavy hind paw has one leg pinned and another on her stomach. It’s only a mercy that it’s putting most of its weight on the forepaws, scarring the wood by her face, rather than breaking her ribs.


Despite the… consideration… Green’s left winded, near smothering under the thick longish hairs as the thing looms over her. The thing's almost as long-haired as a pyroar, and at her pathetic moan it looks down at her. The cat’s whiskers twitched up, making the baring of fangs a bit of a smirk, a familiar smirk. And it pisses Green off even if she can’t quite place where she’s seen that sort of look before.


An attempt to call for help ends with a paw raising up, settling over her about the mouth, it’s there then gone. The smothering is only a second long, barely any pressure, but Green’s gasping at the end of it. But Green gets it. No yelling.


And isn’t it scary that this thing’s that smart, that experienced….


Well, Green’s no pushover and doesn’t need help. She’s about to draw her knife, risk a stab into the thing’s ribs to get it off and get Nido out when the cat looks up. And it’s purring gets a bit louder, almost in greeting, then it’s looking down at her, red eyes squinted up in amusement, one paw scratching an inroad to her face, but not quite touching. The claws cradling her cheek, near prickling close.


“Hi kitty, nice kitty, purr purr purr…”


She’s babbling, hoping the cat won’t notice that Green’s pulling her arm to the side to better twist out her knife…


Footfalls, bare, no shoes. No open door either, so clearly the pretty ladies “company” wasn’t this four-legged killer. Which meant this wasn’t a guard ‘mon, or rather her guard ‘mon. Oh joy, a variable Green couldn’t see. Literally, couldn’t see. Her world was those red eyes, and a sea of fur, claws cradling her cutting close, and a voice.


“What the Hell are you doing here?”


A damned familiar, voice.


“You’ve got to be kidding-“


And the cat’s hissing in her face, and Green shrinks back into herself, it’s more a squirm, and she swallows resentment, mollifying her tone.


“I mean, Hi Mr. Sakaki.”


With a chuff the cat relaxes, understanding the tone if not the words and eases out of its hostility. Then the black-tipped ear twitches up from their previous plastered to the head pose as a calloused hand twiddles said ear. The feline is leaning into the man besides it, rumbling up a storm. Besides the cat, looking down at the cat's catch, cup of steaming something in hand, Giovanni looks... bored.


Like there were kids pinned under his killer cat every morning when he was out visiting friends… or whatever adults did at sleepovers.


Because those were slightly askew, partially open, dark green silk PJ’s. Green would bet her whole food ration on it.


He waited, slowing his petting of the cat as he stared down at her with a peculiar, detached, expression that made Green's skin crawl. SHe wondered if this was hwo Rockets were stared at when they failed and were going to be offed.


“I’m not dealing with this until I’ve finished my cup.”


Then,on near-silent footsteps, he padded out of the limited range of her sight. Alone, sorta, Green groaned.


“You’re just going to leave it-“


“Her, and yes.”


It figured, really, just why? Why her? Why today? She should have just camped at a car wash or something. Listening to the rain outside really pick up, Green slumped against the wood at her back, twitching a foot as she slumped into her sprawl.


She hoped Blasty was having fun if nothing else.


She could hear some noise from the porch, and further away Giovanni was walking about. Fussing with a sink. Just leaving her like this. Well, the noise from outside getting closer was a promise that her solitude was going to end in a bit… And perhaps there was a way to make this work for her. She’d have to give up the last of her dignity, but when did that stop her?


When the door clicked open Green was on her second rendition of “Nice soft kitty” and Giovanni’s Persian, funnily enough, had started purring in time with the song’s prompts to purr and looked a bit non-pulsed when Green was caught off guard by the redhead's return didn’t do the prompt to purr.


Suffice to say the redhead's expression, to Green pinned under an oversize feline singing “soft kitty” must have been something, the strangling noises were, if nothing else, interesting.

 

[K_S]

Need to run through Grammerly.

Green really hated it when adults dug into her phone.

After a quick review of Silver’s most recent send along, something that’d made Silvia laugh and soured Giovanni’s mood further. He’d gotten into her most recent footage and watched it, stony face, jaw muscle jumping, as he fought against some impulse or other that he obviously didn’t want to be public.

Well, that was his problem, he shouldn’t have taken her phone in a public place then.

Hovering over his shoulder, and probably reminding him why he couldn’t lose his cool just be being there, the pretty redhead watched as well. Face turning from amused to worried.

“Those definitely are new and not native to my Region.”

“The Liepard lines are a Kalos vanity,” Giovanni noted, dark eyes thinned, tone near monotone, “as are the corgunk and scrafty. They’re exotic, and transplants being used to transport… and dump.. .whatever that was.”

“I recognize the uniform, and while I could level some ugly claims at the Kalos embassy… I’m going to need more proof than one little girl’s video recording.”

Sitting across from the adults, Green sulked, stirring her oatmeal. Her breakfast, courtesy of the more considerate adult, was loaded with enough sugar to be deadly. With honey on top because Green was owed an apology and she’d take extra sweet as a starting point. She’d also sorta remembered that honey helped with aches (but was starting to think it might have something to do with aching throats, not bruises, because the extra sweetness wasn’t helping at all) gnawing on the coagulation of grain, heat, and sweet, while her privacy was invaded by adults.

Yet again.

“Someone’s looking to shake things up in Sevvi, gut your economy at the least. Why else drive something toxic across town and toss it into the ocean, there specifically?”

Face stilling into a no-tell stillness Silvia made a noise in her throat.

“I want to cross check that theory, and I’ve got a whole slew of ocean scientists who can figure the tides and what not.” And the woman, who was clearly more than just “pretty” gave Green the Look.

Oak had one like it.

The Look was a damnable mix of arcanine eyes and adult and it made Green’s skin crawl like Giovanni’s peculiar no-tell expression when she saw It. The last time It was tipped at her she found herself doing something stupid, dangerous, for the “right reasons” and look how far that’d gotten her. To a broken home and being on the run again, so no, Green wasn’t going to fold to The Look, thank you very much. Not today, not tomorrow…

“Sweetheart, are you ok?”

Green’d been pointedly looking outside, not looking at either adult, she jolted at the warm hand that closed over hers, not quite gripping. Green could twist her hand free, push back, get her stuff, and bolt.

She should, that’d be the smart thing to do.

But no, she had to look up, meet Silvia’s, because of manners and… ung she was taking the Look head on now.

Why why why…

In the back of her head, Green could hear Silver, his voice wry mimic of some league announcer as he listened to her bemoan The Look and how Oak’d used it against her.

“It’s supereffective.”

She’d told him to shut up, then, and right now it was on the tip of her tongue to just blurt that out right now, get her things, and run. Hypothermia, pneomiea, all that was nothing compared to the sheer insanity The Look had gotten her into before.

She’d gone to Silph for it. Red’s puppy eyes drawing her grudging cooperation…

Silver’d tried it then too, to talk her into a break in. A really stupid one. And she’d fallen for it, hook line and sinker. Green cringed into herself, wincing back form the touch because Arceus, she could feel herself getting sucked in. Nothing was even being asked yet and Green was utterly helpless for any case of puppy eyes. No matter Mask’s training, or her life, she really did have quad vulnerability to puppy eyes…

And wasn’t that a revelation.

“No.” Because she might as well try to get out of this, even if it was futile.

“Certainly,” and damned the man for sounding so compassionate, his eyes were hard though, Green could see that at least even if she couldn’t hear through his lies. “You can at the very least tell us where you were camped last night.”

“No I’m really not.” Green dug in, lips pressing into a thin line. “And I can’t. You can use my phone, track its location,” she’d never turned it off since no one knew she’d had it, it’d seemed a bit paranoid to bother. And funnily how she’s lost sleep over worrying about it, even as it was helping her now. “You can have my phone, if you get me a new one and pay a year on it. No turning it off later, no using it to bug me or look me up either, you do that, and it’s yours. But you leave me alone after.”

Ms. Silvia had let her hand go, though that troubling look of concern had deepened, even as Giovani, leaning on the table besides the woman, twiddled with Green’s phone. The man was clearly toying with the idea of not giving it back. Well Green wasn’t going to let him have it. Green tapped the table and held out her hand, request obvious, and in front of witnesses, well she wasn’t sure what he would do.

“It’s mine.” Green snapped.

“The preferred make and model for the replacement?” The Rocket was so still, an in that moment he was suspended over so many possibilities and telling none of what he’d do with his tone or features.

Was he amused at her vehemence, irritated at her refusal, something else?

Green couldn’t tell.

She checked a shiver and snapped the phone back. Quick and hard enough you’d think he’d count to make his fingers at the motions end, but he just leaned back, waiting.

“I… I need a computer to look this sort of thing up… I only used my folk’s to do school work.”

“Speaking about your folks…” The pretty lady pipped up.

And before Green could begin to spin a lie, an evasion part truth part falsehood-

(She was a trainer, swinging by. See her water team? They loved going to the ocean and Sevii looked so promising… and so on and so forth.)

Giovanni shook his head.

“Inaccessible I’m afraid.”

“You have more than one kid?” The woman canted a bitter look up, Green forgotten in that moment. Clearly irritated and alluding to some other conversation that Green knew nothing about.

“Silver’s called her his sister, in my hearing even, but the situation is a bit... more complicated than misplaced adventures in my adolescence... Perhaps, before you do your research, Green, I should tender all the appropriate introductions?” As if her opinion mattered. Still Giovanni was waiting, so Green nodded, and the man continued. "Miss Mayor and head of the Sevii Region, may I introduce you to Green Azule, ex-Mask of Ice Disciple, and keystone to Viridian Corp’s lawsuit into the Mask of Ice Johto/Kanto League scandal.”

Silvia made the Persian pinning Green down noise again, and the expression accompanying it was interesting. A mix of choking and constipation, utter indignation and horror, with a flush on top of it to round it all out.

“She’s just a kid!”

Huh, no wonder the woman had looked familiar.

“All the abductees that Mask took were horridly young. As you know… my son was less than five years old when he was taken…”

Silence, as Green contemplated the view out, it was raining meowths and growlithe, so out wasn’t much of an option. The Mayor of Sevii pulled herself together, while besides her Giovanni tapped one finger against the table. Calws clicked, heralding the feline’s return.

Alright so running was really out.

Green sighed, wishing she’s picked a different beach right now.

“You have a computer?” Pushing aside her meal, Green stood, and to that Silvia nodded.

“Most adults do. I’ll show you how to get set up.” The politician promised, and unlike most adults, the woman was true to her word.

XXX

Returning, the Rocket was the unpleasant scent of wet bird and the sound of waterlogged boots. And those sensations were a bit ominous when coming out of sleep. Only the softness around her and the warmth of the Persian draped over her kept Green from panicking. To better shake off the memory of old abductions Green struggled to sit up, and look around. It’d put a wall between then and now.

Having gotten up to flying into the teeth of a storm so to get Green’s demands “over with” Giovanni looked a mess. Some thumps, affirmed he’d made some sort of stop over by the door. Green could see more packs by the door and a shiny steel suit case that definitely wasn’t hers. Turning on his heel, to go deeper into the house, Giovanni stomped past her and the drowsy mayor. Looking distinctly wind burned, hair a mop on his head, skin pale from the chill, a ”sick Silver” sort of pale. He’d, by the sound of it, tossed a plastic box down and stomped off towards some unknown destination. Unknown, until Mayor Silvia looked up from her tablet and sprawl on a nearby chair and hollered at Giovanni that the bathroom was the third door, not the fourth.

A few heavy steps were the wordless response to those instructions...

Then the sound of running water, as perversely, the Rocket was going to take a hot shower after getting out of the rain.

Hadn’t he heard of drying off with warm towels and settling in front of a fire Green snorted, and then pushed off the Persian draped over her legs. Or rather, she nudged the cat, who opened a red eye, and with a murp, rolled over, letting Green get off. With a bit of squirming, mind.

“She’s friendy” her ass. Green knew when she was being herded about and controlled, even if that controller was soft and fluffy. Still, she was up and minding the water trail so she wouldn’t slip, Green nipped into the kitchen.

Wrapped in the ruins of a waterlogged bag, logo a mystery, was the phone Green’d ordered. The fluffruit 2000 x lite, a steely color closest to silver she’d found in the log. Near lost in the folds of a tearing bag were twelve cards. Premium plan chips, one for each month, labeled and stacked, they had unlimited everything, and sloshed clean from the down pour. The only packaging that’d made it was stuff protected by plastic covers…

That and a contract, wrapped in a ziplock bag.

She could make out a sharp signature that aas probably Giovanni’s on the bottom, but the rest of the writing was small print mumbo jumbo and so folded over Green’d have to dig it out to start reading. So Green didn’t bother.

Just stared at the things he had hared off into a storm to fetch. A bit numb, because it’d been a long long time since she’d gotten anything from someone.

Even if this was a classic case of “something for something”.

Looking back Green realized that They had given her things, things they thought she wanted, Mask had given her just enough not to die and taken everything else in the bargain… And Silver gave and gave, not expecting anything, not even thanks. And she hadn’t thanked him, not when he’d nearly gotten caught, breaking into places and fetching her soft warm things almost frantically those first few weeks.

Suffice to say, gifts were weird.

Footsteps from behind made Green look up, blink sharply at the stinging behind her eyes, as she saw the Mayor coming over, grumbling about men and their thoughtlessness at the water trail, then looking at her and smiling a small smile.

“Hey, he got you the right thing, right?”

Green nodded, not quite trusting herself to speak.

“Need help getting it open?”

A thump and click of claws affirmed that Persian was going to be wanting snuggles and herding her around into a spot so she could nap again, to that inevitability Green sighed. Time was limited, might as well make what she could of it.

“You got scissors?”

“Of course.”

One small perusal into a drawer by the sink, a rather mundane affair of odd and end hardware things that made sense, even if the duct tape in there didn’t, Silvia had a small pair of scissors on hand and movwd to passed them along. A merow, utterly insulted, sounded, and both woman and girl looked to the cat, who had reared and flexed a paw, pointedly.

“Offering to do the honors Persian?” Sevii’s mayor hummed. “Are you his personal paper assistant than?”

Whiskers twitched, near warping the cat’s snout into a smile, tail lifting, more to tone than words, the cat yowled, a friendly seeming, “Per!” as she batted at the box. Almost pointing at it.

“Pushy aren’t you.” Mayor Silvia chuckled, putting the scissors in her pocket. “How about I let you have go and if you can’t safely open it I’ll use these, fair?”

The cat’s responding meow was part ascent, utter sass, and a perfect fit for a Rocket’s pet, really, she was.

The phone was deboxed, the box in pieces and batted about, and the device was activated and charging by the socket closest to the front door when Giovanni stepped out of the shower. Sevii’s mayor was off to make calls deeper in the house, private adult only calls she hadn’t wanted Green to evesdrop on, and curiously she’d said as such, to Green directly.

“They aren’t about you, they’re work related. Mainly about the video, I need to let people know, and later mail those files out, if you’ll allow me to.”

Since Giovanni had held his word Green’d hold to hers. She’d made some noise that’d been taken as agreement, and more tired that anything else Green’d taken her sprawl back on the couch. The free entertainment of watching Persian play had been enough to keep her there, and the weather outside enough to keep her from planning on going out. It’d graduated from moewth and growl’s to arcanine and Persians, the only mercy was that there was no thunder, no power surges.

Being trapped with Rocket in the dark was not Green’s idea of a good time, even if they were sorta working together.

Content to let the good mayor think Green trusted her Green waved her off. Wished her a good day at work, even though it wasn’t quite a right fit, and with a smirk the woman had left. With her team on her belt, trust wasn’t an issue, Green had rain and type advantage if Giovanni descided to do anything stupid...

And seriously, considering Persian’s track record of getting her paw caught in the box, and wandering to Green with a soft mewl to “fix it”, and that it’d been the sixth time thus far…

Yeah, Giovanni had a team of five ‘mon that could fight, this cat, surprise pouncing non-withstanding, wasn’t going to be a problem in a real fight if a box kept beating her.

The water from the shower cut off, and stepping out into the hall, a purloined hotels towel scraping up loose water and hairs, the Rocket stepped onto the scene of Green “saving” his cat for the seventh time. Old phone in her lap, and talking to Silver on speaker, an extra pillow shivered, showing it to be Jiggly, who wanted attention, which Green lavished while teasing Silver about something. In short, Green was a picture perfect image of teenager multitasking with a bit of a ‘mon twist.

Silver, unwilling to take the ribbing while being down, bit back with a bit of snark of his own. “How do you keep getting into things? I thought being normal meant you didn’t get involved in this stuff. So why do you keep getting up to your ears in crazy, huh?”

“How was it my fault the hot dog men decided to descend on the beach? And it’s not my fault that they’re crazy. I’m just trying to get out of this before it gets worse. I keep telling myself, just a few more days but… I’m gunna ask to get out of here tonight.”

“Seriously, do it. Say I’ll come if he doesn’t.”

There were footsteps behind him, almost besides him. Without even turning to look Giovanni cut his arm across the hall, stopping Silvia from stepping through, a glare over his shoulder stilled her greeting, and both adults lingered in the hall. Listening.

“I don’t think blackmailing the Boss of Viridian Co.’s smart Silver.”

“He says he’s my Dad.”

“And Mask said he was bad, and Red said he was bad, and Blue, and Yellow, and Oak, and that police guy, Lookie-”

“And they’re all liars. Right? They all stabbed us in the back when we didn’t do what they wanted. And you said Mask’s full of tauros shit, he’s always been. Good people don’t kidnap kids, right? They don’t ask them to do dangerous things? We don’t have to do dangerous things anymore, right? That’s what getting out meant. No masks, no danger.”

“Yeah,” Nipping her lip Green went back to grooming Jiggly with her hair brush. “You really think it’s a Team thing, but not a Rocket thing?”

“Yeah, Yellow looked them online at school and then got in trouble for looking them online at school. Guess they’re another “adult only” thing. Yellow called it classified, or said the adults called it that, but I don’t think she knows what that means.”

Yeah, Green figured. Classified meant get caught reading or talking about it and Mask locked you with Brown until you froze to death. So Yellow really didn’t know what that word meant. Neither really wanted to explain that to her though.

“You know…” And by that hum Green knows Silver’s putting something together, something Green wouldn’t like. “You always blamed me for our crazy stuff. And you can’t do that right now because I’m not there…”

“I could roundabout blame you, he is your Dad.”

“Says he is.”

“He got set on fire for you Silver, dragged you out of a fire that that crazy Rocket set up. He punched Mask for you, and Sird, and Proton, and probably Red. With lawyers, he punched Red and Blue with lawyers... I’m pretty sure it’s more than “thinks he is”. Anyways…”

Giovanni tapped on the door frame, cutting off... whatever Green was going to say. What was she going to say? Green wasn’t sure, all thoughts died in her head. With a curse Green jolted, Jiggly whining under her because that’d been a tangle she tugged.

“Umm he’s here.” A long moment, than Green swore again. “They’re both here… him and the mayor…”

“You really think she’s my Mom, or going to be my new Mom? I mean, that’s what adults do at sleep over’s, right?’

Oh Arceus, Silver, why did you have to say that, right now?

Moaning, Green slumped near double. Hiding her face in her hands. Silence... save it wasn’t. Silver nattered on about “why were mayors so important anyway?” and realizing he wasn’t going to shut up Green straightened, daring a peek at the adults.

The mayor looks like she was about ready to die. Giovanni went a weird shade of red, and then cleared his throat.

“No, she’s not and is not going to be.” The Rocket cut in. And, oh thank Mew for someone with a brain who could think through sheer embarrassment. Green almost liked the man just then.

“Was that-?” Realization hit and Silver squawked. “Why am I on speaker Green?!” The boy’s voice was cracking in his panic. “Oh my Mew, how do I hang up, how do I…” Beeping, as he tried a few buttons the volume went down a bit, a small mercy since he was in the yelling stage of his panic. “YELLOW, HELP ME HANG UP!”

Green whined in her throat. “I’m sorry, he’s normally like this.”

“You’re not funny.”

“Yes I am…” Because there were two roads, making things better, and making them worse. And they didn’t get away from Mask and Rocket and crazy League peoples by being good. “No, bad cat… How did you get his Persian to want to eat phones? How did Sneasel teach her to all the way from where you’re at?”

“That’s not my faul- Yellow, thank Mew… How do you-?“

Silvia snorted, seeming to shake off her mortification as Silver sunk further into his, by the panicked sounds from the phone.

The bweep of dial tone confirmed someone had hung up at last, Yellow or Silver, Green didn’t care. And really, she probably should have herself. Oh well.

“So, hi?”

“In ten minutes,” Giovanni ordered, looking odd. He wasn’t in his rocket uniform, but rather a button down shirt rather fussily done up and slacks. Both black, with a flick of green around the cuffs and neck to keep the whole thing from being monotonous, or funeral wear worthy. They were patterend after leaves, leaves attached to smoke grey branches, that glinted. Some sort of cuff link around them caught Green’s eye. “You are calling him back and telling him not to come, when your transport falls through for tonight.”

“He’s going to know you said to say that. He’s not stupid.” And Green wasn’t stupid, or going to offer anything like a promise for that.

“Then you are going to call, and I’m going to explain to him why he’s not to come here.”

“Because things are “picking up” because of these “hot dog men”? He’s not going to-”

“The “hot dog men” are Team Flare, and unlike Rocket they regularly target families. They went after honest ittaliano businessmen, kidnapped their kids, and skinned them alive on television to make a point. I had to pull Viridian corp out of Kalos after that debacle because the police were paid off enough to pretend to not know what was going on, as were the League. If Silver’s here, alone, and Flare even suspects, they will do anything to get him. Because if they do that they get Kanto in their pocket in one stroke.”

Silence, than in a tone of sheer disgust, the good mayor spoke up. “Gio, you don’t talk to kids about stuff like that it’s not-“

“Will he listen if you tell him that?”

Green chewed her lip, running a hand over Jiggly while she thought.

“Mask did worse, threatened and did.” Brown for an example. The things Will did to them for others. “If I tell Silver that he’s just going to get mad and try to stop them himself.”

“Which is unacceptable.”

Green nodded, agreeing with the man for once.

“Why can’t you get me out of here, tonight?”

“Because if Flare’s dumping crap into the ocean, they’re doing more. Watching the ships, the shipments, what not. Any commercial source is suspect. And considering the weather I’d not recommend surfing. Even if the weather were fine you could be abducted off your ‘mon as easily as off a ship.” Flicking a glare, to Silvia, then Green, he concluded. “They’re trying to get a foot hold in Sevii. Your bonds to Silver aren’t exactly a secret as despite his many lies, Blue Oak did not lie about that when he testified, that Persian’s more than out of the bag.”

“Blue Oak talked about Silver and Me?”

“Looker used that as justification to look you up. He intercepted you on your way to Sevii, on the road.” Actually, on the beach before they started surfing to Sevii. He’d tolerated the ice beam Silver had Snea’ chuck at him well enough. Really been focusing on Green, now that Green thought back on it. And while the promise of a new adventure had had some allure, home had been right there… So Green had said no, and when the man had pushed, gotten rude. Said a few disgusting things even. Silver had had Snea’ toss a hail behind them before Green had summoned Blasty to get them going.

And the agent hadn’t pursued. Or approached either one of them after. Perhaps thinking they both were incurable familiia members, whatever that meant... It’d been one of the man’s insults, anyways.

And how Giovanni had known about that, Green had no clue. She hadn’t been talking to Yellow then, still that wasn’t important. If Giovanni knew, then other Bosses might too.

Which actually made his threat make sense, and made it closer, and scarier, all at once.

Checking a shiver, Green tipped her head at the man, just… thinking. Finally she wondered. “And how is it leaving…. When I’m supposed to leave, going to be safer?”

“You’ll be leaving with me. I’ll personally escort you to Viridian. As for what happens after, I doubt it will be Flare related. Flare has no hold in Kanto.”

Flare probably had graves in Kanto, definitely not holds if the Rocket’s tone meant anything…

And besides him, looking utterly lost, the poor mayor was certainly adrift. Finally, drawing a deep breath, the woman spoke up, shaking off her shock it seemed. Pushing into the room, she took her old chair and Giovanni followed after her, standing behind Green’s couch. She kicked at his hands, because tehywere there, missed on purpose, and he canted a mild look at her malice, something almost fond twisting his features before he went to the opposite side of the couch to loom there.

Cutting off her access to the door, but then Persian popped up on the other side of Green and lay down, really cutting off her access to out.

“And what do the young ladies parents have to say about this… her leaving, her being the target of an international gang abduction? Do they even know what’s happening?”

“Oh them?” Green snorted, affecting a brittle brightness. Trying to just avoid looking at the Rocket.

Because Giovanni’s giving her a look that reminded her of the table, it was patient and placid, signifying what’s said is in her hands.

“Don’t you know, Mask doesn’t exist Ms. Mayor? He’s just a figment of my imagination. I managed to swindle all those other kids and lock them up all with my figment of my imagination when I was five. I even conned poor Mr. Sakaki, and his lawyers, and the police and everything.”

And Sevii’s mayor, looked from Green, to Giovanni, horrified and sick.

“What- why…”

“They had custody of my son… while I was recovering from cancer treatment.” The Rocket tabbed on. “They kicked him out for his “delusions” about Mask, making him homeless after he resisted their gas lighting and had an episode, a flashback relating to his trauma, in public. Silver was… an undesirable in their eyes. When my son left they turned their attentions to Green, and Green… while reasonable in her caution when dealing with a nearly unknown man… reached out to me for assistance.”

The Rocket shrugged, a mute, “and here we are now,” if Green’d ever seen one.

“They sent cray-cray doctors after me.” Green concluded. “I said Mask was real, that I was sane, and am emancipated since... income, trainer, and have a record in the league and stuff…” Green ticked her points off on her fingers, twiddling them a little. “Anyways, I looked it up. Nothing’s expired yet. Anyways, they had guns with darts, I have a Blasty, and now they have a new back door and I’m sorta on the run again? Except there aren’t ice types trying to re-abduct me, and the police are a joke.”

While the poor mayor strangled Green rewound what she said in her head, and tabbed on. “I mean, sorry, but they are, still… sorry I guess?”

“It’s I…”

“Five minutes, then you call.” Giovanni ordered. Then tilting a look towards Silvia sighed. “Ms. Mayor, if I could coax you to come with me so we can talk about the specifics.”

“Why isn’t.. child services…”

“Ew.. no, I’m not Oliver Quick. You’re not putting me in an orphanage.” Green slumped on the pillows, scooping up Jiggly. “I spent enough time in a cell, years in a freezer, so, no. Not that again.”

“Twist. And no, we aren’t. No one’s calling protective or using freezers.”

Yeah, that’d be a mess, huh? Big bad crime Boss having to deal with judges and interviews and house inspections…. It wasn’t quite the temptation to blurt out as it’d been at their home, but Green snorted, unable to not laugh at the idea in her head.

“What were you, an English major?” Green sneered.

“International business major, minor in theater, actually.”

Green might of over tossed Jiggly at the shock of that one.

“You were a theater kid-“ Jiggly floated down on Green’s head, getting her flippers in Green’s hair and her bulk on Green’s shoulder. “You’re kidding.”

“I had to learn how to make my voice carry at meetings and how to get attention from a room full of people from somewhere. I also wasn’t above taking few “frivolous” courses to piss off my parent off…”

Green’s trying to imagine Silver taking anything to tick anyone off. He’s just too laid back for that… And imaging Giovanni as a knobby shorter version of himself, a black haired lankier Silver, is making her head hurt. Because how… what… Had he had to act in ”Oliver” like the singing version, is that how he knew it wasn’t Swift... or whatever it’d been?

“Three minutes.”

The threat’s almost friendly, which makes it a bit scarier than his idle malice from earlier.

“What?” Because Green’s still struggling, trying to get the Silver Giovanni theater class hobgoblin out of her head and not doing a good job of it.

“The call?”

Oh right the, do what I say or I’ll kill you for letting Silver get in danger, call. Right.

That.

“Also, I’d recommend coming across some income and submitting it through the league channels in the next week and a half, your League immunity is close to expiring.”

Then with a pat to Jiggly’s head, he’s walking around the couch and gone, taking the mayor with him. To threaten, or sweat talk her around to his side of things, Green’s not sure.

She’s not even sure she cares, really.

Flipping open her old phone, Green sets Jiggly off her head, on the couches back, and Persian pops up. Setting a paw on Green’s feet. No running, got it. Claws tap against her toes, a peculiar beat interspaced by purrs… And it takes one repetition before Green realizes what it is. She glares at the cat.

“Nu uh, you get that song for being a good cat. Threatening to squish me until I sing it is bad cat behavior…” Flipping open her phone, Green tried to ignore the not so subtle threat, even as the cat slinked closer, going from looming to draping. Taking inspiration from Green’s complaint the feline spread out to better squash the girl into the cushions, claws tapping, purrs in tune…

Just as the call goes through and Silver picks up.

“Green…” He’s on speaker and a bit tinny. “What… Why are you… Are you singing?”

It takes some squirming, and a kick, but Green’s no longer being smothered to death by death kitty.

“You’re Dad’s cat, sucks. And tell Yellow to look up Sakaki and theater, it’s the only blackmail were going to get for ages. He’s probably deleated all of it, but its’ got to be somewhere on the internet.”

After all everything was.

“You can do it yourself; I mean you’re going to be in Viridian in a day or two, right?”

“About that…”

Suffice to say Silver’s not happy. But he’s informed as to why she’s not coming, and less than thrilled because she tells him that Giovanni had wanted to not tell him everything, than Green turned around and told Silver everything any way.

“I really don’t think we want to get sucked into a.. Team whatever this is turning into.” Green huffed, smacking the cat who is purring into her ear in time to the song that Green’s not singing. “I mean, they skin people alive Sil’ that’s… I… I can’t even think about what they’d do to you if they did that to some rich guys kid that wasn’t a Rocket. I don’t want to ever think about it, about that maybe happening to you… I just…”

“I won’t come.” And it’s a promise, tight and unhappy, but Silver keeps his promises so some of the tension in Green’s chest eases. Because her brains thinking of skinned kid and thinking about Brown, and her head’s not a pretty place. His promise helps her push that back a bit. “Unless they get to you, they hurt you, then everything’s off. I’ll freeze every one of them if they touch you.”

“I’m not stupid Sil’, they won’t even know I’m here.” She’d roll, but couldn’t and Giovanni’s Persian is eyeing the phone and it’s shiny screen with curious red eyes. “Hey, do you have any spare money? I need to put something in my League Account so I don’t lose my license.”

“Why don’t you ask F- H- Giovanni?”

“So I can shake your Da’ down for money?”

“N- ye- I don’t know how to answer that…” A huff, and grumble as Silver, who could move, did, by the sound of the interference. “Look, I used almost all of mine on silly string and potions and glitter.”

He’d glitter bombed floors of the league, snow glitter bombed, and Green figured it had to come somewhere. But all his money, on prank materials?

“Sil’ what did I tell you about rationing?”

“This from Miss. I need money to keep my license.”

“Yeah, Mr. I glittered Sabrina’s office and made glitter snowmen in Kogas so much so I’m broke.”

“Hey, he can’t ninja now, he just sparkles, right?”

And there are footsteps coming from down the hall and Green’s laughing anyway.

“Yeah like a Galar ponyta. Bet he clip clops in those funny wood shoes of his and sparkles for days after he gets his paperwork” probably not, but Silver’s snorting on a laugh. “I’m not alone, so I gotta go. I’ll call you from my new number sometime tomorrow.”

“Talk to you then.”

The screen goes dark and there’s a flicker of red and the relief of all that weight going away as Persian’s recalled.

“You really didn’t have to hang up on my behalf.” The Rocket demurs, clicking the cat’s pokeball on his belt.

“Considering Silver doesn’t trust you...” Much less like, though green’s not mean enough to say that. “I kinda did. You asked me to lie to him, and I didn’t, and he knows that now. He also says that “you suck” because you freaking ordered me to lie to him and he didn’t like that. Oh and “Don’t do that again, or he’ll glitter your Viridian office”. And also, you owe me money. For courier services...”

The last had been Yellow’s suggestion, popping in and out, listening as she’d gotten ready for school. She’d chimed the suggestion out on her way out and it’d sounded good for the two ex-disciples that had no clue what a courier was. Giovanni settled on the edge of the couch, there’s enough room that Green doesn’t feel crowded, but still she scrunches up anyways and glowers at him, Blasty’s pokeball in her hand.

Because he’s not going for his wallet.

And Green really needs him to do that, that or she’s going to have to go out the second it stops raining and pick a fight with someone. There’s all of nine trainers of Sevii, not counting herself, and they smarted up ages ago and won’t battle her. If she punches one of them first they might. Maybe.

Hopefully.

“And you have the proper paperwork to prove your income? All the lines crossed, everything dotted? Because now that Oak’s dropped you as his protégé, you have to file it now, you’ve no dex to automatically record your battle history. So I’m assuming you’re prepared and just need me to pass up some money and sign?”

Paperwork? Green froze, because she hadn’t known. And he’s smiling, a smile like his Persian, all edges and taunting and smugness. And if he were a hair closer Green’d kick him, but he was set just so she couldn’t.

“And two witnesses, I’ll of course sign, since I’m seeing my money go to your person, but who else will you have…”

“You… I… paperwork?”

“Paperwork. You know, active poof of employment.”

And Greens’ recalling threats, and taunting and… and she really really doesn’t want to work with Sabrina. If he says she has too, she’s gone. “And you have something… planned?”

“Right up your alley, I’ll even have Sevii’s good mayor sign off on it, it’ll be unassailable. Unless you want to try to get a job, while you’re on the run? No worries, you have about a week to think it over…”

Mew, she’s about ready to scoot forward to kick him anyways. But she doesn’t. because he’s got her paperwork, she just has to deal with him for a minute, perhaps two more…

“What’s the job?”

“If I wanted to break into this…” And he’s turning a tablet over, the one tucked under his arm, so she can see the screen. It’s got a building and a logo that looks a little like the logos on the hotdog peoples’ shirts. “How would you suggest I do so?”

“A water processing plant?”

“Some competitors in the science community that the good mayor is looking into.”

Huh, weird but… alright.

“How much time do I have to plan this?”

“A week, give or take.”

So basically today. Since slowpoke mail was named slowpoke for a good reason.

“Well, I guess you can get the blue prints and stuff since she’s the mayor. I’d get those, and someone sneaky, and do a tour. Like a bigwig person tour that’ll pull the executives and stuff out of their offices. That gets all the smart people out of the way. Probably faster than a fire. And when I was doing that tour I’d send someone with you, through the roof or something with the ‘prints, to poke around while you distract the big wigs by asking a lot of questions and making scenes and stuff… We… did something like that at Silph, timing a break in when there was a tour by V-. “ By him, Green realizes with a wince. “Well, that’s not important. But it’s worked before. So that’s how I’d do it, if I was in a rush.”

Which Green is.

Black eyes consider her, weighing some factor against another.

“I told you how I’d do it; I did your job…”

“And I’ll give you five thousand for it, no strings attached, because you did. Though you should really consider clearing pay before offering your services. And while I could hire someone else to do the “sneaky” bit,” A Rocket, perhaps a team of them. “I’ve a further proposition… Something that if done just right, may very well speed both our departures off of Sevii. We could be in Viridian day after tomorrow if it plays right.”

And to that temptation, Green runs a tongue of her lips, itching to taste the salt-less air, see the thick shades of trees again, see Silver, just to be able to be. And be in peace. No police, no reminders of them. She might be able to make a home in Kanto, and if not Kanto some other region, but to do that she has to get out of here first.

“How’s it going to work?” Green questions, because she hadn’t before and gotten off lightly, he’s not likely to be that nice twice. “And how much are you paying me?”

“Quite a bit.” He hums, evading as casually as breathing.

“Yeah, how about a number? Related to my pay. And then a description of the job that’s honest? I might say yes after you and the mayor sign off on the first job I took.” Because she’s not letting him off on anything, she wasn’t that money, no strings attached to stay no strings attached.

Fool her once…

Well there’d be no twice, and with a laugh, Giovanni stood, going to the briefcase by the door. Her papers aren’t all the way on the top, but near enough to make her feel important, even if it’s kinda accidental ego stroking on his part. She’s not vital, thus not on the top, or expendable, and thus on the bottom. Right in the middle feels safest and middle toppish makes her feel a little special.

“For services rendered to Viridian Gym and Viridian Co?” She parrots off the paper, not understanding the legalese in the slightest but able to pick out whom she’s getting money from.

And wasn’t that a kick in the face? Because by taking employment form him, as a person and a business, her trainer ship –and freedom- depended on him keeping his station. Which meant that if he ticked her off Green couldn’t go to the police, with his Rocket card, or telling Looky, or anything to anyone. Ever. And he and his Persian, they’re a pair, he’s nearly purring as he watches her put it all together, dark eyes glinting with unspoken mirth.

Green couldn’t even warn Sevii’s mayor about anything. She’s going to have to stick up for the Rocket and provide cover stories if anything goes wrong in Sevii because signing this was linking him to her. Her freedom to his good name, at least until she was eighteen and legal an adult.

It also was taking her out of the goodie goodie squad… indefinitely... And Green’s focusing on that silver lining, and only that, as she scrawls her name in the marked spot. Trying not to feel bad for Mayor Silvia or anyone else ever that has to deal with Giovanni from here on out.

Because she might not be an adult, but she gets responsibility. And in doing this, protecting him even a little, she’s a tiny bit responsible for everything Giovanni does from here on out. Because she’s part of it. And that thought makes her stomach clench as he takes the papers from her, as he calls out to Silvia, “for her “help” for a moment”.

And the mayor comes in, warm from the glow of success, smirking, hanging up her phone as she comes in.

“Booked it. One surprise inspection, and proof from the permits office of lawful wrong doing. We’ve enough proof to put them on the ropes for building outside of zone and using wrong permits. They are’t celared for those tnaks of whatever, we don’t even need to open them up. Just see them. The clutch of Cloy’ heads at R and D are going to be forwarding their information on… Well where they think the stuff was dumped and…”

“Will this help?” Green offers her phone, location app and travel history on the front screen. A toss and the woman’s startled, but catches it easily enough.

“More than you can imagine, thank you very much Green.”

“Yeah.” Green waves off the woman’s thanks. And since Giovanni’s close enough, she nudges him extra hard with a foot because she can. “About that…”

“Of course, Gio walked me through how this works.. Can I borrow your?- Thank you, Gio.” And the mayor signs, never really getting what she’s signing up for, and Green tries not to get sick, but it’s hard. “I’m just glad I can help you out a bit, you’ve done so much…”

“Think nothing of it.”

 

[unrepentantAuthor]

Hi there, reporting in for Catnip Circle.

So, my first impressions of this fic are a little strained by the fact that I'm not a manga reader. There are definitely some attempts to explain the context of the story to readers like myself, but I think those attempts were obfuscated by the way in which they were presented. The prose you're using tends to be quite elaborate, there's definitely a strong push towards a sophisticated lexical register, but it could really do with being more straightforward. I regularly had to reread sentences to figure out what was meant by them, either because of errors, or because they were excessively complicated when a simpler sentence would have sufficed. By 'errors', I mean such things as using 'coral' when you mean 'corral', or using 'adlibbed' to mean 'improvised' or 'jerry-rigged' when that term only refers to verbal improvisation – I noticed that you used Grammarly, which is definitely a useful step, but you might want to consider a combination of more careful proofreading, the use of a proficient beta reader, and becoming slightly less ambitious with the prose.

In terms of the story itself, I'm particularly unsure what tone you're going for. The serious, methodical way Giovanni plans his actions, the references to threats, trauma and the mafia, and how desperately unhappy Green is all indicate a serious tone. However, the opening scene of roombas with knives, and Giovanni feeling that he needs to show off a large bird to a child to not lose face seem much sillier. I'm not sure what to advise specifically, as you know your objectives better than I do, but if you weren't meaning for there to be a dissonance like this I hope it's clear where it's coming from.

In terms of my emotional reaction, Green certainly came across as an angry, scared teen, and Giovanni as a cold, cognisant planner. I usually think of Giovanni as ruthless – he goes out of his way to be reasonable and deferent in this, although it does have the tone of a 'very reasonable' villain who is in fact uncompromising underneath. I'm not rooting for any particular outcome, except perhaps for Giovanni to remain thousands of miles away from these children. Yikes!

I hope some of my commentary is useful, or at least interesting!

 

[K_S]

Its a more than fair reply thanks for taking a shake at the story though you're unfamilair with the genre...

I definitly appreciate the catches on my errors hopefully patching them up will help accessabilty a little. I'll probably apply the non grammer error fixer uppers to later tales though...

Actually you kinda caught the point. There are three tones/perspectuves/angles of this fic running side by side.

Basically the first chapter was meant to catch all three tenors and show them to the reader upfront so you basically have an idea of everything coming in.

The first is the pranking Silvers doing which is part stress releif for the kid part yelling for help and the main comic relief of what turned into a pretty dark fic fast.

The second is Greens situation and as shes in angry teen phase a bit early for very good reason that got a bit of highlight the "why" of that is non canonical and becomes the focus of the early to mid chapters.

Then in closing you have gio who is basically fronting as reasonable villian or the "known devil" as a review on ao3 put it. And trust me. He is ruthless and everything you mentioned he is just playing a long game and assuming specific roles to get his end goal met.

Unfortunatly your wish doesnt come true and he is at Greens door start next chapter pulling another role/con to keep his plans moving and kick off the story proper as he is multI tasking as villian and diabolus ex Machina in this tale.

 

[K_S]

There were a few basic rules of a heist.

The first, learn of your surroundings and the destination.

Get your tools in a line.

Make sure your partner knows the plan.

Then go for it.



Planning an impromptu visit with a plus one took more effort than Green thought it would. And it started with her phone….

Blue tooth and capable of three ways called. As she was the unknown all used tech would be traced to her. Thus her tech was tested, retested, and sent with Giovanni’s Honchcrow for a fly by over the center to make sure that it worked. Once its functionality as a phone was affirmed there were other tests, fly bys with the phone’s camera, and while Sevii’’s Mayor poured over the shots, (more cameras than permitted, another knock, the security contractor an illegal one. Sevii was like every other Region and was dogged in its laws. If it wasn’t their tech, it was to be documented. And not doing so would lead to fines… There were twelve cameras, and only two on the blue print, two given permits…

If Lysander corp really owned this place they were just digging themselves deeper and deeper and no one had even stepped in the door yet.

Having taken away her angry birds and put a lock on it, Green figures she had five of the six numbers down, would try them once he went to the bathroom or something. Green tried to pretend interest in the flyby pictures. Really she did. But the blueprints were more interesting, and the mayor was hogging those and waving them around and it was maddening.

“We could send a digging ‘mon for a basement check,” Green suggested. “You know, evil secret lair under the building, like a Flare base under the water plant. Like how Rocket has a base under the Game-“

And Giovanni’s glaring at her, and Sevii’s mayor is looking worried because… whoops, Green’s not supposed to know about that as a “little kid” she guessed.

Well, she’d throw the Rocket a bone because the contract and everything.

“Mask.. he made us break into that place once.” Green assumed a more down-trodden tone. “We had to use a pilloswine to dig a hole from a parking lot like… five miles before the Game Corner and keep digging until we got lucky and burrowed in.” And Giovanni’s looking a mite murderous. “We didn’t really find anything; well me and Silver didn’t since we were a team… Just a water heat-“

Alright maybe Greens figured why he’s looking a bit irritated, she’d almost forgotten about that. How they’d cut through a metal thing, a giant can Silver’d called it, and the resulting leak had nearly flooded them in their digging route. They’d had to claw a mad path out, tunneling through a neighboring sewer system and running through the tunnels until they couldn’t stand the stink and crawled out through a manhole. The ice ground type had thrown a royal conniption over the scalding hot water and after they’d withdrawn her she’d refused to come out of her pokeball to lead the way through the sewers. So it’d been Silver and Sneasel who’d made ice patches to cover their getaway…

And Green sorta wondered what would have happened if they’d gotten caught back then, nothing good she was sure… But one of the Rockets that’d screamed before skidding into raw sewage might have been Surge… Maybe.

So definitely nothing good then.

After, Mask had chucked them both in Brown’s room for two days for being utterly worthless and had stripped them to a week’s half ration on top of that... Suffice to say that’d been a bad mission.

“No one is going to have anyone dig in with a… like a…” The mayor swallowed, fought to look soothing, and mainly looked horrified. “No one’s digging under anything, alright?”

No no.. the woman wasn’t getting it at all. Checking the urge to roll her eyes Green sniffled. “No no.. not us I mean… he’s Viridan’s Earth badge leader gym… thingie… And we’ve got this new phone and all… I bet.. Maybe with a diglet… we could.”

“You’re asking Rhydon to dig a hole for you, dig a tunnel, to look a possible “bad guy lair”?” Giovanni drawled.

Alright, when phrased like that… no… Green was not going to ask Rhydon to dig her anything. Because the last order ground type heard was to make Green’s hole deeper and bury her in it… So, no, Green wasn’t going to ask Rhydon anything. Still, she shot Giovanni a glare, because it wasn’t a bad idea.

Mew when was the man anything but a wet blanket?

“Alright, Mr. Gym Leader, what do you suggest.”

“Top to bottom break-in, very few people think to look up.”

“Great, what about the cameras.”

How do you normally deal with cameras…”

XX

“And that’s why I need to borrow Sneas-“

“No.”

“But camera’s Sil’ if I have Blasty ice beam them he’ll bring the roof down…”

And because the new phone has a camera Green can see each sullen motion and he can see her pout. Which in turn turns to him wincing. Supereffective indeed, he’s just as vulnerable and Green’s milking it. Hard. Their back and forth is the mayor’s entertainment while she eats. In the back of the kitchen Giovanni’s shamelessly eavesdropping while he tosses something together having seen “the lady” fed first.

And Silver’s aware they’re there, just ignoring them, which Green’s doing too.

“We’re talking less than a half a day here…”

“Our accounts were locked remember, by Oak, he shunted our stored team into the reserve?”

Yeah, Green misses Abby, and wants to kick Oak now, but that isn’t the point.

“Well our old teams locked up, but your Da’ did unlock us for new catches through the League overrides. That’s why you were able to get Telsa checked out at the center.”

Silver’s face dos some odd sort of gymnastics while he turns red clearly not having known and probably about to say something stupid so Green chimes in.

“Speaker Sil’”

“Can you not call him that?” It’s strangled, And while Green gets it she’s seen way too much of denial to let any stand for a second. He really should know that. And it makes her sorry that the truth hurts but she’s not sorry enough to stop.

But because it is Silver and she loves him she can gentle this a little.

“But Da makes him flinch.” Green whines and Sil’ snorts. Softening slightly. “Really you’re missing out here.”

A chair scrapes as Giovanni joins the table. A slice of toast surrounded by a nest of sliced fruit, an island against an egg sea of… were they poached? Scrambled? Green’s not sure, but that’s the Rocket’s breakfast.

No souls of the innocent, or wine, or anything bloody or crying or screaming. Huh. Green tips the camera so Silver can look around, it fills up the quiet.

“So what’d you wind up having for dinner?”

Because time zones and it was pretty late in Viridian now even if it was stupid early here.

“Green’s Uncle, Will, has a secret stash of pop-tarts. I ate one of those.”

“A poptart.” Because Green’s vocalizing the utter disdain on both adult’s faces. Of course Silver totally misunderstood the concern.

“Yeah, Yellow’s on a “only eat healthy stuff” thing going on so Will’s got a stash of junk food scattered around the house. I’ve been taking nips of everything so he doesn’t notice one specific thing going down. He just thinks he’s eating it since it’s such a small amount.

“Silver!” Green whines because Giovanni looks this close to saying something and Sevii’s mayor has a hand clapped over his wrist to keep him from saying anything. Because Giovanni not talking had been one of Silver’s terms to him talking to her when Giovanni was present. Silvia had been added to the list when she started asking questions that Giovanni’d likely asked if he could. She’d lasted five minutes. “That’s not eating!.”

“I know I know…” The redhead huffed. “I guess I gotta pick a fight with some trainers and buy some real food. I was just… busy… and then things started getting bad with you and I worried…”

Worried himself nearly sick and off his food, they’d talked about this… he said he’d stopped doing that. Guess not. But now was not the time to point that out.

“Anyway, I kinda forgot to eat.”

“Well next time you “forget” to eat I’m putting Mr. Sparkly white coat’s song in your phone, as a virus.”

“Snea’snea’ keeps bringing me Pidgiottos…”

“Snea’snea’ has a brain in her head and she doesn’t forget to eat.” It’s a weird backdrop. Of adults politely ignoring her and trying to eat while she chews her old team mate out about something so simple. Probably not helping Silver, but they’d insisted on being here, so this was not her fault. “I know you weren’t raised in a barn…”

“No, I was raised in a cell.”

Silverware scraped and someone was choking. Green’s more than used to shock evasion. She’d taught him after all. They’d used it against Oak and the Goodie Squad, to keep them from asking dangerous questions or shut them up.

“That was a four out of ten… “ Green ruled. “Ok situational timing, but bad tone. You’re supposed to sound sad, or flippant, not irritated.”

“Well, you’re irritating me. And I got a six out of ten, someone’s choking.”

“Eight out of ten, but only if someone dies.”

“Says the person who only gets ten out of tens.”

“Creator bonus.”

“Yeah, right…”

“Seriously Sil’ promise me you’re going to go out and get dinner”

He huffs and hums and looks out a window with a grimace.

“I know it’s not raining, so don’t try that lie.”

“Nah, I’m not that stupid… There’s some kid with a Charmander poking around F- Giovanni’s gym, I’ll shake him down for some money and get a good breakfast with it.”

“Dinner or I swear I don’t care about hotdog men, I’ll swipe Giovanni’s Honchkrow and fly to Viridian to ram food down your throat.”

“Fine dinner.” And he rolls his eyes at her. “Happy?”

“Where?”

“Ung you’re impossible Green. There’s a soup and salad place by the gym, I’ll go there, splurge, get both, alright?

“Promise?” Because if he doesn’t he won’t, he’ll “forget” or something else.

“I promise, but only if you promise not to hit the bank and mail me half of your check for this stupid job. You gotta eat too, and survival bars three times a day don’t count.”

And there’s adult disapproval pointed at her now, she can feel it, heavy and thick.

“Why’d I let you out of your cell again?”

“Because you saw my puppy eyes and went “Wow, that’ll get me a lot of free food if I wave it at old people”. Also you couldn’t reach the last vent, needed a boost.”

“Riiight.” Green drawled. “Now I remember.”

“What’d you eat today Green?”

“Oatmeal,” nasty honey-soaked oatmeal and only half a bowl but she’s not letting him think he’s got the upper hand, ever. Snapping an apple slice off of Giovanni’s plate (his fault he was sitting to close) Green took a loud bite. “Fruff…”

“Ung… not helping!” A thump from beyond her range of sight and Silver’s up, grumbling. “Not ag- Sneasal put that down right now! I mean it! It’s not even dead! I’ve got Green on the phone and do you think she wants to see a bird? No she doesn’t. Put that right where you found it, right now.”

Chitters, a screeched complaint, then a thump and slam. The last is a window slamming shut Green’s sure.

“I’m sorry she’s just….”

“Worried out of her mind, for her dum dum trainer who forgets to eat.”

“Trying to depopulate Viridian For- Crap I shouldn’t have said that.” Shaking his head Silver frowns, slumping into the bean bag he’s scavenged and dragged into Yellow’s bedroom. Phone in hand he holds it over his head, giving Green a weird view of Yellows room by accident and he’s upside down, sprawled and irritated.

“Look I can’t give you Sneasel, she’s acting all worked up.”

And Green agrees and give up with a sigh. Fingers tapping Green tires to think of how to get rid of cameras, fast. She could hack them but that takes ages and…

“What about all those Joltik?”

“They’re barely trained, I mean Telsa’s doing OK, hoping into pockets at command and getting a nice bite going, but she’s the only one paying any mind to anyone. And that’s cuz I gave her some nice batteries.”

“And because you’re a good trainer.”

“Yeah, that too.”

And Telsa, perhaps hearing her name and smelling the phone’s charge is creeping up on the bean bag, Silver’s hair starts to shift in response to the bug’s static field.

“But does Yellow want all these… synthetic ‘mon in her house? she’s so… natural… you know?”

Silver’s brightening, seeing the end of his tick herding days as retrieving the ten of them every night clearly had been a pain. Even so, he hadn’t whined about it, he didn't whine about anything. Even about being raised in a cell and the Mask. But he did brighten when something was going his way.

And getting rid of those ticks clearly was making his day… night… whatever.

“Alright… but I can only have six ‘mon because our accounts are down. How can I send you eleven ‘mon?”

“Well we could trade Telsa for Horsea… she’s not good out of water. Ditty’s with… well you know…”

He did know and had done things to Giovanni’s Viridian office in retaliation. Hopefully, Giovanni’d be in his office when the glitter bomb went off, but if he wasn’t it’d still be a royal mess, a deserved one, and Green hadn’t warned him about it. Yellow hadn’t either and was using her time at school to look up theater things because they were running out of ammunition, and all three of them wanted lots of it to get back at him for punching Green.

“Alright, that’s a few of them, what about the others?”

“If I ask them a question are you going to hang up?”

“With Him there? Yeah. But… how about I jump that Charmander kid he likes to train at the Center. I can catch him there and call you back.”

“After you get something to eat”

And he must have been hungry because he didn’t whine at her added demand.

“K’,” Because bullying a kid into a fight wasn’t bad, not really, that’s what the Journey was all about. Beating people up and taking their money. “Have fun and don’t get caught.” And for fairness’ sake she swiped off an orange slice off of the mayor’s plate, he made a face because for him oranges were “ew” to a near gagging level. No matter how hungry he got.

“Same to you.” Because Silver’d never said anything simple. “Bye” was beyond the kid.

Which was why Silver was undeniably, and utterly, a dork.

“Love you too you dork!”

“Ung why can’t you just hang up and not make it sappy Green, why!” Because he’s squirming like mad, that’s why and it’s funny, so double why. Still, Green shows some mercy and hangs up like Silver’d wish she would. Finishing her bite Green looks up at the… well they looked like they were fresh from the freezer, the adults. So pale and still. Its’ rather creepy.

Not her problem.

“So we’ve got maybe ten minutes because Silver’s going to run to the gym run to the center, and if he doesn’t see that kid he’s going to break into the center and pick a fight with them there.”

He kinda had oo, the soup and salad place he was talking about closed in half an hour.

“I’ve a number of questions….”

And while this is a heck of an opportunity to get a lot of money and get back at him for so much…

“No.”

“If it’s money I’ll pay-“

He’s such a Rocket. You don’t need a uniform to see it. How can people not? Green shakes her head even as he pulls out his wallet to “make his point”.

That he’s stupid, he’s got that down pat, Green’s lips curl into a sneer.

“You don’t get it. We need an answer in less than twenty minutes, an answer for Silver. Not whatever answers you think you need. Do you have anything?”

And she’s making that demand towards both adults. Silvia shakes her head, with a wry “I’m sorry sweetie but I’m not a trainer, I don’t have any idea how it works.”

Sliding his wallet back into his pocket Giovanni’s dark eyes lock on her, then he looks away, seemingly reading invisible texts they flick so fast left to right.

“I can grant you a temporary license that’ll allow you to hold and release a ‘mon from a pokeball. And I don’t have a full team since this is a “civilian” visit, so that should cover the stragglers.”

“Why would I need a license?” Silvia wondered nibbling on a bite, face thoughtful.

“DNA scanners are in most ‘mon tech. Pokeballs, commercial ones, are synched to a mega data system, they lock unless a registered trainer handles them. I can have you registered with a call. If you aren’t and handle a ball even to pass it to Green it’ll cause a lag as the tech needs to re-register who’s holding it. At best it’s’ just a little lag, at worse, there’ll be some sort of lock mechanism about the facility. It’s not a good way to find out and we’ll need every second.”

“And there’s a six ‘mon cap. I can hold more than six pokeballs, but nothing beyond the sixth will open.”

“Oh.”

“But how’s Silver going to trade them all over?”

“I’ve a portable ‘mon transfer system in my suitcase. I’ll set it up. It’s going to be plodding.” The Rocket warned, standing. “One at a time, but it’s synched to a unit in my office. Tell him, when he calls back, that he has clearance to access the gym, the hand scan will take him DNA. The unit’s on the desk of my office.” Tipping his head, Giovanni frowned. “Has he ever traded before?”

“Yeah,” Did he still have Blue’s Rhydon? Green wasn’t sure.

“It’s a very similar program.”

“I’ll tell him that when he calls.” And remind him about the… ohh boy… where had he put that trap? Green’s struggling to remember. Well Silver’d set it, so he’d be fine. Right?

Right.

When the first pokeball hums over, appearing on what Green would have sworn was a thin metallic plate with a groove, the thing was like a mini-teleport pad and she’s remembering Silph just watching it work… the pokeball appears shimmering into existence on a neat little puff of… glitter.

Guess Silver had forgotten too.

Little wonder he’d refused to turn on the visual on his phone or sounded sulky, still in a little bit the ‘mon were over, and Sevii’s mayor was a new ‘trainer, with a registrar number and everything.

Giovanni had dryly offered to grant the “good mayor” joint citizenship, since the service was in his field, roundabout mind.

“I’m not changing my citizenship, you Kantoians are crazy.”

“Since today was a borderline illegal sort of day I just thought I’d offer.” He’d concluded, “But if you aren’t interested…”

“Not in a million years.”

“The first break in’s a bit weird,” Green admitted, pocketing her phone, Silver was done with everyone and everything from his tone. And likely to break something in Giovanni’s office out of spite. She wasn’t going to be listening in on that or let Giovanni listen in on that. “It’s when you get past the scary and realize it’s fun that it balances out. When you break in for the right reasons, not because some nutcase with a mask is making you do it…” The girl admitted, admiring how the mayor was able to get her dress to fold just so to hide the shrunk-up pokeballs near perfectly. Green’s skirt was too short to carry off the look. She’d hide her team in her pocket and under her backpack and deal with the poking. Nothing new, but she’ll have to get some longer dresses, it was a nice trick. “The belt looks nice.”

It’s thin, more than an ambitious strap, but with a nice floral pattern stamped into it to give it some pop.

“Thank you.”

She’s pretty when she smiles, but her smile’s too wide, too bright, and her eyes are wrong and… And she’s clearly not Silver’s mum. And not likely to make the cut as step mum, still there’s no reason to be mean about her failings. Her belt and hair are pretty so Green tells her so, then gets to the point.

“Just do what Silver does.” Green advised. Tools in hand, Silvia is gathering up the blueprints, for her legal complaints while Giovanni’s scraping of the debris on his transfer device, bemused. Clearly having no clue what the rest of his office looks like just then. “Tell yourself, it’s for the best of reasons. It got us through a lot.”

“The best of reasons?”

“Good ones, no one else gets hurt, or sick if we do this right. And you aren’t breaking into anything, just passing me your ‘mon and then I’m breaking into things. But I’m not really breaking anything. Just feeding some joltik. Think of it like that and everyone wins.”

“Spoken like a true politician.” Giovanni drawled. Clean up done and ready to go and going to start herding them along towards gone.

“Ung Gio, just no.” Snapping up her purse, papers in hand, the Mayor’s arguing even as she’s being lead out. “That’s not how a politician-“

“My dear, I know politicians…”

Green tones them out, sure of her stuff and team she takes up the rear, tucking under the Rocket’s umbrella to avoid getting wet on the way to the car. It’s not growlithe and meowths level pouring, but close enough for her not to want the second shower for taking a short walk out in it.

Hopefully, their destination is dry.

 

[Navar]

Decided to read this one since it's on review tag and that thread hasn't been updated since June. Will mostly describe my reactions reading the first chapter.

Set in the Manga verse, a gift for a writer on a different site. I figured I'd share it here.

Oh! I love the manga! Haven't read it in a while but I do remember being reaaaally into it when I was a teen. Already interested since that universe tends to have better development for the characters than the games.

The Roombas with the knives had been the first incident.

This is hilarious. I love it.

“I swear to Mew,” the

Very interesting choice of words, considering that Arceus tends to be the one most writers choose for this kind of sentence.

”The other ‘dex holders… Well after they decided Lance was perfectly alright never mind the guy tried to fry half of Kanto. Well after that they pulled out a donphan load of crap about Him being redeemed. Never mind we told them what He did…

Oh hey this is surprising. Never expected them to just forgive Lance after all the crap he pulled during that arc. Which, to be honest, is a nice change of pace to make the whole elite four evil.

A choked sob, and some static, he waited out the girl’s crying jag. Taking a draw from his drink, cursing that it’d taken all of ten minutes for things to go to such utter hell, Giovanni mulled over what wasn’t being said. Pryce, redeemed, and clearly wanting something to do with his old slaves, the story was suspect from first to last. If Giovanni’d stopped, lingered, perhaps even made an attempt on that old Ice Trainer’s life, he might have been there long enough to see and interfere.

Giovanni has a neat moment of characterization here. He never walked away from being a gangster, it's what he does best, and he knows that, too. He's aware that's who he is. I liked this.

“How about this, I’ll cut you a deal, Green Azule. You help me, I’ll help you. And I’ll be a gentleman and help you first. I come, just me, no one from the Team, no armies, no mafia, no experiments to wreak havoc. I appear, on the doorstep of your parents’ home, unarmed, as indisputable proof of all your stories. I bring proof, of the Mask of Ice, of Silph, of anything and everything you need to prove to your parents what you need to prove to them.”

Another neat piece. he offers to help this girl, Green. Of course, he expects something in return, like the cunning man that he is. I think this is a good deal overall, and Green obviously accepts it for the story to continue.

That's about it! If I have the time for it I'll probably read the next chapter. For now, I like the setup of the story, to be honest, never expected Green and Giovanni to team up, but I quite enjoyed what you wrote so far. Keep up the good work.

 

[Spiteful Murkrow]

Heya, I'd been making a point to go back and throw some reviews at people who'd given me feedback over Review Blitz and saw that I hadn't gotten around you yet. And that you had a request for a review for this story open for a while on Review Tag. Now, I didn't have the energy to get to the second and third chapters, but I figured that I'd go ahead and work towards a position where I could get at them. Since yeah, might as well take a crack at filling that open Review Tag myself.

Chapter 1

The Roombas with the knives had been the first incident.



That’d taken a day to sort out. Though the Roomba with a ceiling fan, with knives atop the spinning fan blades, had been moderately exciting. Still, they were easily dispatched. Rhyhorn had kicked the reappropriated cleaning device, causing it to tip. The adlibbed improvised saw blade spun futilely into the floor for a while, digging gouges into the carpets while the boss of Team Rocket watched on in bemused fascination.



The downed device made a peculiar backdrop as he turned upon the inept clutch of humanity who had been his security teams and tore into them. One blistering ultimatum, which boiled down to him giving them twenty minutes to corral and dispose of the remaining knife-wielding ‘bots or they’d be disposed of and he’d let them get to work.

Yeah, I'd be cranky if someone's discount killer deathbot tore up my flooring too. ^^;

Suffice to say the rest of the robots were dispatched almost immediately.



Once sure it wasn’t rigged to blow, or anything else, he’d taken the juvenile attempt at murder with him to his office. After letting Rhyhorn rip off the pointy bits and bobs, mind. A set of purloined tools and he had it broken down into its components.



The results were… interesting.



Obviously adlibbed improvised, the fan and most of the additives to the Roombas were low quality. Probably stolen. An internet search would later find his hypothesis correct. An article sporting a shot of an eatery that’d just been broken into – such a minor crime, and only interesting because it had not been sanctioned by him- had had a shot of their entryway. The picture of an archway leading deeper into the facilities would confirm that the fan on his desk was likely from that place. There were knives that had been reported stolen, and the company logo on them wasn't utterly worn off.

Giovanni: "I don't know whether I should feel thankful or insulted that whoever tried to do this was too incompetent to put explosives on these things." >_>;

But that search was held off, by two finds.



There were a handful of red hairs, bright and long, tucked into a nook of the device. Those he pulled out, ran over his fingers as he wondered.



And while he could have sent them off to his research department to confirm…



There were enough other hints that it'd be redundant.

Ah. Well that explains why the culprit thought of using knifes on Roombas and not explosives. Too young and inexperienced to make the latter work. :V

The work on the wires, the rerouting, and cuts, there were hints of ice damage where things had been moved about. There’d also been a few fine black hairs of a dark type… The crisp NeverMelt about the follicles marked the fur as part of the Sneasel line, and after that last find…



Well, DNA testing just wasn't needed.

Lovely family dynamic there, Giovanni. Reunions must be quite the event. o<o

A flip through the varied periodicals, after reading about the local break-in, had not gotten him quite what he was looking for. Recalling what he’d learned from various spies and psychics, he turned his attention from local matters to those of far-flung Sevii. When no feel-good periodical piece popped up, about reunions and heroics, he saluted the girl’s cunning and consulted quieter avenues. A comb over the school systems of the Sevii islands procured a list of new students, and… well the child had a rather uncommon name and had the poor fortune of being unable to coax her parents to change it, go into hiding, or take any major effort to obscure her presence.

Oh right. It's a Silver and Green story. This is the 'Green' side of the equation, I see.

Backtracking from academic records, where he'd found the girl had been home long enough to be starting a second semester in some academy or other, it'd been child's play to trace academics those records to a home address, to a phone number.



Making the call, well he’d been considerate, accommodating time zones and making a point of calling her at a reasonable time outside of her class schedule. He'd even granted her a few hours past her last class to accommodate any after-school nonsense she might be indulging.

Uh... yeah, I do not trust amity of any sort coming from Giovanni, so there has to be some sort of horrible catch to all of this. [fearfullaugh]

Lounging in his home office, half past three in the morning his time, he’d set a cup of coffee before him and took sips at it between rings.



It wasn’t a long wait for her patience to break.



She was as she’d been in all their encounters. Rude, impatient, and impertinent. Letting him get routed to voice mail five times before picking up was petty incarnate inconsiderate. Perhaps hoping some tracking software or other would give her an answer to who this was without having to pick up. Well, she could hope, but it wouldn’t, and he’d set his device to automatically call hers unceasingly. On the sixth call, in utter irritation, she picked up to tell him off.

... Should've just smashed the phone there, but okay, Green.

“I swear to Mew,” the girl’s voice carried quite well, and Giovanni eased the phone from his ear a bit. “Whoever the heck this is, you’ve got to be the pushiest telemarketer ever! I’m telling you, once, right now, I don’t want whatever you’re selling-“



“I was wondering if Silver might be with you and available to talk.”



Silence, broken by a yelp of terror, then a dial tone was his answer.

... Okay, maybe she did smash the phone there.

Clearly Green had not learned any manners since the whole incident at Silph Co. He hadn’t expected much from a child who had allied with other children to tear down a building in response to a perfectly reasonable hostage situation. Frustrated that a long day had bled into a long, pointless, night, and that the next day would be met with precious few hours of sleep he let things stand. Resolving to tolerate the child’s skittishness for a week, before taking things up personally.



Both he and the child were spared that though because a half week of calling at exactly the same time garnered him more productive results. She picked up when he called, and spoke, rather than hung up.



“He’s not here.”



Well at least she cut to the chase; he hadn’t even needed to repeat himself.

Surprised that Green didn't just drop the line right there, but let's see where this is going...

“And you don’t know where he’s at?”



“Around, about. We tried… He tried to settle here after… Celebi... but things weren’t good.”



Celebi, and Illex, had been a turning point. At death's door due to a Legend's malice taking the form of disease he'd appealed a different Legend. And on an apathetic whim, the Healer had intervened.



He’d been given a second chance at life, poisons purged, damages reversed, and shaking the light of Celebi’s healing from his eyes Giovanni had found himself surrounded by Lance and the dex’ holders. And while Pryce had been there, and the old man’s presence had been a temptation to divest the old fool of his life, the Rocket’d considered his audience. Surrounded by children and their powerful beasts he weighed morals against sense and decided it was saner to withdraw. Taking his army of Rockets with him had been a mercy, and backhanded thanks for their efforts in speeding along the circumstances of his healing.

Wew, too cheap to send a card, huh? :V

Letting Silver and Green be had been an attempt, roundabout mind, of reconciliation. If the boy wanted nothing to do with him, then fine. He'd let his child make his way with his closest companion for the time being. Eventually, he'd ease the boy back to his side but in that moment of being reborn...



He'd decided to be magnanimous.



Clearly, such generosity had been a mistake.

>implying leaving your child who you have a poisonous relationship with alone is """magnanimity"""
Well, can't say he's not Gio with an ego like that. o<o

“What happened?"



Silence was the girl's answer, and only the lack of dial tone told him she hadn't hung up again. He strained his ears and he could hear subtle background noises. The crunch of her footfalls, this the hiss of surf and beach. He wondered if she were foolish enough to be having this call on speaker, her voice murmured, something in response to a salutation, confirming his hypothesis. So he waited, while she walked, and she gathered her thoughts.



“We ditched Oak’s goodie goodie squad almost as fast as you did.” Her tones were a curious mix, sickly sweet and acidly sharp. “If you’d of stuck around ohhh ten minutes, we’d of probably bugged you for a lift out of that mess.”

That tone gives me some doubts, just saying.

The past, and its regrets, even ones he hadn’t been aware of, were worthless things to mull over. Still, his hands clenched, as frustration seethed in his gut. Ten minutes, how could have things gone to hell that fast… If he’d lingered, even a portion of that span, he might have overheard something. Found some reason or way to twist things so that Silver could have gone with him… Hell, he should have just taken Silver with him.



But it was in the past, and the past, despite Pryce’s mad, roundabout, efforts, was as it’d ever been. Unretrievable. Drawing a deep breath the Rocket Boss flattened his hands on the desk’s edge. Violence, for now, would get him nothing.

Surprised that this guy is just trusting a girl who's a notorious trickster character in the manga, but okay Giovanni.

However, information gathered now could be applied later.



He exhaled, slow and soft, willing the rage back for now.



“What happened?”



”The other ‘dex holders… Well after they decided Lance was perfectly alright never mind the guy tried to fry half of Kanto. Well after that they pulled out a donphan load of crap about Him being redeemed. Never mind we told them what He did…” The child’s voice crackled, under the wash of pain. Of humiliation of a confession dismissed, a lifetime of pain disregarded, and the knowledge that these “heroes” weren’t as good as they seemed, was revisited. “We left. I gave Oak his ‘dex back and, screw him, I kept Blasty. Silver returned Fer’ to Elm though. We were done, with Oak, the League, and the other ‘dex holders.”

Ah yes, this would explain the AU-ness of the story. I admittedly never read this arc of the manga, but... yeah, that does sound like Lance got let off the hook more than a little easily.

A choked sob, and some static, he waited out the girl’s crying jag. Taking a draw from his drink, cursing that it’d taken all of ten minutes for things to go to such utter hell, Giovanni mulled over what wasn’t being said. Pryce, redeemed, and clearly wanting something to do with his old slaves, the story was suspect from first to last. If Giovanni’d stopped, lingered, perhaps even made an attempt on that old Ice Trainer’s life, he might have been there long enough to see and interfere.



But he hadn’t, and this was the fallout.



Finding her voice, and anger all at once, the girl, Green, rallied. “We don’t owe no one anything, and no one has any leverage over us and… And we tried to go home… To my home….” One drawn breath, deep and shaking, anger felled as reality set in. “And it didn’t work out.”

Not sure if you want to be telling Giovanni all of this, Green. But let's see where this is going.

He could pry. Ply out details; twist her with mere words until she was telling him everything by playing on her fears and striking her vulnerabilities. All it’d take would be the mere hinting of his power and resources. He obviously had her number; he clearly knew where she lived and her schedule. He could disappear her parents with a call, less than a handful of words and her whole family would be at his mercy, and she’d have to tell him everything to get them back.

Yeah, see. This is why you shouldn't be so open to him.

Old Rocket ploys, yes, but from what he’d heard from the mouths of the other children culled by the Mask of Ice, such were the motions of Pryce’s own power games. Drink done, Giovanni set aside his glass and considered the lit clock on the back wall. Basic arithmetic confirmed it was nearing four a clock, Sevvi time, if Green lingered any longer on this walk she’d likely be missed.



To that anxiety, that remembered and present sense of wondering and worry for his child, Giovanni, the Boss of Team Rocket, indulged mercy of a sorts.



“I think… we have a bit to talk about, face to face.” It wasn’t quite a suggestion and he heard her breath catch as she cottoned on to the threat. “Commercial phones are horridly insecure.”

Green: "... Any chance we could try using payphones first?"

Giovanni: "No." >:|

“I don’t want you here.” Old indignation, old beliefs were tabbed on as a venomous afterthought. “You’re as bad as he is.”



The poor child couldn’t even say Pryce’s name. That’s how hard and deep the man’s hooks were in her psyche.



“Can you get to me here? Because that's the only other option."



Silence, as she wrestled juvenile back talk and logic and came up with nothing, witty or otherwise, to say.

Giovanni: "I'll take that as a 'no'. Anyhow..."

“How about this, I’ll cut you a deal, Green Azule. You help me, I’ll help you. And I’ll be a gentleman and help you first. I come, just me, no one from the Team, no armies, no mafia, no experiments to wreak havoc. I appear, on the doorstep of your parents’ home, unarmed, as indisputable proof of all your stories. I bring proof, of the Mask of Ice, of Silph, of anything and everything you need to prove to your parents what you need to prove to them.”



“That you’re the Boss of Team Rocket?”



“Don’t get uppity, brat.” Giovanni sneered, lips quirking despite his warning. Of all the cheek… “But my services come with one, small, string attached,”



“I help you find him? Silver?”



“Correct, so do we have a deal?”

Giovanni:

Green: "You aren't making this any easier for me, you know." >_>;

Green lingered in the line, near perfectly silent, thinking over angles and edges until, at last. “I want two days, to think about it, and to pick a time.”



Reasonable, more than. More than reasonable. He said as much and she chirped, utterly false and carefree, how he wasn’t obviously the Boss of anything, he was too much of a pushover for that. It was a flimsy effort to cover for his candor and if he were using a commercial line… Well, it might have held in a court of law to cover him. Still, her effort was appreciated, and he ended the call with a wry.



“Goodbye Green, two days, same time, I expect an answer.”

Green: "And if I don't give one?"
Giovanni: "Oh trust me, I'm getting one one way or another."

“Whatever you say, Uncle G!”



To that uncalled-for bit of sass Giovanni resolved to bring his largest flying type from his stable of reserve pokemon when he did swing by. Her hanging up, thus assuring she got the last word in, cemented that plan. He'd get something large, and nasty-minded, and malicious. All the better to properly scare her senseless and dissuade her from running her mouth at him.



"Uncle G", of all the damned fool things…

Well that's certainly an ominous close to your Prologue.

Alright, so for my overall thoughts... it's an interesting opener, and it gives some insight into the different characters. Both in who Green is as someone who's been badly hurt by past events and looking for someone to turn to, and from Giovanni as a ruthless and manipulative type who is able to exploit Green's lingering traumas and insecurities to get an opening at his son.

I do feel that it might have made sense to try and give a bit more elaboration as to manga events for your readers, since... yeah, it's not as well-known a branch of the franchise, and I admittedly only had a hazy recollection of most of the events brought up here. More explicitly spelling out the 'how and why' of some things such as the sorts of things that Lance did that made the others' declaration of him as redeemed so galling to Green would've gone a long way on that front. Also, the spacing is admittedly a bit distracting. You might want to condense it down into something more compact so that was it's visually easier to follow for readers.

All-in-all though, I think it accomplished what it needed to for an opening, and it was a neat glimpse into an incarnation of mainline characters that are at once familiar and noticeably different. So good job there, @K_S , and good luck with your other writings here on TR. ^^

 

[Spiteful Murkrow]

Heya, was a bit of a grind at a less-than-sane hour, but I got in a chapter review for your story that can properly apply to Review Tag:

Chapter 2

It was a regular night, not quite sundown, a bit after dinner. And because dinner wasn’t takeout there were things to do after dinner. Mum was cleaning the dishes, Green drying them beside her, perched on a step stool because she wasn’t quite tall enough to reach everything yet. Though Green only needed the first step, not the second, which she’d so proudly scampered up a mere two days before her capture. Upon that second step, she’d stood tiptoe, so proud, crowing, look, she was an adult and could do adult things now. She was tall enough…

Well that’s certainly ominous.

But then two days had passed, and then a few years after that.

And she needed only the first step now and likely wouldn’t need it much longer.

Still, Mama’s arm around her shoulder, an idle hug, leaving wet dampness behind, was welcome, as were all the small things that reaffirmed Green was home.

Oh. So Green is back home after a period of a few years being separated involuntarily from home. That… was admittedly a little hard to parse from the opening paragraph, and is something you might want to play around with to try and smooth out. ^^

The main sounds of the moment were water running, the soft scrape of soapy fabric over plastic and silverware, interspaced interspersed by the click of things being set in their place. There came a different click, and the soft muted babble afterwards confirmed that it was the TV that Daddy’d turned on. Static, and clicks, and flickers from the corner of her eye confirmed he was hunting up searching for a news station for them to enjoy. Watching the news was a family thing, where they talked about what was being said, thoughts and feelings and worries were things to be openly bantered about, and since it was election season politicians were to be made fun of too.

Especially if they were scandalous.

Pretty sure that I’d rather watch cartoons, but hey, if it gets the family all together with each other, you could do worse.

“Mind your feet, young lady.” Mum huffed and Green smiled back, settling herself more towards the center of her perch to get the last plate up just right. Making a point of doing but did so safely because Mum liked it like that.

So Green’d do so to make her happy.

I’m… not sure if I fully followed what was going on here between Green and her mother. I’m assuming it had something to do with Green’s stance on the step-stool, but the prose was admittedly a little confusing here.

There were a lot of clicks and grumbles from the living room. as Being on the edge of two Regions did allow the perk of being able to receive twice as many stations if one had the right set of skills to catch them. Her father worked in electronics and computers; he was more than good to do so, even if it were mildly illegal to do so without paying premiums.

Won’t the reception to both regions leave a lot to be desired though thanks to distance?

Not that Green cared. Mum’d complain about it, sure, but she would stop when Dad found her a new Johtoian soap for her to while pass the late hours when she had insomnia or nightmares.

Immersed in the comfortingly familiar surroundings, the rap on the front door nearly made Green hop. Though hopping was stupid. She should have expected it. He said he was coming…

But she hopped and Mum braced her, coaxing her down and giving the door and its knocker a withering look, never mind that it’d never be seen

Mother: “... Dear, should I be worried right now?”

Green: “No! No! Not at all!”

Green didn’t need Mum’s assurances; this visitor was more than expected. Fear on the decline She relaxed and let her fears ebbed away, because he’d promised to behave civilized and she wasn’t stupid enough to trust that, so Green’d promised herself she’d make sure he kept his promise. And she had Nido’s pokeball in her pocket, the ‘mon inside with orders to sit on him pointy sides down, to encourage that good behavior.

With that assurance, because she trusted Nido’, almost more than anything, Green tipped Mum a smile and shrug.

I’m presuming that this is Silver who’s due to come over given that… yeah, I don’t think doing this to Giovanni would end well. :V

“I’m alright.” Then louder, just to make sure Da heard, and if their guest did, all the better. “It’s proba’ly a ‘marketer Da!’” Green hollered, knowing he’d hear it. The walls weren’t paper-thin, but the kitchen was close to the entrance, so it was likely he did, Green didn’t really need to holler, but she did anyway. Because he seemed the type not to like loudness, he’d called Blue a brat for yelling at him about the hostages and…

And while petty, he wasn’t very nice, so Green didn’t need to be either.

Wait, if Silver’s not very nice, then why do you want him anywhere near your house? >:V

Sort of like how she didn’t have to contribute to the house's defenses by bugging the house's doorbell to shock anyone who rung it. And it was a shame he hadn’t rung it. It likely wouldn’t have mattered if he’d been shocked anyway, Red’s ‘chu probably numbed him to shocks and stuff.

The door swung open, enough to make the lock chain rattle, and she could hear him speaking to Da'.

“I understand this is a delicate time for you and your family, and that this is a deeply personal matter but… your child and mine have a commonality that we need to discuss… A shared history linked in Viridian…” And never mind she’d known he’d lead with the abduction. Shock was the fastest way to get the door open, and playing on old traumas, he’d said he would, but it made hearing even the allusions… no easier. Even with Mum wrapping her arm around her, and glaring balefully at the figure who was standing on the threshold. “I believe, Mr. Azule, that it would be best if the rest of this conversation occur inside.”

… Wait, so Green thought it was a good idea to just lead Giovanni straight to her parents? Why on earth would she have thought that was a good idea? .-.

He was talking to Da’ in smooth, soft, slightly accented words. Silver’d never spoken odd like that. Idly Green wondered why Silver never sounded like his father. Even as she nudged out of her mother’s hold and went closer.

Bristling, never mind Da' didn’t have a ‘mon to his name, and wasn’t meant for fighting, Da’ glared at him, with a stony expression stony.

“I’m sorry sir, but I think you’ve at the wrong house.”

“Really?” And forget every promise he made, of no armies, no mob, no danger, Giovanni Sakaki’s voice dropped to lethal levels. “This isn’t the home of Green Azule and her family? You might want to update your mailbox outside then.” Lips curling into a Persian’s grin, all edges, and cruelty, the Rocket bared his teeth at Da’, dark eyes thinning. “This isn’t the home of the child who rescued mine from the Mask of Ice-?“

Uhh… yeah, this is why you should’ve insisted to meet this guy at a police station or something, Green. Since I’m getting really, really bad vibes from this entire encounter right now.

“-That… You are not…” Da sputtered. Paling, because he hadn’t believed. Not him, or Mum, and part of their news watching was to show her about how things could look one way and be another. To help her critical thinking along enough so that she could tell them what really happened.

Um… yeah, no. Blindly trusting corporate media in this day and age is more or less a recipe for getting lied to on a repeated basis. And I distinctly remember that at a minimum, there were broadcast networks in Hoenn captured in Team Aqua’s sphere of influence in the manga’s continuity, and Team Flare did that with Kalosian news in multiple continuities, so… yeah. ^^;

It’d been a smothering sort of love, and she’d been so hungry for any type of love she’d forgiven them their unwillingness to listen. Accepted the domestic tranquility built about a lie, because for her, what was one more lie but another mark on the scoreboard?

Silver hadn’t agreed. He had argued and fussed in his quiet way, and finally, when they’d only responded to him with softness and evasions the redhead had snapped. One too many “the Mask is a delusion” talks and he’d stormed out, taking Murkrow and Sneasel, and not looking back.

Gee, I wonder why he didn’t take too well to hearing a major childhood trauma still raw in his memory called a delusion. Truly a mystery.

He'd called her, the first night he was off of Sevvi, to tell her he was alright, just not coming back. Or talking to her parents ever again. She was trying to wear Silver down, her birthday was in a few months after all, but maybe, Giovanni might be faster.

Which was the only reason she’d let him come here.

And though petty it was gratifying to see someone talk about the Mask of Ice and not get shut down, and shushed, and patted on the head, and told to think, really think, because such fanciful things happened in stories, dear heart, not to real people, not in the real world.

And Giovanni was still talking, in those clipped, accent-marred, words. “I assure you, Mr. Azule, I am not some actor paid off to reinforce whatever delusions you think your daughter is harboring. She doesn’t have that type of money and I don’t have that sort of time to waste. Not while my son is missing. My son, who was, in your custody for several months.”

Taking a deep breath, Giovanni’s posture eased, from the looming he’d partaken to bully Red, to a more sedate stance. “And the rest of this talk needs to happen inside.’

And seeing Da', so pale and shaken, but trying for bravery, trying so hard, Green softened. Da’ probably thought this was the Mask of Ice, even though she’d told Mum and Da’ who Mask was, a foreign gym leader, old and icy cold, sometimes made of ice, sometimes not. They just hadn’t listened well enough.

I mean, I don’t think “he’s an (allegedly) ex-mafia don who ran a(n allegedly) disbanded criminal syndicate” is magically going to make those two feel more at ease.

Still, Daddy was trying. So she set aside her anger and frustration, to chime in.

“He means Silver, Daddy. This is Silver’s Dad.” And full truth hovered on her lips; she swallowed it with a bitter smile, adding another mark. “He’s Viridian’s gym leader.”

“Despite Blue’s and Red’s deafening complaints to the contrary, I still am.”

Ah yes, as if Green didn’t need to make her parents nope out any harder than she already had.

And to that confession, Daddy stepped back, and Giovanni swept in. It was his trench coat that let him sweep, Green decided. Shame they’d just swept and mopped the day before or it’d really be “sweeping”. Slipping off his fedora Giovanni turned about, looking for a place to put his hat perhaps. They didn’t have a hat rack or anything. Hats were stored in your room, and Green had two hanging from her bedroom wall. So, when Green padded forward and offered her hand, rather imperiously mind, and he passed his hat down to her it was probably for the best that he didn’t know that the hall closet she was going to pop it into had the dust brooms and mops.

I swear that this girl has a death wish from the sheer number of things that she’s doing that she knows the mafia boss that she has no reason to trust isn’t being less-than-honest with her doesn’t like. ^^;

A screech from outside, the shadow of wings ghosting over the windows, and Green didn’t startle. Not openly. She had Sabrina to thank for that she supposed. Never mind she wanted to set Nido on the old Psychic witch and tell Nido to roll over the woman twice for trapping her in her own mind and reliving her abduction by the Mask’s bird over and over again...

And Giovanni was studying her expression as it happened. That tap of his foot on the floorboards as he entered hadn’t been a gesture to kick off some dirt before he got in. It was likely a signal and. And Green decided the dust mop bin was too good for Giovanni’s hat. She’d nip into the bathroom and flush the damned thing to teach him better manners.

Why would you do this while Giovanni is in the same room as your parents, Green?

A shame Mum caught her making a wrong turn and called her out on it. And if Green hadn’t known Silver as well as she did. Well, Silver had a funny way of letting his eyes crinkle right before he laughed, and Giovanni’s were doing that as he saw, and was perhaps amused by, her vindictive streak.

He didn’t laugh though. Only watched as she hung his hat on the bathroom’s doorknob (Green meant the place as a threat, she could nip in and accidentally drop it somewhere unpleasant at any time) and Giovanni nodded, understanding where exactly he stood with her.

Green, maybe don’t antagonize the mafia don while he’s right there with your family.

“I’m gunna get my phone off the charger. Silver called and left a message last night and some of the background noises were weird.”

It was curious to see a man she thought of in terms of “looming”, and “sneering”, a coagulation of stationary and cruel, perk up at words. And the customary venom, the mocking drawl when he talked down to her was- not gone- but dimmed. He considered her. Seeming to weigh her words for truth with obvious interest, and he made some sort of decision or other she supposed.

“I’d appreciate it.”

“And I’m getting my team.”

Again:

A snort, as he shifted his coat just so so she could see the flash of yellow and black on his belt. Great balls, likely his Gym Leader Team then. Wonderful. She’d stolen his badge, not earned it, if it got to the level of nasty where ‘mon were drawn, it’d be bad. Taking the stairs two at a time, she tried to remember if any Oak’s goodie goodie squad had earned the Earth badge honestly.

Maybe Red.

… Aren’t Ultra Balls the one that are yellow and black? I thought Great Balls were blue with red accents.

But Red was sulking on some mountain top, and had blocked her number almost as fast as she’d told Blue and Gold where they could shove their “new alliance”. Because while Giovanni wasn’t a litter of newborn meowth, he was a hell of a lot better than a man who abducted kids out of their homes and shoved them into freezers for giggles.

And fuck apologies. Because Pryce had had the guts to try to do that, seeing both his favorite pawns wince back from him, eyes wide, with obvious denials to his offer obvious.

Uh… yeah. “Sorry” feels more than a little inadequate considering what I know of the entire Mask of Ice subplot.

“I’m sorry” didn’t give her back her parents, or take away their fear, or her fear, or undo the ice damage to her hands, or bring back the kids the Mask had killed. Because there was one freezer in the back, one with a kettle of water kept steaming and he’d dipped one of the kids into it as an example and pulled him out when the masked “failed” kid had started really screaming. Then, as the boy was almost cooked to death, Pryce’d had his piloswine pull the boy out, and dropped him. Boiling water freezing as it hit the freezer floor, and the boy’d begged and screamed and they’d had to watch until the screaming stopped.

And then the body’d been left and whoever failed, however they failed, were locked in the freezer with that poor dead kid that no one knew the name of.

Did that actually happen in the manga, or is that something specific to this AU?

Will’d called him Brown because even frozen the blood eventually had darkened to a reddish-brown and it’d been the easiest thing to pick out once the ice had really started to build on the body.

“You ever clean out Brown’s freezer cell, Master, ever tell his parent what happened to him? What’d he do that was so bad that you left him to freeze and rot for five years?”

That'd been Green's last words to Pryce. Silver's had been more direct. A snarled "hail" and they'd both booked it under Sneasel's malice-born snowstorm. Both of them just about done with everyone and everything.

Hard to fault their reactions, honestly. Though these two should really see a therapist at some point.

Green’d known what Brown had done. Silver had too. The older kids whispered it among themselves. Brown had snapped, taking mission after mission in the same place had made him complacent. Hopeful. And he’d approached a police officer and been believed (hard to dispute a mask frozen to your face) and he’d been building trust and trying to get help.

And there’d been a bit on the news, something about missing children and it’d reached Mahogany and the Master had personally seen to recapturing Brown and… killing him… like that.

But all is forgiven because reasons! … Or at least that’d be the case were this not an AU.

And Green was in her room, not really sure how she got there for a moment. Alone, and shaking, because remembering Brown always made her shake. She stared blankly at her bed for who knows how long. When she was done crying she took her phone off the nightstand, and her team too. It was a simple thing to pick it up and pop it into her pocket, to swing her trainer’s belt and its holsters so it looked slightly off-center, fashionably so. Looing a bit more put together Green stole a moment to dab her face, purloining a pillow with a too-long case, then flipping it over so no one would know.

I… am not sure how she got there either, since I could’ve sworn there was no mention of a progression from Green’s room to the stairs earlier on.

You probably want to add a more explicit mention of that earlier in this scene as she goes up to get her team.

She took the stairs slowly, still, a bit spooked. More here than remembering she was able to see that Giovanni had moved the coffee table and laid paper, some photos, some maps, on the purloined furniture. Mum and Da’ were sitting across from him, on the couch, looking sick and shocked, holding hands.

Mum saw her first and with a furtive glance at Giovanni, that the man ignored, pipped in. “Sweetie, let me get your phone and I’ll play the message to Mr. Sakaki, shall I? Then you can go back to your room, and we’ll talk in the morning.”

That sounds like a really, really terrible idea there, but okay, Mrs. Azule.

Ignoring Mum, Green looked at the pictures. One of them, on the corner, with its familiar blotch of red-brown made her smile. Awful as it was, it was familiar, and she shook her head. Making the rest of the way down without a wobble.

“You found Brown’s room?”

“Mr. Henderson’s remains were discovered along with the other cells under Mahogany’s Gym last month. As I understand it Pryce is under investigation.”

Yeaaaah, “I’m sorry” kinda doesn’t get you out of legal charges. It’s a nice concept, but… yeah, no functioning justice system could allow this to skate. Or at least not without making a token attempt at caring about getting to the bottom of the matter.

There’d been a way out leading straight to Pryce’s gym. She could have... if they’d gone out that way they could have alerted Mahogany’s police, brought him down. Because missing children, claiming to be from the gym. Someone would have to look into that… But the vents had seemed safer and Green hadn’t wanted to take the time to find another route.

Because Silver’d gotten sick and when you got sick you got locked into Brown’s room until you got better... or not.

Ouch. Major “for want of a nail” energy there.

“His name was Henderson?”

Green was at the couch, settling in on the space between Da’ and the couch’s plush arm. Looking at the pictures, diagrams of the Mask of Ice’s main lair, with open interest, Green could actually trace out her escape path. She followed it with her eyes, once, twice, blinking sharply.

Green didn’t see how Giovanni’s face softened, just a little bit. “Brian Henderson, twelve years old, his family resided in Kalos, he was missing for eight years, his father was a cop, his mother deceased.”

Ah, so Brown is an AU character, since Kalos definitely did not exist at the time the MoI arc was going on.

Which explained why Bro- Brian had gone to the cops.

“Did you know him?”

“He was the first one that tried to run away,” Green whispered, picking up a picture. It wasn’t her cell, or Silver’s, the scorch marks meant it was likely Karen’s. She was the only one with a fire type after all. “They’d lock us up with him when we got sick or were bad. So no one’d ask “or else” when the Mask got really nasty because Brian was [ ] “or else”.

Dying like he did. We told ourselves stories, when the Mask wasn’t about, about how brave he was because even though he didn’t get it right, he tried. And if we were brave like him… maybe we could try but not die like him and make his dying worth it.”

You want to break up that last paragraph there, and I think you’re missing a few words here and there.

Da’ had slung an arm about her shoulder, drawn her close and she was shaking and hated herself for it. Hated Giovanni got to see it, though he was considering the photos as if looking for some answers on their glossy colored fronts. It was almost like privacy, almost.

“Silver was sick,” Giovanni’s head jerked up at that. “Not when he called me.” She promised. “Right before I got us out, he was catching something nasty. And the Mask was going to lock him in Brown- Brian’s room, and not let him out. Mask promised to do that to us, a lot.”

Silence, outside wings cast shadows into the room and she looked at the Rocket bitterly, almost hating Giovanni as much as Mask at that moment. Almost as much as Silver hated Oak, for maybe the same reason.

It might make sense to spell out why explicitly Green is upset with Gio here, since… I also didn’t follow what was going on there.

And for seeing her anger, the Rocket nodded, accepting the unspoken rebuke.

“I believe we all need a moment as this isn’t going to be a simple drop off the photos and leave session that I thought it was going to be.” Giovanni offered, his tone nearly gentle.

“You’re being considerate.” Green managed a wobbly laugh, “No one’s going to believe that.”

Honey, that’s not the only thing that you shouldn’t believe about this guy, but let’s not even get into that.

“I’ll abstain from any obvious charity,” Giovanni promised, lips quirking, and then he was heading outside to recall his bird, making himself an utter liar. Reaching down, pulling up a few pictures, she smiled, nearly laughed. Silver had gotten Sneasel to scratch out a few swears on the walls like he promised.

Silver just hadn’t gotten Sneasel to spell the curses right. “Fock”, indeed. When Giovanni stepped back in a little later she nestled between both her parents, pointing out the swears Sneasel’d scratched into the walls to her parents. Explaining how she’d tried to get Jiggly to sing pop tunes into the vents at random times because Mask hated those. And how Silver was trying to make icicles that’d fall when someone entered through his cell’s front door because, why not?

Well I’d suppose that’d explain why Silver and Green are still semi-functioning after that whole ordeal. They definitely didn’t take their captivity lying down. Or at least not all of it.

When Giovanni came back in she looked up and dug out her phone.

“I turned off the password lock for my voicemail for five minutes.”

When the Rocket moved to listen right there she huffed at him, glaring.

“Taking phone calls in the living room is rude.” She quoted Mum and Mum huffed a nervous laugh, meaning to deflect, surely.

“I think,” Giovanni hummed. “That I’ll take five minutes to fetch my hat and listen to what needs to be listened to. But when I get back, I will have questions.”

Green, you do not want this man out of your sight. Let him listen in someplace you can see him.

“Timers on the corner of the screen and it’s going to auto turn off when it gets to the end. Altered Parental controls. And I set it to start when you left the room.” Green nearly sang up at him.

And of course, Giovanni had to look down at it and confirm, his glare up at her was more heartfelt than his previous malice towards her parents. And between the shadows of wings, that he’d caused the darken her windows, and the disaster at Silph… She held her ground, smiling up at him. Because she’d be damned before she flinched at him.

Because he’d brought a bird, so whatever she did in retaliation was more than deserved because he brought a Mew-blasted bird.

“I will be back in two minutes.” He warmed, all softness gone. “Then we’ll talk.”

I have exactly zero reason to believe that any of this will end well. ^^;

Giving him all the attention Giovanni deserved, which was none at all, Green flipped through a few photos. Sorting them in whimsical patterns. Finding another familiar one, she pulled it up, showing it to her parents, smile tight and twisted.

"This was the mess hall."

The picture was just an empty cavern, roof crushingly close, a pair of iced-down tables, metallic and glinting under its crust of ice. An adult sitting at it would have to crunch down to get around, but then the Mask's soldiers had been children, and not too horribly tall, even now. And though they didn't ask, just looked on in shocked horror, Green carried on like her parents had asked her a question she'd wanted them to ask.

Green: “... In retrospect, I probably should’ve just asked Giovanni to mail these to a PO box, but still feels good to know that I’m getting vindicated here.” ^^;

"We'd sit in groups, by height, so me and Silver sat closest because we were shortest, in the back. The biggest kids ate first and ate the most, and there were only so many plates and cups and they got passed down. Mask made them start sharing when Silver and me got sick from not eating enough. Passed out in on a mission, we were both in Brian's room for half a day for that... Then Karen and Will got put in Brian's room for a week once after Mask realized what was going on..."

-blinks-

Wait, that’s the ending? Since that… certainly feels abrupt.

Alright, for my overall thoughts:

It’s an interesting glimpse into your characters as you can just see Green’s parents react to finding out that their daughter’s nightmares she kept going on about were more than delusions and fantasies. I was fully expecting the shoe to drop with Giovanni here, but… I suppose that’s a story for another day.

As for things I had an issue with, there’s a lot of weird phrasing quirks here or there that sounded unnatural when read out loud. If you’re not already doing it and fluent in spoken English, I recommend that one of your proofreading passes prior to publishing be done just reading your text back to yourself since it’ll help you notice sentences that don’t sound natural in prose. There’s also some issues stemming from underdescription in a few parts, such as the bit where Green goes to get her Pokémon that feels kinda like she’s teleporting around since she’s not firmly established as heading for her room prior to that flashback sequence she goes into.

Also, I get that this is part 1 of 2 of a broader thing going on, but I also thought that you probably would’ve been better off putting in a conventional ending and treating it like a scene break since the existing ending… basically feels like you wrote everything up on a piece of paper, tore the bottom half off, and then published whatever was on the top half. Like I get that it’s a practice that sometimes works in television or the like, but it doesn’t really translate to written works.

I’ll be shooting to get in a review of Chapter 3 sometime before the end of Review Blitz, since I suspect that Chapter 3 is more or less an immediate continuation of what’s going on in this one and… the ending was more than a little abrupt there. Probably a sign that I need to see Chapter 3 in order to have something approaching closure to this one. ^^;

This was admittedly a more critical review than I was hoping to put together, but I hope it helps you with your story, @K_S and I hope that this feedback was helpful for you and your future endeavors.

 

[K_S]

Silvia and Green

The Heist: part 2, Closing the gap

As Silver would point out… the most important part of planning the heist, is getting to the location and planning an in and an out. Otherwise plots were just dreams. Loot not looted didn’t leave anything for them to sell for food, water, or blankets. It was only the stuff they could get to, and carry out, that meant anything.

For the record, Green could say that Giovanni’s wet blanket trait was watered down in Silver, thank goodness for small blessings, and if Silver’s mum was still alive Green owed her a lot for that

Rain made Green a bit melancholy and winter could turn her downright depressive. Luckily Sevii wasn’t inclined to too much of either, but today was definitely in the gloomy rain category, and while Green couldn’t twist it to be the Rocket’s fault, it was kinda his fault she was out in it. In a car mind, but still, it was meowth and growlithe’ing outside. The sky was shedding more tears than that angsty girl in the sparkling vampire novel Mum’d tried to get her to read to fit in and-

And that probably wasn’t the best thing to dwell on right before a heist.

So Green turned her inclination to mope to other subjects.

Like how she could have twisted the knife, as they drove. She drummed her feet against the back of the Rocket’s seat, and plotted a few scenarios in her head.

“Hey have I ever told you about that time in Silph, when Rocket was running around killing people and holding them hostage, I helped. Dropped a building on the Boss of Team Rocket and-“

That opening needed work, and yeah… Giovanni’d of thrown her out of the moving car if she went that angle.

Plans of “cheerfully” rattling off some fact to make Giovanni look bad to the Mayor, or just leaving hints that lead Silvia to dig and find certain events all on her own were major temptations.

Technically it wouldn’t be a breach in her contract, but when weighing the consequences of her idle malice… she couldn’t. Mainly because Green couldn’t read Giovanni, even when she sunk the new horrid depth of comparing father to son. Silver’d clearly inherited his mother’s physic, and because of that the red head’s reactions and expressions didn’t quite mesh to the Rocket’s…

And there was that fun fact of separated for more of their lives than living together to take into account… It’d be like someone comparing her to Mum and.. nope, not thinking about it.

Giovanni’s “good” genes couldn’t be completely recessive; if they had been Mask wouldn’t have taken Silver, unless Silver’s Mom was somehow a better trainer than his Dad?

And that thought, that was its own tangle she didn’t want to think about, Mask or Silver’s Mom, even though Silver’s asked her to.

Between those two wonderful options, it was safer to dwell on Mask.

So as they drove along the back of an off-black highway, the sky a slate grey dome as far as one could see, the natural dullness made the cityscape blur into sky, Green sulked. Since there wasn’t much traffic the road blurred into sky, sky blurred into scenery, making the world feel unreal.

In front of her, the adults were indulging a quick chat. A pre-heist checklist that should have been handled before they set out. It hadn’t started that way, meandering from how people couldn’t drive in the rain, then Silvia had realized, well oops she needed such and such… And Giovanni hummed, considering that there was something of use in his hotel room…

So a detour was declared. They hit downtown, the courthouse and political buildings were nearly side by side, as was Sevii’s jail, which was stupid. Green’d shaken off her gloom to point out how unbelievably stupid having jail right there was and the Mayor had laughed.

“Sweetheart if the budget was better I’d move them in a heartbeat, but I had to pick between the jail and improving the hospital and that was a no-brainer.”

Green’s look probably said that the move was brainless, and the mayor rolled her eyes.

“I know whose vote I’m not getting… Look… Green, I’m an adult. I do a dangerous job. Not police-level dangerous but… I knew it was unsafe when I took office and me moving people who might hurt me a few blocks, miles, whatever to make me a little bit safer isn’t that important. It’s a number game. Am I important, yes, am I as important as all the people getting treatment in the new wing and outreach facility on the island’s edge, no, I’m not. So the hospital gets the money and that’s that.”

And… that type of thinking was… it was Yellow thinking, it was Silver thinking. It was antithetical to Mask, who’d made it all about him and his precious widdle lapy’s. The man who’d ruined her life and so many others, endings lives, all because he couldn’t let go of a pet.

And it was different from Green, who was a hair nicer than Mask, going out of her way to help people she liked, like Silver, and Yellow, and not really caring about anyone else.

“Alright back there?”

Huffing a sigh, Green slumped against the car seat and mumbled. “Working on it. I just hate the rain.”

“It’ll clear up,”

They swung into a parking spot, Giovanni glancing at the jail then finding something else to look at outside. Then he jolted out of whatever his thoughts were, dodging Silvia reaching around him to dig out a small, chic, umbrella she kept in the grove of the passenger seat.

“I have one…” The Rocket snapped, having been poked, jostled, and reached around several times in the mayor’s efforts to get her things and not liking the experience at all.

“Yes, and I’m sure the funeral home you bought it from would love to have it back.”

Green chewed on her lip, to keep from laughing rather than crying this time.

Because seriously if this was what Giovanni dated, what the heck had Silver’s Mum been like?

“I’ll be back in a few… We’ll hit your place next Gianni.”

She smiled then, confident he was mollified. Green wish she shared that confidence. Then the woman tipping the umbrella up and out, she flicked her wrist and the device unflurried. At first glance Green thought it was white, but the water brought the subtle contrasts out and showed it to be a pink so pale it only seemed white. Like the farthest edge of a cherry petal, and was textured to resemble a pile of them, if spied from up high.

“You need to ah… come along, Green?”

Reading the lines between that, Green shook her head and managed something like a smile for the woman, and a wave, and then it was two again.

Rubbing his shoulder, where he’d been jabbed hard by the umbrella’s tip, the Rocket snarled under his breath.

“Women and their god-damned things.”

So said Mr. I need to get stuff before we go. Pointing out the obvious would be suicide, so Green didn’t, just unhookd her seatbelt and flopped on her side. Besides her, the box of joltick pokeballs rattled, but nothing opened. She wasn’t dumb to flop on them after all.

Supposedly melodrama was a thing teenage girls did. Why she didn’t get, but flopping was one of the few “normal” things she’d done after say… a stressful day at school, or after a rough day at the selling stalls. The sprawl felt more comfortable than sitting stiffly for however long they’d been driving, from the Mayor’s home to her office to wherever they were going next…

Plucking out a ‘tic’s pokeball she rolled it over her fingers, trying to get a good rhythm going and make it look like it disappeared appearing in one hand then the next. Without a screen or long sleeves, the trick was pretty obvious, but the practice wasn’t bad and kept her hands warm as Silvia hadn’t left the keys in the ignition, so the heat was dying down.

And the angle made things tricky.

“Stuff’s easier to swipe if you have a purse.” Green noted, tongue sticking out because it helped her think. “You don’t see me shoving things down my pants to hide the goods and make a getaway.”

The sound that came from Giovanni might have been a snort of amusement, not looking at the man, Green wasn’t even going to guess.

She went from rolling it in her hands to tossing the pokeball to herself, it was one of the Mayors, so Green couldn’t accidentally open it, making the juggling more than safe.

Staring at the roof of the car, Green decided, screw it, and mumbled.

“Silver’s been asking me about things I can’t answer. Not like… you know regular things… like the difference between boys and girls.”

Because seriously Oak and Red’s folks had been really worried about them not knowing and then horrified about them knowing too much. There’d been no way to win there. And the weird stuff they dug into after. No amount of shock dodging had dissuaded them, and she wasn’t having that conversation with Giovanni, ever.

She’d got to Mask first.

“He’s asking about his Mum, but in a Silver way. Like asking me about mine, then some on the TV, and the other peoples at school and I could answer that… but, he finally got to the point and asked me about his… your…”

Green waved the hand holding the pokeball, because, oh Arceus, what if Silver was like a product of a one-night stand or something? She didn’t want to explain that to Silver. Green’s face was turning red and she was squirming, because, ew ew ew… bad brain.

Oh, why had she opened her mouth? Why hadn’t she said no to Silver? She whimpered the last, and there was a creek. Giovanni had turned about, studying her with black eyes and a blank expression, lips pressed into a thin line.

“You really can’t say no to him, can you?”

Oh, thank goodness. Evasions. That meant Green didn’t have to even hint to Silver this conversation had ever happened because she had no information to give.. There was a Mew! Well, she knew there was a Mew Two, so Mew seemed rather obvious, still, Mew was merciful!

“While I’d much prefer to have this conversation with him face to face I assume not doing so would lead to him thinking I was holding it over his head. Withholding the data to prematurely provoke him into a face-to-face meeting?”

Mew, Green decided, was a stunted son of a braindead sneasel, and she was going to find him, and kick him for letting people think he was merciful.

Because this, this was not mercy anything.

“I’m going to retain nothing you say to me.” Green creaked out, a pathetic last defense they both knew was a stinking lie.

“If you were less of a backstabbing manipulative… child… I would be content to dictate something into your phone and trust you to forward it. As we both know what you are I’m not going to pass you such obvious blackmail material.”

Silence, after a while Green tossed the pokeball into its box, looked about, and though there was very little to look at, inside or out. Still, it was better than the placid adult look Giovanni was pinning on her.

“No sass, nothing smart to say?”

Nope, Green had nothing. She was just about to risk going outside, saying she had to “go”, when the front doors of the mayor’s office opened, and the woman was coming towards them, off pink umbrella in hand.

“Has he asked anything… specific.”

If she’d loved him, if he’d ever been loved, you know, the easy questions.

Still Green thought she might go full-blown crying if she said that. Grey rainy days just did that to her. Where birds made her remember the fear of her abduction, rain, and snow, specifically grey days with rain and snow, made her remember everything she’d lost. It’d snowed during her unwilling flight to Mount Mortar, and Ho-oh’s wings had turned the air around her into a steamy muck of a rainfall.

So of course, rain and birds and everything made her brain a mess, and her moods a morass, and it was going to be one of those days.

“Um… he might… we… Me and Yelllow, last year, well we don’t know his birthday or anything so we just do a party around the time when we got out… anyways, we wanted to get him something about her because he’d started doing his “hint hint” questions back then, even if it was just a name… Maybe just the name.” Green amended, with a swallow. “Because Sil’s such a dork he likes looking things up. But we couldn’t find her, so we got him some bitter candy from Hoenn since he doesn’t like sweet things. Which was lame…”

The door clicked open and the mayor slipped in, a wrapped bundle of something in hand. She set those in the thin space between her and Giovanni, flicking her concerned eyes from man and child.

“Everything alright in here?”

“Fine.” Green sniffled.

Clearing his throat, looking ahead and at nothing all at once, the Rocket swallowed, heavily. “December twenty-fourth.”

“What?” Green croaked.

“My son’s birthday is December twenty-fourth.”

Silence, Green nodded, and thinking maybe it wasn’t seen, she cleared her throat. “Yeah, I’ll tell him.”

Then, perhaps reminded, about being good and fair by the mayor herself, for her just being there, Green managed to continue. Though her throat was tight and each word burned.

“We think got out in August. It was the fifteenth when we got… I don’t know how long… Silver was sick… and I wasn’t much better. Days weren’t important, just hiding from Karen’s houndoom, and trying to remember the right way. I… I remember reading GoldenRod had a hospital, a sciencey one. I wanted to get us there just in case he got… worse.”

A flick of the car key and the car both warming up, literally, the Mayor, had turned on the heat. Green managed to get up to sitting and slung the belt on, suddenly wishing they didn’t have to go today but sure there weren’t going to be any other chances.

Green was on a timeline here, which meant like it or not she had work to do.

“Green we, you, don’t have to do anything,” Silvia spoke up. “Not today, not tomorrow, you’ve got a week or more, this can wait if you’re having a bad day.”

No, it really couldn’t. But she couldn’t explain it in a way the mayor would get.

“It’s uh better to do things than do nothing.. you know? Better to keep busy?” Green clearer her throat. “and climbing up a building to break-in in the rain, that’s gonna keep me super busy, I won’t be able to.. ah… think about anything else, and that’s good. It’s the best thing to do.”

It wasn’t even a lie.

“If you say so…” A pointed look was cast at Green’s “sponsor”, one that Giovanni seemed content to ignore, watching the road right now.

“To answer your earlier question,” the car pulled back, Silvia was getting the show on the road, small mercies. “Grace Mirrin Evens was Silver’s mother’s maiden name. You won’t find anything about her after because I abused a loophole in Kantoian privacy laws that prohibits gossip pieces on celebrities, of… specific topics. Her being married to me, a gym leader, granted her enough political clout to invoke those protections. And,” The Rocket’s lips quirked. “Grace was cunning enough not to do anything in public. She basically became a non-entity after our union.”

“But from before?”

“It will be difficult, but there is information. I had her social media pages purged after her passing, it felt crass to leave anything up.. But there are sources available if you, or Silver, decide to dig.” Turning so he was facing Silvia, the Rocket added. “We’ll need to make a right on Shoal and 15th.”

“Living in the biggest hotel in Sevii are we?” Silvia was string to make this normal, and Green twisted a tired smile at the woman in thanks.

“It’s the only facility with enough room and resources to host my team,” twisting, just enough their gaze could lock, the Rocket spoke again. Calling her name.

The girl perked up, or tried, she managed attentive, so win, sorta.

“If either you or Silver find anything about any living members of Grace’s family, I would strongly suggest you do not establish contact unless I am physically present. They, work with a similar methodology as your biological family did. And they have fewer scruples about hurting children to get what they want.”

Green chewed on that bit of news, and her lip, because how was she going to break that to Silver? Yeah, I spoke to your Dad and he said you might have family in the same town you’re in, but they’re crazier than mine… So don’t get in grabbing range…

“You’re not just… gunna order me to order him to stay away, or order me to keep my mouth shut?“

“Why waste my breath?”

Ung Green considered finagling her phone, texting Silver, explaining. But with how her throat burned and her eyes itched, she wasn’t going to be able to sound normal. Silver’d cotton on in a heartbeat. If she texted it’d be even odds that Silver would call back. Once he knew she knew something about his Mum, never mind Giovanni was there, Silver was stubborn like that.

And desperate to know there was someone living that could love him, someone with no horrible history or strings attached.

And she wished he’d just get it. That it was her, and Yellow, and that was it. But Silver wouldn’t be Silver without all that stubborn attached, and Green loved him for it, and hated that he’d only wound up hurt in the end.

The car slid to a stop, Silvia cleared her throat.

“We’re here, and if you need some time… for whatever, I can go up with Giovanni.”

And while kind, Green shook her head.

“After the job.”

It was better to tend to anything… emotional… after a job. Experience had taught her that the hard way.

XXX

Giovanni was back in less than five minutes, and seriously if he’d gone to just change, and they were alone, she’d of tried to tear into him. Because there was a time and place to be a clothes ponyta, and unless it was for a disguise, now wasn’t the time. Green’d been mad, one hair from losing it, until she’d gotten a good look at his get-up as he was settling back in the car.

Because he was dressed in the same get-up he’d worn to Silph with two new additions. A bulletproof vest, the type that was slid under his dress shirt but was recognizable if you knew what you were looking for, and a gun, that was clipped openly to his belt.

The gun was definitely new... and while the sight of it shut Green up, the same was not for the good Mayor.

“I’ve filled out all the appropriate permits and it's legal, Silvia, let it drop.” Giovanni sighed.

“You’re taking a loaded weapon…”

They were inching out of the downtown, all the lights were red, it figured.

“-It’d do me little good to leave the bullets in my hotel room.”

And if that was the Rocket turning on the charm by being funny Green had to wonder how he managed to get Silver’s mom to be with him long enough to have Silver.

Because that was just bad.

“A loaded gun Gio-”

Green considered for one mad moment to grab the joltick box and flip it upside down. Releasing of a dozen electric ticks in an electric car would do wonders. On the pro side it’d stop the fight, on the con side it’d gut the car, and then Giovanni would gut her. Still, it was an idea.

Giovanni tolerated the dressing down for far longer than Green thought he would, before cutting a hand through the air and that shut Silvia up and made Green twiddle with the lock. It was childproofed and locked, well if worse came to worse the window was an option…

Because Giovanni dropped his charm, dropped his civility, and was leveling pure Silph tones, right then at Sevii’s mayor.

“I am a Kantoian-Italian man going into an institute ran by Kalosians. After Kanto butchered Kalos in the last war. A war I served in. These people have obviously allied with Flare. Flare, has ties with the Kalos military, and a history of murdering anyone of Italian descent they can get their hands on. All to get to a hypothetical Rocket Boss who might or might not be Italian.”

He barked a laugh, and it made Green’s skin crawl to hear it.

“And you’re asking me to go in unarmed?”

Silvia opened her mouth, closed it, then looked from the Rocket to Green, then back again, they were leaving the city behind them, in a bit there’d be nothing but road and man-made wasteland on either side.

“Silvia,” the man’s tone softened out of Rocket inflections and into a pitch Green had heard directed at Silver, once. During that offer in far-flung Ilex. “If the Flare Cell is at this plant, we may very well be running for our lives. Because if it is Flare, they’ll have ‘mon, a small army, and no stamped piece of paper is going to get them to leave...”

And Green wasn’t going to say a word, saving the mayor from herself was not part of Green’s paycheck, and Saving Sevii from Giovanni wasn’t going to be happening. She’d let Red try if he wanted to but Green was going to be gone and nothing was going to make her look back.

It didn’t make her feel any less bad for the mayor, it just wasn’t enough to get her to do something about it.

Kicking her feet, tapping a one-two bet against the Rocket’s seat without thinking about it, until he turned to glare at her. Green stopped then and saw the mayor stealing glances at her when driving permitted.

Finally, just sick of everything, Green huffed at the woman.

“Alright since we’re going to spend the whole car ride screaming at each other… What’s your problem with me, lady?”

“I’m wrestling with the moral issues of taking a minor, or even a guest, with me to something that could be much more dangerous than I imagined.”

“I doubt your police force is less corrupt than the present company.”

Green almost smirked at that, if the police were a quarter as corrupt as Giovanni that’d still be pretty bad. Three guaranteed moles, two backstabs, one act of arson, and a partridge in a pear tree...

But if she laughed she’d have to explain the joke, and she kinda couldn’t, and she couldn’t have the giggles, that’d look bad too.

“What he said.” Green agreed, with a smirk. “Look, what would it take, for me to say or do that’ll make you stop seeing “a little girl”? I mean, you know about Mask, a little, you know I raised Silver, what else do I have to do or be to make you not worry about my part in it?”

“It’s a little hard not to worry, probable terrorists, you know.”

And wow, that was dry. Near Silver levels of dry. And to that bit of familiarity, Green’s smirk twisted into a real smile. And she had an idea, a horrible, going to get maimed later, level of bad, “bad idea”. But it was something, and she picked up a joltick pokeball, rolling it over on her fingers, the bumps of the road adding an edge of challenge to her game.

Terrorists were the problem? Well, Green knew a few stories about terrorists and how to work around them. After all, she’d ran circles around Rocket, Mask, the League… she had a lot of experience.

But first, she’d need permission, Giovanni’s permission, to drag a hypothetical version of him through the mud.

The gas station on the side of the road, with a familiar sign above it declaring it partnered with an Alolan Vulpix Queen attached made Green’s smile widen.

Might as well get two birds with one stone, after all the world could do with less birds.

Effecting a squirm, and vulpix eyes, Green faked a blush, because why not lay it on extra thick?

“Hey um… could we, ah pull over? At the station?”

Might as well get a treat out of this while she was at it.

 

[kyeugh]

i'm deeply sorry for how belated this review is; there's no excuse for it, but i hope you'll enjoy this review nonetheless. i've read chapters 1-3, which i hope helps somewhat.

overall, i enjoyed reading this. your characters are so thoughtfully crafted and distinct, and your writing really shines in their interactions, from the dialogue to the tangential thoughts to the body language. every interaction bleeds so much character in every word and action, and it really pulled me in. there is so much history, written out and implied, and in general with this story (but especially through the dialogue) you get a sense of a very large and complex world filled with well-considered relationships.

i enjoyed giovanni's depiction here in particular. there is such a wide range of interpretations to run with for this character, and all of them have their place, but i've always been partial to the chillingly deliberate and calculating giovanni, and you write him beautifully here. his mind is running a mile a minute and it doesn't seem like anything slips past him. he oozes charisma and control. i have to admit there were parts where i was a bit lost in his reflections—i haven't read the manga this story is based on, so i'm guessing there's a lot of context i'm just not privy to. even so, i did find some of the reflections meandering at points; giovanni's perspective in particular has quite lengthy sequences of thought. regardless, it was still possible for me to follow along with this story, and the hints at a larger world were intriguing if anything.

there were quite a few mechanical lapses in this story and a handful of typo as well. i point out a few below, but omitted most. a second set of eyes before publishing wouldn't hurt this story.

i was really curious about green's backstory and her relationship with silver. seems like some seriously messed up stuff happened to them under pryce. i wonder if the overly-controlling parents she's living with now are her biological parents, or if she was placed with a new family after being rescued? are they surveiling her like this because they're traumatized by what happened too, or are they unaware of her past and just controlling like that? definitely some questions raised. i wonder if these are contextual to the manga too; definitely curious about the series now.

small thing, but i appreciated your depictions of pokémon a lot. green's interaction with the machamp was pretty great. would love to see more of that; your fluff is pretty fun.

the subject matter here is a little heavy here, so i'm uncertain if i'll return to this story in particular, but it was a fine introduction to your writing and i may be checking out something else of yours soon, especially if it's based on something other than the manga as i'm not very familiar—let me know if you have any recs! sorry again for the lateness of this review, and thanks for sharing this story.

Spoiler: line comments

One blistering ultimatum, which boiled down to him giving them twenty minutes to coral and dispose of

* corral

Obviously adlibbed, the fan and most of the additives to the Roombas were low quality.

it rang a little funny to me to use adlibbed in this way twice so close together. i think the device is indeed obviously improvised so you could probably cut this second usage entirely.

There’d also been a few fine black hairs of a dark type… The crisp NeverMelt about the follicles marked the fur as part of the Sneasel line

pretty cool detail!

When no feel-good periodical piece popped up, about reunions and heroics, he saluted the girl’s cunning and consulted quieter avenues.

i found this kind of hard to follow. who is the girl? is she responsible for the absence of feel-good periodicals?

a perfectly reasonable hostage situation

many such cases!

shaking the light of Celebi’s healing from his eyes

i liked this imagery.

dex’

i think you want this apostrophe in the beginning if at all.

“Definitely shiny. Snea’d have a field day, she liked to pop Silver’s phone in her mouth when if shined, we had to fuss with all the settings so it wouldn’t… so she wouldn’t...”

really cute detail.

She guilds his hands so the things flat on the floor, wheels down, and she guilds his hands while Mask watches.

i think you meant "guides" here?

Then, putting a bright-colored block something too young for someone his age he reaches out…

i couldn't follow this sentence at all.

There were more, and they were spread wider, taller, machamp and ‘kaun’s doing most of the lifting

not sure what a 'kaun is.

“Silver’s prettier makes better jewelry.”

missing some punctuation here.

like a nest of joltiks smelling a ten pack of batteries

love it.

like the Persian he was occasionally depicted on the media

kind of surprising to me that he's cartoonified as an animal in the media but also most people don't know what he looks like.

Giovanni’d of killed them for the offense

i think you want "have" instead of "of" here, although i think that reads a little murkey. "Giovanni would've killed them" is better.

Do no call, no text, tracked. And a bit redundant had been the ad clipped and folded inside the crossword. A pseudo mp3 player with a rather… fetching… flower pattern that did little to hide the recording apparatus at its center. Still, despite the redundancy, knowing how was of some use, so he’d not reprimand Green for it later down the line.

i thought this coding was neat and well-written.

 

[K_S]

Review reply (appologies this is going to be done on cell phone so expect a slew of typos)

No worries on how long it took. Lifes been exciting a lot on my end so i definitly get not being able to be prompt on anything... Thanks for going a bit deeper in then most of my readers.

Well i am glad the characters were such a draw.

And coniving gio is very much manga canon and a treat to try to tackle. Glad you liked my efforts.

Ah yes... Mechanical snafus... The light of my existance...

In all honesty i may hunt down a beta once i get this tale written out to the lysandre vs giovanni scene but thats pretty far afield. And considering my circumstances probably wont even be on the table until next year. but i will happily incorperate what errors you caught and drag everything through grammerly once i get the time to.

So... Short version. Thanks for bringing these errors to my attention.

Hm so greens back story... Told out in bit and pieces is a bit spoilery but if you dont mind a bit of a read...

Spoiler: Greens manga background and "roosts" alterations to it.

So back about 10 years ago legends oh-ho and lugia rampaged through kanto. Somehow pryce had gotten a hold of thier feathers and used them to mindcontrol the birds. The legends were used to kidnap children throughout the region and two of the victims were gio's son silver and green.

These children were basically conscripted as child soldiers and made to be pryces slaves/assassins/spies. Pryce justified his abduction of silver saying the kid (a 2 yrs old incanon i aged him up to 4 in this tale) had his fathers malice and talents and therefore deserved what happened to him.

Green was just colateral... And heavily hinted to be forced to keep the too young silver alive or else...

Silver per the experience and his age suffered total amnesia and was pushed back to an even younger age mentally and is royally messed up. The boy can not socialize even as a near adult and his morals are... Squirrly on a good day. Kids half feral.

Greens got full blown parentification, kleptomania, and bird phobia among other issues in her life as a result of pryce/mask of ices mind games.

Both bond despite horrid experiences and encouragment not to bond... Aka punishments for basic socialization... Greens goal is to get her and silver home asap... She runs to pallet and viridian as soon as she gets them out and when both are duds green and silver split up as the mask and his goons are looking for them as a team. This throws them off enough that Green is free to start stealing and conning her way into a team/survival and forwarding half her gains to silver as she tries to track down her family under the guise of a mon journey.

She tangles with oak after stealing her squirtle because shes scared the common mon shes got wont be enough to save her if mask comes calling. Oaks ah... Retaliation which is detailed later in this fic is a huge spring board as to why many people consider manga oak a jerk....to put it lightly... And greens literally blackmailed into working with the good.guys as part of oaks ultimatum.

As for greens placement... These are her biological folks. It gets expanded and reinforced in the prequil "she sells sea shells" and in later chapters of roost... (Also theres no one in the world she'd call mum or da... Just saying) But greens folks coped with her abduction by boarding the denial train and not looking back.

Part of my biasis for greens folks reaction for this story is actually rooted in canon.

Green calls them right before a huge battle telling them shes alive ect and thier reaction really comes across as "be home by dinner"and "come back when youve wrapped everything up" vibes...

Which seems borderline insane... I mean i guess different moral values since free ranging children are a thing in the mon verse and what not... but still.

Gios reaction when silver is brought to his attention is to start tearing the region down the the bed rock and start shaking it looking for his kid. Also he does try to off lance and pryce because they hurt his kid... He about faces on his murder plans since lance and pryce are wearing plot armor.... and then canon takes a flaming leap off of sanity land... But thats mho and honestly this fics a fond "poke holes in the plot holes then apply fixing/stucko as needed" sort of affair...

Hmm theres some cuteness when she trains her team in the beach after the machamp scene... And her and gios persian hit off once shes scrapped off the floor post pouncing...

Honestly the longer away from home she is the more time she gets to have bonding moments with mon... Hence more trainer+mon fluff is sprinkled further ahead.

Detailed line by line replies

When no feel-good periodical piece popped up, about reunions and heroics, he saluted the girl’s cunning and consulted quieter avenues.

i found this kind of hard to follow. who is the girl? is she responsible for the absence of feel-good periodicals?

So what gios noting is that the girl/green had made her homecoming very quiet. Aka no feel good periodicals/news articles about the lost kid from viridian reuniting... Ect. Hes noticing how smart that was and is amused all at once.

'kauns an abreviation of kangaskaun... I'd just used kanga' s a short cut and didnt want to repeat so i cut things up a different way.

like the Persian he was occasionally depicted on the media

kind of surprising to me that he's cartoonified as an animal in the media but also most people don't know what he looks like.

Actually he digs into this more in the last... Twoish chapters i have up and really explains in Transversal (another manga au) but he has an iron hard control on his depiction in media. Green learns about it when confessing that for silvers escape day (they treat it like his birthday making her and silver "twins/sibs" of a sort) she and yelliw tried to get some info on silvers mom but got blackwalled. Gio admits to having scrubbed everything online about grace (silvers mom) out, usingg a mix matchnof legalesse, surviving spouse privlages, and censorahop laws to pull off the erasure. He then yanked his info offline except a few professional bios/ leauge pages and definitly had his pictuers pulled to maintain privacy.

As the head of viridian co' aka his buisness/philanthropic front he is very well known. A celebrity even. And most media depictions of him being a fat cat are part racial slur part association with him strolling around with his killer kitty with his "public" team.

In the league after silvers abduction he went almost total deadbeat and the leagues so bleeding hard he wasnt often faced with challengers and faded out of that community and was all but forgotten. But the league isnt end all be all to the world and thats somethung green hasnt really wrapped her head around yet.

As for recs... Well ive a question before i toss out suggestions.

You mentioned that" heaviness" was an issue? Can you elaborate so i can comb through my stash of fics... Also if you come back to this one... Well i'd suggest skipping chapters 12 and 13.. Or juat drop me a line and i can outline them because i suspect the worst of it... Green discussing what happened under pryce might be the heaviest issue on the plate and she royally revisits those topics in that chapter and drops all her inner censors and weaponizes her abuse and silvers abuse against gio in a way that nearly makes the rocket lose his lunch.

Granted my guess can also be totally wrong.. So clarity would help.