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Small detail but I'm not sure this is the expression you're going for. 😭 Usually riding my dick is like being obsessed. IMO "on my ass" works a little better.
This chapter is already off to a crazy start! I didn't realize we'd get such a close up into the shiny trade and what's going on with all these rich people but I'm fascinated. I also love the interactions between Enora and Odette. I feel so bad for Enora given the situation she's in and the arguments between them are very natural and not forced.
Holy there's a technology that calms rampaging Pokemon? That's good worldbuilding; honestly in a place where Pokemon could be around rampaging and stuff I was gonna assume people would just shoot them or take them down with their Pokemon, but I'm glad you gave an alternative.
The whole interaction with Clovis was awesome. I'm starting to like this guy more and more, and it's cute that both him and Odette both looked each other up lol.
AWWW I love that Enora has Odette's back. That was an adorable moment.
This sentence confuses me a little... is it implying that Dorien smiled first and she returned it with a bitter one?
edit: nvm she’s returning the wave, im stupid
HOLY SHIT THINGS WENT HAYWIRE SO FAST. The killing of the Gyarados was so gruesome wow I had to brace myself reading that. And then the little glimpse of Wrath was crazy, and Damion is getting more and more unbearable. Holy cow what a chapter!
These chapters were so good and kept me so hooked I read them all at once when I should have been working. Firstly, the whole chapter with Dorien's POV was really cool. It really helped emphasize how disgusting Dorien and his lackeys really were, while at the same time giving some firsthand insight into sacrilege and how it's sold and administered. ALSO I KNEW IT DORIEN HAD A SIN but i guess Greed and he was Envy. Close enough whatever
And then the iceberg chapters were a WHIRLWIND of information and emotions. Seeing Odette get closer and closer to finding out that she has Wrath in her has me on the edge of my seat, I'm practically screaming at my screen. I love how you clarified information that we already had as well as giving new information. Kept things interesting.
I have SO many thoughts about the lore, but my main ones are this. I want to learn more about JL and Florent and what their relationship was. It seems like a Dumbledore Grindelwald-ish relationship where they both wanted similar things but JL just took it way too far. Enigma vs Virtue Corp is interesting, and I'm also interested in why Valentin (feels weird calling him that now lol) isn't a huge fan of his father.
The flipping between Odette's horny-mode and investigation-mode is done very tastefully and I'm here for it.
I just realized Odette is literally a shiny human. wtf.
Also interesting lore with the fact that holy water is a thing and it works. Great foreshadowing with the fact that Odette has trouble in churches and stuff. I wonder if this fic will expand upon Greater Things once this Kalos plotline is over.
Only thing that confused me is the fact that apparently blood type mons have been around for so long. Even if rich people put all their effort into trying to hide it on the internet, won't it be impossible to completely eradicate it from the general population? You're telling me there wasn't a single leak? At the very least I can imagine some "conspiracy theorists" making blogs online about how these Pokemon are real idk. I'm ready to just accept it as a fact but it's interesting to think about.
On the other hand, GIVE ME MORE ABOUT BLOOD TYPES (pls). Do they have moves? Do they have STAB? Do they have weaknesses/strengths? Can a blood type control a blood type? Can you get a shiny blood type? Can the blood type controlled by a blood type control a blood type? Bloodception. And then THAT blood type controls a regular Pokemon. Ultra shiny
Getting an explanation on Vice Dust is awesome.
Ok final chapter. Noel getting a potential love interest is cool. Odette seeing Florent is big milestone. Them being stuck at Valentin's place is cute. Odette getting mad at Noel is crazy. Crazy? I was crazy once. They locked me in a room. A rubber room. A rubber room with White Swan Black Swan. Why is it named that? I'm gonna go crazy waiting for the new chapters to come out holy cow.
This was an awesome read. Thank you so much for writing this, I'll be forever referring back to how you did things as inspiration for my own writing. This is the first fic I've delved into at TR and it's convinced me to continue reading other people's. Junebug, out.
CWs: Strong Language, Talk of Drugging, Talk of Killing Someone
It was only there that she realized she was alone with him.
She was alone with him. In his house. Rained in, no way to safely leave at the moment. And he was asking her to build a puzzle with him. The subject of her intense crush was asking her to build a puzzle–one of her absolute favorite pastimes–with him.
Her jumbled conscious thoughts ceased as her chest looped itself into a constrictor knot. Suddenly, all she could do was stare at him, blinking.
“Uh…”
“I mean, please don’t feel obliged,” he said frantically. “If you want to keep reading, go right ahead, I just figured–”
“Yes!” she replied with a jolt. “I mean…yes, I’ll join you for the puzzle.”
He exhaled to himself. Was it out of relief? What did he have to be relieved about? Was he hoping she was going to say yes? The thought caused her heartbeat to pick up, so much so that she heard it pounding against her ears as she pushed herself to stand.
Now that she could actually look at the pieces, she also found time to get a better look at the box. The first thing that stood out to her was the number of parts it advertised, and she eyed it closely as she leaned over one of the chairs pushed in under the table.
“2000, look at you,” she commented, trying to ensure they didn’t get trapped in another bout of awkward silence. She also wanted to nurse the cutiefly pecking the shit out of her guts.
“I typically don’t do any less than that. Not challenging enough,” he replied coolly, leaning on the seat beside her. He looked to be mimicking her stance, but she didn’t think too much about it.
“A man of taste,” she complimented. She never did much less than 1500 pieces unless she liked the finished picture. At that thought, she reached over to pick up the box to get a better look at the image, half-expecting something depicting a dark snowy landscape or a group of ice-type Pokemon.
She was surprised to see a painted nighttime cityscape instead. Silhouettes of humans and Pokemon rushed through a downpour that only served to reflect the city streetlights. In the foreground, what looked like a gengar, a misdreavus, and a greavard lurked in the shadows of an alley.
“Oh wow, I like this,” she gasped.
“Right?” Valentin beamed. “I just picked it up a few days ago and have been slowly chipping away at it.”
That much was obvious. He’d already completed the outer edge and had begun working his way inward. He’d also begun separating the rest of the pieces by color grouping, judging by how some were in neat piles, and others were scattered about in a less organized fashion.
“I’m guessing you do a lot of these?” she asked.
“Indeed, it’s fantastic to pass the time with,” he said. “I take it that you’re a puzzle connoisseur yourself, huh?”
“I’ve gotten around,” she said coyly, pulling out the chair she was leaning on and sitting down.
“Something tells me you’re downplaying that a little,” Valentin teased, following her lead.
She stifled a scoff as she held up her hand and pinched her index finger and thumb close together. She hardly felt the need to go into every little detail about the monthly puzzles she, Bernard, and Vienna used to do when they all lived together.
“Just a little.”
She was amazed at how quickly the awkwardness had deflated from the air. The next thing she knew, all she could think about was the fact that she was puzzling with Valentin and became solely focused on trying to show off her skills at getting pieces together. Soon, they were so engaged in it that they stopped talking entirely. It only dawned on her just how quiet it was when a clap of thunder broke her out of her building trance.
She glanced up toward Valentin, careful not to move her head too much and give herself away. He looked rather engrossed in the part he was putting together, as indicated by the notch that had taken form in his brow and the way he rubbed and pinched at his chin. As quickly as she thought the awkwardness was deflating, she felt it coming back on with a vengeance.
Say something else, quick, she thought.
“You said you do this to take the edge off when you’ve drunk too much, so I’m guessing you only smoke the pecha cigarettes when you’re trying to impress other elites?” she said.
Valentin’s eyes slipped shut, the notch smoothing out as he grinned dumbly. He leaned back in his chair and rolled his eyes in jest. “Actually, Love and Frosting don’t like it when I smoke in the house, so I would normally do it outside, but–”
Lightning sent a burst of brightness into the room, followed by a clap of thunder that quaked through the wood floors and caused the light fixtures to clatter slightly. Valentin shrugged when it died down.
Odette pursed her lips. “Understood. This is probably better overall anyway.”
“You’re definitely right, but a little pecha smoke in my lungs never hurt me.”
“And a little whiskey in your system made that office conversation easier.”
He snickered and he reached over for a few more pieces. “Mmmmm, touché.”
They shared brief grins before Odette lowered her head to continue her work. She wasn’t sure what else could be said after that; no sarcastic quip came to her, and the idea of trying to further prod him about his life left her feeling like her insides would disintegrate. Awkwardness started to build again, and panic flooded her stomach.
Anything. Something. Say literally anything. Ask him how he’s feeling. Ask him what hair bleach he uses. Ask him if he wants a kiss.
Holy shit, get a grip.
“I’m sorry, I’m really awful at this,” Valentin said suddenly. Odette silently thanked the gods for the reprieve.
Furrowing her brow, she raised her eyes to look at what was on the table in front of him. “What, the puzzle? You look like you’re doing fine.”
“No,” he said. “I mean this.” He motioned between them, timing it with a few strained nods. Her eyes widened in understanding. At least he said it first.
“Oh,” she said, putting down the pieces she was holding. Averting her eyes away, she tried to come up with the best way to make her empathy clear.
“I guess small talk is harder when there aren’t twenty people you’re trying to ignore sitting around you,” she said.
Valentin pointed at her. “You are correct; that does tend to offer a bit of a boost.”
“If it helps, we can just pretend we’re at another party, and we have Dorien clones trying to talk our ears off.”
“Perhaps,” he said, “but I’d hate if every conversation we had alone relied on us roleplaying.”
Odette began to drag her fingernail across the table, having to fight off the dreamy smile that threatened to curl her lips. “That would be kind of obnoxious, wouldn’t it?”
She only wished talking to him would come on like second nature. She felt herself obsessing over every little word that came out of her mouth, and it only served to pile onto her nerves.
“I know the goal here is to take the edge off, but if you have anything else you want to ask me, I’m more than happy to discuss." He offered a a half smile, one that oozed sincerity. "Clearing some more air might help our case.”
Odette felt some tension enter her body as several more questions began to form. They started surface-level but quickly developed into inquiries about the Clovis LeClair research she had done. No reason to worry about that anymore, though. That was null information.
What did she want to ask Valentin Ménétries that wasn’t ‘what hair bleach do you use?’ He formally invited her, so she felt more at ease trying to consider it.
One question immediately rushed to the forefront of her mind, coming on like an intrusive thought but overstaying its welcome. She warded off the sudden silence by grabbing another piece and trying to jam it somewhere in the image of the greavard she had created.
“I’m pretty set,” she lied. “Why don’t you ask me something?”
“I’d love to, and I plan to,” he said, tucking his hand under his chin. “But, I trust you right now. I’d like for you to trust me more in return, so it’s only fair that you go first.”
He paused to purse his lips and shimmied another piece into the part he was building. “Besides, I think I sense something on the tip of your tongue.”
I wish you could feel the tip of my tongue, she thought longingly before clearing her throat. So much for having a grip.
“Not sure if I should ask,” she muttered. “Might be crossing a boundary.”
She watched Valentin roll his eyes again as he continued to work at his little stretch of the puzzle. He successfully fitted two more pieces into it. “We’ve hopped over a few boundaries today, so I can’t imagine it’s anything worse. My goal is to be an open book to you, so please ask away.”
The more she talked to him, the more his shows of sincerity became obvious. He always made direct eye contact with her when he was trying to make her believe him or get a point across, and he always kept his brow at a neutral, wrinkle-free position while doing so. Sometimes he’d offer a half smile if the topic were light enough. And he never looked tense, even if he had all the reason in the world to be so. Tension only gripped him when he slipped up or was putting on an act.
She decided to match that energy and let the tightness in her shoulders loosen. “Okay, fine,” she relented. She did, however, brace herself for her question.
“Uh…who’s Jocelyn?”
Valentin’s cool expression fled off his face as soon as he heard the name, leaving a blossoming scowl in its wake.
Odette sucked her teeth and smacked her hand to her face in embarrassment. “Fuck, see? I shouldn’t have asked. Forget it, I was just being–”
“No, no,” Valentin cut her off, sighing. “I guess I shouldn’t be shocked you managed to catch the caller ID, and I did make a bit of spectacle out of it.” At least he knew exactly what she was talking about, so she didn’t have to explain herself more.
He was now pinching the bridge of his nose as if the mere mention of the name ‘Jocelyn’ gave him a headache.
“Jocelyn Delsarte. She’s my fiance. My…betrothed fiance.”
Odette felt her heart stop entirely. She tried to will the oncoming despair away, but it flooded into every cavity in her body. Heartbreak came on fast, and it came on violently, apparently.
You shouldn’t be surprised, of course he’s engaged. What were you thinking?
“Oh,” she said. “Congra–”
He whipped his hand up, effectively silencing her. “Save it,” he jeered. He turned his hand and wiggled his ring finger, which, surprisingly, lacked a ring.
“Let me make one thing clear; I can’t stand her. I’d sooner hang myself than exchange vows with her.”
Odette curled her toes as she exhaled slowly and evenly, keeping the sense of utter relief from showing anywhere on her person. She wasn’t sure why she was so relieved; he was still engaged. Engaged in an arranged marriage with someone he would rather die than marry but still engaged. Something about that felt wrong, yet that little spark of hope returned. If he could get away from it, there was still a chance…
Don’t be a fucking homewrecker.
Was it actually homewrecking if Valentin wanted nothing to do with the relationship? Would she be doing him a favor? Why were arranged marriages still a thing, anyway? That had to be illegal in some sense.
But what if Jocelyn was nice? What if she was just minding her own business, trying to make the arrangement work, and he was badmouthing it in such a way? Odette would feel awful if that were the case.
However, Valentin seemed relatively level-headed and reasonable. She couldn’t imagine him being so vehemently opposed to the arrangement and hating her so much if she was someone who was just trying to live her life and treated him well. Did she even know him well enough yet to make such a deep assumption? Probably not.
Maybe he hated the idea of an arranged marriage so much that he badmouthed it regardless of how nice Jocelyn might have been. Wanted nothing to do with her because of her ties to the concept. Odette could see that happening because she’d probably be in the same boat if she were in his shoes. If that was what was happening, though, would it still be a case of homewrecking? Would she be a bad person for pursuing it?
As if she needed another thing to stress over right now. Dammit.
“So that’s why you’d rather risk damaging your expensive ass phone than take her call.”
“Now you’re getting it.” He let out another chuckle, far more aggravated than the first, as he fiddled with a few more pieces. “I think I’d prefer to play friends with Dorien than talk to her spoiled rotten ass. Absolutely insufferable.”
“More insufferable than Dorien?” she asked, trying not to sound hopeful.
She was met with a deadpan look from him, and her heart stopped for the second time. “She chewed me out because I wore a tie that didn’t match her dress to an event. Then quite literally tattled on me to her father, and as a result, I was sternly spoken to about ‘keeping an image.’”
“Oh my gods, Valentin, how could you not wear the right tie? What the hell were you thinking? Now everyone’s going to think you’re a knob,” Odette said sarcastically. That earned her a smirk.
“Yeah, well, I just got a new Hermes tie I wanted to test out; how the fuck was I supposed to know she wanted to wear purple that day specifically?” he replied, shaking his head.
“Read her mind, of course. I hear it’s easy.”
“She definitely thinks it’s something I know how to do,” Valentin said. “Except, even if I could, I still don’t think I could keep up with her nonsense. She expects me to be unconditionally in love with her. But she continuously acts like the world revolves around her and throws a fit when I can’t be bothered. Mind reading wouldn’t make her shit attitude any better.”
“Sounds familiar,” Odette chided.
“I’m sure you know firsthand what that’s like,” Valentin agreed. “Except you’re much better at playing the part than I am. I have no issue indicating that my hatred for her defies gravity.”
“That must be nice. I’d love to tell Dorien to go fuck himself. And he probably would.”
“That’s well within the realm of possibility,” Valentin said with a light laugh. “Unfortunately, the spectacles of my bitter distaste do nothing to ward her off. They just give me lectures about ‘what’s best for the families’ and every bit of nonsense I couldn’t care less about.”
In that small emotional whirlwind, Odette realized that the last name ‘Delsarte’ was indeed familiar to her. “She’s from one of the families that are helping yours with this whole conspiracy thing, right?”
He nodded. “They felt that unification would be powerful, even though our whole operation is underground, so I never understood what difference it made. It was more because Jocelyn can’t take no for an answer, and her father is fantastic at shmoozing mine.”
Blinking, Odette blindly reached for another puzzle piece. “What, she was into you, and you didn’t return the feelings, so she told her daddy to tell yours to make you suck it up?”
“Close. More like…I initiated an experimental fling that I made abundantly clear was only meant to be a fling, and she read further into it than she should have. Used it as leverage to convince our families a union would be great, and here we are.”
Valentin turned his gaze back to the puzzle as soon as he finished, making it evident he wasn’t proud of that fact. It both filled Odette with sympathy and a sense of anger. Being given firm boundaries and stomping on them so heinously? Who the fuck was she?
“That’s…” she stammered, trying to breathe through the throb in her lower back. “I’m so sorry.” She didn’t know what else to say. She didn’t want to make the conversation deeper than it had already gotten. She felt like she was imposing on him too much as it was.
Instead of doubling down on the apology, she decided to commiserate instead. “She sounds like a fucking nightmare.”
“That’s an insult to nightmares everywhere,” Valentin scoffed. “Taught me a valuable lesson about useless flings, I’ll say that much.”
Stop poking it. Let it die; you’re making this worse than it needs to be. Odette knew everything she needed to know. Jocelyn was trash, Valentin hated her, and if he was telling the truth, there was no harm in continuing to crush on him like she was. She should just leave it at that, but her desire to know more about who Valentin Ménétries actually was overpowering. What were his flings like? What did they entail? Was he…in one currently?
“Well, if you said you didn’t want anything more, she should have respected that. Fling or not,” she said.
“You’re right, yes. But I can’t help but feel like I did it to myself.”
If he were casting the line, taking the bait wouldn’t be bad, right? “That’s not how that works.”
“Perhaps not. But there’s a nuance to it.”
“Nuance or not, consent is consent, which also applies to marriage.” She was getting worked up again. She barely knew him, and yet she was seething on his behalf. It must have made itself clear somewhere in her tone because he recoiled slightly.
Odette sighed, settling back against the chair. “I’m sorry, I don’t want to keep pressing the matter and make you–”
“No, don’t apologize. It’s actually quite cathartic to talk to a clueless party about it.” He paused, his expression falling. “I mean, not that you’re clueless in general, I just meant in terms of the situation, you’re–”
“It’s okay, I got what you meant,” she said.
“I swear I wasn’t calling you stupid, I just–” he insisted.
“I know you weren’t calling me stupid, you’re–” Odette tried to assure him.
“--find it remarkably easy to explain these things–”
“--more than welcome to discuss this–”
“--to you.”
“--with me.”
Odette fell silent as she realized she was talking over him, and it seemed Valentin quieted down for the same reason. They stared at each other for what felt like hours before Odette made the first move and returned to doing the puzzle.
“I was just trying to say, I don’t mind if you want to talk my ear off, especially about something like that.”
The sigh he released was relieved. “I appreciate it. But I also don’t want to bog you down with my life story.”
Was there a way to tell him he could do that as much as he wanted without her sounding desperate? She decided not to take the chance. “To be fair, I was the one who asked.”
“That you did, but I asked you to ask.”
“Do you really want to play this game with me?” she asked, narrowing her eyes.
“I’ll play whatever you want me to play, Miss Cinq-Mars.”
She decided to ignore the dopamine-laced chills that his response sent through her body. At least the quietness that lingered between them that time around was much less awkward.
“Then answer my question, sir. Nuance, you said?” she urged, fitting another puzzle piece.
Another sigh, this one long and heavy. “It’s a lot.”
A roll of thunder sent a vibration up through the floors, and Odette gestured toward the patio door. “I have time.”
It was a good while before Valentin spoke again. He seemingly took that time to piece his thoughts together because he stopped fiddling with the puzzle. “If you must know, as I was growing up, I was under the impression that…” he trailed off and clicked his tongue. “Sorry, this might be TMI.”
She shrugged in response and waved him on. Nodding, he continued.
“I grew up under the impression that the act of having sexual feelings was …not the norm.”
Odette tilted her head. “Okay…”
“And it didn’t become clear to me that it actually was the norm until I went away to school. All boys school, so it was all any of the idiots ever talked about,” he recalled disdainfully. “But, I never changed. I remained…pretty set in my ways.”
She tucked her palm under her chin. “You’re…asexual, then, right?”
Damn, she thought regretfully. The feeling deepened when she watched him nod.
“Right. And I wasn’t exactly familiar with the sexual spectrum at that point in time, so for a while, I figured there was just something wrong with me. I decided the way to fix it was to just push through the ick of it and–”
“--do the deed with a bunch of people,” Odette finished.
Valentin’s smile was crooked, and that was the only indication she needed to know she was correct.
“And Jocelyn ended up being one of those people,” she added.
“I was…desperate. And that desperation landed me in her bed despite knowing damn well she was sick in the head,” he huffed. “Not my proudest moment. None of it was, really. None of it did anything.”
Now, Odette just felt bad. Here she was absolutely lusting after him when ‘lust’ as a whole wasn’t something he had the ability to feel. She really was disgusting.
“There’s nothing wrong with you. There’s nothing wrong with not liking sex,” she said. And she meant that from every angle. “I’m sorry you felt like you had to wrestle through all that. But that doesn’t excuse Jocelyn for forcing you into marriage.”
“No, you’re right. But I can’t help but wonder what would have been had I just come to terms with it sooner. Maybe I wouldn’t be ensnared in her delusion,” he mused. “I’m perfectly happy with myself now, which only makes the whole setup of a marriage even more repulsive.”
“You didn’t know any better,” she said.
“No, I didn’t. But, I never fully learned, which is also part of the issue. Like…remember how I told you I’d taken Lust before?” he asked.
It took her a second, but she got it. “Oh, no.”
“I had the antidote, drank it after every outing I had to act the part, but after a while, I stupidly decided to forgo it,” Valentin explained. “Sacrilege effects get stronger after every use, so…I figured I’d give it a shot. Even after everything. There was still a part of me that thought it was possible.”
She nodded slowly, giving herself time to sit with his confession. Giving herself a moment to decide how she wanted to retaliate.
“Can I be honest?” she questioned. Her lower back tingled.
“Please.”
“That is fucking braindead.” As much as she wished he had the capability to feel what she was feeling, there was no world where that was worth getting high on some deadly drug.
Valentin laughed outright, which she decided was a better reaction than him getting mad at her. He rubbed at his forehead as he leaned back against his chair. “You sound like my team and my brother. I already got the tongue-lashing, so don’t trouble yourself.”
“I don’t know, I think I want to trouble myself,” Odette snapped. She was shocked at why she felt so strongly about it, but she figured it was stemming from her infatuation.
Laughing again, this time more nervously, Valentin shrugged his shoulders. “If you feel it’s necessary, be my guest. I definitely deserve it, but it probably won’t be anything I haven’t heard before.”
She decided to test that out. “Noel might be better to talk to about this than me, he loves this type of shit. But you know it’s called a fucking spectrum for a reason, right? And it’s not concrete? It'll shift if your brain decides there’s room for a shift. If it doesn’t, you’re fine where you are. Leave the psyche-melting drugs alone.”
Some of what she said must have struck something within him because it gave him apparent pause. For the briefest second, he shifted his gaze toward the ground as if in deep thought.
“Is that something Noel and I should be worried about going forward?” she went on.
Valentin cut his eyes back to her. “What? No,” he replied. Odette almost cringed at how offended he sounded. “This was two years ago, Miss Cinq-Mars. We’re long past the need to worry about it. It’s much more manageable to tame booze, anyway.”
Crossing her arms, Odette slumped in her chair a little. She wanted to be cross with him for his poor decisions, but the longer she beheld his aggravated gaze, the more she softened up. Fuck him for being so gorgeous.
“Fine. I’ll take that,” she said. “But, one more thing? Stop calling me that.”
“Calling you what? Miss Cinq-Mars?” He tilted his head in concern.
“I called you Clovis when you were Clovis and now I call you Valentin. I would like you to call me by my first name as well."
For a second, she could have sworn she saw the apples of his cheeks flush red. With a few timed blinks, it was gone. “I’m…I apologize, I didn’t mean to offend you. I was just trying to keep things professional, is all.”
Shrugging, Odette pushed herself to sit up straight again. “Yeah, well,” she said in a breath, grabbing a few more pieces and pulling them over to her. “No need for that. You know bullshit about me, and I know bullshit about you. I think that means we’re friends, and friends call each other by their first names.”
He blinked at her like he was dumbfounded, but that look soon gave way into a genuine smile.
“Alright then, Odette. We’re definitely friends." Hearing him say her first name again caused a comforting warmth to flow through her chest.
She could still be slightly in love with him. That didn’t need to go away.
No sooner had she thought that did she reach over to grab another puzzle piece, only for her hand to meet Valentin’s as he reached in the same direction. They lingered there together before Odette came back to her senses and hastily pulled it away.
Too soon, she thought.
As Valentin recoiled his hand, she watched him turn it palm up on the table. The unmistakable sight of scar tissue caught her eye, and she felt herself lean over to get a better look before she could stop. He must have caught her because she flinched from her mini trance at the sound of him clearing his throat.
“Oh, you saw my scar?” He held his hand up to let her look better at it. There was indeed a long, narrow string of raised, pinkish skin tearing through the natural lines of his palm. He smiled awkwardly before turning his wrist to look at it himself. “I was trying my skills at couples skating; long time ago. Fell while I was doing a lift with my partner, and her blade caught my hand. Seven stitches," he explained, running one of his fingers over it.
“Ouch,” Odette said through clenched her teeth. “Stitches in the palm hardly sounds like a good time.” Not that stitches in general were a good time, but she was trying to keep the conversation going.
“I definitely do not recommend it. The scar’s a good talking point, though,” he said, tucking his affected hand under his chin, that crooked smile stretching into something far more suave.
So hot. So fucking hot. Is he flirting? Is that something he would even do? I don’t…
“I-I’m sorry,” she stuttered. She cleared her throat in an attempt to keep herself sane. “I didn’t mean to stare, I also have a little palm scar myself.” She raised her right hand, showing him her still relatively-fresh injury. “Not as old or as big as yours is, but still.”
Valentin leaned in, eyeing the old gash with interest. “Still an ouch,” he said solemnly. “I assume you lucked out in the sutures department, though?”
Laughing humorlessly, Odette reached for a couple more puzzle pieces. “Yeah, it was just a superficial cut from some glass,” she said.
“Let me guess, juggling wine bottles?” Valentin said.
"If I’m being honest, I was pretty drunk. But I went out to eat with Dorien and broke a cup. I tried to pick it up…and…”
Odette’s voice slowly trailed off as a shrill ringing began to fill her ears. Her eyes fell on the puzzle, but she wasn’t focused on it. She’d become caught on what was going on inside her head. How what she was trying to tell him didn’t…feel right. Didn’t sit with her.
Brief yet vivid flashes of herself picking up the glass crossed her mind’s eye. A perfectly intact glass, full of wine. She sipped it. It was fine. Dorien spoke. Her grip on it tightened too much for a moment, then CRACK.
Broken. Blood. But…no.
That wasn’t what she had remembered. That wasn’t what she’d gone around the past couple of weeks thinking had happened. She’d broken it, tried to do something with it, and gotten cut. Solene had gotten drunk, too, right? That’s what she remembered, right?
But, Solene didn’t drink. So why had she been so convinced Solene was drunk?
Why was she suddenly recalling bits and pieces of a completely different scenario?
She was standing up, backing away from the table without realizing her legs still worked. The ringing was getting far more intense, and the corners of her vision blurred. She pushed the heels of her hands into her eyes, hoping that would stop her swimming sight and the noise, but she found no such reprieve.
“Mis–Odette?” Valentin called, the concern all too apparent in his voice. She heard him stand and soon felt his presence at her side. “Odette, what’s wrong? Are you alright?”
Moving her hands off her eyes, Odette pressed her fingertips into her temples, cutting her wavering gaze to Valentin’s worried face.
“I lied. That’s not what happened. I mean, I thought that’s what happened, but–”
He raised a silencing hand, though he moved cautiously. “I need you to slow down,” he said. “What do you mean you thought that’s what happened?”
“I mean, I remember breaking a glass and trying to pick it up, but I don’t think that’s what happened, but I don’t know why I don’t think that’s what happened because I’m…I’m so sure I remember breaking something, and being drunk, and–”
Her breathing was picking up, and her heartbeat drowned out the ringing. Why was this making her panic? What was there to panic about? What if she’d just gotten so blackout drunk she didn’t remember? Why did it feel so wrong?
She was momentarily relieved by the sudden look of understanding that crossed Valentin’s eyes, only for her anxiety to surge as she started to wonder how he might have realized what was happening.
“Okay, okay,” he said. Both of his hands were raised now, and it looked like he was going to put them on her shoulders but stopped short. She might have been disappointed if she weren’t so focused on keeping herself together. “Take a breath; you’re okay. Let me go find something, alright?”
“Find what?” She didn’t mean to sound so forceful, but it came out that way. Valentin, fortunately, didn't look any less deterred.
“I might know why you’re having conflictions and why you’re so riled up. Give me two seconds, I’ll be right back,” he said. He was backing away before he’d even finished talking, and Odette watching him skip-run down the hall Noel had disappeared down.
She numbly went after him, miraculously finding the will to ignore his instructions. She aimlessly followed him past a few doors and to a roomy, luxurious master suite. She was running on autopilot again, so all she could do as she stood in the doorway was watch Valentin rummage through the pockets of an expensive-looking coat hanging on a hook on the wall and eventually his night tables.
Valentin grumbled a string of expletives that were almost too low for her to hear clearly, but he soon found what he was looking for, as indicated by how he roughly yanked something from a drawer and kicked it shut. He stomped up to her shortly after, brows knit in dismay. “This’ll have to do,” he hissed to himself before he held an object out to her. It resembled a shot glass with a cap on it, and a large ‘2’ was engraved on the front.
“Alright, I know this is suspicious as hell, but I need you to down this whole thing. If I’m right, it’s going to help you,” he said, shoving it into her hands.
Odette eyed it through her unsettled blinking. “What am I looking at?”
“Second-degree Vice Dust antidote,” Valentin said. “You’re showing signs of a partial jog. If you have been given anything from a second-degree down, this will set your mind straight again.”
Not even a few hours ago were they talking about this Vice Dust and antidotes and all of that nonsense, and now she was standing there with said antidote in her hand. She must have been silently staring at the glass for a long time because Valentin finally set one of his hands on her shoulder, causing her to flinch back to attention.
“Please trust me. You said so yourself; we’re friends, right? Friends help friends,” he insisted. The tender candor behind his words and his matching look was calming, even for a moment. “It’s all I have on me, so I just hope you don’t need anything higher.”
She stared at the vial again, trying to pick anything off of it that might have told her she shouldn’t be ingesting it. The glass was spotless, and the liquid was clear. If she didn’t know any better, she’d have thought it was water or a shot of vodka. Maybe that was all it actually was, and the concept of the antidote was just meant to be some sort of placebo.
Her raging theories aside, minus the ‘2,’ nothing about it was imposing. It was simply a shot. A shot that might stop the ringing in her ears.
In a quick motion, she pulled the top off the glass and threw her head back as she downed it. The substance tasted…clean. Milky, but clean. Something about it was actually quite soothing. It felt like she was flushing a burn with cool water.
“Did it work? Anything different?” Valentin pressed after a few seconds. She couldn’t respond because she was too preoccupied with the instant results.
I wanted to ask you about the manslaughter case you were involved in last year. Well, I guess it was more of a self-defense killing, considering the victim raped you, right? So that makes you the victim, I suppose…
She got mad. So mad. Squeezed the glass until it broke. And then…
I did say the ride would be easier if you’d put her back in her ball. Hopefully, I have enough.
What he blew at her. It burned so badly. But it was gone as quickly as the stinging pain peppered her face, leaving her feeling dazed and horrified. Solene too. Both of them were none the wiser.
“H-he…he…he got me all riled up. Mentioned…a thing that happened, then…blew some shit in my face when I refused to talk to him. And he did it to Solene, too, that’s why he wanted me to put her away,” she said numbly. “Oh gods…oh gods, oh gods, oh–”
The numbness was interrupted by a sudden explosion of pure fury. Molten wrath traveled up from the small of her back before taking every last nerve in her body in a violent grip. Before Odette knew it, she was gritting her teeth so hard she was bound to break a tooth if she didn’t let up. But she didn’t care. Not as she lobbed the shot at the floor.
“Mother fucker!” she shrieked over the sound of shattering glass.
“Hey!” Valentin shouted in protest. She didn’t hear him well, though. Not as she turned and paced back toward the kitchen, hands balled into tight fists.
“I’m gonna fucking kill him!”
She wasn’t sure how, she wasn’t sure when, but she was certain that she was going to ruin him. One way or another. It was pouring outside, but she’d driven her motorcycle in the rain before. She could go home, grab the rest of her team and even her gun, and–
She felt fingers wrap around her forearm and was forced to face a very steely-looking Valentin. If she were in any other state of mind, she’d have been perturbed by seeing him look at her like that, but all it did was make her rage surge.
“Excuse me, what the hell was that?” he groused. “I understand that you’re rightfully upset, but defacing my property is not something I’m going to condone.”
“You think I give the slightest fuck right now? The creep drugged me, and you’re concerned about a shattered glass?” she seethed, yanking her arm out of his grasp. “And don’t touch me.”
She watched through her reddening vision as his features scrunched up as if he were studying her accusingly. It was the smallest and quickest of changes, but one that she had a hard time missing. So much for ‘not having any desire to scrutinize her.’
“Rest assured, I can vacuum up the glass,” he said. “Your well-being is far more important to me, but I don’t think breaking shit in my home is going to make the situation any better. So I’m going to advise you to calm down before we continue this conversation.”
Odette bared her teeth at him.“What makes you think I want to calm down? What about this is calming?” she questioned, her voice rising again as she closed the already tight gap between them. “Dorien screwed with my head; how do you expect me to sit here and let that slide?”
Her glare bore into him with the might of a rabid mightyena, but Valentin stood his ground. He held her gaze as he crossed his arms, his eyes twinkling with a puzzled light.
“Of course, I don’t expect you to let it slide, but I do expect you to take a deep breath and try to consider how to approach fucking him over rationally. Your anger isn’t unwarranted, but you have to understand how delicate our situation is. Letting anger dictate how you go forward isn’t going to help one bit.”
Odette responded with a scathing laugh. Fuck delicacy; fuck pussyfooting around Dorien and his shit. He had the heavy enough hand to insight her wrath, then drug her, so she forgot about it? All chances to be careful went out the window; it was war now.
“With all due offense, screw that,” she hissed. “I’ll go bash his head in by myself.”
She didn’t give Valentin a chance to say anything before she stomped around him and headed toward the front door. Unfortunately, she didn’t make it very far before he stepped in front of her, effectively blocking her path.
“Move,” she spat.
“Respectfully? No,” Valentin replied. “Above everything, the storm’s only gotten worse, and driving in your state is going to compound your chances of getting into an accident.”
Flaring her nostrils, she began to dig her nails into the palms of her hands. “Valentin, if you don’t get the absolute fuck out of my way, I’m gonna punch you.”
She was pleased with how startled he looked. His wrinkled expression and questioning tilt of his head made his shock perfectly apparent. He hesitantly opened his mouth.
“Is it normal for friends to want to punch friends? That doesn’t seem like you.”
Her breath hitched as the force of a thousand expletives suddenly got caught in her throat.
“But, if that’s going to ease your mind, have at it,” he continued with a huff. “Just be sure to aim for my jaw if my face is your desired target. Right side, preferably.” He pointed at the right half of his jaw. “I chew with my left.”
It was unreal how nonchalant he sounded. Her entire being stalled on what to do next, but a wave of exhaustion washed over her and left her feeling winded. There, she managed to start returning to her senses and realized what she’d just done.
Screaming at him, breaking stuff in his room, threatening him; was she fucking crazy?
“I—“
But, no, she didn’t have the bandwidth to be mortified at her own behavior. Not when she was still reeling at her newly uncovered memories. As the red in her vision receded and the world around her swam, she buried her face in her hands.
“I-I just–” she tried, “I…don’t…how did that even happen? How did I have…absolutely no recollection? I felt nervous around him right after it happened, but…how? How did I not know any better?”
“That’s the Vice Dust’s power. It completely overrode whatever you’d witnessed when he used it on you; there was no room for you to remember anything different. Unfortunately, though, muscle memory is a little different. Your brain forgot, but your body remembered,” Valentin said. She wished she could appreciate how gently he was speaking, but she was on another plane of thought. “It was just reacting accordingly despite you not mentally knowing any better.”
“Gods,” Odette gasped, dragging her hands down the sides of her face. “He fucking drugged us. He rewired our brains, he fucking drugged me and my partner, I’m gonna blow his fucking head off his body, holy shit, I’m–”
Now both of Valentin’s hands were on her shoulders, and he had leaned down so he was at her eye level. She was so out of it that she didn’t even recall him grabbing her again, and it took her several seconds to realize she was nose-to-nose with him. “Odette, listen to me.”
It was hard not to with him so close, despite the fact she felt involuntary tears blurring the corners of her vision.
“You’re okay. I know it’s really scary, but you’re okay. You’re safe right now. Breathe,” he said.
But she couldn’t. Her airways felt constricted under the revelation that the antidote brought, and no matter what she did, she felt like she couldn’t get enough in. It wasn’t until she felt Valentin squeeze her shoulders that she focused enough to take a deep breath, which she held for a few seconds before exhaling slowly.
“There you go. I know you know breathing exercises, Miss Singer, so keep it going.”
She did as she was told. The breaths eventually started coming in a lot easier. It was the only thing that was stopping the lightheadedness and keeping her from passing out. However, as she fully returned to her senses, she became acutely aware of how close Valentin was to her. He was gripping her tightly but tenderly at the same time. Keeping her from jumping to that angry high again.
Something on her face must have let him know that she had come back down because she watched his expression fall and his fingers loosened.
“Sorry, I know you said not to touch you, but I—“ he started to say, and she shook her head.
“No, it’s fine,” she assured him with a shallow breath. “I appreciate…” she shook her head again, “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, I know that doesn’t do anything for my attitude or my mess, I just–I’m such an…I’m not really in a–”
He offered her a gracious half-smile. “It’s forgiven. Like I said, I can vacuum it up. And I think you’re well within your right to be that upset. But it’s not productive.”
That’s the understatement of the fucking century, she thought in embarrassment. At least her mind had cleared enough to where she could hear her own thoughts. Progress.
Nodding in agreement, she began working up the courage to say what else had come to mind.
“Can I tell you something else?” she asked.
Valentin nodded. “Yes, of course.”
Another breath. Another moment of trying to make sure when she spoke, she didn’t sound like a fucking crazy person. “I think there’s more than that,” she began. “When I ran into Dorien again, I’d completely forgotten what he did for a living until he said it, and the hate was…instant. As soon as he reminded me. And-and Noel—” her voice strained under the weight her chest was under, “was telling me a friend of ours asked me out multiple times in school, and—”
Valentin nodded. “Denis, right?”
She shot him a wide-eyed look.
“They were talking about it at the club last night.”
She was shaking her head before she realized it. “Valentin, I don’t remember that. I don’t remember any of it.”
His expression collapsed onto itself. “Nothing?”
“I-I remember the date I had with Dorien, and I had…so much hate for him when he reminded me what he did for work, but…everything before that is still…”
She didn’t want to ask what came to mind next but didn’t know what else to say.
“What did he do to me?”
Valentin looked about as lost as she did, which was no help in helping her panic subside. His mouth was open like he wanted to say everything he could to calm her down, but nothing came out at first. All he could do was shake his head.
“I don’t…know,” he finally said. “Fuck. Okay. Then you definitely need a three, I just…dammit.”
Before he could fall into another string of curses, footsteps sounded down the hallway to the bedroom. A groggy-looking Noel stepped into view, rubbing his eye as he was coming out of a yawn.
“Yo, who the hell is yelling this late? What’s going on?” he called, still blinking sleep out of his eyes. It didn’t take very long for the grogginess to flee him entirely. As soon as he met Odette’s eyes, all of his tired limbs seemed to jolt to attention. He quirked a dubious brow as he watched Valentin step back too.
“Dee,” Noel said slowly. “What’s the–”
He could barely finish his sentence before Odette rushed to him and yanked him into a tight hug. He didn’t hesitate to return it, resting his chin against the crown of her head. Feeling his arms around her did heaps more for her nerves, and she immediately relaxed into him while her body quivered against her warring senses of panic and ease.
“Hey, hey,” he said, concerned. “What’s the matter? You’re shaking.”
“That stupid fucking Vice Dust shit,” Odette grumbled into the fabric of his jacket.
There was a pause on his end, and she felt his chest seize. “What about it?”
She pulled her face away to peer up at him. “Dorien used it on me,” she told him. “That date? I didn’t get drunk, neither did Solene. He asked me about Deschamps, and I broke the fucking cup myself. He wiped my brain about it on the boat back. I remember it all; the antidote works.”
It was hard to make Noel mad. He’d always been a very happy, very easygoing, albeit boisterous personality. So when any form of rage crossed his face, Odette always knew it was serious. On her, it was normal. On him, it was so out of the ordinary, it was frightening. A violent shine took hold of his hazel eyes, his jaw clenched, and the vein in his forehead popped as his grip on her tightened.
Anger didn’t wear him. He wore anger.
“Are you fucking serious?”
He didn’t give her a chance to respond before he glared at Valentin. “What the fuck are we going to do about this? There clearly needs to be something done, he drugged her.”
“Noel, I hear you.” His calmness sounded out of place next to the raw anger surrounding Noel. “You both have every right to be upset, and I am just as appalled as you are, but–”
Noel had slowly let go of Odette to approach Valentin, closing the gap between them faster than he could speak. Despite how quickly Noel popped his personal bubble, Valentin had to have been a wall in another life, because he once again remained rooted in place.
“No, ‘appalled’ isn’t a strong enough word. I’m gonna fucking kill him. Where does he live?”
Valentin crossed his arms. “Noel,” he sighed. “Again. You have every right to be fuming, but we need to be–”
“There’s no ‘we’ here. You don’t have to do anything, just tell me where he fucking lives. You can wait in the car if you’re concerned about providing security or whatever, but I’m not playing this game.”
“I’d be right there with you if the circumstances were different. We’ve been tailing him for five years, do you really think that’s something that hasn’t crossed my mind?” Valentin asked incredulously. He held his arms out to his sides before jabbing a finger in Noel’s direction. “As much as I’d be overjoyed to pop a bullet in his head, that’s not going to end well for anyone here. Not you, not me, and especially not Odette. You should be mad, terrified even, but don’t let that cloud your judgment. Take a breath, too.”
Noel didn’t have an immediate comeback, instead silently pressing his lips into a tight line as he kept his burning eyes on Valentin’s. Odette took the pause to approach again and put her hand on Noel’s shoulder, and he flinched at the feel of her before whipping around to meet her gaze. He forced something of a pained smile.
“I don’t know how you do this all the time." The way his voice cracked made Odette's chest throb. “My heart’s racing.”
He pulled her into another hug that was far tighter than the first.
“It’s not fun, I can promise you that,” she whispered, her voice shaking more than she intended. She allowed the hug to linger for a long while before she disclosed what was left. Aside from a few more expletives, all Noel could do was bury his face in her hair.
“That antidote would only jog anything erased by a second-degree use or lower. If that didn’t completely reform her memories, somebody used a three on her at some point,” Valentin said.
“And you don’t have an antidote for that?” Noel said, turning his head toward him again.
“That’s what I looked for first. I swore I swiped one from the lab to have it here, but I must have returned it at some point.”
“So when can you get another one?” Odette queried.
Rubbing his neck, Valentin paced toward the kitchen. “The issue is, threes are criminally difficult to make,” he said, approaching the fridge again. He pulled back the double doors and began to search the door shelves with a subtle franticness in his movements. “That’s the highest caliber power, so it makes the antidote develop even harder, and as far as I remember…we might be between batches.”
It was obvious he couldn’t find what he was looking for because he nudged them shut with a dejected huff. “I can go down to our lab tomorrow and see about getting one for you as soon as possible, but that’s all I have right now.”
“What, you can’t slide her a one? Two plus one equals three?” Noel was loosening his hug again to stand upright, one of his hands falling to his hip.
“I’m pretty sure that if it worked like that, we wouldn’t be having this conversation,” Odette scoffed.
“I just…” Noel started to say. The words got caught on his tongue, and he indicated his frustration with a grunt as he sent her an infuriated glance. “Why would Dorien even go there? Even if he didn’t know you have a temper, how the fuck did he think that was appropriate and not going to garner a negative response?” he asked. “I-I mean…Is he stupid? Does he keep that shit on hand when he fucks up with a girl? I’m so fucking…”
There was nothing else to say because there weren’t really more words for it. Except, so she thought. Valentin raised a hand, alerting both her and Noel’s attention before he approached her again.
“I hate to interrupt, but Odette,” he began, “I need you to be honest with me, right here, right now.”
Her brows lowered, and she let go of Noel to cross her arms. “Shoot.”
Valentin took a deep, readying breath. “I have my suspicions and hypotheses, and I’ve been biting my tongue until now, but now I really feel the need to ask.” He hesitated just long enough to allow Odette's stomach to knot up. “Is there any chance that…you might be the reason Enigma might not have access to Wrath?”
The first thing she could instinctively do was look at Noel, who looked ready to blow up again. But, he made no move to speak, and she turned back to Valentin.
“Is there something you haven’t told me? Now’s the time,” he urged.
Honesty was the goal here. And that photo of Florent Lambourne popped into her head for the millionth time that night. As did everything else she’d discovered throughout the day…
“The tea party,” she said. “When that bat thing tried to come at me, and I fainted. Right before I went down, something…spoke. In my head. It was…my voice, but it also wasn’t. And that thing just ran, I don’t even know how. Then when I yelled at Dorien, it was because he was trying to…figure out how I did that, I guess? I thought it had something to do with Enora all day, but…”
“She was nowhere near you when that happened,” Noel finished.
“You also said something earlier about…also getting sick around Arcean relics. I didn’t press because you were overwhelmed at the moment, but what did that mean?” Valentin continued, not taking any time to dwell on the information. Just moving forward.
Her gaze fell to the floor despite her attempt to keep eye contact with him. She hadn’t even remembered that she’d said that out loud until now. And now, there was no reason to talk her way around it.
“I…I used to get nauseous whenever I went to Arcean church for services. It wasn’t frequent; once a year at most. But it always resulted in me losing my guts into a toilet or bush, and—“
“Whoa, I didn’t know that happened every time you went,” Noel gasped, shooting her a quizzical look.
“I didn’t think much of it until I learned that’s why Dorien doesn’t like going! I didn’t think it could have been anything weird aside from a purely bizarre coincidence…”
Noel’s look only grew more puzzled, until it dispersed into one of panic. “Oh my gods, wait. Your astral shrine. You don’t use Arcean plates, they give you headaches.” He reached out to grab her by the arm, squeezing it with the same level of unease he held in his voice. “Churches make you sick, holy relics make you sick. Dee, oh my gods.”
Not that the facts weren’t already lining up, but they were wedging themselves in place, despite her trying to avoid all the obvious. The anger issues. The symptoms being in line with blood type possession. Her eyes. The resemblance to Florent. Dorien trying to change her thoughts, trying to upset her.
They’d crossed the coincidence threshold now. She'd known, deep down, all along. But, now there was no way to deny it.
Valentin said the words before she thought them. “Well, then I’m pretty certain. I think you’re Enigma’s missing Wrath. And they want it back.”
***
“I will say this, this is a comfy ass bed. Swanna down is fucking crazy, I might need one of these for myself,” Noel was saying. It was amazing Odette could hear it through the lasting effects of the night's bombshells buzzing in her ears.
She didn’t bother moving from her spot at the edge of the bed and simply nodded with an added "mm" because she couldn't muster up much more. She knew Noel was trying to keep things light, but it was so hard to appreciate his attempts when the weight of revelations was practically pulling her to the floor. She felt like she couldn't move. All she could do was stare at the wall.
I think you're Enigma's missing Wrath. And they want it back.
She wanted to be taken aback. She wanted to be anguished. She wanted to be horrified. She wanted to feel something that a normal person would feel upon finding out their father is a cult leader and that they're possessed by the embodiment of a deadly sin. But, she felt empty. Neutral. As if her mind and body had already accepted it as fact. Perhaps she'd exhausted every emotion she could feel about it in the single moment she'd processed it all to be true. Or she'd just grown really adept at swallowing down those hard emotions. Either way, neither felt particularly good.
However, she supposed that either was better than immediately falling apart over it. As horrible as it sounded, she'd managed to get work past something she was willing to consider far worse. She felt prepared to handle a monkey wrench like this.
“Hey.”
She didn’t need to turn her head. Noel was already crawling up behind her to sit at her side. He rubbed her shoulder, and she let her eyes fall shut.
“Penny for your thoughts?”
“You’re going to need a lot of pennies,” she said after a long while. That got a quiet chuckle out of him. She opened her eyes in time to catch his concerned look, and he sighed.
"I will say that you are taking this remarkably well. But I can't tell if it's in stride or because you're shutting down, so I just need to hear it from you."
Her snicker was delayed. For a second, all she could do was shake her head. "Your guess is as good as mine," she said. "I think I've just hit a shock threshold and my body's decided it doesn't have anything left to do but quietly take it all in."
"I'm not a psych by any means, but that sounds completely and totally fair."
She went back to staring at the wall, relishing in the feeling of Noel hands running across her upper back.
"I know it's a really stupid question, but are you okay? Like, full disclosure?" he eventually asked. She exhaled softly through her nose and allowed her eyes to shut again.
"I'm...functioning. Functioning is better than losing it over something that you can't really help." She aimed her gaze back down at him, just in time to catch him looking at her with that tender look he liked to give her when he was really worried about her. In other cases, it would only serve to fuel her annoyance. Right now, she needed it more than ever.
"Getting upset about it isn't going to change it. This is the hand I have, so I have to play it. It just is," she said. Despite her worries about her oddly Zen state of mind, she truly did believe that.
Noel's worry didn't fade away, and she hadn't expected it to. But, he appeared to accept the answer. "You're fucking unreal, you know that? I mean, really. I can't even believe I know you."
The warmest smile curled his lips, one that set her heart racing. He pushed himself up to look her in the eye.
“I know this is probably not a good time, but I’m really sorry. For what I said earlier." His smile waned down into something more apologetic. "I didn’t mean anything bad by it, I was just trying to keep the mood up, but we both know I’m ass at thinking before I speak.”
“I forgive you,” she said, breathless. “I’m sorry for how I reacted, it wasn’t–”
He was shaking his head. “No, you were right. You must be on another plane of thinking right now and me making a stupid comment probably didn’t help too much.”
“And this is the part where I say you were right because–”
She stopped talking when he grasped her wrists, softly holding them in place. “It’s okay,” he said, an easy grin gracing his lips despite the notch in his brow. “We can go back and forth about it all night, but really. I appreciate it, but you do not owe me an apology. It’s okay.” He didn't release her until she nodded.
Odette didn’t like yelling at him. She regretted every instance where she had raised his voice to him. Friends shouldn’t talk to each other like she sometimes spoke to him when angry. Most of the time, she wasn’t even mad at him; she was just mad, and he happened to be around. They weren’t friends who fought. Nothing worse than petty, silly arguments, at least.
He might have insisted that she didn’t need to apologize, and she did agree that what he said had bothered her and maybe warranted some choice words. But she maintained that, overall, he didn’t deserve any of that. He’d hung around her and her explosive temper for all these years and thought nothing of it, and she never wanted to give him any reason to second-guess that decision. Now that there was an evident cause for that temper, she was afraid he’d just been given the grounds to.
She didn’t want to say anything. She didn’t want to pay attention to the thought of him breaking off their friendship. Yet, that was the only place her mind wanted to go.
“This doesn’t…change anything, right?” She couldn’t look him in the eye and instead settled for staring into her lap, messing with a loose thread on the seam of her joggers. “If…if whatever’s happening here actually is…you’re still…gonna be there, right?”
When he didn’t pipe up with a swift comeback, her muscles tensed. That was the cue for her to start running her mouth, despite the urge to hold it shut and just become one with the bed.
“Because…I know what I said about this being a me problem and that you have no reason to care, but you’re one of the only reasons I haven’t absolutely lost my shit already, but I would understand if this was getting a little too real for you because it’s already too real for me, but I don’t know, especially now, how I could keep this going without you, and–”
Noel had her in a hug before she got too far. Thank the fucking gods, she thought, burying her nose into his shoulder. Her relief was so heavy that it caused her eyes to water, and she had to close them to keep herself in order. She wasn’t a crier, but she was certainly not in the best state of mind at the moment.
“Odette, someone would have to literally kill me to get me to stop being friends with you,” he said, his cheek falling against the side of her head. “And even then, I’d come back as a drifloon or something and just bother you some more.”
She melted into his hug. Noel always had the best hugs, only second to Vienna’s, and maybe even Bernard’s or Marieanne’s. But her eyes snapped open as a question occurred to her. “Why a drifloon?”
He scoffed, though he didn’t release his hold on her. “Ghost? Flying? Good hair? Come on, man, it’s like you don’t know me at all.”
Odette could hear the smile in his voice, which was enough to get her to laugh. In turn, he broke into his own fit of light giggles too, letting his arms loosen just enough for her to pull away. It felt good to laugh. It felt good to laugh with him.
She’d spent the last half hour wondering how she was ever going to recover from the never-ending whirlwind that seemed to be her life right now. But, here she was. Laughing with Noel like there was nothing wrong. Like there was no sacrilege. No Florent. No looming dark secrets that had just come to the forefront. Just them, as close as they ever were.
"You, Odette Cinq-Mars, are absolutely fucking indomitable, and I'm so lucky to call you my best friend. But please don't forget that us squishies like me are still here for you."
The sheer strength behind his words left her stomach lurching, and she felt her eyes well up with a sudden wave of emotion. The relief, the fear, the anger, it all hit her in that moment, and her body craved the release of a sob. She reached up to cover her mouth, thinking that might do something to stop the flow of tears. It didn't work, but Noel was one step ahead of her. He reached up to wipe one away before it even had a chance to fall, and she watched his eyes start to water, too.
"Oh don't you fucking dare," he said, straining his voice to keep it from cracking. "I'm supposed to be the crier between us. You're not allowed to cry." He sniffled as a tear traced the round of his face, then quickly reached up to wipe it away as he laughed to himself. "That's a lie, you can cry if you want to. I'm just not used to it but ignore me. You deserve a good cry, you fucking boulder."
"Yeah, but crying sucks," she laughed. The force of it knocked several more tears loose. She covered her mouth with both hands as her giggles collided with sobs, and before she knew it, she was doubled over into Noel's lap, laugh-crying along with him. They rolled into one another, sniffling and giggling and wiping their tears on each other sleeves for what felt like hours. Their cries eventually subsided, leaving them lying side by side on the bed and out of breath.
As Odette refilled her lungs, she felt light. She hated crying. She hated it more than most of the other things she vehemently disliked. But, she couldn't deny that she'd needed that. All her uncertainties about her state of mind and how she should be reacting had left her through those tears. She was exhausted as a result, but she felt ready to take on whatever was coming next. Wrath demon or not, Florent's spawn or not, she was ready.
Even if the feeling was only temporary, she would find comfort in it while she had it.
Pushing herself up again to wipe the rest of her face, she glanced over at Noel to see he was doing the same. “My ugly crying face aside," he said, sniffling, "my point stands. I’m in. I’m in deep. Probably even more so now. Do you know how long I’ve been following this sacrilege shit? And suddenly, over the span of, like, a month, I’ve found out more about it than anyone else in Kalos? And you think I’m just gonna stop here? Fat fucking chance.”
“I know, Noel, but I can’t help but feel like I just pulled you past the point of no return." She pulled her glasses off her face to wipe the lenses off on her sleeve cuff. “I know you’re invested, but your only skin in the game is that you’ve mingled with a lot of potential Enigma suspects.”
“I’d say that’s still a lot of skin,” he said. “On top of that, I’ve been past the point of no return, Dee. I’ve been dealing with your temper since we were six. That’s 73% of my life. At least now we have a diagnosis." She put her glasses back on in time to catch him playfully poking her in the side with his finger, and she swatted at him lazily.
“You’re right,” she said, her tone sardonic. “I suppose possessing the very embodiment of Wrath is grounds to give someone some anger problems.” That alone already gave her so much to think about. Did Venira’s presence just involuntarily make her upset at every little thing? Was part of it her own volition? Did Venira do it on purpose? In the past, she’d been able to keep it at bay with her hobbies, but was there another way now that she knew the source?
…did Venira know what she was thinking? Always? The thought mortified her. An eldritch beast having a front-row ticket to every unsavory thought she’d had about Valentin so far? Ever?
She didn't want to think about it. Not now.
“Anyway, I get it, but still…” she continued. She didn’t want to say the words that balled up on her tongue, but they rolled out anyway. “It’s not like they’re…probably after you, you know?”
Tonguing the inside of his cheek, Noel averted his eyes toward the ceiling. “No. But, they’re after you.” He let the words hang for a while as if he were trying to give her time to sit with them. “If the roles were reversed, would you be bowing out?”
“Absolutely the fuck not,” Odette declared. She didn’t need to think about it. And it was there that she realized his point.
“Okay then,” he said. “So why would I?”
She stared at him for a beat. But, eventually, she just nodded. There was nothing to argue with him over.
“If you think this sudden revelation that you might be withholding some insanely powerful demonic blood ‘mon is going to run me off, you’ve got another thing coming, sis. I don’t know what that thing is yet, but it’s probably just me shaking you and telling you to shut the fuck up.”
She smiled again. Noel made them come on so easily. “Thank you.”
“And you know that just makes you the cooler one now, right?” he said, eyes sparkling with a childlike eagerness. He heightened his voice into a falsetto that she supposed was meant to imitate her own. “Hi, I’m Odette Cinq-Mars, and I’m holding an ancient unknown powerful legendary inside me, fuck around and find out.”
As he finished his little act, his expression fell. He shot her an apologetic look. “Or, you know, something like that, only what you’re comfortable with,” he added quickly.
Despite her inability to handle biting jokes about the matter, she liked his enthusiasm. It distracted her from her unease, if only for a little while. “I wish it were that simple, but there’s…so much this uncovers. Like, does my mum know? Do Grandpa and Nana know? What about Enora? What’s Dorien’s end goal? If Dorien knows my whereabouts, does that mean Florent does too?”
The thought made her dizzy. If Dorien had been harboring his own blood legendary since before Valentin met him, he had to have still had it in secondary school. This meant he would have been in cahoots with Florent at that point, which meant…
More things she didn't want to dwell on. There was a lot she still didn’t know. Still didn’t remember. She’d need the higher antidote before she could allow herself to venture past that gate, lest she give herself more reason to be crazy. Not that she didn’t have one to begin with.
“Not to mention, how do I even access this thing? Talk to it? If it’s just…in me? My soul? Do I even have a soul? I don’t–”
Noel must have sensed her discontent because he started rubbing her shoulder again. “I know, it’s a lot,” he said. “But questioning more without more evidence at this stage is just going to make everything worse. Let Valentin get you that antidote, bring this up to Enora, and maybe…talk to your mum.”
The first one was the easiest, albeit the most nerve-wracking, because there was nothing else to do but wait. Second, slightly less simple, but not anything impossible. Enora was a hardass about opening up, but if Odette could level with her, it would happen. Eventually.
The third thing, though…
Odette had never had any issues raising problems to Vienna in the past. Never struggled with arguing with her over things, big or small. Vienna was never the type to shut her down on the rare occasion she willingly wanted to “discuss feelings” or anything of that nature. But this felt like a whole different beast altogether.
Vienna was minutely unhinged, yes, but she was quicker than a whip on steroids. And that might be an understatement. It wouldn’t take her long to suspect that Odette had ulterior motives for opening up the “Who’s my father?” dialogue after so many years of brushing it aside, which would breach Odette’s personal vow not to get Vienna involved in her sleuthing.
But, if Vienna had known that her daughter was possessed by a Wrath god this entire time, perhaps that vow was as good as null. Odette decided the best thing she could do was sleep on it. The deluge outside kept her from riding home to see her mother right then and there, and it would not be a good conversation to have over the phone at eleven o’clock at night.
“One thing at a time,” she said. “I should probably sleep off this day before I start figuring out how I’m going to proceed.”
“I’m with you on that. Come here, get under the comforter. It’s so soft.”
Odette humored him and crawled her way under the fluffy white blanket while he got up to switch the light off. She settled herself at Noel’s side, her head falling against his shoulder as he slung his arm around hers.
He was right; it was comfortable.
“Okay, you got me. Swanna down is nice,” she said.
“I wonder if your boyfriend would let me steal it. I’m sure he’s got twenty of these things lying around,” Noel mused. Odette turned her head to glare at the side of his face.
“Keep your goddamn voice down,” she said in a loud whisper. “We’re in his fucking house; this is not the place.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Noel chided. “Speaking of which, I checked for wiretaps and cameras before I went down for my first nap. All clear.”
Her gaze didn’t move off of him even as she furrowed her brow. “…okay.”
Noel sucked his teeth and nudged her with his free hand. “Don’t look at me like that. I don’t know what the man’s into. If he’s gonna watch me sleep, he’s gotta pay a fee.”
Odette opened her mouth to make a snippy comment but decided against it. “I definitely don’t think he’s like that."
“Yeah, I’m feeling pretty warm about him myself. But you can never be too sure,” Noel said. She supposed that was fair.
Still, even though her talk with him had gone in such a sour direction, she felt good about it. Once they got past the painfully uncomfortable small-talk wall, they exchanged words like it was nothing. It felt like she was talking to Noel, Acadia, or any of her other childhood friends. Second nature, despite the levels of horniness built up behind every word that came out of her mouth. But, when she didn’t think about it and just rolled with the punches, there was nothing difficult, awkward, or suspicious about it.
At least she could start to be certain that there was someone else, aside from Noel, who was trying to act in her best interest. That was the thought she rode into the sweet embrace of sleep on.
Rolling her eyes, Odette reached for a couple more puzzle pieces. “Yeah, it was just a superficial cut from some glass,” she said.
“Let me guess, juggling wine bottles?” Valentin said.
She rolled her eyes as she shook her head. “If I’m being honest, I was pretty drunk. But I went out to eat with Dorien and broke a cup. I tried to pick it up…and…”
This is such a seamless transition from the section of the chapter of Odette + Valentin bonding into actual plot stuff. How do you do it???? Give me some of whatever Sacrilege you're taking plsssss I need it
I loved this chapter! Odette and Valentin getting closer is something I needed. I'm glad we're getting tidbits of his backstory including about his fiance (fuck her). The tension when they accidentally touched each other's hand *scream*
FINALLY Odette remembers the date! Dramatic irony done masterfully that was awesome. I'm glad Odette and Noel finally made up, and they finally came to the conclusion that she's Wrath. I really liked how you built up to it, by giving the characters hints throughout the story. It made the actual moment very satisfying.
The more she talked to him, the more his shows of sincerity became obvious. He always made direct eye contact with her when he was trying to make her believe him or get a point across, and he always kept his brow at a neutral, wrinkle-free position while doing so. Sometimes he’d offer a half smile if the topic were light enough. And he never looked tense, even if he had all the reason in the world to be so. Tension only gripped him when he slipped up or was putting on an act.
Odette's crush aside, I really love this bit. In fact, despite Odette's crush (although it doesn't hurt, either), this does a great job of showing how obervant she is. She barely knows the guy, and already she's got his facial tells memorized.
Clovis does this a lot. This is at least the second time I've noticed it in this chapter alone, possibly the third. Hinting at his own guarded feelings, without being tainted or clouded by Odette's inner feelings, helps to show how genuine he really is.
“I was…desperate. And that desperation landed me in her bed despite knowing damn well she was sick in the head,” he huffed. “Not my proudest moment. None of it was, really. None of it did anything.”
That wasn’t what she had remembered. That wasn’t what she’d gone around the past couple of weeks thinking had happened. She’d broken it, tried to do something with it, and gotten cut. Solene had gotten drunk, too, right? That’s what she remembered, right?
But, Solene didn’t drink. So why had she been so convinced Solene was drunk?
“Okay, okay,” he said. Both of his hands were raised now, and it looked like he was going to put them on her shoulders but stopped short. She might have been disappointed if she weren’t so focused on keeping herself together. “Take a breath; you’re okay. Let me go find something, alright?”
You know something's up when Odette's not reacting lustfully to Valentin's touch. Jokes aside though, I wonder how he's going to help her. I guess if he's taken these willingly before, he recognizes the effects, so he probably knows how to get rid of them, too.
(Ah, antidote, of course. I should have seen that one coming.)
“But, if that’s going to ease your mind, have at it,” he continued with a huff. “Just be sure to aim for my jaw if my face is your desired target. Right side, preferably.” He pointed at the right half of his jaw. “I chew with my left.”
It was unreal how nonchalant he sounded. Her entire being stalled on what to do next, but a wave of exhaustion washed over her and left her feeling winded. There, she managed to start returning to her senses and realized what she’d just done.
Screaming at him, breaking stuff in his room, threatening him; was she fucking crazy?
Before he could fall into another string of curses, footsteps sounded down the hallway to the bedroom. A groggy-looking Noel stepped into view, rubbing his eye as he was coming out of a yawn.
He could barely finish his sentence before Odette rushed to him and hugged him tightly. He didn’t hesitate to return it, resting his chin against the crown of her head. Feeling his arms around her did heaps more for her nerves, and she immediately relaxed into him. Her body quivered against the warring senses of panic and ease she felt.
Earlier argument forgotten. Best friends, love that. That said, if Odette's been super horny this whole time, I wonder how Valentin is internally reacting to this? The whole asexual discussion throws an interesting wrench into my Meta Knowledge, but given the clues from him in this chapter so far, I'd still be surprised if he wasn't at least a little bit disappointed/envious. Even if Odette and Noel are just friends.
“I’d be right there with you if the circumstances were different. We’ve been tailing him for five years, do you really think that’s something that hasn’t crossed my mind?” Valentin asked incredulously. He held his arms out to his sides before jabbing a finger in Noel’s direction. “As much as I’d be overjoyed to pop a bullet in his head, that’s not going to end well for anyone here. Not you, not me, and especially not Odette. You should be mad, terrified even, but don’t let that cloud your judgment. Take a breath, too.”
Mad respect to him for this. He'd literally just gone through this with Wrath Incarnate but then, oops, here we go again! And he maintains his composure the whole time. Kimiko could learn a thing or two from him.
Okay, so I'm glad they're all on the same page of "time to murder the drug clown king" and glad Clovis has a level head enough to be like "yo we gotta actually plan how to do this first". Odette and Noel would not be in for a good time if they'd managed to go try to start something on their own. (Which would have been fun also, but this way is gonna end up being more satisfying.)
Hi here for catnip, please pardon amy typos as this is done via phone.
Prologue reaction/review:
As opening... Holy hades my trick of replying to have the chapter hitch a ride on the screen i am working on so everything is in one spot with me has bit me in realms best left unnammed.
But it does show your dedication for improvment/documentation so kudos for that.
So we're starting with a new team, interesting..
So candidly florent's take child to work day definitly is going to pot. I'm curious as to the time frame of this setting (aka alarm and ship are such sweeping generic terms. For example alarm could be a modernday police klaxon, or someone yowling thier head off, even odds).
Nevermind the echoing segment and server walls gave a general time stamp. I retract and feel notjing for sympathy for the gathered grunts and the fact they are all going to need hearing aids sooner rather than later.
A bit surprised no ones got noise canceling headphones either in hand or doled out.. Especially if this alarm was expected.
Granted if it was never expected to go off or rarely did i might understand the lapse... I wonder who or what is fleeing the coup. Florents words hint its something escaping...
And the pokebal alter being wrecked indicates we got a huge problem.
And kept getting routed to spanish's ,to come". While ironic since both the opposite of "coming along" triggered the alarms amd the escapee coming back is setting florent into stroke territory.
Also "majesty" in these times screams of an ghestis like ego.
So definitly more not good there...
That peckish line is definitly alarming.
The mandated groveling aka "appologies" definitly afirm ego. I am surprised they arent being confined while cameras or psychics or search dogs/mon aremt being consulted to find the missing mon.
And as i skipped the notes to avoid spoilers so the Blood Legend is something i'm looking forward explored in full with the cast in the setting.
Whistles... And this is how we traumatize the next generation florentz. He's doing an a plus job in that depo. Definite father of the year material i mean scarring the kid, bonus points for you know... Not keeping track of his descendents/biological responsibilties, especially if theres another ghost type in the wings to latch onto it just digs the hole all the deeper.
so these mon are legends that are bound.. What by blood packs to florents family? And theyre based off the sevem sins? Wonder if it was his conceet of an ancestors? Amd his kid Armel has complete cyclical retrograde amnisia? Ouch i wonder if its from the bond but it does make that jourmal from earleir make sense.
So if florents gluttony... I wonder what armel is? And that leaves 5 mystery slots (well now 4) to be contemplated.
And it looks like the newest soul is vengence...
That leaves lust, pride, envy greed, sloth... I wonder if poor amel would be bound to envy later, his inury fueling that semtiment amd drawing it to him. I'll.leave other guesses for other times.
Ah so envy is bound to him then? Well i'll poke other guesses as it seems apropriate...
Its a bit jarring to see your pov go from planning an infantcide, to (well as much as he can) dote over his son, the history on the kid is interesting amd the tonal whiplash fitting.
Nice build up of florent stalkin/clycling through the area to do the kill. Amd him losing siggt of his own motive from sheer possesive parental instincts... He sees, he wants, while gluttony does dovetail heavily into greed you can see that trait bleeding into almost every action he takes...
A drink or five... Well i suppose the hangover will give his blood legend a means to rachet up the pain with little effort. Though i do wonder how long he's going to be content with letting tje woman who he precieved cheat him keep his youngest kid. Honestly sounds like the poor woman accidentally got pregnant and didnt think of the father... May not of known the father depending how wild the parties were, and made the most of it, and i doubt shes aware of what florent is... Team Enigma being a team and all that...
And so he establishes himself in the kiddos region and the stalkimg continues.... I feel bad for everyone at this point. Also, as envy did massive psychological/brain damage to amal i wonder what damage vengence would do? And how thats going to dovetail
Into the damage being a preme can leave behind.[/SPOILER]
CWs: Body Horror, Blood, Strong Language, Talk of Sex, Sexual Metaphors
Hey there! This is a bit of an exciting chapter, as I'm introducing a character I've wanted to write for a long time! That said, this chapter was kind of a clusterfuck to write more due to some personal issues I was having. My biggest issue is the length--this is a LONG chapter, and I was looking to cut it in half but wasn't sure where a good cutting point would be. So please let me know how the pacing is if it's good as is, or if it drags a little, and where you think a good stopping/starting point would be if I were to split it into two chapters.
Also, please let me know how the interactions are here. I feel like I rushed through some of them a little bit, and I want to make sure they have the right amount of time to "sit" before moving on if that makes sense!
As always, thank you so much for reading!
When she awoke, she wasn’t in the bedroom anymore.
She wasn’t anywhere.
Blackness engulfed her senses, for a small eternity. As her eyes adjusted, the darkness lightened into an endless, deep red veil. Black, formless matter swirled about in the space above her head like ink moving through water.
Odette sat up, though was alarmed when she was met with resistance. It felt as if she was trying to sit up out of liquid, and her suspicions were confirmed when she was assaulted with the sound of splashing and the sensation of something thick dripping down her body as she lurched upright. Some of it landed on her face, and she sputtered and wiped her mouth.
She could feel her own skin. She could feel her own rear, sitting submerged in something lukewarm. Her mind was clear. She felt awake.
As that thought occurred to her, she pulled her hand away from her mouth. Her chest lurched when she saw it was covered in blood.
To her horror, she looked down at herself and discovered that her entire body was drenched in blood. Hell, she was sitting in it.
Through a panicked gasp, she wrestled herself to her feet, trying whatever she could to clean herself. She shook off her hands, wiped her face, and even tried to wring out her hair. But, upon grabbing one of her braids, she was shocked to find it completely dry. She caught sight of her hands again and found that they were no longer coated either. Looking at her body, she beheld her pristine white tracksuit. No signs of staining. It was as normal as it had been when she’d fallen asleep.
Her shoes, however, which had somehow ended up back on her feet, were still splattered with that disgusting red. In fact, she still stood in it. No matter where she stepped, the puddle never ended. She tried to find something else to stand on but discovered that what she had thought was a puddle was a sea. Miles upon miles of a still, bloody ocean stretched out before her eyes, and it seemed that the lone presence within it was her.
“What the…”
She’d only spoken in a shallow whisper, but her voice reverberated through the space as if she’d spoken at normal volume. It lingered in her ear, like the whispers of a distant specter, before fading off entirely.
“Hello?” she shouted. It echoed along the expanse of the gruesome ocean, vibrating in her core and leaving her feeling perturbed. There was no way she was awake, but she was having difficulty believing she was sleeping, either.
Being a light sleeper, she’d never been much of a dreamer, let alone a lucid dreamer. At most, she recalled specks of nonsense her brain had come up with throughout the night, but never anything as distinct and vivid as this. She felt as alert and present as she would if she were wide awake and walking down the streets of Lumiose.
But this wasn’t Lumiose. This wasn’t anything that could have been real.
The more she looked around, the less anything made sense. No doors, no stairs, no buildings, no signs of spooky apparitions. Just her. She kicked against the blood pooled at her feet, watching as it splattered up around her and landed in droplets, sending rims of ripples in all directions. That was the only movement she saw, and soon, it all fell still again.
“Nothing?” she called. No response. Nothing changed.
A nightmare. It had to be a nightmare. Barring the odd coincidence of her having such a lucid dream after the day she’d had, there couldn’t have been any more to it. And she probably wasn’t going to get herself to wake up by just standing there.
Adjusting her glasses, she started forward in a straight line.
She wasn’t sure how long she walked on. It could have been minutes, or it could have been hours. All she could tell was nothing changed for a long while. Nothing got closer, and nothing faded out of view. If she didn’t know any better, she would have thought she was walking on a treadmill.
However, when the scenery did change, it was instant.
The bloody ocean beneath her shifted, leaving her on an incline. Sedge grass and cattails began to sprout from the red alongside numerous lanky trees and rotted logs. Small island mounds also came to form, and Odette was sinking down into the blood up to her waist before she had the chance to process what was happening. She tried to kick her way out of it, but all that did was splatter blood onto her face and mouth, leaving her sputtering. She quickly understood that, like before, all she could do was continue forward despite her fight-or-flight reflexes begging for flight.
When she felt her feet touch the bottom, she clawed through the new swamp she found herself in, battling past chewed-up lily pads and piles of gnat-infested algae before she managed to crawl her way out of the hellish lake and up onto land again.
Panting, she looked back over her shoulder to see that the aimless path she’d traveled down was gone. All there was around her was unkempt swampland with no clear sign of a correct direction. However, she’d deduced quickly that walking forward had brought her here, so walking forward would likely get her out. And much to her relief, the blood disappeared off of her person as soon as she was out of it. It was somewhat comforting to know that would be something she wouldn’t have to worry about.
As expected, walking through a swamp–even one in a dreamscape–in nothing more than sneakers and a tracksuit sucked. She tripped, scaled fallen trees, had to wade through more gnat clouds and squelch through bloody mud piles, and was whacked by bush branches and cut by logs. Just when she thought that was all the dream was going to be, she happened upon an eerily neat clearing, one that felt manmade.
Sitting in the middle of it was a simple, standalone full-length mirror. Despite its simplicity, Odette felt the hairs on the back of her neck stand up. Nonetheless, it was the biggest change she’d come upon in gods knew how long. She felt she had no choice but to approach it.
She walked around behind the mirror first, stepping slowly as if she were afraid to startle it for any reason. She had no doubt in her mind that it likely had the capability to get up and chase her if it so desired because nightmares were just that strange. When it didn’t budge, only then did she loop around to the reflective front.
From far away, she could tell she was seeing the shape of her own reflection. Squinting didn’t prove anything different, and the mirror was as still as any normal mirror should have been. She didn’t let her heels touch the floor as she approached, cringing deeper and deeper every time she heard a leaf crack or a twig snap under her weight.
She soon found herself directly in front of it, and it was only there she got a full look at what the reflection was actually giving back to her.
It was indeed her likeness but…it also wasn’t.
She recognized the curve of her rounded jaw, the shape of her eyes, and the pink hue of her lips. But, she didn't recognize the black-sclera eyes just slightly too big for her head, the razor-tooth grin reaching slightly too far up her cheeks, or the tracksuit as black as the sky above…
Wrong. Run away. Run away, FAST.
But she couldn’t. Despite what her mind was screaming at her to do, something kept her rooted in place. Something compelled her to lean in, just to see…
“B̵̎̒O̴̕͜O̸̍̕.̷̏̎”
The reflection jerked forward, protruding out of the glass. Its face came so close that Odette felt its nose bump hers, and the abruptness of it forced a jolt through her body.
“Fuck!” she involuntarily cried out as she stumbled back and crumpled over her wobbly knees, grasping her chest in onset fright.
Now, the reflection was laughing. Then, it stepped out.
“Oh gods, is that all it took? Some baby shit like ‘boo’?” it cackled. “I guess it probably helped that you weren’t expecting it, but shit, I wasn’t expecting it to be that easy!”
The voice. Odette recognized that voice. It was so distinct, there was no world she could have ever forgotten.
The static-laced voice she’d heard in the garden.
“You…” she said through her calming breaths, “...you’re…you spoke. In my head.”
The reflection, now more of a doppelgänger since it was no longer inside the mirror, was now examining its nails. They were long, sharp, and were just as black as the tracksuit.
“Yeah, that fucked you up for a few days,” it said. “I almost felt bad. But that desmocula would have gutted your ballsy stupid ass, so I had to do something.”
Odette watched, both awestruck and puzzled, as the mirror sunk into the swampy earth, and a path took form through the thin trees. The doppelgänger took off down it without as much as another word.
“W-wait, where are you going?” Odette called, scrambling back to her feet. She hesitated at first but ultimately decided to follow far behind.
“To commit war crimes against dyslexic toddlers,” it yelled back, not turning around. It had shoved its hands into its pockets. “Where the fuck do you think I'm going? I'm walking. We have a whole bloodstream to take up; might as well use it.”
“Bloodstream?” she asked numbly.
That was enough to make the doppelgänger stop abruptly. So much so that Odette nearly slammed right into its back. It turned to shoot her a quizzical look; long lips tightened into a frown. “Yeah? Come on, there haven’t been pools of blood this big in your world since Pokemon used to try and gut each other for sport.” It spoke like Odette was simply supposed to know this.
Soon, however, it was walking along again. “Did you know entrails were, like, the big fashion statement back then? I was the one who made them big, not to toot my own horn. Fleshy things look really good when you know how to style them.”
Odette could not believe the thing was still going on about the topic. At that point, all she could do was stare.
“That aside,” the doppelgänger continued, turning its head to look over its shoulder, “I figured you’d recognize your own blood by now; it’s only…well…your fucking blood. Do you like what I’ve done with the place, though?”
Odette blinked out of her stunned trance. “Wait. We’re…inside me?” she said.
The doppelgänger grunted in annoyance and stopped walking again, this time turning its entire copied body to face Odette.
“Some rendition of that, yeah, but you’re not answering my fucking question. Did you like the decor?” It spoke with a new level of forcefulness that Odette decided was meant to be intimidating. While she was indeed unsettled, she mostly felt herself getting more annoyed. How was she supposed to respond? Lie? Tell the truth? Spew some nonsense?
"It's...something," she said, hoping that would be good enough to end the conversation and not anger the thing. She had a feeling the latter would be futile.
"'Something's' not an answer, fuckhead."
Odette darted her eyes around. Part of her was waiting for a camera crew to jump out and bum-rush her. "I'm not a huge outdoorsy person, so it's whatever. Needs more...development?"
"For fuck's sake, the question wasn't meant to be open-ended," the doppelgänger groaned. "Yes or no. Pick one before I start gnawing on your temporal lobe."
Odette's light annoyance quickly blossomed into something far more concrete, and she sucked her teeth. "Okay, no. I thought it was really fucking obnoxious. Happy?"
The doppelgänger inhaled deeply. Its gold pupils picked up a baleful glint as it sucked on its lower lip. It released the lip with a loud 'pop!' before crossing its arms defiantly. “A word of advice: nobody likes a dirty cunt. So why don’t you clean yourself up a little before we continue this conversation, hm?”
It turned on its toes and rushed ahead, like a toddler trying to get away from a parent who’d just scolded them. Odette watched, too aghast to say anything.
Every part of her being was warring with each other. She was suddenly ready to get into a no-bars-held fistfight with the doppelgänger. But, she was still perturbed by her current dream state, and still unsure if she wanted to get any closer to it. Even so, while she watched the scene of the swamp literally disintegrate around her, she wasn't as afraid as she had been at the start. As the dirt, the trees, and even the gnats sunk back into the blood with the same consistency as a melting popsicle, it all felt expected.
She’d been so certain she knew the doppelgänger's voice. More specifically, she’d been so certain she knew its true identity. But did legendaries normally act like this? Then again, she’d never actually met a legendary, so what the fuck did she know? Still, the question fell out of her mouth before she could think too hard about it.
“What the hell are you?”
The doppelgänger stopped again, but it took a while for it to turn. When it did, a dubious grin had twisted its way up its cheeks. “You haven’t figured it out yet? I didn’t take you for a jackass,” it said tauntingly.
That was the only confirmation Odette needed. But the taunt had left her with a sense of defiance.
“I want to hear you say it.”
Odette could have sworn she saw the doppelgänger smile wider, and it approached her with an ominous weight in its step. As it neared, and Odette was able to see the thing’s uncanny face in more detail, her throat started to tighten. She gritted her teeth as it slapped its hand against the small of her back, the very part of her that let her know when her Wrath was coming on.
“I’m this,” it declared. “Well. Kinda. I’m tethered to your existence by this. I didn’t have a lot of time to pick a spot, so I hope you’ve been enjoying the tingly tramp stamp. If not, well, sucks to suck limp dick, I guess.”
It was squinting at her as if trying to gauge a reaction. Odette decided not to give it one, though she’d be surprised if it couldn’t hear the shake in her exhale.
“You’re Venira,” she said.
The vast expanse was abruptly engulfed in colorful lights. Fanfare trumpets sounded from every direction and yet nowhere at all, so loud that Odette doubled over to cover her ears. Through the cracks between her fingers, she swore she could hear the sounds of cannons popping off and looked up in time to see confetti falling from above.
Venira now stood atop a flight of stairs that ended in a balloon arch. Every single balloon was inscribed with the words, “You stated the fucking obvious!”
“Congragulfuckinglations, we have a fucking winner winner cannibalism dinnerrrrrrrrr!” Venira hollered over the commotion, holding her hands up in a triumphant pose. She looked to be waiting for some sort of response, but when she finally met Odette’s perplexed gaze, her stance started to deflate.
“What?”
Odette tried numerous times to form some sort of sentence. All that initially came out were a couple of sounds that barely counted as words.
“Oh, come the fuck on, are you having a stroke on me now? After two fucking minutes? What kind of pussy shit is this?” Venira spat, her hands settling on her hips. “At least wait the standard five, then I’ll give you the floor.”
That was enough to force something coherent out of Odette. “No, you–” she started to say. A brief surge of anger pulsed through her and snapped her back to full attention. “No. This is just fucking weird.”
Now, the words were gathering in abundance, and she gestured up to her otherworldly twin. “You’re Venira, clearly, but you don’t look anything like what I was shown or even fucking imagined. I didn’t even–”
She clawed her fingers through her bangs, exhaling harshly. “You look like me. Why? How?”
Venira was chuckling now. She practically danced her way down the steps of her grand perch, her movements the perfect mixture of fluid and rigid. Odette wanted to liken them to some variation of a strange contemporary style.
When she made it to the bottom step, she leaped off and landed lightly. The blood barely rippled under her step. “That’s me doing you a favor, dear darling schmucko,” she declared, tapping Odette on the nose. She flinched against the sudden gesture and swatted Venira’s hand away.
“What favor?”
“I figured I would be polite in presenting as a human form that you could identify with, but if you’re not into it, I can always go back to one of my ancient shapes.”
“Ancient sha–” Odette started to repeat, but she dragged her hand down her face to stop herself. “Do you not always look like a branch dragon?”
Venira chuckled again, louder this time. The sound gave Odette the same uneasy feeling she got when she heard the Kalos emergency signal test on the TV. “I could. I could look like that. But that’s some basic bitch bullshit, and I don’t roll that way.”
“So…” Odette breathed. “You’re like a ditto of sorts?”
“Oh gods, no. I have all the ditto goodness without the slutty undertones. Ah, well.” She raised her hand as if she were trying to be reassuring. “I don’t slut shame here. But in comparison, I’m definitely not as loose with who I’d sleep with. In fact–”
“Where are you going with this?” Odette queried in bewilderment.
“Watch your fucking tone, ma’am,” Venira scoffed, sounding offended now. “I’m just trying to explain my goddamn case here, but since you’re too good for that, I’ll cut to the demo. Get a load of this.”
Without a warning, she fell into a heap of jagged limbs, each contorting in ways Odette didn’t think a human, even an insanely flexible one, could manage. If she didn’t know any better, she’d think she was watching some spacey weirdly-targeted rendition of The Ring.
At that moment, she decided she wanted to wake up. But the longer she tried to convince herself to do so, the more she was certain that she couldn’t do anything to make it happen. All she could do was step back. And maybe prepare to run.
“I don’t know what I’m getting a load of, but cut it out,” she warned.
No sooner had she spoken did the discombobulated human form twitch. Then it lunged at her.
It ran on all fours, its bones cracking and popping with each eerie stride forward. It moved like somebody caught in the area of a strobe light, yet managed to close the gap between them in no time flat.
Odette stumbled backward, trying to break into a sprint. Her brain was trying to decide if it was only obnoxiously startled or scared out of its wits, and the break in judgment caused her to lose her footing. She fell rear-first to the ground, blood splashing up around her as she landed. She didn't have time to process her disgust before she found herself nose to nose with a form of abject horror.
In the time it had taken Venira to sprint toward her, her form had shifted tenfold. No longer was she an uncanny reflection but a ghastly exaggeration of it.
Thin, ghastly skin stretched over the skeletal contours of unnaturally long limbs that defied all laws of human anatomy. Her smile now served as a wicked gash, slicing her grotesquely large head from ear to ear. Her eyes, which had grown into enormous, bloodshot saucers, leered down into the dark recesses of Odette’s soul and gleamed with an unearthly malevolence.
The creature's nostrils flared with every giggle-laced breath, and Odette felt all the hair on her body stand on end, sent up by how fast her blood started to curdle. Panic threatened to speed up her breathing, but she managed to keep herself steady by reminding herself that this was her dream. Her bloodstream, specifically. She couldn’t wake up for whatever reason, but she realized she might have had more control than she was led to believe.
Even though Venira looked like she would hurt her, she wasn’t going to. She wouldn’t have scared off desmocula if she wanted to see Odette hurt for any reason. That was logic she could utilize.
“Don’t,” Odette said breathlessly, building up a curt edge behind her following words, “do that. What's the point in trying to scare me to death if you've already gone out of your way to protect me once?"
The smile didn’t leave the creature’s face, even as it started to shrink. Odette cringed through the sounds of bones and tendons popping back into place as it morphed, but her chest settled upon seeing the more familiar yet still-uncanny clone form. Far easier to look at in comparison, but not by the biggest of margins.
“Because it's funny? Does there have to be a point? Who shoved that fucking stick up your ass?" Venira sniggered. "I’ve been looking forward to this meeting for a long fucking time, and you can’t even indulge me in some tag? You’re not a very gracious host."
Odette's temper quickly overshadowed her ease. “I–what?” she fumed.
The sound of her onset rage prompted Venira to cackle outright, her head tilting backward at a barely unnatural angle as the sound rose from the deepest recesses of her stomach.
“You’re so godsdamned precious when you’re pissed off! I can’t stand it.”
“Yeah, considering it’s your fucking fault it happens so easily, can’t say I’m shocked it tickles you so,” Odette retorted. “I didn’t come here to play tag with an infernal…cryptid…thing. In fact, if I had it my way, I wouldn’t have come here at all. This seems to be more your doing than mine.”
“Gods, you’re a fucking stick in the entrails,” Venira scoffed, kicking at the blood that surrounded them. That’s when Odette noticed the stairs, confetti, and lights had disappeared.
“It’s a good thing you’re cute. I like this face,” Venira continued. She brought her hands to her copied cheeks and began to pat them. “I like this body.” Her hands traveled down to her hips, where she set them and began to wag her tailbone back and forth. “You’d never think short and fat go well together, but moving in this skin is as eeeeeeeeaaassssyyyyyyyy as it comes.”
Odette bristled, reaching her hands up to cover her stomach as she was pelted with a feeling of self-consciousness. “What the fuck; I’m not fat!” She was a little rounder yes, but certainly not fat.
“Oh, right, I guess not. Gulattive was fat, but you’re more...thick. Like a peach. No!” Venira gasped, black eyes sparkling. “You’re a pear. You’re a cute little itty bitty little pear-shaped soft little angry cute midget thing.”
If someone had told Odette she was going to wake up just to be bullied by a demonic Pokemon, she’d have assumed they were high off their ass on sacrilege. Truth be told, she was worried she was already at that point herself. Maybe the antidote Valentin had given her was actually spiked.
“Are you quite finished?” she asked.
“I’m just trying to emphasize that I genuinely don’t think you’re fat; you’re just soft. Soft, short girl. Soft, short, pear-shaped, teeny tiny little–”
“I get it,” Odette seethed. The response left Venira a giggling mess, and she covered her mouth as her eyes crinkled under the force of her grin.
Odette decided there was no reason to keep instigating the beast and took another long, hard breath. She supposed since they were here for whatever reason, it was the best time to unload whatever questions she had. Because gods knew there were a lot. And questions meant that the God of All Things Anger couldn’t make more bizarre comments about her weight.
She stood up and brushed herself off. “Okay…Venira…I–” she started slowly before being cut off.
“Stop there.”
Odette clenched her fists. “What now?”
“Don’t call me that,” Venira said.
“Call you, what Ven–?”
“Shut.”
She felt a tantrum brewing in her gut and forced another breath to numb it. “So then, what the actual fuck am I supposed to call you?”
Another wry smile curled over Venira’s perfectly fanged mouth. "You tell me, bitch," she shot back in a snicker. “Just something that isn’t that. I like your nicknames, so I want you to give me one. As a first meeting present.”
Crossing her arms, Odette shifted her weight to her left foot. She didn’t need to feign her curiosity. “Do I get anything as a first meeting present?”
“Mmmmmmmm, I’ll tell you if I like the nickname,” Venira mused, copying Odette’s stance exactly.
Odette beheld the sight of her wrong-yet-right mirror image again, still finding herself put off by the sight of it. She was getting more used to it the longer she was in its presence, but she devolved back into unease every time she stared at the face for too long. That uncanny valley sense came on slowly, but when it hit, it hit with a heavy hand.
Why did Venira even want a nickname in the first place? Unknown or not, she was still a legendary. Odette had a hard time grasping why a Pokemon of her caliber would want to be called by a different name, which she supposed was why she was struggling to come up with something. When her teammates had joined up with her, she'd come up with their names on the spot. They were based on feeling, and she would just roll with it. When she looked at Venira, all she felt was a mixture of apprehension, annoyance, anger, and maybe awe. Curiosity, even. But none of that produced nicknames.
Thinking harder, she started scratching at her cheek. What would anyone want to call the God of Wrath? Something related to rage? Destruction? The occult?
Somewhere in her thought process, she started thinking about her own name. Vienna had the idea to name her after the main character of the Swanna Lake ballet, the white swanna herself. Vienna thought the name was pretty, and it coming from a show she liked so much made it better. Odette supposed she had her family's overall fixation with that ballet to thank for her decision to start dancing.
As she started recalling the plot of Swanna Lake, she remembered how the white swanna eventually came into contact with another woman named Odile, who ended up being transformed to be a copy of her. Her doppelgänger.
Odette paused for a moment before dragging her shoe against the standing blood at her feet. She then let out a scoff, it coming out a deflated chuckle. It was good to know she had a sense of humor, even in the face of so much utter bullshit.
“Odile,” she said simply. “Your name is Odile.”
Venira’s—Odile’s, now—face lit up. Something about it might have been cute if it weren’t so demonic to start.
"Clever," Odile cracked. "Not gonna lie, I was hoping for something like 'Consuelo' or 'Syphilis' or 'Little Sweetmeat', but that's really smart."
Odette squinted in disbelief. “Why the fuck would you want your name to be Syphilis?"
"Because?" Odile wheezed. "It rolls off the tongue so elegantly, and I think it embodies my high-class pedigree and the state of my manners."
Odette suddenly felt tired. It transcended every other sense of exhaustion she already felt. She had an inkling of a feeling that the sensation wouldn’t go away any time soon.
“Okay,” she said evenly. “You got your gift. Give me mine. As long as it’s not another game of tag.”
Odile shifted her weight back and forth between her legs before sighing deeply. “Okay, fiiiiiiiine, I guess now you’re allowed to ask me some questions. That is the whole reason I’m here now, truthfully. I feel like you’re about to explode.”
She smiled again as a thought seemingly occurred to her. “Not that that wouldn’t be funny as fuck to witness, but, actually, I think you’re more fun together than in a million pieces. You’d just be like–”
She reached up to grab her right bicep, and with a loud, wet 'pop!' she pulled it clean off and tossed it aside. A dramatic cry of anguish soon followed as every other one of her copied body parts began to detach themselves, falling to the blood with meaty thumps and the most sickening splashes Odette had ever heard in her life. Odile’s head continued to let out some obnoxious groans, even as it flipped off her torso and rolled to a stop several paces away.
Odette felt bile rise in her throat. Her vision clouded with a feverish blur while nausea clawed at her stomach. Her mouth began to salivate like it usually did when she was about to vomit.
“Okay, stop. Stop! This isn’t working,” she shouted, raising her hands as she turned her head away.
“What isn’t? I thought this was a fantastic conversation?” Odette could hear Odile fiddling with her dismembered limbs, somehow, and cringed through the fleshy squelching.
“You,” she hissed, bringing her hands up to rub her eyes underneath her glasses. “That body, your presence right now.”
“Too hot to handle?”
Odette snapped her head around, facing her doppelgänger’s torn-up body while she sputtered over her words, trying to ignore her body's need to puke. “Wha—no. You’re fucking...freaking me out with this uncanny valley mirror image body horror shit,” she managed, gesturing wildly to the mess. “Can you turn into something else? Literally, anything that doesn’t look like a fucking hellspawn? Preferably something you can’t make fall apart like that?”
Odile’s stolen features crinkled with mock concern, and she reformed into a functioning body in a single instant. “Aw, honey, you’re not a hellspawn. Do we need to have a talk about your self-image?”
Exhaling in aggravation, Odette began to flex her fingers as a means to keep her threatening fit and illness in check. “I think, considering I have you in my bloodstream, I’m as close to a hellspawn as anyone can get,” she jeered. “Can you please humor me? Blood type to…vessel?”
Gods, that’s what she was. A vessel. A host for an eldritch parasite. How the hell was she ever going to get used to that?
Odile stuck out her lower lip in a pout before crossing her arms. They crackled with the movement, and Odette grimaced in disgust. “And here I thought I was being hospitable. No good deed goes unpunished, I fucking guess.”
With a wave of both hands, she shrunk down from her humanoid form into what looked to be a tumbleweed with wings. Like some strange woobat variant. Or, rather, a woobat-brambleghast hybrid.
The weight immediately lifted from Odette’s chest, as now she was beholding something that was no spookier than any of the rambunctious ghost-types at Vienna’s lab. If she squinted, it was even kind of cute despite its wide glowing eyes.
Odile flapped up to Odette, who outstretched her arms to give her room to land. “How’s this, you pansy?”
“Much better,” Odette said, breathing in as her stomach settled.
Odile made a sudden sweeping gesture with her wings. “Well then, get on with it. Start the Q and A before I get bored and chew your fingers instead."
Right. That is what Odette wanted to do. She’d nearly forgotten that while she watched a copy of herself dismember itself. She’d have to add that to the list of things she never wanted to dream about again.
She opened her mouth to speak, but the realization of just how many questions she had brewing in the center of her mind caused her to freeze. She didn’t know how long she stood there with her slack jaw, but when she tried to move her tongue after a while, it felt dry.
“Are you trying to catch a fly? I prefer fruit flies; the big black house ones are fucking vile,” Odile said.
“I just…I don’t even know where to start," Odette said, ignoring the comment.
“That is a problem, isn’t it,” Odile said. Odette watched her nod, momentarily expecting her to add in something insightful. That never happened.
It was there that she decided that her best course of action was just to ask whatever came to mind, rapid-fire style. Odile seemed like the type of character to respond well to that.
“So you’ve just…been inside my body this entire time?” she said.
“Eeeeeyup,” Odile replied.
“And you’re Wrath, so…you’re the reason I’m so pissed off all the time.”
“Eeeeeyup.”
“And when the hell were you planning to let me know about all of this? Was I just supposed to go my entire life just assuming I’m some temperamental freak?”
She broke her gaze away from Odile’s, momentarily finding herself more interested in the blood around her feet. The thoughts continued to wash over her like rough waves over an unsuspecting surfer, and she scrunched her brows in frustration.
“All my health problems, everything, it’s your fault,” she said.
She heard the tumbleweed inhale and looked up in time to see that the slightest of grimaces crossed Odile’s branch-like features. She raised a wing to scratch her spherical head. “Yeeeeaaaaaah, look,” Odile said tentatively, “I didn’t show up in you with intent to fuck your immunity; it just happened like that.”
For the first time since they started talking, she looked serious. Solemn, even.
“I am sorry. And I want to emphasize that I mean that. And I don’t ‘mean’ apologies very often.”
The sincerity behind her words threw Odette off. She wanted to overanalyze them, poke holes in the delivery, and look closely for any signs of deception. But there was nothing to look for. It was as plain and bare as it could have been. Somehow, some way, Odette just knew.
Venira, the legendary Pokemon of Wrath, had apologized to her. And wasn’t pulling her leg about it, either.
It felt…nice. It felt nice to finally hear somebody apologize to her for her shit hand and having it actually mean something.
“Sure,” she murmured after a while. She mindlessly began to sink into a sitting position and was startled when her rear met the cushion of a recliner. But, if fanfare trumpets and unkempt swamplands could be conjured here, she figured a recliner was a welcome change. It was better than sitting in the blood.
She continued as she leaned back into the leather. “But if you’re that sorry, why didn’t you rear your head earlier? We could have figured something out,” she said. “Valentin told me there was a way to keep the illnesses under control if you had a grasp on it. Unless he was lying.”
“Why? Because safety and info gathering, you sweet summer shit,” Odile said. “And your little wannabe fucktoy? He’s fucking brilliant. Even if he trains ice types.” She visibly shuddered, then recovered as if she hadn't. “Pretty much everything out of his mouth was spot-on true. The stuff about us blood types, the other legendaries, the Vice Dust…”
Odette’s jaw tensed. The confirmation of the truth bomb was eclipsed by Odile’s choice of label for Valentin. “Don’t call him that.”
“Fine, your 'wittol gorl cwush,'” Odile mocked, flapping her wings for added effect. “Regardless, you should keep him. And I have no reason to yank your dick about that either; we have the same goal in mind, so you’re best off staying under his ‘fuck me’ eyes. You can yank his dick whenever you want to, though.”
“He’s asexual,” was all Odette managed through the mortified haze that started creeping in through the cracks in her mind.
“Yup, and I used to get my asshole waxed with holy water,” Odile scoffed.
Odette tried to think of a quick comeback but came up ridiculously short. “I...I’m not sure how to respond to that.”
“Congrats, you’ve sharpened my fucking point,” Odile said, rolling her eyes. “Would you like a lollipop? Or perhaps a lollipop-flavored condom you can use when you two inevitably–”
“Oh my gods, enough,” Odette spat. She snatched her arms back to slam her hands over her ears while she squeezed her eyes shut. Her face felt so unbearably hot that she swore she could feel sweat beading up on her forehead. “That’s not what we’re fucking here to talk about, so why–”
“We might not be here to talk about it, but you certainly like thinking about it,” Odile retorted. Odette heard her land on the chair’s left armrest and had a sudden desire to take a swing at her. But the flood of unbearable embarrassment blocked her from doing so.
“What, so you just read my fucking thoughts all day?” Odette groused, dipping her chin toward her chest, trying to scrunch herself up into a ball as a means to escape her own shame.
“Kinda. Sorta.” Odette could hear the stupid, snarky smile in Odile’s voice. “I can sense changes in your feelings. When the changes are really intense, I’ll go poking around your brain for the specific thoughts. You have a very vivid–”
“Ah, please, please, please, shut up,” Odette whined. She moved her hands to cover her eyes as she slumped in the recliner and tucked her knees into her chest. “I don’t even know why I asked, for the love of fucking…”
“No need to get so worked up,” Odile cooed. “I’m just trying to make things a little more comfortable for you while we chat.”
Odette’s left eye snapped open in time with the resentment that took hold of her, and she moved the corresponding hand off of it to stare at the tumbleweed. “Oh yeah, dismembering yourself while in your little look-a-like form was really meant to be comforting.”
“I could name ten people off the top of my head who would have been very comforted by a similar image; thank you very fucking much.”
Forcing another breath into her lungs, Odette lowered her hands and legs. “We’re not here to talk about my relationship with Valentin,” she said evenly. “This is purely a conversation about me and you.”
“I mean, technically this does involve me and you; it involves you thinking about jumping that man’s bones and me–”
“What is this about safety?” Odette sputtered, lurching up to glare down at Odile and effectively cutting her off. “Was I safer living life with a violent temper and sickness spells that almost fucking killed me a few times? Let’s get back to that.”
Odette watched with a clashing mixture of solace and unease as the glee drained from Odile’s eyes. She broke her gaze to look at the ground before suddenly taking flight.
“You like stories? Of course, you like stories; you took fucking acting classes,” she said as she landed in the blood. “Let me tell you a story, then.”
Without warning, any light that was within the realm faded away, and Odette found herself engulfed in darkness. Before the dread could set in, a screen flipped on in front of her. Its light cast some illumination on her and the hundreds of empty theater seats she now sat among. Looking around, she couldn’t find any physical signs of Odile. All she heard was the beast’s static-y voice.
“A looooooooong, long, long, long, long, long, long, long time ago, before you were even a speck of dust on the cosmos, I came to be among some other legendaries you might be more familiar with.” A crudely drawn image of Odile as a flying tumbleweed flashed across the screen. In fact, it was so crudely drawn that Odette would have assumed a toddler had made it. But it got the point across.
More crudely drawn pictures slid in to join the Odile doodle, and they were silhouettes and colors Odette immediately recognized.
Giratina. Yveltal. Solgaleo. Eternatus. Rayquaza. So many legendaries she knew by name. All standing around the Odile doodle. They all had smiley faces.
“However, it wasn’t just me. There were also my bitch ass cohorts,” Odile went on. The drawings of the familiar legendaries suddenly disappeared, only to be replaced by shapes she didn’t recognize. They were smaller forms that looked to be the same size as the Odile drawing. After squinting at them for a moment, she realized that they were just the shrunken versions of the forms of the Blood Legendaries she’d seen in Valentin’s office. They all had angry faces that Odette could tell were meant to be derogatory.
“Without getting into the gory details, as much as I usually like those in particular, our shitty creator kinda treated us like garbage, so I got mad and left.” The other doodles dropped away, leaving the Odile doodle wandering among poorly drawn stars. Soon, Odile landed on green lines, presumably grass, and a dismembered arcanine surrounded by red scribbles popped into the frame.
“I came across your world, and this substance you mortals call blood,” she said fondly. “I drank it, and it changed me.”
The Odile doodle moved toward the red scribbles, then suddenly sprouted into a poorly drawn version of that branch dragon drawing Odette had seen before. The angry-faced doodles of the other six legendaries popped back into view.
“At the time, my cohorts hadn’t given me much reason to hate them, so I invited them to do the same. They changed too.” All six doodles sprouted into the forms Odette was more familiar with despite the childish level of the art.
“Some of the other legendaries didn’t like what we’d become, and we had a big fight about it. During that fight, I learned the power of vessels. I also created an army of other Pokemon like me–like us–that thrived on blood just as we did. I taught my cohorts to do the same, too. From there, I became known as The Mother of All Blood Types.”
Throughout Odile’s narration, Odette watched as the doodles of the Blood Legendaries and some of the others she’d seen smiling earlier quite literally smashed into doodles of different legendaries she recognized. For a moment, she saw Dialga flash on the screen, but his head and neck looked as if it had drawn like a penis. Palkia looked to have been drawn as morbidly obese. She wanted to laugh at how absurd it was, but she had caught on to something else.
"Wait, you created the blood types? Shinies? That was all you?" she said.
The animation paused, as did Odile's voice. She spoke again after a while, but the animation remained stalled.
"Yeah, yeah, it was a big thing I figured out. Game-changing, really. They all thought just seven of us were bad, but try like...seven gazillion. We almost wrecked the population here, though..."
Odette frowned dubiously, eyes roving around the theater on the hunt for the tumbleweed form. "Go on."
"Well, if you think about it, there's not much to explain. A bunch of bloodthirsty 'mon going on a war-fueled tirade? We needed blood, mortals had it, so we just hunted and slaughtered a whoooole bunch of them."
The animation abruptly switched to a group of doodles, presumably Odile and the other blood types she'd created. Odette recognized a few of their shapes from Valentin’s analog blood type Pokedex. The doodles proceeded to fly at drawings of stick figures and other Pokemon shapes, yanking them apart and sending red scribbles all over the scene.
"Now I understand what you meant by Pokemon maiming each other for sport," Odette said, grimacing.
"Yeah, why do you think you all evolved with the uncanny valley?" Odile said. A smiley face appeared on the screen, but its wide eyes and wide grin sent a cold, prickly feeling through Odette's body. It was the exact sensation she got when she looked at Odile's copied face for too long. "We wrecked you all so badly that you evolved to be more aware of when we were coming. How about them leppas?"
The explanation had Odette gritting her teeth again, and she shifted in her seat uncomfortably. "So, is that why you didn't end up killing everything? We beat you back?"
"Oh, don't flatter yourself," Odile snorted. "It was all my genius that saved you; let's be perfectly clear there."
The scene on the screen swapped into an image of the Odile doodle dressed in a graduation cap and holding a diploma. That got a derisive chuckle out of Odette, but she kept her comments to herself.
"I quickly figured out that killing all the mortals on this planet wasn't going to be feasible in the long run, and soon discovered that the best and most powerful way to get blood is to partner with mortals, not kill them," she said. "Partnerships led to a longer supply and way more power. Something about bonds or whatever, that's a whole 'nother story."
She stopped to laugh to herself while Odette made a mental note. "So I got my fill by picking and choosing vessels that worked well with me. So did my cohorts. So did the other blood types."
A diagram popped up on the screen, showcasing the Odile doodle being connected to other Pokemon shapes by arrows. The same was shown for the other sins and other blood type doodles.
"This eventually led to some blood types jumping between Pokemon offspring, which--"
"Resulted in the first shinies," Odette finished, moderately dumbstruck by the revelation. That meant Enora likely had descended from the first Pokemon who had made pacts with blood types. Or came from some other Pokemon who had done it more recently.
"See, you're not a jackass when you choose not to be."
Odette scrunched her nose in irritation. "Continue, please."
Odile's voice took a breath. “In the end, the war came to a draw. My cohorts and I decided to settle down in one particular world so as long as we and those who had helped our side could be left alone. I didn't want anything else; I just wanted to be left. Alone. Me, myself, and I, with nothing more than a couple million mortals to mess around with idly. But that's it."
There was a sudden surge of stress in her tone that stroked at Odette's sympathy. She had to wonder what could have happened to the embodiment of Wrath that made her so serious about not being bothered.
"Things were okay for a while, but as I said earlier, my cohorts are bitchasses. Namely, Gulattive.”
The doodle of Gulattive’s grotesque form flashed up on the screen. His angry face was now more defined. “Gulattive is a bit of a loaded schmuck, you see. He’s Gluttony, so he’s impulsive, never sated, and always wants more. He wasn’t happy with the terms of our war-ending agreement because wanted to keep fighting. He wanted to have a pissing contest with everyone, but he wanted to ensure he was always the one pissing the furthest. More than that, he wanted to be in my position, the leader of our stupid group, because he thought everything was about him. He’s a fucker. But nobody would fuck him because he’s fat and ugly and–”
“Odile,” Odette called. She listened to the voice clear its throat.
“Anyway.”
Gulattive suddenly produced a Pokeball, and other five gathered around him and approached the Odile doodle.
“So, unfuckable Gulattive convinced the unfuckable quintet that the agreement sucked and why doing the most to be the big fat dick on top was the way to go, and they sucked me into a little ball, and locked me up. Because they knew I'd stop them from whatever idiocy they wanted to get into.”
A scribble of purple shot out from the Pokeball in Gulattive’s hand and engulfed Odile. Her doodle disappeared, and the other six doodles were left cheering before a poorly drawn clock cut onto the screen. The hands began turning.
“I wasn’t sure how long I was in that ball. It’s safe to say it was thousands of years, maybe more. But, Gulattive took over the group and led us all into a contract with this family called the Lambournes, all for the sake of having consistent vessels and a means of manipulating a group of power-hungry humans into doing his power-hungry bidding. They all seemed to be on the same braindead idiotic dumbass page.”
At the sound of Florent’s surname, Odette perked up. She watched as the six Blood Legendary doodles spoke with stick figures in bowties before cutting over to a drawing of a Pokeball. It lingered for a beat before popping open.
“However, at some point in time, twenty-two years ago, a Lambourne child was born, and my prison had been unlocked. I escaped without a second thought and ended up with none other than you. Odette. Free for the first time in gods know how fucking long.”
The final scene of the “movie” ended with a horrible drawing of her. But Odette could tell it was her by the braids, the white tracksuit, and the strange childlike emphasis on how red her eyes were. The screen cut to black after that, and Odette found herself sitting back on the recliner in the middle of the same bloody ocean. It took her eyes a moment to adjust back to the change in light, and she gave them a good rub while Odile kept talking.
“I was just excited to be free, even though I’m not sure how it happened. I didn’t want to ask questions; I just wanted to enjoy being away from those backstabbing dickshits for however long I could.”
Upon opening her eyes again, Odette could see the tumbleweed was still sitting in the blood, but her back was turned. Her tone had taken on a far more sardonic weight. “So, to answer your question, I don’t know. At the moment, yes. It felt safer to lay low with no indication I was with you aside from your anger and shitty health. But now that I know how things have progressed outside my fucking sightline, I might have misjudged.”
She looked back over at Odette, her eyes hard now. “I knew it wasn’t going to be quiet forever, but I just craved a few years of peace and freedom.”
For a moment, Odette had no words. It was so much to digest in one go that she was once again left unsure of what to address. However, as the two decades of strife that her anger and health had caused her came rushing back with the weight of an aggron’s stomp, it didn’t take her long to figure it out.
“Am I supposed to feel bad for you?” she said thinly. “You craved a few years of peace at my expense? Knowing there’s a genocidal legendary out there? Newsflash: I didn’t ask for any of this.”
Odile was suddenly in front of her, having morphed back into her doppelganger form. She grasped both armrests and hovered her face so close to Odette’s that their foreheads touched, effectively trapping the latter in her seat.
“Congratufuckinglations, because neither did I,” she menaced over Odette’s surprised gasp. “You think it was all sunshine and ponyta guts having the very beings I gave power to shrink me down to a speck inside a Pokeball? Maybe if you’d let me finish, you would have heard me tell you that I’m grateful for you.”
Odette blinked, her expression falling along with the shaky breath she exhaled. “You–”
“I was locked away in that fucking ball for thousands,” she raised a hand for emphasis and lifted her knee up onto the armrest as if set to climb into Odette’s lap, “of years. I don’t know how, and I don’t know why, but your bastardly teeny existence got me out. And I guess I was just riding the last two decades on the high of freedom and didn’t want to fuck it up. Despite what you might think, we gods are far from perfect. Believe me.”
Now stunned into silence, Odette kept her eyes on Odile’s face. She watched the fiery passion drain from her eerie features, only to be replaced by wrinkles of doubt as she slowly stepped back. She stood there for a while, staring at nothing in particular in a tense, heavy silence.
“I just didn’t want to be caught like that again. I was–” She frowned like she was struggling to finish the thought. “I also didn’t want to know what they would do to you if–”
She cut herself off with a single, rough jerk of her head. She trained her eyes back onto Odette’s, causing Odette to hold her breath in anticipation.
“I know you know a thing or two about letting trauma dictate what you do,” Odile said.
Something Odette could only describe as defensiveness walled up within her. “Don’t…leverage that against me,” she said, standing up to emphasize the severity of her words. She stopped short as another realization hit her, and that wall was toppled by distress.
“Wait. Wait,” she said breathlessly. She settled her hand over her chest as if that would somehow calm her heartbeat, which was now pounding against her eardrums. “Gods, you were…you were there…for that…”
Odile’s face twisted into a look that matched what Odette felt. She would have been jarred by the change were she not so consumed by the thoughts of that thing that had shown up to make the dream worse.
“Don’t,” Odile said quickly. She reached out a hand like she wanted to make some sort of comforting gesture but stopped short. She appeared to stumble over her words before dropping her hand. “I’m sorry.”
For a second, she almost looked entirely human.
“Just…don’t do that to yourself right now. Please.”
Odette exhaled sharply. Odile’s mannerisms were strange, so the fact she felt somewhat comforted by them was equally as strange. Still, nobody needed to tell her twice not to allow herself to sink into that buneary hole. Especially not now.
“Okay,” was all she said.
Odile released a huff, her eyes slipping shut for the briefest of seconds. “Whether you want to believe me or not,” she went on slowly, “even if I hadn’t somehow ended up with you, you were involved in this shit the moment you were born. The Lambournes don’t take kindly to people walking off with their property, and you, Odette Harmonie fucking Cinq-Mars, are Lambourne property, despite whoever's uterus you were prematurely cut out of.”
That was something far more pressing to think about. Something that hadn’t truly struck her yet until that moment. “So it is true.”
Odile answered with a single nod. “Allow me to be the paternity test you so desperately wanted,” she said, sarcasm lining her tone. “Filthy Lambourne blood flows in these veins, so you better start getting used to the shit that comes with that territory. You come from a line of power-hungry, nasty human beings. I’d actually be impressed if I didn’t want to see every one of them burn to death in a blaziken’s gaping cloaca.”
Odette replayed Odile’s words over and over again in the second of downtime she had. Filthy. Power-hungry. Nasty. That’s what she came from. She was directly descended from a familial line that was set on making a deal with a dangerous legendary for the sake of causing problems.
The fact that she wasn’t surprised didn’t just startle her. It frightened her.
“But despite all of that, I see your bitter fucking malice at the way those Lambourne whores are existing right now. With the sacrilege shit happening, and all that,” Odile said. “You would want to stop them, wouldn’t you? Even if they are your blood?”
Yes, was Odette’s immediate thought. She wanted no part of a family that could help commit gods knew how many atrocities. She didn’t have to think twice about that.
Odile seemed to know her answer without her having to say it. She kept talking, sauntering closer with a little more gusto in her step. “Guess what, bitch? You have that edge.” It looked like a grin was tugging at the corners of her lips now. “They want you; they want us. Now that I’m out with a vessel, we have the capability to fuck. Them. Over. That was the one thing they and the other six were afraid of happening, and it did. And we can wreck them for it.”
All of it sounded tantalizing. All in one day she found out about the story behind sacrilege, the Shiny Trade, Dorien, her own past, her unknown paternity, and how it all just seamlessly fit together. How her existence was intertwined with the very thing she had set out to get to the bottom of. How her existence probably had a larger hand in what was happening in the first place. And now, she was being met with the pretty words from the very being who might be able to ensure she saw victory, and who could give her an edge she didn’t have–or at least didn’t know she had–previously.
“Why now and not twenty years ago?” she asked.
Odile raised a brow and recoiled slightly. “The fuck was I gonna do with a two-year-old?”
Point taken, she realized. “Then in general? Why now? Why haven’t you been preparing me for this?”
Odile paused, a vacant yet charged look settling in her dark eyes. “I don’t know. Like I said, imperfect. Now that there are signs that they’re moving, I have to move too.”
She paused again, that time to cross her arms and look at Odette with a little more bemusement. “And don’t start with me about the ‘preparation’ shit. You’ve prepared yourself plenty,” she scoffed. “You’ve been learning deductive reasoning since you got out of your fucking incubator, you’re armed, you’ve got better metaphorical eyes than a fucking claydol, and that acting training got you built enough to mack on a man you’d rather bury in a shallow grave,” she explained, raising a finger with each passing point. “You were capable from the get-go. So shut the actual fuck up.”
Despite the overall curtness of the delivery, the stream of compliments left her feeling rather good, as much as she didn't want to admit it. They were compliments from a god, after all. A god with a really fucked up sense of humor and shitty art skills, but a god no less.
“Okay,” she said after hesitating. “That doesn’t change my disdain for how long you took to present yourself to me,” she added sternly, trying to make herself forget that she'd been complimented at all. But, she softened her gaze as she crossed her arms. “But…better late than never, I guess.”
Odile was grinning now. “I got you all buttered up just like that? Noted.”
Odette licked her teeth, deciding to bite back the quip that threatened to spill out. “How would you recommend we proceed, then?”
She wasn’t exactly sure what had changed throughout that speech, but she was suddenly far more privy to Odile’s wide smile. Something about it carried an air of determination she hadn’t seen before, making it seem more amicable than eerie.
“Your future 'Baby's First Shallow Grave' occupant, Dorien. Inviderus' fuckhead,” Odile said. Her nose crinkled in disgust. “I’m sure I don’t need to tell you this, but keep your wits about you with him. He’s trying to get a rise out of you to get me to rear, most likely to get me back to that ball and to get you to follow.”
Now, his reaction to her warding off desmocula in the garden made all the sense in the world. Paired with his previous blatant attempts at pissing her off, she now understood his angle. She was briefly thrilled to know that she hadn’t been crazy for initially thinking that’s what he was doing. Then she realized what a fucked up thing that was to be happy about.
“If I’m under Gulattive and you’re under Florent, that makes it more likely that they can succeed in their world domming shit. I’m not stupid enough to fall for low-hanging nipples like that, provided it's not Inviderus saying it directly, because that guy could go fucking die in a hole for all I fucking cared, since he's such an insufferable buttmunch."
She stopped to take a breath. "But your own bodily anger might be enough to expel me,” she explained as she jabbed a finger into Odette’s shoulder, causing her to flinch back. “You need to watch it. You’ve been good about it so far, but desmocula was a close call.”
Odette quietly rubbed her shoulder. “What, you don’t cause my bodily anger?” she asked.
“Our partnership instilled it in you, and I might exacerbate it by being within you as I am, but your anger is still your own.”
Frowning, Odette nodded along despite not particularly liking the answer. And Odile calling it a “partnership” felt wrong somehow, but she left that part alone.
As Odette was starting to think of ways to ensure she kept herself sane with her newfound knowledge, a different question came to mind. “Do you…know about any of the other things I forgot? Because of the Dust?”
Flexing her lips, Odile released an irritated sigh. “I couldn’t say. We’re not separate entities right now, so Vice Dust does to me what it does to you.”
“How could we be separate?” Odette queried, tilting her head.
“A formal catch.” Odile pursed her lips and started to pace slowly. "Teeeeechnically, even though I'm living in you, tethered to you, I'm still wild. Catching me would give us that 'official' partnership and separate me from your body, so to speak."
Odette blinked in surprise. Was it that easy? “I have a spare ultra ball–”
“Whoa,” Odile yelled through a deep chuckle. She raised her hands up as if she’d just heard an offensive joke. “Don’t get ahead of yourself, dipshit. That wasn't me telling you to do it now." She started shaking her head. "Do you know how easy it would be to swipe a ball from someone? With me in here, you’re still the obstacle they need to get through. This gives us time to infiltrate and ruin them. And maybe I can figure out what caused my little jail cell to malfunction upon your arrival.”
Odette had to resist the urge to groan. Of course Odile had a point, but gods forbid that Dust was used on her again. Then what? She’d have to wait for another round of antidotes? Provided she even managed to have a jog at all? That was still reigning as the only solution, and all it did was supercharge her anxiety.
“And what if that doesn’t work?” she heard herself asking. “There are things I don’t know about all of this, which means I can’t imagine you know anymore, being limited to my eyes and ears. Should I just sit back and let it happen if we get blindsided?”
“If we get blindsided, I’ll handle it,” Odile answered so quickly that Odette barely had time to process if she’d been heard or not.
“You’ll handle it?” she repeated.
“That’s what I said,” Odile snapped. “Do you need a godsdamned hearing aid to go with those glasses?”
Rolling her eyes, Odette exhaled sharply. “Fine. Continue as normal. Stay with Valentin. Mind Dorien even more. You’ll intervene if you see fit.”
“Atta girl.”
“Can I tell him about this?” Odette said. “Can I tell Noel?”
“It’s your fucking mouth, I sure as hell can’t stop you,” Odile said, shrugging. “Well, I probably could, and it’d be funny as shit, but I won’t.”
Raising a brow, Odette tilted her head again. “You can control my mouth?”
“I’ve never tried, and it’d probably be harder without the bond of an official catch. If I could I would just have you confess your undying horny for your wannabe fucktoy and save you the aggravation and mental strife. You’re not you when you’re freaking out over your Lusty Lusty Lusty thoughts,” Odile said. She grinned in a manner that indicated she knew the commentary was going to make Odette mad. Catching that intent was what kept Odette from actually losing her shit.
“You know what? Point doubly taken. We can wait a little longer before I officially catch you,” she said drily.
If I even want to catch you, she thought.
She didn’t dwell on that too much because now she was trying to think too far ahead. At the moment, she needed Odile if she wanted to keep going on this sacrilege bust. And Odile needed her. That’s just how things were, and for her own sake, they needed to stay that way for a little while longer.
But when the time came, would she even want to officially partner with Odile? What would that entail?
Did she even have a choice?
“I’m sensing your nervous system’s starting to jingle back to life,” the eldritch terror said, shimmying her shoulders excitedly. “Better get a move on, cutie patootie.”
Odette stared at her negative mirror image again before furrowing her brow. “What are you talking about? I’m not–”
Before she could finish her thought, her eyes opened. Her vision was blurry at first, but it came to focus on a smooth white ceiling. The overhead fan was spinning quietly, and she could hear the muffled sound of chatot singing just outside. A swanna down comforter had been tucked up under her arms.
Awake. She was awake.
“Fuck me,” she said out loud. Her mouth felt dry, and she could taste the morning breath on her tongue. But, hearing her voice under normal, awake acoustics was something she'd never take for granted again.
As soon as the words left her lips, her thoughts sprung to life, but they weren’t her own.
That’s what she said.
Crude. Laced with threatening giggles. Static-y.
Odette lurched up, her eyes darting around the room. She’d been so caught off guard by the casual intrusion of Odile’s voice in her brain that it took her quite a while to realize Noel wasn’t in the bed anymore. But all she could focus on was her own mind.
“Odile?” she said in a whisper.
Yes, but maybe don’t talk out loud when you need to respond to me like this, dumbass,Odile said. That’s a one-way ticket to a padded cell and a straight jacket, and while those are a fun time, save it for later.
Odette slowly settled back against the pillows, feeling herself sink into their plush material as she brought her hand up to cover her mouth. Her own thoughts raced over the sound of Odile’s voice, but she could somehow still hear the Wrath god giggling through them.
[Quick thoughts while reading the Venira Origin Story:
You mentioned the length of this chapter. I feel like you probably could have worked in the opening scene with Noel and Odette into the ending of the previous chapter and started this one with Odette waking up in her dream world. Or maaaaybe cut this one off somehow just prior to Odile telling her origin story and shifted that segment into the following chapter; it feels like there's enough meat left in both halves from that point to count as a chapter on their own. It's a lot to cover, though, and honestly I feel like having it all in one chapter is the way to go, length or not.]
Post-read thoughts: Loved this a lot! It's everything I could have hoped for from the first meeting. I do feel like the tonal shift was... somewhat jarring, between the cutesy cuddling between Noel and Odette then diving into the Blood Swamp, and I think that might have been better served, as I said above, by shifting the cuddling scene into the ending of the previous chapter and leaving this one purely the Odette/Venira interaction. But with that said, I do understand (I assume) why you felt you should have that lighter scene in this chapter, just prior to the sheer weirdness of the rest of the chapter, and I don't think it's harmed by including it here, either. Mostly I think it would have trimmed down the length a bit, since you were concerned about that, but given the whole Blood Dream sequence is long even without that, I'm not sure if it would have made a huge difference.
Anyway, lots of good info revealed here, and finally adding that new element we all knew was coming eventually into the game, and I am so excited to see them working together going forward, and especially how Noel (and possibly Valentin?) react to this news!
She stopped talking when he abruptly grabbed her wrists. Not roughly; it was more of a tender, reassuring hold. “It’s okay,” he said, an easy grin gracing his lips despite the notch in his brow. “We can go back and forth about it all night, but really. I appreciate it, but you do not owe me an apology. It’s okay.”
I love these two so much. Something tickles me every time I see this quieter, softer side of Odette, even having seen it several times by this point. And Noel already comes across as the ultimate ride-or-die best friend, and you do all of this without even a hint of romance between them. It's genuinely impressive!
“Odette, someone would have to literally kill me to get me to stop being friends with you,” he said, his cheek falling against the side of her head. “And even then, I’d come back as a drifloon or something and just bother you some more.”
She melted into his hug. Noel always had the best hugs, only second to Vienna’s, and maybe even Bernard’s or Marieanne’s. But her eyes snapped open as a question occurred to her. “Why a drifloon?”
He scoffed, though he didn’t release his hold on her. “Ghost? Flying? Good hair? Come on, man, it’s like you don’t know me at all.”
Further examples; massive fight, and they can just go right back to joking about each other. And Noel's sense of humor is hilarious. Characterization is easily your strong point, 1000%.
…did Venira know what she was thinking? Always? The thought mortified her. An eldritch beast having a front-row ticket to every unsavory thought she’d had about Valentin so far? Ever?
Because that's what any cosmic horror is truly invested in; a tiny horny girl's love life. (This is made all the funnier with the meta knowledge that I know Odile and, actually yes, this absolutely is something she'd tease Odette about.)
“No,” he said tentatively. “But, they’re after you.” He let the words hang for a while as if he were trying to give her time to sit with them. “If the roles were reversed, would you be bowing out?”
“Absolutely the fuck not,” Odette declared. She didn’t even need to think about it. And it was there that she realized his point.
I fucking love these two. These are prime friendship goals right here. You do such a great job showcasing just how close they are without like, spelling it out directly.
I do like this part here. It's a little detail I hadn't considered, but also that's probably because I have ooc knowledge. But yeah, before they become buddies, it makes sense for Odette to be wondering how the hell this whole thing works.
Odette humored him and crawled her way under the fluffy white blanket while he got up to switch the light off. She soon settled herself at Noel’s side, her head falling against his shoulder as he slung his arm around hers.
Ahh, so that's how we're handing first contact. Almost feels... out of character for Venira, in a way, but I know this isn't about to go down how one would (normally) expect it to.
The more she looked around, the less anything made sense. No doors, no stairs, no signs of spooky apparitions. Just her. She kicked against the blood pooled at her feet, watching as it splattered up around her and landed in droplets, sending rims of ripples in all directions. That was the only movement she saw, and soon it all fell still again.
I know you've seen Soul Eater, so... this reminds me a lot of that sort of not-quite-alternate-plane-of-reality thing that they had going on when Tsubaki fought her brother in the enchanted sword. Not really real but definitely not not real.
When she felt her feet touch a surface of sorts, she clawed through the new swamp she found herself in, battling past chewed-up lillipads and piles of gnat-infested algae before she managed to crawl her way out of the hellish lake and up onto land again.
The reflection jerked forward, protruding out of the glass of the mirror. Its face came so close that Odette felt its nose bump hers, and the abruptness of it forced a jolt through her body.
“Oh gods, is that all it took? Some baby shit like ‘boo’?” it cackled. “I guess it probably helped that you weren’t expecting it, but shit, I wasn’t expecting it to be that easy!”
“Somewhere, anywhere,” it yelled back, not turning around. It had shoved its hands into its pockets. “That mirror’s pretty cramped, so let's walk and talk. We have a whole bloodstream to take up, might as well use it.”
This first line ("Somewhere, anywhere") feels oddly ooc for Venira, very... vague, cryptic, unhelpful. But again, this is me and my meta knowledge of her and her personality at work. Still, I do think, for setting the scene here plus given the fact that this is our first encounter with her proper, it's not likely as jarring as it would be to anyone who's not me.
“Did you know entrails were, like, the big fashion statement back then? I was the one who made them big, not to toot my own horn. Fleshy things look really good when you know how to style them.”
Oh, I wasn't expecting this to actually be like what it felt like. Which I guess is kind of dumb of me to not have jumped to this as my first conclusion, really.
They literally have been like this since the beginning, omg.
I will say that it does feel... somewhat odd for Odette to be 'leaning into her annoyance' here, if only because she's kind of unsure of what to make of this body double at the moment. Up until now, she's been mostly confused, but here she just flat out decided it was trying to intimidate her the paragraph before, so she opts to react more combative...? I guess it's in character, to a degree, but I'm not sure I would have expected this reaction this early into their very first encounter.
Most of all, she’d been so certain she knew the doppelganger’s voice. In fact, she’d been so certain she knew what the doppelganger was. But, did legendaries normally act like this? Then again she’d never actually met a legendary, so what the fuck did she know?
The above point aside, when not taken out of context and read all at once, this whole scene does flow together very nicely, as Odette eventually works up to being less uncomfortable and more open to probing at what the hell is happening around her.
“I’m this,” it declared. “Well. Kinda. I’m tethered to your existence by this. I didn’t have a lot of time to pick a spot, so I hope you’ve been enjoying the tingly tramp stamp. If not, well, sucks to suck limp dick, I guess.”
The vast expanse was suddenly engulfed in colorful lights. Fanfare trumpets sounded from every direction and yet nowhere at all, so loud that Odette doubled over to cover her ears. Through the cracks between her fingers, she swore she could hear the sounds of confetti cannons and looked up in time to see some colorful streamers falling from above.
The doppelganger–Venira–now stood atop a flight of stairs that ended in a balloon arch. Every single balloon was inscribed with the words “You stated the fucking obvious!”
“I figured I would be polite in presenting as a human form that you could identify with, but if you’re not into it, I can always go back to one of my ancient shapes.”
Looks like this part here was meant to be bolded, since it's Venira talking, and it was at this point I realized we aren't getting her deformed speech text. 🤔 Which I think is intentional, given that we got it in the "Boo" but nowhere else.
Thin, ghastly skin stretched over the skeletal contours of unnaturally long limbs that defied all laws of human anatomy. Her smile now served as a wicked gash, slicing its grotesquely large head from ear to ear, while her eyes, now enormous, bloodshot saucers, leered down into the dark recesses of Odette’s soul. They gleamed with an unearthly malevolence.
I'm actually a little disappointed we didn't get more here. Where did 'Odile' even come from? I feel like I've asked before but I don't remember the answer... is there some meaning behind it that went over my head in this scene?
Odette felt bile rising in her throat. Her vision swam, her stomach lurched with a violent bout of nausea, and her mouth began to salivate like it usually did when she was about to vomit.
Hmm. Was Valentin confirmed to be hosting a blood legend too? That doesn't feel right. I'd have to go back and look...
Unless Odile doesn't literally mean her siblings, but just the feelings they represent. Most people can still feel lust, even if they're not possessed by the legend representing it, after all. Now that I think about it, that's probably what she means... Valentin hosting the legend of lust is a laughable concept. (Although I honestly would not put that passed you, either LOL)
“A looooooooong, long, long, long, long, long, long, long time ago, before you were even a speck of dust on the cosmos, I came to be among some other legendaries you might be more familiar with.” A crudely drawn image of Odile as a flying tumbleweed flashed across the screen. It was so crudely drawn, in fact, Odette would have assumed a toddler had made it. But it got the point across.
I've probably mentioned this before too, but you manage to mix the perfect amount of horror, humor, and general "what the fuck is happening?" vibes together very well.
“Some of the other legendaries didn’t like what we’d become, and we had a big fight about it. During that fight, I learned the power of vessels. I also created an army of other Pokemon like me–like us–that thrived on blood just as we did. I taught my cohorts to do the same. From there I became known as The Mother of All Blood Types.”
This whole scene does a good job of condensing down the origins of Venira, her siblings, and blood types in general from that one-shot into something simple and easy to follow.
That said... I don't think I ever realized that Venira essentially created blood-types. Feels like a big revelation to me. And it doesn't answer why only shinies have the gene capable of it, like... is that also something Venira meant to do or was it purely a limitation she was forced to abide by? Like she literally tried and could not create one otherwise or something?
“I was just excited to be free, even though I’m not sure how it happened. I didn’t want to ask questions; I just wanted to enjoy being away from those backstabbing dickshits for however long I could.”
“I was locked away in that fucking ball for thousands,” she raised a hand for emphasis, lifting her knee up onto the armrest as if set to climb into Odette’s lap, “of years. I don’t know how, and I don’t know why, but your bastardly teeny existence got me out. And I guess I was just riding the last two decades on the high of freedom and didn’t want to fuck it up. Despite what you might think, we gods are far from perfect. Believe me.”
I'm glad Odile herself mentions that even she's not sure how exactly she got free or how she got to (or into) Odette, because I was kind of expecting that answer to crop up here too and was a bit disappointed when it didn't.
I have so many thoughts about this. Like, I want to write a fanfic about a fanfic levels of thoughts. I had the idea way back during AQ and I suspect you probably knew what I was getting at even then because I know I poked you a couple times about what would happen if they were somehow split up.
That aside but somewhat related, I reeeeally can't wait to get more on how this works, specifically the pokeball bit in this case. How would Odile fight and battle if she's got inside (or linked to?) Odette? Back in AQ she had the lancet to draw blood, but I guess I was still under the impression that they were still linked. Odile still relied on her to battle, or just to change form, even. I am so intrigued by this.
Nothing else to say from here except moar plz. (Totally joking, of course, write at your own pace, but I will be here like a baby bird waiting to be fed until the next chapter.)
A passing thought I had here is that even though most people might read pt 1 & 2 soon after the other, as someone who apparently didn't I had to go back and see what name was said because I straight up forgot.
I kind of think that a sort of
'Florent Lambourne' at the open might be worthwhile. Idk might just me. Not a big deal
“That’s why the wealthy hoard and hide them from the general public. They want these crazy powerful Pokemon for themselves.”
His loose frown gave way to a subtle smirk. “And I’m blessed that the two of you aren’t braindead.” He turned on his heels and moved toward his filing cabinets.
I did wonder to myself briefly what they wanted to do with it keeping it for themselves but lets be real, people like that don't usually have any truly rational reason to behave like that.
Alphabetized names, blurbs, and even photographs of these Pokemon. As Odette flipped through them, she did manage to locate the summaries for hiruition, lophious, and desmocula, among hundreds of others.
“He has a son named Armel who holds Greed. No clear photo, unfortunately. The guy might as well not exist. We only know what we know from other operatives and what I’ve managed to finagle out of Dorien.”
Valentin shot her a look, one that teetered on the line between unamused and exhausted. "Well, it's all there. But, to put it in layman's terms, he disappears. Not figuratively; literally. Gone with the wind. Which leads us to believe Enigma operatives have means to access their point of operations from wherever they may be, even if it's kilometers away."
"Like...teleportation," Noel declared.
"That's the hypothesis we have, yes. Or, much less probable, there's just Team Enigma bases everywhere that we don't see. We've lost him in a multitude of locations, though, and swept the areas after. Unless they're pulling a fast one on us, we're assuming some sort of remote access point."
The use of the speech tag 'whined' felt a bit weird here for some reason? Normally I'm pretty whatever on these as they're character dependent but I noticed it and it felt odd I guess? Based on the conversation I think I might have expected more of a 'groaned'? Idk, perhaps its merely me, so take my thoughts with a grain of salt.
She could never get through a Unitas service without breaking into a fit of nausea. Of course, that had to be a terrible coincidence or something in the building her family had gone to for services.
I have to say, I really do dig the extended throughline of Odette slowly coming to that awful awful realization. It was satisfying both narratively and in an angsty kind of way.
I think any eagle-eyed reader would slowly be amassing the dots even without the prologue, so its refreshing that Odette is making those same uncomfortable leaps. Yet at the same time, its also big oof times. Odette is trying to deny it to herself but being the problem solving detective type, the evidence lines up way too much.
Also I've mentioned this before but this is honestly a nicely constructed info scene. Its not really a dump so much as a slowly developing 'oh shoot' but I think it all flows pretty naturally. The pacing flows quite nicely for me, even having read this before (although, was there edits? my memory is bad but it felt different?) and all the logic basically made sense, as far as I can tell. Also there's a ton of lore in this but it mostly all was quite clear.
The only part that caught me up was the distinction between vice dust and sacrilege I guess? (take the following with a grain of salt, I can be a bit slow and dense lol). Basically as I understand it, sacrilege is a drug made from the blood-type legendaries that gives you a high of that legendaries affinity? But Vice dust is made from Avareed specifically, and more of a highly concentrated substance that can cause amnesia? Do other blood legendaries also can make vice dust from them....?
Anyways other than that, I'm able to follow the developments quite well!
Man this makes me feel kind of sad for some universe where they are friends. Oh man if there's a a canonical multiverse in pokemon bc of Hoopa/ Ultra Wormholes this is canon to them right
Sometimes I read the script and feel like I have to lie down. And whenever I think it can’t get any worse, the writers send me the next episode, and SURE ENOUGH!
NOEL
It ALWAYS gets worse!
DORIEN He claps in time with the first three words.
EVERY. SINGLE. TIME. It always gets worse! I gave up hope for a redemption ten episodes ago because, holy fuck, there is no return for him.
Absolutely not. You cannot under any circumstances dwell on how much you love your significant other than also debate beating the shit out of them out of jealousy on the same train of thought.
If you’re tired of waiting for new episodes of “White Swan, Black Swan,” we also invite you to check out our new prequel series, “Poison and Pecha Berries,” which is premiering soon on Thousand Roads as well.
ngl I do love me an April Fools chapter that an author took a little too seriously. It was absolutely hilarious to read through this whole alternate verse where they're just actors and they're all friends. You're quite good at write banter that feels natural and characterful, and even in this 'joke' chapter that bleeds through. It reads very authentic to how a friend group would talk.
It actually made me sad for a second too though lol? not like , super sad but just a teensy bit where im like... Clovis and Dorien bros if one wasn't a deranged psycho? Odette probably with way less trauma? alas!
Anyways, absolutely exquisitely hilarious AFD chapter, good stuff.
Valentin had suggested they follow him back to his apartment but realized about halfway out of his office that he was too inebriated to operate his car responsibly. So he made a call, and within ten minutes, a dark blue Mazda SUV was waiting outside for him.
Valentin had several filing cabinets in his office back at the rink. Here had entire shelves and locked dressers. Books upon books took up the shelves, while stacks of files sat haphazardly on the desk that was pushed up against the back wall. Above it was a bulletin board, so full of sticky notes and thumb-tacked pictures and documents it was a wonder it hadn’t fallen off its hanger. There were actually multiple boards, all sporting equal amounts of notes. There was even a whiteboard with leftovers of a poorly erased list of bullet points pushed into a corner.
No, she thought. But everything within her protested that answer. She couldn’t think clearly about the evidence she was looking at if her mind was muddled with thoughts of being anything but fine.
She blinked slowly at him before lightly shaking her head. “Why wouldn’t I be?”
Fuck, no, I’m sorry. I know. We are, she wanted to say. She never wanted to see him make such a face. But her lips were still running on their own, she still felt like she wanted to break something. She still felt enraged.
So one small crit here, in comparison to CH 13 compared to the emotions surrounding Odette's dawning revalation that she is maybe hosting a blood legend, this part felt a touch stiff? Not her being irrtionaly mad at Noel, thats understandable. But specifically the way the emotions were reading here felt a bit... plain?
It definitely gets the point across. But it also didn't elicit a emotional reaction from me the way I was really vibing with the ansgt of the emotions in the previous scene. 'She felt enraged' is definitely accurate but even if she was disasscoiating that usually involves a different feeling. Since this is kind of an important surfacing of wrath for her I'd personally hope for a slightly richer description of the emotions and the sensation of anger.
Awwwww this was sweet though, offering to do a puzzle.
It was nice to get what was ultimately a bit more chill chapter after the last Lore Time. I mean, its not that chill considering she gets in a fight with Noel, but there's no huge developments or reveals, just some quiet bits of Valentin's team and some important discussions.
Despite my crit earlier, I overall really liked the beats of the chapter and the arguement with Noel. There's bits in-between that can be strengthened narration wise, but I think its becoming increasingly clear that Wrath is influening Odette, especially here. Blowing up was "irrational" but it makes sense. Odette is totally strung out emotionally from all this, and is hosting wrath and on edge. Rough luck.
I'm finally catching up to where I was slowly, which means soon I can get to the actually legendary appearance, ohohoho.
This is just me with social anxiety at the bank, trying to talk to the teller
Small talk is the worst, why can't I just skip straight to real talk like 'how many chuggas come before a choo choo'
“She definitely thinks it’s something I know how to do,” Valentin said. “Except, even if I could, I still don’t think I could keep up with her nonsense. She expects me to be unconditionally in love with her. But she continuously acts like the world revolves around her and throws a fit when I can’t be bothered. Mind reading wouldn’t make her shit attitude any better.”
No sooner had she thought that did she reach over to grab another puzzle piece, only for her hand to meet Valentin’s as he reached in the same direction. They lingered there together before Odette came back to her senses and hastily pulled it away.
Odette bared her teeth at him.“What makes you think I want to calm down? What about this is calming?” she questioned, her voice rising again as she closed the already tight gap between them. “Dorien screwed with my head; how do you expect me to sit here and let that slide?”
Her glare bore into him with the might of a rabid mightyena, but Valentin stood his ground. He held her gaze as he crossed his arms, his eyes twinkling with a puzzled light.
He could barely finish his sentence before Odette rushed to him and hugged him tightly. He didn’t hesitate to return it, resting his chin against the crown of her head. Feeling his arms around her did heaps more for her nerves, and she immediately relaxed into him. Her body quivered against the warring senses of panic and ease she felt.
Oh man though, this chapter went right back to maximum spicy. Riddled with lots of emotional tension and angst. I've been waiting for the reveal of the Vice Dust and it does not disappoint. I truly cannot blame her and I wish she could just go right over there and kill him. Sheesh. I wonder if Florent knows... I can't remember if its alluded to in the Dorien POV chapter but I wonder about the eventual stuff if Florent will be unhappy to find out what Dorien has done...
Also I liked that Noel and Odette made up pretty quick. I think it would have felt silly for that to last long at all if they've really been friends for this long, and it was refreshing to see a little friend apology. All the awkward tension and poor conversation and weirdness between her and Valentin was great, and it was actually interesting to see a frank discussion of his experiences too.
Also Im glad everyone acknowledged the elephant (or in thise case, wrathful tree dragon) in the room. The connections are too apparent. She's got Wrath.
One thing of note I found a bit odd but aside from the mention of the realization her and her partner had been drugged there wasn't any apparent desperation to go and tell Solene? Its possible this will come up in a later chapter (or if it doesn't I assume its just a rational slip) but I'd definitely expect her to have a conversation with Solene at some point.
Other than that, good stuff. Great emotional writing.
Venira chuckled again, louder this time. The sound gave Odette the same uneasy feeling she got when she heard the Kalos emergency signal test on the TV.
No sooner had she spoken did the discombobulated human form twitch. Then it lunged at her.
It ran on all fours, its bones cracking and popping with each eerie stride forward. It moved like somebody caught in the area of a strobe light, yet managed to close the gap between them in no time flat.
“Oh, right, I guess not. Gulattive was fat, but you’re more...thick. Like a peach. No!” Venira gasped, black eyes sparkling. “You’re a pear. You’re a cute little itty bitty little pear-shaped soft little angry cute midget thing.”
Somewhere in her thought process, she started thinking about her own name. Vienna had the idea to name her after the main character of the Swanna Lake ballet, the white swanna herself. Vienna thought the name was pretty, and it coming from a show she liked so much made it better. Odette supposed she had her family's overall fixation with that ballet to thank for her decision to start dancing.
As she started recalling the plot of Swanna Lake, she remembered how the white swanna eventually came into contact with another woman named Odile, who ended up being transformed to be a copy of her. Her doppelgänger.
Odette paused for a moment before dragging her pearly white shoe against the standing blood at her feet. She then let out a scoff, it coming out a deflated chuckle. It was good to know she had a sense of humor, even in the face of a very bloody nightmare.
“So, unfuckable Gulattive convinced the unfuckable quintet that my ideals sucked and why genocide for the sake of genocide was the way to go, and they sucked me into a little ball, and locked me up.”
A scribble of purple shot out from the Pokeball in Gulattive’s hand and engulfed Odile. Her doodle disappeared, and the other six doodles were left cheering before a poorly-drawn clock cut onto the screen. The hands began turning.
“I wasn’t sure how long I was in that ball. It’s safe to say it was thousands of years, maybe more. But, Gulattive took over the group and led us all into a contract with this family called the Lambournes, all for the sake of having consistent vessels and a means of manipulating a group of humans into doing his power-hungry bidding. They all seemed to be on the same braindead idiotic dumbass page.”
So this did give me pause, trying to untangle the exact timeline and goals here
- Venira and her army of blood types wreak havoc, but get fed up and decide partnering with beings is easier
- Gullattive is unhappy with this and tries to revolt
- To get Venira out of the way he gets a special pokeball and captures her for thousands of years
- During this time he just.... still makes a contract with the lambournes for a slow moving genocide? doing nothing? Partnering with more humans? I thought he hates that idea
- venira escapes into Odette
I guess I'm just wondering why if Gulattive says he wants to do genocide for fun whats he waiting for? There probably is a good reason but it didn't seem to come up. Why just sit around with the lambournes? Between locking up Venira and those thousands of year why hasn't he snacked on all life?
“Your future 'Baby's First Shallow Grave' occupant, Dorien. Inviderus' fuckhead,” Odile said. Her nose crinkled in disgust. “I’m sure I don’t need to tell you this, but keep your wits about you with him. He’s trying to get a rise out of you to get me to rear, most likely to get me back to that ball and to get you to follow.”
Suddenly, his reaction to her warding off desmocula in the garden made all the sense in the world. Paired with his previous blatant attempts at pissing her off, she now understood his angle. And was thrilled to know that she hadn’t been crazy for initially thinking that’s what he was doing.
Actually, even though its not mentioned, it makes sense that he's part of the reason Venira didn't reveal herself, its easier to stay hidden from Dorien and Inviderus
You’re not you when you’re freaking out over your impure thoughts,” Odile said, pursing her lips in a manner that indicated she knew the commentary was going to make Odette mad.
Yes, but maybe don’t talk out loud when you need to respond to me like this, sis, Odile said. That’s a one-way ticket to a padded cell and a straight jacket, and while those are a fun time, save it for later.
Odette slowly settled back against the pillows, feeling herself sink into their plush material as she brought her hand up to cover her mouth. Her own thoughts raced over the sound of Odile’s voice, but she could somehow still hear the Wrath god giggling through them.
So I see you mentioned being worried about the overall length and pacing of this chapter. At this point I can't tell if I have a bias or not but I thought it was great. Sure it was long and I could tell it was long, but it certainly wasn't boring nor did it drag. I think I briefly found myself surprised she wasn't more shook in the opening sequence with the lake of blood but then again, its a dream and I could buy that she might be observing things with a very detached air.
There are a ton of questions to be asked and information to be delivered so all things considered this is great imo. I think this covers a lot of important information and aside from the confusion I mentioned about what Gulattive is waiting for, I think it answers a lot of questions.
Theorycrafting moment.... my memory of the opening is fuzzy but I wonder if Armel's legendary helped Venira break free. Sher herself doesn't know how she escaped her ball, but maybe she had help?
Anyways, I think this was a great chapter overall and even though by now I feel so used to Odile, it was great to actually see her get introduced in fic. She's such a ray of sunshine, very polite and thoughtful, so considerate and compassionate. Truly and benevolent and lovely entity.
I actually can't think of more to say than 'gud fic pls update' lol. really and truly though, man what a CHAPTER.
WHEW LAD did I just blaze through 4 chapters of WSBS? Why yes, yes I did. And I’ve got a nice little stack of notes and quotes to comment on!
Chapter 11:
I could really feel just how tired and done with everything Odette was this chapter. Bad enough that you slip up bad enough to disrupt rehearsal, and get called out on it in front of everyone but then you’ve got your well-meaning yet overbearing friend nagging you, and obsessive boyfriend who embarrasses you with the gaudiest get-well gift of all time, and tons of things on your mind that you can’t share with anybody. Yeah, I’d be pretty Done With Things, too.
Ange was the absolute highlight of this chapter for me, and I’m so glad we got to see lots of his adorable antics.
Odette didn’t realize she had zoned out until she was jolted from her haze by a disturbance on the stage. Her eyes were quick to lock on the left entrance, just in time to catch a couple of dancers tripping and stumbling over each other as they collectively tried to wrestle their way past some props. Props that shouldn’t have been in the way in the first place.
Abruptly sitting up in her chair, Odette frantically flipped through her clipboard as her eyes shot between the stage and her notes. She scrambled for her pen but soon found that she’d misplaced it.
Oh man, my inner theatre kid SHRIVELED at this. I never even was a tech crew or backstage person, but I still cringe at this and at Odette’s embarrassment. Yikes. I feel for you, girl.
She felt RotomPhone vibrate and couldn’t help but groan. She fished it out and was as dismayed as she was unsurprised to see yet another text from Dorien. The third one since she woke up that morning and maybe the thousandth that week.
I hope you’re having a good day so far! I have a little something headed to you that’ll hopefully make you smile 💝
Even if there was a way for Enora to produce something like that, there’s no way she’d use such vile language. Enora was a sassy little thing, but she was no potty mouth.
“If there were ever a time for you not to skip lunch, it would be the week following a visit to the ER. After just insisting you haven't had any hypotension issues for a while,” she said earnestly as she took a spoonful of soup out of the thermos she was holding. "
What could she even do from halfway across the world? Gods, what if Dorien followed her there? What if she never saw Clovis again? That was a sad thought.
The giant bush of roses, fit with an equally as giant pink ursaring toy and a bouquet of heart-shaped balloons, that had been unceremoniously left by the will-call windows, looked extremely tacky against the décor. Odette figured it was the ‘I Love Odette,’ which had been spelled out with white roses against the red, that really did it in.
Did he think this was somehow supposed to glaze over how he’d acted in the garden? How he’d raised his voice and grabbed her? Above all, why did he feel the need to do this while she was at work? He had to have known something like this was impractical, yet he went through with it anyway.
It felt like an attempt at marking territory. The thought made her shudder involuntarily.
Yyyep, that’s exactly what it is. A message that’s more to her coworkers than to her: “She’s mine.” Also, classic love-bombing and trying to make up for that “tiny” mistake of grabbing her and yelling at her. I’m so glad Odette is having absolutely none of it.
When she didn’t immediately hear the sound of a shower running, a toilet flushing, or tittering voices going back and forth, she screamed.
It was guttural; it tore through her throat with such an animalistic force that Odette could only contain herself by grabbing one of the shower stall curtains and tearing it clear off the wall bar and all. As they collectively clattered to the floor, she arched over and grabbed hold of her head as if that would somehow alleviate the undiluted rage pulsing through her brain.
oof, there it is. I think I’d said a while back that I wanted to see Odette actually lose her cool more often? Well, this delivered. Glad that she managed to make it somewhere private before letting it all out. Which begs the question: what happens when she doesn’t have a place to go to let it out? Or if she can’t make it there in time?
The chandelure suddenly appeared in front of her again, and this time, he was wearing the fallen shower curtain like a cape. As for the rod, he held it up as if it were some sort of staff. He puckered his lips in a pompous fashion, and his eyes drooped to match.
“I am the king of the women's dressing room,” he said, deepening the sound of his voice as if he were trying to do an imitation. "And I declare that you're not allowed to be upset anymore. Smiles only."
She was about to send it when she stopped herself. Was the smiley face too much? They were just two acquaintances trying to set up a date to discuss confidential information, so why the hell would she bother sending a smiley face?
But on the other hand, would he think she was being too stiff if she didn’t? They seemed to have a repertoire of joking around whenever they came face to face…at least, she judged that much from the two times they’d talked in person, so perhaps it wouldn’t be that out of place?
She felt a bead of sweat forming on her forehead. When the fuck did texting become so hard?
Ahahaha this was so REAL lol. I felt that classic text overthinking in my soul.
Chapter 11.5:
Wow, you were not kidding with those chapter warnings. This was a brutally creepy and unsettling chapter—I thought I was already more than well aware of how slimy Dorien is, and I was still shocked and creeped out by his inner thoughts. Good gravy, this man is truly disturbed. I’d say he needs therapy, but I think he’s beyond help, tbh. Big yikes.
He sighed deeply into the plastic of the lip balm tube as he allowed his eyes to slip shut. This keepsake had long lost its scent of her, but it still brought him a sense of comfort to know that there was a time when she applied its contents to her beautiful lips on the daily. Perhaps that was how she kept them in such pristine condition–-he always had to wonder how somebody managed to have such flawless lips like that.
Such flawless, kissable lips. These strippers could never.
That’s so freaking CREEPY omg I hate him so much, I didn’t think I could hate him more but I was WRONG? Jsbdjsksjdjkdd heebeejeebies. What a slimy, ratty snotfungus.
He settled for the lip balm on that occasion; not as disposable as the pencil she used to tap against her cheek in chemistry but not as desirable as the sports bra she apparently kept on hand for her dance practices after school. It was a happy medium.
BRUH IT GETS EVEN WORSE? It’s like…I know people like this exist irl, but seeing it written out inside their own head this way just makes it ten times more disturbing. He is so out of touch with reality on so many levels.
In thinking about that, he was certain that that might be more effective in getting Venira to rear her head than he had been doing. Just getting aggressive in battle or talking her ear off about touchy subjects wasn't enough, and the latter had even cost him some of his Vice Dust. Only the first-degree strain, but it was a loss nonetheless. He really needed to watch how much he used on her. She'd taken enough of it as it was.
Perhaps he could hit her just once. Release some tension and maybe, just maybe, lure Venira out. Kill two birds with one stone. Besides, a smack wouldn’t break skin. It would just leave a welt; one that would most likely heal in a day as long as he was careful with how hard he went for it. It wouldn’t be that awful, right?
Oh jeez the sheer implications of this. People with addictions forcing their mon to battle while high as a kite or drunk off their gourd? Absolutely awful to think about. These poor Pokémon, man.
Sure, some people might have called him an asshole for letting another woman crawl on him while he had a loving girlfriend at home by herself. But this was only for the moment. Besides, maybe if Odette had quenched him once in a while, he wouldn’t feel the need to do something like this.
He supposed he understood her reservations, what with her past sexual trauma, but they’d been dating for over a month, and nothing had come of it. She never invited him inside, and she never took him up on his offers to go home with him after their dates.
“I had a crush on her myself in secondary school. Didn't get very far, though. She was such a prig,” Denis suddenly said as he held his drink to his lips. He opened his mouth to continue, but something of a dubious chuckle made its way out before the words did. “How is she now, Dory? I'm sure she’s way more broken in after what happened, right? Was it worth waiting around for her prude ass to open up?”
Hooooly crap I did not think I would hate anybody more than Dorien in this scene and I was so freaking wrong. “Broken in”?! Are you KIDDING ME. I know Dorien got riled up for all the wrong reasons (possessiveness, basically), but I was still so on board with him decking Denis in the teeth. What a prick.
Man, you really illustrate Dorien’s unhinged hot-and-cold obsession so well. Guy is off his rocker even when he isn’t high on drugs.
Chapter 12:
This one has a bit more levity than the previous two, which makes it a nice little breather. As always, I enjoy the banter between Odette and Noel—they have such a sibling type of relationship, almost. It’s freakin great. And their solidarity in simping over the ice skaters was great. 😂
Looks like this is leading up to lots of information next chapter! Honestly, I am so ready. Very excited for the information fam to break so all the pieces can start coming together and everyone can officially be on the same page!
“A little cluttered for my tastes, but it's certainly an aesthetic,” Elton chirped from his perch on Noel’s shoulders. As the bird spoke, Odette reached into the side pocket of her backpack and grasped Isaur’s ball.
Lol for some reason this made me wonder: do ice rinks have regulations on allowing fire-types in the building? Or near the ice? 😂 (I’m pretty sure Elton is a Talonflame—correct me if I’m remembering wrong.)
From their vantage point at the entrance to the rink, Odette could see the rink was definitely in use. A group of seven men and some assorted Pokemon, all mostly dressed to practice some skating, were gathered toward the center of the rink, chattering about gods knew what. The room was empty otherwise.
“I’ll start off by saying that I’m all for this,” Noel said under his breath as they let the doors slip shut.
As they slipped shut, his demeanor change was instant.
His shoulders deflated, and he hunched over tiredly as an exasperated sigh clawed out of his throat. He sat on the edge of his desk and aggressively tugged at the knots on his skates before kicking them off unceremoniously. Now barefoot, he stomped his way to the far corner of the office, where a mini bar—stacked to the brim with bottles of varying liquors—stood, flanked by numerous filing cabinets.
“J.L. Ménétrie—” Noel gasped. The loudness of his voice caused Odette to jump, and she flailed toward him just in time to slap her hands over his mouth.
“I’m sorry, what?”
For the second time, Odette felt her blood run cold. She watched as Noel’s eyes danced with a mix of embarrassment and fear as her look hardened into a glare. They exchanged something silent--something that said "do not say another goddamn word"--before simultaneously turning toward Clovis.
Noel. Dude. Buddy. My guy. This is why we can’t have nice things. 😂 It’s a good thing I already know Clovis/Val is a good guy, so I know that no actual harm is gonna come from that slip up.
As he spoke, he set down the empty glass he was holding and kept his eyes on them as he wrapped his fingers around the neck of that same whiskey bottle. He effortlessly popped the cork off, then held it to his lips to chug whatever was left.
“Right. Because Clovis LeClair actually is a real person,” Odette surmised. She wouldn’t admit she had about 20 pages of notes about him in her backpack because nobody besides Noel and her Pokemon team ever needed to know that.
Lololol I’m just picturing a classic school notebook filled with notes and doodles of his name with hearts for some reason, like a 13 year old girl would do
“What about your boyfriend?” Valentin said quickly. Nevermind how it seemed like he had that question on standby this entire time, but she had to refrain from growling.
“I know he’s up to something.”
“I’m aware of that much, but what are your actual thoughts on him?” he pressed. He sounded tenacious.
Lol Val sure knows where his priorities are. “I know I gathered you here to talk about this super powerful, corrupt, widespread criminal organization, but first: u happy with ur bf or nah?”
Hmm I wonder if Odette picked up on this because of Wrath? Like, she was able to innately sense the anger and animosity the two have against each other?
Eyyy here we go. Does Val know Florent is her father? Is he going to tell her if he does? Hmmm
Chapter 13:
AKA, the chapter where it all comes together! Or, starts to come together, anyway. I know you were worried about it feeling too exposition-y, but I thought it was a lovely balance. The dialogue and responses to new information flowed naturally, so even though we did get a LOT of new information, it didn’t feel like a drag or confusing or all over the place. Nicely done! It’s not easy to juggle and deliver so much information all in one chapter, but you did it very well.
Also: headed to Val’s apartment and there’s a big storm coming? Please tell me they end up stranded at his place for the night ahahahah yes PLEASE
Oh snap okay, I thought the 7 deadly sins were the only blood mon, but I guess this makes the gala chapter make a whole lot more sense. I wonder how many there are in total?
He dug out a thinner folder, pulled it open, then took one piece of paper from the corner and slid it down onto the table. On it was a drawing of what Odette supposed was meant to be a Pokemon, but it didn’t look like one she’d ever seen. Maybe it vaguely resembled a dusknoir in shape but was certainly not one. If anything, it looked like a lantern, plated in gold, with a head that looked reminiscent of a candelabra.
Right, didn’t you commission someone to draw all of them?? It would be really cool to have those images shown right here in the chapter, I think! Or in an author’s note at the end.
As she handed Valentin back the picture, she was taken aback to find him staring at her. Hard. The look only lasted for a second once they made eye contact, but he had for sure been staring at her.
“He has a son named Armel who holds Greed. No clear photo, unfortunately. The guy might as well not exist. We only know what we know from other operatives and what I’ve managed to finagle out of Dorien.”
She tried to think further back to their time in school together and if she’d ever had moments where she genuinely felt scared around him. She was perplexed to find herself drawing blanks.
She really had put much of that time out of her head. It was starting to freak her out.
“But, in Dorien’s case, he’s also just like that. He’s an obnoxious yet eerie little asshole. If he’s committed homicide by his own free will, I wouldn’t be shocked in the slightest,” Valentin continued.
“The real reason is the blood types,” Valentin said. “They're very rare, and they’re only known to spawn in, you guessed it, blood. Entirely random, there’s no pattern, and sometimes it simply happens. But when it does, it causes a change in a Pokemon’s coat color, creating what you know as a shiny. Hence, Kalos’s lovely shiny trade still exists despite nobody really wanting it to.”
“Sometimes, depending on the species, blood types prefer to remain docile. They occasionally won’t even present themselves unless their host is in severe danger. If that never happens, a host could live a full life completely unaware they’re possessed but be susceptible to those aforementioned health issues. They’d just be completely unaware of why it was happening,” Valentin explained, shrugging.
"A shiny could have its original blood 'mon removed and be forced to help create another. A human could make one, too, but we've found it's a little more difficult. They basically have to use sacrilege to a point of sheer, brain-has-melted-and-you-might-as-well-be-dead overdose even to get close to forming one within them.”
Oh gosh the removal process sounds horrifying, actually. Is that what happened to Enora?? Poor baby. I really want to know more about her backstory, even though I’m sure it will break my heart.
"Indeed. Armel most likely was, too, being that he is a biological descendant of Florent. Florent made it clear to my father that they pass naturally between Lambourne blood--provided that they are available to do so, as in, not already with another vessel--though he never really explained how that happened."
"So...how did Dorien get one? Is he a Lambourne?"
Valentin paused to chew on his words. "Florent told my father that, as overseer of them, he also has the power to bestow them upon whoever he picked. If he never ended up having children, which is evidently a different story. Dorien is, from our understanding, not related to Florent whatsoever."
“We believe it has something to do with Avareed’s passive effects. According to my father’s notes, Avareed was, as Florent described, a mind eater. ‘Greed for knowledge,’ so to speak,” Valentin said. “From our understanding, they’re using the same essence they’ve used to create sacrilege to also come up with this substance capable of this kind of nonsense.”
That was fucking rich. Bernard was getting more date time with Valentin than Odette figured she ever would. She exhaled evenly to keep herself from making a face that would make her envy obvious.
“But why even tell us this?" Odette spoke up again. "Why not just tell us we’re way too over our heads and to fuck off? You’ve clearly got the authority for it.”
Honestly, this is a very valid question. I feel like it would be more likely that Virtue Corp would swoop in and push them into some kind of protection program, since neither of them have any credentials to be doing this and are just normal citizens. (Well…Odette isn’t normal, but she doesn’t fully know that yet, lol)
Such simple words hit so much harder than she ever thought possible. Learning that Dorien had a powerful legendary in his possession, that Enora might have one herself, that she happened to slip under the radar for Enigma’s gatekeeping, the weird parallels about her poor health and the health of shinies, that Enigma has ways to wipe people’s memories, and now something even more fucked?
I’m returning for Review Blitz! I remember really enjoying this fic last time, so I’m excited to jump back in and continue. I read four chapters this time, so let’s get to it!
Thoughts on Chapters 3 to 6
Chapter 3 starts on the note of a mass sacrilege overdose at a warehouse. As Odette notes later on, that’s not just something that happens. It definitely looks like there’s something more intentional going on…
I feel the need to appreciate RotomPhone being an actual character here, and a fairly charming one at that. It always weirds me out how mainline handles the concept.
Dorien enters the scene! You did a really good job of portraying Odette’s perception of him here. He starts out nice, there’s a hint of old romance, the conversation is amicable. And then he drops that line, and the way the interaction shifts into something uncomfortable as Odette remembers and Dorien reveals how much of a douche he is very well handled. And he just gets worse as the scene goes on, almost like he enjoys tormenting her. Creepy.
This leads directly into the battle, and it’s a pretty good one! There are a couple points in terms of action where I had a hard time envisioning things (specifically Excadrill’s Super-Earthquake on Ange. There wasn’t really a sense of how it hit him or how he recoiled from it), but the buildup, tension, and sense of stakes and emotion were all perfect. I want to see this guy go down, but he has a legitimate advantage, but Odette proves quickly that she knows what she’s doing in a battle, but Dorien becomes downright disturbing, and Ange going down hurts. You can feel every up and down of the emotional rollercoaster this battle takes Odette on, I was fully invested.
Also I didn’t take note of it last time and forgot it was mentioned as a result, but the idea of an astral shrine that grants benefits depending on offerings is a cool idea. Very occult, fitting with some of the themes at play. I find myself curious about what the story behind it is, though a later comment makes me wonder if it has something to do with the subject of Vienna’s research?
I liked the dynamic between Odette and her grandfather: I get the sense he acted as a father figure for her, and their interactions in this chapter were cute and genuine. He definitely seems like someone who’s been worn down by his role, and that perhaps explains what was implied by the other thing we learned in this chapter…
I like how Odette’s reaction to the letter is pretty much the same as the reader’s is likely to be. It’s a bombshell of completely new information with completely unknown significance, and while it’s hard to say what it means yet, the implication that Bernard may have just lied to her is definitely felt. A lot of things are up in the air with this Virtue Corp, but I wouldn't be surprised if they're promising him a breakthrough in the sacrilege case.
And so Odette plans to get closer to Dorien to find out how he fits into this. It's a very dangerous plan given the side of himself he let slip in the battle, but I can see how her investment in this has started to become something personal.
Most of Odette’s team is laid-back enough to go along with her plan, and Solene eventually comes around. Enora’s reaction is interesting though. Obviously she doesn’t want to help, yet on some level she feels pressured to and won’t elaborate as to why. I'm definitely curious to know what happened to her in the past and why she feels that way.
holy shit Dorien is such a piece of shit you wrote him perfectly it's terrible.
Dorien goes for the throat with that question. It's unfortunate we had to learn this way, but this explains why she fears the stage now. Meanwhile Dorien continues to show that uncanny ability to go from “suave air-headed douche” to “what the fuck” and back again with little issue.
And then he mindwipes her. I was wondering if he was going to take advantage of her being trapped with him, but this throws a lot of things into question regarding Odette’s confidence in having this under control. He’s playing the manipulation game too, trying to get something out of her, and given the jump in time between chapters, it's not impossible this isn't the first time he’s pulled this… My first thought is that he's trying to get to Wrath, though that would raise the question of how he would know about that, unless he has connections to Team Enigma. Yet there isn't any other reason he would ask that question of her. I imagine, at least, that was the first time he had asked about it, as he was very brazen with it and the setup seemed tailored to account for a bad reaction exactly like what happened. He really seems to think little of her, given how much more direct he’s being, trying to get what he wants at her expense.
Another thought I had is that all of this has been taking a toll on Odette, in the sense that she's been getting angrier and angrier (just a couple steps away from killing him a few times in this chapter). I wonder if this'll cause Wrath manifest in the long run. i also wonder if that's what dorien is trying to accomplish, if that really is what he's after.
The plot has started moving now, in a slow burn kind of way, and the mysteries are starting to mount. Odette's in over her head, but you did a good job of writing her perspective in a way that colors things as if she isn't; for a while I was just nodding along to Dorien just being dense like she clearly thinks he is, only for the end of that chapter to reveal he’s anything but. In general the tension surrounding their “relationship” together is palpable in every scene, even when Dorien’s just being a misogynistic asshole I can't look away. I also think the buildup for this mystery has been very well handled so far, and now that we're in the process of trying to uncover it, I'm interested to see where things continue to go from here and how these characters manage to navigate and figure it out even with their only lead actively working against them.
All of that to say that I want to read more, and I will! I will see you here again for when I next get around to it!
Hi! This has been on my to-read list for a while and so I'm here to get stuck into the intro for the evening. Everything about it really does seem up my alley, maybe slightly darker than my usual tastes but I'm confident I'll enjoy it regardless!
I tend to jot my thoughts down as I read so they may be a little scattered, hopefully they're entertaining though.
Prologue
I have a bit of contextual knowledge about the fakemon in this series being based off the seven deadly sins, and I like how unique they feel already. Gulattive has a very corruptive influence, and it's interesting to see the tug-o-war between Gulattive and Florent in terms of who's in control. I like that you haven't described what Gulattive looks like right away, because at this point my imagination is kind of running wild with it.
And so it's the Wrath Pokemon that was stolen, which is probably the most portentious. I have to wonder at this point if there was even a concentrated effort by Vienna to steal Venira in having a baby, or if it were something outside of her control; Florent is obviously giving a very biased report about what he thinks happened, so I'm taking it with a grain of salt.
The Blood Legendaries is such a cool moniker, too.
It's interesting to see Gulattive consider Venira a tyrant given how Florent behaves (and how Gulattive encourages it), so I'm curious to see just what Wrath truly has to offer.
It's really tragic to read about Armel's situation, with the Greed Pokemon eating away at his own identity. And if there is a more productive way to satiate it, Florent is clearly a terrible enough father that finding a solution is on the bottom of his list. I do hope Armel can get away from him, but I guess we'll see.
So, distance apart can lessen the Blood Legendaries' influence? (Of course it doesn't occur to Florent that Armel could probably use some time apart from Avareed). The Birth Curse is an interesting lore drop, and it's curious that an exception seems to be made for Wrath.
It's clear that Florent is the leader (or at least in a very high position) of Team Enigma, but it's interesting that he's referred to as "your majesty" here. I wonder if it's just a title thing or if the Lambournes are a royal family of some kind. I guess it goes hand in hand with the whole inherited Blood Legendaries thing, haha.
It's amazing how quickly Florent goes from "rat of a child" to "perfect" after seeing Odette, which I'm sure isn't just natural fatherly love. That all his wrath melts away when he looks at her, is a potentially ironic twist to the power of Wrath. This is the power of a tyrant, it would seem. I'm very glad for Odette's sake that he didn't get to take her, though- for as devoted as Florent may now be to her, I'm sure it would be a very precarious childhood.
This is a really interesting hook for the story, and I'm excited to dive deeper into it!
Chapter 1
Starting off with an immediate hook for a mystery and Cats- sorry, Purrloins- two of my favourite things. Crazy January weather being caused by the mating season of Castform is simultaneously very funny but also a nice worldbuilding touch. And of course, Team Enigma mention
"2020's got some shit in store for us, I swear." oh boy
I'm enjoying Noel and Odette's banter so far, and I like how they're delivering information about this sacrilege substance and its connection to shiny Pokemon without it feeling too expository. Odette mentioning that her Grandfather is a policeman is reminding me that we got that information in the prologue but I hadn't thought much of it at the time– I have a feeling it's going to be pretty relevant, and not just for the mystery case at hand.
Team Enigma makes sense as the source of the sacrilege, but of course they are... an enigma. I do have to wonder what Florent's end goal is here, and knowing who's behind it just makes the mystery of what they're up to more enticing. And of course, "why was the majority of affected Pokemon shiny?" is the million dollar question.
Enora is very cute so far, and of course the fact that she's shiny does raise a few concerns. At this point I'm wondering whether Odette can understand her, but whether she can or can't it's nice to get a glimpse into her thoughts.
I think the way the story introduces Odette's trauma is very tactful, showing her complicated relationship with the dreams she once had and the reality she lives now. I'm glad her friends are looking out for her, though. It's interesting to learn that being born premature (Birth Curses, am I right?) means Odette has some chronic health issues, which makes sense.
Okay, so confirmation here that Odette can hear Enora's speech, which is interesting! Interesting as well is that we haven't heard from Venira yet...
I'm curious to learn more about what exactly Odette's mother's "base of operations" is for, now. At first I thought the move to Alola meant putting a timer on solving this mystery, but knowing that Guzma is likely going to play a big role in the story, perhaps not. (This is mostly just context I've gleaned from stuff in discord, I could be totally wrong).
I liked the cosier feel of this chapter straight after the portentious prologue, even if it doesn't shy away from some heavier stuff. A clean slate, indeed.
Chapter 2
I'm loving the glimpse into Odette's analytic mind here, it really gets across that she's thinking a mile a minute, even for something so mundane (and yet so dangerous) as driving. And just as well, too. I see some of those Wrath issues are starting to pop up now, though.
I appreciate her falling back on the comforts of the theatre for a coping mechanism, I really do find that singing can help in those moments when you need to distract yourself and get your breathing back under control. I am wondering how long she's been having to manage these rage issues though. It's nice to see that Noel is willing to be patient with her, and that even through her anger Odette can recognise this.
I wonder if the rage hangover is something to do with Venira, or if it's just a usual side-effect of staving off the influence of a Blood Legendary. It's a dangerous game to care about things so much that you get angry with those side effects, but it definitely makes Odette's character more compelling for it.
I like the glimpses into the consequences of Odette's trauma that are still lingering, even if she seems to have moved past it by now. It's nice to get some of the details in hindsight without having to linger too long, and the story of Loïc helping with her depression fugue by being a little shit is a nice segue in and out of delivering that information.
The chaotic introduction to Odette's other Pokemon makes a very strong impression. The dynamics are very fun, particularly with Odette being able to speak back and forth with them too. Except for Loïc, at first.
The astral shrine is a neat worldbuilding touch, and I hope I'll get to learn a bit more about its significance soon. It's a very melancholy place for the chapter to end, but of course I'm sure the emotional rollercoaster has only just begun.
I'll be back to read more again soon! It takes me a bit longer to read and write down my thoughts, but I'm definitely keen to continue from here.
Author's Note: Hey y'all, thanks for popping back in! This chapter is a little strange to me because I had so much planned for it but ultimately ended up splitting my ideas down the middle, which caused this chapter to...not be much, in my opinion? Stuff happens, but in terms of action, it might be a little slow. But, had I kept everything together, it likely would have been too much, y'know? I also worry some lines of dialogue may not make much sense, especially toward the end. So, just let me know what you the chapter contents as a whole and if you think the last conversation of the chapter really hits. It's supposed to be a tense moment, but I'm scared it doesn't carry enough weight.
As always, thanks so much for reading!
“So she just kinda…projected herself into your mind?” Noel asked, eyes unblinking. It looked like he was trying to stare past Odette’s eyes to get a better look at Odile herself.
“I…think? I’m not sure honestly,” Odette said, roughly twirling her braid around her finger.
“And she looked like you?” Valentin added, slitting his eyes slightly.
“She was supposed to look like me, but…”
Odette had practically tripped over herself to get to Noel and Valentin to relay her “dream” with Odile the night before. But, now that they were sitting on the living room couch, with every pair of available eyes in the fucking house on her, ranging from human to Pokemon, it was proving far harder than it had initially sounded upon waking up.
“So it’s true? She is in there?” Isaur asked, looking her over. Her eyes were wide with some sort of emotion Odette couldn’t quite pinpoint.
“I mean…unless whatever you gave me last night was drugged,” she gestured to Valentin, who flexed his lips in light offense, “it felt real. I can’t imagine I just conjured a weirdly lucid dream like that just for the fuck of it.”
There’s a lot of better things you could do just for the fuck of it. Like–
Odette slapped a hand to her ear, like she was swatting off a mosquito. In some sense, it felt like she was.
“Is that her?” Noel asked. He perked up with the height of his words.
“Yeah, she, uh…talks to me now. Inside my head…”
She quite literally sounded like a crazy person.
TELL THEM I SAID HI! Odile’s yell filled Odette’s skull with the same force as a guitar amplifier at max volume. It caused her to flinch and slap her hands over her ears, like it would somehow protect her from the screeching demon invading her mind.
“What? What?” Noel, Isaur, Elton, Valentin’s voices meshed together in a long slur of concerned callouts, once she could only vaguely hear through her palms. She could even hear Powdered Sugar, who was back in his usual spot on Valentin’s shoulder, squeaking along with them. She only looked back up when she felt Noel’s hand on her back.
“Sorry,” she said dazedly. She shook her head, hard, while she leaned back into the couch. “Odile doesn’t quite understand the fucking concept of volume.”
Sorry, I’ll do better. Maybe. That entered Odette’s thoughts as a whisper. Rolling her eyes, her neck went slack.
“She says hi.”
The stunned silence descended on her, causing her to tense.
“She says hi?” Valentin said.
Well I could say something else if he wants me to.
“Please don’t egg her on,” Odette said.
A hopeful look crossed Valentin’s face, and Odette had a hard time missing it. He caught her gaze and abruptly cleared his throat, as if he hadn’t wanted her to see it at all. “Sorry, I just…” he trailed off between his small coughs. “This is absolutely fascinating. And a…tad bit exciting for me.” He looked sheepish now, in the most painful way possible. “I’m sorry. That’s in really poor taste.”
In a way, it was. But for him, she’d give it a pass. She supposed she understood why it might have been exciting, even if it was at her complete and total expense.
“I don’t know what it is,” Odette said, massaging her temple. “I’d call it weird before anything else. But it’s fine.”
He cleared his throat again. “Nonetheless, forgive me.”
“Would you like to talk to her?” she asked without thinking.
Odette could have sworn she saw Valentin’s eyes nearly burst out of his head. Noel wasn’t too far behind.
“…talk to her? Like…talk to her…in you?” Valentin asked, his voice jumping up to the height of his astonishment.
She grimaced. “Well, when you say it like that…”
“No! No!” Valentin gasped, suddenly raising his hands. He did it so fast that Powdered Sugar almost rolled off his shoulder. He stopped abruptly to keep the bug in place, sending him an apologetic grimace before continuing. “I-I just don’t know what would be the most respectful to you, but if you’re offering, I just don’t quite know how to work around it. Like am I just speaking at you and you relay what she says to me, or–”
I see why you want to fuck him so badly.
Odette’s eyes went wide and she felt heat explode across her nose. Valentin stopped his babbling, a look of concern digging a notch between his brows. “Did I say something wrong?”
“No,” Odette groused. “Please continue.”
Knock it the fuck off, she thought.
I’ll think about it.
“Well, that’s the thing,” Valentin said reluctantly. “I’m not quite sure how to actually–”
“Just,” Odette said, interrupting his sentence. “Talk to me. Like you’re talking to her. We’ll do exactly that, and I’ll play middleman translator, okay?”
Valentin and Noel exchanged wary looks. Even Isaur, Elton, and Powdered Sugar did the same. Most of Valentin’s teammates had gathered nearby–including Donut, who was lingering by the glass of her tank–and were close enough that Odette could see some of them send her questioning looks.
“I swear. It’s fine,” Odette insisted, even though she wasn’t too sure herself.
Valentin rolled his shoulders, being mindful of his tiny partner, and adjusted the shirt he was wearing. It was a clean, pressed black polo. The collar was striped red and green, a telltale sign of a Gucci item. “Um…okay,” he said. He inhaled through his nose as he adjusted his sitting position, folding his hands across his lap.
“Hello Venir—Odile.” He coughed into a tight fist. “I’m Valentin. I’ve been—“
Wait. Does he have a freckle above his lip?
Odette was trying to listen to Valentin speak. She was trying to seem attentive and alert. She was trying to be a good friend to him, because that’s what they were. Friends. He was clearly very excited to be in such close proximity to the Legendary of Wrath, and she wanted to allow him the chance to say his piece. Maybe it would make her seem less like a hellspawn to him. If he even thought that at all. She hoped he didn’t.
However, at Odile’s question, her eyes instinctively wandered down to his moving lips. She’d read somewhere that one person looking at another person’s lips meant they wanted to kiss. While she’d sell her right arm to be able to kiss him, she didn’t exactly want him to know that. She was quick with her glance, but still took the time to really look.
Sure enough, there it was. A little freckle right above his lip. It’d settled itself maybe a centimeter or two from his cupid’s bow. It was quite light, and nearly blended with his lip line, but now that she’d actually taken notice of it, she couldn’t unsee it.
Oh my gods, she thought. It’s so cute.
Right? Odile agreed. Freckles are the dumbest things but man I could just fucking eat them.
Odette started when she heard Valentin smack the couch cushion. Blinking rapidly, she focused on his face to see he was staring at her with the same conviction of a tired shrink staring at a lunatic.
“Odette?” he said.
She continued to blink. “Uh…”
For fuck’s sake, aren’t you supposed to be Wrath, not Lust? she seethed internally.
Are you mad right now? Odile asked.
Yeah, a little bit!
Case closed.
Odette sighed deeply. Keep it together. “Sorry, excuse me. Odile said something really stupid just now and I zoned out.” Forcing a smile, she folded her hands in her lap. “Run that by me one more time.”
A bemused grin crinkled up Valentine’s cheeks. The freckle shifted with it, and Odette felt her heart flutter. Oh my gods. Oh my gods.
“What’d she say?” he asked, seeming genuinely curious. Odette felt her insides shrivel up, and the sound of cackling filled her brain.
“Believe me, it’d drop that genius IQ of yours if I told you,” she said.
“Now I think I want to hear it,” Noel interjected, slumping against the backrest and crossing his arms. Odette cut her eyes in his direction, hoping he could catch the “shut up” she was trying in vain to psychically project at him.
“Something about your hair,” Odette replied, turning her attention back to Valentin. “She wants to know what bleach you use.”
“Oh.” He clearly hadn’t been expecting the question, but he beamed nonetheless. “It’s Wella. I swear by the brand.”
At least Odette knew now.
Smooth, Odile scoffed.
“Is there…anything else?” Valentin pressed. The hopefulness in his voice was swoonworthy, but Odette just focused on the sound of her inner demon.
Yes, Odile said. Tell him I think he’s very smart.
That was far more tame than she’d been expecting, and she would gladly take it. Maybe the conversation was salvageable. “She says she thinks you’re very smart.”
And that I think he needs to kill his entire Pokemon team.
Odette glared at the wall just over Valentin’s shoulder. She thought too soon, apparently.
“What?” Valentin said.
“She said she also enjoys your Pokemon team.”
That is not what I said you fucking rat, I swear to gods—
Odette hyperfocused on Valentin’s eyes. He wasn’t wearing his contacts, so they were still brown. She watched him cant his head to the side and squint those beautiful gold-speckled hues at her. “She did?”
You better tell him what I said, word for word, or so help me.
“She did,” Odette repeated.
I’m gonna kick your cerebellum, you raging stupid cunt.
“Interesting,” Valentin gasped. “Blood types are notoriously weak to ice types so the fact Odile feels positively about mine is unexpected.”
Biting down a frustrated wail, Odette pressed her lips into a taut grin as she wished for the sweet embrace of nonexistence.
See, I told you he was smart! I TOLD YOU. Now you just look like a fucking idiot, how does it feel? Stew in it, pussy.
“Actually, I may have…slightly over exaggerated that,” she winced.
“Did you?”
Odette slumped in her seat uncomfortably. “She might have said something about…killing them?”
Glaze trilled in alarm and had to be consoled by Sprinkle and Frosting. The rest of his teammates looked surprisingly unfazed, which left Odette a little confused, even through her embarrassment. Valentin was quick to turn toward Glaze and raise a reassuring hand.
“Relax, Glaze. Nobody’s touching you. You know how they get,” he said. Some tension seemed to leave the aurorus’ body.
Valentin nodded expectantly. “Now that makes more sense,” he said. “You don’t need to sugarcoat that stuff, Odette. I know. My team knows. Most blood types aren’t particularly fond of ice types. Or poison types, for that matter. It’s their Achilles heel.”
Glaze warbled something that Odette couldn’t quite understand, but she knew it sounded like protest. The only semblance of a translation she got was Valentin sighing, and she opted to let it go.
“That’s good to know,” she said, awkwardly scratching at her cheek.
I fucking love him. But gods I wanna fucking deck him. He’s terrifying.
What–
“She sounds pleasant,” Isaur grunted, tucking her hand under her chin. “A murderous aversion to ice types? That’s somehow new.”
Yeah, well, Isaur can stay. I’m used to her.
Odette realized there that, yes, in a way, Odile was probably used to the others on her own team by now. She’d been around, watching them all train together for the past 22 years. Odette had thought her head couldn’t spin anymore, and yet, here she was.
“So she’s…a violent type, it sounds like?” Noel probed.
Odette started nodding, unsure of how to word her answer. “That’s one way to put it. Wrath is Wrath, you know? She’s not exactly the ‘hold hands and sing Kumbaya’ type. But now that I’m saying it, I think she’d do it just for the hell of it if she wanted to.”
I mean yeah. ‘Kumbaya’ is the stupidest word, I’m fucking here for it. But we would definitely have a nuclear taser fight to the death right after to level the playing field.
Odette was a little unnerved at just how quickly she’d grown accustomed to the out-of-pocket comments. In the dreamscape, they’d initially hit like snowballs with rocks in them. Now, in the waking world, after dealing with them in her awakened mind for only about an hour, it was just…Odile. It was just how she was. How she spoke. Perhaps years of Vienna’s blunt uncensored commentary built her up to this. Was it intentional?
Thinking about her mother caused Odette to put her face in her hands. She’d wanted to sleep on how she was going to navigate speaking to her, and Enora and Solene. But all sleeping got her was an even bigger mindfuck, both in a literal and figurative sense. How was she going to approach Vienna with this with Odile screaming expletives in her brain? How was she going to tell Solene they’d been drugged with Odile there to possibly make a tense moment more of a shitshow?
The light in all of this was that, if anything, she had something to empathize more with Enora. They both had blood types in their systems, whether Enora was aware of hers or not.
“All of this to say that your hypothesis is confirmed. I am harboring Enigma’s missing Wrath legend. Florent Lambourne is my biological father. Dorien’s probably trying his hand at pissing me off to get Odile to rear her head,” she said. Her exhaustion was intertwined with her words.
Not probably, Odile said tersely. Is.
Grim seriousness had chased the excitement off of Valentin’s face. He sighed dejectedly and leaned forward again. There, Love hopped up onto the couch and settled next to him. Odette hadn’t noticed her trek over. The blue eon said nothing and looked rather stern, but Odette could see the sympathy in her eyes. Through her neverending angst, Odette appreciated it.
“Yes. While I’d been certain of that, having the true confirmation from Venira herself is…well, a bombshell,” he said. “One that, now that it’s out for certain, I’m unsure how to proceed.”
Noel pinned him with a quizzical look. “What do you mean? This just answered like eighty of your investigation’s biggest holes; what’s left to do?”
“That is correct, Noel, but now it’s a matter of Odette’s safety. Not that it hasn’t been before, but now that we know for certain she is harboring Venira and has definitive ties to Florent, there’s absolute certainty she’s in danger in some way or another, which leads me to concerns about how to go forward,” Valentin said.
Odette stared at him before lowering her brows. “What, are you saying I shouldn’t be involved in this anymore?”
“Not entirely,” Valentin said, clearly hesitating through the words. “But I am saying that it might be worth to re-evaluate.”
He leaned closer. For a second, it looked like he was going in for a kiss, and the sane part of her silently begged for it. “I don’t think you’re grasping how major this is for Virtue Corp. We’ve been trying to figure out ways to take down Enigma for years at this point, but now that we have one of these Blood Legendaries—the main one—“
Fuck yeah, I’m the main one, Odile sneered.
“—on our side here, it’s game-changing. All of that to say is that you’re a very valuable asset in this war on Enigma, Odette. And we cannot afford to lose you, or her, in any way.”
She knew she was playing with fire when she initially agreed to dig into this, but knowing what she knew now about Odile and the other Legendaries and their goals, she was far more attuned to the stakes at hand. And she understood why it was so important that she nor Odile fell to Team Enigma’s grasp. If they did, then fighting back would probably be impossible. Odile had made that clear enough.
Meeting Noel’s pensive gaze, she exhaled evenly. “I get it, and I know those are valid concerns,” she said. “But you said it yesterday; I’m your ‘in’ right now. And now that we know pretty much for sure what their angle is with me, it’s a lot easier for me–us–to approach.”
Valentin rolled his eyes away from her to stare at something past her head. He looked like he was contemplating his response. “I agree. I’m not saying you should fully pull out of this; that might do more harm than good. I’m just saying we need to closely evaluate how we’re going to go forward, even more so than we were planning to before.”
Hadn’t he been the one to tell Bernard that they would pull her out at the first sign of trouble? Then again, she wasn’t supposed to know that. And she would classify getting Vice Dusted, presumably multiple fucking times, as trouble. Yet, she was still involved. Maybe that didn’t quite count.
She wondered if this was Valentin’s opportunity to finagle that little agreement into their investigation without admitting the extent of Bernard’s involvement. Gods, how was she going to traverse that down the line? She hadn’t even had the chance to think about that until now.
“Watch me like a claydol,” she said, shrugging. She might as well feed into it for the time being. “You see something you don’t like, you pull me. I’ll try not to protest.”
“I don’t like that you’ve presumably been Vice Dusted with a level 3 Greed strain,” Valentin shot back, crossing his arms. So much for that not counting.
“Neither do I,” she retorted, letting some venom seep into her words. “Which is why I’d like to do the honors of beating the absolute shit out of whoever did it myself.”
“I’d like the honors of watching,” Noel interjected with a raised finger.
Valentin flexed his lips. He suddenly looked tired, like a teacher trying to reason with a set of rambunctious students. But his eyes betrayed him again because she could see them crinkling with a threatening grin. He seemed to like the thought. Or he just had to laugh at how dangerous it all sounded.
“Okay. I’ll be watching you like a claydol. You two continue as normal. I pull the plug if I think we hit too close of a call. Is that fair?”
Odette glanced at Noel, looking for any sign of approval on his face. The combined nodding shrug he sent her way was enough. She then looked at Isaur, who mimicked Noel’s movement almost exactly.
“Okay, fine. You’re the big Enigma blood type expert here, anyway,” she said. And truthfully, the idea of him “watching over her” was quite exhilarating. What would that entail? Protective stakeouts? Worried phone calls? Late-night check-up texts?
Mmmmm, that’s what you’re worried about right now? You think he’s gonna slip into your bedroom in the dead of night Edward Cullen style and watch you sleep?
Through the course of that conversation, she hadn’t realized how quiet Odile had gotten. And that silence caused her to forget she was even there at all. The sudden re-intrusion caused her to flinch, and she rubbed her forehead in dismay. “Fuck…” she muttered under her breath.
“Volume?” Noel asked, evidently trying to make light of the situation.
“No, just pure, undiluted stupidity,” she said. “She has that in abundance, unfortunately.”
Oh, well, fuck you too, bitch.
Odette grit her teeth. “I mean, she’s an absolute gem, and I’m the luckiest woman in the world to have her taking up shop in my fucking brain.”
I maintain what I said, but thanks for admitting it, fuckhead.
She felt her phone start to vibrate, and it sprung to life as Rotom wrestled out of her pocket and floated up to her. An exclamation point had taken up residence on the LCD screen.
“Bzzzzzzt, don’t mean to interrupt the conversation buuuuut…” The exclamation point morphed into the time. It was 11:00. On a Monday.
Class started in an hour.
“Oh shit,” Odette cursed, springing up to stand. “I’m gonna be fucking late.” She was already hustling toward the door before she finished speaking.
“Send messages to Maman and the team. Tell them I’m headed home and that we hit a lot of traffic.”
“Bzzzzzt, on it,” RotomPhone replied.
“Late? Late for what?” Valentin asked. She could hear his voice behind her, but she was too caught up in gathering her things to pay him much attention.
“She has trainer school,” Noel said. “With Dorien, no less.”
“Oh,” Valentin said, sounding like he was exhaling. “Right. Shit.”
When Odette was sure she’d grabbed everything–her helmet, Isaur’s ball, the bag she’d brought–she finally turned back to Valentin and Noel. Noel was in the middle of grabbing the stuff he’d left in the foyer, and Valentin now had his arms crossed and his lips twisted into a concerned frown.
“Are you going to be okay?” he asked. There was a weight behind that question that Odette wasn’t sure she wanted to acknowledge. But she knew she had to.
Shrugging, she shook her head at him. “I don’t know,” she said. “But I’m gonna make sure I at least act like I am.”
Valentin’s expression was unreadable, and it only served to amplify her unease. He silently came to terms with something in his own mind, before he raised a finger to her.
“Hold please,” he said, rushing back into the kitchen. Odette heard the distinct sound of the fridge opening, a glass clinking, and it shutting again. Valentin returned and presented her with another one of the antidotes she’d taken last night.
“Here,” he said. “Last one of these I have on hand right now. Give it to your partner. Solene, right?”
Odette stared at it like it was going to explode, but she didn’t hesitate to grab it and shove it into her pocket.
“Yeah. Thank you,” she said. Her mind spiraled into the thought of watching Solene down the shot, and coming to the realization of what had actually happened to them. The image of the inevitable fear that was going to burrow its way into her eyes made her stomach lurch.
“And I’ll keep you updated on getting you that three. I hope it won’t take horribly long, but until I hear something, tread lightly, watch your back…you know, all the things I probably don’t need to say twice.”
Odette looked up in time to see Valentin’s lips twitching into the beginnings of a reassuring smile. He was trying to keep the conversation as light as he possibly could, despite knowing it was futile.
She wished she had the gall to tell him how her heart fluttered whenever he smiled, no matter how weak it was. She wanted to tell him how good he was at making her feel warm. That his attempt wasn’t totally in vain.
Instead, she just matched his grin with what she could manage of her own.
“Thanks for the warning,” she said. “I will.”
***
The storm from the night before had left the asphalt slicked with water, making the roads more harrowing than usual and other drivers more stupid than usual (which wasn’t saying much). Water droplets misted the visor of Odette’s helmet and coated her knuckles, but with the number of idiots who nearly swerved into her, cut her off, or even slowed in places where it wasn’t necessary, that was the least of her concerns.
“Jeez. Promise me you’ll put on a couple of layers when you leave for class, Dee,” Noel said to her over the whir of the bike’s engine. “It’s fucking nippy out.”
She hadn’t noticed. Her blood was hot with a cocktail of anticipation and lasting rage from the day before. With the amount of raw, seething anger that had built up in her system, she was sure she could walk outside in a bathing suit and be perfectly comfortable for the remainder of the day. Now she was wondering if any of that was Odile’s doing. Something to keep her from catching a cold in the post-storm chill?
Awwww, you really think that highly of me? You’re sweet, Odile had said. The abrupt intrusion had caused Odette to swerve against a puddle, and she nearly cut off an SUV that ended up laying on its horn.
“Not while I’m fucking driving!” she shouted. The dense, rain-slowed traffic around her drowned out her voice.
Aside from a select five drivers she wanted to hunt down and uppercut in the jaw, they made it home without any additional issues. RotomPhone indicated the time was 11:35, meaning she had about five minutes to get her life together if she wanted to make it to her first class about twenty minutes late.
She’d resigned herself to the fact that she was fucked about halfway into her drive home, and there was nothing she could do about it. Telling the others about her ailment had just taken precedence over making it to school on time. If she gave herself one more substantial thing to worry about, she’d likely commit a crime before dinner.
Her body shifted into autopilot during her walk to the elevator. The hallway went by her in a blur of clean beige and streaks of fluorescent light. She managed a couple of shoddily strung-together words as a goodbye when she stepped off the elevator onto her floor, and if Noel said anything back, she didn’t hear it. All else had faded into mere background noise because her own heartbeat had stolen the entire show inside her head. Anticipation was all she knew now.
She was going to walk into her apartment. She was very likely going to see her mother. She was going to see her team. She was going to see Enora. She was going to face all of them with the trove of dark secrets she’d uncovered not 12 hours ago. And a demon inside her fucking head.
When she unlocked her door and set her hand on the knob, she didn’t hesitate. She pushed it open and felt every nerve in her body seize up as if they all took a breath.
“Odette!”
Vienna’s voice reached her ears before the door was fully open. There were arms around her neck before she stepped through the threshold.
“Good moooooorning my sweet baby.”
Odette stiffened, her shoulders hiking up to her jaw. Feeling Vienna’s cheek against hers, curly black ringlets tangling around the frames of her glasses, and the familiar warmth of Vienna’s signature hug brought her back down. For a fleeting second, she felt completely and totally relaxed.
“Hi, Maman,” she greeted, settling a hand on Vienna’s back out of pure habit. Despite everything, she relished in the moment of normalcy. She actually hoped it wouldn’t end. She wished she could stay in her mother’s normal hug for the rest of eternity and not have to face the reality of what was now lying just outside.
Aw, this is nice. It’s always the moms with the gigantic boobs that give the best hugs, Odile crooned.
Of course, Odile would be there to ensure she never forgot that normalcy was certainly dead.
Vienna pulled away far too quickly. Her hands landed on Odette’s shoulders, guiding their eye contact. “How are you?” she asked breathlessly. Her smile had reached her eyes, but they still shone with that motherly concern. “I figured you were okay; you were with Noel and Isaur and all, but everything’s fine? You slept okay? Did you eat?”
Yeah Odette, did you eat? Odile said, tone dripping with mock affection.
You can eat my ass, Odette snapped back.
That’s not the kind of relationship I was anticipating we were going to have, but if you insist–
Odette willed herself to ignore where that was going and instead worked up a response to Vienna, It barely made it to the tip of her tongue before Vienna slapped a distressed hand to her forehead.
“Shit, you’re gonna be late, aren’t you?” she gasped. “Do you need me to drive you? I can–”
“Maman, it’s fine,” Odette cut in, casually brushing Vienna’s other hand off her shoulder. “Are you forgetting I’m in my early twenties and am technically a functioning adult?”
Vienna squinted. “Are you forgetting you rented my uterus for seven months and gave me these things called ‘motherly instincts?’” she retorted. “You could be eighty fucking years old, that’s not gonna stop me from making sure you’re safe from the big scary rainstorm. Or that you get to class on time.”
Odette had to stop herself from mouthing along with the comeback, being that it was one she heard a thousand times over. “Yes, I get it. You’re my mum, I’m your kid–”
Florent Lambourne is my father.
You conceived me with a psycho.
Her words fizzled out there, as breathing in air had momentarily become difficult. Luckily, Vienna had turned away to walk to the kitchen, so Odette didn’t have to worry about playing it off.
“Anyway, the jokes aside, the offer stands. If you can be ready in five, I’ll zip you by the school. I know it’s out of my way but I wouldn’t mind the excuse to drag a little ass,” she said, tending to the lunch she was packing. Upon further investigation, Odette could see that Vienna’s other partner, the jovial reuniclus Iris, was out and digging through the open fridge.
”You can play the music if you want! You have better taste, anyway,” she beamed, looking over her shoulder with that same friendly smile that seemed to be permanently etched into her gelatinous features.
A smile tickled the corners of Odette’s mouth, but the memories of Florent’s photo and Odile’s confirmation of her lineage kept her lips weighted down. “No, don’t worry. The traffic was really bad, and I’m not in the mood to rush,” she said. Her hands had slithered down into her pockets, where she’d started to pick at some frayed threads with an uncomfortable fervor. “I haven’t missed my first class once so I can fit in one skip day. It’s fine.”
Concern fueled Vienna’s pout. “You sure?”
No. A car ride, especially one Vienna was intentionally aiming to drag, might be the perfect time for her to start prodding. They’d be alone, with no chance of anybody interrupting. Unless they got into a crash over the conversation getting too heavy. Which might be more likely, given the way most of Lumiose seemed to be driving today.
“Yeah,” she said. “If I won’t get there on time on my bike, how’s your sedan gonna get me there any faster?”
“I ‘ono, it’sa pretty fast sedan,” Iris giggled, earning her an approving nod from Vienna.
“Listen to the reuniclus; she’s probably smarter than both of us,” Vienna said.
It sounded like a good idea on paper, but she couldn’t. The things she needed to ask weren’t things that would bode well if one of them were driving. Odette needed solid ground, and undivided attention.
“It’s fine, guys. Really.”
Shrugging, Vienna zipped up her gaudy floral lunchbox and slung it over her shoulder. “Suit yourself, sweet pea. I’ll let you do your thing, then.” As she spoke, Iris floated over and handed her a water bottle, which she eagerly took and shoved into the deep pocket of her clean-pressed, official Pokemon Professor Association granted lab coat. Odette was constantly in awe with how clean Vienna managed to keep her coats, being that she practically lived in them.
“We gotta run, though. Meetings that could be emails and more meetings that could be emails today. Fun stuff,” she huffed. Iris seemed to deflate, offering a shrill groan to add to their collective annoyance.
The two of them hustled toward the door, Vienna stopping to plant a loving kiss on Odette’s head as she passed.
“Be careful on the roads. I’m sure it’s crazy out there right now. And wear a coat, I read it was chilly today,” she said. Her usual warm smile played on her full lips, leaving Odette wanting to feel as content as she ever did in her relaxed presence.
You conceived me with Florent Lambourne.
The thought threatened to break her calm facade, and she hid it with a quick, “I will.” Vienna appeared to accept that answer, because she and Iris took that as their cue to get going. As they filed into the hall, Odette felt the volume knob on her thoughts crank up to the max.
My father is Florent Lambourne. You knew Florent Lambourne. You conceived me with Florent Lambourne.
“Maman?” she called before she realized she was speaking.
Vienna, who was about to close the door behind her, stopped in her tracks to poke her head back inside. “What’s up, baby?”
Who is my father? That’s what she wanted to ask. Four simple words. That was all that she willed herself to say. It should have been so easy.
What came out instead was, “What should we focus on packing next?”
Vienna puckered her lips, slowly rolling her eyes across the ceiling overhead while she filed her possible responses. “We’ll all talk tonight,” she replied. “I have a couple things in mind. Don’t worry about it right now.”
Odette’s muscles stiffened in protest against the grin she forced. “Okay. See you later.”
“Love you,” Vienna said, blowing a kiss. She ducked out of the door, and it shut a second later with a finite ‘click.’
Well, that went well, Odile snickered. Interrogations are really your thing.
“Shut the fuck up,” she hissed aloud, turned on her toes to stomp toward her bedroom.
She was unsurprised to find everyone out and hustling to get ready, being that they all should have received RotomPhone’s message via their pokeballs. Though, that all stopped as soon as she opened the door.
“They’re back!” Ange gasped from where he was hovering above Odette’s desk. She barely had time to acknowledge him before she felt something tugging on her pants leg, and looked down in time to see Loïc scampering his way up her thigh, torso, shoulder, and neck before coming to a halt on the top of her head. He leaned down, dangling both his real head and fake head in front of her face.
“Kkkkyyyuuuuuu,” he hissed in greeting. She wanted to smile, but nerves continued to act as an anchor on her lips.
“Hey Loïc,” she said breathlessly, picking him up off her head gently tossing him onto the bed. It wasn’t long before she was approached by Solene and Enora too, both of them staring her down with frantic scrutiny.
“Are you okay?” Solene asked. “We were so worried when it started raining; we thought you got stranded somewhere.”
“Yeah, well–” Once again, Odette felt like she couldn’t breathe. The air seemed to be draining from the room. “Stranded yes, but nowhere bad. We’re good.”
She released Isaur from her ball, who thankfully looked just as uncomfortable as Odette felt, even as Solene and Ange rushed over to her to exchange hugs with her.
Well, might as well rip the bloody bandage off, Odile said. For once, they were on the same page.
“We need to talk, guys,” Odette said. She didn’t bother to dilute the grimness in her voice, and it was enough to suck any lasting sense of ease out of the room. Varying degrees of concern settled across the faces of her team. Solene wore the most intense variation of it, likely heightened by the way Odette approached her and motioned her to sit down.
“What is it?” the gothitelle queried, words so hesitant that they barely came out at all.
Odette didn’t know how to start. As she sat down on the floor, her team coming to surround her, her eyes couldn’t focus on either Solene or Enora–whose ears were low in what she recognized to be stony anticipation; like the Eon was gearing up for an “I told you so,”–making it that much harder to pinpoint where to begin the conversation.
Seeing Solene’s twitching brow again, however, caused the antidote Valentin had given her to feel like a 2-ton weight in her pocket, and she found that she couldn’t hold onto it any longer.
Starting was hard. She expected that keeping the conversation going would be harder, but the words spilled out like a laminar flow once she got going. As she disclosed what she now knew about Team Enigma, the blood types, Valentin, Odile, and soon Dorien, she struggled to avoid eye contact. Not out of disrespect, but more because if she saw the looks any of her teammates were likely giving her, she knew she might seize up.
She only started to slow down when she set the antidote vial in Solene’s eerily still hand. She fell quiet, giving the gothitelle a chance to look it over, and maybe even decide if she wanted to take it or not. When she gave no verbal response, Odette sighed and began to rub her forehead, picking up the beads of nervous sweat that had started to bud in her pores.
“So he drugged you,” Ange said. There was a dazed warble in his words that made it sound like he was still processing what he’d just heard.
“Straight up, yeah,” Isaur replied. “Her and Solene both. To keep either one of them from remembering how badly he pissed Odette off. So he can keep seeing her without an issue, probably.” Odette was thankful the froslass was caught up enough to pick up some of the slack. She’d become so fixated on Solene’s unmoving face that she’d almost missed Ange’s question entirely.
“For inside Pokemon he wants? Legendary?” Loïc said from his spot at Odette's side. He hadn
“Inside Pokemon” was a peculiar way to put it, but the mimikyu wasn’t wrong. “Yes,” Odette said, eyes still trying to meet Solene’s. “For the angry legendary that’s in me.”
I know it’s probably not a very good time, but if it’ll help, you can tell them I say hi and that I’m very much looking forward to working with them, Odile offered. It was almost endearing, but Odette couldn’t help but pick up the slightest playful edge in her tone, one that very much wasn’t needed at the moment.
You’re right, it’s really not a good time. Shut up, she hissed back.
For the first time since Odette began talking, Solene finally spoke. “And this might have happened to you already?” she said, turning the vial in her fingers.
Shifting uncomfortably in her spot on the floor, Odette began to scratch at her cheek. “That’s the implication. There’s still holes in my memory from secondary school, and Valentin thinks it’s because I’ve already been dosed with a higher strain. There’s no way to know until he gets the antidote for it. I couldn’t even tell you if it was just me, or if…”
She trailed off, sweeping her gaze over her teammates, hoping they would catch her drift. Her eyes landed on Enora, whose ears were so low, she practically looked like a lopunny,
“So…I don’t know if that’s going to just help you remember what happened on the boat, or if…something else might come to light, but I just…” She felt deflated. She didn't know what else to say. “I don’t know.”
The verbal laminar flow was starting up again, but this time with the force of a tsunami. “I’m sorry, Sol. Really, had I known this was even something that could happen, I wouldn’t have even suggested that we got on that boat with him, or that we–”
Solene shook her head, and she started to mindlessly fiddle with the cork of the shot. “How could you have known?” she said. She sounded far too distant for Odette’s liking. “It’s not like either of us could have known he had a drug that wiped memories on hand…I’d never heard of such a thing…neither had you…”
That much was true. Neither one of them could have known. Neither one of them could have known that they were involved in the whole thing before Odette had even suggested they attempt to be. If she had taken Vice Dust to the face in the past already, who’s to say it wouldn’t have happened again even if she hadn’t pulled her team into sticking their noses into the sacrilege issue?
And yet, as she watched the panic, the confusion, and even an air of cold acceptance spin pirouettes in Solene’s eyes, she couldn’t feel anything but a chilly shroud of guilt.
“Wait so…if these blood type Pokemon come out of shiny Pokemon,” Ange piped up again, white slitted eyes dragging over to Enora’s curled up form, “then that means…”
Everyone followed Ange’s gaze to the Eon, who seemed to scrunch up into herself in an attempt to become invisible.
“Enora?” Isaur called with a level of stern curtness Odette had never heard her use. “Is there something you want to tell the class?”
The sylveon didn’t immediately respond. Her head remained bowed, and her ears dragged against the wood flooring.
“Does this sound familiar to you?” Odette pressed. “Do you know what I’m talking about? Have you known this whole time?”
It felt like a canyon was opening up between them. The longer Odette stared at Enora’s silent form, the further away she felt. It was driving her toward the edge faster than anything else had so far.
“Enora,” she yelled, so loud that she saw every body that was huddled around her flinch. Her lower back pulsed, and she swore she heard the sound of Odile clearing her throat. That was enough to get Enora to look up and finally meet her gaze.
“There are so many people fucking lying to me right now. I am begging you to stop being one of them.”
Enora’s wide eyes remained locked on hers for what could have been a few minutes or a few hours. Odette couldn’t parse any time until those magenta orbs flicked away as if the Eon were mulling something over.
Or, perhaps, conversing with something in her mind.
“Canary,” Enora said with laconic finality. She didn’t need to elaborate because Odette immediately knew what it meant. It didn’t stop her world from standing still.
“It has a name,” she probed, despite not knowing how much elaboration she wanted. She watched as Enora’s eyes slipped shut, sighing through a deep breath heavy with shame and the remnants of a facade that had just been popped.
“She’s my partner,” she said. “The one that I was born with. The one that made me shiny.”
The muscles in Odette’s face were exhausted from almost a full day of struggling to lock out every weighty emotion that wanted to showcase itself. It only left her with the ability to stare with a tired indignation that Enora took as a sign to keep talking.
“I don’t remember much of my time as a kit. I remember I might have lived among other eevees like myself, but after being caught, it all faded away,” she explained. She’d taken a keen interest in the seam where the wood boards of the floor met the carpet under Odette’s bed. “I didn’t understand what was happening at first, but it didn’t take me long to realize I was just shiny trade livestock. But they didn’t want me; they wanted Canary.”
There was a notch in her brow that Odette had never seen before, and perhaps if she weren’t here begging her friend to stop lying to her, she’d have found some concern for it.
“I was in a lab. I suppose whoever had gotten ahold of me decided they wanted to test ways a separation could happen that didn’t involve sacrilege use. I don’t know if it was meant to be for scientific experimentation or just because they wanted to see me suffer, but it didn’t matter. Suffering was had nonetheless.
“I’ll spare you the details, as they’re not ones I want to relive. But we bided our time and eventually found an opening for escape and capitalized on it. We wandered for a few days. I was surviving off scraps, and it wasn’t long before I ended up exactly where you found me. In that dumpster in the alley next to Bernard and Marieanne’s house.”
“Who was the one who was hissing at and trying to bite me? Or to fight Sol?” Odette asked.
“Me,” she said as if the memory were fond. “Canary was the one who insisted you would be different, but at the time, I would have rather damned myself than listen to her.
“Until then, not a single human soul had been kind to me, but you…I bit you, and yet you fed me. I was a brute to you, and you still didn’t miss a day leaving me something edible and seeing that I was nourished. You helped me feel like a Pokemon again.”
“Who was the one who agreed to stay?” Odette said.
The grimace that rocked Enora’s muff caused Odette’s lungs to seize up.
“Even after all that, trusting someone again was not in my skill set. Canary is adamant I make my own decisions, but at the time…she was the one who had to convince me. She could not stop insisting you were different and would never tell me why, and I suppose now I understand what she meant. But back then, she just insisted in a way I’d never heard her do so before, and it was the push I needed.”
“So it wasn’t because you wanted to stay with me,” Odette said. “It was because your blood-type partner had to make you.”
“Wait, hang on a sec, I don’t think–” Ange tried to interject.
“It’s not like that,” Enora said, cutting him off. “She didn’t make me do anything. That’s an extremely unfair takeaway from the situation. What part of ‘I was brutally experimented on’ isn’t ringing clear?”
Odette was gnawing on the inside of her cheek so hard that she was tasting copper. That didn’t stop her. It was something else to focus on that wasn’t her urge to flip her bed over or think about how right Enora was and how ignorant she was being. She was simply too upset.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” she said.
“I…I wanted to. I really did.” She was tracing the patterns on one of the boards with her claw now. “I tried numerous times. But I didn’t know how to explain any of this to you. Canary was adamant you’d understand somehow, but she never told me why she was so sure, and I simply could not find the words to explain it in a way I thought you could sit with. I was afraid of it going wrong, I was afraid of what you and Solene and Isaur and Ange would think. I wanted to tell you when you came home with your gregarious proposition, but I shut down. We were rushing right back into the thing I had tried so hard to get out of and–”
“So why didn’t you fucking say that?”
“I. Couldn’t.”
“Enora, you had me wondering what the fuck I’d done to piss you off so badly. You had me thinking I’d struck some fucking nerve in you and what the hell I was supposed to do to smooth it over. How the hell was I supposed to fucking know I was right unless you told me?”
Enora was quiet now. Odette figured it was her time to speak.
“And even if this all didn’t play out the way it did, how the fuck did you assume I was going to react poorly to news like that? You bit the shit out of me; you almost put me in the hospital. Remember that? And I kept coming back to feed your ass and make sure you didn’t die. I wanted you to be okay and desperately wanted you on my team. You think after all that, I was going to write you off? After all this time, you still didn’t trust me enough for that?”
“No, I–” Enora tried to say.
“Twelve fucking years, Enora. Even if Canary hadn’t said anything, you spent twelve fucking years deliberately lying to me. You even went as far as crafting a persona that you were a bad liar so I wouldn’t question it. How the hell am I supposed to trust anything that comes out of your mouth? Am I supposed to take your word that our time together wasn’t just a fluke because your blood type buddy, I guess, sensed what I was? Or what I had in me?”
An acrid look settled upon Enora’s face as she began to glow from within, the blue light twinkling up between every strand of fur on her body and pooling in her tendrils. She suddenly jabbed a paw out in Odette’s direction, one dangerously curved claw pointed right at her like a loaded gun.
“Believe what you want to believe, Odette,” she said. She spoke with an even tone, but there was something icy brewing just underneath it. It sucked the warmth from the room and sent a chill up Odette’s back. “But remember, the only way my kind evolves into this form is through a deep bond with someone fortified on understanding, friendship, and trust.”
She let the words spiral around Odette’s head before continuing. “So despite what I have kept from you until now, there was no way for me to fake that. And you know it.”
Odette found that she could no longer look Enora in the eye. She also found that following that up was rather difficult. But, she persevered out of spite.
“Maybe so, but that still doesn’t change the fact that you lied to me and your whole time this entire time,” she said. “Maybe it wasn’t a fluke, but it was–”
“Enough!”
Solene’s shrill voice caught the attention of everyone in the room. The gothitelle had her hands balled into such tight fists, her left still enclosed around the unopened antidote, that the skin on them was turning a sickly lavender color. There was a new redness to her cheeks that Odette thought was indicative of smoke bubbling up behind her ears.
“I have had it! Can we just drop it?” she seethed, eyes wide and running wild with far too many emotions to pinpoint. “Of all the things I don’t want to hear right now, you two fighting definitely takes the cake! I just want to gather our things, get out of here, and go to fucking class.”
Wow. She’s…yeah, Odile gasped. There wasn’t a hint of jest in her tone; it was more like she was trying to state an observation out of surprise.
Odette flinched at the way the F-bomb left Solene’s mouth. It sounded so unnatural coming out of her, yet it completely underlined just how distraught she’d become. Ange grunted to himself, having clearly become quite uncomfortable with the altercation at hand, while Loïc silently lingered at Odette’s side, eyes passing back and forth between everyone.
“Easy, Sol,” Isaur said, hovering over to Solene and settling her hands on her shoulders. “It’s fine. I think they’re done.” It came out more as an order than a suggestion.
Odette felt her defensive walls crumble, along with her will to continue the day, and she exhaled a defeated breath.
“Yeah. You’re right. We’re late enough as it is,” she said. She knew better than to press Solene again. Not with the way the gothitelle was breathing now. She stood up and made her way over to her nightstand, where everyone's balls were situated. When she picked up Enora’s ball, she hesitated as her finger roved over the recall button.
“Remember what I said,” Enora warned. “One shiny to another.”
The words carried the weight of a snorlax carrying a lightning bolt. For a moment, they gave her pause. For a moment, she wanted to say something. Anything.
I quite enjoy how self-aware Odette is here; she knows what she must look like to everyone else; a crazy person claiming to hear voices in her head that she has conversations with, except here, it's truth. (There's a part of me that wonders just how much of a stigma this is in the pokemon world, where... well, where pokemon exist and not just talk to their trainers, like Isaur does here, but also must be able to project their voices or thoughts or other things into people's minds. Surely this is a common thing with psychics, at least; and therefore, even without training a psychic, surely can't be that much of a curiosity... right?)
By contrast to the severity with which Odette's taking it, I love Odile's childlike request.
“I-I just don’t know what would be the most respectful to you, but if you’re offering, I just don’t quite know how to work around it. Like am I just speaking at you and you relay what she says to me, or–”
I know this is something you've pointed out to me on occasion, so maybe that's why it's pinging me here, but... there's a lot of repetition in this line. Three uses of 'just' and two 'I don't knows' and they're right next to each other. Could probably let it slide, being as it's character dialogue rather than narration, but figured I'd note it anyway.
Valentin and Noel exchanged wary looks. Even Isaur, Elton, and Powdered Sugar did the same. Most of Valentin’s teammates had gathered nearby–including Donut, who was lingering by the glass of her tank–and were close enough that Odette could see some of them send her questioning looks.
This might just be me, but I can't recall who Donut is. Some sort of water/ice-type, I imagine, being in a tank. (I'm pretty sure I recall Elton was Noel's talonflame.)
I half expected Odette to say something along the lines of "it may have been sarcasm, I can't tell", but this is far more awkward and therefore better.
The storm from the night before had left the asphalt slicked with water, making the roads more harrowing than usual and other drivers more stupid than usual (which wasn’t saying much).
Okay, so in your intro notes, you mention that you split ideas and worry that it made this chapter not feel like much. The first scene with Valentin talking with Odile and all that was fine and to be expected.
The driving home scene probably could have been skipped, I feel? Not that it was very long, but I'm not sure it added much.
I started out feeling that way about the vienna scene too, but by the time she left for work, I changed my mind. Normalcy may be dead, but there's still traces of it, and the differences in how Odette's thinking were made pretty clear by her internal thoughts and struggle to try to keep her act together here. Plus, it is nice to see some mother-daughter... well, not bonding, but interactions.
Huh. Interesting. So the 'mon can all read, too? Or did Rotom somehow like... speak to them? I think actually maybe I'm just underestimating the level of sentience you've given the 'mon in your setting.
Solene's text here isn't italicized. For a moment, I figured maybe she was literally speaking, but a few lines later, they're in italics again, so perhaps this one just got missed?
I thought about this first in the Valentin scene, when he mentioned that blood-types live in all shinies. For some reason, I felt like this was a huge revelation, but no one else seemed to react like that, so I pinned that down to... Odette already knowing this and me just not having a good memory. But now, here, it seems like no one on the team knew about Canary's existence? I'm kind of having a hard time keeping track of what the characters are and aren't aware of yet (either because that's the nature of chapter-by-chapter updates, or because of my rhyhorn-brain... probably a little of both).
But yeah, I felt like either Odette should have known this already, or maybe should have come to some sort of realization about it earlier on somewhere.
That said, for some reason I also wasn't expecting Canary to be revealed so early on. Given that no one else had brought it up, I thought perhaps even Enora herself wasn't aware of her partner. Clearly that wasn't the case, though. (Given how early this reveal is, I look back on the reveal during AQ with renewed interest. At that point, Canary's reveal and the notion that this was normal to Enora had seemed like quite a bombshell, so now for it to be revealed that Enora's known about her since birth, it makes the fact that she wasn't even mentioned until that nightmare sequence all the more fun.)
“Even after all that, trusting someone again was not in my skill set. Canary is adamant I make my own decisions, but at the time…she was the one who had to convince me. She could not stop insisting you were different and would never tell me why, and I suppose now I understand what she meant. But back then, she just insisted in a way I’d never heard her do so before, and it was the push I needed.”
While I have a section from this scene quoted, I'll add: I'm curious as to why Canary was so convinced Odette would be different? Could she perhaps somehow... sense Odile? Or was it simply Odette's constant feeding? It isn't made explicitly clear, but feels like it should be. Although, on the other hand... Enora even says that Canary would never say why she was so certain, so perhaps that implies she didn't even know herself? Because even if Canary could sense Odile somehow, I feel like that wouldn't be justification for why Odette was trustworthy. Sure, she's got a blood-type inside her too, just like Enora, buuuuut it's also the God of Wrath, so like... if I could subconsciously identify that, I'd probably want to steer clear of them, rather than decide they're probably trustworthy, y'know? So I'm not sure if all this is intentionally vague or not. (If it is, by all means ignore me, because at that point I'm just musing and I expect will get answers later. If it's meant to be clear, though... I could do with some dumbing down.)
Also, since I'm writing as I go... I keep wanting to scream at Odette here. Like I know where this conversation is heading, but at the same time, like... Odette got Enora to evolve into a sylveon. Regardless of how it started, clearly she's happy being with her now!
Am I supposed to take your word that our time together wasn’t just a fluke because your blood type buddy, I guess, sensed what I was? Or what I had in me?”
Aww. That's oddly cute. And it does kind of recontextualize the whole 'why does Canary trust Odette without knowing her' discussion, by virtue of being soft confirmation that she could tell there was a blood-type in there. So maybe my whole ramble there wasn't necessary after all. But eh, I'll leave it.
Alright, well. I guess in terms of weight, I feel like... well, it's weird. It does, but to me, that weight isn't on the things it should be. I'm not saying Odette's wrong to be angry with Enora lying, or any of that, and I also don't want to say it's a petty thing to be arguing over, but at the same time, I feel like it took away from the whole... Canary reveal? Which, given it is implied to be new information, I feel probably should have been given more wight than it was, but it ended up being overshadowed by the lying.
This is a very nitpicky thing to note, but this... also felt like a weird time for this conversation to take place. Wasn't Odette intending to skip that day's class? She kind of rushed to get home and knew she was going to be late, but then when talking to Vienna it seemed she'd kind of resigned herself to skipping the day... but then Solene at the end insists they just go? So if Odette was still intending to go this whole time, knowing she was late and this conversation wasn't going to be an easy one... I dunno, that feels awkward to me. Maybe RotomPhone could simply alert her an hour earlier, so she knows she has to bust her ass to get home and ready for class while still saving some time for this conversation, but then it ends up running longer than she expected? I dunno, again, it feels like a nitpicky thing to point out.
Overall, I think this chapter works just fine. There's a lot of discussions that needed to happen one way or another, and probably are better off for Odette to happen sooner rather than later anyway. Obviously the chapter would have been longer without cutting the additional content and shifting it to (presumably) the following chapter, but it's hard to say whether or not it's better for that cut or not without having seen it. Still, this does enough to warrant being a chapter on its own, I think.
Author's Note: I'M BACK...AGAIN! I recently got back in to reading actual books and it kinda allowed my prose-writing synapses to start firing again, so while it is un-beta'd, this chapter felt really good to write. I also became acutely aware at just how long my past chapters are, holy shit So going forward I'm planning to keep them all under 6k. Which...has resulted in a lot of split chapters on my planning end LOL. More fun for you, and more opps for juicy cliffhangers, I guess!
As always, thanks so much for reading this stupid story 🤍 🖤
For a small stretch of her commute, Odette felt like she was falling into an auto-piloted fugue state.
You still there? Probably not wise to zone out when you’re operating heavy machinery, Odile said, causing Odette to jolt back to attention.
Maybe Odile would be good for something, if not just present to bust her balls.
Odette made it just as her first class was letting out. Or rather, she assumed as much based on the time. If she followed their normal schedule, she’d have her Battle Tactics course, and Dorien would arrive at the campus in time for their shared Battle Performance class, giving her approximately two more hours of Dorien-less bliss. Not nearly enough time for her tastes. And of course, she could already hear RotomPhone notifying her of texts from him, so that time would barely count.
She realized that she hadn’t seen him in about a week, which felt like a long time for couples who were supposed to be head over heels in love. Granted, she had been sick, and she was supposed to be a little mad at him. Those excuses could carry her, but she knew she’d have to watch it going forward.
However, with the over-the-top “marking territory” flowers he’d sent her, followed up with the revelation that he’d actually drugged her and Solene, she wasn’t sure how she was going to watch anything around him. How was she going to keep herself from killing him outright as soon as she saw him? The thought of his glowing green eyes, perfect skin, and perfect smile sent a stream of boiling rage through her, and she started grinding her teeth to keep her expletives down.
Check yourself before you wreck yourself, dumbass, Odile warned. You’re already making yourself nuts, and the fucker’s not even here yet.
The Wrath embodiment had a point. If she couldn’t contain herself at the thought of him, how would she fare when she saw him in the flesh?
“Right. Thanks,” she muttered under her breath, shrugging her backpack onto her shoulders.
Battle Tactics went by far too fast. She tried to get lost in Songmin’s lecture, but her mind’s eye was haunted by images of Dorien hugging, kissing, and intentionally trying to grate on her. Paired with the Wrath demon’s incessant comments on the lecture at hand or her thoughts about how Songmin’s pants looked too tight for her tastes (which she insisted on pointing out every five minutes), the clock turned faster than it normally did. Before Odette knew it, everyone was getting up to leave.
Well, that was an invigorating lecture. I certainly feel smarter,Odile said, sounding proud of herself. Odette, in the middle of zipping up her backpack, exhaled sharply.
Are you sure you just aren’t more aware of how to tell when somebody is wearing their pants too tight?
What the fuck else did you think I was talking about?
Odette wasn’t sure why she bothered engaging. Then again, it wasn’t like she could just walk away.
RotomPhone buzzed in her pocket again, and dread opened up like a sinkhole in the pit of her stomach. She knew what the message said before she opened it.
Outside waiting for you 😘
For a quick second, her grip tightened on the phone. RotomPhone made a noise that resembled television static and sent a minor shock through her fingertips, causing her to start.
“Bzzzzzzzt, hey!” RotomPhone barked. “Watch those hands!”
“I–sorry,” she said quickly. She forced a breath into her lungs, which had shriveled under her sudden anger. “I’m sorry.”
Minding how tightly she held him, she started typing her response.
Don’t bother because as soon as I see you you’re gonna fucking die because I’m gonna take a fucking bat to the back of your—
“Bzzzzzzzt…uh,” RotomPhone said, bringing his voice down to a whisper. “Are you sure that’s what you wanna send him?”
Tonguing the inside of her cheek, she quickly deleted what she was writing.
Okay, be out in a second
“Better, bzzzzzzt,” RotomPhone complimented. She offered him an apologetic yet bitter grin before setting him back in her pocket.
That was a close one, huh?
Eat a dick.
She hustled down the lecture hall bleachers and to the door. Maybe he would miss her if she went fast enough, but that wouldn’t save her from running into him in their next class. Prolonging the inevitable was hardly a good approach, but if she could milk even a few more seconds, she would try to.
It was no use, though. She barely made it a step outside the classroom before he caught her.
Dorien had situated himself against the wall directly across from the door, ensuring she could not stealth by him. It was like he’d calculated it perfectly. She met his eye immediately upon exiting, and the smile that sprung across his face almost made her throw up all over his expensive-looking sneakers.
She held it off by forcing a tight-lipped grin. “Hey,” she greeted, tasting bile. Bile turned to searing acid as he approached, wrapped his arms around her, and planted a kiss on her temple. It might as well have been a fucking bullet. She wished it was.
“Hey there, Doll!” he beamed, pulling away just enough to grin at her. “God, I missed you so much.”
As she held his deceptively tender gaze, the memory of him asking her about that thing like it was nothing echoed in her ear, far more grating than the sound of Odile’s cackle. The image of him blowing Vice Dust into her and Solene’s faces strobed in and out of her mind, causing her body to seize up with a rising urge to fight.
I want you dead. I want to shoot you and your little demon right between your big green eyes, you raging fucking asshole, she thought against her twitching fingers. Her hands ached to throw a punch, but she knew for certain that wouldn’t be enough. Her need for violence against him transcended mere physicality. She wanted to see the life drain out of his eyes and have the satisfaction of knowing he’d be too dead to bother her anymore.
The totality of her resolve to kill him frightened her just as much as knowing he’d drugged her. But the latter was far more pressing than the former.
It was Odile who kicked her back into gear. Your enthusiasm brings a tear to my eye, really. But you need to C-H-I-L-L out.
“I missed you more,” she said, feeling the muscles in her cheeks loosen up as she forced herself back into her act. “I’m sorry you didn’t get a chance to come see me while I was sick. I was honestly a little embarrassed about you seeing me like that.”
He stuck out his lower lip, canting his head with the solemnity of a preschool teacher consoling one of their crying students. The affection behind his eyes made her want to scream, and she bit her tongue just as she was pulled into another tight embrace.
“Odette, please,” he said in a sigh. “You don’t have to be embarrassed about those sorts of things around me. You can’t help health spells like that.” His arms tightened on her. “And I was so worried about you, I can’t even begin to explain it.”
Right. Of fucking course you were, she thought, feeling her lip starting to curl up over her teeth. She smoothed it out when he pulled away to look at her again, this time raising a hand to graze his thumb over her cheek.
“You look better, though. Really.”
“I feel better,” she said, nodding. Not.
He grinned again, something she guessed was supposed to be more joking. “I definitely prefer your face with some color in it,” he said.
I’d prefer your face rearranged, she thought. She tried to muffle it with a chuckle of her own.
“And…” He trailed off as he took her hands, holding them tenderly while he ran his thumbs over her knuckles. The gesture was meant to be intimate, but the urge to pull away came on like a sixth sense, and she had to fight it off while she listened to him continue.
“I wanted to apologize, in person, for how I acted in the garden. I don’t know what came over me, I-I was just–” His shoulders hiked up to his earlobes as he frantically shook his head, seemingly losing his words. “–I was distraught seeing you in that line of fire, and when that thing scampered off I just wanted to know what, if anything, you did to get it away from you. Just in case it happened again, so I wouldn’t be a sitting ducklett. You know?”
It was an Oscar-worthy performance, one that made her want to body-slam him into the bulletin board they were standing next to.
Man, he’s good. Fuck him, Odile sneered.
In what way? she asked.
With a rusty pitchfork, preferably.
They were on the same page there.
She nodded, matching his solemnity. “I know,” she said. “I think I would have been a mess myself if the roles were reversed.”
Oh, nice touch.
Dorien sighed, sounding relieved. “Can we forget it happened? Water off the ducklett’s back?”
Couldn’t you just Vice Dust me to get me to forget it happened? she wanted to say.
“I’d like that.”
He smiled again, a joyful light coming into his eyes. She couldn’t analyze it for long before he leaned down and set a kiss on her lips. It was quick, thank the gods, but it still left her aching for some steel wool to scrub her face clean. His kisses somehow felt worse than they had before, yet all she could do was smile through them and act like she wanted more, as if nothing had changed.
“Come; I would like to get a decent set in the gym today,” he said, turning and gently leading her down the hall. “Besides, I think we’ve given everyone in this hall enough of a PDA show,” he added with a chuckle.
The people in the hall? Odile asked in a wheeze. What about us?
Odette felt her brow twitching with a threatening scowl, which managed to slip through once she realized Dorien wasn’t looking directly at her. It was a quick yet much-needed break. It had only been a few minutes, and she felt winded, like she’d just sprinted a mile. Gods help her.
Finding a seat in Battle Tactics wasn’t difficult. They’d arrived early enough to where there were still plenty of spots toward the top of the bleachers, where they usually sat. By his own admission, Dorien preferred to sit at the back of the class, and that was the one thing they could agree on. What she didn’t agree with was the way he slung his arm around her when they sat. Her body wanted to lurch at the thought of settling into him, but she knew she had no choice. He usually let up once Chuquete got in, so if she could hold out until then, she’d be home free at least until the end of the class.
“So, what else were you up to this week aside from recovering from that little spell?” He’d taken to mindlessly intertwining his fingers with hers, which subsequently made her want to saw her hands off.
“Fever broke, went back to work, and the cast and I had our little line-reading get together yesterday at a cast-mate’s house,” she said. She didn’t have to put much thought into the explanation because it was all true—well, most of it. “Noel and I got rained in while we were there.”
“Ah. You and your second boyfriend, huh?”
Odette snapped her head in his direction, and a hot sensation clawed up her back and coalesced in her scalp as if something were yanking on her hair.
EASY, Odile hissed.
Blinking, she settled her face into a polite frown. “What do you mean by that? Are you implying I might be cheating on you with him?”
Dorien laughed like he knew the insinuation was preposterous, but it didn’t sound quite convincing enough for her. “Not at all. I think you’re lacking the parts for that to line up.”
“But?” she pressed, dipping her chin toward her chest.
Sucking his teeth, he shifted his sitting position in a way that indicated that he was uncomfortable. The thought lit a small flame of joy within her. “I don’t know, Odie. Don’t you think it’s a little weird that you’re hanging out with another guy so much when you’re already seeing one? Sexuality aside.”
“I’ve been friends with Noel since before I knew you existed,” she said, sounding far more terse than she intended to. He seemed to catch that because his brows jumped higher than she’d ever seen them go before. He pulled his hands away and held them up like he was anticipating her to take a swing at him. Maybe his instincts were better than she gave him credit for.
“No, I know.” His defensiveness sounded almost sincere enough for her to lower her own guard. “I’m just saying. We are dating, are we not? It feels odd that you don’t spend that time with me.”
She felt her eye twitch, and she blinked to keep it from becoming too obvious. “We’ve gone on multiple dates, just the two of us. In fact, I vaguely recall spending multiple days in a row with you. I don’t think I saw Noel once in that first week we went out.”
“Okay, fair,” he said, fanning his fingers to his sides. “But…” He trailed off into a heedful silence. The way he studied her face made it seem like he was afraid of offending her if he didn’t select his words carefully. She had to wonder where that caution was at that island restaurant.
“You’ve brought him to multiple gatherings already. And I’m not concerned about how he might fit in with the attendees; he’s a very…”
He flexed his lips, disgust glazing over his eyes for a nearly unnoticeable moment.
“...likable person. But my concern stems from how it might look for us as a couple.” He lowered his voice and leaned in so close that his forehead hovered mere centimeters above hers. “You know people in my world talk, right? Gossip is like a drug for them. And I don’t want to be the couple that fuels their habits. I also don’t want anyone to think you might be, how do I say this politely…” He tapped at his chin. “Loose.”
Odette’s toes curled inside her sneakers, and she clawed into the fabric of her joggers with such intensity that she thought she would tear through the thick polyester. Odile’s deafening silence allowed her more headspace to imagine pushing him off the bleachers in a manner that ensured he broke his neck when he hit the floor.
“Do you think I’m loose, Dorien?” she asked with the calmness of a cracking dam.
He appeared shocked by the question. “Of course not.”
She exhaled through her nose. Cool. Calculated. Calm. She knew what he was doing now, and she wouldn’t allow it to work—not again.
“Then I don’t see the problem.”
She hunted for a seed of disappointment sowing on his face, just as a small reward for her efforts. All she got was a half smile and a defeated eye roll. He settled back into the position they’d been in previously.
“No, I guess you’re right,” he said. He forced his fingers back between hers, and she channeled her desire to yank her hand back into clenching her jaw. “I’m not saying you need to stop hanging out with him. I just want to be careful going forward. You probably don’t mind the gossip, but I don’t want anybody to say anything negative about you.”
He raised her hand to kiss the back of it again. His lips felt like the stinger of a beedrill: agonizing and entirely unpleasant. Nonetheless, she smiled at him.
“I only want to hear good things about my Doll.”
Her rage fizzled out, quickly eclipsed by the chill of anxiety. Something about that statement instilled a sense of flight within her that sent her heartbeat into a frantic gallop.
She opened her mouth to respond but was cut off by a gasp.
“Oh!” he said. “Before I forget. Did you like my present? You got it, right?”
Curses pounded against the back of Odette’s clenched teeth. “I did,” she said. “You really didn’t make it easy for me to take home, huh?”
Recalling how she waited until all her castmates had left that day to lug the rose mound out back and have Ange and Freddy burn it in the dumpster was a brief moment of solace.
“Maybe a bit of an oversight on my end, I’ll admit it,” he said. “But! I only want the biggest and best gifts for my Doll.”
She wished he’d stop calling her that. It made her feel like she needed to take a shower.
“Big gifts for big apologies, I suppose,” she said, feeling some new heat building up under the words. Dorien let out a nervous laugh that sputtered out into a sigh.
“You know me just a little too well,” he said, his eyes falling to her hands, still locked with his. “It felt necessary, though. You barely spoke to me, and I felt I had to do something.”
You fucking grabbed me and screamed at me; why the fuck would I speak to you after that? She thought.
“I was just…” Now, she was the one carefully selecting her words. “I was a little put off by the way you acted.”
Dorien sighed again, his nostrils flaring. “But I told you why I did that.”
He was poking the beartic again. She might have respected his balls if she didn’t harbor such a deep, unsettling, homicidal rage toward him.
Her stomach lurched, and she could feel her blood pressure spike to a level her doctors would have likely had her admitted to the ER for. “Yes,” she said with a calculated nod. “But you still grabbed me and yelled in my face.”
“Maybe. But you might have overreacted just a little bit, no? It was a high-stress situation; icing me out for a few days was certainly a bit low.”
His reasoning not only caused her mind to stall, but her acting chops as well. For an excruciating set of seconds, she couldn’t figure out the best way to respond to that. The only thing that filled her head was the sound of her blood coming to a simmer over her suppressed anger.
Dorien held her hands up to his chin, effectively pulling her just a little closer to him.“It’s just that I care about you so much, Odie, and it hurts me that you thought my intentions were anything but good. They might not have seemed that way at the moment, but I figured you’d know me better than that by now, right?”
He smiled at her with a sickly sweetness that left her feeling like she’d ingested too much sugar. He was acting as if he didn't drug her brain a few weeks ago, and like his attempt at manipulation was supposed to be cute and sincere.
All she wanted to do was tear his fucking lips off his face.
Odile's voice filled her head again, so abruptly that she nearly jumped. Oh, you know what–fuck it. I can’t fucking take this. Do that. Tear them clean off, she said. Show this bitch how it's done.
Odette wanted to glare, but there was nothing to glare at.
Wha– What the fuck happened to not giving in to the temptation?
Odile didn't respond at first. Odette felt her brain empty out as if the eldritch terror herself was stalling on her own thoughts.
This is the part where I tell you I'm testing you, and you pass. B+.
Why a B+?
You lost your chances at an ‘A’ with that bitch ass attitude of yours.
The physical reaction came on fast but was halted by Dorien waving his hand in front of her face.
"Earth to Odie," he cooed. "Something on your mind?”
Smiling felt painful. “No. You’re right. Maybe it was a little rash.”
He looked proud of himself, making his face astronomically more maimable. “I just don’t like being apart from you for so long.”
“I know,” she said. “I’m sorry.”
As if the universe was finally set to throw her a bone, whatever Dorien had geared up to say was interrupted by the gym doors opening, and Chuquete entering with the usual group of stragglers coming from their previous classes, Odette's own teammates included among them. Odette could see the top of Solene’s head before she noticed anyone else, and the dread corroded a hole in the pit of her stomach.
It was hard to make out the expressions on any of her teammates, and she couldn’t look too eager while she tried to. But as they wandered closer, and up the bleacher steps, it was evident that nothing had changed since that morning. Although Solene had conjured up an air of composure in the time since they separated for classes, her typically bright eyes were dullened with the shadow of agitation.
Enora, on the other hand, looked as stoic as ever. She always held herself the same way regardless of how she was feeling. Odette wasn’t entirely concerned about her, the sense of betrayal she still felt lingering in the corner of her mind aside.
“Oh, wonderful timing,” Dorien chided. “And it looks like your calvary is here.”
He surely meant it as a joke, but he didn’t know just how right he was. Instead of acknowledging it, however, Odette took note of the subtle sidelong glare Solene sent him. Odette knew it wasn’t aimed at her, but she could feel the residual chill of the gothitelle’s eyes, pupils shrunk to white pinpricks of frigid contempt.
Odette felt the skin on her arms prickle with a different flavor of unease. Solene had always been a loud type of angry. When she was upset, you always knew it. This silent, tight-lipped, icy rendition was something Odette had always known was there, but she’d prayed she’d never have to see it in the flesh.
Uhhhhhhhhhhhhhh… Odile started to say. Loïc scampering into Odette’s lap interrupted whatever the intended follow-up was.
Odette gasped under her breath, but when she set her palm against the rough burlap of his disguise, she felt some of the pressure release inside her chest, like the abrupt opening of a swelling wound. She exhaled from her nose, feeling her eyes start to well up under the rage she was breathing out. A new weight crashed down upon her, threatening to take her eyelids down with it.
Without a word, Loïc’s shadowy hand manifested from under his cloak, clutching a miniature plastic water bottle between its pointed claws. The second wave of relief that rushed over her nearly made her burst into tears.
She knew now more than ever that she really could not have been doing what she was doing without her partners.
Grabbing the bottle with calculated restraint, she chuckled. “How’d you know I left my water bottle at home?” she said, playing into the hypothetical situation where she truly wasn’t bothered by her situation. It helped that she really had left her water bottle at home.
She began to unscrew the cap. It wasn’t coming off fast enough. “Thank you. I appreciate your concern for my hydration.”
“Kkkknnngggggg,” Loïc said.
With an appeasing ‘CLICK,’ cap separated from plastic and Odette went in for the gulp. She tried to show some more restraint in her drinking, but momentarily lost the ability to think straight. When she regained herself, she’d sucked down half the bottle, and she no longer like she was going to collapse.
Dorien laughed to himself. “Goodness, how thirsty were you?”
“Not too much, why?” she replied without missing a beat, earning her a heartier laugh. Disgust burned her nose and she sniffled to ward it off. She didn’t want to make him laugh. He didn’t deserve her comedy.
Chuquete was mercifully quick in kicking off class once everyone was seated. 20 minutes of solo 1 on 1 cycle sparring before the day’s hands-on lesson in more effectively playing around weak power matchups. Something Odette thought was interesting enough to adequately keep her attention, instead of it sitting on fuming at Dorien. But of course, this was the one day Chuqete didn’t pick their sparring partners for them, and Dorien claimed her as his before she had a chance to protest.
The cycle sparring was at least mostly uneventful and painless to start. Being that cycle spar matches started and ended quickly–with a Pokemon switching out for another every time it was hit with an opposing move–Odette didn’t feel nearly as tense as she would have felt were they having full-fledged matches. The quick procession of sparring meant Dorien and his sacrilege crew couldn’t go on a tirade and overshoot the power of another move again; they simply wouldn’t have time. Or, at least, she hoped they wouldn’t. She hadn’t had a chance to really drill Valentin about how that worked, but she had to assume that it was something that needed to be charged.
She’d yet to see it happen again since her first battle with him, and she wanted to keep it that way.
Ange fared pretty well against Ferrothorn, but was knocked aside by a sudden intrusion from Dorien’s poliwrath partner after getting a little cocky with his movements. He was still throwing a tantrum even as Odette recalled him to his ball and sent out Solene to deal with the new matchup. It was the third time Odette had called the gothitelle out, and Odette still couldn’t get over how rigid she was with her movements. Rigid, and most of all, silent. Solene always had a bark to give, or grunt to make every time she made a move, and with each one she executed, she was as quiet as ever.
With a calculated Psychic burst, she sent Poliwrath back to its ball, leaving Dorien to send out Conkeldurr, probably in an attempt to get a jump on the day's overarching lesson. Its presence sent Odette’s heartbeat off in a sprint as she replayed the image of it running at a downed Ange with the intent to eat over and over in her head. Gluttony, no doubt, she thought, a scowl ruffling her brow.
I wonder how that would even taste? It’d be like eating a sconce, right? I’ve eaten sconces before; they’re not exactly–
Can you not? Please? That’s not exactly an image I want to entertain.
I’m just saying, if it were to happen, it would be just as unenjoyable for that fatass over–
Odette tuned Odile out in just enough time to watch Solene’s hands flare up with her signature pink glow, evidently charging up another round of Psychic, which, given Conkeldurr didn’t dodge, would easily knock it back. However, as the light built up in intensity, and Solene still made no move to let it go, Odette felt a drop of chill slide down her spine before she could register why.
“Sol, you can let it–” she started to say, but the gothitelle was one step ahead. With a flick of her hands, arms of psychic energy shot forth, some aiming for Conkeldurr, who successfully sidestepped them. The remaining beams should have finished the job, but they had strayed in another direction.
Right at Dorien.
It happened faster than Odette could react. A yelp, a loud crash, and every bit of movement in her peripheral vision ceased. All she could focus on now was the smoking hole in the protective barrier around the wall behind them, before her eyes slid slowly over to Dorien’s panting form, completely unscathed aside from clearly being a little shaken. He'd managed to dodge the beams.
A shrill whistle cut through Odette’s shock like a hot knife through butter, and she turned her head to see Chuquete sauntering toward them with her hands raised. “Whoa, whoa! Team Cinq-Mars, what’d I say about watching your aim? Come on people, I know we’re not on a huge field right now, but I expect more control from teams of your level!”
Odette could hear her shallow breaths, clawing in and out, in and out. Yet, she could not feel them. She couldn’t feel her lungs working, and she couldn’t feel the air flowing into her system. She felt like she was being suffocated under all the pairs of eyes that were now trained on her and Solene, who still stood stick-straight in place, not paying anyone else any mind. She hadn’t even turned her head to look at Odette. Her eyes remained trained on Conkeldurr and Dorien.
“R-right,” Odette said, exhaling over her word and feeling the air rush out of her head. “Sorry, Chuquete. Got a little overzealous.”
It wasn’t the first time somebody had gone out of bounds of the court and hit a wall or the bleachers. But it was the first time Odette’s team had done it.
“Yes,” Solene replied. The only movement she gave was her shoulders raising under the breath she inhaled. “My mistake.”
Chuquete appeared to accept the apologies and abruptly motioned for everyone to get back to their sparring. Dorien took that moment of downtime to cautiously make his way over, holding his hands out to his sides to underscore the dumb quizzical look on his face.
“Jeeze, if I’d have been any slower that might have taken my head off,” he said. “I guess accidents happen, but still. That would have hurt.”
Odette slid her eyes back and forth between an unmoving Solene and Dorien before they finally settled on Dorien. “I-I’m sorry, we’ve never done that before. She just overshot a little, and–”
Dorien set a hand on her shoulder. “It’s fine, Odie. I’m not mad. It was a very impressive show of Psychic, otherwise. Besides, you’re not the one who actually did it, now are you?”
A glimmer of indignation sparked in his eyes as he pinned Solene with a leer. She slowly turned her head to look at him over her shoulder, expression still mostly unreadable on Odette’s end.
“My apologies,” she said, tone as soft as it normally was when she was genuinely apologizing. “I seem to have a clumsy streak going.”
Well, that was an invigorating lecture. I certainly feel smarter, Odile said, sounding proud of herself. Odette, in the middle of zipping up her backpack, exhaled sharply.
Odile's speech here didn't get it's formatting. That aside, I wonder what that's like, having an actual voice inside your head while you're trying to pay attention to classes.
This feels worded a bit awkwardly to me, given the context. She's not really lasting through anything here. I wonder if "barely made it a step" would work better, since it's something she's walking into, not currently enduring, if that makes sense.
This whole segment was painful to read. Fantastic job at capturing Odette's inner rage and showing flashes of it through her body language while still trying to maintain her facade. Her words do kind of feel a little at-odds with the implications that the single-letter text message gives, but they're minor and easy to gloss over.
Blinking, she settled her face into a polite frown. “What do you mean by that? Are you implying I might be cheating on you with him?”
Dorien laughed like he knew the insinuation was preposterous, but it didn’t sound quite convincing enough for her. “Not at all. I think you’re lacking the parts for that to line up.”
It'll be a miracle of Dorien doesn't pick up on all these subtle bodily clues Odette's giving off. There was nothing mentioned about the kiss except Odette feeling gross about it, but surely he'd have picked up on if she was suddenly even less enthusiastic about it than before.
Sucking his teeth, he shifted his sitting position in a way that indicated that he was uncomfortable. The thought lit a small flame of joy within her. “I don’t know, Odie. Don’t you think it’s a little weird that you’re hanging out with another guy so much when you’re already seeing one? Sexuality aside.”
Oh god, yep. Hate this. I get that jealousy is a thing, especially for a person she's known her whole life, but man, you can't just go around expecting her to cut him loose now that she's dating! Nevermind the fact that Noel has never and will never be interested in her like that, that doesn't even matter. Yikes. Red Flag.
Odile’s deafening silence allowed her more headspace to imagine pushing him off the bleachers in a manner that ensured he broke his neck when he hit the floor.
“Maybe. But you might have overreacted just a little bit, no? It was a high-stress situation; icing me out for a few days was certainly a bit low.”
His reasoning not only caused her mind to stall, but her acting chops as well. For an excruciating set of seconds, she couldn’t figure out the best way to respond to that. The only thing that filled her head was the sound of her blood coming to a simmer over her suppressed anger.
Don't blame Odette here at all. I certainly wouldn't have responded well to someone dragging up the argument and trying to re-start it again. Just let it go, man...
and Chuquete entering with the usual group of stragglers behind her. Odette could see the top of Solene’s head before she noticed anyone else, and the dread corroded a hole in the pit of her stomach.
This person's name seems to be spelled with or without a second U several times in this chapter. (I had to actually go back to the beginning to make sure it was the same person, because the very first use doesn't have the U after the Q. I'm not sure which is intended.)
Anyways! This seems to be their teacher... why is Solene with her? I don't remember the details of your setting exactly; I know trained 'mon are often self-sufficient and doing daily life stuff on their own, at least at home... but why is Odette's pokemon working at the school? Was that established already and I just forgot it?
Actually, extend that to her whole team. Has Odette just been without them all during the day? Does every student leave their whole team with this teacher during the day?
Odette gasped under her breath, but when she set her palm against the rough burlap of his disguise, she felt some of the pressure release inside her chest, like the abrupt opening of a swelling wound. She exhaled from her nose, feeling her eyes start to well up under the rage she was breathing out. A new weight crashed down upon her, threatening to take her eyelids down with it.
Without a word, Loïc’s shadowy hand manifested from under his cloak, clutching a miniature plastic water bottle between its pointed claws. The second wave of relief that rushed over her nearly made her burst into tears.
She knew now more than ever that she really could not have been doing what she was doing without her partners.
This was adorable. I don't have much more to say about it. It does kind of hit harder having read the side-story for these two's bonding, but it's still cute to see on its own.
Hm... what happened here? The 'withdraw' makes it sound like Conkeldurr was pulled back to its ball as well, but the rest of the text makes pretty clear it was just sent out. It's also odd that he'd send out a second fighting-type, or one at all to face a psychic... I assume they have to be used in a specific rotation due to the nature of this cycle training method?
Anyway, this cycle training is an interesting method, and I wish we could see more of it. I might have to steal it.
It happened faster than Odette could react. A yelp, a loud crash, and every bit of movement in her peripheral vision ceased. All she could focus on now was the smoking hole in the protective barrier around the wall behind them, before her eyes slid slowly over to Dorien’s panting form, completely unscathed aside from clearly being a little shaken.
This reminds me of Lance's dragonite hyper beaming that Rocket grunt into a wall. I'm both amused at Solene had the power to blast Dorien through the barrier and a little horrified that Dorien just shakes that off.
That said, if Odette's body language didn't give Dorien a clue, there is no way he's going to not recognize this as more than a simple accident. It it had been anyone but Solene, maybe, but there's just no pretending otherwise now. He's gotta know that she knows. Odette's gotta be on high alert.
Dorien set a hand on her shoulder. “It’s fine, Odie. I’m not mad. It was a very impressive show of Psychic, otherwise. Besides, you’re not the one who actually did it, now are you?”
A glimmer of indignation sparked in his eyes as he pinned Solene with a leer. She slowly turned her head to look at him over her shoulder, expression still mostly unreadable on Odette’s end.
“Sorry,” she said, tone as soft as it normally was when she was genuinely apologizing. “My hands slipped.”
HE KNOWS. Solene you blew it, oh no. Surely this won't have any negative consequences.
Despite the shorter chapter, that still took me a minute to get through... and still left me wanting more. I think the lengths were fine as they were before, but that's up to you. I tend to aim for around 6k myself, anyway, so that feels reasonable. Anyways! Hoping the next chapter comes quick since I think you cut this one off early? I'm sitting here like Odile watching the movie play out, hah.
Odette spent the rest of class trying to choke back the biting expletives she wanted to scream at Solene. There was a part of her that anguished over the beams that missed Dorien’s head, but fixating on that only threw fuel on the fire within her.
What were you thinking? she thought, firing venomous sidelong glances at the gothitelle throughout Chuquete’s lesson. Are you trying to blow our fucking cover? If it was literally anyone but you, it might have been passable, but you’re the one he drugged! You better say a fat fucking prayer he’s too traumatized to think too hard about it, or so fucking help me, we’re gonna have an enormous problem.
Sounds of an emery board scrubbing over fingernails joined up with her seething internal monologue. I will give credit where it’s due; her control is insane, Odile said. The move, not what she did. Though if she’d been a centimeter more precise she might have eliminated half of our current problem. And we’d probably be in jail.
Not. Now, Odette thought, sinking lower into her seat, trying to duck away from the rage pooling around her skull.
They could talk when they got home. It was their last class of the day. They could go home and have a very long conversation about restraint and trust and everything else it seemed that Odette and her team now had to work through. They were all supposed to be in this mess together, but with Enora’s clandestine past and Solene acting out on her own, how the fuck were they supposed to continue without risking the whole operation?
Valentin was already questioning the idea of keeping them involved, and surely if he found out about this faux pas, he wouldn’t hesitate to pull the plug. After finally having a breakthrough, after finally being able to piece her puzzle together, Odette wasn’t sure if she’d be able to handle being cut off like that. Whatever anger she’d successfully breathed out slithered back into her system and left her gritting her teeth so hard she felt one of her molars shift.
Class being dismissed was the repose her nerves needed, and she was the first one to begin standing and packing up her stuff, recalling her team to their pokeballs as she went. The gym had grown stuffy under the anxiety that sought to exacerbate her aggravation, and Odette knew a breath of crisp, petrichor-laden air might do her head some good. However, she couldn’t look too eager as she gathered her things. She couldn’t risk giving Dorien any more reason to suspect they were onto him, as if nearly being assassinated by the very ‘mon he’d memory wiped wasn’t clue enough.
So help me fucking gods, Odette thought. She was certain she saw steam on the breath she exhaled.
She counted the steps toward the front entrance of the battle building, using that as her distraction from Dorien’s arm slung around her shoulders, and from her brain trying its hardest to figure out how to do some damage control. What could she do that wouldn’t come off as suspicious?
She couldn’t amp the charm up too high; surely it wouldn’t take him long to figure out she was doing it as a distraction. Not to mention, that might be the end of her. She was barely hanging on as it was. She also didn’t want to keep bringing it up, under the possibility that he actually wasn’t thinking about it as hard as she was, and continuously drawing attention back to the incident would cause him to.
Odette had thought she’d toyed with enough niggling “what-if’s” over the past two days. Obviously, the universe didn’t agree with that assessment.
Her first breath of actual fresh air alleviated some of the tightness in her throat. She slanted a glance toward her bike, parked mere paces from the front door of the building among the other student’s motorcycles and mopeds. Her thoughts supercharged with ways to make a break for it—telling Dorien her mum needed her home, that a family member had suddenly died, something—but the fear of sowing more suspicion kept her rooted under his arm. Damn you, Sol, she thought, the weight of his forearm sending tingles of resentment across her skin. Gods fucking damn you right now.
Odile didn’t have a comment for that but Odette could hear the emery board again.
Dorien made his way down the stone stairs, forcing Odette along with him. The further they moved down the willow lined sidewalk, away from where her bike was parked, the more her hope of escaping him sooner rather than later faded out of certainty. They hadn’t seen each other in a week; of course he was going to want to lead her off on an escapade. She knew she should have been prepared for something like that, and yet the thought of having to spend the rest of the day with him churned the nausea in her gut.
“Where are we going?” she asked, forcing herself to look up at him instead of back over at her motorcycle.
The grin she received in response sent discomfort skipping along her nerve-endings. “Nowhere far. I have some previously scheduled plans with my friends and I’ve already rainchecked a few times and if I do it again, I won’t hear the end of it. I’m meeting them out front, and I just wanted you to show some face. Let everyone know you’re alive. Maybe ask if they wouldn’t mind having you along, for my sake. ”
A flare of hope synergized with the disdain of having to fraternize more with his little group. But, she would suck it up if it meant she had a chance to cut away earlier than anticipated. “The trials and tribulations of keeping relationships,” she sighed as if she were teetering on the edge of disappointment.
“I know,” Dorien said, petting her shoulder. “I’d say you’re worth it, but playing the social game is also part of my job. Besides, if we wanted to get technical, we could have seen each other sooner…”
The corner’s of Odette’s lips twitched with the threatening weight of a frown. She lasered in on him with an indignant look. “You’re going to make me apologize again?”
That earned her an abrupt kiss on the cheek. Had she known that was what was coming, she’d have kept her mouth shut. “No; I’m just pushing your buttons. But I’m done, I promise.”
“Are you?”
He held a pinky out to her. “Promise.”
As she wrapped hers around his, the impulse to snap the bone creeped up her back and into a dimly lit corner of her mind.
You better keep that hand steady, bitch.
Odette carefully pulled her hand away and tucked it into her jacket pocket. Safe and sound.
“Okay. I’ll say my hello’s and show them I’m still breathing.” Honestly, I’d prefer it if I was dead to them, she thought. “I have to ask, though; have you ever had to call an ambulance on anyone at one of those events? Just to know for the sake of my own embarrassment.”
“Actually, yes. You saw how many old bitties there were; you’d be surprised how many of them have underlying medical conditions that like to pick public affairs to flare up.” He flicked his hand around with a sarcastic cadence, matching the rhythm of his words.
He said you have the constitution of a grandma. When you eventually kill him, might I suggest a dull hacksaw? Really draws out the agony; I give it a solid eight stars out of 10, Odile snickered.
“Well, I unfortunately know a thing or two about that,” Odette said. She pretended not to hear Odile that time. She wasn’t sure what to do about the contradicting intrusions yet.
“Please, Doll. I wouldn’t exactly group the Duke of Joule’s alcohol-induced liver failure up with your hypotension episodes.” She felt his arm tighten around her shoulders, just slightly enough that she could brush it off as him readjusting, but just obviously enough that the new pressure she felt against the side of her neck lingered like a spoken threat. “Unless there’s some other secret reason why your blood pressure likes to drop?”
The load behind that question sent her pulse into a sprint. A little over 24 hours ago, it would have provoked confusion, maybe even some minute irritation. Now, she felt cold sweat flooding into her pores, contrasting heavily with the blazing fury searing away at the edges of her forced patience. He knew exactly what he was getting at and it made the thought of his demise sit a little easier in her imagination.
“No. Nothing besides me vacating the womb two months too early,” she said earnestly.
There wasn’t much else to be said before the unexpected growl of a car engine made Odette jolt. Dorien stifled a chuckle while he raised his free hand to steady her, then looked up expectantly as not one, not two, but three cars glided through the nearby roundabout and came to a sliding halt by the curb they were standing on.
Upon immediate examination, Odette could see they were exactly the kind of cars Dorien would be associated with. Their radically sleek silhouettes, low-rise builds, and sharp, ultra-modern detailing lent an air of lavishness to them that practically begged her to gawk. She was certainly more of a bike person, but even she wasn’t immune to the splendor of an expensive whip, let alone three of them.
Dorien was shaking his head now. “You know revving the engine like that just makes people think you’re not well endowed, right?”
All three sets of doors practically levitated open, and Odette’s moment of admiration was dashed by the arrival of Dorien’s little posse. All the familiar Lansat faces, plus the one who couldn’t keep his flirting to himself.
“Yeah, but it sounds so cool, I can’t help it,” Colin said, skipping in place like a happy lillipup before sauntering his way up the curb. He ignored Dorien and went straight for greeting Odette. Despite the fact he hung around assholes, he exuded a persona that was palatable in comparison to the others. While she didn’t have to try as hard to seem at ease around him, the fact he willingly hung with the rest of them kept him high on her shit list.
“So, that’s the only answer you really need,” Adam said, laughing at the glare Colin nailed him with. Once he settled himself, he nodded in Odette’s direction. “Sup, ma’am. This guy’s got you hostage again?”
“You know it,” she replied, hoping she didn’t sound as honest as she felt.
“C’mon Dorien, kidnapping is illegal,” Denis said while he exchanged the standard greeting kisses with her. They felt like they lingered just a moment too long.
“So is thinking I have to kidnap my girlfriend to make her hang out with me,” Dorien said. There was a dangerous warning brewing beneath his words, just present enough to send Denis rolling his eyes as he turned back toward the cars.
Whatever slivers of ease she’d found in Colin was lost to that exchange. She struggled to remember anything about the relationship she had with Denis before Vice Dust might have been introduced to the scenario. The blanks she drew tasted of panic and bile, exacerbated by the kiss Lionel suddenly planted on the back of her hand. She jerked her wrist away on instinct, not realizing how that might have looked. The way Dorien jumped between them eased her concerns; however, the outrage digging craters into his brow was a glorious sight to see, even at her own expense.
“Sorry, figured I’d keep our repertoire going,” Lionel smirked, eyeing Dorien with a smug satisfaction while he licked his unnaturally white veneers. “You’re welcome to return the favor to even the field.” He held his hand out as if expecting her to reciprocate.
“No thanks. I feel a cold sore coming on; don’t want to make it worse,” she said. She’d subconsciously started scratching her hand, like she was anticipating a welt to form. She listened to the mocking laughter being thrown around before it was drowned out by another Odile intrusion.
Noooooo, that was a missed opportunity to bite him. Show your fucking dominance, pussy.
That’s easily an assault charge, she thought. If I’m going down on one of those, it’s not going to be wasted on him.
Okay, I’m enjoying this process of elimination. Very executive of you. But you’re still a pussy.
Her eyeballs ached with the need to roll so she fixated back on the cars while the boys launched into a conversation that she was too poor to follow along with. She visually dissected every curve, every handle, every light on each of the car’s bodies, listening to the way their engines purred in harmony.
It was familiar. And not in a good way.
The one in the front in particular—a white Bugatti with a tasteful red trim and a very noticeable skeledirge decal stuck to the back window—tickled a deep annoyance within her the longer she looked at it. It had felt like she’d seen the exact car before, which was strange, because she was certain she’d never been this close to a Bugatti.
Her eyes then bounced to the other two; a slim light blue beast that she eventually discovered to be from a brand called Pagani, and a dim yellow curve of an Aston Martin. Slitting her eyes, she imagined herself just a few weeks back, sitting at the stoplight with Noel talking her ear off about hair care while she watched with compounding rage as a group of rich dickheads flew through a red light and nearly took them out.
These were those same cars. She recognized the colors. White, blue, yellow.
Crossing her arms to brace herself against her rapidly rising temper, she turned to Dorien.
“These cars look like they belong on a race track, not public roads,” she said, effectively interrupting their conversation about the price of diamonds in Johto or whatever the fuck they were on about.
Dorien gaped at her for a beat before chuckling toward a bemused smirk. “Oh, you noticed? Don’t worry, they get their fair share of racing in. I’m probably the best street racer in our inner circle, and nobody here needs to correct me.”
“Bull-fucking-shit; you’d be the best if the best were good at nearly skidding off fucking bridges,” Lionel retorted, resulting in a full-fledged spat between the two of them. Their arguing only bolstered Odette’s anger, and she felt her nails digging into the fabric of her jacket while her blood began to simmer on high.
Colin sighing pulled her from the boyish quarrel. She offered him a sidelong glance, just in time to catch him shaking his head. “You opened up a can of wurmples there, sis. Last time we went out, we absolutely tore down Metronome boulevard. Right after a storm too; shit was wild. But your idiot boyfriend did almost take out a barrier on an overpass bridge.”
“Which only happened because you distracted me,” Dorien hissed with an aggravated zeal Odette hadn’t yet seen on him. However, she’d become far more occupied with the fact that her little bait for information had worked.
Flashes of that night sped through her mind, just as fast as Dorien’s asshole posse had skidded through that intersection; the corner of Metronome boulevard and Bleakwind road. The red light had meant nothing to them. She and Noel would have been roadkill had she not been paying as much attention as she was. Would they have even stopped?
The sound of those luxury engines reverberating down the street, between the tight school buildings, beat on her eardrums along with the increasing tempo of her heartbeat. She had so many things she wanted to say, most of them starting with some variation of the words “kill” and “yourselves.” With that came the desire to trip Dorien to the floor and start wailing on him, preferably with a metal pipe.
“Careful, the cops will ticket you from here to kingdom come if they catch you.” She shoved her hands into her jogger pockets and went to work at the frayed threads along the seams.
“Wait, Cinq-Marsy, your grandad’s a cop isn’t he?” Denis asked.
She felt Dorien jolt at the nickname, and she also found herself doing a double-take. Familiarity poked tiny holes in her apparent Dust-induced amnesia, but not enough to jog any specific memories. All she knew was that she vaguely recalled that being a common nickname her peers had dubbed her. Grave nostalgia dammed up in her throat and she regarded him with a nod.
“Yeah. The chief.”
The low rumbles of juvenile hoots left Odette wanting to smash one of the car windshields. At least it might keep them from nearly running over some other poor schmuck for a few days. She tugged one of the pocket threads loose and felt a hole open up in the fabric.
“Oh shit. Cop granddaughter,” Lionel sneered. “Dory, you didn’t tell us you were dating a purebred narc.”
Odette decided that Lionel would likely be better company with a fresh bullet in his head.
Wow, you are zero to fucking a hundred today, aren’t you? Odile said. Again, enthusiasm is great, but can we save the actual murder until after we have answers?
Which is it? she seethed. Do you want me to lose my goddamn mind or am I pussy? Pick one, or when I go to sleep tonight, I’m showing up with a bat and playing baseball with your fucking head.
That’s a tough one. Let me consult the 8-ball.
The sound of sloshing water filled her thoughts. She briefly wondered if she could knock Odile—and perhaps herself—out by beating her head against the tree she was standing under. It felt like the only solution for such an asinine situation. Besides, she was sure that Magic 8-balls could only be asked yes-or-no questions.
It says ask again later.
Had Dorien not spoken up, she would have screamed in frustration.
“Guys, come on, Odie’s no snitch. Especially not in my regard, right Doll?”
Odette could practically taste the irony building in the air; thicker than the petrichor ever could be. She decided that allowing herself to laugh about it would be better than harping on the homicidal rage hitching a ride on her train of thought. Anything to keep her from having a meltdown right there on the curb.
“Of course. I know the adage. Snitches get stitches.” The next part felt harder to say. “I can hang.”
Mischief added an obnoxious glow to Lionel’s gray eyes. He gave a slow, dramatic gesture toward the Bugatti. “Well, with that said, are you comin’ along for lunch or what?”
“Oh, no.” That was far too forceful. She saw Dorien shoot a look at her out of the corner of her eye and realized she had to reel it in a little. “I won’t snitch on you, but if my grandpa finds out I fucked around in one of those, believe me, he’d find a way to ground me one last time. No thanks.”
“He’s okay with the motorcycle and not with the fully functional car?” Adam asked with a tilt of his head.
She grinned. “Never said he was okay with the bike.” That was the gods honest truth. “The sole difference is that I’m the only one driving the bike. And I tend to keep within the speed limit on public roads.”
She was proud of herself for being able to sneak a jab in, and it seemed to go over well enough judging by the way Dorien slung his arm back around her.
“Well, are you at least coming to the yacht party?” Denis spoke that time.
That gave her something else to think about that wasn’t destroying those cars or wishing Dorien had indeed driven off a bridge. In their text conversations throughout the week, Dorien had mentioned that another gathering was coming up; a yacht party indeed. The idea of getting back on a boat with him, knowing what he had done the last time they were on one, made her want to decline the invitation. But, this time around, it sounded like they wouldn’t be alone. Not that that would stop him from doing anything nefarious again.
But, if this involved the same group of people that had been at the gala and garden parties, then Valentin would likely be in attendance too, which meant an extra layer of protection. That helped ease her feelings on the matter.
“Oh. Right. Dorien mentioned that in some texts; I guess I am.”
“It’s next week; formal attire. Also, limited seating so unfortunately, no plus ones.”
Colin whining spoke everything she’d wanted to voice out loud. That much was news to her.
“Aw, so I’m not going to see Noel? I was gonna wear my new tux, dammit,” he said.
“I’ll have to break the news to him,” Odette said despite her mind having wandered fifty miles away. She knew that she wasn’t going to be able to drag Noel along to every Shiny Trade gathering Dorien took her to, but it still felt like that monkey wrench was bashing her in the temple. However, she’d survived one boat outing without him. She could manage another one, now that she was armed with knowledge and Valentin’s official protection.
“Are you sure you don’t want to come along?” Dorien asked, rubbing her shoulder as if to urge her into agreeing. “I’m sure you’ve never been in any cars like these, hm? And the invitation is extended.”
His hand against her skin felt like a grater, grinding her down until she had no choice but to say yes. “Grandpa’s strict upbringing still has me in a bit of a chokehold.” But, what choice did she have? She’d been invited without Dorien having to make any requests, and they hadn’t seen each other in over a week. Had Solene not almost decapitated him, she might have had some wiggle room to say no. Now, if she wanted to continue with her damage control, she felt she had no choice but to go along with it.
God fucking damn you Solene.
“So, I’ll just drive myself. See if your cars can stay in line with my lawful pace,” she taunted.
Dorien’s eyes shined with a hint of mischief, enticed by her challenge. He exchanged looks with the rest of his posse before leaving her with a smirk.
“You’re on,” he said. “We’re meeting at Gale Wings Bistro on Hadron road. Know it?”
She actually did know it. She remembered a relatively recent time where she, Acadia, and Noel were looking for a new place to eat, and Acadia had pulled the place up on her phone. After seeing that the cheapest thing on the menu was €40, they quickly realized they were not the target demographic for such an establishment.
“I do. See you there,” she replied, waving her fingers at him and the other prying eyes before making her way back to her bike. She had to focus on tempering her walking speed so she didn’t break into a full-blown sprint. Their eyes were a pressure against her back, one she had to ignore while she donned her helmet and revved the motorcycle to life. The sound was just enough to knock her anger down a notch.
She rolled herself out of the parking spot and down the street, coming to a stop next to the parked cars, still rumbling in place, unoccupied. The fuckface crew remained rooted in the same spots she’d left them in, watching her meander by with varying looks of wide-eyed interest and childlike competitiveness. At least she knew that the sight of a short woman on a motorcycle could momentarily stun them. She wasn’t sure where that information would prove useful, but it was something to remember.
Flipping up her visor, she raised a brow. “Take a picture, it’ll last longer,” she called. Disdain creeped into her words, but most of it was drowned out by the sound of her working motor. She revved it one more time, and after lowering her visor, she sped ahead. It wasn’t long before she heard those rich engines roaring to life behind her.
+++
They caught up to her rather quickly. Not that she was going particularly fast to begin with, but she wasn’t out for a casual Sunday ride, either. They all came to a stop at the last stop light before the highway leaving Santalune. She’d tried to pretend they weren’t there, but with the Bugatti on her left and the Pagani on her right, she was too cornered to play stupid. She heard the Bugatti’s window roll down, and turned to see Dorien’s stupid sunglasses-covered face making a visual meal out of her.
“You know, I never noticed before. But damn does a motorcycle suit you,” he called. Then he whistled. Never had a sound instilled such a deep sense of disgust in her.
Her grip tightened around her brake lever, and she thanked what was left of her lucky stars that her helmet’s visor was so dark. She could glare at him all she wanted, and he’d never know. She wondered if she could conduct the rest of her dates with him with it on.
“Yes, us shorties tend to do better on bikes. No gas pedal to worry about reaching,” she chided.
She couldn’t see who was in the car with him, but she heard laughter. It joined up with the giggles that echoed through her mind.
You know, I might have called you fat and said you were a dirty cunt, but have I told you that you’re also really funny? Odile said.
Was that your idea of a compliment?
‘Thank you Odile. You are also really funny and might I add, great at bloodstream design,’ Odile replied in a grating falsetto.
Before Odette could get into an internal argument, Dorien was talking again. “Speaking of gas pedals, surely that thing has some more speed on it?”
Canting her head at him, Odette huffed deeply, feeling her breath accumulate against the insulation of the helmet. “Nice try.”
“What, you’re afraid of being out sped by a couple of designer cars?”
“Sounds like it's the other way around.”
The Bugatti’s engine revved, and Odette felt her aggravation spike and her self-restraint wane.
“Come on; you claim to be so good at driving that thing, so show us boys how it’s done. Don’t be so wimpy,” Dorien heckled.
It was such a juvenile attempt at getting under her skin. But the issue at hand was that it was working, which only served to make her more upset.
She was not the most social dater in the past (at least, not that she remembered), but she was friends with enough boys to know how they acted around one another. What some of them spoke about. How some of them spoke about it. She could practically hear Dorien jeering about her riding skills, while being egged on into making more vulgar, sexually charged comments about how women looked on motorcycles.
The desire to press her gas switch down to the handle, to speed through the red light herself just to get away from him and silence the hypothetical commentary, was overpowering. She could tout on and on about her lawful driving practices, but it was evident Dorien knew exactly what to say and do to get her to consider throwing it all out the window. Just when she thought she couldn’t hate him any more, the space for her animosity expanded.
“I’m already doing that,” she said. She pumped the accelerator, just to sate her twitching thumb. As if that was all the stop light needed to change color, red blinked into green. She shot forward, not bothering to wait for any of the other cars around her to kick into gear.
The further she got away from them, the better she felt. The further she got down the highway, the less anger steamed her blood. It was amazing how quickly her strife and woes could be blown off by a speedy motorcycle ride down an open road. It was also amazing how quickly they could return by being passed up by six idiots in cars that likely would have killed her a few weeks ago.
It was obvious bait for her to follow, and despite her wrath-fueled desire to keep up, they’d already topped the speed limit ten times over what she’d decided to push it. The way they weaved in and out between the lanes also left her eye twitching, and she began to slow down out of spite.
“Fuck that,” she spat into her helmet. She’d gotten her fill. Now she could sit back and watch them be problematic dickheads from a safe distance, and she’d deal with the subtle digs about her apparent wimpiness when she got to the cafe.
Boys will be boys, Odile said in a deep sigh.
“Oh, do you consider yourself a male connoisseur now?” There was nobody around to hear, so it’s not like she had any reason to keep her responses internal.
There’s not much to be a “connoisseur” about. Most of them have the complexity of a single-celled organism.
“Good one,” Odette said, feeling the humored smirk playing on her lips. Sometimes Odile was capable of being funny. At least, when she wasn’t dropping that type of commentary in the middle of Odette fighting hypothetical tooth and nail not to lose her shit.
Still, she couldn’t quite afford to linger so far behind. She had a general idea of where Hadron road was, but it would be much easier to just follow along. So, she picked up the pace, just enough to ensure she could see the Aston Martin up ahead.
While it bobbed in and out between the other cars on the road, she could still catch sight of it from far off. However, with the gas the group was trying to put on those cars, it wasn’t long before she could no longer see them, even from a safe distance.
“Mother fucker,” she grumbled under her breath, leaning into a little more speed. Part of her started to wonder if that was a sign to just drive her ass home and forego the outing altogether. But, she could practically feel RotomPhone buzzing with accusatory texts from Dorien, wondering why she ditched him, and perhaps accusing her for setting Solene up for nearly decapitating in class.
Gods fucking damn you Solene.
The thought fueled her pressure on the accelerator, and she looped between lanes and slow-moving sedans to attempt to catch up with them. Bernard’s warnings about keeping a lawful speed once again rang in her head, as did images of that night she and Noel had nearly been run over. But, at that moment, she didn’t care. She decided that the faster she caught up, the faster the outing would finish, and the faster she could get home and scream bloody metaphorical murder into her pillow.
SCREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEECH.
A car she hadn’t seen coming suddenly tried to cut into her lane, not fully in front of her enough to allow for a safe clearance. It was mere centimeters from her front tire, and she swerved away to avoid impact, which subsequently landed her in front of a pickup truck going at least 20 miles over the speed limit.
Her brain didn’t have enough time to register what was happening. Instead, her body, and all the muscle memory she’d gained from years of operating a motorcycle, shifted into gear, and with a sharp turn of her handlebars, a calculated grip on the brake lever, and a loud and very wet shriek out of her tires, she was on the shoulder of the road, facing the opposite direction she’d been coming from.
Once the stillness registered with her, only then did she really begin to understand what had just happened.
A fucker who couldn’t drive, she tried to avoid it, and some poor sap in a truck nearly hit her…
Were she not as skilled with a motorcycle as she was, she’d have surely been roadkill, and her ghost would have been faced with the brunt end of Bernard’s grief-stricken I-told-you-so’s, and the eternal knowledge that she never got to kiss Valentin on the lips. As if she’d needed more of those to weigh down her psyche.
For a long moment, all she could hear was her heartbeat. The car tires driving over the wet asphalt, and the occasional horn registered to her as mere background noise as she stared down the barrier gate she’d come to an abrupt park next to.
No…fucking…way…
In the seven years she’d owned and operated a motorcycle, this was the first time she had ever been run off the road. She’d fallen learning to ride it, she’d had very close calls, but never that close. Of course, it had to happen today of all days. The day that was already batting a thousand, with thousands more likely coming.
Odette, take a breath. Odile’s voice was the loudest she’d heard it all day, and yet it still didn’t register within her. Not over her own thoughts, which had built up in intensity over such a short period of time.
Why do bad things keep happening to me?
Odette, STOP, YOU’RE TOO—
Warmth engulfed her senses, drowning out the frigid air and numbing the weight on her stomach. When she opened her eyes again, the left had gone dark, but it was the least of her concerns.
The shriek that came out of her was otherworldly. It was a culmination of her building vexation over the past 24 hours. It was everything she wanted to say, do, break, rolled into one single agonized sound.
She only stopped when a nearby street lamp exploded.
The sound of it jolted her back to her senses, abruptly shedding off the warmth and regaining the full range of her vision. That gave her just enough time to reel around and watch the glass fall to the ground in front of her bike. The sight of it barely registered with her before her knee joints disintegrated into jelly, and she sank to the asphalt while the world around her blurred into a mess of grays and whites. She had just enough sense to cling to the barrier gate, keeping her from totally collapsing onto her rear.
I’m…kill…stupid asshole…you…!
Odile sounded like she was speaking through a phone with a spotty signal. Odette couldn’t make out any one complete sentence, as most of the words waned into a distorted din that left her feeling lightheaded.
Do you…understand…bad…?
“I can’t…” Odette panted. Her cheek fell against her arm, still being held up by her iron grip on the railing. “…hear you…”
She wondered if she could reach one of her Pokeballs. She’d locked them, as was protocol when operating an open vehicle such as a motorcycle. Their voice activation keys would unlock them, but in her haze, Odette couldn’t remember what she’d set them to.
That was…close…
Water, Odette realized. I need water.
She’d left her reusable bottle at home, but Loïc had come in clutch with that other bottle he got for her before class. She finally willed her hand to let go of the railing, and reached around to the side pocket of her backpack to grab it. Shaky hands took far too long to get it open, and she didn’t have the cap fully off before she was trying to pour it into her mouth. Some of it splashed across her cheeks and dribbled down her chin and into the collar of her jacket. But, just enough made it into her mouth to perk her back up.
The highway before her reformed, her headache settled, and the static filling her head faded away into absolute clarity.
CAN YOU HEAR ME NOW, YOU ROOM TEMPERATURE IQ, THICKER-THAN-A-WHORE’S-FREE-CLINIC-BILL, WALKING, TALKING TRAINWRECK OF A GNOME?
Odette cried out and slapped a hand to her head, feeling her eardrum vibrating with the residuals of Odile’s scream.
“Yeah, loud and clear,” she winced, hanging her head between her knees. “Too clear. Lower your voice. And don’t call me a gnome.”
SHUT YOUR FUCKING MOUTH BEFORE I ENCASE YOUR VOCAL CORDS IN CONCRETE. Same volume. Odette was covering both of her ears now. DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA HOW CLOSE THAT WAS? WHAT DID I FUCKING TELL YOU?
“Stop yelling,” Odette growled to nothing. ”Please, I’m already struggling to keep my thoughts straight.”
Yeah, isn’t that the truth, Odile hissed. You are so lucky. You are SO amazingly fucking lucky, do you know that?
“Hard to call myself lucky when I’m barely clinging to consciousness on the side of a highway. Enlighten me, oh wise one.”
Odile’s cackle held no joy. You damn near forced me out. I had to hang on for dear life, you absolute paragon of an assholeism. You couldn’t tell? You didn’t feel anything different?
She had to think about it a little harder than usual, but Odette found herself shaking her head. “No, I definitely felt it. It felt…exactly like it did in the garden. When you repelled the desmocula.”
Huh! Crazy how that works! Odile said. That time, I poked out to save your ass on my own volition, but this time? All you. All you, yourself, and every other stupid part about you. Doing the exact thing I warned you not to do. Did I mention that you’re stupid? Because you’re STU—
“I got it!” Odette yelled.
Odile finally shut up, leaving just the sound of the passing cars as Odette’s company. As she sat there, replaying the past five minutes in her head, the feeling of moisture dripping down her cheek finally registered with her. Her breath hitched upon remembering the garden fiasco again, and she raised her trembling hand to wipe it away.
The blood coating her fingertips caused discontent to take root in her chest. This was the second time it had happened. Now, she had a full understanding of why it did, and that only set her teeth on edge. Crying blood was peak possession bullshit. She’d watched enough horror films to know that for a fact.
She steeled herself with a steadying breath before pushing herself up to stand, dragging her rebooting body over to get a good look at her rearview mirrors. She saw what was left of that crimson tear streak, it having traced the front of her cheek in its entirety before stopping just below her chin. Using her palm, she wiped the rest of it away, blinking rapidly to ensure there was none in her eye. She hadn’t felt or seen any, but she couldn’t be too sure.
“Is that supposed to happen?” she asked.
It’s a side effect of me coming to the forefront and physically inhabiting your body. So, yes. Kind of.
Odette sniffled at her reflection, then went to work trying to smooth out her hair. “Don’t you already inhabit my body?”
I inhabit your soul. It’s separate, Odile bit out. I can bang around in here as much as I like, but taking on your physical skin is a whole different beast, and is what just naturally happens on my way out the door as a technically uncaught blood type. For future reference, since we’re talking about it.
So, in the event that Odile did eventually come out, Odette would have to experience the discomfort of her eye bleeding again. That is, until she formally caught Odile. If she formally caught Odile. She made a reluctant mental note of that.
Now, more than ever, she was ready to go home. Both incidents—nearly being hit again and nearly expelling Odile—had surely taken decades off her lifespan, and now, she just craved a nap of an indeterminate length. If she wasn’t keen to sit through a lunch with Dorien and company before, she certainly wasn’t now. Especially knowing she’d already gotten so close to forcing Odile out, and he wasn’t even in her general vicinity. Who’s to say just laying eyes on him wouldn’t set her off on a second round of having a demonic tantrum?
At that thought, she snuck one more wary glance at the shattered glass from the street light.
“What caused that?” she asked.
Odile’s response was delayed. I feel like you’ve dealt with enough magical type Pokemon to know what the answer to that is.
Odette nodded to herself. Sometimes, a powerful enough ghost, or even psychic or fairy type, had strong enough magical energies that if they simply exerted themselves a little, they could cause certain technologies to go haywire—ranging from slight interference to absolute explosions. Vienna had explained it multiple times; something about strong magical energies being able to override those exerted by electronics and the like.
Of course, she should have expected as much out of something like Odile. Whatever hellish power she had under her legendary belt would likely put any of the magical-type 'mon she lived with to complete shame.
Odette briefly hoped the street lamps didn’t have built in cameras. She wasn’t sure how she’d go about explaining that one if she somehow got pulled in for questioning about vandalizing public property. Sorry, it wasn’t entirely my fault. The energy of the demonic legendary in my soul mostly caused that.
She could practically see a padded room in her future.
Running one last finger under her eye, Odette made doubly sure she’d gotten all of the blood off her water line and lower lid. She also checked to make sure none had dripped on her jacket or pants, finding, fortunately, that her white outfit remained unblemished. One less thing to be concerned about.
After deciding her head had mostly cleared, and that hydrating had left her feeling awake enough to drive, she moved to get back on her motorcycle. However, the lasting adrenaline in her system coiled up in her chest, squeezing with a vigor that left her shuddering in fear.
That had been way too close. She’d once again fallen victim to her rage and had nearly paid the ultimate price for it. Would Odile have been able to help her out of being crushed under a pickup truck? That was a question she decided she was happy to not know the answer to.
It wouldn’t be the last time she got angry today. Not by a long shot. But that would be the first and only time she let it put her in such a precarious situation.
HI I decided to spend my midnight reading this instead of RPing, oops. (That'll come tomorrow, promise.)
I... have surprisingly little to say about this chapter. I feel like I struggle to spend an entire chapter in just one or two scenes sometimes which I feel leads to some pacing issues, and this was a good lesson in heavy-but-not-overwhelming internal monologue to help deal with that. Anyway, considering all the things that one might imagine setting off the bomb only to have this tip the scale, I feel like you did a good job here of building up Odette's irritation to a breaking point without it feeling like it came out of nowhere. (Solene helped with that, but once you're in a bad mood, it's far easier to get frustrated at every little thing afterwards.)
I didn't actually realize this was Odile providing the sound the first time; I thought Odette herself was filing her nails as Odile spoke. This... makes a lot more sense. Anyways... there's a lot of internal stewing here, which only highlights the awkward silence when Dorien walks her out passed her bike. (If they were making small talk on their way out, it wasn't noted, prior to dragging her towards his friend group.) Juicy.
I inhabit your soul. It’s separate, Odile bit out. I can bang around in here as much as I like, but taking on your physical skin is a whole different beast, and is what just naturally happens on my way out the door as a technically uncaught blood type. For future reference, since we’re talking about it.
So, in the event that Odile did eventually come out, Odette would have to experience the discomfort of her eye bleeding again. That is, until she formally caught Odile. If she formally caught Odile. She made a reluctant mental note of that.
Hm. Okay, so definitely possible that Odile can fully take over Odette's body if she wanted/was allowed, albeit with some side effects. This seems to imply that Odile can physically come in and out of her at will, also, again with the side effects of a bloody eye. (I actually forgot she physically came out last time as opposed to like... a manifestation/representation. A personal issue, I know, but I tend to lose sight of events in between chapters due to time.) I'm not sure how being caught would change that, but something to keep en eye on. (Heh.) I guess the idea is that with Odile being formally in a ball, she wouldn't be inside Odette anymore? That feels too simple an explanation, given what I know of the pair, but maybe I'm meta-gaming this too hard.
Author's Note: Aaaaaaand now shit has hit the fan. We're really past the point of no return now.
While I was really happy with how this chapter went, I wasn't sure if the big reveal here was potent enough, or if Odette's reaction was too harsh. It could be because I'm being too harsh, or maybe there's some plot holes there, or maybe I could write it a little differently, but who knows! Right now, without any betas telling me otherwise, I think its fine
As always, thank you for reading 🤍
Lunch had been excruciating. But she survived.
As Odette stared into her tired reflection in her bathroom mirror, fresh out of a much needed shower, she really did wonder how the fuck she was still alive. Or how she hadn’t been arrested for assaulting somebody yet. She decided, after looking far too closely at the dark circles taking root under her eyes, that some mysteries were better left unsolved.
Any one on one time with Dorien was already bad enough. She’d hoped that being among his group would protect her from too many direct confrontations with him, but realized very quickly that she was stupid for thinking that was even possible. Being in that cafe had felt more like she was sitting in an echo chamber of infuriating wealth rather than among actual human beings. They all egged each other on, with her the butt of many of their poor taste “jokes,” leaving her to sit there and listen while she forced a €45 salad down her throat and tried not to set the place on fire.
Odette worked what was left of her hair mask through her loose, damp curls as she groaned to her reflection. Aside from nearly losing her life on the road and Odile nearly rupturing her eardrums, the rest of the afternoon had been mostly uneventful. Surely, the day was saving more of its obstacles for the rest of the evening, now that she was back in the comfort of her own home, with her fractured team and a weighty understanding that a mediation needed to happen sooner rather than later.
Not to mention, her mother would be home soon. That left a whole other area of issues to be explored; a thought that was not sitting pretty in her gut.
“Incoming text from Noel Masse! Bzzzzt.” RotomPhone alerted her. Odette had been glacially texting Noel since she walked in the door, and slid her finger over Rotom’s screen to read his most recent response.
Odette Cinq-Mars
Hey, I’m home. Need to decompress and am also waiting for mum to get home, too. I’ll come up later.
Noel Massé
did school suck? I didnt see u on the news so im assuming u didnt kill dorien yet (￣Д￣)ﾉ
Odette Cinq-Mars
Got close. Could use about 60 drinks.
Noel Massé
ill get my dad to break out the good wine then （╹◡╹）♡
Noel Massé
did u talk to Enora n Sol? (･_･;
Odette Cinq-Mars
Again. Could use about 60 drinks.
Noel Masse
oof…ok say less (ｰｰ;)
She grimaced at the response. Not because she was expecting a more peppy reply, but because it reminded her about how poorly everything had gone. From her argument with Enora to Solene trying to kill Dorien, she wasn't in an ideal position by any means. She began to type another broody message, when she received another notification from him.
Noel Masse
btw did Val text u by any chance? (・・?)
She scowled at the screen, then typed out a new reply.
No? Why?
Her thumb roved over the send button, when RotomPhone promptly notified her that she’d received another text. From her contact Clovis LeClair.
The breath she was inhaling caught in her throat, along with a little extra saliva, and she started hacking up her surprise into the crook of her arm.
Even through the incessant coughing, she was hasty in pulling up their texting thread. It was quite sparse, as they hadn’t messaged again after setting up their initial meeting, or even much prior. But now, the thread had populated with one single, oh-so-titillating text.
Clovis LeClair
Hi. Just wanted to check in on you and your team to see if you were alright? :)
A smiley face. That was a sign of something less professional, and more friendly, wasn’t it? She felt her fingers tingling with the need to respond as quickly as possible, but her brain knew that an immediate reply might come off as too desperate. But, if she waited too long, he might think the message was off base and unwanted, which was far from the truth.
Before she did anything else, she shot a message back to Noel.
Odette Cinq-Mars
He did just now.
Noel Massé
Bet. consider it a reward for ur hard day (^_−)−☆
Noel Massé
Go get im tiger ٩( ᐛ )و
She didn’t know what Noel did—more importantly, she wondered when he and Val had exchanged numbers—but she wasn’t going to ask. She’d become far too focused on crafting the perfect text back. Not too eager, but not too cold.
This was how she wanted to spend her energy for the rest of the evening. Trying to talk to Val felt far less problematic than trying to talk to her mother about Florent, or opening up the floor for another argument with Enora, or even trying to explain to Solene why attempted murder wasn’t the ideal approach to the game at hand. Still just as anxiety inducing, but it was the thing that was least likely to end in a fight. Or more secrets she didn’t know about coming out to ruin her night for the second time.
“You should tell him he has a nice butt, bzzzt,” RotomPhone commented. She could hear the mischievous static behind his words.
“First of all, you’re stupid and I hate you,” Odette said, her thumbs still working away at her keyboard. That got an electrical whir of a giggle from him. “Second of all, why do you know that?”
“So you admit it? You think he has a nice butt? Bzzzt?”
“Okay, don’t fucking Regina George me when I’m typing arguably the most important text of my life.” She sounded annoyed, but it wasn’t enough to stop the smirk playing on her lips. She appreciated his attempt at lightening the mood, even if that attempt involved her indirectly admitting to objectifying her crush. But it was true; she did think he had a nice butt.
With some struggling and repeated backtracking, she managed to string something decent together.
Hey. I’m fine 🙂
Wow, Odile finally cut in. Yeah, that’s really gonna get him to fuck you. Flirting champion of the world right here.
Odette glared at the screen only because Odile wasn’t present to look at instead. “Shut your godsdamn mouth. Or…yeah, your mouth,” she muttered, tapping the backspace key until her diminutive message disappeared. She grit her teeth through the irksome cackling that swelled in her mind.
“You’re thinking too hard, bzzzt,” RotomPhone said. “You can definitely give him more than that.”
Of course she agreed, but with everything else banging around upstairs, writing a coherent text that wasn’t offputting wasn’t coming so easy. The fact that it was Val made it so much more difficult.
Loaded question, but we made it home without accruing a criminal record. Feels like a win 🫠
They had the same sardonic sense of humor and it always came into play whenever they spoke. Somehow, that felt right. Before she could think about it much harder, she sent it.
And now we wait to see if you just fucked your chances of him fucking you, Odile said. Odette could hear the taunting grin in her voice, and her fingers started to curl. Loïc scurried into the bathroom before she could do anything too rash, hissing something incoherent as he ran a lap around her feet.
“What?” Odette asked, just in time to hear the front door of the apartment open, followed by the sound of Vienna having a one-sided conversation. Likely on the phone.
Vienna’s voice caused Odette’s body to seize up. Loïc scurried his way up her leg and sat himself on her shoulder, nestling into the fabric of her oversized Ghost Trainers of Kalos t-shirt like he was attempting to calm her down from the emotional high she just shot up to. She’d have thanked him if she had the capacity to do anything else but stare blankly at her bathroom door.
Texting Val suddenly didn’t take precedence. All she could contemplate was approaching her mum. Their conversation from the morning hadn’t gone according to plan because she’d found herself incapable of getting the words out. Vienna had been rushing to get out the door at that time, but now, Odette had the whole night to ask her that pressing question. She had no excuse.
Interrogation round two? Odile asked.
Odette steeled herself with a shallow breath, locking RotomPhone’s screen as she walked toward the door. “Interrogation round two,” she murmured.
She was bombarded with the smell of takeout—it smelled vaguely Paldean—and the sight of Vienna standing in the kitchen, Iris and Thea flanking her sides. They were trying to listen in on the conversation while Vienna chatted about something about a research project. Two many technical terms and numbers were being thrown around for Odette to keep up.
She noticed the space was rather devoid of her own team, though she should have expected as much. Enora and Solene didn’t come out of their balls after getting home, and Isaur decided she wanted to nap until dinnertime, having tired herself out after filling up at the bistro. Ange had said that he was, quote, “straight up not having a good time because everyone was too tense,” and wanted some reprieve in his ball. That left Loïc, who’d taken to roaming as normal. He occasionally approached Odette to bat her ankles, bring her a dust bunny, or ask her if she wanted a pecha berry from the freezer. She politely declined every time.
Upon meeting Odette’s eye, Vienna lit up, waving her fingers in an eager silent greeting, with Thea and Iris quick to mimic. She gestured to the neatly tied bags she’d stacked on the counters. “Dinner,” she mouthed, holding her phone slightly away from her ear. She tried to say something else, but was promptly pulled back into the conversation on the line. “No, yeah, yeah, yeah, we’ve studied that haunt hundreds of times so it should just be routine…”
Odette waved back, leaning against the entrance to her hallway, giving the three of them a chance to finish their call before she approached. She trained a half smile on her lips, hoping it would smother the deafening volume of her heart beating. She began to say a silent prayer that Vienna would be on that phone call for the rest of the night, but she wasn’t holding her breath.
Watching her mum pace around the kitchen, she felt RotomPhone vibrate in her hand. She jolted at the unexpected feeling, lowering her gaze to read the notification that lit up the screen, just in time for another one to pop up.
Clovis LeClair
I reckon that’s about all we could ask for today, but I’m happy to read it. Did anything of note happen?
Clovis LeClair
Also, I apologize if I’m overstepping!
Against its own panicked pace, Odette’s heart fluttered. His response hadn’t taken long at all, and not only was he asking about her day, he’d double texted. She got him with the sardonic humor approach, hook, line, and sinker. Breifly distracted from the idea of talking to Vienna, she held RotomPhone to her nose while she ruminated on her next reply.
Should she double text back? It took a lot of nerve to do something like that, and she wanted to match his energy. She wanted to tell him he could never overstep…of course, without overstepping herself.
“Okay, talk later. Bye,” Vienna said. Odette looked up in time to see her clicking her phone off and throwing her arms in the air.
“Honeeeeeeeey, I’m hoooooome,” she sang; off key as usual. Thea proceeded to shy away from her intentionally awful singing while Iris even attempted to cover her mouth. “Stooooppppp, you suuuuck,” the reuniclus whined.
“I’m taking that as my cue to go freshen up; good luck Odette,” Thea said flatly as she picked up her pokeball and hovered off down the hallway to Vienna’s bedroom.
“You’ll hit that note one day,” Odette heckled, crossing her arms and wiping away whatever traces of puppy love that had appeared on her face.
“But not today,” Vienna sighed. She nudged Iris off of her, and Iris took that defeat as an excuse to also hover off to presumably freshen up for dinner as well.
“You hungry at all?” she called as she began to untie one of the takeout bags. “I was trying to tell you, we picked up from Asado, so we’re all eating hella good tonight. Where’s the rest of the team?”
Odette shifted her weight to her left leg uncomfortably, exchanging glances with Loïc. “Oh, in their balls. Had a hard lesson in Battle Performance today, so they’re all pretty drained.”
That was mostly the truth.
“Welp, a hearty meal should perk them right back up. How was the rest of your day? Made it to school just fine?”
“Yeah.” She paused. She was probably going to regret what she had to say next, but there was a method to the madness. She hoped. “But I almost crashed on the ride back, so that was fun.”
Vienna bristled. It was such a visceral reaction that Odette became very glad Iris and Thea had left the room. Vienna alone was enough, knowing Iris likely would have had a full-blown meltdown, and Thea would have given her that disappointed look that always made her flinch. She wasn’t in the mood for either.
“Oh, for fuck’s sake.” Vienna leaned against the counter, looking ready to jump over the bar top to get to her. “Don’t tell me that. Are you okay?”
“I’m standing here uninjured, am I not?” Odette offered, shrugging.
A motherly sternness clouded Vienna’s stare, her glossed lips tightening into a dull frown. “You better hope your grandfather doesn’t find out; he’ll kill you, and then I’ll never hear the end of it for letting you get that stupid bike in the first place.”
“Well, thank the gods you’re the first and only person I’ve told.”
Groaning, Vienna pushed herself up to stand and dragged herself out of the kitchen and over to where Odette was standing. When she was close enough, she gave Odette a scrutinizing once over, pursing her lips in a manner that indicated she had a lecture locked and loaded.
“Look, I might not be as bad as him, but it still scares the shit out of me how you ride that thing sometimes,” she said. “You’ve never almost crashed; what happened?”
“That you know of.” Vienna didn’t find the response as witty as Odette thought it was, because she slit her eyes dangerously.
“I’ll ground the fuck out of you right now, young lady. Don’t test me.” Her tone bore an odd mixture of jest and seriousness, and it sent Odette’s eyes rolling.
“I just…got mad. Mind full, you know?” she said.
Some of the tension left Vienna’s shoulders, blown out by a sigh. She reached out and cupped Odette’s face, squeezing her cheeks together just tight enough that it forced her lips to pucker.
“You’re always mind full and mad. So, yes. I do.” She planted a hard peck on Odette’s forehead before letting her go. “What’s got you clogged up?”
Odette grimaced. “Ugh, don’t say it like that. Makes it sound like I’m constipated.”
“You call me disgusting all the time, so you should just expect it at this point, hun.”
With her frown sinking lower, Odette swapped one more look with Loïc. She used the urgency glinting off his beady eyes as the push she needed to spit out what she wanted to say. The setup could not have been more perfect, and she couldn’t lose her momentum now.
“I…I was thinking lately.“ Spit it out. Just do it. Rip off the bandage. “You’ve never really talked to me about my dad before.”
Vienna’s head recoiled while astonishment ignited in her eyes. “Huh.” It was her turn to cross her arms. “Of all the things I thought you were going to say, that was not one of them.”
“I know, it’s just…” What kind of lie could she tell to segue into this? “Noel and I were talking a lot about dad stuff the other day, and it kinda got me thinking.” That was good enough. She knew Noel would play along if asked, and it wasn't entirely far from the truth. They had argued about it a little just last night.
“I know Grandpa has always been the ‘man’ in my life, but he was always ‘Grandpa.’ Never really ‘Dad.’ I didn’t ask about it as a kid because I don’t think I cared that much, but now that I’m a little older and have had time to think on it, I’m a little curious. Like, who am I the other half of?”
Having successfully rid herself of the surprise, Vienna’s face scrunched with steely contemplation. Odette wondered if she was going to be met with a metaphorical stone wall—a thought that made her back tingle and insults ball up on her tongue—or if she was going to be met with an interrogation about why she cared that much—a thought that had her frantically putting together fibs to tell that weren’t “I’m involved in an undercover sting operation for my apparent biological father’s cultish drug ring.”
“Hm. No, that’s fair.” Vienna reached up to scratch her head, then flashed a stiff grin that effectively trashed all of the half-assed falsehoods Odette had conjured up. But, it didn’t settle her head entirely. “I figured you’d ask one day, just not so soon.” The irony in her comment prompted both of them to laugh, but the laughter didn’t feel very sincere on either end. Whatever bubbling anger Odette felt was cooled off by an icy, gnawing agitation.
Vienna had to know. About Florent. About what he was up to. About Venira. About most of the topics that had been uncovered yesterday. There weren’t a lot of other things Odette could think of that would warrant such a hesitant reaction, no matter how subtle it was. Most of the talking points a normal single mother with a lovechild would be scared to tell their kid, Odette already knew. Unless, now that she was thinking about it, Florent had just done something unspeakable to Vienna—something she wasn’t fully comfortable talking about even now—in which case…that would open a new can of wurmples. And would likely result in Odette finally puking up every last drop of grief she’d been swallowing down. She tried not to dwell on that hypothetical guilt for fear she’d lose her nerve and scamper back off to her bedroom like the pathetic possessed idiot she was.
With a huff, Vienna slid into one of the dining table chairs. She’d started running her fingers through the curls that framed her face as she tended to do when she was deep in thought. Odette could also see she was tonguing the inside of her cheek, something she did when what she wanted to say wasn’t particularly positive. They already weren’t off to a great start. Odette pulled up the seat next to her, folding her hands in her lap to prevent herself from compulsively loosening any threads on her shirt.
“Well, what have I already told you? He was a lot older than me. I met him when I was in Galar on an exchange program; he told me he was Galarian, and he had the accent, so I believed him. I also suspected there was some Paldean in him, too.” Brown eyes swerved up to the ceiling, where they got caught on the closed air vent. “Uh, very wealthy. Some business stuff; I admittedly don’t remember much about it. We were only together for about two months and it was 22 years ago. I know I also told you that you weren’t exactly planned.”
None of that information was news to Odette. Just a recap. “Right,” she said. Now it was time to really poke. “But did he know about me?”
Vienna hesitated. A thought darkened face, but she blinked it away before Odette had a chance to analyze it. “No. I knew someone of his stature wouldn’t want the stigma of having a kid with a girl half his age; out of wedlock, no less. Didn’t want to put myself in a position where he might have told me to not have you. And, believe it or not, while I was 18 and stupid, I really did want you.”
“So it’s not as much he wanted nothing to do with a baby; he just doesn’t know.” It wasn’t exactly a startling revelation; in the select few times she’d wondered about it growing up, that always felt like a possibility despite Vienna’s specificity. Besides, if he didn’t know before, he definitely knew now. Vienna nodded grimly.
“I know I’ve told you that I didn’t like him very much, but really. He was a fucking asshole. Really nasty to me. So a part of that was just me trying to keep you away from him, too. I didn’t want you to deal with the brunt end of that.”
That hypothetical guilt began to skip along Odette’s nerves again while nausea pooled saliva on her tongue. Was she making a mistake, poking her mother like this? Was she uncovering some horrible past event that Vienna had tried for years and years to hide away, only to have it prodded out of her by her Wrath-fueled ingrate of a child?
“Wait…did he hurt you? Or…?” She couldn’t finish the sentence; not before the word got stuck in her throat and cut off the breath she was taking. The idea of Florent Lambourne doing anything inherently violent to her mother made her want to drop a nuke on Lumiose in its entirety. Vienna gasped and slammed her palm flat over her chest.
“No, no. Gods, no. Nothing like that, oh gods.” She reached that same hand out and clamped her hand tightly around Odette’s wrist, as if trying to keep her physical body from reaching the height her brain had. She also spoke so forcefully that Odette couldn’t doubt the answer, and she felt the bile burning her throat seep back down to its rightful place in her stomach.
“He never laid a hand on me. It was more just verbal, mind game-y bullshit. He’d say some really off putting nonsense, or he’d condescend me whenever he could. He’d get upset if I didn’t agree with him, or gaslight me if I was angry at him for any reason. Stuff that made me wonder if he was actually 32, and stuff that, looking back now, makes me wonder how and why I stuck around for as long as I did. Sucker for a gorgeous face, I guess,” she added under her breath. “If it had ever gotten physical, I wouldn’t have lasted as long, I’m sure.”
While Odette was glad she wouldn’t have to wallow in the self-reproach of forcing her mother to dredge up a traumatic past, she was still left trying not to let her impatience play on her face. So if it wasn’t anything that bad, then what else was there? It wasn’t something that affected Verinna’s schooling; she still graduated top of her class and became a well-respected Pokemon Professor. Her relationship with Bernard and Marieanne was as ideal as a parent-adult daughter relationship could be. She had a roof over her head in Lumiose fucking City, and a daughter who (currently) loved her. She’d never been shy about owning up to the fact she’d gotten pregnant off of a taboo fling, so there was no shame to power her hesitation, either.
So, did she know?
Odette nodded along with Vienna, willing herself a couple seconds to pause to feign a deep digestion of the information. Since appearances had come up, she decided to ask, just to keep the conversation moving. “Do I look anything like him?”
Pressing her lips into a tight line, Vienna shifted her sitting position so she could rest her chin in her palm. Her eyes didn’t leave Odette’s as she groaned.
“A little.” She reached out and brushed a strand of Odette’s hair away from the rim of her glasses. “The one thing I remember most distinctly about him was that he had the reddest eyes, and you sure as shit got those eyes.”
Odette thought her stomach couldn’t have sunk any lower, but she was feeling it near her ankles now.
“But you got way more of me. My little ruby-eyed clone.” A smile worked its way back onto Vienna’s lips. It was supposed to be comforting, but Odette was in no state of mind to feel comforted by or about anything. “Not that I’d have loved you any less either way.”
Would she love you any less if she knew you were possessed?
Odette didn’t exactly appreciate the intrusion, but the question was valid. That was, of course, implying Vienna didn’t know, which she was far less sure of than she was a few moments ago. Bitterness from her 48 hours of life-altering revelations curdled her blood, and she lended some of that flavor to her next question. “Are you sure I got more of you, though? I don’t think my sea of medical issues and temper run in Cinq-Mars genes.”
That steely look reprised itself with a more severe edge. “Why does that have to be genes?” Vienna retorted. “You had a horrifically traumatic birth; you were two months premature. That was guaranteed to cause problems, and those problems manifested in hormone imbalances, a fucked up immune system, and some emotional regulation issues.” After letting the words hang around them for enough time, the frown she followed up with was laced with unease.
“Is that what this is about?”
Odette wasn’t sure what to say. Vienna‘s response felt too severe for the question; enough to kick up the dread coursing through her. She supposed she could play it off as motherly concern for her child’s self esteem; Odette hadn’t been coy about her disdain for her health or her penchant for losing her proverbial shit. But there was just a tad too much force in Vienna’s words; a tad too much frustration.
“No,” was her knee-jerk response. But the sickly feeling in her gut forced another. “I mean, a little? Am I wrong for wondering?”
“You’re definitely not. But I do think you’re a little silly for thinking your grief with that stuff will be eased by, for all intents and purposes, a sperm donor.” Vienna was rubbing her forehead now, and it looked like whatever energy she’d had upon returning home from work had been sapped away. “If he’s anything like I remember, he’d probably find a way to make your feelings about that worse. Or, maybe he got prostate cancer or something and that’s what all of his energy is going into nowadays so he wouldn’t have the time to bring it up. Even better, maybe it killed him already, so no need to bother wondering.”
There was a severe layer of vitriol in the latter half of that statement. “Prostate cancer isn’t funny,” Odette scolded, hoping to bait a harsher response. One that spilled a little more information.
“Hence why I said what I said. The only thing he was good for was giving me you. Otherwise, good riddance.”
Vienna had supplicated various harsh fates upon the people that had wronged her over the years. When a colleague copied six months worth of her research statistics centered around evolutionary forms for aegislash and passed them off as his own, she not only wanted him stripped of his license, but prayed he’d also get stuck naked in a pen with seven wild stunky. When a newbie tried to usurp a promotion from her on the premise of nepotism, she conjured probable ways the newbie could have her trust fund legally forfeited and given to a nonprofit centered around discovering a vibrator-form rotom. While most of her threats were bizarre at best and unsavory at worst, never had she wished a death upon anyone.
“Got it,” Odette acknowledged. “You don’t just hate him. You really fucking hate him.”
Remorse painted a shadow across Vienna’s face. She must have had the same realization Odette had, because she pinched the bridge of her nose as if she were exasperated with herself. “I-I’m sorry. I know it’s probably not what you want to hear, but I don’t want to sugarcoat any of this. It wasn’t some fairytale fling with an amicable ending. It might have started that way, but it didn’t last. I didn’t like having to tell you your biological father was a dick, but I didn’t want you to grow up thinking he was some amazing mystery figure, either. I didn’t want to risk anything about him clouding what you might think about yourself. I also didn’t want to risk him perhaps physically showing up to make your life harder.”
Too late for that, Odile said, right on par with Odette’s thoughts.
Odette wasn’t necessarily angry at any of this information. A lot of it was just specifying things she knew or inferred, or things she had time to stew in since last night. When it was all said and done, she doubted she could feel any worse about herself as it related to her paternal ties, and she truly did understand where Vienna was coming from. If Vienna was being as sincere as she sounded, it just seemed like she’d just been acting in the best interest of her unfortunate bastard child. Being the product of a teen pregnancy, a traumatic birth, and a childhood of medical issues was bad enough, but to have the looming image of a romanticized father figure hanging over her, only for it to be dashed by a dose of reality likely would have made it all so much worse. If what she was dealing with now was any indication.
“I understand.” Odette offered a smile, one that didn’t feel too difficult to put on. The way it seemed to break the rigidity of Vienna’s posture loosened some of the knots in her gut. “And thank you.”
“Of course. And this is where I apologize for being a psychotic teenager and having you under psychotic circumstances. But, I think you turned out A-okay anyway,” Vienna grinned, reaching over to land an affectionate poke against Odette’s cheek. Loic purred and nuzzled into her other one, like he was trying to drive the point home.
“It’s okay. But, you can make it up to me by answering one more question.” With the reencouraging warmth settling her soul, she felt that now was better than ever to ask her ace question. Most of the mental barriers around the conversation had crumbled with the sudden arrival of some candid, albeit pretty intense discourse. The roads were paved, the walls were down, and she felt more comfortable than ever asking.
“Can you at least tell me his name?”
It was simple. Risking her motorcycle autonomy and the probability of Vienna recounting a horrific experience with her fucked up baby daddy led to that simple question. Odette would ask her for name, Vienna would say “Florent,” she would answer “Lambourne?” and they would discuss it. While the discussion itself felt fuzzy in Odette’s head, the lead up to it was as sure as her crush on Val. It was such a simple question that there should have been no other way around it.
She says Florent. I say Lambourne.
A heavy pause that reeked of dubiety.
She says Florent. I say Lambourne.
Vienna averted her eyes for a split second. It was so quick she probably didn’t realize she did it. It gave the perfect opening for dread to take Odette’s chest in a tight grip and wring her dry of every last drop of warmth she’d gathered.
Florent. Lambourne.
“Aurelius.”
The lie struck Odette harder than she’d anticipated it would, piercing her soul and sending shockwaves of chilly betrayal through her blood. It cooled off any chance of her losing her temper, as all she could feel was that single word, that single lie, rocking her already rocked world.
“That’s a pretentious ass name.”
“For a pretentious ass man.” Vienna’s comeback was firm and unrelenting. She wasn’t budging. That was her final answer.
Odette tried to reason with it. Perhaps everything she’d been told yesterday was incorrect; that, in fact, her father’s real name was Aurelius, he happened to also have red eyes, was involved in some vague business dealings, and this was all a big misunderstanding. She wasn’t actually related to Florent, and she had nothing to do with the sacrilege crisis or his ties to those bloody legendaries.
But, she’d seen the picture. Odile had confirmed it without a shadow of a doubt, and of course the god with a blood affinity who’d been aware of the Lambourne bloodline for a thousand years would know. Florent was her father, and Vienna was not keen on letting her know that herself.
Ouch, Odile said. For once, she sounded remorseful.
Maybe Florent had given Vienna a fake name. Maybe she didn’t know any better, and was certain that was his real name. But that slight pause was deafening. She’d had the right answer in mind, and yet she hesitated. Hesitated like someone quickly thinking up a lie would.
“Sounds fitting,” Odette said. “At least, if anything, I didn’t get any of that pretentiousness.”
The relief in Vienna’s smile made Odette want to vomit. “That you did not. You’re about as far from him personality-wise as anybody can get.”
Are you sure about that, Mother?
“Was there anything else?” she asked.
Yes. Why are you a fucking liar?
“No. But I’ll let you know if something else comes up.”
“Of course. I’ll answer any questions you have as best as I can.”
Liar.
Odette managed a tight-lipped grin, pushing herself up to stand despite the way the room around her swam. The knot in her chest was tight; suffocating. Her nose stung under its weight, and she could feel a pressure welling behind her eyes. “I’m gonna go get the rest of the team. I’m sure they’re starving.”
“Don’t take too long,” Vienna beamed as she hustled back toward the kitchen to continue fiddling with the bags. “I definitely don’t want this getting cold.”
Odette was already pushing open the door to her room before she could respond. She could no longer find words, instead sending a single nod her mother’s way before slipping through the crack in her door. Her back hadn’t fallen against it before she felt the tears rolling down her face. The breath she let out ached of a metaphorical gut punch, hurting so badly that she wished she’d been actually punched instead. That pain might have been more bearable.
She tried to ground herself in the familiar sight of her bedroom. The dark turquoise walls. The white wire-framed bed. Her disheveled ghost-type purple bedding. Loïc’s weight on her shoulder. RotomPhone in her hand. Her team, gazing wide-eyed at her from their spot, huddled near the door.
Ange. Isaur. Solene. Enora. Out of their balls, all having clearly been listening in on the conversation at hand. Odette’s own despair was briefly alleviated by the realization that they looked just as dumbfounded as she felt, only for another round of tears to blind her with a rush of anguish. Knees shaking, she stumbled her way to her chair, dumped her pile of clothes to the floor, and threw herself down in it before setting RotomPhone on her desk.
She tried to go through the motions of calming down as if she were about to lose her temper. She tried to breathe, but felt each inhale getting caught in her lungs, driving her to the peak of hyperventilation. She tried to mutter her way through a Purrloins! song, but the lyrics came out in a mindless garble that did nothing to soothe the sting of deception. She tried to remind herself how much she hated crying, and how stupid she probably looked, but that only drove her to sobs so deep, she had to double over, sending Loïc to scramble to her back.
Screams boiled in the back of her throat, held back by her hands muffling her cries. She clawed her nails into her cheeks, trying to rid herself of the desire to punch a hole in her wall. She wanted to march back out to the kitchen and throw every curse word; every nasty slang word she knew at Vienna. Her eyes flicked over to where she’d sat her phone, and she considered the possibility of texting Noel. Or finally responding to Val. He was surely waiting on her, and focusing back on him might be a cure-all for her obnoxious weeping.
Despite everything her body craved, she could only sit there and silently cry in plain view of her fragmented team. Pathetic.
As if the thought of her friends willed it, she felt arms wrap around her. Then another pair, colder to the touch. Then another, more metallic. Then something soft nuzzled into her leg, while burlap dug into the nape of her neck. She raised her head to see Solene rest her head on her shoulder, and Ange hovering near her face. Isaur had spread her arms over her back, and Enora was now protectively curled around her ankle, glowing with an aura that slowly but surely alleviated the biting chill that had clamped around Odette’s heart.
The warmth of her team’s collective embrace brought Odette back to her senses, allowing her to breathe through the last of her cries. She straightened her posture, just enough to feel Loïc scurry to the top of her head, while nobody else shifted.
Exhaling, Odette covered Solene’s hand with hers, and she felt the gothitelle squeeze her fingers. She looked down at Enora, seeing the clear tear marks tracing the fur on her cheeks. An apologetic frown wrinkled her brow, and said everything that needed to be said in that moment. Just as the hugs did.
I'm a little sad we didn't get to actually see the aftermath/the lunch meetup here, but I suppose if nothing truly worth showing happened, that's for the best.
Call me dumb, but I can't quite... figure out what this means. What is a 'hair mask'? Or is it meant to be her hair itself that is masking her face? I feel like there's a word or two missing here, like something got cut in editing that shouldn't have.
You know, I thought maybe I was overthinking it when I made this comparison, only to be slapped in the face with confirmation on the very next line. Exquisite taste.
That aside, something else about this line I felt required addressing...
He occasionally approached Odette to bat her ankles, bring her a dust bunny, or ask her if she wanted a pecha berry from the freezer. She politely declined every time.
What is going on inside her head? Where do thoughts like this even come from? You've got this whole 'high-school crush brainfog' thing down so damn well, but I simply do not comprehend any of it. I could never write like this.
I was joking about the high-school comment, but now... I'm wondering (and hoping I hadn't asked this in a previous review), how old is Odette at this point? I'm pretty sure she was in her early 20s in AQ and such, and I swore the classes she's taking with Dorien were post-high-school, but if she's old enough to be grounded by her mother...? Unless this was some sort of parental jest, but given how otherwise seriously Vienna's attitude is here in response to Odette's casual indifference about nearly crashing, I wouldn't expect this to be meant as a lighthearted joke. (Yes, I did see that they cool down immediately after this, but up to this point, it had felt like tension was high.)
Hm. Since meeting Odile outside the story, I don't think I ever once considered whether Vienna knows/knew Odile or not. Sure, Dorien would probably have met her at some point, and I know her friends (current and futurel) do. Florent, obviously. But I never considered a scenario where Odile and Vienna interact. That's a curious thought. I guess I imagine they probably have to meet at some point down the line; Odette can't keep that secret forever, especially once Odile... well, grows into her role, shall we say.
“Well, what have I already told you? He was a lot older than me. I met him when I was in Galar on an exchange program; he told me he was Galarian, and he had the accent, so I believed him. I also suspected there was some Paldean in him, too.” Brown eyes swerved up to the ceiling, where they got caught on the closed air vent. “Uh, very wealthy. Some business stuff; I admittedly don’t remember much about it. We were only together for about two months and it was 22 years ago. I know I also told you that you weren’t exactly planned.”
I was going to say, even without the satanic drug cult in the background, a kid asking their divorced, single mother who their father is could in itself be an awkward question, and honestly hesitation would therefore be a perfectly justified response from Vienna. But given said additional context (as well as, I imagine, Vienna's personality) that the reader (and Odette) already knows, I suppose it's easier for Odette to jump right to the conclusion that that's why Vienna hesitated, because she must know something.
Anyway, not a lot of new info here, at least nothing I wouldn't expect Odette to already know. Feels like Vienna's being intentionally vague.
This does also... sort of answer the 'how old is Odette' question, too, I suppose, but it does further my confusion regarding Vienna grounding her. I guess a 'my house, my rules' kind of thing?
she conjured probable ways the newbie could have her trust fund legally forfeited and given to a nonprofit centered around discovering a vibrator-form rotom.
And that's all I'll say about rotom-powered sex toys. Moving on from that, though... It was around here where Vienna's... contemplating Florent's death that made me feel like her responses were a bit extreme for the crimes he'd committed against her. Especially considering the narration states she'd never before wished death on anyone who'd wronged her. I'm not the detective that Val is, but perhaps she does know more than she's letting on here. This is the first time in their conversation that I really feel it.
Calling bullshit. Either some kind of alias he'd given Vienna, or she herself made that up a long time ago for if/when she ever had to have this conversation. My only question is which path it is.
Maybe Florent had given Vienna a fake name. Maybe she didn’t know any better, and was certain that was his real name. But that slight pause was deafening. She’d had the right answer in mind, and yet she hesitated. Hesitated like someone quickly thinking up a lie would.
Oh. Well, narration makes it pretty clear here that Odette feels it's Vienna herself making it up on the spot. It is somewhat interesting, then, that if Vienna had been so determined for the last 22 years to never let him and Odette interact, that she hadn't at some point made up a name to feed her; surely, at some point, she'd know Odette would come asking eventually... right?
(Earlier in the chapter, Odette/narration mentions that she'd never really cared due to being too young or whatever, so I suppose that's meant to be the justification for why Vienna wouldn't have expected this conversation to ever happen? But surely Vienna would have been better prepared than this, just in case, given the severity of wanting to keep his identity secret. Unless... she did and in the heat of the moment the fake name just... slipped her mind? But that isn't really the vibe I got, considering how we've [I've] now made a big deal out of how the story draws attention to Vienna's hesitation being abnormal; it pretty clearly wants us to think she just thought of a name in this very moment.)
Am I overthinking this? Probably.
WHEW! In regards to your author's note... I don't think I'm qualified to judge whether or not the twist here was potent enough, considering that I do have outside background meta-knowledge from AQ and the like. (Assuming, of course, that what I do know is accurate, I suppose, but if it's wrong and that is going to end up being the twist later, that's going to be a huge gut punch, but it doesn't really help me answer this in the here-and-now.)
However, I can comment on Odette's response, and I feel like that was somewhat justified; from her perspective, she knows her mother is lying, and given what she knows of the man, she's lying with good reason... but it doesn't hurt any less being lied to. And it's all the more painful knowing that the truth is what it is (meaning, Florent being the criminal mastermind he is, and she she can't even pretend not to be related to him).
Anyway, for all my nitpicks and poking holes into Vienna's cover, I do feel like this works as is. Odette has reasons for thinking of the situation how she does, and the narration, following her, is skewed towards her way of thinking, which in the end I feel does justify how this played out, regardless of my own personal questions. Meaning, I wouldn't call them plotholes... I'm just speculating, trying to see things not from Odette's point of view. Which might not be the way to go about it, but who knows if the way she's interpreting things are factual?
As always, looking forward to the next chapter, and how Odette's high-school-crush-brainfog will have her reacting to taking so long to respond to Val's texts.
