She was known for her elegance, and you knew it. She was attractive, an Elite, and she turned many heads on a regular basis. You wondered sometimes wondered if they'd feel the same about her if they saw the side of her that came out behind closed doors. You were used to the abuse, you think. It started out small, probably as remnants of your criminal pasts. Both of you were intensely private, cold and calculating. Your relationship had been like a chess game from the word go. But while she had joined Team Rocket willingly, to seek power, you had done so to escape an even darker past than the one you had lived with the Rockets.
You'd been strong, but quiet leaders in the organization for a while, and Giovanni knew that each of you could play off the strengths of the other. He also knew that the fear derived from your dark personalities-and your ability to exploit information gathered from reading minds-made the two of you a formidable duo. Eventually, he asked you to operate as partners permanently. While you both preferred to work alone, you both knew better than to cross the boss. In hindsight, you realized Giovanni was thrilled when he concluded you were growing closer to one another, in that way that father-figures know. He figured it would only be a matter of time before the friendship lead to physical encounters, and he hoped it would lead to actual romance. A determined lover could be ruthless when the object of their love was wounded. Exploiting this in his underlings was, as always, an appealing prospect.
Things had evolved so easily, so naturally that you never had a second thought when her constant flirting took a more serious tone. You were alike enough to have common drives and interests, but different enough to keep the similarities from becoming grating.
Eventually, you'd found herself dangerously close to the other woman's face, your bodies entwined, your back pressed to the wall in the lowest, darkest corner of the Celadon Game Corner. You certainly didn't consent to this, but you didn't make an active effort to escape the her snare, either. The ease with which she manipulated you, influenced you was surreal. You were the psychic-shouldn't you be the manipulative one?
She hadn't kissed you that day, but she had made sure to make your body react in ways it hadn't before.
Within a week, Giovanni had sent his "Dark Duo" to scout out a city for an extension of Team Rocket's criminal empire. Giovanni had booked you a double room at the local Pokécenter. You later learned that she was sure he suspected a blossoming relationship between the two of you, but a double room had thrown her for a loop. Neither of you, at the time, could figure out why Giovanni would want a relationship between you stopped, but you couldn't figure out why he'd egg it on, either. It seems as though sometimes he alternated between the two.
Either way, she intended to claim your lips that trip. Claim them she did. Again, you did not consent, but you did not resist, either. Her long, elegant fingers ran over your body, but you managed to avoid a reaction. She eventually sighed and moved to her own bed. The trip had been awkward for both of you. You could feel the lust rolling off her in waves, and this stirred feelings in you that, were familiar and alien all at the same time.
You had let her kiss you, but you hadn't returned the kiss. She'd ghost her hands over your sides sometimes at night. You'd shiver and shake under her touch until you couldn't take it and turn your face away as she tried to steal another kiss. For some reason, these feelings always hurt.
At some point, she'd given you a nickname that stoked those feelings, the ones that weren't quite lust, but weren't quite love. In fact, that was the nickname. "Love." At first, she interchanged the nickname and your given name, but the context was always a clue as to how you'd be addressed. If another was fortunate, or perhaps, unfortunate enough to have the Dark Duo in his or her presence, she was all business, only your given name. But with the two of you behind closed doors, she only referred to you as "Love."
Eventually, she took your road blocks without your consent. The intimate moment in the Game Corner. The kiss in the inky blackness of that room, late at night. Those shadowy, insubstantial hands feathering your sides. Later, a hand intertwined with yours, leading you through a stygian underground passage as you narrowly escaped the police. Her hot breath on your neck, chilling your spine. Those lips, soft and warm against your ear. Her fingernails, your back.
You never consented; you never resisted.
Her daring only increased with your lack of noncompliance. Those hands found their way under your clothes one night, and every night afterward. You'd gasped softly as those fingernails whispered over your rib cage. It had proven to her that you were capable of awareness on those nights she crawled into your bed, hellbent on making you love her. Lust aside, you were fairly certain you were, in fact, falling in love with her, despite her blatant disregard for obtaining your consent.
She would do little things. If she awoke during the night, she'd cover you back up, since you'd usually thrown the blankets off in a fit of nightmares. Sometimes, she held you through those nightmares. She never pried the next morning; she knew you'd tell her when you were ready. Those silver eyes were always soft, always kind.
Giovanni's prediction came true, eventually, as the intimate friendship became physical. You'd been injured during another narrow escape-damn that kid-and she'd bound the injury carefully. You eventually fell into a feverish sleep as the full heal she'd given you worked the poison from your system. One of those damn kids evolved his Bulbasaur to a Venusaur, and between the poison powder in the air and the stray razor leaf that had struck you in the arm, it was almost guaranteed the wound would become contaminated.
When you awoke, she was still sitting next to you on the bed, lazily tracing circles over the back of your hand with her them. A glance around the room confirmed that she'd somehow managed to transport you to the headquarters. She seemed to be staring into space; you were reluctant to pull her out of her reverie. "Karen."
Startled, she gave you her full attention in an instant. "Yes, Love?" You smiled weakly. The nickname that had come about naturally felt right.
"What's wrong? You look like you've been staring into space for hours. Have you slept?"
"I-no." She frowned; you hated it when she frowned. "I almost lost you." No nickname. Your injury had really shaken her. You gave her hand a soft squeeze; it was the first time you'd ever returned her physical attention. She moved to lie down beside you, conscientious of the injury. A fingertip touched the bandage gingerly. "I can't bear to lose you, Sabrina."
This kiss was not teasing or lustful. It was gentler, sweeter, and you instinctively returned it, along with any and all physical attention she gave you that night. The obstacles were finally gone, and you realized the urge to resist was gone as her hands drifted lower, lower.
You weren't sure when you began dating, but you later supposed it was that night. For a while, the relationship seemed to be a string of physical liaisons connected to an intimate friendship, but eventually, she became more serious. The sexual tension between you had eased, and others were beginning to notice. Giovanni seemed pleased-almost as if you had been his conquest and not Karen's. Eventually, she slipped and used the nickname in front of him. He naturally called her on it; you sensed he was using this embarassment as a tactic to keep her in line. He wasn't concerned with the affair. He seemed pleased, even, when she'd referred to your as her girlfriend. You'd consented to her kisses, her touches, going to bed with her. You had not consented to the title... but you never resisted it, either.
She wanted you to meet her mother, formally. You'd met Agatha before, but your relationship with her daughter had changed; you had changed. The transition from close friend to lover skewed your feelings toward seeing Agatha again. The older woman was certainly aware that both of you were intensely cold and warmed to others slowly. You were also aware that you hadn't really warmed to Agatha in your previous encounters; you didn't really know one another. Even worse, Karen inherited her coldness from Agatha. Perhaps your willingness to visit with Karen's surprise trip would thaw her slightly.
The night before you'd left Johto to visit Agatha in Kanto, her Pokégear began to ring. Both of you'd ignored it; you knew better than to remove your hands from her body in the heat of the moment. Eventually, the ringing ceased, but you didn't know that. The ringing in your ears as the blood rushed through your veins was too loud. You did, however, manage to hear her gasp as she pulled you into a trembling kiss.
Your shoulder gave out, and you collapsed next to her, exhausted despite the lack of attention thus far to your own desires. As you caught your breath, she rolled over to check the Pokégear. As she listened to the message left, her face drained of color completely. "Mom is sick," she'd stated simply. And you'd spent the night comforting her, holding her, loving her, despite your unwillingness to say those words that would change everything.
You weren't unnerved in hospitals the way most were. Your gym, despite the nightmarish layout, was very sterile. What did unnerve you was Agatha. One of the four strongest trainers in Kanto looked like a small, frail woman for the first time in her life. You hadn't seen her since her retirement, but Agatha's weakness in that moment struck a chord within you, and the old mystic sensed it.
Karen had spent hours crying into your chest that night.
Agatha's passing marked a sharp metamorphosis in her daughter's personality. The nickname was gone, the sweet, random kisses were gone, the constant smiles, gentle touches, feather-like fingertips-those without intent-between you two were just gone. Your sexual relationship shifted at that point, too. You tried yourself trying to supress thoughts that the relationship was being stripped bare, to its basest components, to parts too small to use. You began doing anything you could to please her. Sometimes it worked, and you'd get a brief flash of the Karen from just a few short months ago, but sometimes, it didn't. You gave in to her more frequent, more intense sexual demands without question. You found yourself unresisting, but you found your implicit consent beginning to slip away as she sank deeper into a deeply-seated escapism.
Eventually, Giovanni split the two of you for an extended mission in Hoenn. The night before your scheduled departure, she'd suggested making sex tape, seemingly on a whim. Your ability to say yes was completely gone by then, but you had never been able to say no to her.
She'd been more forceful than normal, even using your shirt to pin your hands behind your back at one point. She'd shoved you onto the bed; she had done her best to absolutely dominate you. You couldn't say no, but you had resisted this time, even managed to dominate her for a brief moment. You had to show her that this was not who the two of you were, and you had to do it in a language she could understand. She had merely grinned.
The kisses were harsher, more cruel than they'd ever been. Her hands, were firm, but they could be gentle for a moment now and then. You tried not to moan as she touched you, but you couldn't hold it back.
Then, from her position above you, she cupped your face gently and whispered words you'd never heard in sequence from her before. "I love you." You'd tried to say it, but with the change in your relationship, you hadn't managed to choke the words out before she resumed those touches. You had known she loved you, and you knew you loved her, as well.
The next time you saw her, she was a completely different person. Agatha's death still seemed to weigh on her mind, as did your slow gravitation toward a more legitimate life for yourself. You were beginning to strengthen your gym; you were working for Giovanni less and less. You'd found the tape in her bag, and without thought, rhyme or reason, you'd shoved it into your own bag. A few years later, you'd be thankful for this, but at that point in time, you wanted to watch it, not for the sexual gratification, but to get a sense of what had happened, what you'd done wrong.
This time would be the last time you'd see her as a lover.
When you'd suggested moving in together, she began yelling at you. There was no way, she'd argued, that the two of you could live between the Elite Four and the Saffron Gym; one of you had to give up her goal. "It sure as hell isn't going to be me," she'd snarled. "I refuse to abandon what my mother left." You tried a gentler approach, and her rage shocked you back to a frightened little girl, to that dark, painful past you'd used Team Rocket to escape.
She had hit you.
Of course, she instantly broke down in tears, swearing it would never happen again, that she loved you. But your father's rage and abuse had resurfaced to the forefront of your mind, and you refused to live it again.
Eventually, Karen did seek the treatment she needed, but what you had needed was to remove yourself from the situation. A childhood of abuse was enough for you. It took nearly an easy five years for the two of you to rediscover your friendship, and another five for it to become easy again. By then, you'd moved on, but the lack of answers continued to afflict you. Erika had become a permanent fixture in your life, a lover without abuse. You had consented for her, and it was her slow approach to you that caused you to see Karen's abuses.
Karen wasn't a monster, though. She had taught you to love, despite everything. And love her you did still, but the way you loved her had changed. She was a friend, a commrade even, who sought to shed her past as an abuser, much as you sought to shed your past as both an abuser and an abusee. These ties continued to bind you together, long after the relationship ended.
You'd never love her again, but you'd always lover her unconditionally.