They were on one of the highest points in the gym, a narrow walkway that banded the outside wall just below the edge of the roof. The railing was open here letting her stand on the very edge, gazing down at the calm water of the gym's battle floor, far below her. From this height she would hit that water with enough force to break bones…or worse. She balanced on the balls of her feet, senses alert to everything around her, a master of her profession. He stood behind her, leaning over her shoulder but making no contact, his lips only inches from her left ear. His soft voice lit her very nerve endings on fire. She resisted the urge to kick him out of her personal space.
"You can't think your way through something like this. You have to feel it. Use your heart, not your mind."
Use her heart. She'd given up on that traitorous organ years ago. What use was a heart when there wasn't a single problem she couldn't think her way through. Her current challenge was no exception. Intelligence, strategy, and sheer force of will were all she needed, they were all she'd ever needed. Except, they hadn't worked thus far, her desperation driving her to see out help from every available source, even those she found deeply unpalatable.
His hand skimmed down her spine, the tips of his fingers just barely making contact before coming to rest at the small of her back. Her skin crawled. "I can almost hear you trying to form a plan. Stop planning. Just feel."
Moisture prickled the palms of her hands and she had to force them to uncurl from the fists they'd inadvertently formed. She wiggled her fingers at her sides, trying to bleed away some of the tension that hung thick in the air around them. Her brain felt sluggish, hypnotized and she fought against the feeling. When the shove forward came, she found her responses slow. She was falling, hurtling toward that still, blue water below her.
One of her hands scrabbled at her waist, finding only the empty spots on her belt where she usually carried her favorite Pokemon. But they were gone, she'd left them in her office before stupidly following him up to the ledge. Trusting had never been her strong suit and situations like this were part of the reason why. Why had she thought this time would be any different. Stupid, stupid, stupid. She closed her eyes and for the first time in years, maybe even for the first time in her entire life, she found herself wishing for something that she couldn't quite put a name to. Maybe it was a miracle she needed, or maybe just trust that she'd survive the fall.
And then, instead of falling she was soaring. Relief flooded her body as her hands gently gripped the cool, feathered shoulders of her rescuer. Powerful muscles pumped under her, lifting them back toward the ceiling. The great bird turned with the curve of the gym's wall, circling the uppermost level. Above them the clouds of the overcast day parted and sun poured in through the glass dome of the ceiling, turning the graceful, curling steel beams from pewter to silver.
A ray of sun hit the frozen crest on the bird's head and lit up the space with tiny dots of light as the ice refracted and reflected it. She felt like laughing in relief and joy. Around them snow started to fall inside the gym, tiny white flakes that gusted around them, the air from their passing creating swirls and twists of the tiny particles. She suppressed the urge to laugh.
They landed on the walkway, frost spiderwebbing out from the clawed feet of her rescuer. She slid off, her boots clanging on the ice-slicked metal plates. The bird's long tail lashed back and forth, mirroring her own anger and betrayal already their moods and emotions were linked. The pair faced him as he gleefully said, "I told you, you couldn't think through this one!"
Her voice was dark, cold, and deadly as she replied, "You may have been right this time, but don't think you can ever do something like that to me again." Beside her the great bird turned his head, regarding her with one dark, glittering eye, waiting her command. She laid a hand on his neck reassuringly. "Articuno. Blizzard."