ix. a promise to be kept


"Hey...I have a question for you, Kris. If...I were to...die, before you, and my brother doesn't die, would you...do me a favour? As you know, I've been...a bit sick, recently, and...you know about his whole personality problem, right? I mean, it's alright if you don't want to do this, because you're the last person I would ever want to pressure...and you know that, right? You are everything to me...you know, so I wouldn't wish to burden you at all."

The boy in front of her, who has a shaking and trembling body, coughs. She rushes to him, and he seems familiar but she isn't really sure, but either way, she finds herself patting him on the back, and worriedly asking him if he's alright. The boy lifts his head, and smiles; but Kris just can't seem to see his eyes. She gets this feeling that he hates his eyes, but the persistent hacking and choking noises coming from him disrupt her train of thought. He smiles, gently, and even though Kris can't see his expression or anything except for his smile, she finds herself feeling nostalgic nonetheless.

The boy reaches out for her, and suddenly, she realizes that she's crying. The boy then cradles her face in his hands, and tilts his head to the side, not even saying a word, and she isn't sure why she knows, but she realizes that he's scared as well. They're all scared. No one can be prepared for death. She doesn't know where this sudden feeling of dread gathers in her stomach, and suddenly she's hyperventilating as well, screaming at him that no, he isn't going to die, and that she's not going to let him-!

But the boy then smiles sadly and takes a step back. He turns his head to look at the area around them, and she looks as well, and she can see his brother, out of hearing range but running up to them to call them to dinner, and she notices that he takes a big breath. His brother's voice echoes around the valley, through the hills that they play and roll around in, and she has a sinking feeling that it may be the last time she'll ever see these hills again. It's as if there's no time left, and the boy in front of her is rushing to get his words out, and she realizes that he has something to say before his brother comes, so she quickly nods and motions for him to speak.

"So, um, if I...die before my brother does, would you...er...god, how am I supposed to say this!?" He laments, and Kris can feel her knees shaking as she's pressuring him to speak, to continue speaking, because she would do anything for him!

"Would you, um..."

His brother is extremely near now, and she can hear his brother's irritated voice calling up from the bottom of the hill they're standing on, and she realizes that this may be the only change he has, and he's losing it, fast.

Something changes in the boy's attitude, and suddenly, he's defiantly staring at her, grabbing her shoulders as he sternly and stubbornly states his request.

"Would you kill him for me?"

"Guys, it's time for dinner!"


Suddenly, she's standing in the middle of a bedroom. It is the middle of the night, and the silhouette of a boy is reflected in the mirror. She then turns away from the mirror, to find herself face to face with the boy. No, wait, it isn't the boy. Looking closely at the boy in front of her, she realizes that they are different. It is the boy from the previous area's brother. But she doesn't remember who this boy is.

This boy is angrily muttering to himself, and she can sense the frustration and anger on him. It scares her just a little bit. She has this feeling of wanting to run, of wanting to get away from here, because this boy cannot be trusted, she was told. She finds herself thinking that if she just threw him out of the window, how happy the boy from before would be. But she's interrupted by the boy standing right in front of her, and when she finally turns her thoughts back to the situation at hand, the boy in front of her is grabbing her, grip tight on her arms. It hurts, and she struggles to get free, but the boy in front of her pulls her even closer to him, making sure she won't escape. Panic is overriding all other instincts she has, and she's clawing at him, trying to hurt him, so that she can escape and she's scared!

The boy doesn't care, and retains his tight grip on her. He angrily barks out each and every question, but she forces herself to not listen.

"Hey, Kris? I know you're closer to my brother than I am," and the boy leans in closer to her, anger swirling around in his eyes, and she's even more terrified now, because those eyes were the eyes of a killer, blood red, "and I know you're closer to him than you are to me, but I want you to answer this question," his grip is tighter now, and he forces her to stare inside those eyes that she hates, and his brother hates, and she just wants to scream out and kill the boy right in front of her-! "Does my brother hate me? Is he scared of me? Why does he look at me like that whenever I'm near?"

His grip leaves her arms feeling numb, and she manages to wrench herself away from him, disgust curled in her lip. She moves to make a run, and her arms still burn, and there are still imprint of his hands where they were around her arms. She finds, with a horror, that he's locked the door. She hates him, she hates him, she hates him.

The boy moves closer to the door, and Kris shrinks and looks down at the ground, to where the floor looks black in the night, to nice, calming black. The boy continues on a tangent. His spit is flying in her face, as he yells at her, and she feels this disgust, and hatred, emanating from herself, that she never even thought was possible.

"And why is he always smiling around you? He does this thing with his lips, where they curl up, around you, and yet when I'm near, and I'm even his brother, he doesn't even want to look at me!"

She spits at his face, with all the hatred and anger and fury that a ten year old girl can have, and takes this chance to run away. The only way out is the window, which is open. The moon shines uncharacteristically bright tonight, and there's this feeling of dread pooling in her stomach.

She's desperate.

But the boy in the room is even more desperate, not even trying to stop her, and she suddenly hears sobs fill the room. She doesn't look back, because she's disgusted by him, and how dare he ever think that he deserves such a wonderful brother that he has, and how he thinks that anything he could do would help his brother love him-!

She's halfway out of the window, ready to call out the Crobat his brother had given her, and she hears him suddenly yell-!

"And why do you hate me!? Why!? Have I done something!? Why!?"

The boy whips around, tears dripping, as he tries to stop Kris from leaving. Crobat pops out, and she holds onto it, and just before leaving, she sends the boy a glare she never thought she was capable of. She can see the shock on the boy's face, his eyes shimmering with tears, and she thinks that this boy is the most disgusting, vile thing in the world, so she never wants to see him again and she'll definitely kill him!

"Kris, you little coward! Come back here! Tell me! Tell me why you hate me! Tell me why you hate me when I l- y-!"

She can't hear the rest of his sentence, but she doesn't want to hear either way, because she hates the boy, and the boy deserves to die.


She was running. She had to. Shots were being fired all over, and she had to duck behind multiple buildings to try and save them. She had taken the two brothers out, because they were aiming for them, but to her horror, they had gotten ahold of one of them! They had just taken him! They were taking him and then he fell limp in their arms, probably weak from that weird sound on their watches! She had seen other people fall as the people with the watches walked by, they had only taken him! She grit her teeth, as there was this strange feeling in the pit of her stomach. And she knows, she's fargone, and she's inhumane for thinking this, but she knows what it is she's feeling.

She's glad.

She's glad that it was he who was taken.

She's glad that it wasn't the boy she's carrying now.

But, now looking at the limp body in her arms, blood rushing out of a wound in his chest from a gunshot, she angrily blinks back tears, while trying to comfort him and herself that he isn't going to die. He just isn't. And she's frantically searching for things to keep him alive, but he slowly, with all of his effort, lifts up his hands and shushes her.

"...R-run...Kris..."

And then there's this searing pain inside of her, and her world turns dark. She hears his voice echo inside of her mind, repeating her name, his last words, but there are other, annoying, nasally, and disgusting voices that reach her ears.

"Tch, this girl is annoying. We've already lost both of our targets because of her. Put her down, now."


He's surprised when they actually find a member of the agency, and a girl nonetheless, because he thinks that it's all too weird to have a member of the agency by themselves. He doesn't remember what happens in the night, normally, but the leaders always tell him that in order to keep the organization a secret, they can't risk having him remembering reconnaissance missions during the night. He's been doing these missions for about two years, far longer than many of the other members, and so has become a high ranking commander.

He was never one to really care much about it all, though.

He wonders why, really the agency and the organization had to fight. Wasn't it useless? Humans and all living things were dying. What was the use of a war between the two? A way to kill more people, quicker?

He's brought to the room where the captive is kept, and it's amazing how much restrain he has over his emotions, because everything suddenly changes for him. He's always been bored; growing up, nothing was interesting. Even though he likes Lyra, he knows that she's boring. Always, predictable, unwilling to change. That's why he targets her, because surely even the most boring person can let go, couldn't they?

He's second-in-command; first in command is a person who he's never met. Everything is entrusted to him, the one who could deceive anyone, and do everything. It's boring, and he has no entertainment whatsoever. He's evil for thinking so, but he honestly doesn't give a crap about who wins, if someone wins, or if they all lose.

He's decided that there's no time left for things like that, so now everything is for his amusement. He knows that it's a psychotic way of thinking, that he'd probably be classified as insane, but what he can remember of his childhood has resulted in this. He can't remember much, but he remembers something. A horrible hatred, a jealousy, of his brother, who was everything he was not, yet knows happiness.

He's considered the perfect child. To his parents who have passed away, he's genius. And yet, in the end, his brother doesn't care for him at all. And the girl that was always around his brother, who he couldn't exactly remember, hated him as well. He wants to see his brother again. Years of isolation and losing family members has made him wish to see his brother again, and that's why he's joined the organization. He isn't evil. He wants closure, and he wants happiness back. He wants to see his brother, and that girl, again.

He may not have had happiness yet, but he figures that adrenaline, the rush that you feel, is a good enough substitute.

So that's why, when he sees an unconscious Kris lying on the ground, there's this sudden interest and quickening of his heart in his chest. He never knew that Kris was an agency member, and suddenly, he feels this rush of adrenaline that he hasn't felt for a long time, and he doesn't want it to end. So, the girl who was so contradictory was an agency member? For what purpose? And most of all, he wonders what fun he can have with her. Oh no, he's not thinking of anything perverse; rather, he's thinking of all the rules he'll break, and the excitement he'll have with that, when everything's done.

"Erase her memory of being captured."

The grunts serving under him gape, and he thinks about how useless each and every one of them are. But the grunts obey him anyway, wondering why their commander was releasing a valuable source of information, but he whips out his own device and erases their memories. They're knocked unconscious, and he has his Pokemon bring them to the corridor, where if they wake up, they'll be punished for not immediately obeying their commander.

He retires for the night, bending down to pick up the still-unconscious Kris from the ground, and calling out his Crobat, he flies to their school.

He sees Ethan, who doesn't notice him back. He wonders how many times Ethan's seen Kris exit the school, and then mocks Ethan in his head for liking her too much.

When he gets to Kris's room, he notices how her room is extremely messy. Everything's sown about, and he cringes at the thought of her living here; he doesn't hate her, and he knows he never will, but honestly, her room is something he could live without. But, with the moonlight shining in from her window, he swears that she looks familiar and a bit angelic for a moment, before he notices that her face is really kind of plain.

He lays her down in her bed. He then, with an eager smile on his face, kisses her on the forehead.

He whispers good night, then heads to his room. No one's out, so he can walk about freely, but even if there was, he has a device to erase their memories. Laughing to himself inside his room, he blushes at what he just did to Kris and paces around childishly, before his eyes darken and he chuckles and licks his lips at the entertainment he's just found.

Well then.

His girlfriend was going to be more interesting than he thought.


A/N

So, another crappy chapter. XD And the reason why Silver's acting so weird is because of something that'll be revealed later. However, there's already been some clues as to what exactly is wrong with Silver!

Does anyone else notice how I tend to switch writing styles easily? It's really obvious...

Also, I thought of the best idea for a story, and maybe one day I'll write it, so I guess I'll write a little bit of it here to make sure I don't forget it.

Summary:

In a world where sacrificing something of your own gives you power, the things you sacrifice are the determining factor in how powerful you get. People sacrifice money, jewelry, and other lives to get what they wish for. The four most powerful things to sacrifice, are almost never sacrificed. People are content to sacrifice material things, and sometimes not even that, but when it comes to these four things to sacrifice, no one has ever done these. But one day, the whole world learns of two people who have each sacrificed one of the most powerful things, and they are immediately put together to work as a partner team in crime.

So when Hilda, who's chosen to give up her emotions forever, finally sees her ex, Hilbert, as her partner, again after Arceus knows how many years, she can only find herself in what would be a horrifying situation.

She still remembers everything, including the pain he once gave her, although she feels pain no more.

But- and she realizes that she's in a dangerous situation here- Hilbert has chosen to give up his memories of her, and she finds out, in horror, that he's fallen in love with her again.