Part 7.5: The Crossblade

Chapter 56: Exploring Terra Gamma (4)

Rayse's journey is pretty much just this chapter, by the way. It's never gone up to 4 before, but boy it ain't the last time it will.

I don't own Pokémon.


Rayse

"Aaaahahaha-hhhhoooo!" the flower wheezed out into Mari's face after laughing. It sounded male. Or maybe like a clown. That hit so close to home for me. "Gee, what brings all you goons and gobbers out on a BEYOOTiful day like this?!"

"Ack-!" Mari yelped, her arms trapped, along with her Symbi. The threads managed to worm out from underneath the coil, which didn't appear to have any spikes or thorns like the Flux's. "H-hey, what the hell?! Who are you?!"

"HEY!" Astraea barked. "You ugly sack'a crap! You've been watching us this whole time, huh?! Cheating son of a..."

"Oho! Ohoohoo! Cheating A-MEEEE?! HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHaaaaaaawww," the flower wheezed for a good long while. He spoke with so much dynamism that he was more of a cartoon character than me, and that was... disturbing. "Well, gee, Miss Lolicon Butterfly, from where I'm buried, y'know it don't seem like you done did dat-dere job I gave ye. You too, Two-face – ouch, looks like you took it hard."

"Do not call me that!" Flicker retaliated, then pointed her weapon at both Mari and the sapient, corpse flower. "What foul hole did you grow out of?"

"Wouldn't you like to know? You would, wouldn't ya?! Remember what I said?! I said I'd tell you where this 'hole' thing started! Buuut, since you SU-HUCK at your job, I'm just going to do all this on my own here, see." the flower preached, manic.

A yellow arm with three spiky fingers shot out of a break in the vine. It looked painful. Skin shredded just to allow this, but the flower didn't even flinch. The stubby arm's fingers grew lankier, longer, until they cracked and became disfigured, like the hand of a ghoul. Then, a Crossblade took shape in them. This one was surprisingly short, both in hilt and its three blades. A bladed circle bound each of these black-charred blades, serrated on either side. Honestly, the weapon looked more like a butcher's fever dream. It was the most sadistic looking Crossblade I'd ever seen, and I had this opinion knowing mine looked like it squeezed a bunch of guts together with wicked thorns shooting out of them. Well, this living flower's Crossblade looked like the kind of weapon that cut those guts out.

"Now, where to make the incision?! I wonder where Nephi would want it? Maybe here?" the flower asked, roughly tapping one of the saw blades to Mari's snout. Her scales withstood it, but she cried out. Solacea healed it after the blade was retrieved. "Oh? Not there? Then here?" he asked, tapping her on the right cheek. Solacea healed it. "No? Aw, you know, I'm really glad I have your cooperation with this procedure, and I'm soooo happy to have the whole Crossblade family watching me do it. It... huh... sorry, I'm... getting so emotional – it's such an honor."

He was pretending to cry? Who WAS this guy?!

Jira moved. The second she did, another vine lurched out from underneath her, grabbed her by the waist, and yanked her into the ground with so much force that I heard it. Her Cross flew out of her telekinetic grasp.

Holy cow, this guy's reaction time...!

"Jirachi?!" Patty called.

"Okay, what the actual hell, man – like," 'Emiterasu' began. "You can't just steal my big opening. Do you know how long I slept?!"

Another vine flung up dirt, rocks, and grass in front of Pat. It didn't lurch for her, but it did point at her. Then, yellow electricity arced onto the mudkip, locking her until its discharge was over. Patty, frozen, fell forward steaming, face into the dirt. Her Symbi friend swerved to her side.

"Pa—Oh my God, Pat! That's...! Y-you're okay. No way, you're okay – I'm still here, so that means you're okay." her friend stammered, darting around the incapacitated 'kip, looking for an indication that consciousness was still there.

This guy was more than just a flower. Duh, he watched this whole battle happen. He knew we would be here, fight here, and so he got into position. Even underneath my feet, he was waiting for me to move, so he could show me just how much of an advantage he had.

"Well Rayse?" he called me. My lungs were chilled. He knew what I was thinking. He was waiting. I was going to move before he was going to hurt Mari. "Or Sera. I don't know. What do you like better? Rayse? Sera? Or... Zatch?"

I did move, but he didn't perceive it as a threat, thankfully. I let my head low, just to lay the Crossblade down. He knew me. He wanted a response out of me. I had to be careful! I didn't want this to end badly for Mari, and those two Symbi jerks over there weren't going to do anything, 'cause Mari's body was just a prize for them. I wanted to yell at them and slap them across the face and then tell them they were buttfaces; though, that... didn't help anybody but myself. This was a hostage situation. This time, I was on the other end. I was watching it from the outside.

"R-Rayse is my name." I answered meekly.

"Ya sure about that, girlie? You one-hundo percent sure?" he tested me, but by his tone I would've thought he was teasing me.

"Of course I'm one-hundo percent sure! What, you don't recognize me?" I asked. In hindsight, I didn't know what I asked it that way.

"Recognize? Funny word! Why THAT word? Did I meet you somewhere before? Didn't you take something from me once?" he asked me. He baited me. This was what he wanted. "How d'you like that tune I played earlier. Must've like it a lot if you came into my place wanting more. Ain't that right? Well look at where it got you. I'll bet SECANY wouldn't even recognize you. You should ask her that question. Not me!"

"Secany? W-wait, I didn't take anything from anybody! What are you talking about? Who are you, really?"

"Who am I? Pfft, wow. Nephi's right. We don't have to worry about you at all. You're the dumb one. You and Rinavay. You're both the dumb 'one', because neither of you are good enough to be 'one' on your own. BAM! See, Astraea? That's how you deliver insulting villainous dialogue!" he instructed. What a JERK! I was about to go wild on his-...

No, don't Rayse. You'll get Mari hurt. Alli needs her voice back, too!

"No one wants your bullcrap! Where's Nephi?! You keep saying her name! You'd better tell me, or else...!" the siren threatened. For the first time, I found it charming, since it wasn't being slung at us Pokémon.

Even though this corpse flower boy looks like he's been made of pikachu parts...

Oh. Pikachu parts. Oh, it's...

"It's you," I thought aloud. "Zatch?"

"Zatch?!" Jira hollered from the grass.

"DING DING DING BA-DING~!" the flower boy blared. "That's the sound I would normally play for a winner, but it's okay. I'll play it for you, too, Rayse."

"There's no way," I shook my head. It was slow, weighed down by disbelief. "The Zatch I know is still in me. He's so cool and friendly. He's nothing like you..."

"Like it or not, what'cha see is what'cha get," he answered. "It doesn't matter what you think. You get split into three, and then you gotta suck up all the pain and hurt. Oh, but don't worry. I didn't come here to give you a lesson on how to live your life. You're not like me. We're just 'kindred spirits'. You, me, and that Naphal thing over there you goons call Jirachi."

The pikachu flower smiled wide enough to move his patches out of view. One of his eyes appeared larger than the other.

"What was that catch about Solacea? It couldn't heal you if you got cut up by the Crossblade? Hahahaha, lessee then:" he prompted.

What came after that was so profound that it made me feel embarrassed knowing that I shared a link of sorts with this thing. Zatch took his Crossblade. He lifted it to Mari's neck. Everything was quiet around them, or so it seemed. There was a smile surrounded by flower petals.

He pushed the blade in, and Solacea's sutures went wild, following in after the first hack. The second hack came, the blade pulled the other direction. The sutures followed. Faster and faster, the saw went, digging into Mari's neck. With every hack, the wound was sealed back off, effectively locking the Crossblade inside of Mari's throat. Like Alli, she was speechless. Zatch's intrusions came to a halt. He just left his weapon in the middle of her neck. She couldn't scream. She couldn't bleed. She couldn't escape. She probably couldn't breathe. She couldn't even heal herself, because there were no more wounds.

"Nooo, I was wrong! What was it?" Zatch hummed to himself. He was enjoying it. He didn't need the smile to communicate that. "Rayse? Why don't you come over here for me? C'mawwwn, move those legs. I promise I won't bite. And neither will the rest of me that's underneath you."

"Take the blade out of her first!" I commanded, nervous, shaking.

"Ooooh, shucks, y'hear that, Mari? Your Champion friend wants me... to hurt you! I can't IMAGINE what YANKING this thing out of your throat would feel like. I wonder if your head would come off..." he mused. I felt a growl permeate my throat.

I was walking up to him. He watched me with a widening grin. If he had wanted to make a mockery of me, he had already succeeded. I was so angry that I could cry, but because I wanted to be strong, I did everything I could to keep Mari with us. The Crossblade couldn't kill, right? But, I didn't want her to suffer. What was he going to make me do?

Well, I was up at them, still shaking furiously. My ears and tail down, I glared into the ground, right at the base of his knot of vines.

"Where's your Crossblade, girlie? Get it." he ordered, voice deeper than before. I looked up to him. He was still grinning, the lifeless luster in his eyes shooting me back.

"No." I refused.

A violent squish, a shredding of organic matter. I was sprayed with a fluid I couldn't identify. It was clear. I shut my eyes for a moment. Was Mari okay?! I found her again, Solacea darting through a slit in her throat, dark patches on her white and pink scales indicating a splatter of her own liquid, be it blood or otherwise. It ran freely from her former throat wound.

"Welp, we're doing it your way then!" Zatch heckled with a couple snickers to rub salt in the wound.

"Y-you gross monster! You... sick, horrible, HORRIBLE person. I was NEVER you. N-..." I stammered like a disputing child. I shut my trap when I realized how much control he had over everybody on the battlefield. Quietly, I amended my statement. "You don't have to do this. No one's forcing you to be this way."

"This—hhhhahaha, oh this..." he babbled. "Is this what the 'hard way' is? Is this how we're going to do things?"

"If... Zeldster were here, she'd show you the 'Squiggles way'!" Jira shouted out.

Zatch reacted with silence so tense that I could feel the heat building from his vines.

"Open your mouth." he said. I didn't do a thing. "You. Rayse. Open your mouth."

I did it. I didn't open it wide, but I let my jaw hang just a little. Something hit my teeth and my tongue. A sickening taste rolled into my throat. A vine around my head, chin and top, clamping my jaw shut around this object. His Crossblade, I thought. It was weightless. It was natural to wield for me. It looked like the perfect killing machine, but it couldn't kill.

My legs gave out. Good thing, too, because I didn't need them anymore. I was being lifted up by the head, the blade stuck in my mouth, all of the foreign pain filling my heart, lungs, and limbs like noxious mist. It wasn't enough to weaken me – or maybe my legs giving was on account of that pain. I was angry. I was so angry that I couldn't breath right. I was being picked up and played with by this thing. I shut my eyes. My body felt like it was slumped over to one side, and there was resistance on my jaw, like the Crossblade was pushing up against something. I could still move my head from side to side. Mari whined. It was raspy and wheezy. She had been squeezed so hard.

"You really don't know how easy it is for me to crush Jirachi or zap Patricia into the next millennium," he said, an almost machine-like growl playing over his voice. I wasn't even so sure how he was talking without a throat. Everything about this abomination didn't belong. "You do anything other than what I say, and they get it. No, not just them. Secany, too. I know where she is. I know where she'll go. And I'll make sure that she never comes back, unless you follow my rules. If that's all crystal clear, then let's do this."

Secany. He used that card like I knew he would. I had a feeling in my gut that he was going to pull that out and trump me with it.

He was going to make me hurt her. I had to do it. Patty was in danger. I wasn't sure if he was bluffing when he said he could bring down Jirachi, but I just didn't want to take that risk. And, Secany. He knew where she was. For all I knew, she could be in as much danger as all of us. As much as Mari.

"You can still move your head. Here's a yes or no question. Do you want to hurt this skywisp?" he asked.

Of course I shook my head no! I didn't know why he-

When I shook my head, I felt the blade tear through something tough. It hurt my teeth and made my jaw sorer than it already was. I just hacked into Mari.

"Then why're you doing it? Is it because you're Fluxed?" he asked again.

I kept my head still. Poor Mari was crying, because her Solacea couldn't do anything but help heal her the moment I cut into her. At least, from what I remembered. I didn't notice any sutures this time around. My—Zatch's Crossblade was still wedged into her head.

"Answer the question." he thundered behind me.

I had to do it. I had to shake my head. If I didn't, he...

Wait, why was I moving?! I wasn't doing that! Was Zatch doing that?!

"What the-?" the hideous flower spoke.

I was thrown through the cold wind. All grasp that Zatch had over me was broken by his own urge to save himself from the unseen attack. The sour Crossblade flew from my mouth. As I was hurled, I saw an opaque red bubble in place of where Zatch's vines bound Mari. Actually, Mari wasn't even there anymore. All there was was the big red ball, stemming up from the ground and swirling with its shining, fetid liquid, a boil growing out of the soil.

I coughed when I hit the ground. My spine pulsed with a jolt of pain that I could only call mild to the merciless aftertaste of that Cross. Hitting my back, I instantly flopped to one side, legs falling over. I growled for no reason. I lowered my muzzle and bit into my own red fur. I had to bite something, even if it was just myself. One of my own Crossblade triplets made me hurt somebody. I couldn't STAND that! I was fuming.

But I wasn't drooling. I was still Rayse. I kept that closer than ever before, and now I would never lose it again, because of Zatch. The Crossblade did help. It helped remind me who I was: not him. Never, ever him.

Something soft against my back. Somebody's hand? I pulled away from my bite, stinging myself, ripping some fur out and looking up at whoever it was with a mouthful of the stuff in my mouth. Jirachi was here.

"Rayse? You okay?" she asked me. My heart softened. Ice burnt by that chilling encounter, it began to thaw again. I was so glad she was safe, but I was too embarrassed to even speak, so I just did what Zatch would have wanted me to do. I moved my head; although, it was a nod.

What was happening, I thought? Where was Zatch? How powerful was he?!

I turned the other way, then set myself onto my belly, arms and legs getting me back up. Mari was gone, and Zatch was hunched over the spot where she used to be. His freakish face was blown over with enough comical shock to make me feel somewhat good about what just happened, despite having no clue. If Mari got away, that was good, but the ball I saw her in didn't seem like anything she would have done. It must have been that cackling Flux, then. But, why? Weren't they ALSO just trying to kill each other?

"Man, you did not just do that," Zatch lamented. He looked over at Jira and for confirmation. "He seriously just did that, the dick. Can you believe that? Gee, I guess it IS a good thing Nephi'll fix that problem."

I wasn't about to entertain the idea of speaking back to this waste of breaths. I hated him. I hated how he was talking to us like we were his friends – like nothing was ever wrong.

"What's that? Cross got'chur tongue? Course it did," he grinned again, followed by a low, rumbling laughter. "I'm going to kill everybody who gets in her way. I owe her everything," he said, hunching further, a grim shadow decorating his face while he watched the weary, idle Symbi wielders. "And you two are going to help me, because if you don't, you'll have no place here."

"You're a bully and a sicko, and you want us to help you?!" Astraea barked back.

"Astraea, he knows Nephi. He serves her. You know what this means." Flicker stopped the siren.

"I... I do. I just don't like him. I don't like Nephi either." she said.

"Give it a chance. Fausti would." said her companion.

"I thought you didn't like her."

"I dislike her host Sam. She can't separate herself from him. Symbis are the rulers of their hosts, not otherwise." claimed Flicker.

"That's a bunch of garbage and you KNOW it...!" Patty's fiery friend contested, quiet and afraid. She wasn't even met with an argument back. All she had was her opinion and the cold shoulder of two fellow Symbi folk.

"Hhhhahahaa..." Zatch laughed, probably just to laugh and share that wheezing sound. He was talking at Jira and I. "Tell ya, looks like you Champions got unlucky! Things aren't looking good for the Pokémon side. Gee, it's almost like there's a whole other path things could have taken just for you. But did they? Whenever you think you're ready, you should go to the Paradox and find out.

This entire time, you freaks and weirdos have been running around town trying to 'save your friends' or 'rescue those in need'. Is that really helping? Is that really pushing the Wave forward? You'll just have to go to that other world where static and striders roam free. Or die trying! Ha!

Now if you'll excuse me, my dear Crossblade sisters, I must be going! Mari's not my only mark... Oooooo mystery! I LOVE mystery, hhhhahahaha! WOOSH!" he exclaimed, as his body unraveled and flung itself back underground, the echo of a sinister laughter following him into the earth.

I was seething.

"Huh?! What an ASS!" Astraea clamored, throwing her left arm out. "Hey, get back here! You could at least tell us where you're-...! UGH! I hate this idea, Susano'o."

"Enough whinging," Flicker commanded. She pointed to us with her available hand. "It doesn't matter how any of you feel. We're all jointed by Gamma, but the only poison I see spreading is Flux. If you can say you prefer that over the Crossblade, then I don't care what happens to you."

"Humph!" Emelina grunted. "Aren't you supposed to be a little more respectful to me, Susano'o?!"

"Is that a demand or a question?" Flicker queried. "Don't insult me with your arrogance. You're just a human child. Orochi wouldn't show you any kindness."

I took a step forward. One became a quick three, then another three. I was snarling.

"Just GO! Go away! Nobody NEEDS you!" I shouted, all of those tasteless, sticky words leaving my mouth more easily than they would have done any other time.

"Why don't YOU go?! Don't you have somewhere else to be?" Astraea argued back. As much as I was blinded by madness, she was right. Why didn't we just leave? Our objective was taken straight from our eyes, and now we had to go back to the Grove as failures. Uh... No, we got Alli's and Patty's best friend back. Or, did Patty do that herself? I didn't really know. Maybe it was time to turn tail-bound and get our tired hides back home. I just didn't want to see these awful people anymore. I would'a sooner watched them turn their backs to us and walk away rather than me mar my pride. I should have been proud to walk among friends like these girls though.

Jira zipped down somewhere, then came back into my view. She was holding things. Shiny things. I turned my head. It was Arcadia's staff – both pieces.

"Ah," I gasped. "Jira, where'd you...? Well, you're okay at least. Uhm, 'Emi'?"

I watched Emelina. She was heart-softeningly cute – her little face...~

"Uh-huh?" she answered. Patty rose, big head in her tiny hands. "Pat!"

"Patty, too..." I sighed. Everybody was still okay, despite it all. Mari was hurt and missing, but I had a feeling bringing these girls back like this would've made Alli happier than having her voice back. Uh, that was the theory anyway!

Something was... happening in the air. I looked high, and sure enough, there were isles of land. To be expected! But, other than that and the loud wind picking up and dying off, there were black shapes dotting the distant red sky, their top 'bits' in motion, like... what were they – propellers? There were four of them, grouped together and traveling at the same speed. They had motionless tails, wide bodies with shining panels on the front, and barring on their underside. They were flying to the forest canopy.

"Another strike force," Flicker said. "The Meadow versus the Grove. Isn't it a problem that you lot are here and not there?"

"Oh good lord." Patty groaned.

"She's right! That IS Delta Meadow," Jira looked high. "Rayse, we gotta move!"

"Oh it's PERSONAL with these mother-MMMF!" Emelina squealed, her mudkip host getting to her feet and dusting her booty off.

"Yeah, it sure is..." I mumbled, just to myself, thinking about Zatch.

Zatch, why...? Why, buddy? Is that really you? Don't you remember anything? Your own little sister, and your big brother Zack. You were with me the whole time when you watched them... go.

Don't become the kind of person that you hate.

Or have you been here the whole time, Zatch?

Who's Nephi? What did Nephi do to you?

We had to go. There was a treeline at the back of an empty, crumbling lot. That was our best shot to the Grove. Passing over the grass and through the large visible divide of energy separating human constructs from Gamma-terraformed land, we went on, Jira and Emelina taking care not to push Patty all that much after her taste of electricity to the face. And the rest of her not-so-ground-type-yet body. It shook me to think about how easily Zatch could have done that from the start, how easily he might've STILL been able to do that, and how he could have done it all this time, if he really was watching us – if those tremors and that music from his... my house, was him. What a sick-minded freak, unless the Crossblade or Nephi really were responsible for that flowery amalgam of dead pikachu.

How am I going to explain this? Mari? The Tangle? Flicker? And Kat, too!

Well, I'll have time to think about that after we deal with Delta Meadow's interruption. I am NOT in the mood for those guys right now!

"Kkhee."

"Daddy...wisp?"

"Khehe... ehehe."

Vis

Daddy-wisp was here. Was in me. In Vis. Bowled up, scooped up, took from evil flower. Put inside me. Saved? No. No wisp. No Daddy-wisp in Vis body anymore. Did Vis drop? Vis better at this! Vis was basketball player before. Daddy-wisp taught Vis not to drop ball, but Vis dropped wisp. Vis dropped Charley.

Red eyes, red glare, red walls with hands reaching out, but going back? Why going back now? Why? No more happy-walls-broken... broken down?

No happy? Travis not happy? Travis not want to be happy like Vis? No. Travis not Travis anymore. Was nobody. Became nobody special. Never make that person happy. Betrayed... Vis. Went Astraea instead. Symbi better than Flux? Crossblade better than Flux?

What was this? What was this thingy in place of Vis' Daddy-wisp? Was shiny, like wisp, but not wisp – not pink, no face, no body – metal? Crystal? It lay there. It lay in me and now I lay it on slanted land in sky, hidden away from Not-Travis and Astraea. Vis got away. Vis didn't like happy evil flower man. Was bad happiness. Was wrong happiness. Was like Vis. Bad happiness. Bad...

Bad, bad-bad-bad-bad Vis.

"Kkhehehe, no good Vis." me laughed. Vis laughed, but was not happy to see no wisp, but a Symbi, thing of Black Gamma, but so pretty and shiny, blue like Pokémon Gamma, weird strings attached. Strings attached to Vis? Not like magic strings, but strings like walls? Walls lock me inside? How was life with Symbi? Was better than Flux? Found real happiness? Heal people? Heal people.

Vis reached with long red arm to Symbi. Charley was gone. Vis touched Symbi and was warm. Scent of wisp blood. Weird stuff. Like chemical Vis didn't know. Vis made of blood, right? Vis not THAT blood. Vis Pokémon blood. Wisp blood was okay though. Vis always okay with the non-Pokémon side. Wanted both to be happy forever. But not like Vis. Vis was bad happy. Flux happy. Evil-evil-evil wasn't what Vis wanted not what Vis wanted not what Charley what Al what Travis...

What?

What? WHAT?! WHAT WHERE?!

IS THIS TALKING?!

KKKHHHHEEE NO! HEAR VOICE IN HEAD – wait, where is head when head is whole body? Can fix that? Can heal that, like Charley did? Can I heal?

I... Me? I...

Myself? Am... I am? I am Vis?

What was the feeling? Confusion? Always accepted it. I turned it around so that I could keep smile on my face, because that was the only thing! The only thing was smile, eyes watching me smile, happy to see me happy, and I told them to be happy right back! But no. No more. I couldn't be happy when I couldn't protect anybody. Vis couldn't protect anybody. Vis never protected anybody. Vis stagnant, like dirty water. Vis was dirty water.

Vis took... I took Symbi Solacea into my tendril. I wrapped it up, turned it, looked at it with a big tilt of my body. I could see through it. If I turned it to the red sun at just the right angle, I could see a reflection of myself. How? It was so narrow, but I could see my eyes. Big black circles with a white dot in each of them. I could see my mouth when I moved it again. My mouth changed. I wasn't smiling. I wasn't frowning. I was just... here! I was here, somewhere in the middle.

"Kk..." I sputtered like a broken recording. I looked at this glowing magical crowbar. The bluish strings around it came to life. They darted around me and I grew my leg tendrils high, jerked back, and watched them orbit around me. Were they scanning me? Were they getting to know the guy who took their master away? I watched them with an open mouth. It felt good not to smile for a change. G-great, even. So clear, the thoughts...

Crystal rod. So clear. Healing sutures flew around me like beautiful bugs...

"Charley?" I asked.

My mind was working too hard. I was spacing off into an unknown place – not an uncomfortable place, just unknown. My thoughts were drifting, just like these glowing strings, and just like strings usually did, I made the connection. I was these strings. I was making them drifting, thinking about them, floating them around me. So, I made a conclusion, or maybe a deduction, since I couldn't tell the difference – was never the smart one in the group. I lifted my weird arm with the Symbi pointed to a land-covered sky. Just like that, the strings went back into place. They obeyed my thoughts. I thought it would work, so it worked just like how I thought. One thing. Another. Click. Satisfying noises.

"Ah-!" screamed a somebody. Where was the somebody? What was the somebody – where what now?! I got startled! I looked around, contorting this hot, melty body, being aware of how it felt, the fibrous fluid acting like muscles. How did I hear without ears? Wait, I had horns! Were those ears?

...Where was the somebody?

"Kkuh!?" I crackled. I wanted to make some better noise than that.

Thinking about the noise I made, I saw a shape in the shadows, a hand and half of a face shown around an outcropping pipe and cement locked together and never serving a purpose again. She was gray and white. She was shorter than a human. Also not a human. She was like Not-Travis, but not Not-Travis – crap, was confusing self. Flicker. She was like Flicker.

"Kkh... Uhm, hello!" I said to her. That was better!

Her eyes were too scared to speak. They told me that her body didn't want to move. It recognized me. I didn't feel comfy enough communicating with eyes. I'd done it enough. I was a person. It was time I started acting like one!

"Y-y-you again. Ohh, why did it have to be YOU again?! Unless..." she paused, eyes wider, blue and pretty. She came to her senses – I was better at seeing these things. I got lower, steady, as not to scare her away. She poked out a little bit more, hand pushing against the pipe. Her long, ivory tail lapped over the grass and dirt behind her. "Why do you have Solacea? Did you do something to Mari?"

"Mari? Charley? No! Charley's my..." I answered back. I was surprised at my own voice. No more cackles. No more wobbly-sounding, throaty, uh, effect? I sounded like a person should. "Charley was hurt. I had to do something."

She squinted and puffed her cheeks out. All of her former fear was colored over with valor and skepticism. Save her right hand holding itself against the pipe, she was all the way out, all the way... woman? Very sexy! She was a LOT like Flicker, but... but better! Fluffier, with white fluffy drapery over her neck, a big poof of hair behind two tall ears. Pokémon? I think she was a Pokémon. Kieran would've known which one.

Kieran?! Oh, THAT'S RIGHT! I really AM a person!

"Who are you...?" she asked me. I was so happy she asked. That happiness was a reminder of the personhood that I lost after I met Travis.

"Bryan. Er, my name's Bryan. B-... Yeah." I said. I avoided eye contact and rubbed behind my head-body with a tentacle-arm. It didn't feel very nice. I stopped doing it.

"Well," she rolled her neck, then sighed. "It's about time."

...