POV: Cyrus/ LOCATION: [classified]

In that timeless white room, the federal prosecutor covers the table with colorless papers. She begins by reading my very limited rights before delving into a concise explanation of these documents.

My place here is to adhere to the power dynamic, to nod and obey. Talk back? Ask for clarification? No. Her spotless record is on the line. I'll be a good boy and keep my mouth shut.

So I sign whatever she presents me. With the final signature, I sign away my life. Tomorrow, I will be transported to a high-security psychiatric hospital for the criminally insane. She, her husband, and their city are determined to get rid of me. Erase the taint that mars their prestigious reputation.

It's only 10 years too late. No one cared much about that creepy kid when he was still there, but now that he's in prison on charges of attempted homicide against the Champion of Sinnoh? Sooner or later someone will find the truth of his birthplace, that he wasn't born in Veilstone like he had told the press on the day of Galactic's grand opening. Dig a little deeper, and they'll get a bombshell that will shake Sunyshore to its core.

Ah. Well, secrets are meant to be discovered. No point in hiding them behind harmless white lies anymore.

Everything is a blur after my final meeting with the federal prosecutor. White flashes. White rooms. People in white coats and masks.

Twelve hours left in this world. Afterwards, I'll exist in a room with padded walls until the end of time. I will be forgotten. My legacy erased. Left to a fate worse than death.

I savor my last hours in this universe by easing my head against the cold cement wall. From beyond the barred window of my cell sneaks in a waft of petrichor. I inhale the earthly scent, holding my breath, letting my only souvenir of the outside world imprint itself into my heart.

With petrichor comes rain. Charon mentioned something about a thunderstorm of the decade. The skies above Crystal Cave—how long has that been?—also foreshadowed a dark and stormy future.

But what does it matter to me? Rain will pour, the sun will fall, the moon will rise. Where I'm going, there will be no day or night. An existence frozen in time.

Lacking the energy to climb onto my cot, I lie on the floor and allow my eyes to close. Cold. The cement underneath radiates a chill that permeates my aching bones. A mist of rain hangs over the rancid prison air.

Then the first drop falls. Plip. Plip. Two, four, seven… multiplying exponentially with each passing heartbeat. Rain drumming against the wall. Stray droplets tapping my face.

The world plunges into darkness. Lightning has arrived. Boom! The first thunderclap. My elbow automatically hits the leg of the cot, but my mind remains blissfully numb.

Light. Thunder. Repeat. What a beautiful, perfect pattern. While the melody of tempests roars in the background, my mind toys with the prospect of slumber. I owe it to myself to rest, and I owe it to everyone I've wronged to never wake up.

Yet my sleep is shattered by a very foul stench. Beyond the curtain of my hair, I glimpse a misshapen face staring straight at me.

"You got food to spare?" says the amalgamation of trash and Pokemon.

In this severely underfunded institution, Trubbish sightings are as common as there being no soap in the washrooms. These Pokemon lurk around the prison yard, huddling in dank, dark places. This particular one calls this floor its home.

I find the stale bread I had received for breakfast and offer it to the Trubbish, who greedily crams it into its abyss of a mouth.

"Yummy mold!" it exclaims. "Can Trubbish have that too?"

"That" refers to the sweat-stained cotton spilling out of my mattress. Why not? I have to make sure my visitors don't leave empty-handed.

The Pokemon beams. "You're so kind, human. Normally your kind just shoos Trubbish away."

I'm really sorry about that. It's not that I dislike you; it's just that you reek. But it's not your fault, is it? Looks can be deceiving. Your defect shouldn't be the basis of how you're perceived.

"Trubbish has this funny feeling that you understand it."

I can, actually. Because I'm SpECIaL like MEspRiT said.

Then some guards pass my cell.

"That crazy inmate is talking to Pokemon again," they whisper loudly. "Look at how he's smiling at it like they're old friends. And to think, he was the CEO of that big energy company."

"It's only eleven hours and four minutes until he's wheeled off into the asylum. Just put up with his antics until then."

I return my attention to the Trubbish, who is currently engrossed in telling a story about the time its extended family clogged up the sewers under Castelia City. It's a very heartwarming tale. If I can speak, I will laugh. Instead, all I can do express my mirth is release a scraping gurgle of air.

The Trubbish's grin dies instantly. "Why do you look so sad when you smile?"

Sad? Why should I feel sad? Nonetheless, I rub my itchy eyes with my sleeve.

And the next thing I know, the Trubbish has wedged itself between the bars and has made itself comfortable on my lap. As I watch with curiosity, it reaches into its mouth, groping around in the dubious contents, and extracts a straw doll with a bent neck.

"Trubbish found this in the trash," it says proudly. "For you, human. So you won't feel sad."

I press the doll's scorched, rotting fabric against my cheek. Once upon a time, it was cherished by a child. It belonged. And now, it's worlds away from home. How sad.

A fond, poignant memory crosses into consciousness, one pertaining to the toy robot in my childhood. If just for a heartbeat in time, I am able to travel back to brighter days. If I close my eyes, the cement walls recede into the glimmering blue sea. Petrichor morphs into the saline breeze which runs its playful, phantasmal fingers through my hair.

I open my eyes to the cold, stale fluorescent lights of my cell. And I sigh, tightening my embrace over the toy in my current possession.

Encouraged by my childish behavior, the Trubbish eagerly produces more treasures of the past: a plastic aeroplane with torn wings; a music box housing a crippled ballerina; a chipped silver bell that no longer rings.

Toys past the point of fixing. How appropriate.

"Trubbish has more things in its belly! You can look!"

I don't mind spending my last hours playing with toys and a mutated rubbish bag. In fact, I look forward to it. The Trubbish giggles when I reach my hand into its dark, grimy void of a stomach. Moist. Fuzzy. Squishy. Did something pop? I think I threw up a few times in my mouth.

The world plunges into black. White. Thunder shakes the iron bars. Stinging rain batters the back of my scalp.

Eight hours left. Am I truly going to sit here until they come for me? Am I giving up without a fight? Let Charon pervert the purity of my noble dream?

My hand curls around something cold, solid, and sharp. Copper wires. Miscellaneous gears and cogs and sprockets.

"Are you cold?" says Trubbish. "You're shaking."

I was so close to having all five Time Gears in my possession. This close to fixing this imperfect world!

Howling winds blast through the shoebox window, ramming into my back, finally knocking the purpose back into my soul.

Ah. Through the distorted lens of anger, I see my future very clearly.

I will finish what I have started.

But first, I'm breaking out of here. So when the guards return, I proceed to clapping loudly and randomly. While they distance themselves from this lunatic, I set my plan into motion.

Mind and body slowly reunite; my hands move on autopilot, picking out the necessary materials from the Trubbish's stomach while my mind conjures up the familiar atmosphere of my workstation. I work to the frantic rhythm of my heartbeat, my thoughts circling only around the finished product, only on the future.

"You're hurt."

It is the Trubbish's voice that grounds me to the present. Glancing down, I see that my palms are marked by deep red welts. A nasty gash runs from my ring finger to my wrist.

Ah. I didn't even feel that.

Irrelevant matters aside, it is done. My makeshift lighnting rod. After extensive analysis of the prison's wiring, I conclude that everything here is connected by one big grid. Knock out a port, and the whole system will fail.

The anticipation is killing me. Silent giggles rock my shoulders, ricocheting in my pulsating skull. These emotions are clashing violently within me, filling me with both a deep lust for life and an intense craving for destruction.

After plunging the copper wires into my veins and fixing myself into a makeshift conductor, I slip my wrist between the bars of the window, the lightning rod held firmly in my grip.

Boom! The rain burns like acid against my skin. Did you know, Jupiter, that the human body is approximately 60% water? Water conveniently conducts electricity. If you see me now, you'd stop me. But I'm dead to you, so whatever stupid shit I pull are none of your concern.

Boom!

Is that my heart or the thunder that's quavering?

"Are you bored already?"

I turn back to the Trubbish surrounded by abandoned toys. In its oversized mittens is the doll I had held. The Pokemon is staring at me… waiting for me to come back to play… like my old friend would do.

And I rush to the Trubbish and sweep it into my chest in a fierce hug. Oh, the smell is so terrible that it makes my teeth fall off. But it's warm. So heartbreakingly warm.

A mitten pats my back. "Don't cry. Trubbish has a lot more toys!"

"Thank you," I mouth. "Thank you for being so kind to someone like me. Thank you for visiting, for the toys, for being here with me one last time.

"Now, farewell, my friend."

And I shove the Trubbish out of my cell, along with the toys it had brought me. My back turned to its cries, I thrust the lightning rod out into the rain.

This is the point of no return.

Then the hairs on my skin bristles. Time slows down as the white light of judgement nears. Time stands still when shadows flee from its indiscriminate wrath.

Tick tock ticks my trembling heart. Exhilaration… or fear?

Then the lightning connects. Fire seeps into my bloodstream, prompting implosions in my organs. As my eardrums burst, as my skin evaporates from my bones, as my world succumbs to the all-consuming radiance…

I shed tears of happiness. Finally, I can rest assured that with these two broken hands, I have reclaimed control of my lost future.