POV: Cyrus / LOCATION: Old Chateau
I remain huddled in the corner until the voices in the walls confirm that those people have gone far, far away. They whisper and chatter and weep, a cacophony of guttural sounds that infest this space like sludge in crystal-clear water.
They do not stop, these voices. Chattering everywhere and always about every goddamn problem in their previous lives. It's enough to drive any rational person mad… provided that the previously mentioned individual started out sane in the first place.
Why can I see past my hands? Why are the deceased able to physically brush past me, leaving a sensation of a glove wet from battery acid rubbing against damp skin?
And why is there is a body on the bed? I kicked that fucking corpse aside like the abandoned rag that it was. Yet it had found its way back to me. It crawled back with its ruptured eye sockets and dirt-stuffed grin.
A horrible, reality-rending screech punctures my eardrums. I drop to the floor, crying…
Then I am staring up at the ceiling. My hands are no longer transparent. I see every blood-leeched pore with terrifying clarity.
"Cyruzzt!"
My chest is so sluggish, so heavy. But how can that be, when I lack a heartbeat? When my heart is nothing more than a mass of dead, torn tissue?
"What happened? Rotom heard you scream!"
I throw off the covers and flee the room. Loose nails and shattered wood plunge gleefully into my bare soles.
"Cyrus, be careful! You'll crash into something."
In my hurrying to round a corner, I smash my arm against the wall. Instead of it hurting like hell, my arm rips right off in an explosion of decay and maggot husks. With a dull thump, the limb falls to the floor. Unmoving.
"CYRUS? WHAT IS THAT SOUND?"
Damn it! I should've known they would be haunting me as well.
I scale up the rooftop.
The night is vibrating with treason. A dagger moon glints in the starless sky: a lone, exposed tooth in the jaws of a monster hiding within the obscured galaxy.
Darkness distorts the distance from here to my bed of brimstone. What does it matter? I have been falling for the last 27 years, falling into the bottomless sea.
There is only one thing I can do now. The only thing I still have control over.
Suddenly, the wind stops billowing around me. My world jerks, and I find myself back in this forsaken mansion, surrounded by those Pokemon who time and time again interfered with my future.
"Let me go," I say flatly.
"Cyruzzt, you're scaring us, zzt. You're not your normal self."
"Normal? You call that docile, sedated state normal? You call talking to Pokemon NORMAL?!"
Jostled restless by my unstable emotional state, the spirits of this house converge into a shockwave that pushes the Pokemon far, far away from me. Souls condense above my head, forming a halo of ghoulish blue embers.
"We don't want to fight you!"
"Then vanish from my sight. Now!"
"We can't do that, Cyrus!"
The Rotom launches itself at me.
"Why won't you let me die?" I shriek.
"You have to live, zzt! We need you!"
"No, you needed me! I've given you ALL I had, and now I have NOTHING left for you to take! If you insist on standing in my way, I will KILL YOU AND YOUR SOUL!"
The Rotom buries itself into the crook of my neck. Bpt. Bpt. Its erratic pulse echoes in my hollow bosom. An abrupt image taps my heart: a late night scented by burnt sand, the cone of light from a lamp illuminating a mountain of unfinished arithmetic problems next to a toy robot.
As the Pokemon pile themselves on me, more and more vacuous sentimentality invades my lens of reason: an infantile, leathery wing brushing against a laceration of a boy's temple; a scruffy wing slapping a runny nose; a ragged, slimy fin tugging a frayed sleeve; a restless claw squeezing a bruised, trembling hand.
"STOP!" I scream.
Accursed emotion! Why must something so arbitrary bring about physical pain as real as a shattered spine? Why am I so susceptible to pointless passions? I don't need happiness nor sorrow! All I need is anger. Rage corrosive enough to fuel my noble ambitions and raze everything that is unnecessary!
Yet they tighten their embrace, these remnants of my pathetic past.
"We're not here to hurt you," the Crobat says softly.
Movement sloshes in my eyeballs, pushing out to my tear ducts and spilling over my cheek. The rotten substance drips onto the Honchkrow's clean, extended wing.
"I'm disgusting," I whisper. "Please don't touch me. You'll be defiled too."
The Weavile cradles my head in its arms. I rest my face into its pudgy stomach, the sewage from my heart staining its fur.
"Let it out, kid. We're here for you. We've always been."
Why…? Why do I cry louder around these Pokemon than when I was alone?
"Cyruzzt remembers," Rotom says.
I have washed my face with Gyarados's Water Gun. But I still feel horrible. Like I have been run over by a military tank that backed up and pulverized me a second time just because it could.
"Disappointed?" I say with a mirthless chuckle.
"No!"
"Your heart says otherwise." Look at me, acknowledging the wretched existence of spirit. Oh how low I've fallen.
"You seemed much happier without your memories," Crobat admits, timidly twiddling its wings. "Seeing you happy made us happy too."
"It made you continue to lie to me."
"N-No, that's not…"
"You acted under the grand impression that you could protect me, yes? I never asked you to do that. Why is it so damn hard for you to mind your own business?"
The Pokemon hang their heads.
Sighing through gnashed teeth, I yank down a curtain drape, wrap it around myself, and melt into the floor. I am a proud road block, obstructing this narrow hallway. It is something I excel at, after all, to hinder everyone's progress.
"Do you need us to get you anything?"
"No."
"You'll catch cold if you sleep there."
"I'm fine."
"Do you hate us?"
I turn so fast that my neck cracks like eggshells under a hammer. The hurt in their eyes makes me feel even more disgusting inside.
"Please allow me some time alone," I say softly.
After they leave, I pull the blanket my head and squeeze my eyes shut. Wouldn't it be nice to be a child again, to blot out the world just by closing my eyes?
When I was 7, I wholly believed that Grandfather's house was the safest place in the world. There, I never needed to cover my eyes.
Oh Grandfather. What should I do? Should I run and hide like a coward? Should I hold my chin high and accept my punishment with honor? Or should I just… end it all? Permanently this time?
Can you even hear me? Do you even care? Have you discarded me as well?
I'm scared, Grandfather. Why did I have to outlive you?
Someone shakes my protective fortress. Peeling off the curtain, I am greeted with the head of a Bibarel, bright pink entrails dangling from its severed neck.
"Not hungry," I grunt.
Weavile drags me out of my hole. I allow myself to be dragged along. Don't feel like putting up a fight right now.
As I absently nibble on the Bibarel's brain, my disorganized thoughts slowly simmer down to something cohesive. The mechanical act of chewing untangles my taut nerves. I can't taste shit though.
All right. The story so far… is that the Champion of Sinnoh (former Champion? What the hell happened?) is in cahoots with Interpol to haul me back to my padded prison cell. Threat number 1.
Aside from them, I have Charon's team breathing down my neck. Threat number 2. Apparently my fortune was not enough to satiate his bottomless greed. But what about my will? It was paid out after my death. It should've been. I know that I'm a good-for-nothing criminal now, but I have—had—the right for my will to be correctly executed.
Ah, why do I care? They can do whatever they want. I was cut out from their lives the moment my true face was revealed. This doesn't bother me at all. It doesn't…
Furthermore, there are those two. Threat number 3. How did they find me? What do they want? Wasn't it enough to make me the circus show of our fair little city? Will they not be satisfied until I am presented, in chains, to the mayor? To the people who vaguely knew me as a child? To my pa—
A particularly firm eyeball muscle slips undetected into the wrong pipe. I burst out in coughing fits. It takes Crobat, Honchkrow, Weavile, and half of Gyardos to dislodge the food particle.
I am so very tired.
"Rest, Cyrus. We'll keep you safe."
Rest. Oh, that certainly sounds wonderful. Close my eyes and drift into darkness. Down, down into complete apathy. Into the bottom of the sea where no one will care about me. All my dreams, my aspirations, my legacy, withering away into white foam…
No.
No, I've come so far to throw it all away.
By my own hands, I wrestled back control of my life to end it. But fate had other plans. Will I cow and allow it to tug my strings again?
I am certain you have known me well enough by now to know my answer.
You know that I don't have much time left.
Therefore, I don't have time for failure.
My soul salivating with purpose, I still my mind and focus. This universe is brimming with energy. Energies of those living, of those departed, of sentimentality attached to trivial objects, transforming them into emotionally meaningful vessels.
An immense energy unlike anything in this world dwells within me, providing life to this defunct machine. The power of the past, present, and future that I had once sought to steal and manipulate. Forcibly conferred onto me by those woefully short-sighted Lake Guardians.
There it is. A song. Four melodies ticking in harmony.
Tracing the irresistible hymn of destiny, I arrive at the ancient grandfather clock, the lone survivor of this mansion's treacherous past. How much has it seen? How much more will it take?
One flick of a cheap hairpin, and the rusty clock face springs open.
This was where they stashed the Time Gears? Right where I could steal it again? Brilliant and oh so fucking stupid.
These smooth, burnished edges. Flawless and symmetrical. Delicious. Perfect.
When has victory ever been this easy? Has all my suffering been for naught?
I turn and address my wary audience.
"I don't suppose you'll want to part ways here."
Four empty Poke Balls smack my thick skull.
"Damn right!" Weavile barks.
"I can't persuade you otherwise? A Mild Poffin, anyone?"
"Cyrus, when have we ever successfully dissuaded you from anything?" says Honchkrow.
That earns a snicker from me. "Come now. I'm stubborn, but not that thickheaded."
"Yes, you are," says Crobat with utmost affection.
See? I will never succeed as a parent. My children—forgive me, Grandfather—will grow up chasing death wishes like their foolish father.
Without further ado, I return my Pokemon into their Poke balls. I press the capsules to my bosom. How strange, this numbness which courses through my expired veins. My distended stomach sings, as though it has been warmed by a bowl of hot congee.
"Cyruzzt, you forgot Rotom!"
Oh dear.
"I never captured you," I say gently. "You don't belong to anyone, Rotom. You are a wild Pokemon."
"Why did you name a wild Pokemon then, huh? Why did you take Rotom-zzt-home? Why did you stay up late telling Rotom about your dreams-zzt-and biggest fears? Remember, you were really scared that you might be disowned—"
I clamp my hand over that motor mouth. Eesh! Announce it to the world, why don't you? No one needs to know about the ramblings of a stupid, ugly child.
"If you don't take Rotom along, Rotom will tell everyone about all your secrets, zzt!"
"I don't have any Poke balls," I huff.
As if prepared for that excuse its entire existence, Rotom proudly whips out an Ultra Ball. One not made of plastic, but of wood. Judging from the fine, antiquated craftsmanship, this Poke Ball must've been created in the early days of the Sinnoh region. Back when it was called… hm. The name slips my mind.
"You are very persistent," I say.
"Like Trainer, like Pokemon!"
I hold the antique Ultra Ball to Rotom's rod.
"Ready?"
"Rotom was born ready!"
With a burst of red, Rotom disappears inside the Ultra Ball. One wiggle. Two wiggles. Three wiggles. Click.
Oh my, was my dead heart racing just now? Have I experienced the same joy a young Pokemon Trainer would have felt whenever they successfully captured a Pokemon? The exhilaration of a new door opening. Of countless opportunities made available to those willing to take risks.
Oh Cyrus, you are too old for that. You shot for the moon, and you fell to your death. The stars did not break your fall.
Regardless, you have something much more precious now: a team. A family. With these five powerful stars in your fragile galaxy, your spirit is at last complete.
Up in my bedroom, I take along the necessities: my wanted poster (I used to look like that? My how time flies), the Old Notebook, and the Red Sunstone. Once I make the necessary preparations, I set off.
Before I cross the threshold, a giggle escapes from my throat. Soon I am laughing. My shoulders shake, and my ribcage dances. I toss back my head, howling with delight, and my right leg snaps off my hip. I fall like a sack of shriveled potatoes.
Incredible. I am falling apart. Literally and figuratively!
Once the fit of laughter subsides, I pull myself together. Your madness gives you strength, Cyrus, but you must be lucid to get things done. Do you recall the last time you succumbed to insanity? Yes, I remember that quite clearly. I remember many things that I yearn to forget.
The moon in the sky is frightening, so much so that it almost seems like nocturnal daylight outside.
Beyond this forest is the edge of dawn. There, I will make my lifelong dream a reality.
I am Cyrus.
Remember my name.
I will finish what I have started.
With these two broken hands, I will reclaim control of my lost future.
By any means necessary.