This story was co-developed by Titan127 and beta read by ShonnaRose and JhinoftheOpera.

[8-1] Lie There and Die

"You seem restless today. Would you like to focus on that?"

Kris tried to sit up straighter to make herself less obvious, even though it was far too late for that. Obviously, he could read body language. She was stupid not to pay attention to herself.

Knowing that the Viceroy was hiding something wasn't the problem; knowing that he knew that she knew made her avert her eyes every time she walked past a League employee.

"No. I'm not uncomfortable, not more than usual," she said.

"Anything you say in this room remains in this room," he said, pointing the back of his pen around the crimson hearth that held them.

The Viceroy made his stipulation very clear. The reward for keeping her mouth shut was reduced security, down to a single agent no fewer than ten meters behind, except when she was in the presence of other verified League personnel. She was free to move about the grounds of the castle but no further, and she could call or text whoever she wished, not that they'd clarified to start on that last point. It was… indescribably relieving, to not be watched as hard as she was. To just be on her own.

Lucian, for his part, hadn't invaded her thoughts, even though he easily could have rifled through the files of her mind to find inconsistencies. If he really wanted to burden himself with her information, it would have been so easy to take a peek. It didn't really make sense that he'd respect her privacy. He should have known by now that she expected the opposite.

Her eyes searched for lenses at the corners of the ceiling, and she tried to pick up sounds just outside this office. It was in a relatively secluded part of the League, due to the Elite Four having a dedicated section of the castle for themselves. The one agent she was assigned was somewhere on standby, but Lucian qualified as "League personnel", so it's possible he was far out of earshot.

Kris finally decided to say something. It had been a week since their last session, and her chance encounter in the executive suite, and she'd kept it bottled and corked since. It desperately wanted out, slipping through as a little more than a hush. "I learned something about the Viceroy."

"Ah," said Lucian, in a similar whisper. "Do you find it distressing?"

"I- I don't know. I barely even know what to make of it. Something about losing documentation for Champion candidates. He was arguing with Oberon Terminus."

This was news enough to Lucian that he sat quiet in his seat. His maroon suit blended in with the couch and the warm lighting, and he clicked the knob on his pen only twice to process his thoughts. For once, Kris felt like she needed to be the one to prod.

"Why did you tell me about Orre?" Kris tried to read behind his lavender glasses, but his eyes were the same color and told the same, empty story.

"I simply thought it might be useful to you." There was an unusual hesitation in that statement. "Have you told your brother?"

"No. I haven't," she said, and for unknown reason, it got a rise out of her. She hadn't made a single attempt to dial one of his burner numbers into her Pokétch, no matter how frequently Dr. Cassius dropped by with a new little slip of responsibility. She already didn't know what she was doing by getting involved. Saber probably had it handled already, and she was sure he could find out far more than her half-assed attempt uncovered. She was useless. "We shouldn't talk about this anymore."

"As you wish. Let's focus more on you." Lucian's voice rose back up, though she realized that it hardly made a difference. He was soft-spoken as is, perfect for slipping past defenses and making people think he wasn't trying to get under their skin.

"What about me?" she spat back, for no real reason.

"Does everything feel overwhelming to you?"

What kind of moronic question was that? Did she think that her parents dying was overwhelming? Did she think that being monitored every second of her life only to trade it for a flimsy gentleman's agreement with Sinnoh's head of state was driving her insane? Did she think that her parents' killer was still unknown and on the loose was haunting her, every waking second of every day?

"You're supposed to be a therapist," she said. She had had enough of this, just like she'd had enough of him every previous time. For all the energy she seemed to lack these days, Lucian's prodding was an effective substitute for vitamins to get her blood flowing. She had convinced herself. She hated his guts.

He continued despite the jab. "Why exactly does it feel overwhelming?"

"Because it—" Kris swore to herself. She didn't even want to answer him, yet every time she accidentally seemed to open her mouth before her brain had time to decide the right course of action. And it forced her to continue, because tripping over her words was far more embarrassing than whatever she had to say. "Because it's difficult to be who I am?"

"And who exactly are you, Ms. Masuta?" asked Lucian. Another dumb question, but somehow asked in the most genuine manner possible.

It was such a dumb question that she couldn't even formulate an answer. She just sat in place, eyes probing an answer for how much she couldn't-didn't want to-generate one. Why was it taking so long? She began with her name. People had one thought when they mentioned Christine Masuta.

"I'm… a success story," she said, brushing the hair from her eyes and sitting up straight and proper. "I'm who people look to when they want evidence that hard work pays off or whatever. But they don't really see me as a person, just a goal. They just think 'Wow, look at how cool she is! I'm gonna be just like her!'"

And they weren't even right about her. Hard work? It's not like she didn't have every resource available to her from the start, but everyone seemed to ignore that to revere the end result. She'd seen it countless times in magazines and on the internet. Forums would range from reverent to downright creepy in their adoration for her and her brother, and she never knew how to process that attention. It flattered her at the same time as it repulsed her, how she was always, forever, permanently on stage.

Though the last few times she checked, her face hadn't been anywhere on television. There were tons of news reports about her missing brother and his run-ins with the International Police. A sensational manhunt for the century that lacked any mention of her at all.

He wrote on his clipboard. "How do you feel about having that status?"

"I feel… I don't know. It's not something I think about, it's just accepted. Sorry, expected. Expected." She clenched her fist and her teeth. She knew she'd screw something up if she talked so much, and it hurt. Physically. Her muscles twitched with an unknown pain just as sweat beaded on her neck.

He wrote again. "Can you remember ever feeling different about it?"

Kris was still recovering from her mishap. She couldn't whisper the next sentence. "Maybe when I was a kid."

He wrote. He wrote. He wrote and wrote and wrote and she hated it. "Tell me more about that."

"No."

"No?" Lucian must have sensed the atmosphere, as he placed the clipboard aside. He did that every time he tried to "pacify" her, babying her by making it seem like he cared.

"No. I don't want to do this."

"Maybe we could just end this session, then, and see if you're feeling better next week?" he offered.

"Do you think this is funny?" she asked. "Do you enjoy watching me squirm like this when you ask questions and whatever?"

"I—" He must not have been qualified to respond to that kind of question. "I'm attempting to do my job, Kris."

"Why the hell do you even need to ask me any of this? Why can't you just cut the crap, use those psychic powers of yours, and tell me what's wrong with me?" she shouted.

Her chest was heaving, even though she'd done nothing but sit quietly the entire meeting. And now her throat was raw too, like that phrase had tried to escape the entire time and finally decided that it was willing to tear out its escape route.

She threw herself back in her chair, limp and facing away from him. It was moronic of her to shout. As much as this therapy charade wore her down, Lucian was one of the few people in the entire Sinnoh League she felt like she could actually talk to since Saber left. She didn't know Bertha or Aaron well enough, and Flint was—well, he was Flint.

After letting the peace elapse, and while taking a casual sip of water, Lucian said, "Ah, I suppose I should explain how I… function."

"I don't want to hear about your performance issues," she shot back.

Lucian's drink exited his nose, leading him to cough over and over. Her cheeks rose, but immediately reinforced her frown when he chuckled to himself about it. She couldn't enjoy this. She shouldn't even have to be here. After stitching himself back together, Lucian went full teacher mode on her, which only made the pile of schoolwork in her room linger at the edge of her mind.

"I can only read the forefront of someone's mind, enough to gain a general sense of their emotions or their motivations. And, as per my training," he said, waving his clipboard. "I can reasonably extrapolate certain things about people."

"Uh-huh. So, no reading my subconscious?" she asked.

Lucian shook his head. "My abilities intercept the thoughts that border on the threshold of your sensory input. I suppose, if I focused, I could read the workings further back, but it would be nothing but a jumble. I can't understand the voices until they begin to coalesce."

"So, you can't help me."

"I can guide you, if you're willing to let me, but it's a complex process," he said. "Depression is not simple. There could be thousands of little things picking at you that make it feel like it's impossible to move forward."

Kris shot to her feet, accidentally knocking a photograph off the table. "I'm not depressed!"

The photo's glass frame shattered. She spied both Lucian and her mother's faces imprisoned behind the cracks. It was old, about 2003-ish, when Lucian first became a member of the Elite Four.

"I know how it feels," said Lucian. "Sometimes you feel like your dream is an impossible distance away, and you break down thinking about trying to get there. And you're content. That's what's hardest to break."

Kris knelt in front of the picture and mindlessly collected the pieces. Miniscule sparks of pain, so small she didn't really register them, covered her hand as she swept up the tiny fragments. Lucian also dropped to the floor to help her, and together they collected the broken glass using the photo like an ashtray.

She got a closer look at the image. It was a bright summer day—no snow, but they were wrapped in scarves—and everyone in the image was happy to be alive. Except Lucian. With her mother's jubilance wrapped around him, he was crying.

The Lucian in the photo somehow looked ten years older than the Lucian of the present. His hair was frayed and there were bags under his eyes that had disappeared with time. She had no idea what could have happened to a twenty-ish year old to make him look like that.

"Why did you choose this line of work?" she asked.

He sat back in his seat and placed the photo between them, clearly reminiscing about it himself. "Perhaps I just wanted to pay something back."

The sudden crisis of the broken photo seemed to have chipped away at her growing resentment, and all she felt was so tired. She said, softly, "I think I'll take that out. Come back next week."

Lucian nodded. "Tuesday, like usual?"

"Sure. Tuesday."

He led her to the office door and she stepped into the hallway, but as he waved goodbye and closed it behind her, she used her shoe as a doorstop. He titled his head at her, and then noticed the 50,000 note in her outstretched hand.

A half-hearted attempt to shoo her away to 'focus on other work' failed to break her iron-plated stubbornness. He matched it by letting her arm get tired.

"Sir. Lucian. I'm using your services, and you know I have the cash to pay for this," she said. Money was never an object to her, and it especially wasn't now after she discovered an additional nine figure transfer in her account. Kris refused to think about where it came from.

He shook his head. "I'm paying something back. And I'd rather we not get tied up with medical law. A casual chat, remember?"

Eventually, she couldn't hold the note up anymore, and pulled her foot from the door. It closed gently, leaving her alone yet again.

She didn't think about much on her way back to the suite, though she marked the date on her calendar first thing. It was so empty without those appointments anyway.

Kris muttered to herself as she returned from a training session, the only time she'd left the suite since her meeting last week with Lucian. Her inherited Pokémon had cooperated fine, each one sparring with one of her own barring her mother's Lucario, whom she'd kept willfully hidden inside his capsule.

She didn't want to risk him saying something. Not before… not before she had the chance. She needed to look them in the eyes and say what she needed to say. To Kiki, to Boss, to Opie, to Princess. They deserved to know.

But the entire time, she'd done nothing but sit patiently in the corner, watching the Pokémon moderate themselves and mouthing under her breath what she might never have the courage to voice. It reminded her of her graduation speech, only with no promise that she would actually stand and speak. Once she returned to the suite and the safety of the room, she planted herself in front of the full-body mirror.

"Look, there's something I have to tell you. It's about your Trainer. Your Trainer is… your Trainer isn't, uhh…"

Even though it was private between Kris and her double, she still couldn't find the words. An hour had passed already as she tried to converse with her reversed self beyond the mirror. A cold fog at the edges threatened to obscure her partner completely. She swore that she saw a strange movement in her image, but when she stared harder, there was nothing.

"My Mom isn't here," she said. It was the closest she'd strayed to the truth. "She's not available—no, she's not… agh!"

How the hell could she tell them if she couldn't even tell herself? Those garbage words hadn't crossed her lips or her mind, no matter how hard she searched for them. It's not like she didn't want to. She needed to accept this. She just needed to fucking grow up!

Kris threw herself down on her bed and buried her face in the stockpile of pillows. She knew what she was doing. She'd lay there for a while, promising herself that the rest would rejuvenate her for whatever task was ahead that needed doing, but the time would leech away with each successive thought. It'd be more comforting if she could nap, but she hadn't found the best luck sleeping, either.

She tapped her Pokétch to life and went to messages Only two people's conversations remained, the rest previously sent to a digital graveyard on impulse, as she couldn't bear to look at ones that couldn't continue. She opened the first option.

Christine: Hey u here (Sent 16 Oct 11 at 18:47)

She stared at it for a while, wondering if he'd even respond. He usually left her bugging on read, and she conceded she didn't often leave much to say. But after a blank period, she saw the bar pop up at the bottom.

Blond Nerd: Yeah, give me a secons (Received 16 Oct 11 at 18:49)

Blond Nerd: Second* (Received 16 Oct 11 at 18:49)

Blond Nerd: Okay here. Sorry I was finding a place to sit down in Jubilife (Received 16 Oct 11 at 18:56)

Christine: Where u headed? (Sent 16 Oct 11 at 18:56)

She had no idea what she actually wanted to talk about so it was a good place to start. Not that her fingers were taking signals from her brain anyway, they just seemed to tap on a whim.

Blond Nerd: Still on the way to Floaroma, and we should get a train right there. Using a dictionary so it's dicey (Sent 16 Oct 11 at 18:56)

Christine: Your sis is vegetarian right (Received 16 Oct 11 at 18:56)

Blond Nerd: Recently yeah (Received 16 Oct 11 at 18:56)

Christine: If ur near kongene theres a place that does a lot with root veggies. It's p good (Sent 16 Oct 11 at 18:57)

Blond Nerd: Is longer a street? (Received 16 Oct 11 at 18:57)

Blond Nerd: Kongene** sorry, foreign words (Received 16 Oct 11 at 18:57)

Blond Nerd: Wait nevermind I found it on my map. We already sat down at this place but Laina was having trouble reading the menu anyway (Received 16 Oct 11 at 18:58)

Christine: Say har du yunevsk and they'll give you a Unovan menu, regional law (Sent 16 Oct 11 at 18:58)

Blond Nerd: But only if I ask? I'm clearly not from around here (Received 16 Oct 11 at 18:58)

Christine: Were pretty proud of our language ngl, learn it or suck it up nerd (Sent 16 Oct 11 at 18:58)

Blond Nerd: Great advice (Received 16 Oct 11 at 18:59)

Blond Nerd: Hey I'll send you and your brother flowers once I get to Floaroma (Received 16 Oct 11 at 19:02)

She failed to process this for a moment, and apparently, he did too. She saw the "typing" message appear and disappear a few times. She wasn't even sure what she'd do with a flower when she could barely take care of herself.

Christine: Thanks but no than

Christine: Thats sweet but you dont ne

Christine: Uhh how are you even gonna mail acro

None of the three messages made it past her second thoughts. She settled on one that required far less effort.

Christine: Thanks (Sent 16 Oct 11 at 19:10)

Thanks. That's it. Someone was sending her flowers and being nice and all she could give was a halfhearted thanks with no explanation? She slipped the watch off her wrist and cast it onto the bedside table, unable to think of any way to follow up that idiocy, then jammed her palms into her eye sockets.

What had she accomplished by texting him? Nothing. And she still was no closer to saying what she needed to say to her mother's Pokémon, who had no doubt spent the past few weeks in horrible anxiety that her news would only deepen.

Suddenly, the buzzing returned, and it wasn't the short jolt of a text. The screen flashed an unknown number on a black canvas, subtitled by seven missed calls over two days. She felt the blaring light from the device brand the number into her face as she stared at it.

Who in the world had her number? Ciel, Lucian's work, maybe some old high school acquaintances like classmates or administrative staff, and Saber. And it couldn't be the last option, since it didn't match any of the burner numbers, but then…

It blared to life when she pressed answer.

"Kris! Oh, thank goodness, I was afraid you'd never pick up!" Her brother's voice boomed loud, in low enough quality that the shrillness punched her eardrums.

"Geez, Saber. Hold on," she said, then cranked the Pokétch's volume down. "Okay, okay. You're good, go ahead."

"This is very important, so listen to me closely. You need to avoid Dr. Cassius from now on, and don't talk to him unless-"

She cut him off, head still pounding. "What are you talking about? Dr. Cassius left the League a few days ago."

Nothing but crackling silence came after, and she wondered if the line had died. The speaker already implied he was talking on some piece of junk, but she couldn't imagine why when "exorbitantly rich" was an understatement they'd lived with for years.

"Did he say where he was going?" her brother finally asked.

"Gosh, I don't remember," she said. A conversation from only days ago completely slipped through her like a phantom. "I think he said something about the Battle Zone, but that's not really a where. Ranted about research stuff like usual."

"I... I see."

"What's happening?"

"It's nothing." His voice carried an unconvincing gravity, but like her talk with Dr. Cassius, it seemed to phase right through her, leaving nothing but a cold impression she would soon forget. He replaced it with an unsteady pep. "It's wonderful to speak to you! Have you been keeping well?"

The urge to tell him about Lucian's sessions welled, but she stomped it back like a child before it could flow from her consciousness. She hated them. Where she got the motivation to slither from her stone bed for the second Tuesday in a row just to listen to him prick and taunt was a mystery, and she hated more to memorialize herself in that position.

She also couldn't talk about her encounter with the Viceroy. She couldn't, or she wouldn't? That left her with a functionally blank history, where everything was fine.

"I've been keeping." An excellent non-answer, with a dose of dry comedy in her tone. She was a master comic, standing before a crowd of howling fans.

And, of course, her brother took it without another thought, which she chose to believe was because he was optimistic and not because he didn't care. "Excellent! Have you been keeping up with your training recently?"

"Uhh, sure," she replied, as much as 'watching them silently from the corner' counted as training. "You told Dad's Pokémon about, umm, what happened, didn't you?"

"Of course."

"How did they… take it?"

Without any visual, she couldn't know if her request was a suspicious oddity, as he didn't let his opinion carry through the line. "They were devastated. I've offered them time together as a group to maximize emotional support, but they aren't likely to be fully recovered for quite some time. Have yours been similar?"

She froze. All she had was another lie. "Yeah. They're taking it about how I expected."

"Well, don't be discouraged by the lack of results! You must accept the wishes and grief of your Pokémon and be the forum they need to heal!" he exclaimed.

The lack of video became a blessing when her nose began to run and her eyes began to well, and she locked her jaw to prevent little, pathetic hiccups from escaping. She'd already failed the most basic thing, so unable to act or say what she needed that her mother's Pokémon were better off with just about anyone else. She couldn't even keep up with class assignments when every concession was made in her favor-how could she care for suffering, living creatures?

"Kris," her brother started. "I know it's not the most optimal situation, but would you mind if we… talked like this more often?

She couldn't remember her answer. Yes, no, maybe, I'll think about it? Whatever it was she said, the call ended without her knowledge, leaving her alone on her bed with her lungs tangled and gasping for air. Her resumed rehearsals filled the still room.

"Hey guys. I don't know how to tell you this but," she whispered, an elbow over her eyes. "Your Trainer is…"

Breath. Swallow and use your tongue so your mouth doesn't get dry, she thought. It's just a sentence.

"There's something I've wanted to tell you guys. It's about your Trainer, Cynthia." Kris took in a freezing breath and felt a similar chill nipping at her exposed toes. Her stomach felt as massive as a planet even though she was talking to no one. "It's that—- well she—-"

Just say it.

Say it.

Say it!

"They're gone."

Yes, they were. They were never coming back.

They needed to know that, and she did too. But feeling the wetness flowing from her eyes that showered onto the pillow, she dreaded their own responses. She had to tell them eventually. Eventually.

But maybe she'd just let them be happy for a little while longer. She didn't need to change things just yet.

Three years ago today (July 27th, 2018), I published the first chapter of the first story in this series. It's been a bumpy, exciting ride, and I'm nowhere near done yet. Thanks for keeping up all this time, and I hope you're ready for whatever comes next!

I really enjoyed the short chat-fic segment of this chapter, and I think it goes a long way in making these characters feel real. I definitely want to do more of it in the future if I can find a place for it.

Next is Part 2: Come and Smell the Roses. See you someday!