Category: Pokémon
Rating: M
Couples: ?/OC
Warnings: AU, hint of rape/character death
Chapter: 24
Copyright: Characters & places © By Game Freak, Plot © by me
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\
Diantha flinched a bit, the tone of voice carrying quite some sentiments about the man one would not expect from a child… then again, he was a terrorist and her mother was dead with enough hints floating around that he had done it.
"I would like to preface matters by voicing my displeasure with the Pokémon League." Mother Palkia took a seat herself as well, managing to look as if the wooden log beside Allortan was a throne rather than a fallen tree. "It is quite frankly failing at fulfilling its' meaning of safe-guarding the children. First Team Rocket in Kanto and now this?"
Considering Lance wasn't here, they choose to ignore that accusation about the Viridian Gym, since it was his region. Diantha did feel the need to speak up regarding her own though. "I can certainly agree, but we have little control about the administrative part of the League, in the end."
"You are Champions; you ought to." The grey-clad woman pointed out. "The net that is supposed to keep children safe on their Pokémon-journeys is showing holes. Two slipped through and were found… how many more are passing under the radar because they keep low? How many children had their dreams ruined by the opinions and actions of villains and criminals? Themselves ruined?" She looked up at the Gojika-mansion. "The Sinnoh-church does not demand baseless forgiveness. Forgiveness is only expected when asked for… and I am not sure I can forgive this even if the League asks. I cannot forgive this failure to keep her safe. To keep the children of Kalos safe."
"Have no doubt we will see to it that someone pays for this." Steven assured her, arms crossed. "You are not the only one who considers it unforgivable…"
"You still consider it far more forgiveable than I do." She offered him a sad smile. "But I suppose you would not know. You weren't here back then… I think most of you weren't, or you were so young as to have missed most of the drama." Grass-green eyes looked up to behind Diantha, where Wikstrom and Wulfric were standing. "But you two might. You are natives of Kalos, are you not?"
"Yes." Wulfric confirmed softly.
"Do you recall the 'Summer of Dread'?"
Diantha half-turned to be able to look at them and could tell immediately that they did remember. Even she remembered, vaguely, having heard something like that when she was just starting puberty.
"What is that?" Drasna asked, eyes narrowed a touch.
"A dark time..." Wikstrom answered, voice devoid of his regular grandeur. "For several months – mostly the Summer-ones of that year, hence the name – Kalos lived in terror."
"Mostly the women though." Wulfric looked almost sick as he recalled those years. "There were almost daily abductions throughout the entirety of Kalos… woman would be yanked from the streets, sometimes even their houses and taken out into the lands surrounding the cities."
"There, they were beaten, raped and sometimes killed. At times, they would mercifully be returned to a city to be found, but dozens were just lost because they were left out in the wilds, where they probably were eaten by wild Pokémon or simply faded to the elements." Allortan finished for them, a small mercy considering the subject-matter. "The final estimated victim-count was in the hundreds… as was the count of the dead."
"And it was all master-minded by my father, who had a good dozen minions to do his bidding." Mother Palkia still wore that sad and melancholy smile. "He considered it punitive. The women had forgotten what it meant to be women, so he would teach them and by the brutality of the teachings, scare the others back onto the correct path in life." It was a hollow laugh, more in line with a ghost haunting an old mansion being poisoned by its' regrets rather than a still-living human. "You might have noticed he is a misogynist; women are supposed to marry, breed and feed. Nothing else. No jobs, no careers, Arceus forbid if they are non-straight or dare I say it, single mothers…. All those are wrong and foul and must be punished for their unnaturalness."
Beside her, Fantina pointedly looked elsewhere.
"But..." Diantha suddenly remembered some horrible things. Of whom Allortan had identified as 'victims' of it all. "Didn't… weren't you and Olympia… 'victims'?"
"Yes." Mother Palkia smiled at her in pity. "Yes, I was a victim of my father's 'purge'... Olympia was of a sort… She does not victimize easy, after all."
"And you couldn't warn me!?" Kalos' Champion shot up, glaring at the lawyer opposite her. "You could have warned me! I could have spared Olympia this mess!"
"It was not my place to tell you, Diantha." Allortan countered sharply. "Olympia's past is her own, not mine."
"Are you sure?" Cynthia cut through his words, pulling her colleague back down to her seat. "The behaviour of your Pokémon makes me think otherwise. I know my dragons and she would not shut up." Her grey eyes narrowed. "She was vocalizing constantly; mate-calls and brood-calls. But you live in Lumiose, so any family of hers would be there… except perhaps some human family? Olympia recognized her… and reacted stronger to her – and the association with you – than to Diantha." Sinnoh's Champion took a deep breath. "That's why you gave Fantina your Pokémon, didn't you? Because it would be a safe way to remind Olympia of what she'd stand to loose… Her mate and brood. You and Oizys. She is your mysterious 'mon coeur'."
Nothing seemingly changed on his face, but she got the distinct feeling it was as if she was staring down the Sharpedo he had compared himself to. "She stood to lose four children. We have three besides Oizys. I never claimed them publicly because they are too obviously Gojika." Allortan evenly stated.
"Perhaps you ought to get us some of the famed Gojika-alcohol, Gerard, Fantina." Mother Palkia looked at the two beside her in clear dismissal. "We will need it. Check on her while you are gone."
She was answered with a raised eyebrow, but the lawyer did as she suggested, heading up the path to the mansion.
"I'm staying." Fantina countered softly.
"Dear one, you don't have to."
"I have grown up, Therese." Hearthome's Gym Leader smiled gently. "I can handle it."
The older woman merely inclined her head in assent. "Very well."
"Oughtn't this be even more reason for him to have stopped me?" Diantha snarled, her shock and confusion being drowned out by anger and indignation. "Was she the one he was hoping would stay out of the next hearing!?"
"Yes." Mother Palkia answered with sublime calm. "He knows her protectiveness over me. They were already together back then and he attended most of the court-hearings, not to mention they would simply have talked about things."
"So… was she?" Wikstrom vaguely gestured towards the building.
"Raped and beaten?" The grey-and-pink clad woman finished his question. "Not as such… But she knows… she knows intimately of how I was. I daresay, she remembers my ordeal better than I do myself… to my everlasting shame, forgiving though she might have me." She looked over at Fantina.
"There is a reason Lombardt fled from her… and it's not that he respects the power of female Gym Leaders. Instead, I am very certain he fled because he finally recognized her." The purple-haired woman continued, holding her gloves in what well could be called a death-grip.
"And I have been told he learned to fear her well, back in the day." Therese managed a soft chuckle. "One of two regrets I will forever have; I did not witness it. It could well have been therapeutic from what I have been told."