The aftermath of Caelia's broken heart will be explored. How will she deal with this pain that threatens to overwhelm her? At the end of the day, she's still just a girl.

Also, there are still issues with fanfiction, so I don't know if this chapter is being read, either. As said before, if you can read this chapter, please review so I know.

KedharS: She's had a rough life.

Rosealine gold: Hopefully the problem has fixed itself, but I don't know.

Aquahaze675: Welcome back! Yes, quite a lot of major events have happened. And of course Caelia cried. She might not know it, or believe it, but she's still human. Hopefully, she'll be able to deal with the pain.

Thunder Fire: Blake's certainly rubbing off on her, though not quite in the way she would like.

MikySP: I'm not really sure if the next arc has a concrete title yet.

Pokemon Academy: Beginning of Beginnings

Chapter 358

Caelia stumbled out into the snow, her vision blurring by tears and the bluster of the falling snow. It was likely freezing, but Caelia wouldn't have noticed if it was. The only thing she could feel was the pain in her chest, telling her what she already knew, that Blake had not chosen her. He had chosen Ayame Toujou, and now Caelia was left with nothing but her broken shell of a body, and the pain that came with it.

Should have… never met… Caelia thought, wiping her eye as she tromped through the snow. If only she had never met Blake Harker. If only Blake Harker had never showed her kindness, never helped her, never made her feel again. She would have lived her hollow, empty life waiting for it all to end. And that would better than an eternity of misery.

What was the point of even going on? That was the question bouncing around in her head right now. It wasn't the first time the thought had crossed her mind. Before, when she was empty and hollow and there was nothing of value to be found in her life, she had contemplated the thought of ending things many times. But she hadn't, because there had been no point. Death was emptiness, and she had already been empty. Ending her life would have granted her nothing. She would go from one state of nonexistence to another. She had had nothing to live for, but at the same time she'd had no reason to die, either.

Caelia continued walking through the snow, not even sure where she was going at this point. She only stopped walking when she saw there was nowhere for her to go. At some point, she had strayed from the road without noticing, not bothering to watch her steps and unable to feel the snow's resistance on her boots. But she had walked herself to the bank of the river that went through campus, normally wide and deep, a loud rush of water that had not slowed considerably into a trickle. Still deep, and not yet frozen due to the motion of water, a river in every meaning of the word.

Caelia hadn't any reason to end her existence before. There was no sense in ending something that was already broken and empty, so she had just done as she liked. But now, "existing" meant this heartache, this pain, for the rest of her life. She would feel nothing but agony, suffering, an existence meant only for misery.

Now Caelia had a reason to die.

She stood in on the ledge, a few feet up from the water, staring down at it. She could barely make out the smooth ripples of the snow touching the surface, the water just slightly visible in the light of the street lamps. It was probably freezing, if not frozen. When was the last time Caelia had felt cold? It would be so easy. Just a single step forward and it would be done. With her broken body, swimming was not something she was capable of.

So easy…

"I wonder, would you drown before you freeze? Or freeze before you drown?"

That voice!

Caelia turned to see Sylvia Driscoll standing behind her, nice and bundled up in a black trench coat and wearing a big smile, her eyes glimmering with what could only be malice.

"What?" Caelia blinked.

"Well, go on," Sylvia urged, gesturing to the river excitedly. "You're going to kill yourself, right? Throw yourself into the river? I haven't been on this side of things before, I'm rather excited to see what it looks like!"

Caelia had no idea what Sylvia was talking about.

Syvlia sighed, walking up to Caelia and looking her in the eye. She looked… disappointed?

"I really expected more from you," Sylvia said, shaking her head. "All the signs were pointing to you doing something exciting. Going after Blake, or Ayame, do something passionate, violent, I was quite looking forward to it, honestly."

She looked past Caelia and down into the water, then turned her attention back to the girl.

"But this? Really? Ending it just like that? Talk about boring. It would make telling you about Blake and Ayame totally meaningless. I wanted a show, not to just see a broken little doll throw herself away so pointlessly."

Caelia didn't really care.

"I asked Specter to keep an eye on you, follow after you, so she could keep me informed. But it looks like it was a disappointment in the end," Sylvia sighed, twirling her finger in the air. To Caelia's surprise, a Shuppet emerged from Caelia's shadow, floating up to her trainer's side, a wicked smile on her face. Sylvia patted her on the head and recalled her to a pokeball, turning back to Caelia.

"Tell me, Caelia, do you really want to die?" Sylvia asked.

"Can't keep going. To empty. Broken. Nothing but pain. Agony. Can't stand it. Too much. Hurts, hurts, hurts! Want to end pain, want to go away, no more, just… just end it."

Sylvia blinked.

"I see. I thought you were someone who would fight to hold onto your chance of happiness," she sighed, shaking her head. "That the pain you would feel when you learned the truth would drive you to try and overcome it, to take Blake from Ayame yourself. I thought you just might have been mad enough to do it, but I never thought you were the type to give up."

"It's unfair," Caelia said. "Unfair, unfair, unfair. Need Blake! Need him! No one else, no one… this aching, this pain, need Blake to stop it, need Blake to bring me back, can't… why her?! Why?! It's not fair! She doesn't need him! I need him! Mine, he… I need him! Need, please!"

"Life is unfair, Caelia, or didn't you know that already?" Sylvia scoffed, brushing the girl's hair out of her face and running her fingers across the mask covering her burns. "I would have thought that fact was seared into your skin by now. Life is unfair. So you can either learn to live with that, or if you can't, well…"

Sylvia glanced over at the river ahead of them, and looked back to Caelia with a pointed expression. She shrugged her shoulders.

"I can't… anymore of this and I… too much, can't, don't want this pain. Want Blake. Can't have him. Unfair, unfair… better… better to just end. If this pain… too much of this pain, too much, if it's going to destroy me then rather end it."

Sylvia blinked. That was about what she expected.

It seems I overestimated her mental fortitude. I thought that living so long with nothing would make her struggle to keep everything she had, but apparently not. She's been so isolated from pain up until this point she has no resilience. Feeling such an agonizing heartbreak like this is too much for her to deal with. Her brain is so undeveloped that it is literally too much for her to handle, and she'd rather end it all than try to actually move past it.

Sylvia sighed.

Quite a nuisance, this girl. And here I was hoping for something a little more gripping. I guess I'll need to make a change of plans.

"No sense in going to the trouble of ruining those clothes of yours," Sylvia mocked, Caelia's hideously frayed and unwashed ratty outfit already far beyond the point of ruination. "I can handle things for you if you'd like."

Caelia blinked, not entirely sure what Sylvia was saying. She opened her mouth to inquire when suddenly the world began to spin before her eyes, and she found herself staring up at the night sky in confusion.

"There we are, that's what I like to see," Sylvia purred, her face appearing above Caelia. Caelia realized she'd been pushed over. Since Sylvia was standing so close above her, it wasn't likely that she had landed in the water. So she must be lying in the snow. Odd. There wasn't really a reason for this that Caelia could think of, but it was what was happening.

Sylvia straddled Caelia, and looked down at her. She was interested in what she saw, even though Caelia was doing absolutely nothing of interest herself. She simply looked up at Caelia with the blank eye of hers.

"Let me try something, okay? It's so boring if you just ended things yourself. Even I needed a little push when I got to that point. So why not let me take the reins now, hmm?"

Caelia blinked.

"Huh?"

"I've never killed someone before," Sylvia admitted. "If you're going to die either way, you don't mind if I do it myself, do you?"

"…Don't care," Caelia responded.

"Lovely! Then I'll get started right away, no sense keeping you waiting, after all!" Sylvia chirped, smiling. She reached her hands towards Caelia, and wrapped them tightly around the girl's neck, squeezing down tightly, cutting off her airflow.

Caelia didn't even notice. She had no clue whether or not she was ever breathing, so she didn't know that she wasn't now. But she saw Sylvia's arms reaching down, and knew that she must be getting strangled right now. Black lights began flashing in her eyes and she felt herself starting to black out. It would stop hurting soon…

Kara flashed in front of her eye next, and that caused her to blink. Kara… if Caelia was gone, then she would be all alone, wouldn't she? Her, and all her other pokemon. If she died, then they… the would all be…

Caelia opened her mouth to say something, but no sound was escaping.

"I'm curious," Sylvia's voice rang in her ears, hollow and distant. "You seemed so adamant that you didn't want to keep going on. That it was over, a life of misery and pain, with nothing worth living for if it meant this heartache would continue."

A playful smile crossed her face as she leaned in, that smile the only thing that Caelia was able to make out as her vision blurred.

"So if you really did want to die, then why are you struggling so much, I wonder?"

Struggling? I'm not… what? Caelia blinked in confusion. She tilted her head down to look at Sylvia's arms, and saw, much to her surprise, her own hands, clenched tightly around Sylvia's wrists, struggling to break the grip the girl had on her throat.

"That's where it is!" Sylvia cackled, releasing her grip on Caelia's neck suddenly, leaping off the girl. Caelia sat up, stunned, blinking the odd lights away from her eye as the oxygen flooded her lungs, not that she noticed it.

"What… that… what?" Caelia asked, not sure what had just happened.

"What's the matter, Caelia?" Sylvia stood over the seated girl, smiling joyfully down at her. "Are you alright? Is everything okay?"

"Why did I… why did you… what?" Caelia just shook her head, at the moment her mind going as numb as the rest of her was.

"You were empty and hurt and just wanted it all to end," Sylvia reminded her. "But it seems that deep down inside, some part of you didn't want to bring it to an end just yet, isn't that right? You still had a little bit of a spark in you after all that didn't want to be extinguished. Seems you might not be as empty as you thought you were."

"That's… what?" Caelia didn't know if she could believe it, or what she was supposed to be believing. Her thoughts were so muddled and confused.

"It's real easy to kill yourself when you don't even bother living in the first place," Sylvia told her. "A teacher here told me that, a lifetime ago. And now here I am, alive and well. So why not consider it, Caelia? Why not try living for a change? Have you even attempted it? Really living, with that broken body of yours? Or will you continue to just hate yourself?"

"That's… I… it's not fair."

"It's not fair," Sylvia agreed. "So what? Are you just going to give up because it isn't fair? That's what you've been doing your entire life, right?"

"That's… huh? Wait, you… how?"

"You're rather slow on the uptake," Sylvia smirked. "I've been told all about you, Caelia, that's how I knew what buttons to push. You've spent your whole life giving up, thinking there was no point because of your broken, ruined body. But there's still something there for you, you know. No matter what little, miserable life it is, there's still a life there. So why not try to embrace it, live it, for as long as you possibly can?"

Caelia didn't know what to say to that. Sylvia wasn't that far off. She never actually had tried to live, not really. Not… not as she was. And now, to keep living now? When it hurt her just to even think about Blake?

"Why not give it a try?" Sylvia asked, extending her hand to Caelia. "Try living for a change, who knows? You might enjoy it. You might be able to find some hope for yourself after all. You have your 'reason to keep going' now, don't you?"

Caelia blinked. She was empty. Nothing. She had resolved to live a bizarre, hedonistic life of doing whatever she liked, because nothing mattered to her. Then Blake mattered to her. And now that she'd lost him, she was ready to throw it all away.

But when it came down to it, she had fought to live. She didn't understand why she had fought back, why she still wanted to live, but she was starting to. If she had died, then her pokemon would be all alone. Kara and all the others. She couldn't have that. She wouldn't let her pokemon be alone, no matter what.

I thought I had nothing… that I was empty and broken… but even I had something to care about, a reason to keep going…

A small smile spread across Caelia's lips. The ache in her breast hadn't abated, it was still painful, miserable, and she wanted to make it all stop. But not that way. Not at the cost of her life, and the misery of the pokemon that she would abandon. They had stuck loyally by an empty, cold girl like her, and she wasn't about to abandon them now.

Caelia reached out to Sylvia, fumbling for a hand that she couldn't feel. Sylvia met her the rest of the way, grabbing her hand and helping the girl to her feet.

"There we go, now, no more of this lame, boring suicide talk, okay?" Sylvia said, patting Caelia on the back and guiding her away from the river's edge. "Let's go get you inside, so we can get you nice and warmed up."

"Not cold," Caelia replied.

"Well, whether you feel it or not your skin is like ice," Sylvia laughed. "Don't want you to die of hypothermia after your just decided to live, 'kay? No matter how much of surprising twist that'd be, no thanks. Then I'd have your death on my conscience."

Meanwhile, Cynthia had run out into the snow, still looking for Caelia, even as the weather had taken a turn for the worse.

"Caelia!" Cynthia cried. "Caelia, come back! Where are you?!"

But no matter what direction she looked, she could only see white. Caelia was nowhere to be seen.

"Cynthia!"

Cynthia whirled around, shielding her eyes. That was…

"Blake?! What are you doing out here?" Cynthia asked.

"Olivia sent us out to get you," Blake said. "She said the storm just got a lot worse all of a sudden, and it isn't safe for you, or anyone else, to be out here. Campus safety is gonna start searching the campus to get everyone inside."

"Screw that!" Cynthia scowled. "It's my fault Caelia is out here in the first place! Because it was my dumb idea to come see you, and- wait, did you say 'us'?"

The sudden realization was met by two strong arms wrapping around her waist and lifting her off of the ground.

"Hey! Let me go! Put me down!" Cynthia exclaimed, thrashing against Ayame, but the taller girl's grip was too strong, and she had a good sixty pounds of muscle on the shorty, so it was a pretty futile gesture.

"Calm down!" Ayame barked. "You need to get back inside before you freeze to death out here, we can't have you getting lost!"

"But Caelia's out here!" Cynthia wailed over the snowstorm. "And she doesn't even feel the cold! If she doesn't know any better… if I don't find her… then she's the one who's going to freeze! Put me down! Let me find her!"

Ayame grumbled. She'd lived beside a snowy mountain most of her life, but didn't have the energy or patience to shout Cynthia down, so she just ignored her.

"If you're out here too, that's more people getting lost," Ayame snarled. "So you just behave yourself! I know it sucks, but it's important!"

"Cynthia, I'm worried about her too," Blake assured Cynthia as they headed back to the dorm, keeping an eye out for Caelia but unable to see anything. "But I don't want you dying trying to find her, you know?"

"Ugh, why did this have to happen now?" Ayame grumbled. "We haven't had a storm this bad in years, and the weather reports said it was just going to be a mild snow… really hope that everyone's okay right now…"

Ayame was feeling anxious for a different reason. The track team had scheduled a late practice this evening, now that the snow had finally been cleaned off the track. And if there was a storm… she shook her head. She needed to get back inside and check her phone, to make sure that everything was alright with the people she cared about.

But Cynthia's struggling was making that incredibly difficult!

Ayame stomped up the steps, following Blake, who opened the door for her. She stormed into the common room and practically flung Cynthia onto one of the couches, ironically the same one that she had nearly gotten sick on at the party a few months back.

"What do you have to say for yourself, huh?" Ayame demanded, pointing an accusatory finger at Cynthia, her eyes filled with anger.

"…I'm a little turned on by being manhandled so roughly like that?" Cynthia admitted, her cheeks turning pink from a mixture of the cold and embarrassment. "Like, whoa, the fact that you can just lift me up and carry me, damn, really got me kinda worked up…"

"That… that's not what I meant!" Ayame exclaimed, her face turning crimson.

"Totally get why you're dating her Blake," Cynthia nodded to him. Blake rolled his eyes. No, you idiot. My brain doesn't work that way.

Cynthia's expression turned serious.

"That's not important right now!" She insisted. "We need to go find Caelia! Who knows what could happen to her out there?! I have to go back out!"

"No dice," Olivia said, strolling into the common room. "Check your mail. Lockdown orders just initiated. No one's going anywhere."

"But… but-!" Cynthia looked desperately out the window. Caelia was gone. If… if something happened to her, then it would be all Cynthia's fault…

"It's okay, Cynthia," Blake said, placing his hands on her shoulders. She turned to look him in the eye. "I know it's rough, but Caelia's a tough girl. She isn't going to just go down without a fight, I've been through a volcano with her. Trust me. She'll be fine."

"O… okay…" Cynthia nodded, sniffling. She would believe in Caelia. And campus safety. No way anything bad could happen, right? So she would hope for the morning, when everything would be fine and Caelia would reply back to her text. Yeah. It would be fine. Cynthia reached out and wrapped her arms around Blake, hugging him tightly. Blake hugged her back.

Cynthia opened one eye and smirked up at Ayame, sticking out her tongue as she hugged him a little tigher. Ayame glared at her.

A storm falls upon the Pokemon Academy! What does that mean for our students? Will everyone be okay?