In full darkness, Bianca could only sense she was inside a small room, and could make up only the outline of some of the things in there. She had to admit to herself that the mystery filled her with a wicked sense of joy, she was eager to see everything inside. Bianca heard steps, and identified Grimsley's silhouette as he reached for the only source of light in the room, a very faint white dot on the wall, probably a switch. She then heard Grimsley turn the switch on and the instant flash blinded Bianca for a few seconds, causing her to cover her eyes with her hand. The ancient looking lamp above them was not even that powerful and it only produced enough light to lit the upper half of the things in the room, casting many shadows, but it still had quite an effect on Bianca seeing as she had spent so much time in almost complete darkness.
A few seconds later, Bianca's sight adjusted well enough for her to fully open her eyes. It was exactly what she thought of when she thought of the kind of room Grimsley would have. First she looked at the wall to her left, which was fully encompassed by a big bookcase filled with very old, worn out books. Bianca walked over and reached her eyes to read some of the titles,
"The outsider by Egbert Cinus, The captor in the meadow by P. J. Celadon," Bianca said out loud, "Existing and nullity by Francois-Phillippe Surpin," she read and then paused to see if Grimsley would add something, but he stayed silent. And with her back turned to him, her eyes on the books, Bianca became a bit embarrassed and a bit more nervous,
"have you read all of these?" She asked, trying to avoid the awkwardness she sensed was coming,
"some of them," Grimsley finally answered, fully aware that it would give Bianca a much needed break, "I've read at least some pages of every one of them though."
Bianca nodded and continued looking around, but stopped at the corner right next to the bookcase, where an anatomically correct human skeleton hanged from a hook stuck to the wall,
"that's fake right?" She asked, hoping for him to say the right answer,
"maybe".
Bianca swiftly turned to look at him with an eyebrow raised, Grimsley rolled his eyes and then closed them,
"of course it is...I guess...I don't have the right to get offended for you thinking it could be real, I use it to hang my clothes, that way it's easier to put them on after I iron them...is that good enough for you?"
"Yes, sorry", Bianca answered and turned back. Next to the skeleton, on the wall at the back of the room, there was a painting of Shauntal from the elite four. She was sitting classy on a black bench wearing her typical purple outfit with a closed book on her lap. Behind her a dark blue sky full of stars and the moon right above her, and below her darkened yellow grass with a few orange leaves scattered over it. She had a faint smile on her face and her cheeks were red. Her eyes looked to the ground and the light from the nightly sky reflected on her glasses. Bianca took her time to admire the painting and had to keep herself from smiling, because of the beauty of the painting, and because Grimsley had it up on the wall,
"...I...have no explanation." Bianca turned and listened to Grimsley talk, "Caitlin painted it and gave it to me, she thinks we'd make a good couple and spends a lot of her time letting her thoughts be known, to me,"
"and what do you think?" Bianca asked, then she immediately bit her lip and looked at the ground,
"he, you are just like her...all of you ladies, you are wonderful, beautiful on the outside as well as the inside..." Bianca's face became bright red in a second, "...I always tell her that I disagree with her," Grimsley continued, knowing exactly what he had done to Bianca, "because that means that I have an opinion about it, which drives her imagination wild, showing that I care...it's not like we did not try and see if there was something there...there's not, but the painting does look good, doesn't it?"
"Yes."
Bianca looked away from the painting, and next to it on the wall she found a stand with a glass case containing a desiccated purrloin. Its eyebrows were raised, as if it knew something Bianca didn't, and it had one of its front paws raised in a snooty fashion, as if the purrloin were saying it was more important than her,
"I did not kill him...in case you were wondering," Grimsley said before Bianca had the chance to ask anything, "he died a few years ago, and my peers thought it would be a good idea to preserve its body and present it to me as a gift...what a joke, he died and is gone, that's not him anymore that's just a pile of bones and fur, although I don't mind looking at it, that's why I kept my mouth shut and accepted it,"
"I'm so sorry," Bianca said with sorrow, then she kept inspecting the room.
Next to the glass case, on the corner, was an old desk. There were many loose, blank pages on top as well as a note pad with unintelligible symbols written on it. There was also a purple coffee mug with Grimsley's face on it, and a green, monstrous looking hand, which made Bianca give Grimsley a very sassy glance,
"it's a good paperweight," he said, and Bianca couldn't help but notice a trace of embarrassment on his face.
Finally on the wall on the right there was a table with a map on top. It showcased the zone encompassing the ruins of N's castle and the entirety of victory road and the pokemon league, but it had red and black dots and lines drawn all over it. Bianca remembered why she had gone there in the first place,
"that's a cool map," she said, with the knowingly despondent intention of revealing Grimsley's plan. She was certainly out of her element,
"sure," he said, not taking the weak, sad bait,
"alright, I'm not good at this," Bianca continued, "what is the endgame of this plan of yours?"
"My endgame? My endgame is to create a place where my evil can run rampant, where miserable mooks cursed by their past can gamble their money away and stay and sleep in their misery,"
"and you think they'll let you do that?"
"They will do what they will do and I will do what I will do, and whatever happens,"
"you go to jail,"
"maybe, but just so we are clear I'm not trying to take over the world or anything like that,"
"it seems you want to give people that idea," Bianca replied,
"I don't care, sure, because of the choices that I make and the circles on which I move, I could be considered evil, but that doesn't mean I want to cause harm, as a member of the elite 4 I am obliged to uphold order and justice after all. Most of the people here may be evil, and they may not want to change, but even if they did want to change, and even if they did change, Unova would not accept them back, they are irredeemable ghouls, so what incentive do they have to change, and if they are not going to then why can't they just stay here under my command and not hurt anyone?"
"That's a good question,"
"it is as easy as that, we can choose what we do and we are all responsible for our actions, you choose to do evil, they stop you and lock you away, you regret it and change your ways, they forgive you and it's all good, except they don't forgive you, very few people do, very few people can change their mind about freaks, so we stay locked away and keep the mayhem to ourselves."
Bianca listened attentively. Grimsley continued, "I think you'll change your mind about us, won't you?"
"It depends," she replied,
"if you could make people change the way they look at you, what would you change?"
"The way they see me, I guess, I'd make them take me seriously, instead of how they see me now, as a useless loser,"
"because you are not?"
Bianca blinked hard and looked at the ground,
"I'm not saying you are a useless loser, I am genuinely asking you what you think," Grimsley said,
"...I don't know," she answered, "I don't even know if I believe you, I think you are not telling me everything,"
"well that is all I will tell you, so you can leave if you want, and tell them what I am doing, letting a bunch of mooks crash in here for free and making them serve me drinks...or you could stay here for a while."
Bianca moved in front of the painting and looked at it again. Grimsley moved behind her, she could tell he could tell she was having a hard time trying to make up her mind.
"You could continue whatever it is that you think you are doing, then go ahead and tell whoever it is you need to tell, prove them you are not a loser," Grimsley said. He wasn't the most eloquent orator, and the ability to convince people to change their minds was not one found on his otherwise extensive repertoire, but he genuinely wanted to convince her to stay,
"I think you should care more about what you do, like, generally speaking," Bianca replied, looking straight at him earnestly,
"who says I don't care?"
"...I kind of hate you right now,"
"that's fine."
Bianca unwittingly let out a laugh, she closed her eyes and cursed herself for it in her mind,
"I just need to think a bit longer about this," she said as she looked at him again, "can I just stay a bit longer?"
"Of course, there are a few rules you need to learn however, the first one, no one is allowed in my room but me."
They smiled at each other, sincerely this time,
"I'm serious,"
"oh, of course."
Grimsley led Bianca out of the room and closed the door behind him. They got out of the hole on the wall and found no one else but Jonny, Helma, and Lucia, knelt down with their faces on the ground,
"we are sorry we lied to you," said Lucia, with her face still directed at the ground,
"yeah, it was all Helma's fault, not Colette's," Jonny added,
"HEY!" Helma screamed, then stood up, "this was your idea in the first place you mook, I'm gonna deck you," she grunted angrily before grabbing Jonny's head with both of her hands. She started shaking him up and down rather violently,
"ahh! Help! Help!"
"Anyway," Lucia continued as she stood up, not minding the one sided battle beside her, "our message got kind of bogged down by that but we are sorry, it was not Colette's fault, I mean not entirely."
Bianca smiled at them, and Lucia smiled back.
"Sure whatever," Grimsley dismissed them, "now get out of here please...who's Colette?..."
Meanwhile, away from the ruins, outside professor Juniper's laboratory, none other than Colress himself was surreptitiously peeping through the window with a worried expression on his face. He noticed an unpleasant, earthly smell that was not there moments ago, and then heard steps behind him,
"what are you doing here?" Colress heard behind him. He turned to find Cheren, the source of the unpleasant smell. Colress could tell it came from him because of the way he looked, overall a dirty person, tired, with leaves coming out of his pants and shirt, and missing one shoe,
"did a purrloin eat your tongue?" Cheren pressed, "I don't have time for this, I need to see Bianca immediately, it is a matter of the utmost importance,"
"Well," Colress answered, "I'm afraid you won't be able to see her just yet..."