Chapter Fourteen

"That asshole!" Silver shouted to no one, though several people around us began to stare. I didn't entirely care; nothing really seemed to make sense anymore. Now that everything was finally coming together, it was all falling apart all over again. There was no break. The pieces all fit. It was just the wrong puzzle.

But I felt positive about one thing: Mew had been evoked. Or, at the least, Clay felt some sort of sympathy for Silver and me.

"No. It wasn't Clay who did that." I touched Silver's arm, and he froze where he was. "Clay wasn't the one who made the ceiling cave in, but he did know that it was going to happen. That arena… it was for battling, certainly, but battling with enemies. Clay knew that the ceiling was going to fall because it was designed to do that. But he saved me. Silver, he saved me. He started backing up, and then he sort of… tilted his head and held eye contact with me for a moment. And I just knew that something was going to happen. He did that. He made me nervous, and he saved me."

Silver furrowed his eyebrows, but something seemed to pass through him that made him relax. His whole face dropped, looking so sad for a moment, and he nodded. "He kept one end of his deal, at least… The asshole…"

I narrowed my eyes, my voice quivering as I asked, "What?"

"He blocked out the thoughts about you." Silver crossed his arms, rolling his eyes. "Actually, he somehow completely shut me out. I can't see any of his thoughts anymore. But that doesn't mean I can stop thinking about it, Lyra. I just get so… angry when I think about it, and I don't know why. I don't like to see you with him like that…"

"You mean like jealousy?" I asked, and Silver dropped his arms, gaping at me as if I had just said a naughty word. "Silver, I never let Clay touch me, but if I wanted to get here—to make it to where we're standing right now alive—then I couldn't fight back. And I never intended to hurt you like this, so if you could… just calm down, I know we can work this out. If we're going into this blindly, I don't want to fight you, too."

Silver shook his head at me, and I sighed. "I'll try not to think about it… but I'm not jealous."

I grabbed his shirt, pulling him towards me and kissing him. If he wasn't jealous, then he wouldn't kiss me back. But there he was, holding my body against his and kissing me back with more fervor than that first time we kissed. He didn't push me away, and he didn't resist, giving us just a moment to validate his jealousy.

"Yeah," I added with a wink as I pulled away from him, "you are."

But this wasn't a time to be making out with Silver, and I knew that. We had more important things to worry about, like who the hell the real boss was. If Clay wasn't the leader of Team Xana, than who was? Had all the information in that computer data base been a lie? Were the people I thought I could trust complete liars? Allison and Henry… even Will. Did I need to question their back stories and find out the truth?

Team Xana was definitely different than I ever expected. False leaders, liars, murderers… they really had it all. And I was at a complete loss at what to do. Find the real boss of Team Xana—and then what? Tell them to do what Clay couldn't? But if Clay wasn't really the leader, then who knew who really was?

He had been so close to telling me. I just needed to find him again.

"Hello," a familiar accented voice rang behind us, and Silver and I turned to face Allison. She shoved her hands into the pockets of her lab coat, smiling at us like an old friend. I couldn't force myself to smile back. "You look lost. Aren't you supposed to be in the PCC, Silver? And… Lyra, you should be there, too, no? Don't let Clay find you wandering around—"

"Clay's not the boss," I interrupted, unable to stop myself. Allison's face lost all expression, and for a moment nothing seemed to resonate with her. But she furrowed her eyebrows, shaking her head and laughing quietly for a moment before smiling at me again. How could I tell if she was faking or not?

"Of course he is! He's the one who founded Team Xana… if he wasn't the boss, then… who would be? Oh, Lyra, you're so funny!" Allison laughed again, looking at Silver with an amused expression. He just stared at her, his face completely serious in contrast to hers. "Where do you even come up with stories like that?"

I sighed, letting my head fall for a moment before staring at the blonde again. "What if he was lying? What if he was playing with us this entire time? It wouldn't be so unlike him to do that, right? Especially if they real boss wanted to hide his or her identity. Who would you guess is the actual boss? Just… take one guess," I ordered, and Allison gasped.

Narrowing her eyes, she took a step back before pointing straight at me. "You."

Silver grabbed my arm, tugging me towards him and shaking his head. "It's not Lyra. I mean…" He paused, looking at me. "She's just not. Why would you even guess her? She's the only chance we have to take back our lives, and she's been fighting for us this entire time. If she was the boss, she wouldn't have—"

"Then, why do I have to listen to her now?" Allison retorted, her voice becoming more accented as she snapped. "Why did she come here when we were so close to finishing up? Why did she get chosen by Clay? Why was she the only Champion who was spared when we fought them? How did she escape? I can't believe I didn't realize it sooner." She back up further, continuing to point at me. "Henry! Henry!"

"No!" I yelled, but it was too late. Allison turned on her heel, running away from Silver and me towards her fellow Admin. I spun around, glancing at the people who were all staring at me now. The whispers turned into monotonous lies, spreading around like a disease. The talking grew louder and louder, and I grabbed my hair, tugging at it as I turned back to Silver.

"It's not me. You know it's not me." I stared at Silver, waiting for a response, any response. He was silent for a moment, watching me as though I was just a stranger. Finally, he nodded, grabbing my arm and forcing us out of the Science Labs and into the PCC.

The same dark atmosphere of the PCC felt even worse today. If I didn't find out who the real boss of Team Xana was soon, everyone was going to think it was me. And it was probably easier to take me down than it was to take Clay down, considering I hadn't set up any protections like he had. If they all wanted to get rid of me now, I didn't see anything stopping them.

"Look at this." Clay smiled at me as he popped up in front of us, looking particularly amused by my situation. "You just got yourself into a bit of a bad situation, didn't you? Well, don't worry. Seeing as you're the girl in charge, I'm sure you can work it out just fine. Oh, and sorry about the ceiling in the arena. I didn't know about that."

"I'm not in charge—wait…" I stopped myself, taking a deep breath and calming myself. "Explain everything. It's story time."

Clay laughed, looking around the PCC. "I will. It's not like I really have a choice. But don't you think we should go somewhere a bit… less busy?" He gestured to the people wandering around doing their work, and I crossed my arms. After I was almost crushed to death in the arena, I really didn't want to go anywhere elusive.

So, I pulled us into the little cubby area where the computer controlling the Pokémon machine was set up. "Happy? Now spill. Who's the real boss of Team Xana? And who are you if you're not really the leader? And why did he try to kill me if the whole point of my being here is to send me to space and stuff? What's going on?"

Clay sighed, folding his hands together and gesturing to the rotting chair. "You should probably take a seat. This is a lot to digest."

I rolled my eyes, doing as he said, and he grinned. "I really am the founder. This organization was my idea… but not all of it. When I originally founded Team Xana, I just wanted to continue my parents' work. Since the boss of Team Galactic, Cyrus, was stuck in Distortion World, no one else would step up and take over. So… I did by forming an entirely new group with more… humble ideals. There wouldn't be any stealing, any murder, anything criminal. I simply envisioned joining everyone together and visiting new galaxies. There are plenty of other galaxies out there, so I didn't see the necessity in creating a new one.

"Well, I tried recruiting members, and a lot of the old Galactic members had given up caring, and most of them told me that they were too old to care about any of that anymore. But, really, they didn't want to work with me while their boss was stuck in Distortion World. And I, of course, had no idea how to get Cyrus out of Distortion World, so I figured this whole 'Team Xana' thing was just a mistake." He sighed, shaking his head.

"So, I left Sinnoh and came here to Johto. Since I was so young—just your age, Lyra—everyone kind of laughed at me when I asked them to help me. A lot of people had heard about Team Galactic and considered them a criminal organization, so people were criticizing me for trying to recreate it, even though I swore I would use safer tactics.

"And then, Lindsey came around. She was far more aggressive than I was, and she forced all these people to join. I was intimidated by her, and since she was so much older than I was, I was afraid of being rude to her. Actually," Clay continued, folding his hands together, "I was just afraid of her in general. And when she told me to step down, I did."

I furrowed my eyebrows, staring back out into the main PCC area in search for the woman. Lindsey? I knew she was horrible, but everything—all of this—was her idea? Why hadn't I seen this before? Clay even told me once that Lindsey was the reason they hurt people. Why didn't I take the hint that she was the one I should have been fighting?

"She came up with this 'Pokémon Conversion' idea, but she wasn't nearly as smart as me or the other members. So, she had me oversee the designing and basic concept. And once we had that… everything fell into place. We stole Pokémon, and all of the Legendaries came to save them… so we got them, too. And once we became so powerful, she started all the raids, gathering only the strongest members and discarding the rest. She even disposed of some of the members we already had if she dubbed them weak. I watched everyone come and go."

Clay looked at me, all amusement completely gone from his face. "It was for her own safety. That's why she lied. She gave me Mew, and told me to pretend to be the boss to protect her. Because if she went down, we went down. Since I was the founder, it made sense that I would be boss, and no one would ever know the difference. But she's always had control. Everything I did was part of her plan… and she never took a Pokémon, so she didn't have to actually listen to me. Just like you were safe from me before, Lyra."

I held up my hand, signaling for him to pause. "Wait. She never took a Pokémon's abilities? But I thought she had Cynthia's Garchomp…"

"No, she never—"

Before I knew what was happening, two thin vines flew out of nowhere, wrapping themselves around Clay's throat. He stopped talking, pulling at the vines as they lifted him off the ground, and I screamed, rising to my feet and pulling on the vines. I knew if he teleported away, whatever those vines were from—a Pokémon?—would come with him, so we had to pull them off of him!

"Clay!"

We had to pull them off of him… we had to…

He stopped moving just as a Venusaur stepped forward, revealing itself to us. And standing right next to it, petting the beast, Lindsey frowned at us, her eyebrows knit tightly together. The Venusaur dropped Clay, and he fell in front of me, his body unmoving.

Lindsey stepped forward, looking down at Clay and shaking her head disappointingly.

"He was talking too much," was all she said.

Author's Note: Early update (well, a day early, so it's not that cool). I was actually planning on updating again tomorrow or Sunday… but I don't think that's going to happen. I unfortunately need to finish my stuff for the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award contest, so I'll update again when that's all said and done. So, sorry, but another week before the next update. Saturday, February 5th. If I update early again, whoo-hoo!

TWO more chapters!

If anyone was confused by the ending, I understand. A lot of information was thrown at you at once, and then the whole part with Lindsey and the Venusaur happened really quickly, too. So, if anyone is confused, I understand.

Plus… I didn't want to be gross. So, like… I didn't want to go into details on what exactly happened to Clay. But the fact of the matter is—Lindsey just killed him.

Disclaimer: I do not own Pokémon.