Chapter Thirty-Two
The sleek, airy uniform of an Admin, with a gold-lined R glittering on her right shoulder, felt like a second skin. With it on, she could almost forget about the fur underneath.
Her living quarters, which had once belonged to Hax, had been refurbished at her request. Taking cues from Giovanni, Seven had the room lined with tall, leafy ferns. However, she kept them short, letting all the light through from above. The original flooring, a dull black wood, had clacked against her claws every time she walked barefoot, so she had it replaced with lush brown carpet.
The main room had her desk, made of lily white wood that once matched the floor, a plush leather chair that molded itself to her body, and a similar but smaller seat for guests. Behind her desk, another door led to her bedroom, furnished with a similar desk-seat combination and a small bed. She kept a night light next to the door, an LED that wouldn't burn out for a hundred years.
From the computer on her desk, Seven examined a full inbox, ranging from expense reports of her new army of Grunts to mission debriefs regarding the latest raid on White Knight facilities. She leaned back in her chair, smiling at the bold, black numbers showing surplus cash income from all the stolen assets of a weapons warehouse.
A knock came at the door. From her computer, Seven saw Admin Fisher standing outside her door, leaning against the opposite wall and looking up at the camera. With the press of a button, her door opened, and Fisher entered.
He looked around. "I see you've redecorated. Good. I always hated that wood, damn stuff wouldn't stop squeaking. He left it in so nobody could sneak up on him."
Seven wondered how much guile Fisher concealed beneath his headstrong personality. She sat up and asked, "What did you come here for."
Fisher gave her a small smile. "I thought I'd check up on the new Admin. The first week can be rough."
"All my operations have been successful," Seven said warily, "And I have finished reorganizing all the Rockets I rescued into tactical groups and outfitting them with the equipment I stole."
"Sounds like you have everything under control, then?" he asked. His eyes drilled into hers, and they carried a hint of the smile on his face.
"Yes, definitely," Seven said.
"Good! Then you have time to take off, don't you? I need a drinking buddy, and someone has to show you how Admins celebrate."
Fisher held his hand out. Seven felt a strong temptation to take it, to accept the gesture of acceptance, but his approach felt too coy for her tastes.
"I would prefer not to," she said, edging back in her seat. "I may have no problems on hand, but I still have duties to attend to."
"You don't have anything to do yet," Fisher said with a wry smile. "Not until the war with the WK gets cooking. Come on, it'll be good for you." He leaned close and made his voice a hoarse whisper. "Good practice at pretending to be human."
"I don't need any practice," Seven said with a scowl, "But I guess I'll go."
"Great! I know a great bar, and it's no fun drinking alone." He eyed the empty belt at her waist. "Bring some weapons. It's a rough neighborhood, and the fights are part of the fun."
The bar, named Robot Dreams, had a bright yellow neon Mareep bounding over the name, flashing in ionized green sparks. Shadows surrounded it. Shifty figures loitered in the alleys and glared at the two Admins as they passed.
The bar was packed with rugged men and tougher women, nursing beers and chatting with their table cliques while warily eyeing the other patrons. Gazes turned away from Fisher as he strode straight for the bar. His step had a swagger in it, and a knuckleduster glittered around his fingers.
They took two seats near the middle, which was deserted in favor of the close-walled corners. A tall, skinny man scuttled behind the bar to a cracked tap and filled a chipped mug.
"The usual, Fish?" the bartender called, with a tall mug of frothy ale in one hand. At a nod from Fisher, the bartender set it down and turned towards Seven. "And for you, sir?"
"What he's having," Seven said with practiced calm. She took a sip of the ale, fearing a powerful, bitter flavor. While it wasn't appetizing, Seven found she could swallow it without a grimace. Before she realized it, the mug she tipped over her mouth was significantly lighter, and her head thrummed with a pleasant, light buzz.
"I call them that because that's how he drinks," the bartender said with a wink. Fisher grinned at him and slammed his empty mug on the bar. The bartender scooped it up, filled it, and slid it back to him.
Without warning, her illusion flickered. She frowned into her empty mug and focused on honing that image. The mild intoxication made using her power feel like wading through a knee-high swamp, with mud clinging at her feet and a chill creeping over her skin.
Fisher caught her staring into the mug and asked, "Want another?"
"I better not. I need to concentrate."
A flicker of unease flashed across Fisher's eyes. "If you need to leave, just say so. Don't risk getting exposed."
"I'll be fine," Seven said hastily. "Just a bit of air, that's what I need. I'll be right back."
Seven walked out of the bar and took a deep breath of the balmy night air. The smell of sweat and beer hung like wet rags over her mouth. She examined the alleyway, and after a glance at the well-lit streets, walked into the darkness. People edged away from her. She kept a wary eye on them, occasionally catching the glint of steel in the faint lamplight from the streets, and had her own hand on a knife at her waist.
A pair of scuffling boots raced towards her, but the moment she flashed her blade, the steps twisted and vanished up a wall. The brick walls around her were pitted. Though they made easy handholds, Seven remained on the ground, where the shadows hid her. Her form wavered like a dying candle, but in the dim light, her facsimile of humanity held just enough realism to prevent second glances.
The deeper into the alleyways went, the fewer faces she saw, and the darker the alleyways became. The scalpels loomed around her, but the faint pinpricks of starlight kept them away. Her head pounded, and her feet caught on every bump in the streets.
Eventually, she came across a block of broken buildings, far south of the bar, where wood rotted away and the streets crumbled to gravel. Caved-in walls formed a rough lean-to. After checking that she was alone and the walls would hold, Seven crawled inside, let her disguise fall, and rubbed her aching temples. Her tongue felt bloated, and buzzing filled her ears.
Some time later, Seven's headache receded. Weaving an illusion felt like juggling live fish, but Steven's image held. She crawled out, stood, and found a shadow in the alleyway. Seven grabbed her knife and flipped the blade open.
A familiar, unintelligible voice growled at her. Seven peered closer, and her throat dried up when she recognized the Lucario. He held up a piece of paper, but the ink blended in with the darkness. She took a flashlight out of her hair. Bruno squinted in the harsh beam of light while Seven read the message, "Do you have time to talk?"
"I guess," Seven said with a frown. She hid her blade, hoping that the Pokémon hadn't noticed in the dim light.
Bruno sat on a toppled brick column and wrote another message. For a whole three minutes, he grumbled and scratched out lines of writing, tearing out the messy pages and crumpling them up each time he ran out of space. Then, words poured onto the front and back of a page. The writing was smudged in places, but what Seven could read made her breath catch in her throat.
"I know you are being forced to work for Team Rocket, and I can help you. I want to help you. So please, I'm asking you to trust me. There's a place with others like me, a place where Team Rocket could never approach even if they wanted to. There's many more Lucario, and each one can sense a person's Aura like I can. If anyone wanted to hurt you, they'd never make it to the front gates."
She flipped the note over with trembling hands. It went, "I know this is a lot to take in at once, and I'm sorry I can't give you more time to think it over. The Elder told me I have to leave in thirty-six hours, and I can't refuse him. If you need time, I can give you until tomorrow night. Meet me back here, at the same time, and I can get you out of the city, to a place where you will no longer have to be their slave. A place where you can be yourself."
Seven re-read the message, mulling over the implications of more Lucario.. Then she handed it back to him.
"I – I need to think. I will be back, to let you know what I decide. But you better go, they'll start to wonder if I'm gone too long."
That was all the encouragement Bruno needed to leave. Once he was gone, Seven prowled the area, searching for any sign of Grunts. They were alone.
As she walked back to the bar, she wondered about the offer, her brain darting from thought to thought like a dragonfly. She hadn't considered leaving Team Rocket, not after watching Seamus get his brain matter sprayed across a plastic tarp, and even then, she had nowhere else to go. Now, there was this Temple, a sanctuary from the dangerous, duplicitous world she inhabited.
At the thought of having a home where she would no longer have to hide, she almost lost her grip on her illusion. But then, the final words of that message came back to her. A place where she could be herself. He saw her as a Pokémon. They all would.
She thought about her new office at Rocket Headquarters, the sleek uniform that waited for her on her bed, the computer that gave her unlimited digital freedom, the small army of Grunts that would heel like dogs at the snap of her fingers. The nightlight, her eternal flame in the darkness, glowed in her mind.
The Robot Dreams came into view. Jaw set, Seven walked up to Admin Fisher, tapped him on the shoulder, and said, "I need to have a word with Giovanni. The sooner, the better."
He turned towards her and said with a small laugh, "Are you sure we don't have time for one more?" But his eyes were sharp as daggers, ready to stab the chest of the nearest man.
Seven met the steely stare and said, "We have work to do."
Changelog
10/29/18 - minor edits... also, fun fact. I just learned that the big dash thing that I've been using to separate the Changelog from the story actually adds about fifty words to this site's word count for some reason, so I won't be using that anymore. I don't want to artificially pad the word count like that.