A/N: As always, thanks so much for your support! Here's the next chapter, and I hope you enjoy!

Disclaimer: I don't own Pokémon or the picture used as cover (though I did edit it).

Days

The day with the conference call

Cilan

Friday, January 3rd

"You're doing it again," Chili's voice sounded and pulled Cilan back to reality. It had been a frequent occurrence these last few days, 'it' being getting lost in thoughts of the recent past and what ifs, until Cress or Chili called for his attention. They had taken to that recently, mostly when they were in a work situation, which they were now.

"Ah, I'm sorry," he muttered, firmly anchoring himself in the present. Chili stood with his back to him, but Cilan could see him nodding. Both their faces were turned to the battlefield, where Cress was facing off against a challenger. Chili was refereeing, while Cilan sat on a bench behind him, holding Quilladin on his lap. His poor Pokémon had gotten hurt during the one battle Cilan had to do, and he was now putting anti-burn salve on Quilladin's shell.

Regretfully, he looked down at Quilladin, who fortunately didn't seem to be bothered by the burns anymore. It was probably a good thing that he'd only had one challenger today, because battling was not one of his strong suits right now. Pretty much anything requiring his full attention was not one of his strong suits right now.

"I'm sorry, Quilladin," Cilan muttered, checking the shell to make sure all of it was covered with salve. The Pokémon grunted something and snuggled closer, though careful not to hurt Cilan with his spikes. "You did really well."

Despite Cilan's inattention during the battle, Quilladin had still managed to pull out a win for him.

"You'll be okay, Cilan," Chili said, though he didn't take his eyes off the battle. Cress's Slowking just evaded a fiery attack from the opposing Delphox before launching his own Scald attack.

"I'm fine," he replied automatically.

"Hm-hm," Chili said, wincing when Slowking was hurt by a Shadow Ball. The Pokémon got up, but barely. He had faced off against the challenger's Pangoro before, and it was showing now.

Cilan truly tried to pay attention to the battle, but he found his thoughts drifting again. Truth was that he wasn't fine. Although he supposed that he was already feeling better than before. His brothers had been supportive and understanding, and had (mostly) respected his wish for privacy on the matter. Although they wouldn't let him spend all day alone in his room to think (or brood as they called it), they hadn't asked him any painful questions, either.

Although that wasn't entirely true, either. Just after Iris had left, Chili had outright asked him what they had talked about and if he needed to retrieve Iris for more talking. Albeit Chili had worded that less politely, he remembered vaguely.

Cilan scratched the soft fur around his Pokémon's eyes and Quilladin grunted in contentment.

But he had kept Chili from going Iris and had given him a short rundown of the conversation, because at that moment he had felt that seeing her never again would be too soon.

That feeling hadn't lasted, as he had known even back then, but he was glad that Iris had kept her distance. And Chili's pent-up energy had been useful in keeping the press at bay in the later days.

Realizing that he was zoning out again, he tried to focus on the battle. Cress had recalled Slowking and was now battling with Crawdaunt, who was making short work of the opponent's Delphox.

It was a brutal tactic, unusual for Cress, and it drove home that his brothers were under stress as well, with him being in the state that he was. Or perhaps that was a self-centered thought, but Cilan couldn't deny that his brothers were now more occupied with him and picking up his slack.

He eyed his blue-haired brother, who seemed to be completely focused on the battle. The Kalosian challenger had now sent out a Gogoat, taking the type advantage.

Cress's inquiries about his emotional welfare were more subtle than Chili's, but surprisingly he was a lot more persistent. The redhead was willing to let him be and seemed content to let Cilan come to him now that the biggest thing was cleared up.

Cress however… Whenever a silence fell in their conversations, he was wont to give Cilan a look with a questioning smile, and in passing he would often put a hand on his shoulder or pat his back. And if Cilan happened to lose track of the conversation or get lost in his own thoughts, Cress immediately picked up on it. And every evening Cress reminded Cilan that he could talk to him, if he wanted to.

It was odd to be on this side of the situation; Cilan was used to being the most emotional stable of the three of them. A lot had changed.

He sighed. This time, there was no reaction from Chili, but Quilladin jumped off his lap to sit next to him on the bench and gave him a proper hug.

Cilan thanked him with a smile. Despite that he sometimes just wanted to be left alone, he was glad with the support of his family and friends. He wondered how Iris was doing… She had May, so she was not alone, and that was a comfort to him. Which was odd, because at the same time he wanted her to hurt just as he did, and that thought was always followed by a sting of guilt, then followed by some anger because why should he be feeling guilty when she was the one who ran off-

His feelings were a twisted mess and Cilan felt entirely at a loss what to do. There was a gaping, Iris-shaped hole in his life now that her friendship and companionship were suddenly gone and it hurt. But the thought of seeing her again also made him want to run, or hide, or scream, or break down crying – or perhaps a combination thereof, Cilan didn't know.

It was all so confusing. Why hadn't she said something sooner? What had changed? Or had it been wrong from the beginning? That thought made his insides squirm, because he had really thought that they had a chance, that they could be something more than friends-

"Gogoat is unable to battle! Gym Leader Cress and his Crawdaunt are the winner!" Chili called loudly, and Cilan forced his attention back to the present. It wasn't as if his thoughts had been so pleasant anyway.

The bespectacled man who had challenged Cress ran on the field to comfort his fallen Pokémon, while Cress high-fived with Crawdaunt. Cress then met the challenger in the middle of the field and started an encouraging speech, but Cilan was distracted by the ringing of the phone.

"I'll get it," he said to Chili, getting up from the bench. Quilladin jumped from the bench as well and walked with him, excitedly chattering about the battle they had just seen. He hushed the Pokémon when he noticed it was Alder's number on the caller ID.

Cilan frowned. Alder had not shown much interest in Iris's and his problems, though he had sent them his felicitations, which had arrived two days after the not-wedding.

He accepted the call, and Alder's uncharacteristically serious expression immediately made Cilan realize that this was about something else.

"I'm calling a meeting," Alder announced without as much as a greeting. "Get your brothers as fast as possible and join the phone conference."

Cilan barely had time to give his assent before the screen went black.

"Quilladin?" Quilladin looked at him questioningly.

"Let's go get Cress and Chili." He tried to keep his voice light, but the serious look on Quilladin's face told him he hadn't succeeded.

Cilan quickly strode back to the Gym, Quilladin on his heels, and found that Cress was just wishing the challenger the best. Cilan caught Chili's eye and Chili's greeting smile froze on his face.

"What's going on?"

"Don't accept any new challengers for now. Alder is calling an emergency meeting," Cilan explained to the fire type trainer.

Chili's eyes widened and he gave a sharp nod. They turned to watch Cress approach, who smiled and wiped his forehead.

"Man, that Myron sure gave me a run for my money-" Cress cut himself off, frowning. "What's wrong?"

"Alder wants to talk to us, it's urgent," Chili said, already walking towards the phone. "C'mon, I want to know what's going on."

Cress gave him a questioning glance but Cilan couldn't give an answer. "I have no idea what's going on, but Alder seemed very serious."

They picked up their pace to follow after Chili, who was already starting the teleconference program. As the program opened, Cilan thought to recall Quilladin; he was his youngest Pokémon and if it was bad news, he wanted to be able to break it to him gently.

Soon enough a raster of screens appeared, most of them already showing the confused faces of Gym Leaders and Elite Four members. In the upper corner, Cilan could see Iris's mass of purple hair, but he tried not to look at it too much. Instead he looked at the others, and found that only Shauntal and Alder himself were still missing.

After about a minute of confused muttered and worried glances their screens flickered on as well, and Cilan couldn't help but notice that Shauntal looked even paler than usual. Alder himself looked unusually serious, and Cilan felt a heavy feeling of dread settle in his chest.

"Thank you all for being able to join us so quickly," Alder greeted, taking a short moment to nod at the camera.

"As most of you probably know, Agatha of the Indigo Elite Four passed away not too long ago," he started. "However, the Indigo division suspected foul play-"

Cilan felt his eyes widen and he heard Cress mutter under his breath.

"-and they looked into it. As they put it, there were no signs pointing towards a natural or an unnatural death, but they found similarities between Agatha's case and two suspicious deaths… possibly murder cases."

"Murder," Cilan breathed, and he heard more shocked sounds coming from his fellow Gym Leaders.

Alder continued on. "Since they had found nothing concrete, they only shared the information within their own League and with the other Champions. But things have changed now." He paused for a breath. "Two days ago, Phoebe of the Hoenn Elite Four has died in similar circumstances."

Cilan held a hand in front of his mouth in horror. Phoebe dead… Gasps and murmurs and shocked exclamations came from the video phone, but it was impossible to discern who was saying what. Cilan shared quiet glances with his brothers, Cress pale and Chili frowning.

"That's horrible," Chili said, and Cilan could only nod in agreement. He hadn't known Phoebe very well, but the younger members of the League had always tended to stick together during interregional meetings, and he had spoken to her on multiple occasions. Such a bright young woman, a talented trainer…

The sounds from the videophone quieted and Alder took the lead once more.

"It's a very sad and terrible happening," he said. "And we have to seriously consider the possibility that Agatha and Phoebe's deaths were no coincidence, especially when we take the civilians' deaths into consideration. And if we do that, there is an obvious conclusion that can be drawn from these cases." Alder straightened, expression grave. "Someone or something is targeting ghost type trainers."

And at that announcement, all eyes went to Shauntal, who simply blinked back at them behind her thick round glasses.

A/N: Thank you for reading! So yup, things are going interregional. Also, the challenger mentioned here is actually a canon character, I'm having fun putting those in for a cameo whenever I can. Anyway, I hope you liked this chapter, and I'd love to hear from you!

Thank you!

Recommendation:

Thor: Bargaining by proantagonist. FFN. If you love a good redemption story with family feels, this is the one for you! Loki travels back in time to save Thor's life. Of course things don't go as planned. A finished multi-chaptered story!

Recommendations are welcome!