NSO Chapter 32
(Day 4, Part 3)
I don't own Pokemon.
Zoey paced in circles nervously in front of the light blue bedroom door, where muffled sobs could be heard emanating from behind the thick piece of wood. Janice had sent her to talk to her sister after Cleo had come home a crying mess, going straight to her room and refusing to come out. When she did exit her room for things like dinner, the time spent outside was minimal, and interactions were almost nonexistent. Zoey was going to knock but hesitated, her paw mere inches away from hitting the door. She looked behind her and received an encouraging smile and thumbs up from Julley. Taking a deep breath to pluck up her courage, Zoey gave two sharp raps on the door. There was a moment of silence as the sobbing stopped abruptly before there was the sound of a lock clicking open.
Pushing open the door, Zoey noticed a tendril of water slithering back into the tub in the room and a sniffling pile of blankets on the bed. Sighing, she climbed onto the bed to sit beside the soaking heap of blankets, and her sister that lay beneath them. As she sat there, her mind struggled with what to say to Cleo.
Cleo, mom wants to talk to you? Nah. If I'm going to make up excuses to leave, why did I even come in here?
Cleo, you have to woman up and stop crying! He was barely worth i-no. That's not right either.
Hey, Cleo. I...uh... brought you dry blankets?
Zoey stared down at the sky-blue blankets and sheets she had brought into the room with her and frowned to herself. None of these responses seemed to be the right thing to say. Then again, she was an Ice-type. They weren't exactly known for being the most compassionate Pokemon in the world, quite the opposite. But this WAS her sister, the Vaporeon that she had known for sixteen years. With all that she had put her through with those silly contests, she had to make it up to her. She at least had to try to comfort her.
"Cleo...did something happen between you and Zenith? I-I know I'm no expert in relationships, but maybe I can help you two figure things out." The Glaceon cringed at her cold straightforwardness. She didn't expect a reply, so the Glaceon was surprised when Cleo's head popped out of all the blankets she had swaddled herself in, teary and puff-eyed, wiping away stray tears.
"Y-y-you think so?" Cleo stuttered as she tried to speak with the lump in her throat, voice hoarse with her throat raw from crying.
I don't know, I didn't think I'd get this far-NO! Bad Zoey. Say something encouraging. Something comforting.
"Uh... yeah. But let's dry yourself, and change your sheets first. You're going to catch a cold if you sleep with these, and I don't think that these blankets can soak up any more of your tears."
Five minutes later, Zoey and Cleo sat on the bedroom floor, the wet blankets and bedsheets drying out by the windowsill. Cleo wrapped herself in the new blankets Zoey had brought, and had a box of tissues by her side, which was rapidly being depleted, even though the Vaporeon's crying had now been reduced to occasional sniffles.
Seeing that Cleo had calmed down significantly, Zoey decided to press the issue again.
"So... what happened? You came home crying, without Zenith, and locked yourself in your room for a few hours before dinner. Did you two fight?"
"No..." As tears started to well up in Cleo's eyes again, Zoey started to notice where all the nearest tissue boxes were located. "He..." More tears as the Vaporeon recovered the memory. "He... he left me for someone else." Cleo buried her face in the blankets, the sheets growing damper with each passing second. Leaning over, Zoey spread her paws wide open in a hug that her sister immediately accepted, the Vaporeon pressing her face against the Ice-type's chest fur, squeezing the Glaceon as tight as her arms would allow for. Enjoying the embrace, Cleo's walls came down, and she slowly recounted the situation to her big sister. Listening to Cleo's story, Zoey felt sorry for she had to go through, and as she gave her sister reassuring pats on her back, her mind, trained by her time in college studying for her Police Science and Criminal Justice degree whirled into action.
The entire situation confused Zoey. Zenith didn't seem like the kind of Pokemon who would just leave someone that he had spent months with. And it wasn't like Cleo and Zenith's had a rocky relationship. The bond between the two Pokemon was unbelievably strong. So why would Zenith just break her sister's heart like that? It was a move that so one would have seen coming. Narrowing it down, there were three reasons that could have led to this.
Number one: Zenith had a change of heart. That was unlikely, since Zenith was one of the most loyal Pokemon Zoey had ever met, and with her time spent in college, she had met a lot of Pokemon. Coupled with what Cleo had shared with her, the Umbreon had the Vaporeon put on a pedestal. His world revolved around her, caring for her greatly, and the Glaceon knew that her sister felt the same way about him. It would take a lot of drive from someone else for Zenith to willingly fall for another.
Number two: Zenith was actually a sadistic psychopath, and was setting the entire thing up intentionally, building his relationship with Cleo for several months to ensure that the Vaporeon would fall in love with him, before breaking her heart as hard as he could and relishing in the enjoyment of seeing Cleo in such a broken state. This theory could be debunked by the fact that Zenith never had a girlfriend until he met Cleo, as far as the Vaporeon knew. However, the theory could only be wrong if Cleo' information was a hundred per cent correct. Zenith had attended Kingdra High for many years, while Cleo had just joined last year. There was ample time for Zenith to do the same to other girls before selecting Cleo as a target, and his antics wouldn't be well known around the school since his plans were long term. But if that theory did end up being true, Zoey hoped that Zenith loved broken limbs as much as he loved breaking hearts.
That left number three: Zenith was under the influence of someone else who forced him to leave Cleo. This theory could only be viable depending on the kind of Pokemon in Kingdra High. Zenith could take care of himself, so the only kinds of Pokemon in the school that would be able to overpower or persuade him successfully would be... wait a minute.
"Cleo."
"Yeah?" The Vaporeon wiped her tears on the blanket, looking up at her sister's voice.
"Who was the Pokemon that Zenith left you for?"
"Uh... a Sylveon, I think Zenith called her Sylv-"
"SYLVIE!" Cleo jumped as Zoey's shout caught her by surprise. Looking at her sister, Cleo was astonished to see the Glaceon on her feet, now pacing furiously around the room of a confused Vaporeon.
"That fucking slut! You'll pay for this!" In Zoey's rage, an Ice Beam was aimed at Cleo's still damp sheets, freezing the water molecules trapped inside into little ice spikes, which then shattered, effectively freeze-drying the blankets.
As Zoey kept muttering obscenities under her breath, Cleo watched her sister's hushed tirade with astounded curiosity. Where was all this heat* coming from?
"Zoey?"
"When I get my paws on that whore- yes, Cleo?"
"You know... Sylvie?"
The temperature of the surrounding air seemed to drop a few degrees as Zoey's fur started to bristle, her expression of cold fury growing even frostier. "Oh, I do know her. And more importantly for you, I know why Zenith left you for her."
"She had Zenith under some sort of spell, didn't she?"
"In a way, she did, She's a Sylveon, Cleo. She probably used Attract, procced Cute Charm, combined with that stupid Salazzle perfume... I'd put nothing past that hoe." Cleo winced at her sister's crude words, but at the same time, her hope, which had been trodden into the dirt, started to rise once again.
"So... how do you know so much about Sylvie?"
"We have history. I always saw that as a bad thing, but now it seems to be coming in handy. Although I have no idea what she's doing in your school."
"So if you ARE right about Sylvie, and she DOES have Zenith under her control, does that mean..."
Looking at her sister's hopeful expression, an uncommon warm feeling stirred within the Glaceon.
"Yes, Cleo. Zenith still loves you, deep down." Was that a small smile Cleo saw flicker across Zoey's usually cold, emotionless face? But that smile quickly vanished, before being replaced by a worried frown as Zoey considered the situation.
"Of course, above that "deep down" is a whole lot of pheromones and infatuation. We have got to get Zenith as far away from Sylvie as we can, as fast as we can. If not, the pheromones will stay in his system forever..."
"... And Zenith will love Sylvie for the rest of his life." Cleo finished Zoey's sentence, shivers running down her spine as she imagined the scene, dread setting deeper into her stomach. "So, what do we do?"
"Well, now you have to apologise to Mom for ignoring her before she leaves for her business trip tomorrow. And besides, there's nothing we can do at this hour. We have no idea where Zenith is, and I do not know where Sylvie lives. The best thing we can do is to wait until tomorrow to come up with an actual plan."
"That sounds fair. And Gayle's coming back from Battle Camp tomorrow. She'd want to save her brother too."
"So it's settled then. Now go talk to Mom." As Cleo stood up, Zoey gave the Vaporeon a little push, directing her out of the room. But at the doorway, Cleo stopped, turning to look back at her sister.
"Zoey?"
"Yeah?"
"When you said that you'd make Sylvie pay, what was she gonna pay for?"
"For breaking my little sister's heart. Why?"
"I just wanted to say... thanks. For everything." The light blue door swung shut with a click as Cleo left the room.
Julley came in shortly after, wiping the sweat off his brow. Panting heavily, he plopped himself next to Zoey, leaning on his girlfriend to soak up the refreshing, frosty air.
"Hey Julley. I trust you heard everything?"
"You know me too well. Also, warn me next time when Cleo leaves the room. I barely got out of the way in time. So, Sylvie, huh? Been a long time since I heard that name."
"Yeah. Let's just hope that this time, it won't be as bad as before."
.
.
.
"Ugh..."
A painful throb in the head woke Zenith from his groggy slumber. Rubbing his noggin to try and relieve the pain, the Umbreon glanced around, trying to make sense of his surroundings. His biological clock told him that it was late at night, so he tried to see the moon, hoping a Moonlight would be able to help heal his head.
But there was no window in the room.
As realisation set in, Zenith looked around frantically, now noticing things and objects in the dark room that he had never seen before. It was either Cleo had changed out everything in her room for some reason, or...
This isn't Cleo's room.
Okay, so if this isn't Cleo's room, where am I?
Looking around his foreign surroundings, Zenith noticed many details that caught his eye. Hot, pink walls. Frills everywhere. A closet in a corner with a 'special vase' sign on it. And as memories started to seep back into his aching head, Zenith finally connected the dots.
I'm in Sylvie's house.
I gotta get out of here.
There was no window for an easy escape, so Zenith rushed towards the bedroom door. In his haste, he did not notice that the pink bed beside him was empty. The Umbreon also felt more sluggish than usual, as if his mind couldn't process information as fast as it used to.
Which explained why Zenith was caught off guard so easily.
He had barely exited the bedroom when ribbonlike tendrils shot out from behind the doorway, wrapping themselves around his legs and wrists, tripping the Umbreon up, down a flight of stairs directly in front of the bedroom.
Zenith tumbled down the stairs, landing in a crumpled heap at the bottom, groaning from the bruises and injuries he had sustained from landing on each sharp step. Looking up at the dark hallway, Zenith saw Sylvie step out of the darkness, in a nurse outfit, sashaying slowly down the dimly lit stairs.
With every step she took descending the stairs, Zenith tried to move, but fear held him in a vice-like grip, his mind still incapacitated by the nightmare that was unfolding before his eyes.
"Hey, Zenith. Miss me?" The Sylveon cooed, strutting towards the gaping Umbreon that lay helplessly on the floor. As she reached the bottom of the stairs, her tendrils extended out, curling around Zenith's limbs once more and lifting the Umbreon into the air.
"I know what you did, and it makes me sick knowing you manipulated me into leaving Cleo. Now let me go! I have a life to lead!"
"Tsk, tsk. And here I thought we had something special. But no matter. You may not like me now, but this will certainly change your mind." Still holding Zenith in her grasp, Sylvie walked back into her room, to that cupboard Zenith had noticed earlier. She rummaged through its contents for a while, before producing a contraption. It looked like a muzzle combined with an altered half-faced gas mask which had two vials of bright pink gas strapped to its sides.
"What's that?" Zenith began to struggle more frequently as Sylvie brought him closer with the contraption in paw, but the ribbons held him tightly in their grasp.
"Oh, it's just a loving gift from me to you. And speaking of loving..." Sylvie strengthened her aura, weakening Zenith's feelings of hostility long enough to strap the contraption around Zenith's snout. As she clipped the two rods of the muzzle around Zenith's struggling head, a computerized voice announced, "Love Muzzle successfully attached and locked. Voice command integrated."
it didn't take long for the 'Love Muzzle' to work its magic. The gas vials depressurised, releasing its contents into the mask. With no other option, Zenith was forced to breathe the gas in. The Umbreon's paw, once resisting against the tendrils gave in as the pheromones entered his system once again, sending Zenith's infatuation for Sylvie skyrocketing. His eyelids drooped shut, and when they reopened, they were no longer crimson red, but an unnaturally pinkish colour.
Sylvie smiled to herself, letting Zenith go as he gazed at her through love-struck eyes.
"Nice outfit there, Sylvie. it really accentuates your... everything."
"I'm so happy that you noticed, Zenith. And as a reward, you've earned a free check-up. C'mon, handsome. let's get you to bed."
"But I'm not tired, my love. In fact, I'm most energetic at night."
"I never said that we would be sleeping... and this is going to be so much fun."