(A/N: Hey, sorry for not updating. I've been homeless since february, so I haven't been able to work on this much. I have a few chapters still left over, though, so I'll upload those until this site is up to speed with AO3. Thanks for reading, and I'd love to know what you think.)
"With or without
I'm trying to pick a side
Deep in my doubts
I'd be passing twenty-five"
—"Holy Hell" from Nisemono by Ginger Root
Sheer, unadulterated agony ripped out of Cori's throat in a shriek of pain that, even with her ears pressed flat against her skull, Max was sure would burst her ear drums. Max wished she hadn't agreed to this, but with her claws tightly pinched around the one remaining misaligned scale, it was almost over. With a final flick, she ripped it out and threw her paws over her ears.
Even her paws weren't enough to shield her completely. Cori said this was for their own good, but she couldn't be sure. It must've been similar to how Cori felt about their swimming lessons. Cori poked at her leg with a hindpaw to signal they were done screaming. Max tentatively put her paws down.
"Thanks," Cori whimpered. Still very much in pain, they added little more than exasperated breath to the soundscape. That was supposed to be the last one, though, so Max let herself slump back against the wall behind her.
Although, she realized she had the perfect tool to make this at least a little bit more enjoyable. She hopped up and headed over to the turntable. The record Neb had mistaken for a white smudge was still in from the night before, so she flipped through the albums to find its twin. Technically this was the reverse order, but she had a feeling Vinny wouldn't care. Once she had it out and set aside, she returned to the turntable.
With surgical reverence and care, she lifted the dust cover with one paw while the other got the record sleeve. This was hard enough with hands and fingers, and she had to work with paws and claws. Somehow, though, the muscle memory persisted despite the different hardware.
Wait, muscle memory—oh, she must've collected records as a human. She started to wonder if any of these records were in her old collection and stopped before knocking herself out.
To keep from touching the record directly, she held opposite sides of the sleeve and slid it under the record. Once it hit the spindle, she gripped the record through the sleeve as lightly as possible—making sure to use her pawpads and not her claws—lifted it up and stumbled backward to let it drop into the sleeve. It was so big and flat that she struggled to maneuver it even after she had it in the sleeve.
Usually, she was used to her new height. She barely even noticed it as far as she could remember since the rest of the world changed around her at the same time, so she never had a frame of reference. Records amended that by giving her exactly that.
She refused to stand next to a perfectly upright record because she knew she was taller than a forty-five already and didn't need to check.
Getting records on was a lot easier than off. After she put the old sleeve back in its case, she tugged the new one out, hobbled over to the turntable, and bent down to gently place it on the slipmat. Grabbing the corners, she started tilting it up to let the record slip out and into place. It was just barely off, so she had to very very lightly nudge it until the spindle went through the center.
"Piii kachu," she sighed in relief. Perfect, now she just had to place the tonearm. Her paw did that practically on its own, and its twin dropped the dust cover as she turned to see Cori had fallen asleep. That explained their uncharacteristic silence.
A blazing guitar riff ripped through the quiet of her place and shot Cori to the ceiling. They only barely missed actually hitting it thanks to being so close to the wall. Max had intended absolutely none of this, but it was an incredible spectacle to watch. The chuckles she tried to hide behind her paw once Cori landed might have had an adverse effect on her claims of innocence, though.
"Sorry!" she forced through the giggles. "Sorry, I didn't realize." Cori's gaze shot around the room while they tried to catch up to the waking world. The music answered their question instead of their sight, though, and they grumbled some relief. For their sake, Max turned the music down a few notches before heading back.
Cori brought their paws up to rub the sleep out of their eyes while Max tempted fate by flopping against the wall and closed hers. After making up for lost blood, her ribs started healing at a pace that amazed her. She'd assumed that had taken her out of commission for months.
"Are you okay?" Cori asked.
"Huh?" Max asked, tilting her head to peek one eye open. "Yeah?" Maybe they were just worried she'd flopped back too hard.
The way Cori nervously nodded while tying their paws into knots suggested otherwise. "Well, if you're sure," they mumbled. Max could feel their next words tensed in their throat while they struggled to build the courage. "Just, y'know, I'm here." They gave her another nervous glance and looked away just as fast. "And, y'know, I know Eleos mea-"
"It's not gone forever," Max groaned. She had a feeling that's what they were talking about, but she was hoping they wouldn't commit to bringing it up.
"I know, sorry," Cori mumbled. "Still, I get it. Breakups are-"
"On a break," Max corrected before she'd really decided to. Once their words registered, though, she quirked a brow. "You get it?" They froze in place. Max made sure to keep her chalance well withing the non (even though she had no reason to be excited in the first place).
"Maybe," Cori said. Effectively a yes that polite company would let slide.
"The delphox?" Max asked, not feeling especially polite in the moment. Cori grumbled something and shrank. "I didn't realize you'd eve-"
"Braixen," Cori corrected. Max squinted at them, but didn't challenge them on it. She was a bit surprised she'd misheard or misremembered that badly, though. Cori seemed to read that in one of their many sparse glances her way. "I said delphox in a panic trying to make someone else up."
"Oh," Max said. She didn't feel quite so bad about her skills lying anymore. She did her best and then some to make sure she didn't chuckle in the slightest. Instead, she shuffled over to lay a paw over their shoulder. They flinched at her touch before leaning into it. More than just nerves kept them from looking up. "How recently was this?"
Cori had a few false starts before they managed to answer, "A few days ago." Their eyes fled from her, though it seemed more out of discomfort than guilt. Still, Max could almost taste their regret for having brought this up (even though she forced the issue).
"What happened?" Max asked. It was important, after all, to take a genuine interest in the friends who support you. Sometimes, supporting your friends just happens to also keep you from having to talk about your own issues that you're trying to pretend aren't there. "It just didn't work out?"
"Kinda," Cori said. As the music played in the background, they started to nearly imperceptibly rock their head to the beat. Max wondered if they even knew they were. It lightened the mood just a bit, and that made the worry in their hesitation that much more obvious. "I told him I have to leave." The new pit in Max's stomach somewhat validated their hesitation.
"He… kinda understood?" Cori continued. Max did her best to keep a supportive smile on despite the guilt eating her insides out. "He was just mad that I didn't even wait until after Life Day."
Max flicked her ear up at that. She'd never heard of that Holiday before. It sounded like a kind of Easter, but she doubted this world would celebrate that. She forced herself to let go of that pondering and gave Cori some more comforting pats (careful to avoid the sore spots).
"Sorry, I didn't realize you had someone," she said. Was she really so unconcerned with her friend's personal life? "You know, you don't have to leave."
"What?" Cori asked. They suddenly flinched away as if she'd just apparated next to them. After a second, their head seemed to catch up with their location. "Oh, no, that's not it." They gave an awkward smile down before looking away again. "We kinda… needed to break up." Max tried desperately to hide her relief. "Honestly, moving just made for a really good excuse."
Max eyed them with concern until their smirk forced its way out, and she rolled her eyes. "Oh, well good! Glad you're leaving for the right reasons," she chuckled.
They yanked her into a hug before she'd even closed her mouth, eliciting an embarrassing (and increasingly common) squeak. She was a bit worried about her ribs, even if they didn't feel too bad. It was almost a habit at this point, but Cori practiced impressive restraint in how gentle they held her. That incident with her shoulder proved they were a squeezer (and she'd had plenty examples of such before then, too).
The hug wasn't a quick one, though. Once the surprise wore off, she had her arms wrapped around their neck. Reciprocating the hug didn't bring it any closer to its end, though. If anything, it forced them to fight even more of an urge to squeeze her ribs to pieces. She started to worry if they were okay until they nestled up to her ear.
"I missed you," they whispered.
Max stiffened at that. It had barely been more than a week. They did spend time together almost every day before that, though. She'd certainly thought about them plenty in their time apart, but she'd never expected the same from them. With a touch of frustration, she realized she'd assumed they wouldn't think about her if she wasn't there. Old habits die hard.
"I missed you, too," Max whimpered, squeezing them a bit tighter. Her own tone surprised her a bit, but it made more sense when she felt the telltale warmth welling up under her eyes. "Goddammit." She shook her head in disbelief as she nosed into her arm to wipe them away.
"What's wrong?" Cori asked, pulling away to look at her. A spike of panic shot through them when they saw her rubbing the tears away.
"Nothing," Max quickly said. "This just keeps happening, lately." She shook her head again, a smile starting to spread on her lips. "Sorry, it's probably really annoying."
Cori tilted their head back with a smirk, asking, "Annoying?" Max hadn't really given it much thought, so she couldn't really respond with more than a shrug. After a moment of appraisal, they shook their head and looked down at her with a devious grin. "I think it's cute."
"C-cute?" Max squeaked, failing to sound nonchalant. Most of her friends had teased her by calling her that, but she somehow wasn't used to it from Cori yet. She wasn't exactly flustered. It just brought an intensely warm and bubbly feeling to her chest that she desperately needed not to be there for the same reason she couldn't let herself be happy Cori was single.
Cori had just started to chuckle when they both heard the sound of claws rapping against a door. Max hurried to dab the rest of the dampness out of her eyes and hopped up before yelling, "Uh, come in?"
The door swung open, and in walked Goon with his own bag on his shoulder, and another in his paw. Right, they'd discussed him helping a certain totodile move. This mission, he didn't mind letting go through the official channels.
"Hey," he said, giving an appreciative nod to Cori. "Good, you're here. You can hold her down." He held the other bag up, and Max realized why she recognized it. That was the equipment he'd swiped from the doctor's office. "She needs some stitches removed." She started to wish she'd been just a little bit more gentle with their scales. It's not like they were the slightest bit vindictive, but she wouldn't mind if they were.
She'd still take a vengeful Cori over Dani any day.
"Well, holy hell
Trying not to think how it feel now"
The midday sun streamed idyllic beams down to the hilltop. Even keeping as healthy a distance from it as she did, Max could still hear the singing from the spring. The trees obscured the path to the bottom, but so high up, she still had a wonderful view of the world below. She couldn't make out any buildings or landmarks, but she could just barely see Pokémon Square.
This random little stop in her journey to demise had etched its way into her mind. Even before she'd had her awareness, she could feel the border between the grass and the stone with her eyes closed. She didn't dare get close enough to touch the water, but she could sometimes manage to let herself sit on the stone.
It was hard to accept that she wouldn't be able to come here anymore. This place had meant nothing to her when she found it. All it had of note that it met her needs at the time, needs that it never got to fulfill thanks to Cori. Yet, because of that, it filled a role she'd never have expected. Such a high up, secluded place became the perfect place to rest with someone who cared, who mattered to her.
Someone who needed her. This stream, this spring, this hill would all sustain long after her or Cori. They were visitors to a landmark that couldn't even feel their presence. It was like she'd always seen the world. Despite literally saving it, she'd never believed it needed her. It was sturdy, and people are strong. She was just the person who was there.
After that, she didn't know if she'd ever be the one who was there again. Grass that bent beneath her paw righted itself within seconds, and stone gave no give to her weight. Water that rippled to her touch wouldn't stop its flow for her sake. It was a melancholic comfort.
Cori took that comfort from her. They were strong. They probably could've made it on their own. They were a wonderful friend before they'd even known her name, trapped in a world that didn't love as much as they did. Their heart was filled with an infectious love that would have formed the perfect environment for them eventually.
She was just the person who was there. Even when she didn't want to, she had to be there. That infectious love in their heart reminded her what it was like to live. It was hard to believe she could do any good, but even harder not to at least try for their sake.
They would get better on their own, she knew it. She always knew that they would be okay. She liked to believe that it was because she could help them, but she wasn't particularly well equipped for that. They didn't need her help. They didn't need her. They wanted her. They liked having her around, and that meant so much more to her. Spending so much time convincing herself no one cared, Cori proved her wrong to the detriment of their own well-being.
Now, they were throwing their world away to come with her on a mission neither of them really understood. Cori said it's what they want, but Max almost felt that they were wrong. Even a shitty support network is better than none. She had to wonder if they were old enough to understand what they were doing.
It was too much for her to understand, too much for her to worry though on her own, but nothing she could share with anyone. Her whole world had changed because of this teeny little spring on this annoying to climb hill. She picked up a little stone and tossed it to the water to watch it sink.
The sight gave her a dark smile; what a first impression.
Rustling grass to her right made her ear twitch. She cocked her head to get a better sense of the sound on instinct. Two sets of paws, one short, the other tall, both varying levels of stout: Cori and Goon. She hopped up and turned to wave at them as they crested the hill. "Hey!" she called. It was a bit of a relief to see them. They'd come just in time to save her from her thoughts.
They both saw her wave. Goon flicked his paw and scanned his surroundings while Cori hopped and hurried over to her the moment they saw her. Cori's pace started to make Max worry the slightest bit, even despite the restraint they'd shown earlier that day.
"Hey! Careful with her!" Goon shouted. Evidently, he had the same concerns. "She always thinks she's okay before she is." The warning didn't slow Cori in the slightest. When they made it to her, though, they made sure to gently fling their arms around her. Goon kept a close watch on Max until she nodded to let him know she was okay.
She wrapped her arms around Cori while her eyes lingered on Goon. It felt wrong seeing him here. Of course, it had been odd seeing him at all. Maybe it was because he was the first person she'd been able to convince herself didn't care, yet he seemed to be the one who cared the most.
"Nice place," Goon said. He made it to them about the same time that they decided to release the hug. His gaze wandered around until eventually landing on the spring. "Come here when you need a soak?"
"Well, I do, at least," Cori said, beaming from ear to ear (metaphorically). "I think it's nice! She can't, though, obviously."
Goon tilted his head with a raised brow. "Why not?" he asked. Max shrank away, her cheeks sparking in embarrassment. "She can swim."
Max flinched back in surprise, shaking her head. "What?" she said. He might remember a lot that she didn't, but swimming isn't really something you can forget to do. "No I can't." Goon looked down at her with that dispassionate gaze she'd grown accustomed to. She probably could've guessed what he'd do next if she'd tried. He had a very direct way of proving himself, after all.
The quick attack brought his claws to the nape of her neck in the same instant she'd seen him move. In the very next instant, she was careening through the air. She was surprised he'd do this so soon after telling Cori to be careful until she saw water beneath her.
Panic came too fast for her to resist fleeing from it. The world around her faded to nothing more than a distant speck. The freeze that wrapped its wet claws around her dulled to an ache while she heard instincts jabbering in her mind. It happened so fast that she could barely notice what happened before it all faded completely.
Something wrapped around her. She tried to wrest herself out of its grasp, but it held strong. Even when she shocked it with all the electricity she had at the ready, its grip remained strong. It could've been partially because of all the water arcing her own electricity back into her.
It breached out of the depths and finally let her go once they crashed into the ground. She heaved up whatever water she thought was stuck in her throat while she ran, but something else was right on her tail. It outpaced her in an instant, digging its claws into the back of her neck and ripping her into the air. She tried to rip herself out of its grasp, but couldn't even figure out where it was.
Despite not having much at her disposal, she flung all the electricity around her into the air and felt it crash into the monster right behind her. Not a single spark arced back to her, though, leaving her completely empty. Even when the charge locked the predator's limbs into spasms that released her, she only had the energy to fall.
All of a sudden, her mind was too hazy to race, too dizzy to distract itself with any thoughts that didn't pertain to her immediate safety. She knew she was in danger, but not why. A shiver went up her spine, and she couldn't tell if it was from fear or cold. She didn't know where she was, she didn't know what happened. She just knew that she was wet, she was cold, and she was scared.
She tried to run and found herself curled up in a ball instead. Frost bit at her while water dripped from her fur. A few shakes flung some of it off but still left her soaked. All her energy went to keeping warm, and it wasn't helping.
A familiar scent forced her up to face it as it came closer. A huge, white, hulking beast looked mere inches from her face, even though it was a good few yards back. Another shiver wracked her spine as she took a step back, a whimper escaping her throat. She recognized it. Was it the monster chasing her? She had trouble looking at any part of it besides the massive claws.
One of the claws held food. Shiny red that shifted to licks of yellow at the base, she almost mistook it for an apple. Whatever it was, it managed to shift her attention off the massive claws holding it.
She looked up to the beast's face and saw it darken. It didn't gain any malice or hunger, though. She couldn't read the change in his expression, but it reminded her of fear. He held the berry out to her a little bit more and shifted her attention back to it. The sight alone made her belly ache, her mouth water. Whatever it was, she needed more food.
Hunger annihilated her fear and managed to get her paws walking over one step at a time. The pokémon holding the berry didn't move until she had cleared half the distance, when it knelt down for her. While the fear faded, her shivers didn't. The cold started to feel worse.
Finally close enough, she carefully stood up on her hindpaws to reach for it. She looked up at his face to confirm and saw that same, dark horror she saw before. His eyes met hers, yet looked distant. Despite that, he nodded, and she took it.
She jerked it to herself and turned around to start gnawing away at it. One bite reduced it by half, and the next two finished it off. She tilted her head up to swallow the barely chewed mush and noticed another berry in front of her. It was between her teeth before she'd even seen the color. This one was tougher, though, and slowed her down. She had to really gnaw it down.
As she did, a pair of claws started running down her back. All the remaining tension in her oozed out from the touch as delight joined the cold in making her shiver. The claw suddenly jerked back when she squeaked from joy, but it came tentatively back while she finished off her second berry.
Max scarfed down the rest of the berry to better receive the ministrations. She leaned up to sniff the paws, then nuzzle her (rather full) cheeks into them. They had a bit of warmth on offer, and she needed as much as she could get. She twisted and turned her head to present the spots that needed his attention, and he obliged. Before she knew it, she was laying in fluff, surrounded by warmth.
The world started coming back into focus for her gradually. Her surroundings started to look less and less distant, her thoughts almost starting to come together again. It felt like crawling out of a tar pit.
Warmth greeted her more and more as her energy returned. It all felt hazy, but the haze was fading. She felt herself wiggle into the fluffy warmth and decided to do it some more. After she did, she started to feel someone staring down at her. She looked up to see a familiar face. The name came soon after.
"Goon?" she asked, and his eyes suddenly darkened. She'd seen that look before, hadn't she? The memory felt equal parts ancient and recent, hard to recall, yet somehow fresh. Whenever she'd seen it, though, she could definitely recognize it, now. He was staring, unblinking, at her eyes. His gaze didn't meet hers, though. He wasn't looking into them, but at them. "Are you all right?"
Enough of her faculties returned for her to hear herself. Instantly, she understood his expression, knew what he was looking for. She dug her bracelet into her paw and forced a deep, slow breath. The world around her didn't fully clear, but she could make the rest of it out enough to notice Cori off to the right.
She started to wiggle out of Goon's grip, but he suddenly tightened his hold. A spike of panic shot through her, but he quickly let go and Max wriggled out with newfound urgency. It took a bit more focus, but she managed to hold on despite the scare. Her cheeks sparked wildly while she rushed through some speech exercises before struggling to say, "S-sorry. What happened?"
"How much do you remember?" Cori asked. Max glanced over and saw scorch marks all across their scales. She flinched back at the sight and looked to see even worse on Goon. "It's okay! We're okay!" Cori hurried to say. They had a smile and their paws up when she looked over to see them.
Max didn't exactly believe them in the slightest, but she tried to accept it to keep herself from slipping again. Her paw didn't leave her bracelet. She did her best to hold on.
"Do you remember anything?" Cori asked again.
Keeping her eyes off Goon and Cori, she tried to dig into her mind. Even without looking, though, she felt Goon's stare digging a hole into her. She looked up, and he immediately honed in on her eyes again. She grit her teeth, but didn't let herself shrink away. "G-Goon?" she asked. "You all right?"
Goon's eyes suddenly shifted to looking at her instead of past her, and he blinked a few times as if waking up. "What? Yeah," he said. Max tilted her head in concern when he started to force a smile. He kept stealing glances at her eyes.
When she raised a brow, he gave up trying to play that he was fine. "All right, sorry," he said. The smile faded away, leaving behind the shadow of fear it had attempted to cover. The constant glances at her eyes started to worry her. Did they still look empty? "You just…," Goon trailed off, starting to lose himself in thought again. "You looked like one of those things in a dungeon."
"Goon!" Cori barked, but it was too late. Max felt her heart in her throat. She tried to choke it down, but Goon's eyes flashed with understanding once he saw the hurt in hers. Before he could apologize, she raised a paw.
"It's fine," Max forced. She suddenly remembered Shan treating her almost like a pet. "It's, I'm sure it's a freaky thing to see." Her forced smile was about as believable as Goon's had been. Another shiver went down her spine. "Looking at someone… when they're not there." Her mind started to wander as a memory called to her from right outside her reach. "It's like they're already gone."
"Max?" Cori and Goon asked in unison. Cori took the initiative to shake her shoulder, though, and said, "C'mon, Max, you've got this." They gave her another shake, ripping her further from the memory, and she pulled away from it.
"N-no, I wasn't losing it," Max said. As quickly as it had come, it was gone. It left a gaping hole in her chest. She'd forgotten something important—very important—and it was still there. Even if she could only feel the negative space around it, she could still feel it. "Sorry." She shook her head out of her thoughts and looked back up.
"Anyway, so," she mumbled. She knew there was a topic they'd gone off, but she couldn't quite remember it. Plans, they were planning for—right, Cori. She straightened up a bit to look a little bit more confident, a little bit more certain she was all right. "Are we clear on the plan, then?"
Cori and Goon shared a glance, then looked back at her. Trying to figure out the problem took no time at all. Every inch of her was still sopping wet. The cold raked shivers through her constantly despite her attempt at standing (relatively) tall. She tried to fling some more water off, which didn't help her warm up nor did it make her look any more solid. "Anyone have a towel?" she reluctantly mumbled.
"What, was using me not enough?" Goon asked. Max looked to see the pikachu-shaped wet-spot on Goon's belly and lap. She looked away while her cheeks sparked. Goon wasn't the physically affectionate type in the slightest. That meant that she'd been the one to curl up onto him. While she was feral.
"Hey, uh, hey," Goon rushed to say. "Look, it's all right. Don't worry about it." He threw both paws half up while Max tilted her head at the gesture. Goon wasn't one to walk his words back at all, much less so eagerly. It only took Max a second's thought to imagine why, though.
"Goon, I'm fine," Max said. She rubbed her eyes and forced him to drop the act with a glare. Her tail flicked around behind her to wave off excess frustration. "It's not like I'm gonna flip that easily." She crossed her arms as a hint of doubt crept in to her expression. That was a pretty brave claim considering she didn't even know how she'd blacked out this time. "D-did I? What happened?"
Goon started squirming in his seat, claws reaching to the back of his neck while he said, "Oh, well, it wasn't anything big. Just a little-"
"Goon threw you into the spring," Cori said, crossing their arms. Goon's eyes shot to them as if he was about to snap at them. If he wanted to deny the allegations, it was already too late.
He seemed to recognize that, flinching back from his ill-advised display. It looked like a kid that realized they'd just incriminated themself. Max might've thought it was cute if she wasn't so confused. "Look, I didn't know, sorry," Goon grumbled. "I've seen you swim before, so I figured you just didn't know." That confirmed it was intentional, at least.
She was still plenty confused, but she still managed a breath of relief. He was talking to her like normal again. "Well, I did technically drown since then," she said, failing to hide her embarrassment behind snark thanks to the little sparks bouncing from then. She flicked a thumb Cori's way. "They yanked me out, resuscitated me, I shocked the hell out of them, and that's how we met."
Cori glanced away the more she explained, but Goon started shaking his head with a growing grin. After a bit of thought, he nodded. "Yeah, that's about how I'd expect you to meet someone," he said. He leaned back to stretch after a chuckle. "Beats our first impression, at least."
It was Max's turn to be horrified—how bad was their first meeting?—but Goon didn't let them dwell on it. "But that's for another time," he hummed, taunting her with a smirk. Worse, he was right. They did have more important business to attend to. He brought this up for the express purpose of torturing her. "Plan for tomorrow, then?"
Max wondered if she'd ever have friends that didn't enjoy making her suffer. Maybe Sam.
"You never wanted anything
Well, are we over?
Tell me again
No matter what our hearts will bring"
Max jerked up in her pile of hay, heart racing while her paw clutched her chest. Breath fled from her lungs while she tried desperately to pull it in at the speed of her racing heart. Even though it had at least mostly healed by now, she felt an ache in that particular spot in her chest. The one mere inches away from killing her.
Her paw trembled while she forced it to let go. Clenching it so tight, already she could feel the creeping dread that it had petrified. She tried to keep a close vigil at her hindpaws, but it was too dark to see more than their shape. Luckily, they were trembling just as severely as the rest of her. They could still move. She could still move. She was still flesh and blood.
She looked around the dark hut she'd called home for so long. This was one of her last nights sleeping here. At least, trying to. She let out a whimper and flopped back down to the hay, trying to curl up and sleep again.
Just like every night before, though, she felt the empty space behind her clearer than she felt her own paws. Whimpers in the form of feral jabber squeaked out of her. She didn't bother trying to resist. It was probably a cold night, but the house kept her reasonably warm. Despite that, she felt frigid. The empty air around her sunk its frozen claws into her fur to rake out sobs.
Why didn't she ask Goon or Cori to stay with her?
"It's over, it's over, I think!
Remember counting all the things"
When she felt her eyes heavier than the Earth and a throat drier than the sun, Max knew that she'd fallen asleep (by a miracle, or a curse). If any tiredness left, exhaustion came to take its place. It was either a restless sleep, or a short one. She didn't particularly care which. The white that seared her vision when she took a peek suggested the former, though.
She wanted to roll over and go back to sleep, but trying only woke her up more. It was to be one of those days, then. She hadn't felt this awful since waking up from the two day slumber after drowning. She was one splitting headache short of a hangover.
Someone said her name. She barely made out the sound or the voice, only realizing she'd heard it after she felt her ear twitch. Her eyes half opened to see a splotch of orange in the void of white.
Orange. She forced her eyes open and dragged herself up to a sitting position. Even that change in orientation was enough to make her lightheaded. The sleep took a lot of rubbing out of her eyes before she could make out any more than the vague suggestion of orange, and the blinding brightness of the white all around made it even harder. She had to get up now, though—it was back! Eleos was back!
Once she managed to barely stand, though, her vision cleared enough to see more than the charmander's shape (just in time for standing to black it out again). In that one instant, though, she'd memorized the sight.
The eyes were an almost eerily pure blue. She froze. She recognized them. She recognized those eyes. She recognized that face. She recognized this charmander. It wasn't who she thought it was, but she knew she recognized them from somewhere.
Her paws came back up to rub away whatever hallucination was in her eyes, but it persisted. Even her vague memories were plenty to draw from for just how he looked. If she had more faculties, she might have questioned the familiar white void surrounding them, but her eyes were already blurring from a different source.
"Ithos!" Max screamed, throwing herself at him in a tackle that threatened her chest's recovery. She didn't care, though, digging her face into Ithos' chest while squeezing him hard enough to make sure he couldn't get away. "Sorry, I'm so sorry!" She couldn't possibly care about slipping in that very moment, nor could she have stopped if she tried. "I fucked up, ruined it! I was a dick and worthless and an asshole and I-"
"Max!" Ithos shouted, shaking her a little. His voice sounded… more familiar than he looked. More recent. "It's all right, okay?" She'd heard this voice recently. Her heart dropped while she remembered her fight with Jake. "C'mon, worthless?"
Ithos chuckled; she'd said that in feral. There was an Ithos that could understand pika-speak, but she still wasn't sure any of that was real.
"I thought I told you to stop saying that."
There was no denying it. He sounded exactly like Mew. He wasn't even trying to hide it.
"Really?" Max growled. Rage pumped through her veins. She shook all the way to her core. "I don't know what's more insulting." She forcibly shoved him down to push herself up. "That you tried this, or that you actually thought I'd fall for it."
'Ithos' looked up at her with confusion that turned to panic when she shot the calling charge to the sky. The lightning bolt crashed back down to her, but a bubble contained her and it before it hit the intended target. The bubble shot her own lightning back into her in a circuit out of her control. The entire time, she stared at the impostor with a cold, dead stare.
Mew stared back at her in silent disbelief, though he didn't drop the disguise. "Max," he whispered before shaking his head and holding it in his paws. "You actually think… Mother of Creation." Max considered mocking him for technically swearing to himself again, but she was too angry.
Mew tilted his head back with his eyes closed to pull in a deep breath. "Okay. Whatever," he grumbled alongside a long, loud sigh. He looked at her again, this time with a half-lidded stare. "What did Goon tell you?"
"Wouldn't you like to know," Max growled with a sneer. Mew stared at her with even deeper frustration that made her question what holding this information back even accomplished. She didn't sacrifice her righteous fury to be embarrassed, though. "He told me exactly what happened. Ithos was there, then you were there, then you left." She crossed her arms to try and look certain again. "You took him."
Mew held his head in his paws again, the flame on his tail searing a bit brighter. "You two are such idiots," he grumbled; Max felt a chill go down her spine. "Okay. Let me just prove this to you." By the time Max tried to ask what he meant, Mew had his paw on her forehead.
His lungs were about to collapse from laughing, and the pikachu staring indignantly at him didn't help. "Y-you can't be serious!" Ithos cackled. "A pichu, sure, but how do you not know how to control that yet?" One paw held his belly while the other wiped a tear from his eye. The pikachu yelped as more sparks started spewing out, and Ithos started laughing even harder.
The pikachu kept screaming, though, far past the point that anyone would take a joke. He was serious. He actually thought he was in danger.
Ithos took a few breaths to force himself calm and said, "Look, you're okay." He reached over to rest a paw on the pikachu's shoulder when a stray spark shot through every nerve in his arm. Every muscle spasmed, and he realized that maybe Pikachu's fears were a bit more justified than he thought. "Heck!"
"Sorry!" Pikachu yelped, grabbing his cheeks with his paws. It stopped the shower, but only because they all went right into Pikachu's paws without so much as a wince.
Ithos shook his head in disbelief. "Incredible," he said, barely holding back another chuckle. "How d-"
"Sorry," Pikachu whimpered.
"It's… fine, don't worry," Ithos said. Whatever Pikachu's deal was, he clearly needed some help. "How do you have a charge that strong, yet no idea how to control it?"
Pikachu's eyes shot open before looking away. It looked more like someone getting caught than embarrassment, though. It was probably a mix, because when he started to put his paws down, his cheeks were still sparking. "Well, um," Pikachu mumbled. He kept glancing around them with his eyes lingering on Ithos. In minutes, Ithos clocked that he was absolutely abysmal at hiding that he was hiding something. "Can you… keep a secret for me?"
Ithos gave him another once over, then said, "Yeah, of course." He already had a pretty good idea what 'Pikachu' intended to share, but he'd play along. For the most part, at least. "My name's Ithos, by the way."
Pikachu's cheeks suddenly sparked, though he seemed not to notice this time. "O-oh, right," he mumbled, turning away to scratch at the back of his head. "Mine's…," he trailed off, looking to the sky in thought for a moment until he said, "Right, Max! My name's Max."
"Max?" Ithos asked with a smirk, suspicions all but confirmed. "Odd name for a pikachu."
Ithos reeled back, finding himself heaving on all fours. He—he? No, that wasn't—right, she. She felt her entire mind clapping in on itself with the foreign memory. It made h… her see significantly more forepaws than the two she was used to having. Her throat heaved again, but still felt nothing. A paw tapped her on the back to annihilate all her nausea at once.
She collapsed to the ground. Without her inverting stomach distracting her, she noticed those forepaws of hers were awfully yellow. That was normal, though, right? Ithos had always… no, Ithos didn't have yellow paws. That pikachu did. What was his name?
"Max?" someone above Ithos said. Yeah, that was Ithos' name. Wait, no, Ithos was Ithos' name—but she was almost certain her name was Max. Wait, wasn't Ithos a guy? She… used to think she was a guy. Did that track?
No, it didn't. Not in the slightest. That pikachu Max was also a guy. She had pikachu paws, though, so did that make her Max? Which of them used to be a guy?
A scaled paw grabbed her shoulder to flip her over. Ithos looked down in concern at Ithos. "Max?" Ithos asked Ithos. It didn't make sense, but neither did anything, so it checked out. Ithos held his head in his paw. "Okay, sorry. I probably should've tried something safer."
Ithos squinted her eyes up at him in confusion. She was pretty certain Ithos was a charmander, even though she was clearly a pikachu. The more she thought of it, though, she didn't feel like Ithos. She dug back into her mind and found almost no memory of being Ithos except for the most recent one. "I'm… not Ithos?" probably not Ithos asked.
"… Right," possibly Ithos confirmed with a nod. He even went so far as to answer her next question before she asked, pointing to his chest. "I'm Ithos." He looked down at her expectantly, so she nodded. She wasn't Ithos, he was Ithos… that was important.
That was very important. A bit of her sense was ever so slowly coming back to her, and she was certain that the fact he was Ithos was incredibly important. A small spark spawned a reflective surface between her and Ithos, showing her own face to her. Ithos held it with both paws, peeking around it to explain, "and you're Max."
Max, she was Max. The fact clicked in her head and brought about a lurch in her own mind as disorienting as the one that came from the memory. It set her head back on straight by spinning it around to screw it back on.
It wasn't very pleasant.
The new memory, though, finally had its proper context. It wasn't her memory—it was a memory Mew had shared with her. Her eyes opened a little wider. Mew had Ithos' memory. Mew was new to this. Mew kept fucking up trying to use his psychic abilities—they both had the same voice. Goon saw Ithos, then he saw Mew—Revelation Mountain!
The last day she'd seen him—he'd taken her to the peak of Revelation Mountain before he'd… okay, that was still too much of a hell of nonsense that she couldn't unpack quite yet. It did, however, confirm what Ithos had been trying for two nights straight to get her to realize.
She felt stupider than she ever had in her life—and that was impressive.
"Sorry!" Max screamed, throwing herself around Ithos despite the stomach churning nausea. When Ithos slammed into the ground, she squeezed him even harder to keep from bouncing off. "Sorry, sorry, sorry! I'm so sorry!" She buried her weeping eyes into his chest, relishing in the familiar sensation of Ithos' body heat evaporating them. "I fucked up, ruined it! I was a dick and worthless and an asshole and an idiot and stupid and I'm so fucking sorry."
This time, Ithos didn't bother interrupting her. Her constricting hold made it a lot harder to recover from the fall, but he wrapped his arms around her when he did, running a paw down the back of her head. "It's okay, Max," he cooed.
Finally hearing his soft voice again, feeling him in her arms, and especially the soft raking of his claws through her fur was almost mind-melting in its amount of relaxation. She found her grip relaxing, much to Ithos' relief, and nuzzled her cheek into his chest while leaning her head back into his paw. Her guilt started fading away with the world around her.
This hold, she recognized it. She'd felt it hundreds of times before. She felt more comfortable in his arms than she felt in her own fur. Her body wasn't the same as it used to be, but the sensation of scales against her fur was identical. His touch alone brought to mind the countless sleepless nights he'd coaxed her into slumber.
"Chaaaaaa," she squeaked in pleasure.
"Max?" Ithos asked. More importantly to Max than the words, though, the scratching stopped. She tilted her head to look up at his half-terrified expression. Almost the same expression she'd seen on Goon.
"Sorry!" Max squeaked, hopping up. She started backing away without noticing, a familiar torrent of excuses racing through her mind. Ithos got up, both paws up in surrender, but he didn't try to stop her. Even though worry had taken its place, Max could still see the dark horror in his eyes.
Right, of course. It couldn't have been him. That… they were different. She didn't know how it was even possible, but it was less painful than imagining the alternative.
It already hurt enough that he was afraid of her.
She started to babble more when Ithos interrupted to whisper, "Hey, don't worry. It's okay." She slowed to a stop, despite a thousand voices demanding she flee to protect him. "I'm not gonna hurt you."
Ithos missed the actual problem to an almost comical degree, but it gave Max just enough of a hold to pull herself back. With exhausting pants, she flopped down. This had to be the most important meeting she'd had in months. Her emotions were flying far too high for her to consistently hold on, which only made the meeting that much more horrifying.
"Wow," Ithos muttered, barely audible at all. Max only heard him because instincts had her on high alert. "I had… I didn't know it was that bad." Max rolled up to sit in a lame attempt to face him at least a little bit more. "I'm sorry." She found her instincts eager to warm up to him.
Still not sure if she could speak, Max quirked her brow and looked up at him in confusion, entirely unable to imagine what he could be sorry for. Ithos looked away, scratching at the back of his neck. After a second, though, he shook his head with a chuckle. "And I called you and Goon idiots," he hummed. He started walking over before catching himself and looking at her to check if he could.
"I mean," Max said, nodding while rubbing her temples. She wished she hadn't grown as a person at all, because then she could've blamed Goon for this. "We certainly were." It finally started to hit her, the full magnitude of her single-minded idiocy.
"Maybe," Ithos said. He dragged her out of that spiral by wrapping an arm around her back. She froze, too afraid to lean in for fear of which side of her wanted to. "But… still." Ithos shook his head again. He tried to force a chuckle, but it didn't make it past his chest. "When you couldn't recognize me, I just…." His voice trailed off while a cloud of guilt hit both of them.
Right as Max started to feel the shame hitting, Ithos pulled her tighter to say, "It wasn't your fault." He looked intensely at her, but she couldn't bring herself to meet his gaze. "You forgot so much. I… I didn't even know it could get this bad."
"Yeah," Max said with a dark chuckle. "I get that a lot." His warmth ran along her back, seeping through her fur and holding her up. His claws lightly tapped at her opposite shoulder. Sitting like this felt so right, so familiar, yet the only time she could remember sitting like this before wasn't even her own memory. Still, a smile started pulling at her cheeks, and a memory started tugging at her mind.
Ithos was smiling, but she saw more behind it. It was genuine, but still hiding something. The way he'd said, 'It's not your fault,' sounded familiar. She could hear the hurt behind it, now, but she couldn't tell if that was her mind playing tricks on her, mixing memories up while they formed.
"Still, Ithos," she said. She grabbed his paw in hers and looked up to him. He flinched back a bit, and she saw the hurt showing beneath the cracks all the more clearly. "I'm sorry."
"No, it's all right, I mean it!" Ithos said. It wasn't remotely believable, even if she couldn't remember him saying the exact same words in the exact same way before. "It's not, y'know, you." He glanced away to hide his cheeks flushing a darker orange, and she caught his pain before he could hide it. "Wouldn't be fair to hold it against you."
"It's still not fair to you," Max said. She shuffled a bit around to face him. When he couldn't help a trepidatious look back at her, it all but confirmed her suspicions. He was looking at her just like he had last time, searching her eyes for recognition. She'd been terrified to think he was looking for that inky black.
Max smiled and put her other paw on his shoulder with an empathetic wince. "I'm sorry," she said. Ithos started to squirm at the sudden spike in desperate sincerity. "I… can't imagine how it felt to have me look at you without recognizing who I was looking at."
Yet, the way he looked at her felt eerily similar to the feeling. She could see what was missing in his eyes as tangibly as what was there, but she couldn't place it. She could only tell it wasn't enough.
Whatever she couldn't see mattered less when he adorably looked away to scratch at the back of his neck, cheeks flushing red. "Well, it's, y'know, all right," Ithos mumbled. Even still, he was trying to put on a brave face for her. "It's not like it's your fault."
"Ithos," Max said. She wasn't sure if she wanted to laugh or scream. "It's hard to get lost in Dungeons for sixteen months on accident."
Ithos' eyes shot open and back to hers. "You were there how long?" he sputtered. He stared into her eyes with horror she recognized. It made her flinch for a moment, but it wasn't her eyes that scared him. "Mother M-" Ithos cut himself off and glanced away, "L-Lugia! How'd you even live that long?"
Max flinched. She could've teased him about almost swearing to himself again, but she had to hide her reaction to that first. "Well, luck, for one," she mumbled, looking nervously up. It turned out, she didn't need to hide her reaction.
Ithos was staring down. His eyes were wide with horror. "Oh," he mumbled. His paw went to his mouth.
Max flicked his snout before his paw could get there. He flinched back in surprised anger, so she yanked him back into a hug. "Don't you dare," she teased, shaking her head. It took him a moment to relax and return her hold. He felt stiff, a bit awkward, and she realized she was probably being much more affectionate than she used to. At least, more affectionate than he remembered.
"You," Max said, unceremoniously escaping his hold to stab an accusatory nubbin between his eyes. "Won't be using an apology to get out of talking about your feelings." She smirked and cocked her head back in victory at his surprise. When he started to chuckle, though, she felt the victory slipping through her nubbins.
"Oh, I'm the one afraid to talk about my feelings?" Ithos chided. Right. He certainly had her beat in that regard.
"I, well, y'know," Max mumbled. She looked down and started to shrink away. That was the whole problem in the first place. Well, the main problem was the complex agony of being treated like a guy by everyone who ever cared about her when even she didn't know that was wrong, but talking would've helped.
Ithos laughed as he yanked her back into a side hug. Max squeaked in surprise that quickly turned to embarrassment. Even wherever this was, she couldn't help slipping into pika-speak.
"I'm proud of you," Ithos said. Max froze. Hearing that was going to overload her brain for the next century at least. "You really made it out." He ran his paw down her back in a familiar pattern as he shook his head. Despite her best efforts, his pets did help calm her down. "I never gave up on you, y'know." He gave her a little squeeze. That sounded familiar.
"I… really had no idea what you were dealing with," he said. The shock was still hitting him. Max was recognizing every word more and more. The letter, but… no. "I always knew you'd make it out the other side." He wilted a little, as did his tail flame. "Just wish I'd been there to see you come back."
He glanced down and to the side, regret in his eyes. When he looked back, he saw that Max had already caught him. The feigned pout made Max giggle, but he didn't resist beyond that.
"I just… wish I could go back," he said.
I always wanted to come back.
The letter. It said it was from him, but she couldn't let herself believe it.
"Why can't you?" Max asked. Ithos frowned while looking pleadingly down at her. Max just smirked back. The diversion wasn't going to stop her from digging out whatever was bothering him. "C'mon, all the effort you put into getting me to open up. You can't do this to me now." She almost started nuzzling up closer to him but caught herself in time. "Tell me what's wrong."
"Max, it's just," Ithos sighed, looking away. "I can't go back to that anymore." He held up his paw to stare at it again with a growing frown. "The whole time, I was mew. I wasn't really a charmander." He flicked his paw out of sight and looked ahead with a bit of disgust.
"This whole time, I've just been," he mumbled. His face twisted the more he tried to finish. "That."
This was starting to sound familiar. This time, though, it wasn't from memories. Max knew almost exactly what he was talking about. She would've chuckled if she didn't know for a fact it'd hurt Ithos if she did.
Instead, she brought a paw to his back and started dragging it down. "I kinda get what you mean," she said. Ithos side eyed her with a smirk that she happily returned. "I'm supposed to be a human, aren't I?" Before he could answer the rhetorical question, she dug her claws into the extra-rough patch under his shoulder blade. She wasn't the only one sensitive to pets. That was a bit comforting.
"In all this time, though, I never felt human," she said. She chuckled a bit and shook her head. "Honestly, I think I was ecstatic to finally wake up as a pikachu that day."
"What?" Ithos asked. The confusion must've been a lot, because he had no trouble getting out of her petting-induced spell. Of course, it probably wasn't quite as effective on him as it was her. "Or, right." He looked apologetically down at her. "I guess you don't remember, but you used to talk about hating it."
Max winced and looked pleadingly up at him. He stared blankly back. Why could he never figure out the things she didn't want to explain?
"Yeah, well, about that," she said. She took a deep breath in. "I realized it was never about species." Ithos tilted his head, but listened attentively. Her eyes traced along the ground. He was paying perfect attention to her, but she wanted to not be visible at the moment. Alas. "Ithos." She looked pleadingly up at him again with an apologetic smile. When he still didn't get it, she flicked her eyes to her tail.
"Oh!" Ithos said, swiftly smacking a paw to his face. He dragged it down his face, as if pulling realization over it. "Ohhh. That makes so much sense, now." Plenty of pieces were all coming back together for him, most of them pieces that Max couldn't remember.
Max took the tail she'd demonstrated with and plopped down on her belly to hide her face under it. Humiliating. It made sense to everyone else first. At least Ithos hadn't figured it out before her.
"I'm really sorry," Ithos whispered. He pat his paw on her back, rubbing it back and forth enough to get her attention but not quite enough to immobilize her with pets. "That must've been awful." It was. She could feel him wincing in sympathetic pain above her as he shook his head. "It honestly hurt watching you struggle with something for so long while having no idea what was wrong."
For a moment, she could remember herself in his arms. That impossible life she'd 'dreamt' the night Eleos left. In that moment, she heard the past and present Ithos speak in unison.
"I couldn't bear to see you hurt like that."
It was perfect. It kept lining up all too well. She didn't understand it. She kept telling herself it was impossible because she didn't want to deal with the pain if it was real.
"Yeah," Max mumbled. She brought her right paw to scratch at her left arm and kept her eyes firmly focused on the intricate process. "It wasn't great for me either." The forced chuckle didn't do the mood any favors. Yet, when she felt Ithos' paw at her back again, she found exactly what she needed to say in his touch. She shook her head. "Yep. You're still you," she chuckled.
She looked up at him to smile. "Nothing would stop you from caring about someone else, would it?" she asked. Her smile spread a bit thin, but she forced herself to keep his eyes in hers. "God knows I tried." Ithos nodded along with what she was saying, but he looked confused by the jump.
"Look at me," she said, placing a paw on his chest. He was already looking at her, but she hoped he knew she meant it metaphorically. She didn't exactly like being looked at, but— "What do you see?"
"What?" Ithos asked. He might not be quite as absentminded as her. He had more trouble keeping up. "I see you." He chuckled a bit. "You're a pikachu." Max wanted to die a little bit when he looked her over (why did transition have to take time?). "Torn tail, ear." He squinted at the ear a second before shaking his head and smiling with a shrug. "You're a girl pikachu." He smirked a bit. "A chubby one."
"Kaaa," Max groaned, rolling her eyes. If only. She still hadn't gained all her weight back from the hospital. Still, he'd already switched to calling her a girl despite the fact she certainly didn't look like one yet.
Not the point. She shook her head and brought focus back to the point she was making.
"Yeah, that's what you see," she said. When she looked into his eyes this time, her cheeks started sparking, so she glanced down at her own paw. "But, y'know. It's not how I was born." She turned her paw over and squeezed it with a smile. "I used to be a human guy, didn't I?" She looked up and saw him about to try and correct her about that. Still so careful. "Is that what I've 'really been' this whole time?"
"What?! Er, no!" Ithos sputtered out. His cheeks flashed red, and he slapped his paw to his mouth. "I-I'm really sorry, Max, that's not what I meant!" He turned to rub her shoulder in a flaccid attempt at comfort with an even less effective smile. "You're, y'know, you! I was talking about me."
Max chuckled, shaking her head. It sounded familiar, of course. They'd had a conversation like this in front of that spring.
"Why's it any different saying it about yourself than it is about me?" she asked. Ithos opened his mouth for an answer that never came, then looked away. Max reached up to grab his shoulder like he'd grabbed hers. "You should be true to yourself, all right?" He squirmed as his nerves shriveled up and revealed the struggling self image that lie beneath. "Whatever that means. You should be you."
Ithos turned his head away with his mouth twisted down while he tried to think of some rebuttal. Max could see him trying to think of some loophole that would let him discredit his feelings without doing the same to hers. He was coming up empty, though, and that made her smile.
"Well, y'know," Ithos mumbled. "I'm… I can't just ignore my station, y'know." He didn't even bother trying to look at her while he lied. "I've got, y'know, Mew stuff to do."
Max giggled at him, and he deflated into a pout. He was so cute. A shame he sucked at lying.
It wasn't long, though, before he gave up on the failed deception. He let out a sigh while Max loosened her hold on her giggles. It was even funnier seeing him deflate into a pout like that. Somehow, it seemed like her laughs were helping his mood rather than worsening it. Eventually, he even chuckled a bit himself.
"Yep," Ithos said. He reached his left arm out and pulled her into a side hug, turning her giggles into a surprised squeak. "You're still you, too." Max panicked. The giggles were probably too much. Did he think she was making fun of—
"I meant that as a good thing," he laughed.
Max practically melted on the spot from relief. She shook her head as she planted it into her paws with a thin smile. "I didn't realize I had any good qualities before," she said.
"Of course you did," Ithos said, rolling his eyes. He didn't seem to recognize that her joking tone was a front, but she couldn't blame him for that. He pulled her a bit harder into his side with the hug, and she found her body conforming to the touch. "It never mattered what we were talking about." He rubbed her side and pat three times before releasing her far too soon.
"You always knew how to make me laugh about it," he said. Max looked up at him with a nervous smile. She wanted to believe him, but it was hard when all she knew about her past was the suffering she put others through. Yet, just by smiling down at her, Ithos erased the doubt from her mind.
"Thanks," Max said, nearly whispered. God, was she really gonna be this emotional all the time, now? "I didn't know I was anything but a problem before talking to you and Goon."
"Oh, right, Goon!" Ithos said. He started beaming down at her. "You actually went to see them, thanks!" Max tried to smile and just hoped he wouldn't ask her how it went. "How'd that go?" She was never hoping for anything ever again.
"Um," Max mumbled. A mixed bag would've been an understatement. Just her mix of a wince and a weak smile were enough to give Ithos a sufficient answer.
Ithos chuckled, tapping her back with a paw while he shook his head in amused disbelief. "Well," he hummed. His paw started running down her back, finding exactly the spots she needed scratched faster than even Eleos could. "I guess we've got a lot of catching up to do." Max nearly jumped up, turning to face him, checking if this was some kind of trick. "Sound good to you?" It did sound good to her.
For the third time, Max threw herself into a violent hug strangling his chest.