The Lumiose City Police Department was a towering block of a building. Odette had been told countless times the structure was hundreds of years old, and it truthfully still looked the part. Same degraded gray bricks and mansard-style roofs bordered with stone druddigons that glared down upon anybody who dared draw near. A huge stone arch surrounded the front double doors, which opened and closed as people arrived and left. She brushed arms with maybe five or six people before actually going inside. She hoped her grandpa wouldn't be too swamped to meet.

As she eyed the enormous LCPD emblem etched into the shiny tiles of the front lobby, she briefly recalled how she used to skip laps around the perimeter of that same emblem when she was younger. She spent some of her time off from school here when her mother was too busy with professor work, and her nana was off coordinating Pokemon contests or coaching some poor soul in them. Bernard would bring her along, and she'd follow him around the office like a baby ducklett, watching him do his police business while he reminded her that the world wasn't always so fine and dandy and why she needed to stay alert and observant.

To make sure she was doubly aware, he'd enroll her in some peewee self-defense classes, the curriculum ranging from saying no to strangers and, if that didn't work, how to break out of bindings or how to disarm an attacker. The classes got more intense as she got older, eventually tapering off into a gun defense class that landed her a permit to handle a concealed firearm. It was only then that she realized the master plan behind him bringing her along to his work as often as he did, and she supposed it made sense. The overprotective cop must ensure his granddaughter is equipped to handle anything nefarious.

At the very least, she could say she wouldn't be able to read the world as well as she did had she not spent so much time here. She owed him that much.

xXx

"Look how big you've gotten!"

"Same ol' braids, huh?"

"Good to see ya, Little Cinq-Mars!"

"You're still so small!"

It was the same thing every time she visited, no matter how long it'd been. Bombardment of greetings from her grandpa's coworkers, human and Pokemon alike. All the "how've you been's" and "you look great's" came one after another as she walked through the lines of desks spread out through the third floor. She couldn't help but notice that some of them still spoke to her like she was six, but she guessed that was just out of habit. She hadn't grown a lot since then, anyway. Nonetheless, she flashed her typical half smile as she waved and engaged in slight small talk as she walked.

As the chief of police, Bernard got his own office at the back of the space. The bulletproof window flashed his full name, and it was fitted with a heavy wood door that he could open and close as he pleased. Such a luxury in a place like this. For now, it stood open, and he was leaning on the door frame.

"What a surprise," he chuckled when she approached. Despite his bright smile and laugh, she could see the sleepiness on his face.

"I'm full of them," Odette said. She didn't bother to wait for a response before going in for a hug, and Bernard didn't hesitate to return it.

"What brings you by here? I figured you'd still be in class at this time," he said when he let her go.

She shrugged. "Maybe I skipped," she said. "Don't arrest me." She brushed past him and sat in one of the leather chairs in front of his desk, throwing her bag and helmet into the empty one next to it. Her eyes then travelled to the corner, where Bernard's trusted arcanine friend, Toulouse, lay curled up, fast asleep. He blew smoke out of his nose every exhale, indicating it was quite a deep sleep. She frowned nonetheless.

"T didn't come to kiss me. I'm sad," she whined.

Bernard watched her with a raised brow before shaking his head and nudging the door shut. "He's dead tired, so I'm letting him rest. The lucky bugger," he said as he trudged back to his seat. He had an abnormal sway in his step, which told her he was certainly on the verge of collapse. He threw himself down into the swivel chair, and a deep yawn escaped him.

"I might be stating the obvious, but you look exhausted. You should go curl up with him."

Bernard began to rub his face, taking special care of his eyes. The bags that had started to form around them were practically screaming at her.

"What gave it away?"

She wanted to say so much but decided to keep her answer simple. "I really had to look you over, but I think it's your gait."

He smiled to himself as he shook his head. "You got me."

Odette flashed her own smile before she dove her hands into her bag again. "I have something that will help, though."

"Seeing that helmet wakes me up enough," Bernard said. "It terrifies me that you're still driving around on that damn bike."

She scoffed to herself. She pulled a plastic bag containing snacks out and dropped it on his desk, hoping the sight of it would deter him from the lecture she knew was coming. He gave her some version of it every time he saw her helmet or even the motorcycle itself. People die on those things every day. I'm not worried about you, I'm worried about other drivers not seeing you. I'll look into helping you get a car instead if that's how you want to get around…

"What's scarier? Me driving a motorcycle or flying around on a Pokemon? The drop is much farther down if I were on a Pokemon, just saying."

"People die from falling off their Pokemon less than they do crashing bikes," Bernard said pointedly.

"Well, thank the gods I've never crashed."

With that, she began to empty the contents from the bag: two bottles of Moomoo milk and a large pack of Oreos. Bernard's face lit up, as expected.

"Can I tempt you not to lecture me with these?"

He was already opening the box. "For now."

They each plucked a cookie from the box. Odette held hers between both hands, prepping to pull it open, and he did the same. They eyed one another, an air of friendly competitiveness starting to fill the office space.

"One," Odette said.

"Two," Bernard counted.

"Three," they said in unison before pulling the stacked cookies apart. They both eyed the pieces with the cream filling still squished against them. Odette frowned when she saw that this particular piece was very stingy on the filling.

"Mine's small," she whined.

"Mine takes up the whole thing," Bernard grinned. He showed the cookie to her, and the filling circle indeed covered it almost entirely to the edge.

"I win." He then bit into it.

Odette slumped against the back of her chair, taking a reluctant bite of hers. "Law enforcement's luck," she grumbled. "I'll get you next time."

"Whatever you say," Bernard said, opening his milk bottle and taking a sip from it. "So, are you going to tell me why you skipped class?"

"I'm sticking it to the man and the establishment of education."

Bernard's brow raised. "Sticking it to the man by leaving school and...visiting a police station?"

Odette finished off her Oreo and leaned to grab another one. "I never said my logic wasn't flawed, Grandpa."

He offered a half smile. "And the real reason?"

"I had an exhibition in battle class today, and my opponent was...bad."

"So you won? That's hardly a reason to skip, then."

She shook her head as she pulled the cookie apart. "No, it wasn't like that." She paused. "I mean, we did win, but when I say bad, I mean...bad bad. Like, you should lock him up downstairs bad."

She didn't remember him being so...threatening in secondary school. Or as insufferable. She knew people changed after graduating, and she supposed changing for the worse was always possible.

Bernard leaned back in his chair, crossing his arms over his chest. The look in his eyes signalled that had caught his interest. "That's mildly concerning coming from you. Why is that?"

She shoved the entire empty half of the cookie in her mouth, deciding to start poking the beartic. She couldn't come out and ask him about what she'd found out, but she could damn well start dropping some lines.

"Well, for starters, his family's in the shiny trade. That alone should get them thrown in prison."

Bernard rolled his eyes and rubbed his left temple. He didn't give away any implication that this information might have bothered him. He was too damn good at acting like nothing was wrong here. "I'm not entirely in disagreement there, Swanna," he huffed. "Unfortunately, that would get me sued."

"Why'd you have to be a law enforcer instead of a lawmaker?" Odette groused.

"Even if I were a lawmaker, I doubt I'd be able to do much," he said. "The ones that have been in office have been trying to get the trade abolished since you were in Vienna's stomach."

She pursed her lips in disdain. Twenty-two years of trying to get that establishment overturned, and nothing? And shiny involvement in the sacrilege crisis was getting swept under the rug? There were pieces here, and she couldn't make them fit.

"Does that not concern you?" she asked.

"Everything in this region concerns me, hun," Bernard said solemnly. "But I'm only one person."

"Right," she relented. "Your focus is on the sacrilege issue right now, anyway."

He sipped lazily from his milk bottle before another yawn sounded from him. "I take it you watched the news this morning."

"And read every article about it before that," she corrected. "When are you supposed to go home and sleep? Nana's going to wig out if you don't."

"Hopefully, right after you leave. We have a little more debriefing, but I'll be home to her before she knows it."

She cautiously began to work at the cap of her own milk bottle, considering how she wanted to piece together her next question. This time, she decided to tread a little closer to bluntness.

"Anything the news isn't telling us?" she asked.

Bernard shot her a knowing yet warning look. "The news knows just as much as I do," he said. "I'll just be reiterating what's been said if you start drilling me. And even if I did know certain profound things that haven't been disclosed yet, who said Icould tell you?"

She frowned. "That hasn't stopped you in the past," she muttered defiantly. "You told me about the new side effects they discovered. And about a few cases before they went public."

"Let's not forget the nuance of those instances, though. I only chose to inform you of things because they were being told to the press not long after," he said sternly, holding up a finger. "Anything else? I have to stay tight-lipped, even to my precious, eager granddaughter."

That was pretty much the expected response. What she'd found was far from little. She supposed it was worth a shot, but a shot that would inevitably miss. Scrubbing files hardly seemed like something they'd want to drop to the press any time soon, no matter the reason.

With a heavy sigh, Bernard bowed his head. "Look, Swanna," he said earnestly. He leaned over the desk, pushing some papers aside and setting down the bottle to fold his hands together. "There's nothing even to say. Anything the press knows is stuff we know, and anything the press doesn't know is stuff we're still determining if it's worth knowing. Which...isn't much," he explained. He then lowered his voice. "But that's about all I have for you."

She'd be impressed with that performance if it didn't royally piss her off. He sat back and began to rub his temple again.

"Why are you so interested in this anyway?"

Odette mimicked his sitting stance. "Because it's you," she said. "You're tired all the time, and you seem stressed." At least that part was true.

His eyes on her softened up a little. In fact, he even smiled again. Feeling a sense of bashfulness coming over her, Odette shrugged her shoulders and averted her gaze off to her left.

"That aside, I wouldn't be surprised if my opponent in class today was getting high with his Pokemon on sacrilege," she shot back, forcing the feeling to pass and keep the conversation going.

The smile flew off Bernard's face, and he held his hands up defensively. "And you didn't start with that why?"

"Well, it's a hunch. Kind of. I saw something."

"What kind of hunch? What did you see?"

She crossed her legs and began to twiddle her thumbs, taking a moment to recall the incident in as much detail as her brain would allow. Dorien's words, his stances, his looks. He spoke in such a dark way. Like he meant everything that came out of his mouth. And how he smiled at her so soullessly, how the light drained from his eyes...everything about it screamed wrong. And that was on him alone.

She couldn't very well tell Bernard she was also deducing that Dorien's involvement in the shiny trade was leading him to sacrilege, but she figured that would be enough for now.

"It was...the way he stared at me when we were battling. And his Pokemon? He had an excadrill partner, and it was too powerful. It took Ange out in an Earthquake. It was so well aimed, it was scary. You can't fucking aim Earthquake like that. There's no magnitude high enough for that kind of control," she explained. "Then, then, then, his conkeldurr-"

"Odette-" Bernard tried to cut her off, but she kept talking.

"He went straight for Ange, and Ange fainted. He wasn't fighting. Went straight for him, drooling. Dorien even said something about having fresh meat, and I didn't even know conkeldurr were fucking carnivores, I just-"

"Odette."

She stopped talking and glanced back at her grandfather. She took notice at the way his demeanor had changed. Eyes slightly narrowed, shoulders somewhat tense, hand on his computer keyboard. He was in his information-gathering mode, it seemed. It made her feel at least a little better that he was listening to her in the slightest, even though he'd cut her off.

"Slow down," he said. "You sound frantic, and we don't think clearly when we're frantic."

Odette exhaled sharply, slowing the gears in her head. "I'm slow. I'm calm."

"I'm going to need a deeper breath than that."

She obliged. He nodded and gestured for her to keep talking. "Alright. Continue."

She was quiet for a moment to consider where to begin from. "You know how psychopaths are? How they can turn off and on?" she asked. "We started talking before class, and everything was fine. But he progressively got more and more off. Then during the battle, it was like an entire mood shift," she explained. She brought her finger up to her braid and began fiddling with it. Her eyes moved to Bernard's wall of plaques, and she began to look them over while she allowed herself to speak.

"Like, something just shut off. His look was different, his voice was different. Different person. There were even points where it felt like he was trying to grate on me. Threaten me."

She stopped talking, only to allow her words to stew in Bernard's brain for a second. When he didn't respond, she finally stared back at him. She was confident in her own show right there, and it seemed to be getting to him.

"It's something I dwelled on a lot on my ride over. I know people are besting move power all the time, so maybe it's nothing but..." she trailed off. "It bothered me a little."

"A little," Bernard said in a breath as he rested his chin in his hand, tapping his fingers against his cheek. It looked like he was truly considering her words, and the next thing she knew, he was logging into his computer.

"What was this person's name?"

She cringed. "Dorien Bonhomme."

Bernard paused. It was quick, but a pause nonetheless. With a short huff, he pursed his lips questioningly. "Dorien? You mean that chemistry boy you were always hanging around with?"

Odette's cringe didn't waver. "Yeah, that's him."

Bernard nodded slowly. "Wondered what happened to him. Now I guess I understand."

She watched him do some typing, clicking through every now and then. She watched as he bobbed his head, muttered to himself, and squinted. She couldn't tell exactly what he was doing, but she had at least an inkling of an idea that he was looking into her concern.

"Hm, well," he said after a few minutes. "What you described does sound peculiar. Enough to warrant some concern in me. However, unless we catch Mr. Bonhomme with sacrilege in his possession, I can't do much with this for the moment. The most I can do is have somebody look into keeping an eye on him. You're free to do that as you wish, as long as you steer clear."

She didn't know why she was expecting a little more to come out of that, but she wasn't sure what else there was there to do. There wasn't much even the LCPD chief of police could do without a photo or video evidence of Dorien snorting sacrilege with his Pokemon pals in the bathroom. She supposed it was enough that Bernard was taking her claim even remotely seriously.

"You still have your gun just in case, right?" he asked.

Odette released a gruff breath. "Locked up under my bed, yeah."

"Well, it's not going to do much there, is it?"

"Considering I have a friend that will bite somebody's head off if I flash him a pecha berry and tell him to, the gun seems sort of redundant."

Bernard flexed his lips, and Odette braced for a different lecture. Not one related to her motorcycle safety, but one related to her Pokemon safety. And this time, she wasn't getting out of it.

"And what will you do if you can't get your pokeball out in time?"

She stared at him with a deadpan expression. "We had the voice activation keys installed on them for that reason."

"And if they malfunction? And you have to reboot the ball? Or, gods forbid, something happens to your Pokemon once they're out? Then what? I'd trust Toulouse in a pickle before anything else, but they train the force to use guns for a reason..."

She waved her hand at him dismissively. "Yeah, yeah."

She then noticed that his expression had grown serious again and wasn't letting up. She reluctantly sipped from her milk, biding her time before she had to speak again.

"If you must know, I'm also keeping it locked up for the safety of my fellow Kalos citizens," she said. She brought the bottle back to her mouth. "I've been flaring up a lot lately," she muttered into the glass.

His response was slow. "Should I be worried? Do we need to look into you going back to therapy?"

She began to bite the rim of the bottle mindlessly. She counted the number of times she'd gotten mad at something in the past twenty-four hours.

There were a couple of little things that happened at rehearsal yesterday, then the street racers. That was the biggest one of the day. Her Pokemon's shenanigans when she got home were another small instance. Then just that morning, she'd missed a light on the way to school and beat her fist on her handlebar so hard that she almost broke her broken handle. Then there was the whole Dorien fiasco. She got really mad there. That would probably go down as the biggest one of the day. Then, she almost lost it on the guy in front of her at the poke center who was insisting the poor nurse didn't heal his Pokemon all the way…

So, a lot. There was a lot. About on the same level as what used to happen before...that thing happening.

"I don't think any therapist has said anything I haven't already heard."

"Well, repetition helps, you know. And meds are off the table..."

That got a scoff out of her. "They were never on the table to begin with, Grandpa. My body's fucked up as it is." A pause. "I'm just fucked up as it is."

She'd always been a quiet, well-behaved kid most of the time. But, when she exploded? The schoolyard fights and tantrums were abundant. It was troubling enough that it scared her mother and grandparents. Doctor visits chalked it up to anger management issues resulting from a certain hormone deficiency-the same hormone that left her so underdeveloped and somehow caused the mutation that left her with red eyes-as the doctors had put it. They put her on medication for a while, but all it did was exacerbate her health problems.

"Honey, don't say that," Bernard sighed sympathetically. "You can't help the things you were born with."

Bernard always did what he could to help keep her under control. She was always fine when she did things she liked, and she'd learned to play off his calm demeanor. That worked out for a while.

"Sure, but we've seen the shit I do when I'm too pressed. You can only pin so much of that on a hormone problem," Odette grumbled.

She remembered her last day of preschool, right before they moved out of Brackish Town. Some asshole kid in her class kicked a wild bidoof for walking off with the playground soccer ball, and she lost it on him for being so cruel. She'd only meant to twist his hand until he cried, but she couldn't control herself. She could still vividly remember how red her vision had gotten, and she snapped his finger in the heat of the moment.

The school wanted her barred from attending future grades, that being the straw that broke the camerupt's back. It didn't matter then because her family was already in the process of moving out to the city.

Nonetheless, she also remembered how hard she cried about it. She had never cried that hard. Ever.

"Which is why I think it helps to talk to somebody, especially after what you've been through. It's helped in the past, has it not?"

Bernard, Marieanne, and Vienna ultimately decided she needed help after the move. That led to years of visiting a psychiatrist every week, and it was that guidance that ultimately led her to take dance and, eventually, singing lessons. Ways to "hone her emotions" as it had been put in the sessions.

Adding to the occasional trainer school, her tantrums faded into virtual obscurity. Once in a blue moon, she'd crack. But she never broke another person's finger again.

"I guess so," she said.

Now that all of her extracurriculars had become a source of stress for her, it seemed her tantrums had returned for old times' sake. Taking up more trainer school was barely helping, and being on the sidelines of a performance was probably only making it worse. All because of that thing. That stupidthing.

It was too much to ask for her to be okay, right?

Maybe Bernard had a point. Maybe therapy would be the move again.

She'd stopped going a few months ago because the thought of spending an hour discussing her feelings was giving her more anxiety than she currently needed to be piled on. She wasn't five anymore; she couldn't be coaxed into talking with snacks and a cool puzzle. Nowadays, she'd rather keep to herself.

She shook her head. "But it's not that bad right now," she said. "I'm just saying. And I'm just playing it safe."

Bernard didn't like that answer. Odette briefly thought he would let it go, but she knew better.

"Are you sure? Is there something else bothering you? I told you if you just wanted to focus on trainer school for now, I would help you out. You didn't have to take that job at the cent-"

She held up a hand to silence him. "It's not like that," she said reassuringly. "I was making a subtle observation, and like a responsible gun owner, I'm dealing with it accordingly. And I'm fine with the way things are."

He sighed deeply. Very deeply. Which told Odette he still wasn't convinced. She wasn't necessarily shocked because the apple never fell far from the tree.

"I'm still worried about you, Swanna," he said. "I know you say you're fine, and it has been over a year since everything happened, but...maybe you could try focusing on something completely new?" he suggested. "If trainer school isn't helping, take time off. Quit your job. Go travel. Have an adventure in another region."

"I'm moving to Alola in three months, so that's checked."

He narrowed his eyes at her. "Not what I meant. But fine." He tapped his fingers against the desk. "Then quit your job and do an internship here. I'll put you and your observational skills to work. You should just get away from performing arts for a while. Focus on something else."

She'd barely had enough time to start considering his words when somebody knocked at the closed door. She instinctively whipped her head around to face it as Bernard yelled, "It's open!"

The door swung open, and one of the younger cops shyly poked his head in.

"Uh, sorry to bother you, chief. It's not urgent, we just need you to come look at something real quick."

Odette exchanged looks with Bernard, and he stood up. "Hold that thought. I'll be back in a second."

"No rush," she said. She watched as they walked out the door, and Bernard pulled the door closed behind him, leaving her to the quietness of the confined space.

Focus on something else, he'd said. Truthfully, he had a point.

Her exposure therapy wasn't doing her any favors. Training school was a temporary fix until she had to get up in front of the class and show off her skills. She'd only gotten away with it today because she was so pissed off at Dorien that she couldn't see straight.

She grabbed a couple more Oreos and tossed one in her mouth, not bothering to break it up into bites. Her eyes darted around the office, taking in all the familiar plaques, pictures, and posters Bernard had hung up all over the grey-blue walls. Pictures of him with his human squad, his Pokemon squad, some awards, and medals.

Her eyes then fell back toward the desk, where he had his horde of family photos out and about for all to see. The one that appeared front and center was a photo of him, cleanly shaven, with no sign of gray in his black head of hair, carrying her as a toddler. She had his police hat on, but it was too big, so it dangled off the side of her head. It was his favorite out of all of them; he gushed about it whenever he could. Those were happier times before she became such a menace.

She stared at it for a while, letting his words run laps around her brain. He'd suggested travelling, but with such a big move happening so soon, there was no point. Quitting her job at the point she was at seemed like a dick move regarding the rest of the cast. But if she was thinking in terms of herself and her own mentality, Bernard was right. Getting away from a performing arts setting would most likely be best, and taking on some mundane internship here didn't seem like a-

Her eyes travelled down to the papers on the desk that Bernard had pushed aside earlier. She straightened her posture to get a better look at them. She noticed a couple of sheets of copy paper, some printouts containing marked-up calendars, and an open envelope with what looked to be...a wax seal?

Her brow furrowed. She peered over her shoulder at the closed door and then the window. The accordion blinds were shut so that nobody could see into the office. She glanced at Toulouse, who had barely moved since she sat down. He was the heaviest sleeping arcanine she'd ever met, and this time, she was thankful for that.

She pursed her lips and stared back at the envelope. The longer she stared at that splotch of pink on the point of the open flap, the more she was positive it was a wax seal. Who the fuck closed their letters with wax seals nowadays? It seemed like such a waste of time.

Nonetheless, when she was positive nobody was headed back, she quietly stood up and grabbed it. With the envelope now in her hands, it was clear that this wasn't just a standard post office envelope. The paper was aged to a fine yellowish tint and felt thicker than most normal paper. She ran her fingers along the edge of it, flipping it over a few times in search of a return address. She was somewhat surprised to find there was none. Just the letter "B" printed in thick cursive on the front.

She eventually examined the seal. It was still intact, with streaks of silver running through the pastel pink hue. The acronym "V.C." was stamped into it. The flap of the letter was already open, so she pushed it up, only to see that the note the envelope housed had been haphazardly folded back inside. Her grandfather had already opened and read it, so she wouldn't be tampering with much if she took a peek.

Once again, she glanced back at the door, pausing to make sure nobody was about to walk in, then at Toulouse. She waited for him to blow another round of smoke out of his nose before pulling the letter out.

Upon unfolding it, she was somewhat shocked to find that the note wasn't written in elegant cursive or print. No, it looked like it had been typed out on a typewriter or something. She supposed she was somewhat grateful for that because she couldn't read cursive to save her life.

Bernard,
Your and your men's cooperation has proven most helpful. I have my best people stationed within our prime suspect's circles and have gathered far more insight into Team Enigma's happenings. Keep doing what you are doing with your efforts and the press, and we'll be in touch before the next meeting.
J.L. Ménétries
Virtue Corp.

The longer she stared at the words, the less it made sense. It was such a short note, yet there was so much throwing her for a loop. Cooperation? Suspects?Team Enigma? The press? Virtue Corp?

She read it once, twice, three times, and she still couldn't make it make sense. Certainly, it seemed like this correspondence had been happening for a while. She'd just intercepted a response of some sort, and she was suddenly dying to see what her grandfather had said in the first place. Hell, what if he was in the middle of writing back to this one? She stood up again and began digging through the pile of papers on the desk. Her search was fruitless, and she slammed herself back into the chair again.

She cringed at the sound it made, and her gaze moved back to Toulouse. He whined in his sleep and slumped over onto his side, and that was that. She exhaled in relief.

This was information she didn't know she needed or even wanted. It was raising more questions than answers.

Before she could even think twice about what she was doing, she had her phone out and was snapping a picture of the note.

"Bzzzzzt! Taking pictures of letters? Bzzzzzt!" RotomPhone commented.

"Shhhh!" she shushed harshly, pointing to the sleeping fire dog. "Send to Noel Massé."

"Woops, sorry! Bzzzzzt!" the phone said, mimicking a whisper. "Sending to Noel Massé."

She shoved the phone back into her bag and zipped it up for good measure. She went back to looking over the note, examining each and every letter, and even the paper itself. On the hunt for something else out of the ordinary, something else that would make this even more bizarre.

The sound of the doorknob clicking snapped her back to reality.

She scrambled to get the note back inside the envelope. It was haphazardly placed to start, so she wasn't too worried about making it neat. She practically threw it back toward the area where she found it and shuffled a couple of papers around to make it look as close to how it'd been when she initially spotted it. Her butt was barely back in the chair when the door fully opened. She shoved two more Oreos in her mouth for good measure.

"Yeah, don't worry about it, I'll sign off on that," Bernard said from the door. Odette turned around to see that his hand was on the knob, he had the door open, but his entire body was facing the other direction. She took a couple of quiet breaths, hoping to slow her heartbeat.

Somebody outside the office made a comment, and Bernard laughed to himself. "Good one," he added before turning and nudging the door behind him.

"Sorry," he apologized. "Work stuff, you know?"

She chewed casually, swallowing after a moment. "Hey, I interrupted you today. I don't mind."

He sat back down and picked up a few more cookies for himself. "What was I saying before I left?" he asked. He paused to think, then his eyes lit up momentarily. "Oh, right." He bit into a cookie and chewed it for a beat before swallowing it. "You. Finding something else to do with yourself. Keep your mind busy with other things."

My mind is certainly fucking busy right now, she thought dazedly.

It was there that her backpack started vibrating.

"Bzzzt! Incoming call from Noel Massé!" the RotomPhone said. The material of the bag muffled it.

Odette cursed internally, but she didn't let that anger show.

"Send to voicemail," she said. RotomPhone stopped buzzing after that.

Bernard eyed her thoughtfully. "You don't have to hang up, pretend I'm not even here."

She shook her head almost too hard. "No, it's alright. He knows I'm visiting you."

Once again, the backpack started buzzing again.

"Bzzzt! Incoming call from Noel Massé!"

I'm going to kick his ass, she thought.

Bernard smirked at her. "Well, it seems important enough that he's willing to call anyway."

She rolled her eyes, deciding she needed to act fast.

"Yeah, I told him we would meet for lunch after I got off school and visited you, but he's so goddamn impatient," she said, pushing the exasperated tone. "I'll get out of your hair and go sate him. The faster I leave, the faster you can go home."

She stood. "Send to voicemail," she said again as she shouldered her bag. Bernard stood too, and he went in for the hug first.

"Think about what I said," he told her as they embraced.

"I will," she said, sounding sincere. "You're right. Getting my mind into a different place will be good for me."

That time, he appeared to buy her answer. He let her go, allowing her to grab her helmet. She walked toward the door, turning back for one final wave as she pulled it open.

"Bzzzt! Incoming call from Noel Massé!"

"Bye, Grandpa," she said.

"Bye, Swanna."

She pulled the door shut behind her and had to stop herself from bolting for the elevator.