Then he heard the keys jingling and the steps in the hall. Oh, he could make this a game, couldn't he? Sixteen disappeared into the shadows, but bent the reality of the apartment, and when Michael opened the door, he was in some old lady's apartment. Twelve cats, shitty lighting, potpourri and lace and doilies, and china sets and dolls, a little old lady watching whatever the fuck black and white bullshit on tv in her tattered shitty recliner. Sixteen chuckled a bit.

Michael looked so confused for a hot minute as he double checked to make sure it was his apartment. The numbers matched up, and his keys had worked. Again Sixteen chuckled to himself a bit, making the old woman ask if it was her husband, finally home from the war. Alright, now that was the turning point and Michael told him to knock it off. So he dropped the illusion and there the ex-project sat, the middle of the dining table, his legs crossed, his trashy music playing from his headphones, a wicked grin on his face.

At least it settles introductions. Jacki closes her eyes. Huffs. Starts again.

“I’m not really sure how to go about this, Stern, so I’ll let you figure it out.” She folds her arms. Tilts her head. “My father is dead. I am here to plead guilty to his murder.”

Everyone looks after their own, and there are two affiliations entangled enough in the potentiality of a crime committed to create a vested interest⁠. If she dies in this party’s custody, the chances of the paperwork being accessible under a Freedom of Information Act is significantly higher. Jacki imagines some patented Rosenbach silence and a dead chief of police missing a corpse will buy herself some time to think.

may 14, 2021 - Jack’s never been one for pleasantries, particularly when she’s focused.

may 16, 2021 - Freya Kaur. Lycan. Lobos Pack. Something to focus on. That’s all Jacki goddamn needs to know.

may 19, 2021 - Unity, perhaps, of a different breed. (A game of who wore it better.) Something to fucking focus on.

may 30, 2021 - And she’s had enough fucking lies for a lifetime. So she focuses. Back to trying not to fucking think.

jan 6, 2022 - And when a target⁠—the girl detective from the masquerade⁠—is given in the shape of a fucking challenge⁠—

It’s easy enough to work towards. It’s something to fucking focus on.

jan 8, 2022 - When she rises from a something, any something, with little memory predating it besides a request to evade death until it aligned with a schedule, outside of a door she knows to be locked with a sneaking certainty of what lies on the other side and another something in her head screaming to fighthunt⁠kill—

She damn well needs something to fucking focus on, and the memory serves as an adequate enough goalpost.

Roman liked to think of himself as a tough kid. He imagined in that PictureBox inside his head that he was a giant. A hulk packing Machamp muscles with skin as hard as a Metagross. In his mother's arms, he couldn't have felt smaller, however. So tiny. Vulnerable like a warrior without his armor. Yet, so secure in a love he didn't deserve.

"No! Red is TEN!" He was so adamant about it too. "Unless Ten went and developed shapeshifting, yer about three feet too short and five people too light. Red is a goddamn mountain, and yer just a girl!" It still escaped Nix that her NAME was Red. Because how dare. Either he did hit his head that hard, or he was just friggin' stupid. Both were pretty good possibilities.

This thing, Deoxys, it's far too quick on the draw. Too powerful as well. A single strike of the creature's tentacles is enough to render Beheyeem useless and unconscious in the dirt.

He has more Pokemon, another Beheyeem to try and teleport them away, but there's no time to act. Killian's barely fast enough to return the first before Deoxys darkens his world.

"However, if you do deny me, there is the chance that my lordship will not render his support in your cause. Whether or not it because he too, is quite childish, cannot be determined." Yeah, it could, but he had to be careful about offending his own master, let alone the one that stood before him. Two birds one carefully worded stone.

Roman isn't sure whether or not to believe his mother. If he were his dad, he'd hate him, and that's enough in his mind to confirm that Bo does. The energy to voice that isn't with him today. The willpower's lost in a sea of other emotions, buried behind regret and self-hate for the actions he took.

Hoenn couldn't help but ruin the lives of those it touched. The region felt cursed. Offering so much allure but demanding a heavy price.

Stern doesn’t say day, she says what happened the day Jacob Rosenbach died, and Jack’s first impression is that it’s a bit of a stupid fucking question.

She is, however, also of the opinion that Wren Stern is a smart person, and that smart people don’t ask stupid questions unless they’re doing it for smart reasons.

There is an old nursery rhyme that feels like an apt descriptor for the situation at hand: the boat is sinking.

”That isn’t love.”
It’s moving—

—as water rushes into the surface as she stands up—

"Now you're my cub now, so we're going to get you a tutor and see you educated and make sure you can do this job with me. You're not going to be soft on the other humans, are you?" He needed Mike to be tough, and he'd teach the boy everything he knew.

For the first time that whole time since he had come back, Ame actually looked hurt. Not mad, not upset, just... Hurt.

"You left me behind. And now you are so eager to fight for me? How many years has it been?" Too many as far as Ame was concerned. "You want me to forgive you? Knowing that you could've come back... You could have shown me that you were still..." Ame gripped his sword a little tighter. "And then you let that woman come for me instead of yourself like you should have." Ame pulled his sword from its sheath and pointed it straight at the man that had once been his general, his best friend. "And now you want to fight for me?" His eyes narrowed. "You don't deserve to!"