johto isn't kanto, and that's the only reason why this chase has gone on for this long.

through the thick of the crowd he barges through, leading with his shoulder as he looks to part the sea. his hat shields the glaring sun from his eyes as his figure casts his shadow along the stone pavements of goldenrod. the salty musk of the ocean is prominent throughout the city; each breath feels like he's inhaling sea salt.

the conditions aren't optimal but he won't let it deter him. not when he's this close.

she remains in his line of sight even when she makes a sharp turn into a hotel, through the grand revolving doors. he's quick to follow into unknown territories. could this be the mistake that decides the outcome?

he has no time to think as he breathes, slowing down to catch his breath as he scans the vicinity. he immediately looks to the receptionist and notices their frantic eyeline. he follows it deeper into the heart of the hotel.

"stay sharp, galahad. we can't lose her again." 

we won't.

they find themselves in one of the vast hallways on one of the many floors. she can't have gone too far. "find her, please. i'll be good, but you stay safe now." a nod reaffirms his words. gallade starts his TELEPORT.

mason remains alert as his hand lingers over the pokeballs aligned on his belt. the usual clicking of his boots is masked by the thick of the carpet. vigilant as always, he makes his way through the hotel.

i'll be good, but you stay safe now.

the voice alone fills the gaudy hallway air, traveling along its length to reach aya at the other end. she's stopped, her body pressed against the cool wall with the hopes of blending into its fabric altogether. curiosity allows her a moment to steal a look around the corner, eyes finding her pursuer speaking to his gallade.

that stupid fucking cowboy hat. she's seen it once before. twice before, thrice before. the persistence irritates her and she slips further down the adjacent hallway.

the hotel proves to be nothing more than a cage within a cage; she reaches a stairwell and regretfully travels upward. further into the heart of captivity, all without guidance from above in the form of her lover. "giulio? giulio?" it's a frantic plea but she knows no response will come in her hour of need. instead, she is met with a curious employee in the stairwell. "d-don't speak, got it?" he nods. Good.

with cowboy on the floor below her, artemis feels the smallest bit of relief as her feet carry her into a brisk gallop down the hall. "if i can just, just get to the other side of this floor and go back down and leave. get out of this nightm -"

gallade makes itself known in a blink of an eye. the savage beast will go no further.

"isla, please! attack!" fingers fumble across the pokeball and artemis summons vespiquen. the queen guards her subject with ferocity, a swarm of bees escaping her hive-like skirt in the form of an attack order. she won't be stopped here; if it comes to fighting, then so be it.

their minds are linked, interwoven into one single entity: he hears what gallade hears, he sees what gallade sees. this is what makes them such a powerful team. it's their connection, unbreakable and unyielding, that makes them feared: the cowboy and his psychic-type.

he stops when gallade stops.

with only seconds to react, gallade doesn't counter the ATTACK ORDER, instead he prepares himself for it and allows the bees to swarm him. their stingers attempt to dig into his skin that's tougher than usual; years of battle has made it so. 

in a blink of an eye, gallade retaliates: a swift PSYCHO CUT cuts through the swarm of bees as psychic energy ripples across, intending to slice into the body of vespiquen. but it's only meant to serve as a distraction as gallade shifts on his feet, moving forward to attempt an AERIAL ACE across the bug-type's body.

while the battle commences, mason is quick to find the stairwell that leads up. he hears the battle and curses under his breath, urging himself to move faster because this is a battle he knows he can't afford to lose. not again.

through the door he bursts, just in time to see the end gallade's attack. "it's time to stop running." there's a stumble in his breathing but he corrects it immediately. his hand hovers by the gun holstered around his belt.

"you're under arrest, artemis."

bees swarm her vision as they attempt to subdue the gallade. it is strong; stronger than isla, its sleek but strong body overcoming the stings and diving in on the vespiquen with an aerial ace. more bees swarm their queen, her orders coming out quickly enough to issue a defend order to soften the super effective blow. her underlings attempt to protect her, but it is the queen herself who attempts to push the gallade back with an air slash that she sends rippling down the hallway.

it is not enough. aya knows he's here. it's never enough.

both directions are sealed off: one by gallade, the other by the cowboy. she turns her back on gallade and is met with a gun in her face. artemis...

the pseudonym reminds her how fake all of this is, how aya marlow would never even be here. she wouldn't be running.

but artemis is the one who is here, and she has no choice. her left hand goes up in surrender. "oh? was one of these yours? you want your pokemon back? fine...i think i have it here somewhere..." sarcasm coats her words while the right hand hovers over her waist belt where the stolen pokeballs hang as isla backs toward her ever so slowly.

the beast is trapped, cornered into her most ferocious state as she stands across from the hunter.

underhandedly, artemis tosses the pokeball toward mason. "belinda! isla!"

in one transient moment, the pokeball erupts to unleash her girafarig and attempt to disable the gun's loading mechanism or bat it out of the pursuer's hand with a psychic. artemis ducks, her vespiquen rising over her to unleash another defend order and another air slash in a circle around her. both hotel room doors beside her burst open while the remaining air slices down the hallway in both directions to attempt to push back the gallade and mason once again.

the chaos gives the trio enough time to duck into one of the rooms. its a standard room: another corner. another air slash bursts the windows that look over the street below.

the playing ground will never be level, not when he has to operate under rules and regulations that hinder his chances of being victorious. that's the one difference that makes it so rocket are that powerful: the league won't compromise their values, they won't stoop that low.

despite the gun he has pointed at her, finger by the side of the trigger, she has the high ground simply because of one thing: he won't and can't shoot her.

and she knows it.

"if you don't mind." 

he sees her hand hovering over her belt and he does the same, ready to retaliate because he knows she won't go down without a fight. predators when hunted, when pushed into a corner, will fight back with an intensity that's driven by their fear of dying. of losing.

a flash of white appears before he feels the gun being ripped away from him, tossed aside onto the ground somewhere. the vespiqueen rises for a DEFEND ORDER and an AIR SLASH that's targeted around the room, intending to cause chaos.

another flash of white summons his guard: his blissey tanks the attack for him as she stands mostly unhurt. gallade manages to bring his arms up in time but it's not enough to stop the impact from sending him back into a wall. it buys the trio enough time to slip into a room.

no orders needed to be said.

blissey's HEAL PULSE makes sure gallade remains healthy as he storms into the room. it only takes mason three seconds to catch up just in time to see the window breaking.

"stop!" 

his voice halts gallade in his tracks, stopping his attack. mason raises both hands up in a display of submission. he takes one step forward.

"let's all calm down here for a moment. surely jumping out the window isn't the best plan of action." his eyes narrow but only out of caution. "i suggest we sit down and talk it out. like adults." 

there's not enough time: her feet feel rooted to ground at the sound of the pursuer's command.

jumping out of the window surely is the best plan of action, but artemis stays her hand. truthfully, she isn't sure which faction she fears more. which consequences she'd rather not face.

"like adults?" her voice is bemused but curiosity leaks into it. "fine. fine." she means to shut him up with the agreement; the noise dies down for the first time in a few minutes, and her ears desperately tune in to the earpiece that is hidden in her left ear canal. still static.

she lowers herself onto the bed that fills most of the studio-style hotel room -- even high-end hotels cheap out on layouts. isla and belinda hover behind their mistress protectively, the slightest change of the wind capable of provoking the vespiquen into another defend order.

she, too, stays her hand. somewhere inside, aya knows the league is fair. it's why she sits so casually, even with her life seemingly at stake as her eyes search his person for the gun once again. artemis knows it won't go off, and so she leans back on her hands as they hold her body erect. one slowly and predictably reaches to one of the two stolen pokeballs on her waist and sets it on the bed next to her, making it the cowboy's to retrieve. the action is deliberate so as to protect her life from any sudden reactions.

"what do you want me to say? sorry? that it won't happen again?"

static still fills her ear. she wonders if they can hear her but can't or won't respond.

if an apology could make it all go away, she'd grovel at his feet and cry until her tears ran dry. life just doesn't work that way anymore.

the air calms but tension still lingers between them, not willing to dissipate as caution wills against it. the wind howls through the exposed window, riffling through his ranger attire as he takes another step forward. his eyes follow her as she sits on the edge of the bed. he doesn't give her a chance; his stare never strays.

"i'd like an apology, please." 

he's not joking.

her casualness is reflected in her posture, in her tone of voice, in how she sits so relaxed on the bed. it's as if she knows she'll come out of this situation unscathed because the league won't tolerate for anything else. perhaps she knows he's too anal to compromise the morals the league is known for upholding.

he breaks his stare for the pokeball next to her. "and that belongs to me, so i'd like it back. if you don't mind." he steps closer but is always mindful of her. he reaches out for the single pokeball on the bed.

gallade and blissey both tense up, anticipating a fight because maybe they know better than to trust a rocket. mason is an optimist and a believer; he wants to believe that rocket can be good, that not all of them are bad.

he puts his faith in artemis.

"you're under arrest, artemis."

a gentleness about the cowboy's actions almost comforts aya. it almost makes her want to throw up her wrists for free detainment, almost enough to give up free life with rocket for imprisonment -- or worse.

almost.

her eyes follow his hand as it reaches for the pokeball as if it sits on a hot stove, but she makes no attempt to stop him. the pokemon itself holds little importance to aya, especially in comparison to her freedom. while his hand retracts with the goods in hand, she can't even remember what pokemon it is.

how does she put her life on the line for a pokemon whose identity she cannot even recall?

the apology he demands is still absent nearly thrown into the wind for the sake of being difficult. "there are a lot of things that i'm sorry about. a lot of things." her posture shifts from laid back to hunched over, a subconscious way of closing herself off. "but what i do keeps me in their good graces. rocket isn't nice, and i know you think you know that they're not nice, but you really have no idea." the mask remains fastened tightly as her head hangs, keeping artemis' identity in tact.

it is aya speaking, however. her eyes rise up and meet his as he remains where he has been since the beginning of their encounter in this room.

"this keeps me alive. so i can't apologize." she means to say it keeps her from being killed.

the promise of arrest passes through her ears but she does not accept it. more words spill out of her mouth to prolong the process. "i've never admitted that. and i know you don't care because i'm street trash these days."

the moment his fingers connect with the pokeball laid on the bed, a connection is formed: more than what's present on the surface, more than their simple cat-and-mouse relationship that's spanned the course of a few months or more.

what's the saying: relationships are built on trust? it applies to theirs. he trusted her enough to reach for his pokeball, and she trusted him enough to not arrest her on the spot.

there's a mask on her face but he looks past it. "who says i don't care?" it's another one of his weaknesses; his flaw that's so easily exploitable and yet he shows it to her. he reveals his hand and there's nothing up his sleeve that can save him.

"you're right. i don't know how bad rocket truly are, and i'm afraid to find out. but you're wrong when you say you're street trash." he's not sure why he's defending her. "i do care. i care enough not to have shot you back there because i could've. you know i could've. but i didn't." 

with a sigh, he holsters the pokeball back onto his belt and adjusts his hat. "thank you for your candor." he crosses his arms over his chest as he speaks. "but you can help me now. help us both." he lets his words hang in the air for moments.

"you gotta' tell me everything you know about rocket. i need to know what i'm up against in order to take 'em down."

who says i don't care?

with his pokemon returned, aya has nothing left to hold over him. trapped and without half her bounty, the cowboy still relinquishes all the power to her. his authenticity so harshly contrasts rocket's ingenuity that it confuses her and leaves her mouth agape. for a moment, she is speechless, bound to her current life only because nothing can change it. to hear that she isn't street trash makes her feel like the girl from nimbasa city, the one who was going to have everything, just for a moment.

even if it is followed by words of shooting her. her head nods in acknowledgement but her mouth still searches for the response she desperately needs to come up with. her reason to defend rocket, to break free of his imprisonment -- perhaps the words do not come because she does not want them to come.

"but why? why give a shit about what becomes of me?" he's roped her in, at least for now, with the cowboy-lasso-charm. her posture shifts again, more upright as they continue to look at one another. eye contact does not break, even in the pauses. it's a sign of the trust they've built between one another in the last ten minutes: a trust she hasn't experienced in years.

"kanto stands no chance. rocket will bring it to its knees...but it is never going to be enough. they have their sights on so much more...so much more..." again the silence lingers between them, their pokemon still alert and on edge. aya feels herself backing away from that edge while the cowboy talks her down.

the cowboy.

"i've been calling you the cowboy for months now. do you have a name?" she implores him with a saccharine tone he hasn't experienced from her before.

she doesn't even noticed that the static in her ear has stopped.

why?

"because maybe you're not as a bad as you think. call me old-fashioned, but i'm a believer." an optimist. while his words might seem like they are chosen with expertise and gravitas, he speaks from his heart as he always does. "people are capable of doing bad things but it doesn't mean they're bad people. they're just misguided, misinformed." 

a pause.

"perhaps lost." 

his final words are meant to garner a reaction from her because that's what he thinks she is: lost and without a place to call home. so she follows the only thing that she can truly consider family, even if it is a dysfunctional one.

her words on kanto makes his blood run cold. he's not unaware to it: the reports from kanto's league has told him that much. kanto is falling, will fall, and there's nothing anyone can do about it. but he'll be damned if he doesn't try. it's where he's headed next after this little excursion.

'the cowboy' draws a chuckle from him. "i do." but the cowboy does have a nice ring to it. he pauses for a moment to think it over but decides that trust is a two-way street. "mason." 

trust must be given and earned. "and you?" it can't be artemis, or at least he hopes it isn't. what parents name their child artemis?

her words on kanto pull him away from the moment. he allows her ample amount of time to speak before continuing.

"kanto might not stand a chance but we'll try our best. we have to. i just hope i won't see you there."

"so noble...like a comic book hero." there's some sarcasm in her words, but jest mostly shines through from a rather delighted aya. relatively delighted, at least. as delighted as a soon-to-be prisoner can be.

her initial response comes before he finishes speaking.

perhaps lost.

the accusation jabs her swiftly and precisely -- aya is winded as she finally breaks eye contact. doing so is an obvious concession to the validity of the comment, but she never would deny it in the first place. she is lost. lost in a sea of faces. a sea of masks that hide true identities and intentions. her mouth opens, its hinge refusing to shut until words come out.

"...temis? artemis? we have your location. sorry baby, lost your signal for a while. is everything okay? rendez vous in --"

a hand goes up to scratch her ear, its motion natural in the moment of discomfort. she shuts giulio off. the old artemis can't come to the phone -- she's dead.

"mason...yeah, okay." the name fits his face, and she knows she won't forget either as she studies it through the slits of her mask. reciprocity requires that she provide her own name.

"aya." it nearly brings a smile to her face, to say it. she never says it with artemis' mask on. she rarely says it at all, these days.

his words stink of a determination she doesn't recognize in herself. kanto is a lost cause, and she has no intention of stepping foot in it, maybe ever. "i hope we don't cross paths like this again."

they speak as if they both know she has no intention of being detained today, even as her body remains planted to the edge of the hotel bed in its most vulnerable state.

aya. for some reason, it's a fitting name for the girl hiding behind a mask -- the girl that hides behind her walls she's spent years building because she's scared of not belonging anywhere else. all he can do, all he can hope for, is to be the ladder that helps her escape.

"it's a pleasure, aya." 

artemis, aya, her name doesn't matter in the moment as he ponders on his options. both of them know she's making it out of here but his strong sense of loyalty cannot be broken. it cannot even be compromised, not even for a second. so he sighs his frustrations.

"i hope so, too." but something tells him they will. call it a gut feeling. 

he reaches down towards his belt for the standard league handcuffs. duty before all else -- that's what he signed up for and that's the crest he carries. so he must abide to it.

he looks at her with a hint of dismay in his eyes. "i still have to bring you in. but i'll make sure you're safe and taken care of, alright? you need to work with me here, aya." he flashes her the handcuffs but doesn't make a move to slip it around her wrists yet.

don't stop her.

he tells gallade and gallade tells blissey. there is ambiguity in the situation because no words leave his mouth. so he is technically not in the wrong.

his eyes shift to the broken window -- brief, fleeting, before coming back to her.