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YOU'RE ALL THAT I SEE

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[attr="class","freiwantmid"]CHARACTER FACTION team rocket

[attr="class","freiwantmid"]CHARACTER RANK grunt

[attr="class","freiwantmid"]FACE CLAIM yamazaki sousuke from free!

[attr="class","freiwanttop"]ABOUT THE CHARACTER

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the world was against him. fuck them.

[break][break] he made no apologies for how he decided to fix what she broke, no matter how many bridges he burned along the way.

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[break][break] Kris Flynn was a good kid. Honorable, kind, and funny, he was popular for more than the fact that he was the school's soccer star.

[break][break] He was born in the heart of a warm, suburban neighborhood in Unova, way before there any of the dramatics that would later consume it. It was a cool spring day when young Kristopher Flynn-Edwards fought his way into the world, with a mother and father who loved him. That's right, a father. However, that would all change soon enough, when the man formerly known as his "Dad" disappeared into the thick of the night, taking all his belongings with him and all but abandoning Flynn and his mother.

[break][break] Flynn's memories of his father are far and few in between. If asked, the only thing he remembers of the man are him pouring his cereal in the morning, lounging in front of the TV and toe-ing him away when he crawled too close. By the time Flynn (or Kristopher, as he was known back then) turned 5, his father was gone and it was just he and his mother, alone, like the way they would be for the next 17 years.

[break][break] For the most part, Kristopher's childhood passed by breezily with the boy having no awareness for the situation happening around him. He had no idea about how much his mother struggled to keep afloat in the rapidly changing town, no idea of the rumors circulating around Candice Flynn-Edwards for her sudden single mother status. Mistralton City was the second smallest city in Unova, made of small neighboorhood shops and quiet people who had nothing other than to do but gossip. Candice hid it well from her son, working two - and sometimes even three - jobs as she asked her parents to babysit him (because she couldn't afford a sitter) or "borrowing" t-shirts from the lost and found so she could save money and buy him a new set of clothes, or a backpack, for the school year. Even back then, Kris was a happy kid - a good kid. He was popular in his class for nothing more than the fact that he was a friendly face, easy to get along with and handsome to boot.

[break][break] It was only when Kris turned about 8 or 9 (details are fuzzy), he remembers realizing the hardships that his mother went through. He remembered kicking a ball on the playground (he'd loved soccer even back then) when he overheard a discussion between two of his classmates. They were sneering at him, talking badly about his mother. Even Flynn now can't remember the exact details, just that he remembered the words "His mom", "bitch" and "no wonder Kris' dad left". Before he knew it, Kristopher found himself blazing across the field, throwing his very first punch at another kid's jaw and landing himself in the principal's office which would be the first of many, many others.

[break][break] When his mom had to quit her daytime job to go pick her son from school, she was not happy. She was not happy because her Kristopher was better than that. He was better than getting angry and throwing punches. He was smart enough and big enough to use his words, not his fists, when he was upset, and didn't he know that?

[break][break] Of course he knew that. Of course he knew that. He didn't say it, though. Instead stubbornly turning away, while his mom put ice on a bleeding lip. Even his grandmother looked disappointed, standing in the back as his mother's shadow. Rather than apologizing, rather than saying sorry, Kristopher just turned to his mother then, eyes flashing, and asked her, "Where's my Dad?"

[break][break] Needless to say, Candice Flynn-Edwards was stunned into silence.

[break][break] She eventually ended up telling Kristopher the story of his father, only giving vague details after the point of Kristopher's birth. On the topic of him leaving, she just said that he had important things to do but he was a good man. No matter how much Kristopher pushed on other details - on a name, on a face, on anything - Candice didn't budge. Kristopher asked why they had his last name, if he wasn't around anymore, and all Candice said that Mistralton was still an old town. They might have been known for their modern landing strip and daily imports, but the people stayed very much the same. There were still old folks with old rules, and things like changing your name because your husband left you was not so easily an option. It was only after that incident that Kristopher - having always been a little bit more introspective than other kids his age - began keeping an eye on his mother, watching how she rarely slept or rarely ate. How she never got new clothes, unless it was a new uniform for a new part-time job. He noticed how his clothes were sometimes thread-bare, and whenever he got a new hat or new gloves, he would notice they were painfully hand-stitched.

[break][break] He started to spend more time at home, to help around the house and do the dishes and the laundry. At one point, he even learned how to cook. He would make some eggs on a plate for his mother every morning before school, packing both their lunch bags so she didn't have to.

[break][break] When Kristopher entered middle school, he had already decided to forge a new name for himself. Rumors stopped circulating - at least around school - about him and his family, if for nothing than the fact that Kristopher himself was getting more and more popular. He made the school's soccer team in sixth grade, one of the youngest there ever was, and he was well-liked amongst his class. He told everyone to call him "Flynn", his mother's maiden name and not his deadbeat father's. The name caught on quickly enough - Flynn, after all, was less of a mouthful than "Kristopher" and plus, that's what the coach called him anyway. By the time he reached high school and was star of the varsity Track and Soccer team, he was practically a legend. Best guy in his class, funny, athletic, and smart too.

[break][break] Needless to say, Flynn got the girl. When he was 16, he went to homecoming with Alethea Ivanova . In a lot of ways, the two were complete opposites. Where Flynn was outgoing and likable, she was aloof and kept to herself. Where as he had come from a poor family and was a single child, she had come from a good family and was the oldest of three. Flynn was funny, and often the center of any room he walked into. Alethea stayed on the outside of it, yet somehow eyes seemed to follow her wherever she went.

[break][break] The two were an unlikely match, yet, despite all odds, the two started dating and fell madly in love. The two couldn't be seen without the other. Flynn's mother loved Thea - maybe even more than her own son, was the reoccurring joke. A joke because that was ridiculous, because everyone knew that there was no one in the world who could possibly love Flynn more - she sacrificed everything for him, after all. Whether or not Thea loved Candice was another subject entirely. If she was ever threatened or intimidated by the weight of a mother's affection for her only son, at least, she never showed it. She was not expected to. She was polite, kind, lovely, all the kinds of things that any mother of Mistralton would want for their only son.

[break][break] The people of Mistralton adored Alethea Ivanov. The Ivanovs were everything that the Flynn-Edwards were not. A perfect family of five, blond, well-off. There was no secret of disappearing deadbeat fathers, or single mothers who worked too much. Flynn's family loved Thea, but the Ivanov family did not love Flynn. He only met them a few times, but her father's disapproving stare was all Flynn needed to know that he was not welcome in their elaborate, three-story home. Though no one outrightly spoke about Flynn's taboo family while he was present, the boy knew more than well of the rumors. His mother too. But none of it mattered, because he loved his mother and he loved Thea, and Thea loved him.

[break][break] As the saying goes, everything was perfect until it wasn't. Flynn's peaceful life came to a screeching halt when his deadbeat father suddenly re-entered his life, pleading for Candice to take him back. And much to Flynn's overwhelming astonishment, she did.

[break][break] Flynn was furious. He was strongly against the union, yelling at his mother for the first time in forever because she deserved better. She said it was for him, for him to have a father figure in his life again and Flynn nearly blew a fuse.

[break][break] Bullshit! Do what you want, but he'll never be my Dad!

[break][break] Things were rough then, with his deadbeat father suddenly come back to Mistralton, with nothing on his back but a flask and a backpack and a plea to make things right again. As expected of her, Candice took him back. They moved in to a slightly bigger house - with two incomes, things were better. Thea did her best to try to ease Flynn into it, but he wouldn't have for it. He had never needed a father in his life, and he certainly didn't need one now. The only good thing to come of it was the fact that Flynn and Thea got to spend more time together, because Flynn no longer wanted - or even needed - to be at home with his father, and he certainly didn't need to be working a part-time job, since his father was bringing in cash. If his father wanted to take of his mother, fine, let him, but he wasn't going to be a part of it.

[break][break] At the same time, Thea was facing a crisis of her own. Both her parents still didn't particularly like her long-term boyfriend, or even want to welcome him into their life. They never said it, but they knew his lack of a blue-blood background was a disgrace to them. They had wanted her to break up with him since day one, despite being the school's track captain and soccer star. She herself was at an impasse - what should she do?

[break][break] As it turned out, she didn't even have to make a decision. Life made it for her.

[break][break] Life gave her a baby.

[break][break] At seventeen.

[break][break] Needless to say, it was a surprise. A big surprise. Flynn had just turned 17 but he was still nowhere near ready to be a father. But at the same time, he loved Thea and the thought of killing their baby was not something he could stomach. Thea felt the same. So, of course, as expected of him, Flynn proposed. There were no flowers, or big confessions of love, or anything special. He proposed to her on a playground bench with a toy ring, and a promise to buy a better, bigger one in the future when the both of them could afford it. It was not what they had wanted, but they could do it. They could raise a baby.

[break][break] Her family didn't support it. When she told them, they were - no surprise - furious. They were furious at her, but they were furious at him for inflicting this on her. Even even possible, they hated Flynn even more for what he had done to their perfect little girl. But when she told them that her and Flynn were engaged, that they planned to get married and raise the baby together? Oh, they could have burned down the house. They nearly did. Thea's family did everything they could to break them apart, and even Flynn's own mother could not find it in herself to support her son's rash decision.

[break][break] You're too young, Flynn, she pleaded. Her dreams - all the ones she'd had for him - shattered, in an instant, with one bad decision.

[break][break] Flynn was astounded. His mother - the only person in his life that he loved more than Thea - didn't support him. Between her taking back his father, and between her not support his decision, Flynn couldn't take it anymore. He ran back to Thea and told her that they needed to elope. They could leave Mistralton behind them and start a life of their own. Everything would be okay. He would make sure of it.

[break][break] And young love is a wild, reckless thing. Young love is what made Thea say yes, caught up in all her emotions as they were.

[break][break] At 17 years old, Thea and Flynn eloped. They moved away to Driftveil City, where they thought they could start over, and Thea gave premature birth to their son in a community hospital. The process was difficult, stressful and all around terrible - but Flynn held her hand the whole time. Telling her that he loved her, and that she could do it, and that was how Noah Ivanov-Flynn was born into the world, a spitting image of his father.

[break][break] Everything was perfect then, in that split second that Noah was born, and only then. Because as soon as the hospital bills from emergency room visit came rolling in, both from the days when Thea had to be hospitalized and when Noah had to stay, their perfect world suddenly became impossible. Everything seemed impossible to endure. Flynn - a perfect shadow of his mother - ended up working 2 and sometimes 3 jobs to support his new family, not letting Thea lift even a finger. They lived in a tiny apartment in the seaside town, which was all they could afford at the time. That was how things stayed for months. Flynn knew they were struggling, but he had perfect trust in the fact that they could get through with it. Things were difficult, but they were happy. Sure, he and Thea fought sometimes, but it was nothing they couldn't deal with.

[break][break] Or so he thought.

[break][break] It was only six months after Noah was born that the boy began to show symptoms. He had always been sickly — when Thea had been pregnant, the doctors had warned them that there might be complications, and suggested that they abort. At the time, Flynn had been hesitant, but Thea had been determined. Nothing bad could happen to their baby as long as they loved him and treasured him. One look at Thea's beautiful lavender gaze, and Flynn had been convinced.

[break][break] And for the first few months of Noah's birth, it had been. All his doubts about whether he could be a father vanished as soon as his son was brought into the world, as soon as he saw his son's first smile, and heard his son's first laugh. Everything was perfect, so much that he didn't notice Thea deteriorating, didn't know the worries that his wife held dear to her heart. When Noah got sick, it only got worse. The hospital bills stacked up, Flynn had to work more, and Noah simply got sicker.

[break][break] It was inevitable.

[break][break] Noah died, and then Alethea Ivanov left him.

[break][break] Less than two years after they'd eloped, Flynn came home to an empty, ghost of an apartment and a note. At first, he'd been terrified- he thought they'd been robbed. But as he grabbed the note on the coffee table, his terror turned to horror. It was a note from Thea. She had given up, she was going home. She had taken all their savings - the money in their joint back account, the cash stashed under their bed, everything - and used it to buy a ticket home.

[break][break] If only we could be strangers again, the note had read.

[break][break] It was ambiguous, but Flynn had spent years loving her and knew what it meant the moment he read it.

[break][break] He had given up everything for her, and she had left him.

[break][break] The next several days were absolute hell. Flynn spent hours trying to call her phone. He left at least fifty five voice messages. He skipped his shifts at work so he could visit the police station, and the Church, and nearly every single place after that in an effort to find her.

[break][break] But there was nothing. No clues as to what her note meant, where she was, or how he could find her.

[break][break] After the shock was when the misery kicked in. Flynn didn't know what he was supposed to do. He had left his family for his wife, who had just up and left him. Nothing except divorce papers, and an absolutely useless note. She had left him all by himself, after losing their son, and left him to clean up the grief all by himself.

[break][break] A fucking bullet wound would have been better.

[break][break] He spent a total of 3 months in Driftveil, wishing, hoping, that everything was just a reoccurring nightmare. That he'd wake up, with Thea soft in his bed and their son in her arms. But after the 3 months, Flynn couldn't avoid the truth any longer. With nothing else to his name, Flynn had no choice but to go back home to Driftveil. But Thea wasn't there either. In fact, at first, the Ivanovs even blamed him for her disappearance.

[break][break] No one in town was helpful either; they just gave him disapproving stares and clicked their tongues, either like they were sorry for him or hated him. He didn't know which. Both fucking sucked. But the worst part of it all? When he finally got to the front door step of his childhood home, tail between his legs, a thousand apologies on his tongue for his mother, he found out that she wasn't there. She wasn't even home.

[break][break] She was in the fucking hospital in Castelia City. Because she was dying.

[break][break] God knew he wanted to kill himself then. And so many times after that.

[break][break] What the fuck? He had left Mistralton and his family in peace, and somehow his mother had contracted a terminal illness. She had a tumor? She had cancer? And she had never once called him to talk about it? Even after he left, they spoke frequently - but never about this. She always hid it. And when she stopped calling so often, he had just assumed that she was busy. He was busy, so he didn't even think a second of it.

[break][break] Flynn raced to the hospital. And if he thought the days after Thea left him were hell, then the next few weeks were fucking suicide. He watched his mother on her death bed, dying, with a fucking smile on her face. Because she knew that there was nothing that could have been done, and it was for that reason that she hadn't told him. Because she didn't want him to hurt, because she didn't want him to worry. Flynn couldn't even look at his so-called father in the eye. He didn't even know if his father ended up cleaning up his act, if he still beat his mother, whatever. Who cared? His mom was dying, and Flynn was powerless to stop it.

[break][break] Candice Flynn-Edwards passed away from a complication in surgery on a warm autumn afternoon, just a week before her own birthday.

[break][break] Flynn cried his eyes out. Nothing hurt more than seeing his mother's corpse in a coffin, and then lowered into the ground. The one person who had always had his back, even when he'd left her, was gone. Mourning was not even the right emotion for Flynn then - he was fucking devastated. And who wouldn't be, with the way things had turned out for him?

[break][break] But Flynn had always been a finnicky kid. One with a heart of gold, but a god-awful temper, and when he saw his father at the funeral, late, with a shabby suit and an apologetic expression, he lost it. Flynn absolutely lost it. He flew across the field and socked the man in the jaw, and screamed that he wished he was dead. In front of everyone. At least three men had to tear the former track and soccer captain off of his supposed deadbeat father, but the damage was done. Flynn was cuffed, and his father was brought to the hospital for a bruised jaw and broken rib. He spent three days in the precinct before he was allowed out, someone having paid an anonymous bail. Flynn had an idea of who it might have been, but not even that could have saved him from his anger. After a discussion with his grandmother, they both decided that it was best that he left Unova. He needed a clean slate. His grandmother took money out of her life savings, bought him a plane ticket to Kanto, and a month's rent and deposit in a city named Saffron.

[break][break]But there was an aching, meteorite-sized crater in his heart now. Flynn's life felt empty. To make matters worse, he had no money to his name but hell if he had the work ethic anymore to keep 3 jobs. Who the hell cared? What did it matter anyway? If he died from starvation, it wasn't like there was anyone left in the world to miss him. Feeling lazy, pathetic and useless, Flynn gave up on life. He made bad decisions, the type of bad decisions that he always strayed away from because he had always thought about his mother scolding him as she bailed him out.

[break][break] He got into trouble. Drugs, alcohol, all the bad shit. He made friends with a group of shady guys dealing weed right beneath his roof, and they let him in on their little crime circle. Things, for the very first time in Flynn's life, were easy simple. He didn't have to work three jobs for rolling in the kind of dough that would keep a roof over his head and foot on his plate and even a little extra to spend on shirts or sneakers or that designer jacket he'd seen in display at the train station. Things were good, but - as the theme in his life - things were good until they weren't.

[break][break] No matter how shitty the Saffron police were, they were still police and they eventually got wind of Flynn and his gang. A month after his 21st birthday, Kristopher Flynn-Edwards was charged in court for possession of drugs and dealing it. The whole crew got away too, throwing their youngest and newest member under the bus for the crime. Fucking lucky. Just like everything else in Flynn's life, he had gotten the short end of the stick. The judge sentenced him to five years and a bail of nearly 10,000 dollars. His grandmother didn't have that kind of cash. He was fucked. Even if he played his cards right, and got probation in a year or two, that kind of trail would follow him for the rest of his fucking life.

[break][break] And that, ironically, was when things began to turn around for Flynn.

[break][break] Locked up in his cell, head on his knees, miserable and hating himself for everything he had done and had yet to do, one of the other guys in the cell struck a deal with him. He said that he knew a good lawyer, one that could help him fudge his records and pay his bail without question. He could get him out within two years, and his record could be clean. Easy.

[break][break] The catch? Flynn just owed him a favor.

[break][break] Flynn knew when there was a good thing coming. He had no choice. He accepted the offer.

[break][break] Shockingly, the person was actually good for their word. Flynn would never forget the day that the guard unlocked his cell and told him he was free. He would never forget the day he stepped out of the jail, into the fresh, cool spring air of Saffron's dewy morning and saw his grandmother standing there, tears in her eyes.

[break][break] For at least a year, things were good again. Flynn didn't hear head or tail of that suspicious man, the one that had all but saved his life. When he applied for jobs, no one seemed to even know of his bad track record. It was just like that man had said -- everything wiped clean. There was nothing like new beginnings. He and his grandmother moved into a small house in Cerulean City, to start a new life together. Flynn started taking temp jobs, his grandmother made them a garden in front of their house. It wasn't perfect, but things were looking up for Flynn.

[break][break] But then on a dry, humid August evening, laid flat underneath a neighbor's car so he could help her with an oil change, Flynn received a call. It was from that man. He said that it was time for his favor. That he needed to meet him at the corner diner ASAP.

[break][break] Horror seeped through Flynn's veins like liquid nitrogen, but the years since his mother's death and his wife's abandonment had built up an iron defense. He fudged a lie to his grandmother, packed his bags, and met him at a shady diner, just a little after midnight.

[break][break] By this point, a lot of things had happened in Flynn's life to surprise him, but this encounter gave him the shock of his fucking life. The man who had saved him was part of Team fucking Rocket.

[break][break] Over vanilla flavored coffee and Pikachu-shaped pancakes, Flynn was quickly filled in. His suit looked fancy because he was a Team Rocket executive. Not quite as powerful as an underboss, but powerful all the same. And that's exactly what they needed from him. From Flynn, that is. Flynn was a 6'2'' former track and soccer star, and even though the years had been hard on him, he still had enough bulk and muscle to show for it.

[break][break] Kid, you're sharp and you're strong. I could see it even in that grimy old cell. You have potential. We need new recruits like you.

[break][break] Flynn hesitated. Joining Team Rocket would be the ultimate betrayal.

[break][break] We'll pay you, of course. Your grandma won't have to worry about anything anymore.

[break][break] Flynn wanted to say no. He should have said no.

[break][break] And I don't think I need to remind you... about our little arrangement?

[break][break] He didn't. He said yes. At 23, Kristopher Flynn-Edwards became a member of the alleged, criminal organization called Team Rocket.

[break][break] That was nearly five years ago. Since then, Flynn has kept loyal to the criminal organization, following them from Kanto all the way to Hoenn. Even at the supposed dismantlement of Team Rocket was not enough to shake Flynn from it's ranks. It was too late. He had already been sucked all the way in, their slimy tentacles wrapped around him and his heart. There was no going back now. When a former Team Rocket contact approached him, asking if he was a man who still kept his promises, Flynn responded the only way he could.

[break][break] Abso-fucking-lutely.