Thank goodness he wasn’t looking too weepy today, considering he had just managed to finish baking a tray of mint chocolate brownies to snack on to get rid of the misery.

Well, misery loved company—especially if the company was food company then he wouldn’t mind it at all!

Just has he was about ready to go down to the front desk and take the receptionist’s place, the very same person he was looking to tag out came running up to him instead, stammering something about someone who had shown up without warning and—what?

“Hey, hey, slow down—let me handle this, alright?” he said around a mouthful of brownie. After which, he gave said receptionist one, before heading down toward the front desk, brownies in tow and completely just eating them as he went.

“Someone looking for me?” he said once he’d arrived, hand still holding onto the frosted dessert treat.

With one hand holding the container that had the brownies stacked in it, and his other hand in the middle of holding a half-bitten one, he blinked.

“Oh, shorry,” he began as he finished the half-brownie in his free hand before popping the top of the container open and offering the mint chocolate brownies to the other man. “Want one?” he asked, plucking out another piece for himself and taking a rather big bite out of it.

Look, food loved misery and he was hiding his misery by making food for days on end. This had resulted in so many trays of brownies and cookies and other baked goodies besides. It felt… strangely therapeutic to let his frustrations out by baking.

“I’m not doing anything, so… here, take a brownie, take a few if you want. I made a lot and I don’t know how to finish all of it without getting a case of diabetes,” he chuckled.

In the back of his mind, he wondered if there were other Gym Leaders who had already been interviewed. Wow. He had really been out of touch with the rest of the world lately, having shut himself into his sorrow and just baking the hell out of all the recipes he knew.

People always said the fastest way to one’s heart wasn’t through their ribs, it was through their stomach—uhm, excuse me for that dark thought.

“I needed to bake,” he chimed in. “Releases all this… tension and stress that’s been piling up on me,” he explained. “So rather than scream at nothing, I’d keep my hands busy.”

Taking another brownie for himself, he then pointed down at the open door.

“Come on outside, I want to show you something. Nah, there’s nothing in the oven, made sure to take it out before I came down here,” he offered nonchalantly.

Through the corridor, out into the open—into the wild. There were still traces of perimeter fencing, but otherwise, majority of the area was open-air. Shadows of avians (both Flying-type and not-so-Flying type) scattered around the area; some coming in to alight on various ‘perches’ scattered around the premises.

“They prefer being out in the open.”

“By all means, feel free,” he gestured. Chuckling as two literal blurs shot out from Zac’s person, one of them he picked out to be a Ledian—secretly one of the few remaining lines he didn’t have yet.

The other was an Archen, and he almost crouched down to get a closer look at the Pokémon!

“Aww, yeah, Archen are really scrawny. Not to mention they’re glass cannons in more ways than one…” he mused, watching as a much-larger shadow came out from somewhere, following the Archen and landing near it—his own Archeops.

“Oh come on,” he chuckled in his Archeops’s direction, “Really?” he added a few moments afterward, before getting a squawking, guttural-pitched squawk from the Archeops. It was its own way of laughing, so to speak—ready to catch the smaller Archen if and when necessary.

“Birds. Call me a kid but this is more on a little personal reason,” he began to explain as he decimated the brownie he was holding. Allowing a few moments of silence, he then continued once his thoughts weren’t as scattered as they were previously.

“If nobody’s going to watch out for them, who will? Lots of Pokémon get injured all the time. Even more so during migration season. It’s why I built the Sanctuary around nature and not opposing it, because I want them to feel at home with something they’re familiar with.”

“I’ll let you in on a secret,” he continued, reaching for another brownie and offering the open container to the other man for him to grab some more brownies while they walked around.

“Majority of the Sanctuary is funded out of my pocket.”

After taking another bite, he cleared his throat slightly.

“Allow me to explain—while I was given provisions to set up the Fortree Gym, I wanted to deviate from the usual structure of having a stone building smack in the middle of a city. So I figured, why not adapt the Gym around nature?” he gestured, pointing to the open-air arena where his Gym battles took place.

“The Sanctuary followed much later; and it was an uphill battle securing all the necessary permits to get the damned place up and running. I don’t want the government involved in something like this—you know how red tape operates—and have them steal funding and all that other shady crap,” he continued.

“I decided to build the Sanctuary out of my own savings. Mind, it wasn’t easy. I had to source a lot of things myself. Fact that when they found out I’m the Fortree Gym leader kind of made people take a second look at what I was actually doing around here.”

He let the silence drop for a few moments before he continued.

“I’ll admit, I had to wave my title around a little, but everyone who’s contributed to building the Sanctuary proper did it out of their own volition. I gave them the freedom to choose what to do with their money, their investment. And well—you have what you see in front of you right now. I still run it mostly out of pocket, however there are donations here and there too.”

Another bite of the brownie.

“All to keep them safe.”

“Oh, you’re the one taking her place as Lavaridge’s Gym leader?” he inquired, eyebrows going up slightly as he chowed down on another brownie from the container. Arceus, he should stress-bake more often, this shit tasted way better than the previous batches he’d made.

“Congrats on the promotion, then!” he added a few moments later before taking another bite out of the brownie he was holding.

He was amused (and not the least bit surprised) when Zac immediately pounced on his last statement. Holding the container open in invitation (mmm, sweet delicious brownies waiting to be devoured) there was a serious look in his eye now.

“If ever, should anything happen and by some weird-ass happening I lose the right to award badges for challengers—they can’t take the Sanctuary away from me. They may take away my right of awarding my badge, but they can’t take over the Sanctuary, because it’s registered under my name.”

Looking around, he wondered if it was alright to voice his qualms.

“Off the record, I’m wary about the people in power at the council. There’s something—I don’t know, call it ‘gay instinct’ or so—that keeps telling me that one of them is bad news.”

More avians flew out of the trees—one of them, a younger pink-plumed Murkrow—hovered over the two for a few moments before cawing and catching his attention.

“Oh, be careful out there, okay?! Don’t want Hela getting on my case again!” he chuckled as the Murkrow flew off.

“Sorry about that, I have a Honchkrow that mother hens that particular Murkrow of mine to death,” he explained with a sheepish scratch of the back of his head.

Back to the topic at hand…

“That’s absolutely what I planned for. In case people take over smaller corporations, then who’s to say what will happen to the people working there? That’s why it’s better to keep a personal eye on something like this,” he trailed off, gesturing at the nature around them, “…rather than have corrupt representatives seize everything and waste the money that’s meant to go somewhere.”

More leaves began falling around them, and this time another one of his companions appeared—holding something he recognized on sight.

“Ah. Hi, Carina,” he continued, holding out a finger for the Ribombee to land on before waving the yellow Pollen Puff their way.

“She’s always like this. Offering sweets. Sorry,” he apologized with another sheepish grin on his features.