Lulu’s second assault was more vicious than the first. There was raw emotion behind it. She saw red, and nothing else. Her fists flew, and she barely felt the ones which hit in between her own.

Then, there was a sore, choking sensation around her throat and she was being pulled back. Fighting it the whole time, she sputtered as her hands slowly lost force and she slumped a bit, allowing the pokemon to remove her from its trainer. She fell back in much the similar fashion Fernando had, throwing a hand up to pry at the kecleon’s tongue as she struggled for breath.

TW: bodily fluids, gross

Despite bared teeth, she had no bite left with the tongue around her throat. This, with the addition of the foot to her stomach was enough. Fernando got what he wanted, the sick fuck.

Her body lunged, attempting to not choke on her own vomit as she sputtered from still being held back. There were strained coughs as she fought for air.

She glared at him with unwavering spite that defied all pain and struggle. Through the hacking, spitting, panting, Lulu still somehow managed to ask him in a rasp that stung her imprisoned throat, “How… do you… figure?”

She wouldn’t let anyone tell her she was worthless.

She was a mess. Blood, vomit, sweat. No tears, though.

Needless to say, her glasses were done for. They laid in pieces somewhere across the room. The focus of her stare, which hung defiantly on him, was visibly off both due to this and the lack of oxygen getting to her brain.

Her chest heaved in front of her and she tried to suck the lower half of herself in and away from him, but the kick to her belly still had her down and grappling with her own body’s reflexes. All she could do was choke through most of his monologue when she wanted to deny it.

No, she hadn’t betrayed them. She’d simply survived. They’d started killing people. There’d been no hope, no other way... It wasn’t betrayal at that point. The moment someone put a hit out on you, there was nothing left to stay loyal to.

If there had been one person in the world she’d betrayed, it had been Rinc. She’d left him in Galar in her escape from the region without a word. Thinking a lack of contact would protect him, she’d never even said goodbye. After trying to shake him down, they’d killed him, figuring he was lying when he'd told them he had no idea where she’d gone.

Unable to silence Fernando, and at the mercy of a buzzing mind, her thoughts began to centralize around her deceased lover. Fernando’s strategically vague words warped and skewed to fit. Her mind made them work.

It became visible in her eyes which didn’t find Fernando clearly: she was attacking herself, now. Her breathing began to slow some, not from the Kecleon’s grip, but from her own gradual release from reality--in a sedated sort of way.

The only words that choked were, “There's only me.” No more Rinc. No one else mattered. Not at that moment.

And it sounded like the truth, because it was.

Her chest hurt. The heart in it pounced fiercely, even as the adrenaline declined and the pain of her wounds began to creep in, following the emptiness in her stomach.

She eyed up at him hazily, staring at none of his features in particular.

The way he kept at it was almost as though he knew what he was talking about. Paired with the map of the ocean, it was enough to be suspicious. Worried, even.

Unfortunately, it seemed she wouldn’t be making it out to tell anyone. All she could do was keep her mouth shut and hope for the best.

“Take my life, if you're gonna do it anyways.” Better dead than cracked, after all.

As the MISTY TERRAIN swirled, there was a twitch in her brow. She was unnerved not by the sight, but by the smell. It wasn’t sweet. It was salt. Brine. Ocean. Skin, as though it was on her lips—clear over the stench of blood and vomit.

Something in her chest lurched and she denied it.

“I don’t have a fucking heart.”

The energy around him grew, oppressive, changing the atmosphere of the room to something cold and hopeless. Unsure of what tortures awaited her or if it would indeed be death itself, she held her breath a moment, only breathing again in an audible gasp when suddenly, her vision was crystal clear.


Her directionless gaze visibly focused on him; on his face in horror as he descended into what sounded like true, evil madness. What followed was everything that haunted her. The devil was real.

There were many levels to the terror. For one, Lulu was afraid of ghosts. Two, Lulu had a lot of skeletons in the closet.

Vague sounds of pain and suffering occasionally came in familiar voices, drawing a shake in her breath. Some, however, were not so vague.


A tall, middle-aged woman with long blonde hair and a brutally scarred face appeared. Natalia, late boss of the Motostoke Dragons, dead by steak knife via the hand of Fiona McCoy aka Lulu Flint. She stood shoulder to shoulder with Fernando, icy stare freezing down her nose at the woman on the floor and hitting the cigar she’d been smoking since she'd died.

To the other side of Fernando appeared a man who was closer to Lulu’s age, if not a couple of years younger. His eyes were soft, but the way his brow furrowed showed pain and confusion, and even some hatred.


Lulu’s breath hitched. Her eyes were wide. It was as though she hadn't even seen the other woman towering over her menacingly, clearly a power figure. An oppressor. Lulu’s focus was all on the man, her gaze suddenly glistening with tears threatening to fall. She was frozen in fear and sadness.

Natalia demanded her attention, however, stepping in between them. She clearly knew him too, and he minded her.


Natalia sneered. “After everything I did for you. Death was what you deserved.”

The smallest remaining ounce of cool in Lulu evaporated.

“I never FUCKING TOLD THEM ANYTHING!” She became like a rabid dog, spitting from the leash of Kecleon’s tongue. Her scream was thunderous, as though all of the rage in her soul was being let loose at once, overtaking fear by a mile. It carried the weight of the hatred of thousands, which was conceived and sustained on Natalia's lie against her. An assumption.

And it wouldn’t go away. It wouldn’t stay dead. Her loyalty, one of her strongest and truest traits, had been constantly questioned by all she had ever adored. It was infuriating.


“Are you done, now? You're a goddamn liar.” She looked over at Fernando, blowing nonexistent smoke casually. “Are you going to kill this bitch?” Her eyes fell back on the heaving mess of a woman disdainfully, still addressing the living man next to her. “You'd be better off, trust me.”

She might’ve cried then, actually. Seeing Rinc was enough. The emotions which came clearest through his eyes were brutally unfamiliar to her. She’d been arrested out of the blue. He’d likely been at the apartment, cooking her food at the time, waiting for her to get home. Nothing amiss, then, boom, your world falls apart.

The thought of feeling his skin, his breath… What she wouldn’t give to be up against his chest and in his arms, even one more time. It was all like a knife through her heart.

And then, there was a fucking foot on her head.

The waterworks which threatened were sucked up by an instantaneous draught. She was furious. Her jaw clenched in blood and vomit and she kicked but there was no one there to hit. “I’M GOING TO FUCKING KILL YOU, SILPH.” It was dark, growling, and like she was swearing on the last tiny scrap of holiness she had left. Somehow, some way.

Because ghosts were real.

You’re fucking dead.

She eyed up at those who had haunted her dreams for months already, from her weakened position on the floor, trying to gauge how much time she had left in such a situation. Her mind was beginning to give her out of body sensations, clipping away at her senses to salvage what it could. As her brain attempted to flee from trauma, she struggled to even process the dialogue of the trio around her. She was displaced from reality with a disorienting ripple like a metal wobble board.

“I’m so sorry, Rinc.” It was poorly placed and out of time, surely, and perhaps even spoken over.

Her body still struggled occasionally against all forces, if only for the sake of not lying there in submission. That wasn’t her. Her attention, however hazy, returned to her old lover—or, what she could see of him, past Natalia’s equally broad shoulders. She was at their mercy, now. She could tell that much.

The boss smoothed a hand down the edge of her red jacket and ashed her spectral cigar over Lulu’s cheek. “Sounds like icing on the cake.” She didn’t crouch to her level yet, merely eyeing straight down like one would from a top office for a long moment as though making a point. “I’d do this shit for free.”

Then, she lowered. “Do you know why I took you in, Saoirse? Did you think I was scared of a fucking child?” Her voice was cool like the wind that followed the reaper. It didn’t match the daggers that were her words. “You had all the money in the world, girl, and you gave it up to kill by the side of people who were killing for it. And you think I’m evil?” She paused to let that sink in. “’My filthy rich family didn’t love me enough, woe is me.’ It’s sick, really. You’re textbook crazy. I picked you because you were the stupidest, most reckless bitch I had ever seen.” She paused for effect, turning her jaw a little to get a better look into her eyes. “And you gave me everything, didn’t you?”

Lulu’s eyes couldn’t escape her, then. The woman blotted out everything else. She was forced into two parallel black holes, only they were blue. “You thought I was your Mummy.” The cigar was poked through the center of Lulu’s forehead. “I’d be ashamed.”


With that, she stood again. “Your brain helped a lot, kiddo, but what really set you apart was your deranged behavior. I didn’t raise you to sit with me. I raised you to keep you on a fucking leash.” She sneered, and her head tilted to the side and eyes flashed pointedly towards Fernando. “Looks like you’ve traded hands. Things don’t change, do they?”

Lulu was gutted, clearly. Things had been simplified for her, in a way that left her mentally grasping at straws to justify her life and the decisions she’d made. It was unfair in many ways, but Lulu was unable to see that at that moment. Guilt, embarrassment, and loneliness were things all too oppressive.

Eventually, she seemed to begin an attempt to reason, “Rinc…” But he wouldn’t meet her eyes and she was cut off with a cold, “Just shut up, Saoirse.”

Rinc was standing on the side of the woman who had ordered him dead. He understood where she was coming from. She still had his respect. All that had come into light had severed his love and anything positive he’d previously held in his heart for Lulu.

Seeing the abandonment and rejection in his eyes with her own was a worse blow than any words could hope to deliver. From the other end of the situation, Lulu had been forced to run from the first instance of happiness she had ever known; the only love she’d ever been offered by even the smallest stretch. She’d left Galar for him, and him alone. To save him. But at that moment, she couldn’t manage to remember her reasoning for anything anymore.

Feeling utterly alone in the world, she shivered and short-circuited.

Then, Rinc took a step forward and got to her level. “You need to tell this man whatever he wants to know. I want my life back. I deserve it.” He sounded matter-of-fact, and then considered for a moment. His eyes were conflicted for two mere seconds before he concluded decisively: “And I want you dead.”

The look in Lulu’s eyes flashed horror, and then, finally, a tear fell to mix with blood. Wait. “I did it to protect you.” Her voice was as broken as her heart, choking and breathless.

He looked at her a moment, face not changing. “Yeah, well. That was stupid, wasn’t it?” He crossed his arms. “Tell him. You owe me.”

“I can’t.” Cillian.

“I can’t.”

“I can’t...”

I can’t breathe.

Lulu began hyperventilating, shutting down into a full panic attack on the floor. The movement her body made was identical to the one she’d performed on the bed that morning after they’d slept together. She rolled in on herself, as much as she could with her restraints. Shutting out everyone.