"not the only thing that's fucked up here." elijah buries his hands into his pockets.


while the pokemon bond over beans, elijah prods quietly. with silence, there is no need to survey. he allows bryan's thoughts to do the work for him.

elijah raises his hand at the flask, "no thanks. i just brushed my teeth."

nearby, a small sink with an old raggedy toothbrush. it's balanced against the sink's edge and spins ever so slightly on the bevel.

"that's too bad." elijah says. "that makes you a liability, you know."

bryan delarosa

"sad." elijah offers clipped sympathy. as if trimming hedges or arranging flowers, he shifts awkwardly and hides behind metaphorical foliage. "then there's no where else for you to go." a laugh escapes him as a coarse puff of air. "look at the silver lining. you're right where you belong."

the floette's unusual colour seems to brighten as it recuperates. still, the harsh light of an underwater submarine's dingy office drowns all life from hue.

"rumour has it that it grew from a special seed. others say it was attracted to the flower that grew from it instead." elijah shrugs. "cadis was the one who found it and now he's busy dying."

he releases his heavy arms and they fall like unraveling dhelmise.

"at least one thing's clear. we both don't trust the league. that makes you good enough for me."

bryan delarosa

"won't kill you, but stranger things have happened."

the accent lands flat on elijah's ear drums. humourlessly, the apothecary stares at him with bleached blankness. the stare turns into a scythe of scathing critique as he witnesses the floette fall asleep.

"no furniture. nothing comfortable." elijah demands. "i don't want this floette thinking it's a part of a loving family. that it's going to be owned by some caring trainer." he holds the cage door open wide and its little hinges squeak. "pretending we care about it is a lie crueler than the machine we put it in."

bryan delarosa

"have more energy for the machine." elijah's laugh trumpets out from the corner of his lip like bitter flame. "you're cute."

but the compliment is heavy and flat: a dense vest, too cumbersome to wear as praise.

"not my decision. that's the thing." elijah says. "it's the higher ups. but i agree with them. listen, kid." he closes the cage, the metal rattling as it swings in. "we're all in the dumps here. get too comfortable and you'll get shit on."

bryan delarosa

elijah snorts. the sound is like the strike of a match before the whoosh of a flame. he laughs, pointing a fat finger at bryan's flushed face. "you should see yourself right now."

he doesn't being called old man. he's been called it a dozen times before. despite his youth, he moves about like one who has been hard at work all of his life: aged by hobby, practice and disappointment.

"sure. all of them. you never know. we're all grunts relative to someone else." he stops, brow raised like an old cobble arch. "what do you mean new battery?"

bryan delarosa

"ambitious."

elijah takes the article. the office swells with its scent, and the plants coil and shiver as if in timid greeting.

"but why?" elijah asks after emptying his mouth of smoke. "power? significance? you wanna fuck it?" he shakes his head, his stiff green hairstrands like spears.

"shit's scary to me."

bryan delarosa

"not just rocket. all around the glooobe." elijah says, voice like a paper airplane spinning around the terrible sphere.

occasionally, it'd get in the news. rare— but it happens. elijah glosses over such passages.

"and how do you know blue mulch will help your sister?"

elijah's face is sculpted with the chisel of skepticism. one strike is enough to cast the humor out of expression.

"what if xerneas," elijah says, clowning the deer's name, "has no intention of helping your sister? it's a pokemon, bryan. not a philanthropist."

bryan delarosa