gavin was not someone he was expecting to come and visit him. after all he was pretty sure he annoyed the piss out of the other man. but it had been fun for him regardless when they hung out. he even still had the togepi they had saved together. though he wasn't letting the baby anywhere near the monster of a baby at the foot of his bed.

he set the phone down and pulled himself up just a little bit. after all he looked like shit but at least he could try to look a little bit more awake. "oh you know me, i'm busy busy busy but i can always make time for you." his voice was missing the lightness that it usually held when he made jokes like that. even he knew that it fell flat. but he also didn't care.

"just be careful, i haven't worked out if jello is a murderous meltan or just a vampire." and on that glitch was actually serious. after all it was a weird reddish color from his blood. the meltan just wiggled some though, content with it's half a fork that glitch had given it.

Cillian Quinn

he shook his head when gavin asked if he knew a lot about the meltan. he didn't really. he'd been meaning to do a bit of research but of course now that one of them had popped out of the leg that had come off.

"it came out of my leg yeah. apparently it had been feeding on the iron in my blood and that was what made it that color or whatever." apparently that happened sometimes that pokemon had weird shiny mutations.

"he hasn't done anything violent yet so i've been letting him hang around. he likes eating my cutlery when i'm done with it."

he sighs and rubs the back of his neck a bit. "how are things out there?" since he hadn't been allowed out of the room he needed to get his news from somewhere.

Cillian Quinn

it was sort of the elephant in the room really that he wanted to address. especially since he'd been in the group chat with the rest of the leaguers.

"you've been outted as a rocket, well, patrick has. all the gym leaders are talking about it. some of them were planning on placing bets on you for the tournament but... you know. i played it up like i had no idea, as a good baby partner would."

the word mother was not coming out of his mouth right now. not after being misgendered for days by a hospital topside.

"things will work out fine. and then we can move to mossdeep and i can fucking retire this gym leader shit or something."

he hated the league, he partially hated rocket. he didn't care about any of this anymore. being a gym leader was supposed to be a joke but now he was holding the position so he could just wait for the eventual rocket takeover.

"if you kidnap me then i won't have to do paperwork."

Cillian Quinn

he sighed and stretched his arms a little bit. everything still hurt but he wasn't really worried about that right now.

"well, even it was hard for me to remember the name patrick anyways. maybe this time you'll choose an alias that's fun!"

it was a little bit of a laugh really. there was nothing wrong the name patrick but if he didn't make fun of gavin then who was he?

"i don't know, it's not bad but i didn't think they'd even accept my application so i wasn't really prepared."

and he wasn't really wanting to do all of the hard work and stuff.

"if you guys take mossdeep next you'll get the science labs from the observatory to work with. and i want to start doing... more but not like, paperwork more. it's hard to explain. can a gym leader come out as in favor of rocket while still staying a gym leader?"

talking to gavin was at least a good distraction. it almost made him stop thinking about the missing limb.

Cillian Quinn

glitch bit his lip to think for a moment.

"how about a traveling salesman? or a circus clown? or you could learn to be a fire breather or something?"

those were his ideas of a fun alias anyways. though really he was just throwing things at a wall to see if he could get gavin to laugh or something. it was a fun distraction to think of other things.

"oh, wait. i have an idea... if we really want to make things interesting?"

it was risky and extremely stupid but... it could throw league credibility under the bus.

"i could come out as supporting the slateport take over and then 'mysteriously' disappear. rocket could pretend to publicly look for me and cast doubt at the league as if they did something to me. destroy my whole apartment that they paid for like it's some sort of a struggle. it's a massive play but i can stay on the sub while the ruse is going. i'm sure lulu would love to have me back in the lab."

and he'd really love to be back in there. anything was better than this whole thing.

Cillian Quinn

he was glad that gavin was on board with the idea. especially since he'd thought that it was kind of crazy himself as he was saying it out loud.

"i... i'm so tired gavin. everything is exhausting and i can't move around like i used to. even if they get me the prosthetic im a liability in the field. league keeps offering me one and im worried about what they'll put on it. and i'm worried that if i don't take it and show up with one from the rocket labs they'll start to question things." paranoid was more the word but that wasn't the point.

"if we can destroy league credibility after we've taken sootopolis like we did then... it'll be a step forward. people might see it as a retaliation if the gym leader who supports the takeover goes missing. not everyone will believe it but if enough people do then they'll start to talk and dissolve the structure they've built."

he nodded to himself, taking a deep breath. "i'll do a couple more challenges a couple more large ones for sure, then i'll do my bit..." and they would have to see where they could go from there.

Cillian Quinn