[attr="class","skullimg"]

[attr="class","skulltitle"]導通抵抗

[attr="class","skullbody"]Isaac didn't know when he had escaped from the wrathful eye of paxton concordas.[break][break]

Isaac didn't know when he got separated from the one lifeline he could always count on, Ashley Shepard.[break][break]

Isaac didn't know how long it had been since a bullet at the worst possible time had critically injured one of the most important Pokemon he had ever met.[break][break]

All he knew was that he had to run.[break][break]

Each step forced itself through his body like an electric shock, sending the organs that had been dislodged from their resting places tumbling around his insides. The mask that he had thought would keep him secure instead felt like an iron cage around his face, desperate, panting breaths barely forcing their way between the bars. The fog surrounded him, threatening to swallow him whole. The faces of lost souls lurked inside of it; those he had seen die, whose who had tried to kill him, those that he had killed directly, indirectly, through the ripples of the consequences his each and every action held.[break][break]

If it wasn't for Knuckles, he would have died there. The Lucario had used every last drop of Infinity Energy she had remaining to force him away, away, away from this nightmare. He recalled her after. The form was still so new, so foreign, so unnatural to her, and she needed her rest. It was a rare moment of clarity in his manic state, brought about by his obligation to one who needed him.[break][break]

Without her, without anyone, only the haze remained.[break][break]

He didn't know where the haze was taking him. He only knew away. Where the sound of battle started, he strayed away. Where others gave chase, he managed to evade against all odds. The beaten path had become his home, Isaac keeping to the mists that suffocated this mountain. The faces residing there tormented him all the while. He deserved it.[break][break]

It wasn't until he nearly bumped into hard, ashen stone that he slipped into a moment of clarity. How had he gotten near the mountain's peak? No, no, no. This wouldn't do. This wouldn't do at all. Away had become towards. Safety had become danger. He hadn't escaped; he had simple circled the vortex known as Mt. Pyre, not even realizing as it pulled him closer and closer to its hated nexus.[break][break]

A voice rang out. He prepared to pay it no mind, let it meld into the choir of screams with all the others. But then he stopped hearing it and started Hearing it.[break][break]

It was Annalise Henderson. The first Ranger he had encountered in his Rocket duties. The first Ranger he had kinda, sorta, maybe befriended, or at least came to mutual understanding with. The first Ranger to go along with his better nature, and the first time embracing it had given him no end of grief.[break][break]

Part of him wanted to tell her everything that had happened since they had first bumped into each other. Part of him could feel his throat swelling shut at the mere suggestion. A little voice inside told him that it wouldn't even matter; the Isaac that she knew had been wasting away, and his last vestiges had died alongside Kiryu.[break][break]

As these facets fought for dominance, a single world rang out. Even through the modulator distorting his tone, his agony bled through.[break][break]

"Leave."[break][break]

TEAL DEER;[break]
He was a trauma boy[break]
Got no time for drama boy[break]
He doesn't want to deal with her

[break][break]

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[attr="class","skullimg"]

[attr="class","skulltitle"]導通抵抗

[attr="class","skullbody"]Family.[break][break]

Isaac knew family, alright. There was the man he refused to call father. He could spare all the love and effort in the world for everyone else, but as soon as someone crossed him he became cold, unyielding, and oh so cruel. And Isaac had the misfortune of crossing him by being born. He was a living symbol of that man's inability to control everything, and for it he bore the brunt of his deepest, darkest grudge.[break][break]

There was his mother, the burnout whose wandering eye got him into this mess in the first place. It wasn't that she couldn't take responsibility for her actions. It was that she never cared to. She floated by, unaffected by anything, never once apologizing for the hell that she had brought Isaac into. Her work was her everything. Her family, a distant second. There was barely a third place left for Isaac.[break][break]

And then there was Elliot. The golden child, soaking up all his family's love like some radiant sunflower. He could do anything he put his mind to; strength, skills, or smarts. And yet, in spite of it all, he was so kind, so humble, so loving, even to his abject failure of a big brother. Isaac resented him, and he hated it, because in that moment he understood how that horrid man felt when looking at him. Yet despite this, he would have moved mountains for Elliot. That combo, more than anything, was what drove him to leave and never return.[break][break]

They were all dead to him. They had to be. There was only one remnant of Isaac's home that he would consider happy. She was in the ball slung around his belt, fighting for her life, and for every second this ranger blocked his way her chances grew worse.[break][break]

Isaac's eyes were hidden behind a mask, yet the pure hatred within them as plainly visible.[break][break]

"I have no family," he snarled, his voice modulator practically distorting the statement into static. As Annalise slipped two Pokeballs off of his belt, Isaac practically tore two from his own. Every motion was a struggle, pushing past the tension in his seething muscles. Was he even choosing to engage? Or was he being pushed forth by some invisible hand of fate?[break][break]

Yet, strangely enough, he didn't release them right away. He simply held firm in his eye contact with Annalise. His chest rose and fell, as if the mere act of breathing required a herculean effort. His hands trembled around his Pokeballs, knowing all too well that if he released them, they could share Kiryu's face. And the occasional pop, fizz, and hiss from his voice modulator made him seem for all the world like a broken machine.[break][break]

Why should he run back to that battlefield? So Annalise could gun him down like a dog while his back was turned? So every League official in a mile-long radius could swarm him as he retreated through their ranks? So he could be swallowed by the fog, torn to bloody pieces by the macabre parade of sins that dwelled within it?[break][break]

There was only way out. It was through.[break][break]

"Let me pass, and nobody else gets hurt," he said. There was a heaviness to his voice, a weariness, as if he had to fight to get every word out from his throat. Today, the mantle that swallowed his body didn't make him look imposing, even as he tried to keep up with Rocket appearances. If anything, it made him look smaller and more scared than ever.[break][break]

And yet, desperately, he tried to stand his ground. He had to. The alternative was too horrid to imagine.[break][break]

TEAL DEER;[break]
Isaac isn't backing down.[break]
But, uh.[break]
He isn't really doing much of anything else.[break]
I think he's broken.[break]
Oh no.

[break][break]

[break]

[attr="class","skullimg"]

[attr="class","skulltitle"]導通抵抗

[attr="class","skullbody"]"It will."[break][break]

Because Isaac didn't play by the rules, did he? Not Rocket's. Not the League's. He just smashed his head against them, desperate to do Something while confined to the shackles of obligation.[break][break]

What that Something was felt increasingly fuzzy and hard to define. Doing the right thing? Remaining part of a criminal organization destabilizing the region even in the face of the apocalypse was a funny way of showing that. Survival? Every action he took hurt him more, and even when he won, he lost. Protecting those he loved?[break][break]

That couldn't be it. After all, he'd just killed Kiryu.[break][break]

The mist surrounded him like a clammy, heavy blanket. The stench of death swelled within his nose, permeating through his body as if it had infested his bloodstream. Stale air suffocated him, a spectral hand with a death grip on his face. He could see his failures looming over him, each a larger than life shadow. His efforts at walking the line only made everything worse, for everyone.[break][break]

And yet he pushed forward anyway, even as he brought ruin to everything he touched. Because that was all he knew. Ever since joining Rocket. Ever since he ran from home with no plans, resources, or hopes. Ever since he had been abandoned by a man that had grown to resent him harder each day. All he knew was to push forward, because to stop was to die.[break][break]

Now Annalise wanted to make him stop.[break][break]

As sticky thread hit Isaac's mantle, he snapped into action. He swiped at his mantle, tearing off the breakaway point and flinging it away from him. His momentum fueled him, his body practically spinning as he whipped a Pokeball at the Volcarona. The ball flew faster, harder, more viciously than ever before.[break][break]

The ball exploded into color and motion. It had been crammed with ball seals, turning a simple capture device into a weapon of sensory overload. Smoke and ominous lined the outside of the ball, blocking any view of what was happening within. Inside the ball was a visual cacophony; rainbow star showers, flashes of light, and bursts of flame. Anyone within the Pokeball's burst radius would have an inhuman amount of visual noise to parse through.[break][break]

As the battlefield grew hot, and his illusionary flames spilled from the dreadful black cloud, Isaac knew that he had set foot in Hell.[break][break]

Would the Volcarona, overwhelmed as it was by the visual noise, notice the Scrafty that had emerged from the ball? Would it notice as the Scrafty reared back in midair, then bucked forward with all of her might? The Head Smash was a brutal technique, just as hard on the user as it was the target, and Aubrey sought to use it to send Volcarona plummetting down to Earth.[break][break]

Through it all, Isaac was as silent as the graves that surrounded him.[break][break]

TEAL DEER;[break]
All is not okay in Isaactown.[break]
String Shot hits Isaac's mantle, which he tears off to avoid being grappled.[break
He returns fire with a Pokeball loaded up with ball capsules.[break]
Scrafty emerges amidst the dazzle camouflage, aiming to Head Smash the Volcarona down to earth.

[break][break]

[break]

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[attr="class","skulltitle"]導通抵抗

[attr="class","skullbody"]The Volcarona landed in a crumpled, broken heap. Aubrey touched down shortly thereafter. Her head rung like a bell, but her pained look gave way to a small, triumphant snicker.[break][break]

Isaac would be lying if he said the sight didn't fill him with a certain sick satisfaction. The League had grievously wounded one of the Pokemon nearest and dearest to his heart. A part of him wanted to inflict that same pain in turn. The sickening crack that echoed across the mountain, the futile twitching of wings as it tried to pull itself together, the desperate, stomach-churning realization that the pain one inflicted on others could be turned right back on them . . .[break][break]

He didn't care that the Volcarona may be the next face in the mist, another sin whose voice joined the choir. In fact, he didn't care for the mist at all. If it dared surround him again, he would fight his way through it every step of the way. How dare they haunt him? How dare they hurt him and leave him the one feeling bad for it? How dare they corner him in his very dreams, where they were inescapable and endless and hellbent on trapping him in a special kind of hell?[break][break]

Yet as Isaac blinked, it wasn't a Volcarona he saw. It was Kiryu, feebly holding herself up with a single, trembling claw. Her chest had been torn open in the middle, molten rock dribbling down the wound like freshly flowing blood. Her eyes were far off and hazy, desperately trying to focus on something, anything. She moved as if in slow motion, the noble Aggron shivering in a fashion that chilled Isaac to the bone.[break][break]

The sight was one thing. The other senses were far worse. He could hear her every breath; slow, heavy, and rasping, each one sending her chest shuddering. Each breath was fainter than the last, making the faint gurgle underlining them all too obvious to hear. It smelled like a coal mine after an avalanche, powdered stone and decay intertwined with one another. Searing burns shot across his arm, the pain of a backfired Mega Evolution carved into his memory.[break][break]

This was the agony that he wanted to inflict on someone he had once worked with, someone who had nothing to do with his tragedy.[break][break]

The sound of sizzling skin and an alarmed cry snapped Isaac out of his nightmare. Volcarona was itself again, and it had just hit Aubrey with a Heat Wave while backed against the ropes. She was already weary enough from the Head Smash; as she staggered back, trying to square up, it was clear to Isaac that she was fading.[break][break]

"Not today. Not again," Isaac said, his whisper too soft for the modulator to even pick up on. Volcarona was too injured to give chase. This was his chance. He refused to let it slip through his fingers.[break][break]

Isaac broke into a full tilt run, charging past Annalise and tossing something from his belt down at her feet. Aubrey followed in his footsteps, panting heavily from exertion as she tried to keep up. Recovering her Pokeball was the easy part; as soon as he scooped it up, he lobbed it her way, recalling the Scrafty before she risked any further injury.[break][break]

That left the hard part; getting the hell out of here. Isaac tossed down his second Pokeball, finally freeing a second hand and letting his ace in the hole out of its Pokeball. The shiny Dhelmise that emerged settled into Isaac's grip, Isaac lashing it back and flinging it towards the nearest rocky outcropping. Its Anchor Shot was less of an attack and more of a grappling hook, pulling Isaac away from this nightmare far faster than he could run.[break][break]

Maybe Annalise would give chase. Or maybe she would be distracted first by what Isaac had tossed at her feet. It couldn't have been another Pokemon; it would have gone off by now if so. The same would have applied to a weapon, like a grenade or molotov cocktail. So what in the world could it have been?[break][break]

If she took the time to look, she may notice a Hyper Potion resting by her feet.[break][break]

TEAL DEER;[break]
Isaac tries to have his bastard arc.[break]
The fresh trauma of death slaps that shit down.[break]
Isaac switches Aubrey (Scrafty) for Sanford (Dhelmise) and fucking bolts, using Anchor Shot to go Fast.[break]
As he runs, he leaves a Hyper Potion by Annalise's feet, hoping to at least prevent another death tonight.

[break][break]

[break]

[attr="class","skullimg"]

[attr="class","skulltitle"]導通抵抗

[attr="class","skullbody"]So she knew.[break][break]

Isaac had been hoping to avoid this. He had intentionally swaddled himself up in layer upon layer of mystery just to prevent that from happening. Yet, one by one, those layers had been torn away from him. His mantle had become a liability, tossed aside before it could threaten him. His padded clothes had been broken through, ruined by shot after meticulous shot. And his composure had died alongside with his Aggron. In place of mystique, only a broken down husk remained.[break][break]

Yet these were not the only layers to be stripped away. So, too, had the man that Annalise once knew been broken down. Where he had once seemed cocky and able to take on the world, weariness and bitterness had rushed to fill the spaces between. He caused hurt, and he had been hurt. He caused trauma, and he had been traumatized. With each day, more and more strain pushed against the facade, threatening to finally make it snap.[break][break]

He wanted to tell Annalise that man was dead. Yet, if he was, who threw that potion?[break][break]

Sighing, he reached not for his belt but for his face. He slipped aside the mask that wasn't him to show a glimpse of the mask that was. The soft, form-fitting black skull was a stark contrast to the hard white shell that had encased it. Even as he forced a smile on his face, his voice was pathetic and small. "Congratulations on the promotion, Head Ranger,"[break][break]

If only she knew why his heart bled today. If only she knew that he was fully prepared to make her share in his pain, only to back down when he had been so acutely reminded of how it felt. Today, his heart bled not out of love and care for his fellow man, but because it had been torn from his chest.[break][break]

Yet hers did. She displayed an honor in these horrid circumstances that Isaac knew he could never live up to. She could have taken his gift and spat in his face, turning the Pokemon whose life he had just spared against him. And yet, the Volcarona was nowjere to be found. She could have had her Altaria rain fire and brimstone down upon him as he rappelled up the mountain. Instead, she just stared him down, letting words stand where actions could have, maybe even should have.[break][break]

He hadn't been lying. He genuinely couldn't think of better hands to leave the Rangers in.[break][break]

Of course. That explained everything, didn't it? She wasn't a soldier. She wasn't a warrior. She was a guide and a protector. They all were. Yet here they were, being marched to the front lines of Dahlia's war. Just like Josh Devlin. Just like Julia Davis. The idea of any of them fighting, dying, losing their innocence as he had . . .[break][break]

"You shouldn't be here," he said, voice cold and low to try and hide the pain that bubbled beneath the surface. He tried to make it sound like a threat. He really did. But as he looked up at someone who he realized he genuinely admired, it rang hollow.[break][break]

"I wish you weren't."

[break][break]

[break]

[attr="class","skullimg"]

[attr="class","skulltitle"]導通抵抗

[attr="class","skullbody"]Annalise's expression was hard as she loomed over Isaac, her Altaria's advance slow and menacing. Isaac flinched away reflexively. As he did, Sanford swung in front of him, the Dhelmise's Growth causing it to puff up menacingly. Its chain shook as it let out an ominous howl.[break][break]

It was funny. Isaac never felt like he understood what Sanford was thinking. The Dhelmise was so poker-faced that, for the longest time, Isaac hadn't even been able to think of a nickname for it. Yet, when push came to shove, it sprang to his defense without even needing prompting. Had it started to bond with Isaac, one lost soul to another? Or was it just protecting him for the sake of the mission?[break][break]

Desperation tightened Annalise's throat as much as it tightened Isaac's chest. His breath hitched a little, yet he clenched his fist tightly around Sanford's chains to steel his nerve. "You're wrong. Rocket started this whole shitty mess, but we're not the ones turning the Rangers into conscripts," Isaac said. "I know you can fight. But that doesn't make you a soldier. Brutality. Bloodshed. Being ready to kill the first person your eyes meet. War is for soldiers. Not you."[break][break]

Annalise wasn't the only person he meant. After all, had he not had every opportunity to finish her Volcarona off? An enemy resource, rare and powerful, lying broken and near-helpless before him. It would have been trivial to have Aubrey boot it in the head as they made their escape. Instead, such was his trauma, his guilt, his heart, that he gave aid to his own enemy.[break][break]

No matter how hard he tried, he didn't have the nerve. He wasn't a soldier.[break][break]

Then why was he even here? Why the fuck did he fight? Because the big bad shadow man props his feet up, and all the underbosses fight over who gets to lick his boots? He didn't fear Walsh. He didn't respect Walsh. He didn't even know the first thing about the guy! All he knew was the people he respected respected people who respected Walsh, and the people he feared feared people who feared Walsh.[break][break]

He wished he knew what they were fighting for. They were disrupting a plan to stave off the apocalypse to buy five more seconds to mine a meteor, because of Reasons. They were sieging a town full of innocents to grab a few drops of a complete unknown energy source, because of Reasons. Some of the Underbosses distrusted it. Some of the Grunts thought it was madness. Rocket's more independent agents shrugged and tried to find where it benefitted them. But there was only one man that seemed gung ho about this plan.[break][break]

Everyone was marching into battle after a shadow.[break][break]

Yet it wasn't the shadow whose flag Isaac marched under. "I'm not fighting for any of that," Isaac said. "I'm fighting to protect the people I love. The people who so many here would round up and slaughter without a care in the world. The people who slipped through the cracks of this Arceus-forsaken region and were forced to thrive in the abyss. The people who have been failed, time and time again, and whose only escape leaves them branded for life. They're why I'm even here."[break][break]

"And you know what?" Tears climbed over the eyeholes of his mask as he tried his damndest to hold it all together. He thought of Ashley Shepard, who he had lost track of when Knuckles rushed him away from that sniper with every bit of energy she had. He thought of Johanna Joy, who he hadn't even seen, let alone knew if she was alright. He thought of ana fell, who was probably worried sick about him back at Petalburg. He thought of Kiryu, and the horrible fate that befell her because of his negligence.[break][break]

"I failed them all."[break][break]

TEAL DEER;[break]
They're, uh.[break]
They're still talking.[break]
Seriously.[break]
Nothing to see here.[break]
We might be at this for a while.

[break][break]

[break]

[attr="class","skullimg"]

[attr="class","skulltitle"]導通抵抗

[attr="class","skullbody"]A spat? A spat!? Is that seriously how Annalise thought he felt about all of this? After what he had seen? After what he had been through? After what had been taken from him? Isaac's brow knit hard enough to wrinkle his mask. His fists squeezed so hard that Sanford's chain started to cut through his gloves. He squeezed his eyes shut, holding back the tears that threatened to flow freely the second they opened.[break][break]

And then he screamed to the heavens.[break][break]

"They shot Kiryu right in front of me!" It was half a roar, half a wail, and half a desperate plea for understanding. "She's dying as we speak! Alone! In pain! That Pokeball's the only thing keeping her stable right now! And for what? Some war I didn't even want? That I don't even believe in? Because I said the wrong thing, at the wrong time, to someone more cold-blooded than I could ever be?"[break][break]

He punched the surface of Mt. Pyre hard enough to chip the stone. The white hot pain that shot through his hand was nothing compared to the agony throbbing inside of his heart. "It's all the League's fault," Isaac said, forehead pressed to the wall of the mountain. His shoulders shook with such force that they threatened to snap off of his back. "And Rocket's fault. And my fault. For getting her into this mess in the first place. Not just today. But all those months ago."[break][break]

He turned to look over his shoulder, glaring at Annalise. "Is that really what you think? That I think this is a spat?" His derisive laugh at the concept sounded more like a broken sob. "This isn't a spat. This is a war. This is the beginning of the end of my life. And I don't get a choice in if I fight it or not. None of us do."[break][break]

He forced himself to turn around in full, facing Annalise for the first time since he spoke. "Let's say you're right. I don't have to do this. If I leave, I'm dragged back into this war, one way or another, and live out the rest of my days in fear until I'm hunted down and killed. My bit part is filled by another set of hands. The wheel keeps turning. Nothing changes."[break][break]

"Or I stay. I stand by the people who mean everything to me. I ease their pains. I lift their spirits. I support them when they need guidance. And maybe, just maybe, I make little impacts where I can. Make things better for everyone stuck in the same boat as me."[break][break]

"You get it now, Anna? At least here, I'm more than useless."[break][break]

Anna loomed overhead, just as the meteor did. They were both inevitable. They were both terrifying. They were both far bigger, far more important than Isaac ever could be. And yet he forced himself to climb anyway. Because all he knew how to do was push onward. It was the only option the path he had been leashed to allowed.[break][break]

He was fighting his fate with everything in him. Yet his fight was pulled right along by its puppet strings.[break][break]

He never had a chance at all, did he?

[break][break]

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