Elisabeth couldn't refute MATIAS SILPH's view of her. She held no zealous devotion to Rocket, no sense of pride outside of her own power.[break][break]

They were both Sevipers in the grass, awaiting the potential moment they'd have to bite their respective organizations in the heel.[break][break]

"Think bigger," he said, and the illusionary glass ceiling she'd bowed her head beneath glittered, tauntingly, in her mind.[break][break]

Had she become this comfortable limiting herself? Some part of her wondered if she had simply forgotten what it was like to navigate life without constantly being aware of the power that surrounded her. A life without such a hierarchy seemed unreal and foreign to her.[break][break]

"Did you simply swap one cage for another one?" a voice sneered in her mind, uncomfortable and all-knowing. "Did you replace the man you buried with declan walsh? Perhaps you merely found comfort in consistency."[break][break]

Her face flushed with an anger he wouldn't understand, and she turned away, her hand curling into a fist. At his question, however, she snorted. Matias in Rocket indeed.[break][break]

It was difficult to picture, not for the man's temperament, but because of the shambles of his reputation.[break][break]

"Frankly? You'd have more enemies than friends. In Rocket, we are not so... tolerant, so to speak, towards those we disdain." The look she gave him marked him as presumably unwanted company. "People turn more of a blind eye to infighting. Easier to justify sudden disappearances in our line of work. We don't value idealism."[break][break]

Her fist uncurled, and she laughed again, but it was a lighter sound this time.[break][break]

"Though who knows? Maybe that would play in your favor, and you'd simply kill your way into earning people's respect. Though betray the right person in the League, and you'll win the right attention from Rocket right off the bat."[break][break]

She could provide a list of names, but surely he knew of them well enough.

[attr="class","ooc"] MATIAS SILPH[break][break]

[attr="class","pkmn"]

"Oh?" She exhaled a brief staccato of a laugh. "You are used to being the strongest person in the room, Matias. In will, in firepower. But declan walsh does not suffer fools the way that dahlia goode does."[break][break]

Unseen, somewhere, the Tablets of Ruin that Wo-chien bore across its back flared in response to several of the names that ran through her mind, scrolling through them in an unending procession of resentment.[break][break]

"If you want me to name the obvious, fine."[break][break]

She clicked her tongue. Traitors and active threats came to mind first.[break][break]

"Katherine Fairburne. Remiel Calcifet. Razz Kingsman. Any of them would fetch a fine price if you brought their head to Rocket. Though I'd argue the better prize would be your brother, FERNANDO SILPH, or the Commissioner."[break][break]

A mocking smile preceded her next addition.[break][break]

"We'd find Eva Morales more useful alive than dead, I think, were it not for Rayquaza. And rumor has it Councilwoman PENELOPE LIVY has become a bit more vicious lately, hm?"[break][break]

She looked to see if either suggestion might spark a reaction in him, before continuing.[break][break]

"But any Avatar of the League's you could subdue would be welcome. Or any other rats."[break][break]

Such as CIAN MAHER, Rowan Wrynn, and Caleb Harcourt.

[attr="class","ooc"] MATIAS SILPH[break][break]

[attr="class","pkmn"]

"What about him?"[break][break]

She smirked at him, visibly entertained by the notion. With the slow leisure of someone turning a thought over in her mind, she sauntered over to his side before glancing up at him.[break][break]

"You cut off the head of the Hydreigon, and another just grows back. You think you'd usurp the void of power uncontested?"[break][break]

What a laughable scenario. Who would bend their knee to a sole conquering vigilante, when they commanded armies of their own?[break][break]

"You'd need support within Rocket to accomplish such a thing. Support you lack. Competition you'd find in spades, though. With Cillian Quinn. With THEO BECKETT." Her smile shifted to something conspiratorial. "And with me."[break][break]

For all that she'd dealt in shadows, she hungered for power as much as any of the others did.[break][break]

"When SILAS BLACKWELL died, did we simply crown his murderer as his heir? You, of all people, surely know the answer to that question."[break][break]

Though as the wind whispered through the blackened leaves overhead, she wondered how much he knew. She wondered how accurately she could rely on what she thought she knew, when it came to that man.

[attr="class","ooc"] MATIAS SILPH[break][break]

[attr="class","pkmn"]

"So arrogant. You Silphs all think you possess the Divine right of kings."[break][break]

An absent note of condescending fondness echoed in her observation. It amused her, how certain he was over things that felt so absurd.[break][break]

At her feet, a thorny vine curled in on itself in answer to her rippling laughter, blooming with the bruised petals of venomous flowers. She knelt down, plucking it and winding it between her fingers, as a child might make a daisy crown.[break][break]

"What would the benefit be of yoking myself to you, I wonder?"[break][break]

Stepping closer than her common sense would normally allow, she tauntingly placed the makeshift crown on his head, her hand drawing through his red hair before pulling away.[break][break]

"Crowns aren't meant to be split in half, Matias. Our mutual alliance would last until it didn't."

[attr="class","ooc"] MATIAS SILPH[break][break]

[attr="class","pkmn"]

"What a tempting proposition."[break][break]

Though her mockery held a whisper of truth as she let a finger rest on her lips, allowing herself to imagine the possibilities he'd drawn in front of her.[break][break]

What she wanted, and what he wanted, didn't necessarily align in every respect -- though perhaps they didn't have to, in order to achieve a worthwhile result.[break][break]

You could trust a selfish man to be selfish. There was a security in that knowledge.[break][break]

"Cut off the head of your own snake, Silph," she said at last, "and I'll cut off the head of mine."[break][break]

Both of them were better suited where they stood, rooted in the heart of their respective organizations. The closer they lived near its pulse, the better they knew its every vulnerability.[break][break]

"We seize power in our own respective corners of Hoenn. Should we see value in sharing information that helps the other ascend, we do so. Should we see reason to attack one another on the battlefield, we do so. All is in the pursuit of our own goals."[break][break]

One foot cautiously crossed the threshold into treason, while the other remained firmly back in the shadow of loyalty.[break][break]

"And when you stand at the top of the League and I stand at the top of Rocket, then we'll see if all these grand promises still hold."

[attr="class","ooc"] MATIAS SILPH[break][break]

[attr="class","pkmn"]

How unwanted the specter of doubt was, slinking back into her shadow as she considered her relationship to declan walsh. He'd awarded her the position of underboss, true, but that had been in a different time.[break][break]

He'd given that power to a woman who had proven she would obey without complaint when he asked her to risk the destruction of their world. Would she be so obedient now? Would she remain the patient Ekans biding its time beneath the boot of the man who owned her life?[break][break]

"I have no present reason to see him dead," she began slowly, the 'yet' implied if left unspoken. "Rocket is reeling still from the aftereffects of all that has transpired. We have much to distract us, beyond petty usurpings of power."[break][break]

Did they, though? Did anyone, truly, have more to occupy themselves than the constant ladder of ambition?[break][break]

A vague recollection of a conversation with ALEXANDER STONE came to mind, insisting there was more, before she callously brushed it aside.[break][break]

"But seasons change," she said, looking up at him meaningfully. "And with them, any leaf might see reason to change its color."

[attr="class","ooc"] MATIAS SILPH[break][break]

[attr="class","pkmn"]