[attr="class","aurelie"]

[attr="class","aurelie_body"]Again, the more impassioned Isaac grew, the colder and more impassive Aurelie became in response. She crossed her arms and listened silently to his long diatribe about his wretched origins and many tragic life experiences that had brought him so much suffering—and about how he was special because he'd overcome them all through grit, determination, and sheer stubbornness.

He meant well, she supposed. He was trying to inspire and encourage her. He was sharing his truth and making himself vulnerable before her so that she would look deep inside herself and consider her own words and feelings, which had clearly upset him.

When Isaac was done, she nodded neutrally. "Thank you for telling me all that. I'm glad you got away from your terrible parents that never showed you love," she said, picking her words with care.

"I'm even more glad you didn't end up killing yourself because you were tricked in the digital simulation," she continued with complete sincerity. "I'm glad you kept pushing yourself and clawing yourself out of danger. You're right, that is what makes you special."

Aurelie sighed and slowly rose to her feet from the position she'd sank into out of shock earlier. "And maybe you're right. Maybe everyone is special. Maybe everyone is wonderful and deserving of good things.

"But the way I see it... It was never about how you were born or where you came from, Isaac. It's like metal," Aurelie explained, turning away from Isaac to gaze unseeling at the ocean. "I've used leaf springs and axles from discarded lawnmowers and cars in the junkyard. I've used high-tech alloys made using powder metallurgy. It doesn't matter where they came from, as long as I can test them and figure out their properties before I use them."

Her voice was still cool and detached. "But all alloys aren't created equal. Some respond to the forging, tempering, and quenching process by splitting apart, cracking, or snapping into pieces. Some grow stronger and more flexible and ductile. It all depends on their chemical composition: what elements were added in what percentage to the iron or steel. It only matters what it—what you—are made of. Who you are inside.

"You're a unique alloy, Isaac. You have the lightness and versatility of aluminum, the strength of steel, the flexibility and conductivity of copper, and the utter resistance to tarnishing and corrosion of...of gold or platinum. I wouldn't hesitate to use you as a scalpel, a sword, or a crowbar."

She shrugged. "And maybe I have some of those properties too. Maybe I could be capable, eventually, of all the things you've already done. But I haven't been tested, forged, hammered, and tempered as you have. And until I have... I don't feel I've earned[ a miracle."

That wasn't all of it, but it was enough for now. And it was certainly as much as Aurelie was willing to say at the moment. The new distance between them was already manifesting in interesting ways.

Now, Aurelie perked up, looking genuinely curious and intrigued, and more like herself. "But! One moment, Isaac. Did you just ay say that even legends are taking notice of you? I'm going to guess that you're not just referring to Shadow Lugia or Necrozma, either. Or Chien-Pao or Zamazenta either. Which legend? What happened?"

[attr="class","cred"]VEL OF PIXEL PERFECT

[attr="class","topimage"]

[attr="class","textbox"]"No."[break][break]

The more Aurelie spoke, the more Isaac's heart started to pound. It was funny. One would think someone who had grown up cast aside, looked down upon, and dismissed at every turn would crave words like that. It would be the validation they never had growing up, proof that they weren't just not worthless but instead worth more than they could have ever imagined. It was like a fairytale come true. Perhaps, back when he was young and angry and alone, Isaac thought hearing that was all he could have wanted.[break][break]

Yet it wasn't. Hot tears of rage burned at the corners of his eyes. His hands curled into fists, his grip tight enough to turn his knuckles white. A million thoughts tried to force themselves out of his head, all silenced in a single, shuddering breath. When Isaac finally found the ones he wanted, his voice shook.[break][break]

"Why does everybody have to say that?" Cygne. Ashley Shepard. Caleb Harcourt. Now, even Aurelie. "I am sick and tired of being put on a fucking pedestal! Do you even hear yourself right now? Talking about me like I'm some kind of perfect little diamond in the rough? Acting like I deserve better than you, because I am better than you?"[break][break]

"I don't give a fuck what anyone deserves!"[break][break]

Anguish bled through Isaac's voice, a roar that threatened to shake the heavens themselves. The skies, once as clear as crystal, tore open. This lonely little precipice, where two friends were forced to face each other down, had become engulfed by its own personal rainstorm.[break][break]

"I'm a coward. I'm quick to anger. I'm too stubborn for my own good. I spent four years hustling people because it was easier than getting a job. I work on a ton of projects because it's easier than working on myself. There's a lot about me that just flat-out . . . sucks!" Drip. Drip. Drip. His words fell, sharp and cold, like the rainfall from above. "And you know what? None of that changes a damn thing. I suck, and my life matters. And so does everyone else who sucks."[break][break]

"I didn't 'earn' a new lease on life because of all that fighting I did. I did all that fighting because I was lucky enough to get bailed out in the first place." Had he never gone to the digital world, would he even be standing here? "Sure, not everyone's gonna use their chance how I did. But I'm me, and they're them, and they can all shine in ways nobody else can."[break][break]

Some people broke under stress, but if massaged into new comfort zones could grow far beyond the limits the world put on them. Some people were best alone, others were best with the world as their stage. And then there were all little people leading small, simple lives, which were nonetheless the most beautiful and precious things they would ever experience. Who cared if they couldn't be him?[break][break]

"I'm not fighting for a world where people need to earn their miracles. I'm fighting for a world where everyone gets a chance."[break][break]

Unlike Aurelie, it was much harder for Isaac to change on a dime. He wore his heart on his sleeve, and it was clear where and how it had broken. Nevertheless, he considered her words, because even as her judgments and his traumas became suffocating she would always mean the world to him.[break][break]

"Suicune saw that dream. And they saw what I would risk to fight for it." Suicune had saved him, and yet they hadn't. If Echo hadn't fought through death itself to save him, the two would have never met. "So they decided to help me fight."

[attr="class","aurelie"]

[attr="class","aurelie_body"]Conversely, the more exasperated and outraged Isaac grew, the more Aurelie's cold demeanor warmed up with flickers of amusement and even merriment. At moments, she looked like she was only barely holding herself from smirking at his indignant tirade. Only her affection for Isaac and her grasp of how seriously he took this issue restrained her.

"Good grief, Isaac, I never said you were perfect," she finally chuckled, raising her arms in a futile effort to shield herself from the sudden rainstorm. "I'm sorry that you've heard this so often from other people and that it...what is the phrase? Pisses you off so much."

She would have smiled at this point, if the pelting rain weren't making her feel so chilly and bedraggled that all she could manage was a sigh. "Forgive me. I didn't realize it was such a sore spot, though perhaps I should have. I never meant for you to start ranting about your faults and your, uh, sucking. I know you're not perfect, and I'm sorry that it sounded like I was saying you were. I'm sorry that other people kept saying that you were.

"Look, if you prefer, I'll go back to punching you instead of praising you." She chuckled again.

Then Aurelie brushed more raindrops out of her eye and put her hands on her hips in a gesture that seemed more weary than defiant. "What I was trying to say with my metal metaphor is that you're a good person. You're a great person. And you've been through a lot, suffered so much, reacted to so many things by trying to do the right thing and become stronger rather than giving up, and worked so hard to fight for others, protect them, and do kind and selfless things for them.

"So, maybe you do or don't deserve more than I do. But it seemed like it was your turn for a miracle. And maybe mine will come later. I don't know. I still don't know how much I want it or even what I want," Aurelie concluded candidly.

Eyeing Isaac narrowly, as if wary of another impending outburst from him, the redhead shrugged and let her shoulders slump. "That's all. Arceus! I understand your point. I hear your message, I appreciate what you're trying to say, and I admire your mission and your dream. Maybe we do all deserve our own miracles."

Maybe the real miracle will be that he actually accepts this and stops shouting at me so much, she thought wryly. Well, right now, I'll take that much. Whether Isaac did believe her or not, at least she hoped he wouldn't insist on forcing her to change her mind this instant, possibly by shouting at her even more.

Well, if he did, she would tell him the same thing she said when he suggested earlier that he could help her switch her allegiance and get into the League's good graces. Don't. Moods could be changed in a minute. Minds couldn't.

When he told her about Suicune, Aurelie's expression softened, and a touch of pride in him shone in her smile. "Now, of all the surprises you've given me today, that's been the least surprising. Congratulations, Isaac. I'm glad they believe in you and are lending their power to help you."

A sudden, wry smirk crossed her face as she remembered the last time she'd seen someone publicly and spectacularly wield their Legendary avatar powers. "But try not to use Suicune's power to blow up courtyards full of Rockets, will you? Or murder any High Pokemon Kings."

It really had been a very eventful past hour or so since Isaac had arrived on the rocky outcropping and spoken up behind her. Aurelie blew out her cheeks, looking tired and drained as every bit of news sank in and the rain continued to pound down. She sat back down on the rock, letting her feet dangle loosely above the water and watching her Sealeo still paddling serenely amidst the churning waves.

"Well, I'm not going to punch you anymore, and you're not going to arrest me. So, what's next for you, Isaac?" she asked. "What comes next in your grand plan to make this a better, purer, and happier world for everyone?"

[attr="class","cred"]VEL OF PIXEL PERFECT

[attr="class","topimage"]

[attr="class","textbox"]He was pouring his heart out here, and it was amusing her? Anger and hurt warred in the back of his mind, but he bit his tongue and forced them down. She deserved her chance to say her piece. Only the betrayal that winced through his eye with every chuckle betrayed how he felt.[break][break]

Then a raindrop, his raindrop, hit him straight in the forehead. Maybe he'd gotten a little worked up.[break][break]

Slowly but surely, the rage and hurt began to simmer down. In their place, only a weight he couldn't quite place remained. At Aurelie's offer, a million thoughts tried to push through this weight, their voices hollow and numb. How was he supposed to answer her when he didn't even know how he was supposed to feel?[break][break]

"No, it's not-" He stopped himself, sighing. Instead of continuing, he sat at the ledge of the precipice, turning to face the stormy seas. "What you said was really nice. But when you brought it up when I asked why you were hard on yourself . . ."[break][break]

Memories raced through Isaac's mind. The way Cygne did these terrifying, self-destructive things just to try and be useful, all while praising how amazing and special he was. How Caleb Harcourt denied him the messier half of kingship, taking those burdens up himself because he deserved to suffer and Isaac deserved to thrive. How Ashley Shepard stained his soul in blood so his own hands could be clean.[break][break]

Yet it went further than that. It went all the way back to those earliest days, where the shoe was on the other foot. El Sunderland had been the golden child. El had been the good one. Smarter, kinder, more talent, more potential . . . they were Better, and that meant they deserved the world Isaac had been deprived of.[break][break]

"When I was growing up, deserving more meant someone else had to get less." He looked so tired now. How long had he carried this worldview's burdens while fighting so staunchly against them? "It was a zero sum game, and one that'd been rigged against me from the start. Now I'm the one getting all the praise, and all I can think is how much I'm taking away from everyone else."[break][break]

Now it was his turn to laugh in the face of his own pain. "Am I just afraid of being loved? Fuck, that's pathetic."[break][break]

Isaac wished he could say he was fighting for some incredible goal passed down from on high, all out of the goodness of his own heart. That would be a lie. Ultimately, he was still the same scared, lonely, haunted little boy, pushing against everything he knew so nobody in the world would ever have to be like him.[break][break]

"I'm sorry, Aurie." Because as much as he needed to rage against the light he'd been plunged into, none of this was her fault. How was she supposed to know what had been taken from him? "It's okay not to know what you want, y'know. I mean, come on, look at me. Do I look like I've got a clue? I figured I'd just get Caleb out of there, and maybe die with a clean conscience."[break][break]

"Now look at how much I've gotta live with." What was once a storm of grief and pain had petered down to a strange, soothing melancholy. Each cool, refreshing droplet seemed to frame Isaac as he spoke. "I'm never gonna think I deserve this. But, if life's gonna give me this chance, it's only fair I do the best I can with it, right?"[break][break]

"Maybe that's the only next step there is, for any of us."

[attr="class","aurelie"]

[attr="class","aurelie_body"]As Isaac's mood slowly calmed and the rainstorm calmed with him, Aurelie truly began to grasp the extent of his powers—and his bond with Suicune. She realized, then, how truly hurt and upset Isaac must have been, not only during his outburst but also when he saw her amused reaction. And when he spoke up again, she slowly began to grasp why.

"I didn't realize," she murmured, feeling guilt-stricken. It didn't absolve her, of course, but it was true all the same. "I didn't understand..."

Aurelie had known that Isaac had grown up in Hoenn. She remembered his hints and occasional stories of a troubled, unhappy childhood. Even with that knowledge, though, she still struggled to comprehend the circumstances he described now. Having grown up in a close-knit, loving family, she couldn't fathom family support and love being a zero-sum game, not truly.

In her family, while her mother had favored her little brother while her father tended to favor Aurelie, that had been both understandable—like called to like, after all—and ultimately minor. For the most part, she and her brother had received similar treatment and opportunities. The idea that one sibling would get everything, while the other would be deprived...

Arceus, the one time I ever ran into a zero-sum situation with my family was what caused me to leave Kalos forever, Aurelie thought, unconsciously clenching her jaw, even as she shook her head in wonderment. And it wasn't like I had to. I could've stayed. I had prospects even if I stayed. It was just... Her hand strayed toward her eyepatch and brushed the edge, slowly.

"No, I'm sorry, Isaac," she murmured, lowering her gaze. "I'm sorry that you grew up like that. I'm sorry it scarred you to the point that praise and love are so painful for you, though Arceus knows I understand why. No one should have a childhood or family like that."

It only reinforced even more in Aurelie's mind how good Isaac was, and how noble. So many people in his position—probably including her, honestly—would react to his upbringing by becoming selfish and insatiably greedy, wanting to claim everything for himself and never letting anyone else have anything he didn't have.

Instead, Isaac feared other people being deprived. When he received something good, he wanted so badly to give back. And the whole time, he was afraid he didn't deserve those good things, or love, or respect, or praise, because he had never gotten those things as a child.

And even more remarkably, the tempest around them was subsiding, which told Aurelie that Isaac's mood was calming and his suddenly more-understandable indignation was, of all things, diminishing. That he was instead trying so hard to understand why she had laughed and realizing she thoughtlessly reacted to the sheer scale of his outburst... It humbled her. In his place, Aurelie would've been roaring at the top of her lungs, stamping both feet, and probably throwing more punches.

But she didn't want to say any of this aloud. Instead, Aurelie said quietly, "It's hard to move past what you grew up with." She smiled sympathetically. "I mean, I still keep thinking the seasons here in Hoenn are weird, because they're not what I'm used to! And this...

"This goes so much deeper than just weather."

She sighed and shrugged again. "Anyway, you're right. The only thing any of us can do is the best we can do.

"But I wondered... Aurelie hesitated but then plunged on. "Especially with Suicune at your side, now, are you planning to take up arms against Rocket as a whole? You haven't summoned up the sea to drown me where I stand, but you'd be a formidable enemy and an incredible asset for the League if you did. And..."

How much have you changed your perspective and allegiance? How far are you willing to go for them? Especially when they also left Caleb to rot in a cell for a whole month, never raising a hue and cry to find him.

[attr="class","cred"]VEL OF PIXEL PERFECT

[attr="class","topimage"]

[attr="class","textbox"]"Don't be. Nothing we can do about it now."[break][break]

Isaac's time with his family had come and gone. So, too, had his time on the road. Even his time with Rocket had come to pass. Now was the next big chapter in Isaac's life, and it was as exciting as it was terrifying.[break][break]

" 'Sides, you said it yourself, right? It was all that forging and testing and polishing and stuff that made me who I am today. Sometimes for the better, sometimes for the worse. But I'm me, and I wouldn't change a moment of it if I could." A wry smile spread across his face. "And trust me. For a moment, I had the chance."[break][break]

How different would his life had been were he to instead reach out to Celebi? Perhaps, ironically enough, only Celebi would know.[break][break]

"You've got that right," Isaac agreed as Aurelie reminisced about how hard it was to unshackle one's self from their past. "But maybe moving past it's the wrong way to go about it. We're always gonna have that tie holding us down, right? Maybe instead of moving past it all, we've just gotta grow away from it, instead." His feet may have been firmly planted in the ground, but he'd reach for the stars until his fingers grazed the clouds.[break][break]

It all went so much deeper than the weather, and Aurelie had found the deepest run of them all.[break][break]

"It's . . . complicated." Isaac's features took a turn for the serious. "It's not you guys I want to fight. But . . . I've seen what Rocket does to people when it gets its claws in them. Just look at Ashley Shepard. Before he got dragged back into this life, he had the kind of smile I could only dream of having. But trying to be a perfect Grunt broke something in him, and trying to rise up the ranks and change things around here just forced those cracks deeper and deeper, harder and harder, until . . ."[break][break]

The man he loved like a brother, so casually jumping to murder as a first resort. Letting himself suffer under any weight, any indignity, any pain, just to try and protect those he loved. Straining against an organization too small for a heart so big, and letting it rend him like barbed wire in a desperate attempt to fit. Rocket couldn't change him, no matter how hard he tried to change, and now it would break him.[break][break]

"I'm always going to fight for the Rockets I love. And that means I need to fight the biggest threat to them."[break][break]

"Rocket."

[attr="class","aurelie"]

[attr="class","aurelie_body"]Aurelie's eye widened briefly in astonished surmise when Isaac quietly reflected that for a moment, he apparently was given a chance to alter the past. A chill of foreboding ran down her spine, as if she had suddenly been brushed by a huge, unseen wing. Arceus, these Legendaries! They're so powerful, so…unknowable, she marveled.

It made her regard Isaac with a renewed sense of growing wonder and deepening alienation. And now, he's part of them.

But then, feeling small and weak and mortal compared to someone brilliant and gifted, whom she loved like a brother, was nothing new to Aurelie. She sighed and smiled pensively. "Grow away from the past, huh? I like that," she echoed, slowly nodding her head in thought.

"If nothing else, I guess it's probably healthier to think of ourselves as trees instead of...oh, I don't know, trucks or trains or something like that," Aurelie mused aloud. "It's smart to accept that we can't leave everything behind.

"Otherwise, if you try and things from your past keep catching up to you anyway... Ugh. It'd probably feel like you were being hunted down by your own self, somehow."

When Isaac shared the stories about what Rocket did to its members, including his friends and loved ones, and how that drove him to oppose the organization of Rocket, though, the muscles in Aurelie's jaw rippled again. Of course, she bore no love for Declan Walsh and the mad, greedy, bloodthirsty plans he concocted and carried out. She still dreamed of overthrowing him somehow, someday, some way.

But hearing Isaac say these things not as a Rocket grunt but as a new-minted League recruit... Even if Isaac's heart hadn't changed—yet—things were different now because of his new allegiance. Someday his loyalties would change. And how much could he protect and fight for "the Rockets he loved"—from the outside?

"I see," Aurelie said at last, her tone soft but slightly skeptical. "Betraying Rocket so that you could save it from itself, huh? So you could save us from our bad, dark, criminal selves?"

The thought, for all its nobility, integrity, and typical Isaac good-heartedness, rankled. To save us from our base, dark, criminal selves and lead us to the blessed light of salvation and good, clean, honest living, right?

"I know, I know, you didn't really betray Rocket as much as you were being true to a person you loved," she hastened to add. "And you wouldn't have left if you weren't forced to...with a bullet, no less."

Then Aurelie smiled ruefully and spread her hands wide, keeping her words and expression gentle, all too aware now of the fearsome specter of Isaac's new powers. "And honestly, I'm sure if anyone could save us from our dark, doomed cycle of depravity and destruction, it'd be you and Suicune."

[attr="class","cred"]VEL OF PIXEL PERFECT

[attr="class","topimage"]

[attr="class","textbox"]Criminal.[break][break]

It was funny. Isaac had always hated how reductionist the League's arguments about Rocket could be. He hated how the person behind the mask was tossed to the wayside, smothered and suffocated beneath labels. He hated how "criminal" was the softest of these, just a lead-in to far worse condemnations.[break][break]

He hated how his guts roiled at this new reversal. He hated how taking it so lightly, downplaying everything they'd done as being a bunch of "bad, dark criminals," made him want to scream. He hated how flimsy the shield he'd always hid behind looked from the other side.[break][break]

More than anything, he hated seeing it in the hands of someone he respected - no, admired.[break][break]

"How is any of this criminal?" Criminals didn't declare open war over every new speck of land that made itself present. Criminals didn't twist gods and monsters under their control to dance at the edge of the apocalypse. Criminals didn't enslave an entire region of the globe, exploiting it as mercilessly as they had Caleb Harcourt. "This is insane."[break][break]

"I'm never going to tell you what you have to be. But be honest with me about what we are."[break][break]

We. Because it didn't matter how much Isaac denounced them. He had been a part of Rocket for a year and a half. He was always going to carry that burden, both in the eyes of Hoenn's people and in his own blood-slicked conscience. Even if he shed it, he could never shed the love he held for those he had to leave behind. To have them lie to his face, through manipulation or outright delusion, hurt like nothing else.[break][break]

So, too, did the conclusion he had come to. He hated those labels, those oversimplifications, those judgments. Even moreso, he learned, he hated this dance around them, this refusal to acknowledge the truth that haunted him more with every passing night.[break][break]

Team Rocket were terrorists, more a hostile regime than some crime family, and he was sick of pretending they weren't.[break][break]

Was Aurelie right? Could he break their cycle? Was she even saying that in good faith? Or was she just mocking someone who she had loved like a brother, once? Doubt clouded Isaac's mind, born from a cruelty far worse than if she'd simply attacked him. Who was his torturer? An uncaring world or someone he'd adored with all his heart?[break][break]

Which would be worse?[break][break]

Nevertheless, he did what he always had. He smiled, because if he ever let life fake that from him he knew there would be no coming back. He refused to let it have that win. For every person on each side to make him feel the crushing hopelessness of his dream, there was another who saw him as a shining beacon. He refused to let them down.[break][break]

"I'll do my best," he promised, smile tearful, because for Isaac Merlo there was only ever one direction.[break][break]

Forward.

[attr="class","aurelie"]

[attr="class","aurelie_body"]Aurelie wasn't sure herself if she was making fun of Isaac or if she genuinely believed in him and his mission to reform and rescue Rocket. Probably a bit of both. Somehow it seemed fitting, much like how she both loved and hated him right now for who he was and what he'd done. Probably much like he most likely loved and hated her right now for her manifold negative reactions to his words.

She didn't see at all why coming to this island even was criminal, let alone "insane". Scientists had detected a new, unknown energy source on this island, and Rocket wanted it. And why shouldn't they? The League was here because they wanted it too, weren't they? Should Rocket simply roll over and let them have it because they were "the good guys" or "needed it more"?

Was it really so different from two oil companies racing to claim a newly discovered mother lode of oil somewhere? Two treasure hunters competing to unearth a valuable relic? Two scientists fighting to be the first to discover a cure to a plague? To be sure, Rocket was fighting dirty and sabotaging their rivals, even going so far to maim and kill, but the League didn't always hold back either.

But Isaac was right, overall. Aurelie still hated what Rocket did with the meteoroid—could it really have been only a year ago now? On the eve of region-wide apocalypse, Rocket's mission was to...mine the meteoroid for its minerals. Not to save anyone, not to help, not to boost their chances to survive—just to mine for riches.

That was assuredly insane.

"You're not wrong," Aurelie admitted, sighing and slumping slightly. "I think...I think sometimes I forget what we have been recently. And I think of what I want Rocket to be."

Because she wanted them to be just unscrupulous criminals. Thieves. Renegades. People without concern over rules and regulations, who did the things that ordinary League civilians could only dream of.

"But...maybe you're right," she conceded. "That's not why we are. I want it to be different, and I hate thinking about it, but that doesn't mean it isn't the truth."

She smiled weakly, self-mockingly. "Remember that ice cream vent session we had last year? You, me, and Ruby." Aurelie sighed again, softly and regretfully, at the thought of the fiery, prickly, and resourceful Ruby Garcia.

"I thought...Arceus help me, I thought you and she and I would fight together, side by side, to change Rocket. From the inside. To overthrow the bosses we despised and change Rocket for the better. Or at least, a little less bad." Now, she exhaled a long, melancholy breath.

"But...I'm not a crusader. I wouldn't even know where to begin. And Ruby...I don't know where she's gone, but I haven't seen her in months. And you..." Aurelie smiled sadly. "You fought, for sure. You still fight. And I can see you still dream the same dream.

"So, I'm sorry again, I guess. I should give you more credit." She crossed her arms tightly and protectively in front of herself. "I just wish it'd been different. But...like you said, we just have to grow past it, right?"

Her smile now was faint but genuine, if still very sad. "So, congratulations, Isaac. On making it to where you did, on staying true to yourself, and on surviving. And...good luck."

[attr="class","cred"]VEL OF PIXEL PERFECT

[attr="class","topimage"]

[attr="class","textbox"]"That's how I tried to cope this whole time." A soft, sad smile spread across Isaac's face as he gently nudged Aurelie's slumping shoulders with one of his own. "First I told myself it wasn't so bad. Then I told myself I was gonna make this place better. Then that, even if it was too late for me, I was gonna lighten the load for people like us. But when even that seemed so useless . . ."[break][break]

Was it any wonder he broke away to save Caleb Harcourt? After all his attempts to lift his loved ones up only lead them deeper down this winding trail, what else was he supposed to do? At least this way, he could save someone. With a little more work, he could save himself. Maybe, if he put his heart, his soul, his blood, his sweat, and his tears into it, he could even save the world.[break][break]

This, too, was insane. But at least it wasn't an insanity that broke entire regions over its knee.[break][break]

Ruby Garcia had been gone for so long. He missed her so badly. He'd hated seeing her pains, the cracks they spread deepening by the moment no matter how hard she tried to hide it. He wondered if she'd been as crushed as Aurelie, as Naomi Sato, as Tempest Quinn and even bryan delarosa had been. He wondered if she'd even gotten his parting gift.[break][break]

He wondered if she knew that she was one of the people he'd done this for.[break][break]

"Only 'cause I have people worth fighting for." A weary laugh escaped him as he pondered the absurdity of this whole situation. Him, the wayward jester of the trio, being the "sole survivor" in that fight. "Arceus, I'd be happier if I was never wrapped up in this whole mess. If I could just run away from it all and live life on my own terms. A vigilante. A phantom thief. Maybe even some kinda black knight."[break][break]

"But it's way too late for that, huh?"[break][break]

Maybe it'd take another five years. Maybe it'd take another ten. Maybe it'd take until he dropped. Even when this half of the war ended, the other half would rage on. How would a League fattened on blood adapt to peacetime? No longer held up by an irredeemable enemy, how would they make themselves accountable? That, too, would be a battleground in the war for Hoenn's soul.[break][break]

Only after it was all over, when he was old and grey and so, so tired, would he let himself rest. It might end up being his final rest, for all he knows. Would he have lived up the belief Suicune held in him? Would he have made the people he loved proud? Would he finally be able to look Arceus in the eye and let go with a clean conscience?[break][break]

Or would he, against all odds, finally get to enjoy his life, relieved of the burden of knowledge?[break][break]

"It can always be different. But that's not for me to decide." Isaac made sure to make that fact clear before Aurelie's entire face started puckering again. "Life your life best you can, Aurie. Let yourself grow, and let that growth take you wherever it needs to. And if you ever do need me, I know you'll find me."[break][break]

He pulled her in for a tight hug. Despite the brave face he tried to put on, his shoulders were shaking. It was clear he knew this may well end up being the last. Even with everything they'd given each other to think about, things would never quite be the same between them. In some ways, it was a good thing. In others, it was killing him.[break][break]

"Thank you." Those last words broke his voice, and with that he fell almost silent. "I'll always love you, sis."

[attr="class","aurelie"]

[attr="class","aurelie_body"]This entire conversation—this entire encounter on this ridiculous rock out in the middle of nowhere in the sea outside the newly risen island—had been such a rollercoaster. Aurelie's emotions and reactions had run the gamut, from angry, hurt, concerned, or disgusted, to self-deprecating, embarrassed, sad, fond, and finally, accepting.

After all that, she was tired. Perhaps not as spiritually and emotionally tired as Isaac, after all his internal struggles and external travails within Rocket and outside it now. But this certainly wasn't some kind of contest. Aurelie just felt worn out, her heart weary and aching.

When he pulled her into a hug at the end, she struggled between the competing impulses to melt into the embrace and to stiffen and pull away in protest. In the end, Aurelie chose the former. She hugged him back just as tightly, her own body trembling as well. Who knows if we'll ever do this again? Or even see each other again?

For all that she'd been gritting her teeth against the too-ready tears, that thought made Aurelie want to cry. And then when Isaac called her "sis" at the end...

"I'll always love you too, mon frère," she managed to whisper back, tears trickling down the sides of her face and from beneath her eyepatch. There was so much more she could say, so much she wanted to tell him or yell at him or murmur affectionately in his ear.

In the end, though, Aurelie settled for the simple and truthful. "I understand what you did. I'm mad at you, but I don't...I don't blame you. And I'll always be here for you, too. If you ever need me..."

As if the avatar of Suicune, the new League recruit with the dizzying network of connections and friendships and with unique skills and strengths all his own, the young man with a heart as big as the entire world and a soul as pure as the waters for which his Legendary partner was famous—and now a man with two working eyes, too—would ever need her for anything. But she wanted to say it. Just as she wanted to say everything else she had just shared, for all that it felt both like Rocket heresy and like the deepest, most genuine, most heartfelt truth at the same time.

"I'll always be thinking of you, wherever you end up," Aurelie told him, finally disengaging herself from the hug, "and wishing you well. I trust you. I believe in you. And...I'm proud of you, Isaac. I always will be."

A faint smile curled the edges of her mouth. With a gesture she remembered doing to her own blood-brother many times, Aurelie tapped the end of his nose with her forefinger. "Stay strong. Keep your wits and your knife sharp. And don't forget to eat your vegetables!"

[attr="class","cred"]VEL OF PIXEL PERFECT

[attr="class","topimage"]

[attr="class","textbox"]For all she was mad at him, for all she tried to safeguard herself from her own emotions, for all she knew the limits of their current situation, Aurelie couldn't hide from the truth forever. She melted into his arms, her own body starting to quiver and her own eye starting to tear up. For a moment, Isaac wanted to firm up, comfort her, do anything to spare her the pain he'd caused.[break][break]

Then, with her own whisper, Isaac broke.[break][break]

He held Aurelie as if he was afraid, the second he let go, she'd turn into dust. His tears spilled into her shoulder, and the breaths he tried to steady now hitched uncontrollably. "Aurie," he sobbed, the only word he could even bring himself to say. A part of him wanted to leave before he continued crumbling to nothing. Another part of him couldn't imagine being anywhere else.[break][break]

He wished he could tell Aurelie how badly he needed her. He wished he could tell her he'd trade all the power in the world just to have her by his side. He wished he could tell her that there would always be a hole in that network of connections that nobody else could ever fill. He wished he could tell her he'd sacrifice the miracle of his eye for hers in a heartbeat.[break][break]

But he couldn't. There was only one way Aurelie could join him, and that would have to be her choice. At least for the time being, both of them chose where they felt they needed to be over each other. It hurt like nothing else, but he couldn't blame her for staying any more than she could blame him for leaving. All he could do was hope that, one way or another, this farce could end and they could be back in each others' lives.[break][break]

"Right back at you, Aurie." As they parted from the hug, his voice was soft and genuine. Bar a few more shudders at the fringes, it was clear he'd composed himself. "And I'm not going to doubt any of that for a moment." Even if he doubted Rocket more and more with each passing day, he could never doubt Aurelie. It was impossible.[break][break]

"Promise me you'll always be you, okay?" The idea of her ever losing herself filled him with dread. "And no matter what this world throws at us, never lose hope on me. Otherwise, I might just have to pay you another visit." One last cheeky grin spread across his face as he took a few steps away from the lip of the promenade. He sighed, worked up a running start, and leaped right off its edge.[break][break]

If Aurelie tried to stop him, her fingers would pass right through. All they would find were the swirling winds Isaac had become.