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a thrill of excitement runs up absinthe's spine. she steps forward, black boots crunching in the grass—if there's something out there, affected by the toxic chain, they need to have it. it could also be dangerous, of course, but the chance of discovery? the possibility of getting their hands on it, of prying it apart and figuring out how it ticks?[break][break]

absinthe doesn't think she's ever wanted anything more.[break][break]

at absinthe's side, the form of a frosmoth appears in a flash of white. asbestos blinks. the powder on her wings shakes loose, glittering in the pale morning light like dandruff. without turning her head, absinthe can see the moth's wings flit, and from them emanate tiny spectacles of poison.[break][break]

"let's find it," the chemist says with nonchalance, voice cool as the toxic chain around ruza's neck. in a couple of quick strides, the chemist has caught up to yuina's side, her hands tucked loosely in her pockets. her breath comes in a snarl, filtered through the respirator at the front of her gas mask, the only sound cutting through the silence other than the crunching grass. on her shoulder, asbestos and his wings, toxic scales fluttering to the ground around them.[break][break]

she pauses, eyes narrowing. up ahead, something silhouettes through the fog. beautiful, deadly, adorned with feathers and wings.[break][break]

absinthe's eyes spark with latent electricity. "is that...?"[break][break]

she's heard the tales. she's also been told she should try to kill the thing on sight.[break][break]

she doesn't want to.

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absinthe moves to step forward, reaching out towards the bird—a rising, vicious hunger curling in her stomach. oh, how she yearns to study it, to cut it open and find out what makes it tick. her fingers stretch almost reflexively, claws opening up at her sides. she wants to hold it down. she wants to kill it.[break][break]

but—no. that's not the practical option. they'd be throwing away a perfect opportunity to study a rare creature swathed in the effects of the never rot. they'd be idiots if they didn't try to take it in, to figure out its physiology. it is clear that absinthe has not faced the brunt of this creature's power.[break][break]

the grass crunches beneath her boots as she wrenches herself to a rude stop. through the fog, she turns, and her gaze flares as she stares at yuina with an expression bordering on anger. a tense silence stretches between them, and absinthe's breath comes out in a low, threatening snarl.[break][break]

"are you out of your goddamn mind?" she hisses, voice low and dangerous. "why would we kill it when we could take it back with us? don't you see the opportunity we have right in front of us?"[break][break]

her head snaps back to look at the bird, wings extended out into the sky. her fingers flex at her side. the thought of its blood on her hands sends a shiver down her spine and a flare of hunger through her stomach, and she's reminded horribly of the first time she has ever killed something. she can still remember the animal pinned down on a black wax tray, can still remember the tear of its flesh between her claws.[break][break]

her breath comes out in a low snarl. "you really want to throw that away?"[break][break]

she pauses. her eyes narrow and find purchase on the figure through the fog—a fog that is now turning a noxious purple.

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life is chaotic. the nature of the world is to begin perfect and descend further into madness. threads, once seared into submission, begin to fray at the ends with every eon that passes. seams come undone, stars explode into supernovae. many people, throughout the course of absinthe's life, have told her to destroy that which is wrong, as if that act of menace will prevent the wrongness from seeping back into every facet of life once more. howard slayte tells her to destroy the monkey when she sees it, her husband told her to destroy the parts of herself that were unsightly to gaze upon.[break][break]

once, she did what they told her to. she cut away the rotten pieces of her body with the exacting knife of a surgeon, seeking the perfection of a form loved by the only person she has ever cared about. she changed everything steeped in the darkness of her birth. she was brought into the world broken—she believed cole could make her whole.[break][break]

but, as the porcelain grew over her body, the cracks festered beneath. the darkness grew inside of her, fed by an umbilical cord connected to the hatred that yet clung to her heart. she nurtured the darkness, she prepared for its coming.[break][break]

and then it never came. it died inside of her, and the rot that once defined it seeped back into absinthe's body. the porcelain blackened and cracked. all at once, she wasn't perfect anymore—she never had been. she had only acted like she was.[break][break]

it was the tangled threads of life, slinking around her throat, the throat of a child she never had, and pulled.[break][break]

the child's destruction did not save her. it made her worse.[break][break]

absinthe’s gaze hardens, her breath rattling through the respirator, thick with memory and regret. destruction has always left her empty. she knows that now. entropy had left her battered, bruised, filled to the brim with scars. she tried to destroy the chaos, she tried to avoid it—the only time absinthe has come into contact with entropy and made it to the other side unscathed is when she has instead come to terms with it. when she has tried to guide it. destroying the fezandipiti will only bring ruin. yuina can’t see that, but absinthe does, and she won’t let the chance slip through her fingers.[break][break]

her hand rises slowly, a deliberate motion, her heart thrumming with determination and fury. at her side, asbestos—the frosmoth bound in toxic chains—flares her wings with a soft hiss.pale powder wafts through the air like a warning shot, shimmering with faint poison. absinthe’s voice is low, commanding, and edged with that same menace she keeps hidden beneath her mask.[break][break]

“enough.”[break][break]

asbestos obeys without hesitation. her wings beat once—twice—and the world is swallowed in a swirling gale. the fog thickens, turning into a torrent of snow, ice, and toxins. the battlefield is engulfed in a brutal blizzard, whiteout conditions that swallow yuina, her pokémon, and the fezandipiti in a freezing vortex. flakes whip through the air, tearing at skin and fur alike, as the temperature drops rapidly, the landscape buried beneath a sheet of cold.[break][break]

the intent is not just to freeze. it’s to halt, to overwhelm, to remind. remind yuina what it feels like to be powerless—just as absinthe has been powerless so many times before. a storm born of control, yet driven by chaos, a reflection of the world yuina wants to fight and the world absinthe longs to understand.[break][break]

“stop this,” absinthe snarls over the howl of the blizzard, her mask vibrating with the force of her words. “you think destroying it will set you free? it won’t. you’ll cut it down, and the rot will find its way into something else. you can’t fight it this way.”[break][break]

her boots crunch through the snow as she steps closer to yuina, unbothered by the frigid air slicing across her skin, no worse for wear as her mask filters out the toxins in asbesto's snow. the frosmoth flits above her, toxic chains dragging through the snow with an eerie hum. i’s scales continue to flutter down, lacing the wind with poison that’s subtle, but ever-present—a reminder that this storm is absinthe’s to command.[break][break]

"i don't give a shit about your freedom,” her voice is sharp, a scalpel cutting through the storm. “if you want to kill it, you will need to get through me.”

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