"The better you."

A face that is more a mask of disdain, an expression worn carfully as it regards its original.

As it is being regarded in turn.

"I'm here to claim what's mine ... ."

And yet, there's a fondness as one glances over the Trubbish by the other's side.

A constant in every instance.

"You're too weak. Too soft. Everyone knows that. Everyone sees that."

A break.

"You should just leave, really. Not even belonging to our dearest trash."

The comfort of the smell of a whole dumpster, focused into one pokémon.

And still, no reply as the face is merely shocked.

Eyes are rolled. A head is tilted. Hands raised.

"Always speechless when it matters most."

"... at least I'm not pretending to be Ms Witty One-Liner."

Cassandra Kubrick

The more Cass' doppelganger talks, the more irritated she becomes. Even if she can't deny the pure shock at being faced with this version of herself, this ... possibility.

You shouldn't exist.

Proudly wearing Rocket garb, she's almost thought it was a non-spooky doppelganger amongst the Rocket members, but it's too same. It's her, one step to the left, really. Maybe too exactly how she imagined herself in a different future. A future in which she now feels like she's given up, given in, caved with only one desire remaining.

I want a peaceful world.

I don't want to be afraid anymore.

I'll ... become the worst there is.

She feels something in her dying twice over as she remembers and it seems that the other remembers, too.

"Oh, finally could speak up, huh?" An arrogant smile that makes her wish Vespa Baskerville would be by her side so they could verbally curbstomp this fraud together, but she needs to brace this herself.

"Sorry, I was just dumbfounded by the nonsense you're blabbering. That's a real talent." Crossing her arms to hide the shaking. "What? You're gonna kill me?"

"I will."

A shiver runs down her spine. It doesn't feel like it's wrong - it doesn't feel like a lie. With the weight of a prophecy, the other approaches with a smile, though its stance remains relaxed. Mocking.

"Really, how could we ever think that there's a difference to be made here?" it continues talking, and she feels Jon pressing against her leg, providing comfort as he hasn't stopped staring at his evolution. Their eyes meet and ... there's recognition. Unlike with their trainers, there's an odd form of respect. "This world isn't worth saving. We can only make it as peaceful for us as we can ..."

Sorrow.

Cass lunges forward in a frenzy, roaring a shout despite her precarious location as she reaches for the other's hair.

The world briefly turns into a mess of purple strands and skin, clawing and being clawed as silent shouting fills the air between two people rolling on the ground. Cass doesn't even really process anything - just knows that she needs to get something between her hands, pull at it, somehow destroy this warped copy.

These hidden desires before anyone could find out about them.

No one is allowed to know. I'm not that.

Anymore.

But she has been. At some moment in her life, she truly believed ... and part of her would still like to. It'd make things easier. She could ignore what morals and ethics there are in this stupid world, could just do as she pleases. Finally, finally cease that constant of fear that dominates her subconscious.

Part of her lost strength, but her doppelganger doesn't take the chance upon it to continue attacking either, as both of them simply are on the ground, still entangled but unmoving.

"You're so fucking weak. And dumb."

"It takes nothing to sway you."

"And that's what you're calling ideals? What's stubborness good for if you're always on the wrong side anyway."

She should smell copper, but she doesn't. There's something between her fingers, but she doesn't dare look.

No reply. Nothing she could say to refute the words of herself, after all. Even as it's warped - it's exactly the warped version that she could have imagined becoming her future, one day. It's exactly another thing she's been afraid of, too.

"Why can't we do anything right?"

A broken voice that speaks aloud the things she doesn't want to be real.

As they both lay on the ground, defeated amongst dying leaves, they both hear plastic rustling, like a bag being kicked around by the autumnal wind. Something else also moves, as both of their trash companions move closer to their trainers.

"I can't be you. Never."

Dirt covers her face, making her tears a muddy colour as well as they fall down her face.

"I just can't."

There's a desperation in her voice. A desperation that she can't quite pin on any single emotion as Jon's trash hand moves to try and stop the tears somehow. The acidity of his touch burns, but she welcomes it. It's comforting as a voice still continues talking, even as it sounds more and more pained.

"You want to be. Or you wanted. Still want, somehow. Despite everything. It must be nice not to fear - it must be nice to have one purpose to stand behind that isn't nebulous world peace. Must be nice to fall in step."

"Lose the ones you care for. Just get new ones, right? A new circle of friends. Just like moving."

"Why can't you just give up?" someone asks, crying.

A slimy touch. A, frankly, gross hand that she's taken with pure delight. Cass tilts her head slightly, looks at Jon next to her side. This angle is weird, but she can still see his thoughtful gaze, the determination that lingers with this little guy.

"Why don't you ever give up?" she whispers.

Within this hand, there's something else. Confused, curious, she pulls herself up from the ground, watches the steady gaze of her doppelganger as she focuses on Jon. The Trubbish (and Garbodor) both of them are fond of, no matter how twisted, distorted.

(Truly a consolation. If it didn't have him ... she probably would've killed it right away.)

"That's ... the first time I had to fill out this stupid career form."

Back when she didn't want to become a hairdresser yet - scientist is noted there, just like mom. Later on, it would change to fashion designer as she's had a particular craze for that, though it then swiftly manifested into hairdresser. Considering the state of her hair right now, a rather embarrassing admission.

But more importantly ... "You kept that."

Jon nods, maybe with a bit of a smug expression, as his body impossibly contains more things that she's simply tossed towards him for food, but he deemed important enough to keep. "And what ... what is this telling me?" she asks him.

The Garbodor in the background moves, the red glow uncharacteristic in its eyes.

"Jon ..." she whispers.

But it merely reaches for her, gigantic fist dripping with poisonous sludge.

The ensuing fight is devoid of any grace.

Cass would like to intervene, but Jon wouldn't allow it - putting Protects behind him, keeping her away from the fight as her doppelganger rises like something malicious. It's one little guy against a big one - David against Goliath, perhaps, except that Jon doesn't have a clever idea to get himself out.

She can merely watch as remnants of her past are spilled onto the decaying leaves.

A flyer about rangers back when she was very young.

An old school book.

So many old diaries that she didn't really wanted to see again.

Pictures of an imaginary friend.

Various notes for various games.

Merchandise she threw away after an obsession has faded.

A half-finished crocheted plushie before she decided to start anew.

Something she can't even recall anymore.

"Jon, stop, please-" she pleads, but he's simply not going down.

Using Pain Split over and over again, healing himself up and reducing the Garbodor's health. Perhaps, trying to make his other self understand, somehow.

And eventually, this, too, becomes a heap of old memories that do not vary too much from the present. Jon moves still, though barely. Endureing it all.

Only one person remains standing on the other end.

"Only because you heal up full doesn't mean it didn't hurt before," she whispers, though Jon doesn't react - simply looks onward, towards the doppelganger that is still around. Looking at its falling companion with a look of sorrow and understanding.

And that's where we differ ... and align, Cass thinks, already feeling the urge to tear into something upon seeing Not-Jon's body that slowly fades into some black sludge, covering the ground before dissipating.

"Finish it."

A calculating look.

"You can't."

Cass looks away, not being able to bear the simple statement. The truth. She is soft, even or maybe especially towards that other self, that alternate future that she wishes wouldn't exist.

After all, it's herself still, a warped version but still. She's selfish to the core.

She can't bear to dismiss even a part of herself that she's come to loathe and fear.

But there's someone else in her stead, standing up for what she can't do.

Jon stands protectively in front of Cass, impossibly tall in spirit as he's looking on death's door. Literally anything would send him over the edge, let him faint so that she'd have to face her doppelganger all alone. But he's here, holding onto a thread so she doesn't have to.

"He's got the best of us," her doppelganger speaks up, the voice neutral but the gaze unspeakably fond. "Carrying what we can't so we can go on. We've also got to bear it, of course, but ... makes it easier."

"That some piece will always be somewhere."

She hates tying that realisation to that version of her, but she also knows that it belongs to it, too.

"Did you give up?"

"No. I gave away. But it never quite left, did it?"

Cass pauses for a moment, before replying, "I suppose not."

TW: MURDER OF YOUR DOPPELGANGER

An almost tender moment shared after bouts of violence. What an irony, she thinks, what a warped version of imagination reality is.

But there's no space for haughty words like this - even if her doppelganger's as down as herself, Cass still needs to put a lid on it. It could recover, and then ... "You can't exist here."

She wonders briefly if it's from another dimension entirely - not only warped from here, but copied over from another universe, another reality. "Where the hell do you come from?" she whispers, though her quiet voice doesn't really ask for a reply.

Either way, she needs to ... she swallows as she tries to look for ... a branch? A pointy one. She has no idea how to make this anything but grotesque, but she hopes that at least there won't be a corpse. Just shadows poofing into the air or something, nothing that remains.

"I think this should work," she eventually finds a sturdy branch and breaks it to make a pointed end. As she moves back to where her doppelganger lays, something wet touches her leg - she doesn't flinch, merely looks down at Jon, looking up at her with his big eyes. His other hand moves to try and grab the branch, even if he's way too small. "I appreciate it, bud, but ... this one, I gotta do myself. You fight for me all the time, don't you?" she smiles.

Fights that more often result in failure than not, leaving her to run, but still.

He keeps enduring it for her.

"And right now, I need you as you are. Don't worry, I'll be fine."

"Eventually, I'll be."

As she hoped for, there's no corpse remaining. She can't exactly recall what happens the moment she killed it, as if her memory glitches in weird odds and ends ways, but ... she and Jon stand now in front of a blank patch. Leaves pressed down in a Cass-shaped form, the only reminder what might have been here.

Jon huddles closer to her, and she pulls him into her arms. A comforting trash bag filled with everything Cass. Everything Jon. Everything of her other pokémon, she assumes, her friends. "You took it, too, right?"

Then, she laughs - a mix of dry and bitter, sweet and sour.

"I should stop asking questions I don't need answered."

"Let's leave."