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With the psychic power pulling him back to his feet, Ash finally was able to breathe a little bit easier. But, as he gets in the oxygen, still a little winded, he turns towards the new friend before him atop the Galarian Rapidash.[break][break]

"Yeah..." He rubs at his neck, as the new Rapidash enters the fray, the trainers readying up another Galarian Rapidash who whined in a very cute way.[break][break]

Ashley stares, and eyes the beast.[break][break]

"Oh my god, she's so cute." He reached down, the female Rapidash enjoying being pet and loved upon. Had it been in the cards, Ashley might have been an equestrian kind of guy. Less a brony, but more just a lover of horses in general.[break][break]

He does look to Paxton, and there's a pause. "Well, you're a natural." A laugh leads to him coughing, as he gets atop of the new Rapidash, the neigh one of joy for the rider.

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[break][break]

He walks through that diner now. In that memory, the way his younger self responds to Jay how his day was. He forgot how nice it was back then. How Jay was then. Before Rocket, before Theo, or Chu-E broke him. He finds himself turning away.[break][break]

This was before that harbor mission.[break][break]

He feels sick.[break][break]

[break][break]

[break][break]

The warehouse was empty. Ash and Jay were dressed all black. He remembers one thing, a big Tyranitar that sat in the warehouse behind those men. A rememberance from a foster father, a scar that wouldn't heal. Silver eyes hold fear.[break][break]

Three goons around them, one Tyranitar. And Ashley looks to Jay, his hand shaking with the gun in hand. He hadn't killed yet by then. He wasn't like them.[break][break]

It shouldn't have been loaded.[break][break]

Part of him wondered if it was Jay. But he shakes that thought away. Even if it had been Jayden, it didn't change the situation. The past can't be changed. What happened... happened.[break][break]

"..."[break][break]

Quiet as a mouse, the cold sweat on Ash was all the more pressing. He didn't... he couldn't.[break][break]

But tonight, he would.

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Burning alone...[break][break]

Believe it or not, Ashley had one more reason he couldn't leave yet. It's selfish, but a part of him knew that there was a way to save jayden cross. The guilt of knowing he turned his back on Jayden back then burns more, corrosive upon his insides, and twisting around each and every one. He knows he can. Isaac saved Caleb Harcourt...[break][break]

Why can't he get Jayden?[break][break]

It's one of the biggest moments since he saw Jayden in that lighthouse near Dewford. It's the part of him that burns the most. He wants to do right what he should have done years and years ago. He doesn't want to leave if it means Jayden stays and becomes worse. But the longer he swims in Rocket depths, the easier it is to drown. He found that out when Cillian Quinn, Theo, and Zev accompanied him to his father's murder. When he found how easy it was to drown in those dark depths.[break][break]

Ashley wasn't a murderer. Well, he was, but he didn't fit the Rocket that was today.[break][break]

The air is hot. The hell burns closer. A step further in, and he knows he has to embrace that fire. If he doesn't more people die. What was his brother's life to four operatives? Four operatives with people who cared about them, sure. But Ash is sympathetic no more.[break][break]

This world is kill or be killed.[break][break]

On the outskirts, within that deadly field of ash, the fire he surrounds himself in swirls and swirls, as he feels a presence nearby. Reinhardt, the Nidoking, looks him over with sulky eyes. Ashley remembers what he was told in the SPECTRA ops. How he cared too much about these beasts.[break][break]

With a hand on Reinhardt's head, Ash smiles.[break][break]

He's not a monster. He'd rather fail a thousand times than to throw that away. He'd rather be beaten by his Rocket associates, than to ever be like them.[break][break]

A buzz on his comms. "Here he comes." Ashley tenses up. His heart does flips harder than a Palafin. His stomach knots further.[break][break]

"Roger. Showtime, people." Ashley stands, removing emotion from his face. Dark eyes awaiting the deed to be done.

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[break][break]

[break][break]

Bad was still bad.[break][break]

Even if it wasn't Chu-e Choi or THEO BECKETT, it was still vile. Sawyer knew abuse. Jayden suffered from it from a familial perspective, one that Sawyer would never truly know. He never had a real family. He didn't know what the feeling was like.[break][break]

But he knew the family he had here. Holding Jay's hand meant he was still here. Holding it meant that Ash was too. Not as Sawyer. Not as this Rocket alias he adopted as his last name, as himself.[break][break]

He smiles quietly, leans back, and just lets the world go by. Eyes closed, as little Jubilee's milkshake was the only thing that could be heard over the 80s-styled music...[break][break]

[break][break]

Nothing else mattered back then. A memory that made Ashley smile all the more.[break][break]

[break][break]

"You didn't order a drink, dummy." Ash grins, making a chuckle, pushing his water over towards Jay. Yeah, drinking from his glass, but that's okay. He didn't mind the germs so much.[break][break]

It was just Jay.

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[break][break]

[break][break]

Jubilee, the little Raichu, cries out happily, seeing Jay enter the diner. And with it, Sawyer's eyes shoot up. He's grinning, ear-to-ear, but the grin readjusts itself. He looks over Jayden. Every other face a shadow, a memory he couldn't recall from an era way back when. He wants to see if he has come back any worse than last time.[break][break]

Maybe it's his fear of losing his friend for good in a cruel, unforgiving world. Little Sawyer had worry riddled over his face, plaguing his every thought.[break][break]

But he never did want to pry. He just cared too much not to.[break][break]

"I did. I hope you like peach cobbler and vanilla ice cream, that's gonna be our dessert. I just got something light." The dessert was the best part of tonight. And notihng beat it more than sharing it with Jay. That funny friend he had funny feelings about. It was hard to think back then, that things would lead to their eventual points...[break][break]

In this bittersweet little memory, Rocket could not poison them. It was everything before, and everything after, that would let that poison into their veins.[break][break]

"You should try the burger. This place makes 'em just as good as they did in Castelia." The few he had in Castelia when he was thirteen still could be felt on his tongue. This place was the silver medalist, but only to the king.[break][break]

Concern over his face, he holds his hand out to Jay. His cheeks are hot.

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The lie had begun. Keep a level head.[break][break]

Ashley turns in the report. The fabrication of events. Isaac Merlo's murders of four grunts, and brutalization of leader. A sendoff for an old friend. Ashley, burying the soldiers with given coordinates. A small send-off to sell that he still had a heart.[break][break]

A cold heart trained to do the deed. Reinhardt helped the bodies be buried. The dirt on his hands from graves he made. But the dead follows him. It always did.[break][break]

It might have been convincing. It might have even worked.[break][break]

Never let them guess you.[break][break]

The report goes to jayden cross's desk. And then Zev Harcourt got involved. The lie begins to crumble. The cracks begin to show, shatter apart, the imperfect story now suspect. The plan put in place.[break][break]

A talk that could not wait. Ashley's heart is in his throat. He hadn't spoken to Zev in a long while. And something really rips into him. Out of all of Rocket, he feared two the most. declan walsh, after what he did to Jayden...[break][break]

And Zev.[break][break]

It was Jayden's office. Ashley had been here before. He sits down. Steadying shallow breath, his expression masked and hopefully layered. He could feel his stomach twist into knots.[break][break]

Keep the lie believable. He exhales. The panic wasn't there. But it was coming.

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The air is hard to breathe. Lungs are on fire. Here, on the outskirts of Fallarbor Town, five enter. They are dressed to remain inconspicuous. The dread and sweat trickles downwards. Autumn may be here, but the heat presses down on him. Not the weather.[break][break]

The hell he finds himself in.[break][break]

Ashley had been assigned a mission. But not just any mission. It was to kill... Isaac Merlo . His best friend. The best friend that defected while he took time away. The best friend he took the eye of. The best friend he loved like a brother. The best friend that he had to put under wraps.[break][break]

Five operatives to hunt one traitor might seem excessive, but this traitor eluded some of the stronger Rockets. And today. Ashley was set to take him in. He led this mission.[break][break]

On the one hand, some might consider this a conflict of interest. But to others, this was merely a roadblock. A quick photo of Ashley's half-sibling and his fiancee, kepler brueshaber , and it shut Ashley down. Added to that, the number of operatives that went weren't just to ensure the capture.[break][break]

They were to ensure loyalty. Just like they did back then. The operative he worked with before ratting him out to THEO BECKETT . The one that led to Jubilee's death.[break][break]

Only this time. It was a half-sibling he never got to know. And a fiancée he wanted to spend his life with.[break][break]

Here. He stands awaiting Isaac, at the gates of hell, the maws twisted arms coming to pull him in. Silver eyes never looked so full of anguish, but behind them sat a resolve that not even declan walsh could take away from him. No one.[break][break]

Ashley knew something they did not.[break][break]

15 rounds.[break][break]

Four bullets to use. Eleven to miss.[break][break]

With a shoddy breath. Ashley awaits Isaac's arrival. Unable to tell him what was up. But hoping, praying to any god that would listen. Please be prepared. He shakes the nerves, swallows his pride.[break][break]

And prepares for the bloodbath.

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"What happened to you?"[break][break]

How many times has it been since he's said those words now? He should be enjoying his new engagement. He had a whole month spent away from Hoenn, and yet he's back.[break][break]

And everything is just as bad as it was. No. It's worse now.[break][break]

Where did it all go wrong?[break][break]

[break][break]

Fifteen years old. Sawyer sat in the little Kanto diner booth, silver eyes peering out as he looked out to the world. His hair is short and silver. It'd be another year before he styles it the way he used to. It'd be another few years until he dyed it black. He sits with his sweater to keep warm. Someone has the AC on too much, and he's shivering.[break][break]

The retro vibe is lost on him, a bygone era of time with no relevance to a teenager.[break][break]

Despite everything, this place had one thing going for it in Unovan culture; there was this peach cobbler, warm, hot, that paired really well with vanilla ice cream. A cold and hot blend that was magical. He learned it from one of the older boys of Rocket, and considered this diner a gem. A little piece of home.[break][break]

As much as he wanted to forget about home, anyways. This was some of the only good shit. All that waited there was another dice roll in a broken foster care system. Here? In Rocket? He could be something.[break][break]

When THEO BECKETT didn't beat that into him.[break][break]

He shivers.[break][break]

Sawyer was happy though. He waited here for his friend. Someone close in Rocket, that he respected. Seated next to him was a big Raichu, that made a happy giddy noise as she drank from a milkshake. Jubilee. Sawyer always spoiled her.[break][break]

He loved that Raichu like nothing else.[break][break]

A look at his phone, and he wondered if he got lost. No message on his phone.[break][break]

He decides to text himself. U comin', Jay? They hvn't come out w/ the cobb yet. He's nervous as he sends the text.[break][break]

Petting Jubilee... he waits for his best friend. jayden cross.

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If he falters... she'll be there.[break][break]

That makes Ashley smile wider, as he relaxes a little. He finally lets his muscles just... go. And he nods. "Yeah?" If she'd be there, it would make him feel better.[break][break]

So he responds by saying something he always knew.[break][break]

"I've always been weak... so I look forward to that. Really." He tries to gives a big smile, Laguna once again squelching in his jacket, as he ruffles the little goop. "Thanks, Eris."[break][break]

Laguna burps up a bubble of sticky goo, letting it float in the air for a couple minutes, as Ash just stares at it, right there. Indigestion? Huh... he pokes at it, and realizes he can't... it won't let him touch the ball of goo. He raises a brow.[break][break]

Huh. Bubble Goo Protect shield... Wild shit.

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Dismantled. Just like that. Punching upwards, high, Ashley felt the press of the goliath that was Walsh. He felt so small, so foolish in that moment, to bother to fight back, to bother to talk back. What did he know of Rocket on his return? He knew of Silas. He knew Kanto. But he didn't know what else Rocket was. And here Walsh was, breaking him apart, molecule by molecule with words sharper than every knife, every dagger.[break][break]

The look of despair that flooded Ash's face was priceless. He bears down atop of him. The pressure meteoric. His legs shake. And that last work, that last set of words burned from the barrel of that smoking gun.[break][break]

His silver eyes looked down.[break][break]

To shiver, to shake, to break by its weight, he can feel his legs shake, he can feel his heart crumble, and suddenly he is nothing. Elites mean nothing. Admins mean nothing. He failed as a friend. He failed as a person. He failed Jay.[break][break]

Over. And over. And over again.[break][break]

So when Walsh leaves, and Jayden tells him, with a steely voice to take him to the infirmary... Ashley turns around for the first time. To see the wound he dealt Jayden. To see the wounds he gave Jayden.[break][break]

This is what a Rocket is. Some are born to it. Jayden. And some are enslaved to it. Himself.[break][break]

If only he had heeded THEO BECKETT 's warning.[break][break]

Walking back, and scooping Jayden up into his arms, he wordlessly begins the short walk to the infirmary. A walk that felt like a thousand miles under the scorching Hoenn sun.[break][break]

Your fault.[break][break]

Fuck.

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Another Pokeball, and Ashley comes back up, placing it for Holy Diver to hold onto. The Buizel has a sack at the ready, placing it safely in there, as Ashley gives him a thumbs-up, before diving back down.

What else? Come on, can't just be Pokeballs.

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Oh god, just like last year. Another Pokeball thrown into the water. The hell? They have manufacturing costs, that shit is not fire. Who throws away a perfectly good ball?[break][break]

Oh well. Back in. Dive to the bottom, lookin' for something...[break][break]

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