"And in a few generations, this pain will fade. Even if it breaks my heart."

Her interest is responded to with a smile. For once, he gets to educate and enlighten. In another world, he was a professor who taught the secrets of yesterday to the hope of tomorrow in a classroom. That desire was still there, but acting on it now seemed like a distant memory.

It makes his heart ache.

"Because, in spite of all of our wisdom and understanding, we misunderstand the emotions that guide us. How our bodies work. Even now, we underestimate the importance of symbols."

It's clear that Howard was trying to piece together an explanation for his logic. He made weird gestures with his hands, before eventually giving up and letting his hands grow limp.

A deep sigh. A heave.

She does not speak it, so he does not correct her, but the language is not of divinity. It was written by humanity in order to communicate with giants. The admin took pride in their hallowed words, even if he could only speak them now due to being bound by blood and stone.

"Ugh, I can't explain it." He grumbled, before turning to her. "Give me your hand."

---

Absinthe Blackwood

Every day was a reminder that Kanto's fall had been due to luck and circumstance. Theo could bleat of his conquests all he wanted, but all that today proved was that he led lesser criminals into believing that they were wolves instead of sheep. That lesson had stuck until this precise moment.

This moment, where wolves were reminded that they could bleed like livestock. A the end of the day, that was what Kanto consisted of. A handful of kings leading pawns. Hoenn was similar, but Hoenn was familiar and Kanto was alien.

"For now." For the first time, Admin Fox is unmasked next to Hitoshi. His eye is red and vindictive, not the darker color of blood but something far more distinct. "This will suffice. Good work, Black Dog."

Still, Howard let the masquerade go on. If Hitoshi still thought he was Admin Fox, then the admin would not deny him that luxury. Perception was a funny thing.

"But it will not last for long. We cannot enforce law and order with those we have present. priam conrad is not enough."

No matter how hard Priam tried, one man could only do so much.

---

Hitoshi Inoue

The two set off through the park, their bugs behind them. Crispr is a dainty thing, fluttering through the branches as Sleep Powder fell from its wings in a dust comparable to snow. Celpho lumbered along, his claws snapping with ferocity not displayed by his owner.

"Shitty." Howard admitted as they walked through dappled paths of sun and shade. "But I'm better. Thanks for the time off, I appreciate it. That, and for not firing me."

He kept his left arm covered in his sleeve and stuffed in his pocket to avoid displaying the scarring, feeling Gideon look him over. It was a hideous sight, and it made the archaeologist nervous. Not only did it invite gazes, but it was a lasting memory of destroying a city. It was best to leave that figment of the past buried.

For now.

"More interns? You have half of the anthropologists in the field working in the museum, Dr. Graves. You'll deprive the rest of Hoenn of young talent at this rate." He threw a Pokeball at a passing bird with remarkable dexterity. It was a shot made easier by Crispr's Sleep Powder.

"Your gift basket was very kind. It was the highlight of my stay in the hospital."

---

GIDEON GRAVES
CATCHA DA BIRD

"I disagree."

The pessimist and the optimist clash. Absinthe saw the worst in things, a perspective painted by trauma and forged by disgust in the world as a result of being broken. Even as she pieced herself back together, that negativity would haunt her until eternity ended. She described Petalburg, the admin thought she was describing herself.

It is with that understanding in mind that he speaks softly.

"People will move into new homes, they will find work, and they will find meaning in the reconstruction of what they have lost. That is what makes us human—our unwavering tenacity. There will be scars..." He gestured to the two mountainsides created by Regirock's attack. "...but they will eventually become a part of the landscape, covered in greenery and trees."

His eye lingered on the chemist's mask for a moment. He says something in an ancient language that he knows she cannot understand.

"⠊ ⠺⠊⠎⠓ ⠞⠓⠁⠞ ⠊⠝⠎⠞⠑⠁⠙ ⠕⠋ ⠉⠓⠁⠝⠛⠊⠝⠛ ⠍⠽ ⠃⠕⠙⠽, ⠽⠕⠥⠗ ⠕⠇⠙ ⠃⠕⠙⠽ ⠉⠕⠥⠇⠙ ⠃⠑ ⠗⠑⠞⠥⠗⠝⠑⠙ ⠞⠕ ⠽⠕⠥ ⠺⠊⠞⠓⠕⠥⠞ ⠁ ⠎⠊⠝⠛⠇⠑ ⠎⠉⠁⠗."

His gaze returned to the stone colossus.

"It will work. It will serve. It will kill Eternatus and anything else that threatens the world." For the first time in years, Regirock was serving the world in a productive way. It rebuilt instead of destroying, it healed instead of hurt, and it instilled order instead of slaughter. "It's an interesting piece of history. Tell me..."

"Do you know why Regirock lacks fingers?"

---

Absinthe Blackwood

"Hmmm..." He's already fading into the abyss of sleep when Chu-e wraps himself around him. To remain awake is beyond his capacity, there is only so much functionality that the body can maintain after refusing to sleep for so long.

It was warm and comfortable. To think was to extend sentience.

"I think..." The admin felt Chu-e's breath tickle his nose. He brought their skeletal form closer to his own. "...that would be..."

He closed his eye.

"...nice."

---

Chu-e Choi

Friend.

Friend...?

FRIENDFRIENDFRIENDFRIENDFRIENDFRIENDFRIENDFRIENDFRIENDFRIENDFRIENDFRIENDFRIENDFRIENDFRIENDFRIENDFRIENDFRIENDFRIENDFRIENDFRIENDFRIENDFRIENDFRIENDFRIENDFRIENDFRIENDFRIENDFRIENDFRIENDFRIENDFRIENDFRIEND.

Dammit. His heart ached. It was like kicking a dog that had huddled by his foot for warmth. It was wrong to express discontent with Makoto, but they needed to understand the risks. His life was not worth theirs in this regard. If they died for his folly, then it would be another burden for him to carry.

They were already too heavy as it was.

"You do not deserve to suffer for my sins. Just let me handle it. Let me handle everything." He gave Makoto a weak smile. "It'll be fine."

Yet it didn't feel fine.

"I'd kill for a smoke. And some whiskey. And some painkillers." He chuckled and waved his hand awkwardly, with as much strength as he could muster. "Don't actually look for those. Pretty sure they'll throw whatever the hospital has me on out of whack."

His face fell, slightly.

"I'm more tired than anything, though there's not much to be done about that."

---

Makoto Kurumi

There's a momentary silence as Howard digested the information. Pokemon deaths were change on the dollar in this war, but each one threatened to break Howard down. If Shirley died now, with a bond formed between them due to the Sygna Suit...

He didn't want to think about that.

"That's an Aerodactyl for you. Each one is one in a million. I wonder if Brute and Shirley would've been friends?" It's an interesting thought, though an irrelevant one. A thought experiment lost to history had no meaning. "But I'm sorry."

He kicked off his shoes and rolled off his socks. He sighed and rubbed his temples, suddenly self-conscious. It didn't matter how people thought he looked. This wasn't him. This wasn't who he was.

A pristine form, hideous on him.

It's that self-loathing that causes him to change in the bathroom, coming back with a pair of running shorts instead of eloquent attire. He regarded Chu-e for a long moment, as if appraising him and his question.

"Not immediately, but I have a meeting coming up with high command." He didn't mention that there was a chance he would die at it. "If I could have what I'm wearing now ironed out and ready to go by then, I'd appreciate it."

He slipped beneath the covers.

"I'll have to buy new clothes, soon. Hardly anything fits."

---

Chu-e Choi

Desert did sound pretty good. Especially if Aurelie made it, although Howard didn't envy Aurelie for having the Herculean task of finding halfway decent ingredients in this submarine's forsaken pantry. Maybe she had rummaged through the breakroom for supplies? There were occasionally nifty little things left in the fridge, such as unmarked sandwiches from a Paldean place that Howard insisted on eating.

Aurelie didn't need to know that last bit, though.

"Tsk. You're so cruel." They had returned to lighthearted banter with the threat of her taking his desert privileges. It was a bold threat, especially when compared to threats of execution or punishment. Somehow, the desert revocation hurt more. "But..."

He thought of her words of heroism. He resisted the urge to mention Galar when asked of knights and swords and armor and adventures. It was an entire escapade that they had both clawed from at different points in their lives. There was no need to mention it again.

This person who played video games and cooked and worked in a forge asked for an impossibility.

But...

It was strange. There was a paradox at work here.

But...

Even though she had no stake in this oncoming war, even if he had no reason to keep her heartfelt promise other than friendship and camaraderie.

But...

He wanted to keep that promise for her, because she had been heartfelt enough to ask it of him. She had been the only person to do so. Not Zacian nor Navy nor anyone in a fictional dream born of fantasy, nor anyone when he had risen from Granite Cave with fanatical purpose.

There was only one thing to do, then.

"Okay, you win." He met her gaze with his own and nodded, a small jerk that almost betrayed the war going on in his mind. "I promise."

He paused.

"So I'd really like to share that chocolate mousse with you."

---

Aurelie Lefevre

The warm moment faded. The admin's face turned grave in the faint light.

"I erred in my judgement, and I regret what happened to Dewford, but the threat of Eternatus continues to loom. I will not allow it to come to pass. Its power rots the mind and dulls the body, and even when you expunge it..." He attempted to flex a dying hand that came in contact with a star. "...it continues to kill you."

The knowledge was harrowing, but it was also humbling. Knowing that this was what it took to bring down a human. There was a limit to the amount that the flesh could withstand.

Eternatus could not shake humanity's will. They would win.

"I'm furious that you went. I'm furious that you disobeyed my order as your superior." Yet Makoto's smile was shameful. He could not dissuade them now. It was too late. "But you went. You survived. That is what matters."

His hand twitched in theirs. Weakness against strength.

"Do not do it again."

---

Makoto Kurumi

There was a deep, thoughtful pause as the admin looked into their eyes,

"No. Amor realized that home is more important than this region. He had responsibilities to shoulder." He refused to let the tinge of bitterness at Amor leaving Rocket taint his words. Makoto deserved to have an unmarred picture of the man, not tainted by emotion. "He simply knew that you were enough to inherit his will."

The admin's eye softened.

"There is no need to fear. You are the former Head Scientist's hope, whether he is here or across the ocean or gone from the world entirely."

Even if that man had left the admin with an impossible task with a pile of impossible notes and distant dreams of seizing the divine. Why had he left them for home now? What had he experienced that had caused such a change?

It was easy to imagine that one of the three Wishes was Amor's. A childish thought, but there was an occasional need to delve into a stint of needless childishness. Howard sighed at Makoto, regarding them thoughtfully.

"Be proud." He clenched at their hands with impossible weakness, his fingers barely twitching. "Of what you can and will accomplish in his stead."

---

Makoto Kurumi

It was, ironically, the Wish that was the most effective.

Perhaps it was the working of fate, acknowledging the banality of what Howard desired. Yet the admin loathed the concept of fate. It disgusted him, because it implied that there was no meaning to any action that he or any other would take. If fate truly existed, then it meant that Makoto's empathy did not matter.

It would mean that Howard's dream did not matter.

It would mean that Makoto was kicked onto the streets for no reason at all.

It would mean that Amor had abandoned Makoto for no reason other than that it was fated to occur. Such a world was heartless and cruel.

Yet a wish was a human desire. To wish was to hope that tomorrow would be better, and that would not occur due to the benevolence of some distant or faraway god. Tomorrow would be brighter because Makoto would make it brighter. Howard would live slightly longer because Makoto demanded it of him.

There was no better recipient to a Wish than one who had wished upon a star.

"Ah." His vision cleared slightly, his voice rattling in his chest. "Makoto, you..."

It hurt to live. He did that. It hurt to smile. He did that too. He did not stop weeping red.

"Amor's protégé, through and through." The words echo to another time. "I want you to know that we're both proud of you, regardless of what happens to me."

---

Makoto Kurumi

The grave is surrounded in thorns and mist, with only the smallest hint of flowers left behind. What remained consisted of slow decay and rot and death.

The admin that at on a colossal boulder was a weary man, his gaze staring intently at the site of the underboss he had killed during the battle for this backwater city. After a deep exhale, Howard turned from the grave of Elisabeth Fiorelli . It's sudden and quick, as if he expected something to rise from the hallowed ground and attempt to claim his life.

'Hallowed'. Please. This place was cursed.

"Aisling." Even the way he spoke was different, though his inflection was the same. His eye bore into the trainer shackled to Rocket's employ. "You helped us win this place. Here."

The Aerodactyl flash drive flew through the air, before clattering by her foot.

He turned back to the grove masquerading as a tomb.

"Someone is buried here. Someone evil."

---

AISLING O'CONNOR

"You fucking LOST IT!?!?"

The outraged voice of Howard Slayte rang over rubble and stone. Rocket grunts turned to hear a smidge of the distant screeching. A dire sign, knowing that Admin Fox had lost his temper so early in the morning while the shifting of rubble and reconstruction went steadily. Petalburg would slowly return to normal.

Oscar's dignity, likely less so.

"Oscar." Howard clenched the engineer's shoulders with remarkable strength. His hat was askew. It smelled of tobacco and shame. "Team Rocket's first Genesect, the one that we use as the blueprint for every Genesect that you've cranked out of that fucking workshop of yours. The one with all the crazy upgrades."

His grip tightened.

"You lost it? HOW?"

---

oscar clayton