CHAPTER 188

My alarm woke me up at eight in the morning, and I was out and about right away. I wasn't exactly a morning person, but I had never struggled to wake up once I got on two feet and out of bed. Today was going to be packed (like most days in Veilstone so far), so I wanted to wake up as early as possible and take advantage of it even if we'd gone to sleep rather late. I could always fix my sleep schedule and catch up on my hours later.

"Hnng…"

"You're tired from traveling. Stay asleep, don't worry about me," I told Cecilia. "We can get you another key to the room when I come back later."

"Fine… love you."

I couldn't help but smile as I turned toward her. I got close to the bed to fix up the curtains, since a few rays of sunlight were shining on her face and bothering her, then I kissed her forehead. She put her arms around my neck and tried to keep me from leaving, so I planted a few more kisses on her lips. She was so cute when she was sleepy.

I laughed. "I'll see you later, okay? I'll be out all day. I've got to do training, media stuff and such."

"Be careful," she muttered.

"I will. Want me to bring you breakfast? They're making bacon and eggs today."

"I'll go down when I wake up," she whispered. "Can you get Slowking out of his Pokeball for me?"

I turned to the belt she'd left on my desk.

"Which one is it again?"

"Third one from the left… wait, no, from the right."

I nodded, releasing the tall psychic into the room. Slowking stared at his sleeping trainer and shot me a grateful look. She was already back to sleep now that I was out of her arms.

"Hi. You can speak to me now, by the way," I whispered. "Hatterene helped me get over most of the pain from telepathy."

Ah, he immediately said. That will make things much easier from now on.

There was still a headache, but it was easily manageable. Slowking didn't know how to attenuate his voice like Bellatrix did, and it showed.

It is my understanding that there is more to your relationship with Hatterene than meets the eye, he pondered, placing his hands behind his back. A mother-daughter like bond, if I had to guess. She was testing us to see if we were worthy of you. A self-centered and flawed way of thinking, in my humble opinion, but we all have our biases. Even I.

I raised an eyebrow. Hatterene as a motherly figure? An interesting thought that I couldn't deny made me feel warmth, but I doubted she felt the same.

"She's protective of me," I nodded. "Sorry if she gave you a hard time. Cece and Denzel told me about it."

It was fine. She was very emotional and irrational, but I could visualize the situation from her point of view. I am interested, but I will not pry since I can tell it is a sensitive topic.

"Thanks."

And to you as well. Be safe on your travels, he said. He levitated Cecilia's phone and clumsily typed in her code with his single dull claw. I shall begin looking for psychic type masters capable of teaching me the process of shielding minds.

I waved Slowking goodbye and exited my room. While telepathy was nice, I disliked the fact that unlike with Bella, there was simply no emotion in his tone. I'd honestly prefer to talk to him naturally if he didn't mind and fully learn all of his quirks, but I doubted that he'd like that. To be honest, there were plenty of my friends' Pokemon I wanted to talk to. Cecilia's Scyther was at the top of the list, but Zweilous was close. Denzel's entire team would probably be a riot, but I wanted to focus on Sylveon. Then, there was Mira's Kadabra. The psychic type had apparently been studying me, and I wouldn't mind hearing what he had to say. That one would have to wait until she apologized and we made up, though. Hopefully Denzel would be able to mend the bridge by talking to her. He was probably feeling terribly hungover right now.

Actually, he wouldn't even be up. It was barely 8:30 am.

Today was a training day, however, so none of that was on the table. I finally picked up Princess and Angel from the Pokemon Center and passed through the same rolling suburbs to get to route 214. I was going to take note of any fighting types that could be found here for Cecilia as well, although I knew that like most wild Pokemon on this route, they were all further south. Stumbling upon one here would be a miracle.

I released my entire team, who cheered now that they were finally all reunited. Sweetheart doted on her sister, who actually landed on the ground to be showered in her screams of affection while Buddy didn't even complain about being treated like a helium balloon by Angel, who relentlessly pulled him up and down with a vine wrapped around one of his tentacles. He kept going with the charade until Honey tried to join in and grab a tentacle of his own, after which he just dissolved into water to slip past both of them and slithered toward Sunshine, who scoffed at his weakness. According to him, if Jellicent didn't want something done, he just needed to fight them off.

Of course, that didn't stop him from being reluctantly touched by Tangrowth. Princess even greeted him with a slight smile, and he offered her a nod. They were getting closer slowly but surely.

I directed them to train, although Princess and Angel could still take it easy. What I was interested in, however, was Vespiquen's performance against us. The way she had complete control over honey intrigued me, but the only Pokemon I had that excelled in control was Togetic.

Excel might have been a big word. My standards had shifted completely since seeing Vespiquen battle, but she was still great at it. I was beginning to wonder if it couldn't be replicated, not with something like honey, but with the earth itself. A mastery of Ancient Power so complete that the ground would flow like water around her and change however she wished it to.

An inspiring idea that could bring her to greater heights. The problem was that it'd be a lot wiser to focus on her fairy type attacks, along with Air Cutter, which she was going to work on today as well. We'd neglected her flying type the entire time, but it needed to catch up now that we were going to fight a fighting type specialist.

I'd given controlling the field some thought last night in bed as well. Princess had the control to make whatever she wanted— she literally sculpted art every day, most recently a Nurse Joy, although she'd told me that she wanted to make Bella and Night soon. She'd created an enormous wall dividing the arena in two during the double battle with Chase and Cecilia, but that had nearly wiped her out. Angel had the raw power to screw up the field (even if that power was nowhere as close to Ampharos'), but none of the control. If I could combine those two somehow and make Princess turn the arena into something we could use after Angel would give her enough to work with…

"Bingo," I grinned.

An idea had struck me, now I had to practice it and make sure I wasn't in over my head. It wouldn't work against someone like Volkner or Crasher Wake, but it seemed perfect against Maylene. There were plenty of trainers that'd be willing to battle me back in Veilstone.

—

6:00 pm had come in a flash, and Melody had come to pick me up thirty minutes earlier. This time, there was no avoiding my responsibilities. I had also skirted around the fact that I'd gone against her word and told Cece and Denzel about the interview in a week's time, but I made sure to tell them not to spill. I trusted my two closest friends enough with the information.

"Don't look so nervous," Melody said. We were the only two people in the elevator.

"Oh, it's for completely different reasons this time. Pokemon stuff. I've been trying to make this new strategy work with Ancient Power, but it's a little tough."

"Oh, the moment someone starts talking about battling, everything sounds like gibberish to me. I don't even know what Ancient Power is. Is that an ability?"

My head whirled toward Melody and I shot her a look of pure disbelief.

"You know what, never mind," I sighed.

We walked out of the elevator and into… what I could only describe as a makeshift interview room. Two comfortable chairs sat opposite of each other with lights shining down both. There were microphones, individual equipment and a greenscreen behind all of this. A group of five people sat further in the room with a dozen empty coffee cups and notes everywhere.

"We figured that simulating the environment the interview would take place in would work better for you," Melody said. "The real thing will look better and have a bunch of tech guys running around in front of you, but this is pretty one to one."

"Thanks," I muttered. "They are…?"

"Your training team that flew in with me," Melody explained. "From left to right, Gregory, Kenny, Julia, Sebastian and Rene. They were the ones that helped me train you for your Solaceon interviews and gave me pointers on what advice to give you."

I nodded and waved at them, and they greeted me back. It was nice to put faces on the team behind Melody.

"So how different is this going to be, then?" I asked.

"We'll show you how some of Mallory's interviews have gone in the past, show you how to pose and carry yourself— remember the smiling point? That still applies," Melody said. "The interview's supposed to last ten to fifteen minutes and is very unlikely to go over. Cable TV's run like a tight ship. They keep to their schedule, otherwise they won't have enough time to run advertisements, and that's how the real money's made."

"We'll be running mock interviews and guide you on how to answer each question," Rene said. "But before that, we've got a list of those questions that SGNC's sent us at Mallory's request, and we wanted to see what you thought of them."

She handed me a piece of paper that I slowly scanned. The first questions were easy. She'd ask me about what convinced me to become a trainer, a few questions about my journey until she could naturally segway into what happened on route 215.

There have been rumors that you can understand exactly what Pokemon say. Is this true, and could you prove it to us live on stage with one of ours?

Arceus, I didn't even know there were rumors about that.

This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.

"Don't want that one," I said, tapping at the question. "I can't do it right away and it'd be awkward to just say that, no? I feel like people would expect me to say yes."

"That's fair," Melody smiled. "I would have said the same thing if I knew how quickly you learned to understand a Pokemon. Your instincts are getting better."

"And that's a fascinating ability," Gregory added. "Have you been able to do it since you were a child or—"

"Greg, you aren't interviewing her," Julia snapped. She looked the most tired out of everyone in the group. "Keep your questions for when you're not on the clock."

I kept reading, nodding along. These were a lot less confrontational than I thought. Questions about my time with the wild Pokemon and if I could give them a few tidbits about some of them, more about how that link with Pokemon reflected on the relationship with my team… these were nice.

Would you ever consider joining a Pokemon Rights protest in the future, seeing as how you stood up to the Rangers outside the gates?

That one was trickier. I didn't exactly have an answer for it, since it really depended on what the protest was advocating for. I was leaning yes, but Melody convinced me to keep it in since the team would help me develop a proper, well-argued answer.

You shared some emotional words with Hatterene and Decidueye before you left. There are many theories running around, but could you go more in-depth about your relationship with them?

"How vague are my answers allowed to be?" I asked.

"Too vague is bad. It makes you look weak and unsure of yourself," Melody said. "Like the protest one, we can help you—"

"No, this is different. Scratch it off, then," I sighed. "If I can't be vague, I won't answer."

That was the last question I'd had to deny, and they quickly sent the list back to Mallory via email so she could either adjust her list by adding different questions or pad her current ones, because yes, she was planning on using the interview's full runtime, so there was no hope of escaping by having it end early.

Melody clapped her hands. "Let's start training you in the ones you've approved of so far! They might change slightly, but it'll still help. Sit in the chair and I'll act as Mallory…"

I shambled back home exhausted that night, and I was supposed to come back tomorrow afternoon in order to get to my date in time.

—

"Arceus, my back hurts," I sighed.

"How does your back hurt?" Emilia asked. "You trained for an interview. That should be pretty low on the physical side of things."

"It's the chairs, Emi. Plastic chairs with terrible support. I swear, the chairs at the League Office where I got my Carry License were better."

I was currently getting ready for my date with terrible results. I had no fancy clothes and only packed to travel. The only dinner date appropriate attire I maybe had was that dress Cecilia had bought me back in Hearthome, but it was way too cold to wear it even with a vest on and it wasn't formal. Emilia had joined me in my suffering.

And to help me with my makeup and hair. Yeah, that was mostly why she was here. She was so good at it now thanks to her contests, but she was also excellent at fashion in general. I hoped that she'd be there to help me for every occasion like this, because she certainly made an excellent fashionista. I did have that Poketch Company event I was supposed to attend this summer.

"This is terrible," I groaned. "I have nothing! I was so busy that I had no time to go shopping, I'm going to look like trash."

The restaurant Cece had invited me to was a fancy one in the city's south, so that was basically code for dress well. I couldn't show up to this one in jeans. Well, I could, but that'd be disappointing for both her and myself.

"Come on, now, it's not the end of the world. I can lend you something if you want."

I turned toward her with Lilipup eyes. "You would?"

"I'm only… what, two inches taller than you? Our bodies are pretty similar, so it'll work."

She left and came back five minutes later with two huge suitcases.

"I have a lot of things in here," she said, opening them. "Feel free to peruse and pick whatever you like."

I hesitantly lifted a khaki skirt, which Emilia nearly slapped out of my hand with a horrified look.

"Are you kidding me? That would look terrible on you."

"What? I don't—"

"Just leave it to me. Sit here."

She motioned to the bed, and I followed her orders without hesitation. Emilia dug through the suitcase and pulled out a few options for me.

"I wish we could have gotten these ironed," she groaned as she patted them down as best she could. "No time now."

The girl hummed as she stared at what she had picked until she settled on a pink one shoulder dress that left a dangerous amount of collarbone exposed and that would reach down to my knees.

"Pink and white go great on you," she continued, pulling out some white heels. Cece had said that she liked white on me. "Have you worn heels before?"

"Uh, no."

"Okay, we'll go with white flats then. Go put this on and I'll prepare the makeup and hair stuff. I should have a few hair bands hanging around. We're going with a low bun. Cece's going to love it, trust me."

"I trust you with this more than I'd trust myself," I said, shuffling to the bathroom. "You know, speaking of Cece, it's the 27th in a few weeks. I was thinking of what to get her and I got a good idea, I think. Don't tell her this!"

Getting in this dress was impossibly difficult, but I was somehow managing.

"I won't tell. Spill."

"Well, beyond the actual gift I was going to buy, I was wondering if you could record a small personalized message for her? I was going to ask everyone and ask you to edit it if you don't mind. I hope it's not too much work."

"Oh, please. It's just adding a few clips together, it'll be done in five minutes," Emilia said.

"You know… remember that letter she gave us before leaving for Mount Coronet?"

"How could I forget?" Emilia said, her voice turning slightly grim.

"Personalized messages for each of us. I wanted to spin the idea into something more positive. I think she'd like it."

Her tone brightened, "That's a great idea. You're good at this gift stuff. Most people don't even know what to get until the last second and sometimes they even end up pulling the 'I'm your gift' card. Not that it doesn't work… it does, and frighteningly well."

"By most people, do you mean Pauline?" I teased.

"Yes. Yes, I meant Pauline."

I laughed and realized that my body felt constricted every time I did so. According to Emi, that was just the pain of looking good. She said that I had 'potential' and should dress like this a lot more often, so I figured that was good news. I looked into the mirror and took a few breaths. My burns were in full view in the dress. Red, scarred tissue stretching down my neck, collar and arm. A smidge of it was visible on my lower thigh.

"It's a lot of effort, though," I sighed.

"Girls are badass when they look good."

If I'd been drinking something, I would have spat it out. I hadn't expected such a direct statement from her, but I couldn't really disagree.

"Stop fidgeting around and sit still," she said.

I didn't know what she was doing to my face, but I nearly gasped in disbelief when I saw it.

—

Cecilia had really thought that she'd stop being nervous for dates by now, but she'd apparently been entirely wrong. Maybe it was because it had been a while since their last serious one. Sure, they'd knocked on people's doors in Solaceon, but it hadn't felt anywhere as official as this and she didn't want to disappoint. Training and focusing on Talonflame's flying type attacks yesterday had kept her mind off things, but now that the day had come, Cecilia found it impossible to focus on training, so she'd had Slowking run some drills with the others.

It had gone… relatively alright. Talonflame didn't need the extra help nor the direction, but Zweilous and Golett certainly did. Meanwhile, she just let Scyther do his own thing whenever he wanted. The fact that he had chosen to stay with her had filled her with untold amounts of relief, but she knew it was just the first step. As Grace had said, this was a chance. She still needed to be better and atone for what she'd done, but Scyther refused to tell Slowking what he wanted her to do, so Cecilia was stuck trying to figure it out herself.

She was no Grace. Figuring it out by just listening would be impossible, and she doubted that he'd speak to her girlfriend directly. She had directly contributed to him getting caught, after all.

"Is this too much?" Cecilia asked, turning toward her friend. Pauline's eyes narrowed as she studied her. She was wearing the same long dull black dress that she'd worn for multiple parties that Emilia had thrown. "I feel like I should wear something more unique."

The Pokemon Center's mirrors were so small that it was impossible to even look at herself properly. Even after all these months, she was used to much taller ones.

"It's never too much. Dress killer and own it," Pauline said. "But hey, she'll definitely think you look hot in anything."

"I'll wear something else," Cecilia sighed. "You know, her birthday's soon. I've got no idea of what to get her. It can't be something simple, but if I get her something too expensive she'll dislike it too. Can you help me?"

Pauline smirked. "March 4th, right? And that sounds like her alright. She's probably thinking the same thing right now since your birthdays are close, so at least you've got that going for you."

"I wouldn't want her to suffer my fate," she said as Pauline unzipped her dress. "Thank you. I was thinking of jewelry—"

"Just get her a ring and ask her hand in marriage while you're at it," she sarcastically interrupted. "And you said not expensive."

Cecilia stammered, "D—don't be silly. Obviously not a ring, but something like a necklace or a bracelet. Whatever, you're terrible at giving gift advice. You're the kind of person who'd say you were the gift."

"Touché. Emi loves it though."

Cecilia began to dig through the many clothes that Emilia had stored for her in her luggage and given back to her yesterday until she found something that caught her eye. She smiled as relief filled her.

"I found something."

"Then go get dressed already! You're taking way too long."

Cecilia stared at her phone and noticed that she had thirty minutes left, then ran into the bathroom. She still had to do her hair and makeup too… she'd be cutting it close.

"How did your flying license thing go, by the way?" She asked.

"They don't do same day appointments. Earliest I got was tomorrow," Pauline grumbled through the door. "Luckily they've got a guy with a Charizard there that can teach me, so it should be pretty quick."

"What are you going to do after?"

"I don't know. Stick with the group to Sunyshore, probably. Then fly off. It sucks, but I can't afford to waste time galavanting through Sinnoh."

Cecilia nodded and made a vague sound of approval. Considering what Pauline had told her about desperately wanting to reach the Conference, her worries about time constraints made sense. Maeve would do the same, if she had to guess. The girl had already began her own training with Staraptor. The problem lay with Louis and Justin—

She caught herself and grimaced. Justin's goal was no longer the Conference. Not this year. But Louis had no flier, and as it stood, he would never make it to eight badges in time. There was simply no way he'd get to Snowpoint and backtrack to Canalave without a flying type capable of traveling with a human, so Cecilia planned to get him alone in an attempt to convince him to either go out of his way to catch one as soon as possible or simply purchase one. He had until Pastoria to get one.

Of course, Cecilia was worried about her own prospects, but she still had plenty of time for Golett to evolve.

Heels were going to be tough with her leg, but she wasn't going to be walking for too long—

"Holy crap. Your phone's ringing," Pauline said.

"And you just snooped?" Cecilia scoffed. "Is it Grace? She's early."

"It was upright, it's not my fault! And, no, it's not the gremlin. It's that bitch Amy. You didn't block her number?"

Blood froze in her veins, not out of fear, but rage. Memories of that fated day at the hotel, Amy Saunier asking Cecilia to essentially resign to her fate and be a slave to her father's whims, and now she dared to call? To grovel at her feet and talk about how it wasn't her fault, perhaps. If she was lucky, they'd never see each other again. Cecilia wasn't sure if she'd be able to stop herself from releasing Zweilous and terrifying her. She'd gotten off free from any consequences because she wasn't a trainer, nor was she from Sinnoh and law enforcement probably believed that she'd been pressured to act like she had by Harvey and Clarence, or at least that was the narrative the news, her parents and lawyers had gone with. Last she'd heard, she was still in Eterna, although her parents had flown in to help her 'get through this', whatever that meant. Cecilia tended not to look at whatever concerned Amy, or she'd get the urge to destroy her television.

"Do that for me, please," she answered cooly.

"Got you. Want me to send something? Like, fuck you Amy, jump off a bridge, I hope your plane gets hit by some rogue flying type when you finally fly back to Kalos—"

"No. Just block her. She doesn't even deserve to communicate with me any longer."

"Hanging her off to dry? Cold as hell, I love it," she said. "Done. You won't be seeing her pop up again."

"Thank you," Cecilia said, opening the door. "Zip up this dress for me?"

Pauline paused, looking at her. "Arceus, Cece, I am so jealous of your skin."

—

I turned eyes as I walked downstairs and out of the Center. Each one of my steps felt constrained and difficult to make. Breathing was more demanding than usual, but I did have to admit that Emilia had done an excellent job. I pulled at the purse she'd given me and felt comfort at the sound of my Pokeballs jumping around the bag. Now that the time had come, I couldn't help but feel nervous.

Cecilia was waiting for me next to Louis' driver, and her appearance left me speechless. Black stiletto heels elongated her legs and gave her a feeling of unmatched elegance. There was a small glitter, and it was only then that I noticed the diamond necklace around her neck. A black strapless dress that quite literally sparkled hugged her brown skin and bold red lipstick adorned her lips.

She was— she was really fucking hot. I audibly gulped as I approached her. She'd gotten Louis to lend us his Arceus damned limousine.

"Cece… You're—"

"You're beautiful," she told me with a bright smile. "I still can't believe I'm dating you sometimes."

"Ditto," I laughed. I almost slurred my words. I couldn't take my eyes off her.

She helped me inside the car and followed suit.

"Good evening, ladies. Where to?" Edward asked.

"The Elegant Carver, please," she said.

I hadn't been this giddy and happy in a long time.