Nove Nu-Vonde
( acquaintances become antiquated )
- 34
- Posts
- 7
- Years
- The void
- Seen Sep 10, 2017
Uh, hello? I don't have a good intro, so I'm just going dive right in: this is a story, and I wrote it, and now you're reading it. This is a narrative I've wanted to tell for awhile, though I never quite got around to it. I've had some recent issues with writer's block, though, so I figured making myself finally write this would be a good way to motivate. This is more of a writing exercise for me than anything else, to not only try and beat writer's block but to practice with some of my more used OCs for future RP use. Still, I hope you'll enjoy reading it anyways.
Expect updates to be more or less irregular. Once a week updates would be best case scenario, though it'll probably usually be more like once every two weeks or so. I only ask that you are patient. Criticism and feedback are always appreciated, so do not hesitate to share your thoughts with me! Even if you hated it, I like to know where I went wrong. Thanks for reading, and I hope you enjoy!
As per the writing section's rules, a warning: my tone in writing tends to be a bit more dark than typical Pokemon fanfics, and more mature themes, strong language, references to violence or murder, and possibly romance (probably not but it's not entirely impossible) will make appearances here. This is rated M, and if any of the above mentioned things may be upsetting to you, I strongly advise you leave or proceed with caution.
chap·ter one
fed up
Marley stared down at the paper, a disdainful glint in her eyes, hands shaking ever so slightly with subtle rage. She took a deep breath, before slowly and deliberately tearing it in half, almost perfectly bisecting it. "No," she said flatly to no one in particular, though her Froslass flinched a little at the word, unaware of what exactly had her trainer so shaken up but well aware something was wrong. It tilted its head, the stoic look on its face belying no emotion, though it seemed curious nonetheless. Its yellow eyes gleamed as they looked over the paper, covered in lines and shapes that meant nothing to a Pokemon like it, before turning up to exchange looks with the Murkrow who had delivered this upsetting package. The tiny black bird seemed unnerved by the presence of an Ice type, but diligently remained on the windowsill as it waited for dismissal. Marley imagined it'd been so strictly trained she could have killed it right then and there and it wouldn't have moved a muscle in retaliation, but she thought herself better than that. Maybe she wasn't, but it was nice to pretend.
She picked up the pair of paper scraps, folded them neatly in half, placed them back in their envelope, and handed the whole mess of it back to its deliverer before waving the Murkrow off. "There's your response. Now piss off," she said dryly, arms crossed. She could have almost sworn she saw it breathe out a sigh of relief, as if it'd been holding its breath this whole time in anticipation, before flitting off just as quickly as it'd arrived. Her Froslass let out a frustrated "hmph" as it left, not sure why she should hate it, but knew that if her trainer did, then she should too.
"Me too," Marley replied jokingly, a faint smile crossing her face no matter how hard she tried to stay mad. "I- I just can't believe that… that self righteous piece of shit would even consider asking me something like this! As if there was even the slimmest I would look at this and say, 'yeah, this looks like a great idea!' She claims to have studied me, but of course, if that were true she'd know that I've made my feelings very clear, very publicly, on the subject of Team Termina. Not that I should put lying past her," she grumbled angrily as she paced around the halls of the penthouse, "Considering she's so eager to admit she's done it before, like it's some kind of accomplishment. Something to be proud of." This was an absolute outrage, Marley thought. Never did it occur to her that ignoring the letter and moving on with her life was an option. No, this was an offense not soon to be forgotten. It wasn't even really the letter she was mad about, if she was being honest with herself. A lot had been leading up to this, the letter had only been the straw that broke the Numel's back.
From a distance, her Froslass watched, both curious and a little concerned, though its face was cold and expressionless as ever. It was used to this kind of reaction by now, it knew its trainer as well as she knew it. It raised its tiny hands and began moving them with grace and precision, as if trying to communicate with some complicated form of sign language, though its motions held no true semantic meaning. Not to humans, at least. They only conveyed its quiet worry in an attempt to calm its trainer down. It had dealt with Team Termina in the past as well, and although it understood little English, it recognized the phrase "Team Termina" as well as it did the phrase "use Blizzard!" How many times had it been forced to cut through swarms of Zubat and Glameow, only to find a hundred more in their place. It broke its stoic expression for just a moment, lips turning ever so slightly down into a frown of disgust. It didn't know much, but it knew it hated those white coated humans as much as it hated the scorching rays of the sun itself.
Turning to her Pokemon, noticing its frantic signing, Marley let out a quiet sigh. Her temper was getting the best of her. Again. There was no one even here, she realized, besides her Froslass and other five Pokeballs. She'd been yelling at nothing. She could swear she was going crazy up here alone in this isolated place with no one but her ghosts to keep her company. "Maybe I should join Termina," she conceded mockingly, "if it meant having someone to talk to."
Her thoughts were abruptly interrupted by the chiming of a Hoothoot clock. It's tiny, twinkling chimes rang out twelve times before going back to its quiet ticking. It was noon, it seemed, a fact supported by the loud bells of the massive cathedral Hearthome was so well known for pealing out in the distance. She turned back to her Froslass, who had resumed signing, though its hands moved in an entirely different way this time. "You don't have to remind me," she sighed, having already started reaching for her other Pokeballs. "I know it wouldn't be especially wise to let you all, y'know, starve to death." She was only half serious, of course. Only one of her Pokemon actually seemed to need food. The rest only ate when the mood suited them, or just didn't. Still, it wasn't good to keep them all cooped up constantly. Probably not, anyways. She wasn't a Pokemon, she had no idea what it was like in a Pokeball.
"Gengar, Mismagius, Bronzong, Dusknoir, Crobat," Marley said flatly, releasing them in succession as she called their names, devoid of the heated passion young trainers were known for as they shouted the names of their companions with excitement. She had performed this ritual a million times, and expected to do it a million times more. Still, seeing the whole crew out and about, grins perpetually plastered to their faces as they stared up at their trainer with anticipation, she couldn't help but smile back at them. They were all she had now days, and she was okay with that. She told herself she was okay with that, anyways, and just that thought was enough to keep her going through the day.
"Settle down," she said as the whole lot of them trailed her eagerly to the kitchen. It was mostly her Gengar she was speaking to, though. Like a Growlithe pup who'd been neglected for a year, it paced around her feet eagerly, alternating between a bipedal and quadrupedal stance, chanting broken fragments of its name as well as hers. She probably would have crushed it by now, it had such a penchant for getting under her feet, if she didn't pass right through the intangible ghost every time she made contact with it. She got down two bowls, trying to ignore the Pokemon hovering impatiently around her as she did so, one small and made for feeding while the other was noticeably larger. The first she filled with kibble and set down on the table, and her Crobat was quick to swoop down and inhale the little brown pellets, while the other she pressed to her refrigerator's ice dispenser and filled with big cubes, before placing it on the ground. Her Froslass picked up one piece at a time, crunching through them effortlessly with its surprisingly strong jaws with methodical dedication, depleting the bowl rapidly, while the Gengar and Mismagius snatched up any remaining pieces and rubbed them on their faces, seemingly obsessed with the cold. In all her years training with Ghost types, Marley had never understood the correlation between them and cold, but they seemed to like it and ice was cheap so she was happy to provide.
She turned from her Pokemon and left them to their own devices as they chattered among themselves and enjoyed what she'd put down for them, having collected herself by now, though still quietly seething about that letter. She knew she should probably do something about Termina. She'd always had the sneaking suspicion Morgana had something more shady going on behind the scenes than what she was letting on—as much as she hated the woman, Marley always thought her too smart to be wasting all the resources and raw man power available to her on things as trivial and obvious as hassling children and mugging strangers—and now that she had confirmed this, no matter how vague she'd been about it, something more serious than petty frustration had settled inside Marley. For the first time in a long, long while, she was afraid.
She shook her head in attempt to clear it of these thoughts. No, of course she couldn't do anything, even if she wanted to. She was outnumbered one to thousands. To indulge in these fantasies of heroism and grandeur was foolish. What, was she ten? Marley switched the TV on, hoping maybe some background noise would help. It was a game show of some kind that was on, and it wasn't really the kind of thing she enjoyed, but she was thankful for the white noise nonetheless, and so she left it on. TV entertaining an audience of none behind her, she reached a hand up to the thick red curtains that were draped over every window in the penthouse, and there were plenty of windows, giving the whole place a sort of eerie red glow as the afternoon sun desperately tried to penetrate through. She pulled it back, those bright rays finally freed assaulting her incapable eyesight. "Fuck!" She said, stumbling back for a moment, reflexively bringing her hands to her face, turning away from the bright light. With a heavy sigh, she reached into her pocket and pulled out a pair of sunglasses, large enough to fit over her prescription glasses. Another day she'd have to let her albinism get the best of her, it seemed. Just one day she'd like to go without wearing those obtuse shades that made her look nothing short of a top tier douche, but today, unfortunately, would not be that day.
With a wide sweeping motion, she grabbed the curtains and opened them fully, prepared to face the bright afternoon light this time. Behind her, her Pokemon let out quiet, discontent hisses, Gengar and Mismagius faintly shivering as the light washed over them while her Froslass began signing frantically with frustration. She'd let them get soft. It used to be one could shine a searchlight on them and they wouldn't flinch, but now anything more than the dim glow of electronics was enough to set them off. "Don't be like that, now," she said under her breath, arms folded as she observed the city below her while she addressed her Pokemon. "Any one of these days, you could have to start fighting again. Not that I want that, but, well… If worse comes to worst, would you really let something as mundane as the sun defeat you? I thought I raised you to be stronger than that."
At the foot of her towering apartment complex, she could see some kind of a scuffle going on. There always was now days, it seemed. Hearthome had become a mess ever since Team Termina had started to occupy it. A pair of men donning white coats with gold trim were harassing another man. They were commanding a pair of Absol, and although the canine Pokemon were fighting with the man's Pokemon, it was clear to her they'd tear right into the guy without a second thought the second his Pokemon fell. Him and his Clefable seemed to be making a valiant effort, but she imagined he'd be overwhelmed soon enough. "Idiot," she mused to no one in particular. Getting in the way of Team Termina was a good way to 'mysteriously disappear' these days. A frigid hand pressed against her shoulder, and anyone else might've been scared out of their own skin by such contact, but Marley didn't even flinch, knowing already it was her Dusknoir. Its single eye, glowing dimly like the light of a dying lantern, watched the man and the predicament he'd gotten himself in intently. "You think so too, huh?" She joked, softly chuckling as she looked up at the imposing black phantom that hovered beside her. It didn't seem to hear her, or just didn't care, it was difficult to tell. It was instead intensely focused on the streets below. She wondered what it was thinking, though the motivations of her Dusknoir remained impossible to decipher. "Come on now," Marley said wearily, smile faltering just so slightly. "There's nothing you can do. Nothing any of us can do. He chose to jump off that cliff, now… now he has to live with that."
Closing the curtains and beginning to draw her Pokeballs in preparation to recall her team, she walked away from the window and back to her Pokemon, still in the kitchen, carefully watching their master from a distance, hushed. That was enough time outside for now, she thought. She wanted to be alone for awhile.
Expect updates to be more or less irregular. Once a week updates would be best case scenario, though it'll probably usually be more like once every two weeks or so. I only ask that you are patient. Criticism and feedback are always appreciated, so do not hesitate to share your thoughts with me! Even if you hated it, I like to know where I went wrong. Thanks for reading, and I hope you enjoy!
As per the writing section's rules, a warning: my tone in writing tends to be a bit more dark than typical Pokemon fanfics, and more mature themes, strong language, references to violence or murder, and possibly romance (probably not but it's not entirely impossible) will make appearances here. This is rated M, and if any of the above mentioned things may be upsetting to you, I strongly advise you leave or proceed with caution.
chap·ter one
fed up
"Salutations, Marley Sigmund,
If you've received this letter without it having been intercepted, consider yourself an incredibly lucky individual. I am Morgana; the real Morgana, for clarification, not the one who has "signed" the carbon copy recruitment flyers that I'm sure you've seen littered about. If you are wondering, yes, this too is a recruitment invitation, though I've taken the time to handwrite it specifically for you, Ms. Sigmund. I'm sure you understand why, given your status.
I've been monitoring you for a while now. Studying you, even. You are a fascinating person. Your rise and your fall, the things you did, the way you act. It was a mistake to retire, really. This is not my opinion, it is a fact. You were wrong. But your mistake is not without its silver lining, because it gives us both an important opportunity, not only for me to make this offer, but also for you to accept.
It may not seem it, but Team Termina is at a critical stage in its plans. Someone such as yourself could be a vital lynchpin at this moment in time. I would like to invite you to become not just some mere pawn, but an admin within our organization. Your prowess in battle as well as mental acuity are impressive, and I would like to put them to good use within our organization.
Before you decline, which I know you are about to do, stop. Consider the big picture here. Disregard the media and the way it sensationalizes us. Disregard what you've seen. Throw it all to the side for a moment. Understand what Team Termina does, or rather, what you've seen it do, is not what we stand for. It's not what I stand for. A facade, you could call it. A white lie on a much grander scale. We only desire to keep the ignorant from understanding our true intentions so that they might not stand in our way. You and I, we're smarter than this. None of this is news to you, I'm sure. I am quite confident you've understood all this for a long time now, which is why I'm all the more certain you will accept this offer. You have to. There is no other option for someone like you. Someone whose glory days are behind them. I am giving you an opportunity to take that back at no expense to yourself. Imagine, you could be someone again.
I encourage you to be swift in your response, as time is a precious resource of which we have little at this moment. You have nothing left to lose, Ms. Sigmund. Keep this in mind before you decline my offer.
Sincerest regards,
Morgana Takagi"
If you've received this letter without it having been intercepted, consider yourself an incredibly lucky individual. I am Morgana; the real Morgana, for clarification, not the one who has "signed" the carbon copy recruitment flyers that I'm sure you've seen littered about. If you are wondering, yes, this too is a recruitment invitation, though I've taken the time to handwrite it specifically for you, Ms. Sigmund. I'm sure you understand why, given your status.
I've been monitoring you for a while now. Studying you, even. You are a fascinating person. Your rise and your fall, the things you did, the way you act. It was a mistake to retire, really. This is not my opinion, it is a fact. You were wrong. But your mistake is not without its silver lining, because it gives us both an important opportunity, not only for me to make this offer, but also for you to accept.
It may not seem it, but Team Termina is at a critical stage in its plans. Someone such as yourself could be a vital lynchpin at this moment in time. I would like to invite you to become not just some mere pawn, but an admin within our organization. Your prowess in battle as well as mental acuity are impressive, and I would like to put them to good use within our organization.
Before you decline, which I know you are about to do, stop. Consider the big picture here. Disregard the media and the way it sensationalizes us. Disregard what you've seen. Throw it all to the side for a moment. Understand what Team Termina does, or rather, what you've seen it do, is not what we stand for. It's not what I stand for. A facade, you could call it. A white lie on a much grander scale. We only desire to keep the ignorant from understanding our true intentions so that they might not stand in our way. You and I, we're smarter than this. None of this is news to you, I'm sure. I am quite confident you've understood all this for a long time now, which is why I'm all the more certain you will accept this offer. You have to. There is no other option for someone like you. Someone whose glory days are behind them. I am giving you an opportunity to take that back at no expense to yourself. Imagine, you could be someone again.
I encourage you to be swift in your response, as time is a precious resource of which we have little at this moment. You have nothing left to lose, Ms. Sigmund. Keep this in mind before you decline my offer.
Sincerest regards,
Morgana Takagi"
Marley stared down at the paper, a disdainful glint in her eyes, hands shaking ever so slightly with subtle rage. She took a deep breath, before slowly and deliberately tearing it in half, almost perfectly bisecting it. "No," she said flatly to no one in particular, though her Froslass flinched a little at the word, unaware of what exactly had her trainer so shaken up but well aware something was wrong. It tilted its head, the stoic look on its face belying no emotion, though it seemed curious nonetheless. Its yellow eyes gleamed as they looked over the paper, covered in lines and shapes that meant nothing to a Pokemon like it, before turning up to exchange looks with the Murkrow who had delivered this upsetting package. The tiny black bird seemed unnerved by the presence of an Ice type, but diligently remained on the windowsill as it waited for dismissal. Marley imagined it'd been so strictly trained she could have killed it right then and there and it wouldn't have moved a muscle in retaliation, but she thought herself better than that. Maybe she wasn't, but it was nice to pretend.
She picked up the pair of paper scraps, folded them neatly in half, placed them back in their envelope, and handed the whole mess of it back to its deliverer before waving the Murkrow off. "There's your response. Now piss off," she said dryly, arms crossed. She could have almost sworn she saw it breathe out a sigh of relief, as if it'd been holding its breath this whole time in anticipation, before flitting off just as quickly as it'd arrived. Her Froslass let out a frustrated "hmph" as it left, not sure why she should hate it, but knew that if her trainer did, then she should too.
"Me too," Marley replied jokingly, a faint smile crossing her face no matter how hard she tried to stay mad. "I- I just can't believe that… that self righteous piece of shit would even consider asking me something like this! As if there was even the slimmest I would look at this and say, 'yeah, this looks like a great idea!' She claims to have studied me, but of course, if that were true she'd know that I've made my feelings very clear, very publicly, on the subject of Team Termina. Not that I should put lying past her," she grumbled angrily as she paced around the halls of the penthouse, "Considering she's so eager to admit she's done it before, like it's some kind of accomplishment. Something to be proud of." This was an absolute outrage, Marley thought. Never did it occur to her that ignoring the letter and moving on with her life was an option. No, this was an offense not soon to be forgotten. It wasn't even really the letter she was mad about, if she was being honest with herself. A lot had been leading up to this, the letter had only been the straw that broke the Numel's back.
From a distance, her Froslass watched, both curious and a little concerned, though its face was cold and expressionless as ever. It was used to this kind of reaction by now, it knew its trainer as well as she knew it. It raised its tiny hands and began moving them with grace and precision, as if trying to communicate with some complicated form of sign language, though its motions held no true semantic meaning. Not to humans, at least. They only conveyed its quiet worry in an attempt to calm its trainer down. It had dealt with Team Termina in the past as well, and although it understood little English, it recognized the phrase "Team Termina" as well as it did the phrase "use Blizzard!" How many times had it been forced to cut through swarms of Zubat and Glameow, only to find a hundred more in their place. It broke its stoic expression for just a moment, lips turning ever so slightly down into a frown of disgust. It didn't know much, but it knew it hated those white coated humans as much as it hated the scorching rays of the sun itself.
Turning to her Pokemon, noticing its frantic signing, Marley let out a quiet sigh. Her temper was getting the best of her. Again. There was no one even here, she realized, besides her Froslass and other five Pokeballs. She'd been yelling at nothing. She could swear she was going crazy up here alone in this isolated place with no one but her ghosts to keep her company. "Maybe I should join Termina," she conceded mockingly, "if it meant having someone to talk to."
Her thoughts were abruptly interrupted by the chiming of a Hoothoot clock. It's tiny, twinkling chimes rang out twelve times before going back to its quiet ticking. It was noon, it seemed, a fact supported by the loud bells of the massive cathedral Hearthome was so well known for pealing out in the distance. She turned back to her Froslass, who had resumed signing, though its hands moved in an entirely different way this time. "You don't have to remind me," she sighed, having already started reaching for her other Pokeballs. "I know it wouldn't be especially wise to let you all, y'know, starve to death." She was only half serious, of course. Only one of her Pokemon actually seemed to need food. The rest only ate when the mood suited them, or just didn't. Still, it wasn't good to keep them all cooped up constantly. Probably not, anyways. She wasn't a Pokemon, she had no idea what it was like in a Pokeball.
"Gengar, Mismagius, Bronzong, Dusknoir, Crobat," Marley said flatly, releasing them in succession as she called their names, devoid of the heated passion young trainers were known for as they shouted the names of their companions with excitement. She had performed this ritual a million times, and expected to do it a million times more. Still, seeing the whole crew out and about, grins perpetually plastered to their faces as they stared up at their trainer with anticipation, she couldn't help but smile back at them. They were all she had now days, and she was okay with that. She told herself she was okay with that, anyways, and just that thought was enough to keep her going through the day.
"Settle down," she said as the whole lot of them trailed her eagerly to the kitchen. It was mostly her Gengar she was speaking to, though. Like a Growlithe pup who'd been neglected for a year, it paced around her feet eagerly, alternating between a bipedal and quadrupedal stance, chanting broken fragments of its name as well as hers. She probably would have crushed it by now, it had such a penchant for getting under her feet, if she didn't pass right through the intangible ghost every time she made contact with it. She got down two bowls, trying to ignore the Pokemon hovering impatiently around her as she did so, one small and made for feeding while the other was noticeably larger. The first she filled with kibble and set down on the table, and her Crobat was quick to swoop down and inhale the little brown pellets, while the other she pressed to her refrigerator's ice dispenser and filled with big cubes, before placing it on the ground. Her Froslass picked up one piece at a time, crunching through them effortlessly with its surprisingly strong jaws with methodical dedication, depleting the bowl rapidly, while the Gengar and Mismagius snatched up any remaining pieces and rubbed them on their faces, seemingly obsessed with the cold. In all her years training with Ghost types, Marley had never understood the correlation between them and cold, but they seemed to like it and ice was cheap so she was happy to provide.
She turned from her Pokemon and left them to their own devices as they chattered among themselves and enjoyed what she'd put down for them, having collected herself by now, though still quietly seething about that letter. She knew she should probably do something about Termina. She'd always had the sneaking suspicion Morgana had something more shady going on behind the scenes than what she was letting on—as much as she hated the woman, Marley always thought her too smart to be wasting all the resources and raw man power available to her on things as trivial and obvious as hassling children and mugging strangers—and now that she had confirmed this, no matter how vague she'd been about it, something more serious than petty frustration had settled inside Marley. For the first time in a long, long while, she was afraid.
She shook her head in attempt to clear it of these thoughts. No, of course she couldn't do anything, even if she wanted to. She was outnumbered one to thousands. To indulge in these fantasies of heroism and grandeur was foolish. What, was she ten? Marley switched the TV on, hoping maybe some background noise would help. It was a game show of some kind that was on, and it wasn't really the kind of thing she enjoyed, but she was thankful for the white noise nonetheless, and so she left it on. TV entertaining an audience of none behind her, she reached a hand up to the thick red curtains that were draped over every window in the penthouse, and there were plenty of windows, giving the whole place a sort of eerie red glow as the afternoon sun desperately tried to penetrate through. She pulled it back, those bright rays finally freed assaulting her incapable eyesight. "Fuck!" She said, stumbling back for a moment, reflexively bringing her hands to her face, turning away from the bright light. With a heavy sigh, she reached into her pocket and pulled out a pair of sunglasses, large enough to fit over her prescription glasses. Another day she'd have to let her albinism get the best of her, it seemed. Just one day she'd like to go without wearing those obtuse shades that made her look nothing short of a top tier douche, but today, unfortunately, would not be that day.
With a wide sweeping motion, she grabbed the curtains and opened them fully, prepared to face the bright afternoon light this time. Behind her, her Pokemon let out quiet, discontent hisses, Gengar and Mismagius faintly shivering as the light washed over them while her Froslass began signing frantically with frustration. She'd let them get soft. It used to be one could shine a searchlight on them and they wouldn't flinch, but now anything more than the dim glow of electronics was enough to set them off. "Don't be like that, now," she said under her breath, arms folded as she observed the city below her while she addressed her Pokemon. "Any one of these days, you could have to start fighting again. Not that I want that, but, well… If worse comes to worst, would you really let something as mundane as the sun defeat you? I thought I raised you to be stronger than that."
At the foot of her towering apartment complex, she could see some kind of a scuffle going on. There always was now days, it seemed. Hearthome had become a mess ever since Team Termina had started to occupy it. A pair of men donning white coats with gold trim were harassing another man. They were commanding a pair of Absol, and although the canine Pokemon were fighting with the man's Pokemon, it was clear to her they'd tear right into the guy without a second thought the second his Pokemon fell. Him and his Clefable seemed to be making a valiant effort, but she imagined he'd be overwhelmed soon enough. "Idiot," she mused to no one in particular. Getting in the way of Team Termina was a good way to 'mysteriously disappear' these days. A frigid hand pressed against her shoulder, and anyone else might've been scared out of their own skin by such contact, but Marley didn't even flinch, knowing already it was her Dusknoir. Its single eye, glowing dimly like the light of a dying lantern, watched the man and the predicament he'd gotten himself in intently. "You think so too, huh?" She joked, softly chuckling as she looked up at the imposing black phantom that hovered beside her. It didn't seem to hear her, or just didn't care, it was difficult to tell. It was instead intensely focused on the streets below. She wondered what it was thinking, though the motivations of her Dusknoir remained impossible to decipher. "Come on now," Marley said wearily, smile faltering just so slightly. "There's nothing you can do. Nothing any of us can do. He chose to jump off that cliff, now… now he has to live with that."
Closing the curtains and beginning to draw her Pokeballs in preparation to recall her team, she walked away from the window and back to her Pokemon, still in the kitchen, carefully watching their master from a distance, hushed. That was enough time outside for now, she thought. She wanted to be alone for awhile.