Pedestal: Chapter 106

I must've frozen in shock, because Lola laughed humorlessly and said, "Don't worry, it's not as if I'm going to tell everyone. The Gym leaders know about it, right?"

"How—How did you—" I spluttered helplessly, mind recovering and going a mile a minute. Lola knew, Lola knew, Lola knew—this could only end badly. How had she figured that out? Had someone told her? What if someone else found out? What if the media found out?

"We met in Snowpoint, remember? You may hardly remember it, but I distinctly remember the two little kids carted in with injuries from that Abomasnow. You certainly changed my visit. I also remember you enthusiastically commandeering the television every time Sayre battled on it. You and that girl friend of yours talked about him fairly often."

"…Yeah. We were friends," I said softly, challengingly. If she was going to make an issue about this, I was going to fight her. I would fight her for Nick.

Lola closed her eyes and hummed absently to herself. "I thought as much."

Was that it? "Are… Aren't you mad?"

"Why would I be?"

"He's kind of the biggest criminal in Sinnoh right now."

"Did you help him with that little fact?"

"Well, no—" though I had happened to break him out of jail the one time he got captured.

"Then why does it matter? It's in the past. You can't change your past, only deal with its consequences in the future." That statement probably shouldn't have hurt as much as it did. Still, I was incredibly grateful to Lola right then. She knew about Nick and I (to some degree), and it sounded like she was going to keep it a secret. She wouldn't benefit from keeping it to herself, at least not that I knew of, so she was actually doing this out of the kindness in her heart.

"…Thanks, Lola," I said and meant it.

"Don't thank me," she mumbled with a sigh. "We're enemies in this race, after all. I could turn around and blackmail you with this information later on if I think it could help me win."

"You're already a shoo-in. You've gotten three beads out of every challenge so far," I accused, eyes narrowed.

"That's true. But in all seriousness, I probably won't tell anyone. I'm not going to be stupid enough to make any promises on your behalf, but during the course of life in general, I won't tell anyone."

"Thanks, again." She only smiled grimly and shook her head. We finished the dance, Carlita came over and demanded to know why I was dancing with another female, and I managed to dodge an array of bullets for the evening.

I never did dance with Alicia that night, but oddly enough, that was okay with me. I didn't want to pressure her into anything that would only make her uncomfortable. Realistically, the best I could hope for at this stage in the game was just to stay friends. Carlita had the time of her life, however, and several times got applause for her dancing skills. Gardenia in particular seemed awed with the idea of a dancing Breloom. I also managed not to dance with Archie, though that was more on accident than in any sort of grand plan.

Vaikuntha and I returned to our room at about the same time. He said he had a great night as well and learned many of Sinnoh's dance techniques (I had no idea what that meant), and we both tiredly collapsed in our bunks for the night. Carlita and Oviya retired to their pokeballs gladly; dancing really was a workout. The night was thankfully dreamless (and we didn't even need the cough medicine).

The next morning, we woke up to hell.

I bolted upright to someone pounding on the door. Vaikuntha rolled off of the top bunk—nearly landing on me—and we sleepily dragged ourselves to the door to answer it. Hanna, looking harried, glared up at us. "Do you want the bad news or the worse news first?" she panted.

"Did you sprint here from your room?"

"Yes." Without waiting for an answer to her question, she held up the newspaper. Across the top of it in blocky, black letters, read "THE REALITY OF THE NIGHTMARISH GYM RACE". I swallowed, mouth suddenly dry. There was really only one thing that article could be about. Hanna lowered the paper and glared over it, and said, "Someone last night must have spilled. I haven't read all of it, but it looks like they don't have details about specific ones."

"Well, good! How could they, anyway? No one's told anyone else about their nightmares! No one would!" I exclaimed in panic, taking the newspaper from her and scanning over the article.

"But now they know of them," Vaikuntha pointed out worriedly. "That means they will know what to look for, what they want to know."

"Exactly," Hanna agreed darkly. "But now there's an uproar about the immorality of it all, and how they want to get the police involved to try to catch the culprit."

"What can the police do that we haven't tried? This isn't a standard crime. Is it technically a crime?"

"It's inhumane and was a blatant violation of personal privacy and respect."

"It will probably not be a good thing if the police are involved. We are nearing the end of the race, and it has not happened again. We can only assume and hope that the Gym leaders will pick out the culprit in their own time."

I handed Hanna the paper again with a heavy sigh. This would be hard to dodge around. The media would be all over this, and probably aggressively, too. "So what's the bad news?"

"This was the bad news." Vaikuntha and I could only stare at her. "The worse news happened earlier this morning, so it didn't have time to make the morning papers like this."

"What is it…?" I asked, almost afraid of the answer I would receive.

Hanna looked down at her slippers. "…Two trainers and their teams were found dead just north of Sunyshore. They think it was Nick."

-.-.-

The media was frothing at its collective mouth trying to get to us, both for our opinions on the potential that Nick Sayre was so close to Sunyshore, and for the nightmares. We actually had to be escorted to the stadium for our final partner competition by armed guards. It wasn't just the press; it was all of Sunyshore. People were demanding to know what the Gym leaders were doing about this—about all of it. They were already turning to us for answers, too. As if we had any.

For my part, I was mostly lost in a daze. I followed Vaikuntha numbly towards the stadium. Nick had said he wouldn't kill anymore. Sure, that admitted he had killed before—but I wanted to believe him. I wanted to believe him so badly. He had stayed quiet this past month, so why start up again now? The fact that it was so close to the city was equally frightening. He was close. He was close to Gym leaders and the trainers who would become Gym leaders. I didn't want to think about what he could do with that opportunity. Because he wouldn't use it, right? He couldn't have done this.

"This is poorly timed, but something we had planned since the beginning, so it's unavoidable and unfortunate," Gardenia announced solemnly, hands clasped in front of her. "We will handle the press as best we can, and can only advise you all strongly not to speak to any reporters until this dies down. And… we're sorry. We're so, so sorry."

Her apology was met with stony silence.

Volkner stepped up to take over. "Get in your pairs for today's challenge. Same pairs. Today will mark the last of the traditional challenges, but we will explain that more in detail later. Today, it's more battling."

"Who are our opponents this time? Randomly assigned again?" Sela asked sarcastically, hands on her hips.

"Your opponents are your partners," Volkner said dispassionately. I stared up at him. The revelation was like a bucket of cold water when I'd already been doused with liquid nitrogen. "It will be a one-on-one battle, and you will use your starter, or equivalent. I could easily explain why we want to do it this way, but let's face it. No one's in any mood for more talking. It should be fairly obvious, but if not, use your imagination." He sounded so tired. But at the same time, I agreed with his statement that no one wanted any more talking. We were tired, too.

And, looking up at Vaikuntha, I could only surmise that things would get worse from here on out.

I didn't speak, and he didn't, either, as we were led to our arena. We didn't even look at each other. We did pass Lola—I didn't see who her partner was—and she said with a flat voice, "Turning friends into enemies. A test of strength, isn't it? Battling your friends… Psychological torture, isn't it?"

"Please be quiet," Vaikuntha whispered. Whether or not she heard him, I didn't know.

We took opposite sides of the arena. There would be no surprises in this battle. Des versus Koel. With the fire, I had the type advantage, but ground moves would be useless, and I had the feeling Koel was more experienced than Des. Probably, since Vaikuntha had been training for longer.

We released our Pokemon, who took in the situation mutely. Vaikuntha wasn't looking at me, instead looking down at his feet. Koel stalked back and forth in front of him, feathers grating, looking furiously defensive. Des shuffled backwards, blowing smoke while we waiting for the referee to start the match. The woman raised her hand, and both Pokemon tensed. She dropped it, and in the split second before either trainer could start giving orders, Des took a deep breath for a fire move, and Koel leapt forward, wings held out like swords.

"I forfeit."

Koel screeched to a halt, and turned around and stared at his trainer with wide eyes. Des tilted his head to one side, exhaling his breath and dripping flames rather anticlimactically. I likewise took a couple steps to the side in order to see around my Camerupt, staring in shock at the other side of the arena.

Vaikuntha raised his head and looked at the referee expectantly. "I said I forfeit. I would rather lose here by my own hand than expose my Pokemon to a long match in which he has the clear disadvantage. I am not sure we would lose the battle, but it would be too hard on both Pokemon to justify it."

"Wait, Vai—"

He turned to me with a patient smile. "Brother, I have made up my mind already. As much as I would like to say it is, I cannot say this is for you."

"Are you sure?" the referee asked in confusion, looking a little lost. He nodded emphatically. "…Side A forfeits. Side B wins by default."

I returned an equally confused Des and jogged over to my roommate as he returned his Skarmory. "Vai, why did you do that?"

"I have enough beads to cover for this. I am not out of the Gym race just yet, brother," he replied cheerily.

"I know, but—still, you just lost! I'm pretty sure Koel could have taken Des, he's faster and better at close-range combat—"

"I would not expose either of our Pokemon to that long or hard of a battle."

Frowning, I ducked my head, but I would not let the matter drop. He had just forfeited! "I… I can understand that, Vai, but it's not like it would have been a fight to the death or anything…" Bad choice of words.

"I would rather lose on my own terms than have to win on any others. I made a promise to Koel." And with that, he would not speak any more about it.

The referee led me away and explained the situation to Crasher Wake who, with a grimace, only gave me one bead. I wasn't about to argue the point, and felt bad enough for that one bead. First, I cost Vaikuntha his three-bead streak. And just now, I cost him his winning streak. Sure, he had enough beads to cover for this, as he said, but it was the fact of the matter.

We sat around and waited for the other battles to finish up, since no one else forfeited (of course). We didn't talk. I felt guilty, and I had no idea what he was feeling, though he was smiling and kicking his feet idly. The second battle finished a couple minutes after that, and I was unsurprised to see Lola march out and receive three beads from Fantina.

I was surprised, however, when I saw who she had just beat—Alicia.

Dragging her feet, she passed us with a great sniffle. The bracelet on her wrist didn't have any beads on it. Alicia had been partners with Lola? But not just that—she had just lost and didn't have any more beads. She was out of the competition. Without thinking any more about it, I jumped up out of my seat, snagged Fantina along the way, and ran over to Alicia. "Alicia! Wait—!"

She turned around and something in her expression changed when she saw it was me. I couldn't tell what it was, however, and it stung—but that wasn't going to deter me. "…Yes?" she asked guardedly.

"Fantina, all bead-giving has to be sanctioned by a Gym leader, right?"

"Ah, oui," she replied. Alicia immediately saw where I was going with this and shook her head, but I held out my own bracelet to her regardless.

"I have four beads left. I'll give you two, so we can both make it to the next round. I'm not doing this because—because of anything. I'm just doing it because I want to, and because I'm sorry."

"You don't have to—"

"I don't have to do a lot of things," I replied with a smile I didn't feel. I untied the knot and slipped two of them off, then with a nod from Fantina, held them out to her. Alicia frowned, but held out her hand to take them. "Look, I just want us to have an equal shot at this next one. Let me do this. Please?"

"…Alright," she replied softly.

The rest of the trainers trickled out, some losers, some obviously winners. It seemed as if Alicia wasn't the only one who ran out with this competition, however. Those of us still with beads were herded away from the others—and it was about then that I realized there was not many of us left. Just as I was doing a headcount, Volkner strode into the room and announced, "Congratulations. You are the final ten. From here on out, things will be different."

Alicia. Myself. Vaikuntha (naturally). Lola and Sela (just as naturally). Benjamin. Archie. Keith Baxter (thank you once again, karma). That guy with only 'Challenger' as a name, and a girl I only recognized as the girl with the Lickilicky from the last double battle match, Kaili Schoff. We were the final ten.