𝐀𝐏𝐎𝐂𝐀𝐋𝐘𝐏𝐒𝐄 | [VARIOUS/Reader] | POKÉMON

IV

4.
SHARED PAST

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pov. lance
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Standing in my casual training outfit, I supervise the sparring women and men before me. There's still unoccupied ground beyond the city, just before the big fields stretch across the last bits of space, and it serves as our training grounds. I can see golden fields from where I stand with arms crossed, some workers collecting the first harvest of the month.

Just behind the fields, the stone walls stretch mightily into the sky. They're the size of a house, roughly estimated, and completely run once around our gorgeous city. And behind the wall?

A green valley. A horizon drenched in wonderous pastel colours every sunset. A whole world to explore for the children of our city. And yet, despite this beauty lying so close, we cannot reach it. We cannot allow anyone to leave.

Their deaths would be resting on my shoulders for eternity. The weight already lying on me reminds me of this, every time I stand, every time I wake, trying to get out of bed when my past is doing everything it can to pull me back into the sheets.

My body aches, from the struggles of continuing. Sometimes I can't find the will in me to proceed forwards. And I have to remind myself that there is no other way. That I was the very man who dug this hole that I'm now finding myself in.

There's no time for pity. Not when everything behind these walls threatens to fall apart at any moment. I can't think about me. There are so much more important things I need to take care of.

I see a frame much too familiar. Her sole presence makes my arms jitter. My past haunts me, but much more so does hers. Whenever I lay eyes on her, I see empty eyes and bloody snow. Memories return and I find myself back a year and a half ago, when tragedy struck our small village.

An attack in unmanageable extent. Fronts on two different sides, and not enough manpower to stop it in time. They drew in, Pokémon of huge size and amount, and struck us down like pray. We had lost so many. People were brutally torn, screaming for help,- but it never arrived.

Young men who faced the oncoming danger to protect their families and loved ones, knowing they had never stood a chance in the first place.

I had always been praised for being the strongest, earning the title of champion as a result. And yet, I hadn't been able to save them. If I were truly the strongest, then why couldn't I save the folk I care so deeply about?

The tragedy mustn't repeat.

Everyone knows. Striking each other down in training, over and over again, it's all that goes through our heads. Waking up in cold sweat in the mornings, seeing mauled children behind closed eyes, it's all we ever think about.

She wraps her knuckles with tape, firm enough to squeeze her skin. Scars disappear behind a screen of white, and her intense orbs find mine. Holding her gaze is hard. The intensity in those dark eyes leaves my breath to disappear. But it's the least I could do after running.

Meeting her gaze and enduring the fire that comes with it.

She walks towards me and with every step, I feel my pulse quicken, the urge to draw back growing.

Then she's right there, leans forwards and a whisper draws from her lips.

"Fight me."

I'm rendered immobile for a moment, though, when her hand comes flying my direction, I'm quick to spring back to life. I catch her wrist, but before I can properly grasp it, she's already drawn it back.