Frontier Town Nina's Place

[canisaries]

For a second there, Laura looked like she might believe him, but then...

"I don't know, Andre," she said, adrenaline creeping into her voice, "what does a killer look like? You don't look yourself, is the thing. Maybe if you were some bloke wearing a bloodstained shirt you'd look more the part."

Actually, it would be a raincoat. I'm cleanly like that.

"Look, I'm not gonna put your name in the news—" unless? "—or try and investigate you or prosecute you or whatever. Whatever you did, you did it in another reality, in a different body.

She promised no consequences - none of the legal sort, at least. It reminded Andre of someone...

"I'm afraid that I cannot allow you to die, Andre. Nor will you see a Forlasan court of law for your crimes on other worlds. You must serve penance in other ways."

If two different people said it without knowledge of each other, could it be true?

I have no idea what your motive could possibly have been, maybe I'd even be bloody sympathetic if I knew. But there's no point in going after you for it, so I'm gonna tell you again: be for fucking real with me."

Well, there it was again. Laura demanding honesty. But he couldn't be honest. She wouldn't understand.

And maybe she shouldn't. Maybe no one should, because there wasn't anything to understand. What Andre had done wasn't justice. It was a grisly way to pacify the guilty conscience of a selfish man who had it so well when others suffered.

No, no, what am I thinking? I have found understanding. Odette understood me. Sure, that's only one out of five people who found out understanding, but... it proves that I'm not just insane.

So... what do I do? Tell Laura the truth? Tell another lie that gets the gist across but sounds better (definitely leave out the fucking torture)? Continue to deny things? Refuse to answer entirely? Which option is the best for me? Which option is the best for the Wayfarers?

Andre struggled with the choice until he realized that he'd already waited too long. Surely no innocent man would give such a dead-eyed stare for so long when asked to be honest.

He sighed. He decided on a whim to go for the choice that felt like no real choice at all: half-assing it.

"Fine," he said, "fine." He adjusted his glasses with a hoof and looked away. "You're perceptive, I'll give you that."

He sighed and looked back. "Truth is, I'm not completely innocent. I have done something I'm afraid of getting out. But the situation is complicated. Nuanced. Ben doesn't fully understand it. And, well, I suppose by I must admit I don't have the complete picture, either."

He didn't know, after all, how madly Ben had loved Mike. He didn't know the depth of his sorrow.

"But, Laura, there is something I can say with complete transparency." Andre looked as deep into Laura's eyes as he could, trying to will her to understand his conviction. "I never wanted to hurt Ben."

 

[Jackie Cat]

First honest thing you've said to me.

Laura returned Andre's gaze, unblinking. (You'd have to be a magneton to beat a cat in a staring contest.) She knew she had the leverage here, anyway – even if he was telling a truth, she still expected him to frame everything to his benefit, and she'd make him sweat for it.

"Okay," she said, after a long enough moment spent rotating him on a spit in her mind. "Okay, that I believe. You know what I think? I think that whatever you did, you didn't bloody well think it through, and now you're faced with this shit as an unintended consequence. In that way, you're not special in the slightest, I promise."

She sniffed, and allowed herself to untense just a tad. Hardly at all, mind. She was talking with a bloke who, best case scenario, did some kind of negligent manslaughter. Best case scenario. Suddenly the hard drinks behind the counter looked terribly appealing.

"I should tell you now, I'm not gonna help you gaslight the cub." Cub? Adult bear before the summon, right? "Ben. I've been meaning to talk to him, actually. Follow up. Since he'll be lost, confused, resentful... Can't imagine why." Howls, this was gonna drive her round the bend, wasn't it. "Is there a version of this palaver where you come clean about your nuanced situation and I persuade him not to go around starting a lynch mob? I've been thinking about just contriving for the two of you to never be in the same room again, but somehow I doubt that's gonna be a reasonable long term solve."

 

[canisaries]

"Okay, that I believe. You know what I think? I think that whatever you did, you didn't bloody well think it through, and now you're faced with this shit as an unintended consequence. In that way, you're not special in the slightest, I promise."

It was true. Had Andre never tried to comfort Ben after Mike's disappearance, had Andre never given Ben his home address - Gods, what a stupid fucking thing to do, he could never berate himself enough for it - this never would have happened. Perhaps whatever source that leaked it to Ben that Andre had been the last one Mike had been seen with would still have leaked that information, but Ben wouldn't have known where to find Andre. They would never have met each other, they could never have formed any kind of relationship, and Betel wouldn't have pulled Ben to Forlas to be Andre's partner.

Of course, that may have meant that someone even worse could have come. Like Red.

"I should tell you now, I'm not gonna help you gaslight the cub." Cub? Adult bear before the summon, right? "Ben. I've been meaning to talk to him, actually. Follow up. Since he'll be lost, confused, resentful... Can't imagine why." Howls, this was gonna drive her round the bend, wasn't it. "Is there a version of this palaver where you come clean about your nuanced situation and I persuade him not to go around starting a lynch mob? I've been thinking about just contriving for the two of you to never be in the same room again, but somehow I doubt that's gonna be a reasonable long term solve."

Andre sucked in a breath through his teeth. "I suppose it's not reasonable of me to expect you to cover for me when you don't even know what I did and why. Fine. But I don't think there's anything I can tell you that'll help you calm Ben down. Ben was... very close with Mike." Andre didn't say in what way, since that wasn't something he had the right to go around and tell people.

He paused. There was nothing he could tell Laura that would help calm Ben down, no, but there were still things he could say.

"Mike, on the other hand, wasn't close with Ben," he started. "Guy practically told me so himself. Ben was just a tool for him to win battles with. All the hyping up, saying Ben was going to be a star? A stupid little play he had to put on do to keep the ursa hooked. Ben wasn't a partner to him because a pokémon could never be his equal, no matter their fluency in human language or legal rights. That's what he thought."

Andre sighed. "I did try to tell Ben this once. It made him attack me. So, no, he isn't receptive to hearing what a piece of shit Mike was or how he's better off without him."

Was he? Andre never found out what happened to Ben after he'd fled to Kanto. In fact, he'd never searched up anything about him. He knew he wouldn't have been able to stomach it.

"Frankly, as slimy as it is, that 'gaslighting' is the most peaceful way I can find to resolve this," Andre said. "If Ben believes himself to be mistaken - which is an entirely reasonable conclusion to come to with his knowledge of events - there'll be no lynch mob. Ben will still be miserable, yes, he lost what he thought was his best friend - but the truth wouldn't make him any less miserable. So if the options are 'sad Ben, Wayfarers operational' and 'sad Ben, Wayfarers in chaos', which one would you pick?"

Gods. Every time I open up about what I did to any degree, the words that come out of my mouth are just reprehensible. Yet I just keep talking. I keep defending myself, convincing others that my way is best. And I believe myself just enough to never stop.

Where is this all going to lead me?