Magna City Shining Congress – Side Halls

[canisaries]

"I don't... I don't remember when I stopped seeing the way ahead," blurted the Medicham, lip wobbling.

Andre might get the impression she wasn't really talking about the past few minutes.

"It used to be so clear. There was a wonderful goal ahead, and I just kept stepping towards it, and now I don't know where it's gone..."

Andre hummed quietly. He figured that doctor's goal must have been the same as that of the CDE's, or maybe more broadly that of the Covenant, but it would be better to ask.

"What kind of goal was it? Do you remember anything about it?"

Roscoe sniffed. He didn't have an immediate answer for this one.

"Not as such, no... I guess I just... I dunno, man. I don't really have friendships, I don't think, with the rest of the Teardrop crew? I can't imagine they think the kind of thoughts I'm having right now, though. Which is fine, but... I'm. Not sure why?"

He pressed his tail-hand to his face and pinched the bridge of his squat, Aipom nose, hard.

"I think I... have a double standard?"

The amount of mental acuity and personal will it took Roscoe to recognise this while practically drunk on Blacklight must have been enormous. But a crack was showing in the cognitive distortion.

"Just feels like... I gotta live up to what they need me to be?"

"I think you just gotta be you," Ben said. "That's all anyone can be."

 

[Jackie Cat]

"I..." She averted her eyes. "I think I know what you mean. You try to be somebody, but then maybe people don't like the person you're trying to be, and you don't know how to be somebody different."

She looked back up at Garnet, placing a paw on her pincer. "I like you, though."

Garnet froze, as if by moving the pincer, she might injure the little fox cub touching her, or startle her away.

"Y-yes..." she replied, hesitantly. "I just keep being that same person, because what if by changing I make it worse? Or, I don't even really know how to be different..."

A pause, as she processed the other thing.

"I like you too, little fox. You have a pretty red colour, like me. You're much warmer than me, though."

She took a long, deep breath, that came out in a sigh. As she exhaled, the tower she'd been building blew away like loose sand in the breeze.

"It's nice. Relaxing."

"What kind of goal was it? Do you remember anything about it?"

"That's classified," she replied, tartly. Then her face creased in worry. "Maybe it doesn't matter. You sound like such a sweet boy, honeymuffin... Would you keep a secret for me, my little follicle? Of course you would. Yes."

Cherry reached out for him, still disoriented.

"I work for the Commission for Directed Evolution," she whispered. "We're researching the very foundational energies of life and spirit and body... My dream, oh! My dream was to perfect it. Just imagine. No more loss or pain, no more cruelty, no more fear. Imagine endless joy. A surfeit of love."

"I think you just gotta be you," Ben said. "That's all anyone can be."

Roscoe scoffed, and looked away. But the frown on his brow showed the sentiment meant something to him.

"Just be yourself, huh? Well, maybe I will. See how they like me without my airs and graces. Behind the mask, there ain't much to me but quips and smoke and miseryguts."

The monkey looked so tired, now.

"Saints, it'd be such a balm to have fuck-all expectations for once. You... You ever feel like that, kid?"

 

[canisaries]

"That's classified," she replied, tartly. Then her face creased in worry. "Maybe it doesn't matter. You sound like such a sweet boy, honeymuffin... Would you keep a secret for me, my little follicle? Of course you would. Yes."

Andre's snout wrinkled. Follicle?

Cherry reached out for him, still disoriented.

"I work for the Commission for Directed Evolution," she whispered. "We're researching the very foundational energies of life and spirit and body... My dream, oh! My dream was to perfect it. Just imagine. No more loss or pain, no more cruelty, no more fear. Imagine endless joy. A surfeit of love."

Andre extended a vine and gently placed it in one of Cherry's hands for her to grab.

As for her words, they did bring to mind some thought experiments Andre had pondered in his teens. If all suffering was eliminated, would evil cease to be as well? If so, would it be because no one would have reason to do evil any longer, or would it be because no harm could even be caused anymore, even if people tried?

But those were thought experiments. Real life was never quite as ideal. Still, Andre didn't think pointing that out was productive - at least not yet.

"No more loss or pain," Andre repeated. "Well, that sounds like a noble goal. What changed? Did you find it unachievable, or did you, for some reason, find it undesirable?"

Roscoe scoffed, and looked away. But the frown on his brow showed the sentiment meant something to him.

"Just be yourself, huh? Well, maybe I will. See how they like me without my airs and graces. Behind the mask, there ain't much to me but quips and smoke and miseryguts."

The monkey looked so tired, now.

"Saints, it'd be such a balm to have fuck-all expectations for once. You... You ever feel like that, kid?"

Ben thought back to Mike again, though he hated that. He thought about Mike talking about how important the matches were, how important it was to win, how he wanted - needed - to have a better win-loss ratio. Everything was fine and good whenever they won, but...

Whenever they lost, Mike didn't take it so well. Mike would lash out at the other team members. Never Ben, no, never Ben, but sometimes it almost felt like he wanted to...

But all of that was just because he was so driven, right? So passionate. That's something Ben loved about him. That unflinching confidence. Ben wanted to keep that alive. Ben wanted to win for Mike. Because when Mike was happy... Ben was happy. And when Mike was upset...

Ben sighed. "Maybe," he said quietly. "Maybe it would have been nice if the losses didn't sting as much."

 

[Cresselia92]

Julius looked at her with wide eyes, wider than his glasses could accomodate.

"It's... going to be rather more like an explosion, I fear. They may be nothing left to fix, very soon."

He took a long, shuddering breath.

"If there's stability to find, I don't know where to look for it..."

Lyra blinked slowly, trying to make heads and tails of the other rabbit’s despair. An explosion that broke something that couldn’t be fixed? What was he implying…?

“…A point of no return.”

Silver’s sudden voice took Lyra by surprise, and upon turning to her friend, she saw that while his eyes were still aimed at the chessboard, his gaze was focused on anything but those moving pieces. He sighed deeply and crossed his arms before continuing his own rambling.

“The reality that your life will change so drastically that nothing will be the same nor feel familiar ever again, forcing you to start from scratch. Like a page that has been erased in a flash and needs to be written once more…”

As he spoke, Lyra could feel the somberness seeping from his body language and voice, with his claws digging in his arms and his eyes narrowing sharply, and her heart squeezed with sadness. Stability was a luxury that Silver had lost twice in his life, from what she understood, and he was still only a teen like she was! Having to start again and again after working so hard and for so long… goodness gracious, the idea alone sounded so daunting and frightening!

“Maybe… it’s less a matter of fixing what is broken and more a matter of creating something outta the broken pieces,” Lyra offered, rubbing one of her ears. “Like, huh, you might break a prized glasswork, but you can always melt the shards to craft something else. Sure, it might not end up with the original shape, but there is also the chance of getting a better glasswork because you remember how it looked beforehand. All you need is… ah, to have a goal to keep you and your experience centered.”

Lyra leaned closer, giving an encouraging look to the other Lopunny. “What is something you wanna pursue at all costs, no matter what happens?”

 

[Shiny Phantump]

"Lillian. All I've done here... That's what I've kept going for. If I can't get back, then at least I can build something here. But it's all failing, rotting. It's like Aether all over again. Maybe this is just what I am? I struggle, and work, and suffocate, and achieve nothing."

He glanced around the halls of the Congress as if it were collapsing around him.

"There's no way to keep it together, anyway. It's all coming down whatever happens now. And with it, all my work, gone, like a library going up in flames. What a fucking waste."

The Umbreon's rings glowed and flickered, then dimmed. There was little fight left in him now.

"I'd give anything to start over from the beginning. Anything."

Back home, Lillian's Aether had been rotting from the inside out from the beginning. Maybe Gladius meant it differently, though. Meant something other than the moral rot that came with the existence of the deepest labs of Aether. Because, well, he wouldn't have been blindsided by something like that existing in the Covenant of Light.

"Even if you could turn back the clock to the beginning, you'd lose everything you've done so far." She scratched the back of her head awkwardly, realizing that this was a weird thing to say and she was probably taking this too literally. "You know, by way of going back in time...

Words about how salvaging things died unspoken on her tongue. Something about watching the Covenant fall apart felt natural. Maybe it was because this was her first time here, and she'd never seen it in any other state than active collapse. Not that the idea of Gladius losing whatever he'd built down there wasn't not sad, but it felt nature documentary sad. This pikipek will die, but that is the way of things kind of sad. The kind where you have to understand that you shouldn't really fight it. Institutions rotted and burned and that was that.

"You know, they clean things with fire, sometimes. Maybe you do need a second chance, but not one to do the same thing over again. Struggling and suffocating comes more naturally to you than breathing, doesn't it? Ha, I was never much good at struggling. Maybe not trying so hard is what's kept me safe so far. It's never did anyone else in our family much good so far, has it?"

 

[Jackie Cat]

Parallax slumped, breathing heavily. The idea of letting go took the wind out of him as readily as if Lillian had slugged him the gut.

"I get it. What you're saying... makes enough sense."

His jaw tightened, and he screwed his eyes closed.

"It just... hurts. I don't wanna live with the kind of mistakes I've made. I want to salvage it all somehow and prove it was worth it... or start over like it never happened. But it's impossible. So, 'burn it all down' it is."

He opened his eyes to look at Lillian with a hunted expression.

"And... I don't know if I'm gonna make it if that happens. Maybe it's the right thing to leave my work behind, but..."

There was so much fear in the Umbreon's expression. Fear, guilt, and loneliness. Maybe what he was going through felt so similar to death that it felt like there was hardly a difference, in the end...

 

[Chibi Pika]

"What's she saying?" Leaf snapped at Ralsen. She flung a pay day into the air, bright and sparkling and attention-grabbing, anything to keep the charizard from fleeing further away while they worked this out. "What does she want with him?"

Ralsen shook his head. "I doubt she wants anything with him in particular. He was there," he replied simply.

The glittering coins sailed through the air, catching Jade's eye as well as Vesta's. The Charizard wasted no time in picking them off with a spray of fireballs.

Jade strained her ears to catch any words in the Charizard's noises, but it was all guttural snarling and raw aggression, devoid of tones. She would've said that it wasn't speech at all, except... there was something there. Barely perceptible, more subconscious than anything, like the distorted words buried under radio static that you could only make out when you weren't trying to.

"burn it all. burn it all down..."

"Before losing her grip," Ralsen began, "she kept saying that this place was a dream, and that she needed to burn it all down so that we could awaken." His expression was strained.

Jade's tail swished. "It must've turned into a full-on frenzy." They were honestly lucky it hadn't gotten this bad with any of the others. She'd already been suspecting that this fight wasn't one they would win with words.

She turned sharply to Leaf. "We've gotta get her to drop him. You aim low, I'll aim high."

Out of the corner of her eye, Jade spotted Ralsen charging up his leaves with grass energy, but she ignored him and took off running down the hall, already reaching for a Water Pulse. Thunderbolt would've been faster, but... prooobably not ideal while Vesta was still holding Blue.