Ex Rocket Leader

there's an almost imperceptible twitch in her upper lip at his first observation, like whatever mask she's decided on wearing is settling in. her air is more cordial than the trenches dug out from under her eyes convey, her face fizzling out like a dying firecracker, a forgotten battlefield painted in dark browns & swelling skin. ada does itch for a return to form, to reply with a simple, cliché you have no idea & pretend she's regained her lost spark, but she just sits there blankly, rolling her fingers over her coffee.

no classic ada wong-ism can say what every public & private channel of communication hasn't for the past year already. that she's damaged goods—dead in the water, quite literally—her last tour de force an exercise in self-immolation, torching her reputation such that very few people would ever work with her again, & those that would have all the ammunition necessary to make her not a business partner but a slave.

maybe if they saw what she's been getting up to since, ada would get the satisfaction of seeing shock of their face before they clasp a leash around her neck.

when sakai makes his joke, or his equivalent of one, she does laugh, “ my sleep has been shot, but nothing as bad as, well, let's say my head hasn't been ... foggy. ” she smiles like a woman who can't help herself.

Surprises, she had in spades.

Sakai didn't know what to expect from her, but her low mood was plainly written. The dry and wry humor seemed to be good for her morale, and Sakai offered a small smile in turn at her small, if somewhat morbid, joke. "Ha! I agree, there's nothing worse than poor sleep compounded by a foggy mind," he mused.

"And the Kanto prefecture has you to thank for these recent restful nights," he ventured, "It's a pity that you can't benefit from the same."

[text]: o'coffee club, terminal 3

he really doesn't need any more directions than that, he can find his way. for a man of his discretion, she imagines sakai travels light, no more than one small courier bag with all the bare necessities & just the one change of clothes. just in case anyone's pores start leaking black sludge again, now that was the kind of embarrassment she would've left out of her report, had she haggard back to her handler with that drive in hand.

but her week in tokyo just had to get complicates, not just by underground fighting rings & old ties between umbrella & the local yakuza, but by the surprise of someone using her alias while destabilizing a country in the baltic—at least when she had a go at breeding civil war in eastern europe, she made sure to step in right as the conflict was reaching a boiling point.

ada bites into her cheek, she's sure if she could draw blood it would taste as bitter as her filtered coffee. she's lived a thousand lifetimes since they've last crossed paths, & she certainly looks like it, like the black fog & the nanomachines robbing her of sleep were just an appetizer for how cruel her fate would be. now she has another parasite doing the same, & this one she can't just excise like an infestation, no, she's chosen to nurture it—her, ada shudders in a breath. for all the chrysalid coursing through that child's system system, the only risk the virus poses it to the host, it will stunt her growth, liquify her organs, ensure she doesn't get a childhood.

sludge again, seems to be the theme of ada's recent past.

whenever he reaches the warm, wooden interior of the coffee shop, ada greets him with a half-hearted wave from the terrace, watching him glide in from between the palm leaves. ada wong is always bold, be it saturated reds or stark blacks, & even despite her apparent death & the dead littered around the globe, the only change in her appearance is a curlier texture to her hair. she hasn't had time to straighten it out.

Sakai pulled out the seat across from her, sitting down to join the woman without hesitation. Face to face, he was a better judge of character and intentions. His assessment? Despite the boldness of an allegedly dead bioterrorist sitting in public at a coffee shop, there was no mistaking the fatigue.

He'd become well acquainted with how it looked on her when she was infested with malicious nanomachines.

He bowed his head slightly, and folded his hands in his lap while scanning the interior of the O'Coffee Club. A habit, from years living quietly as a fugitive.

No one seemed to be disguising furtive glances, nor listening in.

Still, he refrained from asking immediately what exactly had happened since Ada departed Tokyo.

"Glad to see you are in... decent health," he started.

It wouldn't have been honest to say she looked to be in 'good' health.

Again--their conversation. It replayed in his head over and over again as he rested his eyes upon the ex-mafioso's cold, crumpled body.

He'd never forget the dread in the professor's voice as they left them both behind.

It's the kind of thing that plagued nightmares. It at least made good fodder for staying awake.

Speaking of that, Red would rub his eyes with exhaustion, grumbling to himself as he tilts his head downward, shifting fingers to temples to account for the oncoming headache soaring throughout his cranium. Red maintains a frown, trying to wrap his head around the situation. He'd begrudgingly sigh, giving up and turning his attention back towards both bodies.

[ At least you prepared for this. ] Molars grind in the back of his jaw. [ You know we're getting you back into your body, right? ] His disregard for the laws of nature had swelled to a head in this climax with the Fog.

It was a beast that defined that of which people and pokemon knew. It didn't care to abide by nature's set decisions. It can't be bargained with. It can't be reasoned with. It doesn't feel pity, remorse, or fear. More than that, it absolutely will not stop until it has engulfed everything and everybody around it into his reality: ultimate death.

Red deserved to pine after his almost fictional brand of heroism, if this beast was allowed to exist, because it sure didn't give a shit about reality, either.

Giovanni stares quietly through Jack's vision, observing the alternate reality Red's conviction for something they weren't even sure was possible at this point.

But he wasn't going to kill the young man's hope, either.

"Listen," he says, voice crackling out of the tiny Porygon, "We can worry about the state I'm in once the Fog is gone."

They fold their hands behind their back, nodding once to Red, "I've not given up, but there's not much that can be done about it right now. Even if we could find a way to return myself to my own body right now- I would be in no condition to help you. And you need me on the field."

They needed all the help they could get, and Jack and Giovanni in the state they were in now were a better chance for victory than either one of them separate.

"I just don't want you to despair or think that I've somehow been cheated. Of course, I would love to continue to live and experience things, and make new memories. If I can't? I'm alright, too. I'm lucky to have made it as far as I have."

"She's been all over me. I would have brought her if I thought she wouldn't scare the nurses."

He steps inside fully once greeted, trying for casual but missing the mark due to how tight his shoulders were. He slinks over to sit in one of the chairs provided for visitors, motioning for Giovanni not to make himself uncomfortable for his sake.

"Things, uh, sure have been crazy. Haven't they?"

It's hard to ignore the rescue and rebuilding efforts across Kanto and Johto that showed on the television. A freak wave and then the sickness in Saffron at the same time had taken its toll.

He'd been busy helping out where he could, which had put an uncomfortable amount of attention on him, but it was what felt right to do.

Even more uncomfortable was trying to avoid staring openly at Giovanni's injuries, but he can't help it as he speaks.

On a technicality. Part of him wonders how much Silver had heard about the events of those forty-eight hours, and the nature of Giovanni's plight to begin with.

The fact that he could have just as easily failed and been lost to Silver forever.

But there were better things to occupy the mind than imagining a possibility that never came to fruition.

"Things are crazy. They always are," he shrugs, "I've known more pandemonium than placidity to last four lifetimes over. But this is new."

He gestures vaguely around the room, "I didn't expect things here to be so... quiet. But I guess I was out for most of the scares."

Giovanni's lips quirk up at his attempt at joking and making light. It doesn't last long, shifting to look over at Silver again.