How did we get here?

Chapter 1c

"Chase after him!" William yelled, but Gloria stopped him.

"No, it's not worth it, we wouldn't be able to find him, and even if we did, he may overpower us," Gloria said.

"Ughh!" William stomped the ground in frustration. "We were so close! Why didn't any of you help me?"

"What're you talking about?" Felix asked. "We did the best we could. Sorry things didn't pan out the way you wanted."

"Well, when I got knocked down just know, you didn't interfere! I almost died because you just sat there and watched!"

"Sorry, my moves were on cooldown," Felix tried explaining himself, but William shut him down.

"Well what about surf? Or brick break? Even I came up with water pulse, even though you're the water type!" William yelled at Felix in frustration.

"William! It is what it is. At least we made it out fine, and we can continue the mission!" Adam tried calming William down.

"You almost died so many times back there, and now not only are you not grateful you escaped with your life, you're throwing a tantrum like a child!" Gloria chided him. "Not everything's going to go your way all the time."

William sat down on the ground, letting his head clear. "Not everything's going to go your way all the time," Gloria's words echoed through his thoughts. That was something he had heard so many times, and he hated hearing it. He thought back to his parents, his sister, his financial struggles. How he wished he had more control over his life...

Blaze sat in her seat, deep in her thoughts. The school day had started how it always did, some of her classmates would make some snide comments about her, then the teacher would start teaching, and she would space off. She didn't understand why she had to go to school in the first place, the teachers never actually taught them anything useful, most just came in for the paycheck. The school would always try to half heartedly teach them some mental health advice that never worked. "Reach out to a teacher if you're struggling with your mental health!" they said. But when she actually mustered out the courage to reach out to her teacher, he just told her that life wouldn't go how she wanted it to and to just suck it up. That incident made her feel small, that her problems didn't matter in the grand scheme of things. That no one would care if she died.

She vowed to never open up to some stranger again.

"Hey Blaze, where's my money?" the Blaziken sitting next to her slammed his fist on her table. The teacher wasn't even bothered by the distraction because "your problems are none of my business". This was why she hated going to school so much, that Blaziken would always threaten to beat her up if she didn't give him thirty dollars everyday without fail. She'd considered dropping out of school, but the Blaziken said he would kill her if she did so. She didn't know how whether to embrace of fear death, but it would be extremely selfish to leave William on his own. The worst part about her situation was that she needed the money to pay their rent, but if she got beat up she wouldn't be able to work as many hours, so she had to precariously balance her rent and not getting beaten up. She began thinking about her expenses that month. She made around 1200 dollars a month, and she paid the Blaziken nine times this month, and spent thirty dollars on food, which totalled to 900 dollars, barely enough to pay the rent. She had to face the reality that she didn't have the money to pay him off again. She resigned to her fate, tears forming in her eyes as she stared at her table stained with dried blood.

"Are you there? Am I getting my money or not?" the Blaziken screamed at her.

"No..." she whimpered in fear. She felt like curling up into a ball and crying.