Pathos「Pokemon Fanfiction」

Epilogue

Epilogue: Enough To Get By

Life hadn't been going very well.

Then again, it hadn't gone well ever since he was a child, but there was a difference in the atmosphere this time. Something felt off; the days went by as empty and hollow as they used to, but it was like there was something else missing.

Something had gone wrong along the way, hadn't it? The nights of screaming as he woke up had faded, replaced by days of aching numbness, and if he was to be honest, he wanted those nights back.

He wasn't upset when Yan had told him what happened. He just nodded quietly and told her that she could leave; and as she exited the inn, he muttered a sorry for what happened and closed the door before she could even register what was happening.

It hurt a little to have been left out of the whole loop, but he understood. None of them had quite understood what was going on—he'd just missed the most information.

Ironic, isn't it? he thought to himself, but the amused smile never came. I'm supposed to be great at getting information.

Would he ever get information for anyone again, though?

Fabio hadn't gone on a job in a long time. The knife lay on the table of a room that didn't belong to him, blood-stained and scratched in all its glory, but it had been untouched for a while.

When did he become this pathetic?

"Oi, asshole. If I'm going to let you leech off my house and food, then the least you could do is stop moping around."

He had no idea why he was staying with Leone. The both of them were tentative around each other, to say the least—and oh Arceus it was pretty stupid to stay with someone who'd almost tortured him to death.

The guy seemed to be trying to make something up to him, though; he was out on jobs most of the time, but he came back most nights and brought back dinner with him. It was sort of funny—he'd used to do the same thing for the boy when they were younger.

"Why are you doing this?" he asked one night, and his plate was untouched. "Seems a little strange for the person who tried to kill me, don't you think?"

Drip. He could still hear the sounds of the liquid dripping against his face and against the ground. It haunted him everywhere they went; after all, they'd been all he had heard for a few days straight.

Leone shoved a spoonful of rice in his mouth, and he refused to speak.

"My idiot sister made me realise something," he finally said, and his golden eyes held something other than irritation. "That's all you need to know."

They sat in silence for a few seconds, and he tried to focus on the plate in front of him. The taste of curry burned at his mouth, and he welcomed the momentary distraction.

"She's been trying to get me to give up my job for a while now," he sighed, but his words were razor-sharp. "I think she wants me to work for that shitty military setup. It pays well, but there's less freedom than I'd like."

"Work part-time, then," he suggested, and his mind was already at work—he was making all sorts of calculations in his head before he knew it. "That way, you can kill as many people as you want and you can get a decent pay."

Leone stabbed his spoon into his rice again. "It sucks to admit it, but you're right."

"I'm always right," he huffed back, but the argument pleased him a little.

He was still wary of Leone—after that incident, he would always be—but he could live a little better if the boy wasn't trying to be someone he wasn't.