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OFFSCREEN POST

Olive Branch

TWs // CWs : Hospitals, Discussions of Child Death, Discussions of Kidnapping / Child Abduction, Panic Attacks, Violence, Injury, Gore, Blood

Connected to Connecting Roots and Uprooted.

No one liked being in the hospital.

It was mind-numbing and draining, having to stay in one little room for days on end all the while doctors and nurses poked and prodded at you. It wasn’t just the medical staff that had been bothering Esper though. Police and other official looking people came and went, asking her questions that made her uncomfortable and forced her to reevaluate so much about what she knew. She didn’t like it. She didn’t like being told she was “safe now”, she didn’t like being told she was “in good hands”, she didn’t like how they talked about her da and mum, she didn’t like any of it.

Esper stared up at the ceiling with an unfocused gaze, listening to the ticking of the clock. Her face almost seemed ghostly pale if not for her reddened cheeks and nose from hours of crying accompanied by the deep bags beneath her eyes from lack of sleep. Her hair was out of its braid, white threads spooled around her in messy strands like the roots of a tree, branching off into different paths. She looked like a mess.

Everything was out of her hands. She didn’t get a choice in any of this. Her entire life had changed in a matter of days and she wasn’t sure how she was meant to feel. Her da and mum had lied to her. They had been lying to her for so long. And yet she couldn’t even begin to understand how she felt about it all. Was she angry? Sad? Happy?

A small knock on the door cut through her thoughts.

Esper’s head slowly turned toward the door, her brows furrowing slightly in aggravation. It was probably more pushy cops coming to ask her about her da. Fucking wonderful.

With a roll of her eyes she called out to them, “Come in.”

The door creaked open slightly to reveal an exhausted-looking Victoria. Despite her attempts to appear composed, the stress lines and dark circles beneath her eyes betrayed any semblance of imperturbability. Clearly, the recent revelations had been taking as much of an emotional toll on her as they had on Esper.

Esper gasped as she snapped into a sitting position, “Tor–!” She was swiftly cut off as a sharp pain shot through her chest, causing her to double over in the bed, her arms wrapping tightly around her torso as she let out a hiss of pain. “I… I shouldn’t have done that…”

Victoria instinctively lunged forwards and reached a hand out to her, but slowed herself the moment she realized Esper was not immediately dying in front of her. “Are…” She began to ask something, but trailed off with a pause before saying, “I was going to ask if you were alright, but I suppose that would be a bit redundant of me, now would it?”

The white haired girl slowly sat back up, wincing as she let out a small laugh, “Just– Just a bit, I think.” Esper looked at Victoria with a small smile, “Though I’m not the most happy about people seeing me in such a state… with my hair being down and all.”

“Oh. I can leave if you—”

“I’m joking, Tori.”

To Esper’s surprise, Victoria chuckled with a slight smile. “I thought you were—” She instantly shut her mouth right before the punchline, her face falling into a frown. She looked at her friend with an unsure tilt of her head.

“Esper.” The girl stated without hesitation, “I want to be called Esper. Or, as you have been calling me, Esp.”

“Right.” The young heiress drew in a quiet breath and nodded. “Then… Esp it shall be.”

Esper smiled in turn. She wasn’t ready to be Estelle, she didn’t know if she ever could be. It was strange really, finding out that your name isn’t your name, at least not in the way you thought it was. But she could understand why her da did it, at least from his point of view, it would’ve made everything easier for him if she didn’t have her legal name.

Though that did make her wonder…

“Why the hells didn’t my da change my brother's first name?” Esper suddenly asked aloud, tilting her head to the ceiling in thought, “Why’d he keep his first name?”

Victoria shifted uncomfortably on her feet, uncertain of how to respond.

Esper continued, “And it’s not like I can fuckin’ ask him since he fuckin’ vanished after the second Darkest Day…”

“Vanished…?”

Esper blinked in response, turning her attention back to Victoria before glancing away with an awkward chuckle as if it was funny, “Ah– Yeah. I was the last one to see him that day, he found me during the chaos and promised to go get help. He… uh… never did. No one’s found him so we don’t know what happened to him.”

The other girl’s brows furrowed. “Forgive me for asking, but how are you so certain that he never sought help?”

“Oh, I didn’t mean like he didn’t try–” Esper vaguely gestured with her hand, “It’s just that my da and authorities were the ones to find me and Juno. And they hadn’t been told by Flynn that we were there, so they tried to interview anyone they could and no one stepped forward about having been spoken to by Flynn during the disaster. So, he may have tried, though he never actually managed to get help.”

She tilted her head. “Juno?”

“I– I should just give the rundown.” Esper responded, shifting in her bed to get more comfortable before continuing on, “So. Juno was my closest friend in Spikemuth and we spent a lot of time together. On the day of the big championship match, he was over at my old flat. It was just him, me, his Nickit named Polaris, and my da’s Obstagoon named Maverick. We were having a good time until, well, the second Darkest Day started in which Maverick… was one of the Pokemon to dynamax.”

Victoria winced slightly. “In… the house?”

“In the flat building… yeah.” The girl nodded as she began to fidget with her gown, “With both me, Juno, and his Nickit in the flat with him. And so many others in their neighboring flats…”

She thought back to that day. Roars and calls of Pokemon shook the earth around her, echoing throughout Spikemuth and the surrounding area. The weight of concrete and brick crushed her body so tightly that she could barely fill her lungs with the dust-filled air. Metal debris pricked at her skin, jabbing at her sides and mudding her hair with crimson. She couldn’t move, she could barely cry out as all her energy was dedicated to keeping her alive and awake.

If only Juno could’ve been as lucky.

He was alive for a while, whispering promises of life and safety to Esper in the darkness of their prison, though his body laid frighteningly still as crimson slowly pooled around him. His mind and body grew weaker by the second. He had been impaled when the building collapsed on top of them— a large, jagged piece of rusted metal had been lodged straight through his shoulder and into the debris below. Polaris was curled up to his side, beaten and battered as much as the two children, chirping and crying to his trainer.

She remembered the way Juno’s eyes grew duller by the hour. Until they were cloudy and lifeless.

Victoria looked past the girl before her with a thousand-yard stare. The ticking second hand on the clock came to a stop, filling the room with a discomforting silence.

“We were trapped for nearly the whole day– But Flynn found us early on. He promised to go get help and… well… he never came back.” Esper let out a shaky breath, her face feeling hot, “And by the time help did arrive… Juno had been dead for several hours.”

The other girl shut her eyes and turned her head away, reaching a trembling hand to her chest. “Excuse me for a moment, Esper.” She took several deep breaths until her hands stopped shaking and the stress lifted from her face. The clock resumed its ticking, returning the familiar ambiance to the once silent room.

After a moment, Victoria cleared her throat with a wince and gestured to her head. “Um— Mind-reading.”

Esper blinked before flushing red, waving her hands frantically, “Ah– I’m sorry– I forgot– I’m sorry I’ll just stop now I’m sorry–” The girl promptly tried to fill her mind with other things such as memories of Fauna and Deerling.

“No, no, it is through no fault of your own,” Victoria tried to reason with her. “It simply caught me off-guard is all.”

“Are you sure…?” Esper looked up at her with big eyes.

“Positive. You needn’t apologize, Esp.”

“Okay…” The girl nodded in return, “I was done anyways though. That’s about everything… Well not… everything… but all the really important things.”

“I see,” she said, finally turning to look back at her friend. “If I may be so bold to ask, do you… think Flynn is…?”

“Alive? Dead?” Esper hesitantly shrugged, “I don’t know. I don’t know which I would rather, which would hurt less… If Flynn is dead then… he’s gone. But if he’s alive… then he left me to die.”

Before Victoria had time to respond, there was a knock at the door.

The girl raised an eyebrow, then looked to Esper. “Are you expecting company?”

Esper huffed in response, grimacing at the door, “No. It’s probably another officer or doctor or something. Let me just–” She raised her chin to the door and called out, “Come in!”

The door slowly opened to reveal a lanky man in a black and green jacket, his hood pulled tightly over his head and casting his face in shadow. His attire was worn and dirty and his demeanor seemed akin to a kicked dog with how he hunched in on himself and how his hands trembled at his sides. He hesitantly stepped into the room, closing the door behind him before turning in the direction of the two girls in an awkward fashion.

Esper and Victoria exchanged glances for a moment, then eyed the man wearily.

The man stood there silently for a minute, staring at Esper specifically for an agonizingly long before clearing his throat, “So– Um–”

At that moment, a flash of recognition and utter hatred crossed Victoria’s face. An invisible force suddenly yanked the man towards the girl while she winded up her fist and connected it directly into the center of his face. The force of her punch snapped his glasses in half and knocked the hood off of his head.

Flynn Wyrmwood was knocked to the ground, clutching his nose in pain.

With a snarl, Victoria looked down at the man and hissed, “Hablando del rey de Roma, por la puerta asoma.” She raised her leg to stomp—

“VICTORIA–” Esper shouted. “DO NOT… stomp… on….” Her voice trailed off as she looked down at the older boy. A boy with darker skin than hers and yet had the same pure white hair and lavender eyes with white pupils shining brightly. Esper repeated, her heart leaping into her throat as she took in the sight of the boy, “Victoria. Stop.”

The young heiress looked back towards her friend, then to the coward at her feet. She narrowed her eyes at him, but gently lowered her foot to the floor and stepped away. “Get up,” she spat at him. A sudden force lifted him off the ground and flipped him onto his feet— not too kindly, however. The momentum from the flip threw him forwards and he bashed his face into the side of the hospital bed.

Flynn grunted in pain, barely managing to catch his footing before slowly dragging himself into a standing position, blood dripping from his nose. “Yeah– Yeah no– I deserved that–”

“Indeed you do,” Victoria cut him off.

“Victoria. Stop harming him.” Esper scolded before turning her attention to the bloodied boy infront of her, her eyes scanning his face. It was him. It was actually him. He was alive. He… he was alive.

That hurt.

“Esper…” Flynn stared back at her, seemingly also studying her. A ragged breath left him as he spoke, “You’re alive.”

“You left me.”

“I know. I’m sorry–”

Esper cut him off, her chest tightening, “You left me to die. You left Juno and I to die.”

“I’m sor–”

“Juno is dead!” Esper spat. Tears had begun to well up in her eyes, “And you’re alive.”

Victoria glared silent daggers at Flynn. If looks could kill, he’d have perished where he stood.

He paused, opening his mouth to speak before closing it again and looking down in shame, “I’m sorry…”

The white-haired girl stared at her brother in silence for a while. The ticking of the clock was the only indication that time hadn’t stopped.

“Why now?”

Her brother looked up at her, blinking.

“You had plenty of chances to come back. And yet you didn’t.” Esper asked, her body aching as emotions welled up inside her.

Flynn glanced away, “I… I was scared. I am scared. Father scared me, I was scared if I came back or told anyone then…”

“You knew.”

“I…” He winced, “I did. Yes.”

“You knew the entire time.” Esper’s gaze was hundreds of miles away, “That’s why he didn’t change your name.”

Flynn only nodded in response.

The white-haired girl gripped her blanket between her hands. Her thoughts became foggy with all the questions she wanted to ask him, but one stayed at the forefront of her mind.

“Why are you here?” She asked. “Da is gone now, you could no longer be a missing person.”

Flynn took a deep breath and looked his sister in the eye, “I… I wanted to give you the choice on if I did or not…”

“What?”

“I hurt you, Esper,” her older brother swallowed, “I hurt you a lot. I didn’t want to suddenly come stomping all over it again. So I wanted to give you that choice.” He wiped the blood from his nose as he knelt down by her bedside, “Do I come back home or do I go back to whatever hole I crawled out of?”

Victoria furrowed her brows and wrinkled her nose at him.

“I…” Esper trailed off, staring down at her brother with teary eyes. Why was she being asked to choose? Why did she have to make that choice? Why was this the only choice she’s been allowed during this whole fiasco? Why this of all things? She hadn’t seen her brother in nearly two years, she had thought he was dead somewhere, possibly eaten by some Pokemon or the like. But… here he was. Asking her to make a life-altering choice for him.

She felt sick.

“I…” The girl blinked, tears running down her face before she sharply turned away from her brother. As she spoke her voice seemed almost devoid of emotion. Almost. “Stop being missing... Come out of hiding… You…” She glared at him from the corner of her eye, “You don’t get to run from this.”

Her brother gave a small smile. Tears began to run down his face, dripping onto his now bloodstained jacket. “I won’t. I promise.”

Scene End.

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Victoria belongs to @victoria-vd