ratherbelocky | .004 Δ [Video]

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.004 Δ [Video]

Goooood evening, residents of Johto. It's a lovely, drizzly January day, and I've got a question you folks might be able to answer for me. Consider it an informal poll.

[York looks comfortable and cozy as he lounges around his house, still wearing his ugly Christmas sweater.]

Now, I understand that this place just isn't equipped to support a Grifball League, but there's got to be more to life than just hockey and baseball. Are there Pokémon Olympics or something I should tune into? And, hey, what kind of sports did you guys have back in your worlds? Were they fun? Would you recreate 'em here if you could?

[He rubs his chin for a moment, then adds:]

If anyone around Goldenrod's interested in forming some kind of low-key community sports team--y'know, something for people, not Pokémon--let me know. I might be able to help us get something set up before baseball season starts.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

What does a soldier need dancing for?

Wouldn'ta met my squad leader if I hadn't been at the club that night.

I must've made an impression, if you know what I mean.

So are you dating or something?

The short, uncomplicated answer is yes.

I won't ask more, then. Not my business.

That's all right, man. It's just fun to actually get to admit it out loud for once. We always had to keep inter-agent fraternization hush-hush, you know? Which is its own kind of fun, believe me, but, well. Change is good.

Anyway, I probably wouldn't've heard about the Project if I hadn't met her, so. The rest is history.

What's 'the Project'? Or can you not tell me?

Project Freelancer. It's the program I was part of, in the military.

Sounds pretty complicated.

Yeah, it ended up not living up to what I thought it'd be. But I've been out of the service for a while now, so I don't have to worry about it anymore.

That's good. Fighting can be... rough. And even if you think you're fighting for the right side, you may not be.

[York takes a long pause before he answers.]

Yeah.

Turned out I wasn't.

You live and learn, right?

[Well now isn't this interesting...]

I can understand that entirely.

You can't go back, but... well. You can try to clean up the mess, right?

Uh, yeah, not so much anymore.

Though I guess I did have a pretty big hand in the first phase of stopping it, so I can take some credit for how things turned out in the end.

... Oh. Well.

That's good, at least. That you managed to stop a little of it...

I crashed a whole spaceship.

I helped something from another world help invade my world.

I... haven't been able to fix any of it yet.

Aliens?

In the sense that they aren't humans from our planet, yes. In the sense that they're from space, no. They're from another world that got invaded by something that's trying to invade ours through cracks in reality. And... I thought helping them would be the best way to do what I thought I needed to do.

I was wrong.

Oh. Yeah. That's a hard place to be in.

We all thought we were doing the right thing.

Everyone always does. It's only afterwards that you figure out what was staring you in the face the whole time.

The Director of PFL was lying to us the whole time. Told us we were the good guys, that we were special ops against the Insurrectionists. Rebels against the United Earth Government, I mean. It was a bad thing, we were already fighting the Covenant - they were aliens - just to survive. We couldn't afford to have old human-human disputes picking at our edges, too.

Turns out he'd been breaking the law for years. Tortured the Project's one smart AI until it tore itself apart to produce the "fragment" personalities he needed for his experiments, used us to steal private property. Killed and hurt a lot of people just doing their jobs.

He did a lot of damage before some of us started to catch on. And even then, not everyone believed us.

That... that's pretty terrible. ... 'Sorry' doesn't cut it, huh?

Hey, you're not him. And I hear he and the rest of the Project get taken down eventually. But the things we've done, the echoes'll linger for a damn long time.

Good and bad.

I'da liked to have done more while I had a chance, but it's good to know that what I did do mattered, in the end. I hope you manage to find some peace, at least, man.

[It takes him a little bit to respond, because... what do you even say to that? He's totally not crying a little. Totallly.]

If the world's not destroyed after I go back, maybe.

.004 Δ [Video]

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