Kalos Journey

Chapter 37 - Trust Regained

Siebold ran a restaurant not too far from the boot shop, it was one of the most renowned restaurants in the city and Malva was happy to pay since it was her way of making up this misunderstanding to Kyra.

Kyra was amazed by how fancy the place was, she knew Malva was an Elite Four Member, but this felt much more like an exclusive restaurant for the super rich.

"A friend of mine runs the place, fancy restaurants aren't normally my style, but I need to make this up to you," Malva explained as she and Kyra were led to their seats.

To Kyra's relief, they were sat away from the rest of the crowd of the restaurant. It hadn't been too busy, but Kyra would still rather her conversation with Malva tonight to be between just them.

Kyra and Malva just generally chatted whilst they waited for their orders to be taken. The extensive menu gave them quite a bit to talk about, and a laugh too as the two failed at pronouncing some on the names on the menu. It was nice for both Kyra and Malva to be civil towards each other again, they had been worried earlier that their friendship was through, but they were clearly not ready for that yet.

"Malva, you brought a lady friend," Siebold commented, pleasantly surprised to see Malva with female company.

Malva sighed, "Kyra, this is Siebold, my heavily egotistical yet funny colleague at the Elite Four."

"You love me as a friend really. Are you ready for me to take your orders ladies?" Siebold replied, taking the playful joke as it was intended.

Malva gave Siebold hers and Kyra's food and drink orders, getting her card out to pay.

"Ah ah ah, this is on me. You've had enough stress as it is today, don't worry about paying," Siebold said, batting Malva's card away and refusing to take it.

Malva eventually gave in, she and Kyra thanking Siebold and letting him head back to the kitchen.

"If you're wondering what that was about, I think Siebold feels bad for what happened up at the League earlier. The other two Elite Four Members aren't exactly friendly towards me, they upset me and I'm pretty sure this is Siebold's way of apologising on their behalf. Not that he needs to, he tried to stop them, but sadly they just didn't get the message," Malva explained, having worked out why Siebold had paid.

Kyra felt sorry that Malva had been upset but her own colleagues, Malva admitted it wasn't uncommon and that she'd explain why once their food had come since it was to do with her affiliations with Team Flare anyway.

The food and drink didn't take too long to arrive and the two got to talking, Malva coming clean first. "I ran away from my home in Kanto a year or so ago, Kalos was the cheapest place to fly to, so I came here. With my pokémon, I worked my way up to facing the Elite Four and after I defeated Clemont, I met Lysandre for the first time. He helped Houndoom and I with Mega Evolution on the terms I helped him out with Team Flare. I agreed to since back then Team Flare were trying to help the people of Kalos in ant way that they could. But that all changed a few months ago.

"When Lysandre's ideals changed, I didn't agree with them and wanted to stop working with him. But he wouldn't let me, I was working for the Elite Four by that point, and Lysandre's excuse was that he needed my help in ensuring that the League didn't get suspicious of us. Not too long before I met you, Lysandre needed my help in sorting out something in the Geosenge Town base, it was essentially my job to make sure none of the Grunts damaged the statue-y thing we were moving, I don't really know what it is myself if I'm honest. But the League somehow found out about the statue being moved from where it should be and they asked for my help.

"I could hardly ignore them, so Lysandre and I made a plan. He would have his Gyarados use Hydro Pump towards me and my Talonflame as we flew away, making it look like I had figured out what was happening beforehand and was already dealing with it, but my team was struggling to do it on their own. Everything was fine until one of the Hydro Pumps hit Talonflame and she spooked, accidently throwing me off.