Pokémon Fool's Gold | Orre & Galar Fanfiction

Chapter 46: Cipher's Grand Master

'...Why not just try again? You believe I'll play football again. You should believe you can try the Gym Challenge again.'

'I can't now, can I? He saw straight through me.'

'Yeah, but this is Orre. Three of our Gym Leaders are ex-criminals. Plus the two Cipher Admins in the Elite Four. Even Wes was a criminal once.'

Wyatt finally shifted to rub his eyes. 'You heard Kamron. "No-one leaves alive."'

His P★DA jingled. There was usually some warning before announcements. This one began immediately. Wyatt passed one of his headphones to Trip and propped the P★DA up between them. A wooden desk was unoccupied before a tall window, overlooking The Under's lower level. The walls were deep red. A Houndoom curled up in a basket. Amidst scattered Pokémon and football memorabilia were photo frames. Before Wyatt could argue, before he even knew what he was doing, Trip took the P★DA and zoomed in. His heart skipped a beat, or several. There wasn't one photo of him. There were eight, some of which were recent. One appeared to be from his last game. Another was of him and Laila... and one with a man he didn't recognise, who promptly plopped down at his desk to address his audience. Trip couldn't breathe. He was shaking. Wyatt gently squeezed his shoulder.

'I'm really sorry... I should've told you...'

It was hard to take it in. Trip wanted to pause the whole world while he tried. Lyndon's straight, strawberry blond hair was unlike Trip's, but looking into his blue eyes was like looking into a mirror. His round face, crumpled by apparent distress, was innocent. He was pale as if he rarely saw daylight.

'I don't care.'

He didn't. Trip couldn't believe his dad was evil. In those eyes they shared, he saw a lost boy who clung to memories of the first love he couldn't save and a son he couldn't be with, for whatever reason. That reason had to be why he was trapped down there in The Under, working for Cipher. Maybe it was Rosen...

'Trip, this is gonna be a shock.'

'It won't be. So what if he's a Cipher Admin? Maybe he doesn't even want to be.'

Wyatt turned the volume up. Lyndon spoke quietly, with an unmistakable Pyrite accent.

'...Orders are absolute from your Grand Master, Lyndon.'

The tears springing to Trip's eyes abruptly halted. A ball of anxious threads and plummeting hopes explosively unravelled in his sinking stomach.

'Grand... Master?'

'I'm sorry, Trip. I'm so sorry. I should have told you, but it's such a big deal, I was worried...'

Trip barely heard him. He covered his free ear. He already felt like a frail baby bird Pokémon knocked from the air by Rock Blast. How much worse could it get? Though it did get worse with every second his eyes hovered on those photos of himself in the office of Cipher's Grand Master. He still couldn't look away. It wasn't like being glued to a car crash. It was more like his soul was frozen above a trainwreck where his motionless body burned. He wondered if Lyndon felt it somehow, because his voice was trembling.

'Rosen Raco is no longer a member of Cipher, active immediately. Anyone aiding or communicating with her will be punished, including Admins. This shouldn't be difficult when not a fucking one of you actually likes that Zubatshit sociopath.'

Trip blinked. He removed the hand from his ear. Wyatt was speaking.

'She's your grandma, right? Who killed your mom?'

'Yeah.'

'I repeat – I am your Grand Master and these orders are absolute. I don't give a shit what she threatens you with or what Znider or Verzant or whoever the fuck else tells you. And I don't know, or care to know his name but whoever got arrested with her can get fucked too. Goodnight.'

The video ended. Wyatt clicked to play it again. That wasn't how he expected to be introduced to Lyndon, either. People were right that he wasn't as 'creepy looking' as Znider, but he was as quietly frightening as he looked innocent.

'I guess that's him saying he cares about you and your mom...?'

'Yeah, but Grand Master? I'm guessing he wasn't when she died. Or was he?'

'I don't know if he's, like, really the Grand Master. Maybe until Alfie and Ardos get out of jail. Surely they're the Grand Masters?'

'Didn't Alfie hide behind his manager last time? He was Cipher Head on paper but Alfie was pulling the strings. But...'

The thought waiting to be voiced lurked in the depths of Trip's mind for days. He tried to ignore it, but now it screamed from his subconscious to his conscious, he couldn't.

'I've been thinking ever since we saw...'

Wyatt's sympathetic eyes said he already knew what Trip was going to say.