Thunderlight

(Cont.) Not Very Fast, but Definitely Furious

A white flurry of bubbles sweep around him as they submerge, floating feebly up to the surface before popping. Mott allows himself to stop, his body aching and his lungs burning, and he stays suspended. Floating between the bottom and the surface, quiet, still, and alone.

Well. Mostly alone.

Lenny is in his arms. His cheeks are puffed outward with a contained breath of air, his eyes wide. Clearly, he's more than a little disoriented. But once he gathers his bearings, he turns his head to Mott. Gratefully, he pats Mott on his arm, over his bandana.

Mott's heart thumps.

Then, Lenny starts looking a little blue. Frantically, Mott jolts himself back into action, swimming hastily to the surface and kicking himself for forgetting that most people can't breathe on land and in water.

They reach the other side of the canal, Lenny gasping and coughing. The land is bordered by massive rocks that reach high enough that Lenny couldn't possibly get up there on his own. Mott nudges him along, helping him to climb the sleek, slippery surface before following after him. Lenny drags himself to the nearest dry surface, panting with his head hung.

Mott shakes himself off, flicking water everywhere. It doesn't dry him off much. Mostly, it just makes his fur poof out. He grumbles as he smooths it back down, watching his reflection in the canal's surface. Glancing up to the bridge confirms his suspicions: the killer is long gone.

It takes a few minutes for Lenny to catch his breath. Between the chasing and near drowning, he's pretty short on air.

"I'm sorry," he rasps, his voice hoarse, "that I couldn't catch them."

"Don't apologize, you did your best," Mott assures, sitting beside him.

A small breeze passes them by, making Lenny tremble. The water was cold even to Mott's standards, and most water-types are pretty tolerant to that sort of thing. He can't imagine it was at all comfortable for Lenny. Especially since grass-types are notorious for getting cold.

Mott shuffles closer, and Lenny eagerly indulges himself in his body heat. More shudders course through him, but they eventually grow more subdued. After a while, they completely subside, although Lenny is still shivering slightly.

"Any chance that you caught a glimpse of their face?" Mott wonders.

Regretfully, Lenny shakes his head. "Even when I was close to them, they were too good at hiding in the shadows for me to see."

Mott nods. It figures that someone so skilled would be able to kill, bait, and escape with ease. It does beg the question of why, though, which Mott thinks is rather obvious: they didn't want the two of them to discover how to defeat Zekrom.

Piecing together his mental, makeshift theory board, Mott adds the killer to what he's amassed so far. A rich patron pulls their funds as soon as the museum gets a breakthrough. This, clearly, is because they wanted to silence any information around beating Zekrom. This killer shows up and strikes just as the curator was going to give them that information—evidently, the rich patron hired an assassin to take her out prior, and Mott and Lenny just happened to be there in the wrong place and the wrong time. But then why did the assassin flee instead of killing them? And why did they bait them? Where were they leading them?

Even as small answers come together, he feels more big questions pile up. It's frustrating how complicated this whole mess has gotten. His mission, no matter how impossible, started out rather straightforward: defeat Zekrom. But the deeper he gets into this, the more twists and turns muddle his way. Unanswered questions probe at his mind, spinning around and around on repeat.