Charlus could feel Grace's knuckles tightened despite the fact that they were trapped inside the magnetron.
"We're not an old married couple," she vexed, "and Lysander again Alain?! You couldn't trust me but you trust this... this sleaze bag!"
Alain stood still in the corner, his head was bowed down in shame or respect, Charlus couldn't tell anymore.
"How are you still alive?" She further said, "I though Ash Ketchum and his Greninja blew you out of my region."
Lysander was weak, he looked sick and haggard. He himself with help of a cane and was wearing multiple prosthetic limbs. The third degree burns that he'd suffered had turned into a light pinkish shade. There was a raggedness to Lysander's breathing, of course it might've been the artificial respirator attached to his neck.
Grace couldn't help but question his choices, instead of his bulky guards he should've brought nurses and a team of doctors, she kept on thinking.
If it wasn't for his life support, Lysander was dead, it was clear from the whitisness in his hair.
Lysander bit his lip as he sat down on a chair which Alain brought after he motioned him too. "You really brought me these two," he said, "I didn't think you had it in you boy."
Alain grunted his teeth, "People underestimate me."
"Indeed they do,"
He looked at the two prisoners and then back at the white haired half dead man, "I kept my deal of the bargain—"
"Indeed you did."
"—it's time for you to honour yours."
Lysander nodded, "Of course but..." he glanced at Grace with a whimsical look, "what's the rush?"
"I'll tell you what the rush is!" She tried to move forwards but the magnetic field around her ankles and the wrists only made her move backwards.
"I told you it doesn't work!" He said, "James designed it and it has no flaw!"
"And I told you I don't need you advice!"
"You didn't say it!"
"Well I am now!"
"Enough!" Alain roared, the roughness in his voice was more denser than before, "stop bickering!"
"Why what's the problem?" Lysander quirked, "it's quite a show, an old married couple... it's adorable."
"We're not married!" The two of them howled at the same time.
Lysander hit his head playfully, "Of course not, I would never let an Oak marry into the Nobel house of Van Black... we're the last of the Blacks, we have to have some respect don't we?"
It took Charlus some time to understand the dept of what he'd said. Alain and Grace were of the last members of the Van Blacks, unless of course Serena had a child and decided to give it her name.
"What do you mean 'we'?" He asked.
Lysander looked at Grace with an innocent grandfather expression. "You haven't told him?"
Grace refused to face either of them and so did Alain.
"Told me what?" He asked yet again.
Lysander got up. Creaks echoed in the air as his cane hit the roughness of the cave. He walked over towards Charlus and placed his cold dead metal hands on his cheek. He couldn't help but resist the urge to bit his nose off.
"Why do you think the Van Black's are discredited?"
Charlus didn't answer, he wasn't fond of where the conversation was going.
"It's because evil is in our blood," he showed his crooked teeth, "isn't it, dear sister?"
Charlus's jaw dropped open as he bend forwards to look at Grace. She still refused to meet his eyes or anyone's and so's did Alain. He looked at Lysander again, desperately waiting for him to burst into a laugh, to tell him it was all a joke.
But nothing of the sort happened.
"Why so baffled, Oak?" Said Lysander, "shocked?"
Charlus didn't know what to say, he kept his calm.
"The Van Blacks weren't part of the Xovier, they were independent and selfish, they had their own organisation, Flare, until a few generations back when they decided to 'become good'." Lysander spat, "They tore down the Flare but then I reinstalled it and merged with the Apocalypse, my bloody father was ashamed, as a peace offering he gave Grace and Alain to the chamber."
"But you– you killed–"
"Oh yeah, I killed my parents." A wicked smile crept up on his face, "my father thought that the next generation would be 'good' he couldn't been more wrong." His laughter echoed in the halls, "It all depends on little Serena now."
The mention of her name raised both Alain and Grace's head.
"Don't you say his name," she said.
"Why?" He mused, "Serena Yvonne Van Black... I must say, I've taken quite a bit of interest in her."
Grace struggled within her bonds, she tried to break free but the magnetron was just unbeatable. Charlus could see the little red blotches on her face pretty clearly, her eyes were screaming murder and tears were almost on the verge of flowing down.
"You wouldn't dare!" She barked, "if you go near her I will—"
Lysander clicked a certain button and Grace's screams echoed in the cave... the magnetron was giving her shock waves. Alain closed his eyes, unable to take anymore of her painful screams.
By the time Lysander finished, Grace was barely conscious.
"I don't like threats or interruptions, dear sister." He smiled wickedly, "now, where was I Charlus? Ah! My nephew Alain and sister Grace are just as evil as me... maybe even more."
Charlus had often called Grace as the child of darkness, she was intact quite dark and strange. She often came forwards as too strong, maybe even cruel in a way or two.
But she wasn't evil.
She did do some bad things but that doesn't make her an evil person, it made her a... person.
"Grace could never be as vile as you!"
Lysander looked quite taken aback but he managed to regain his composure. "An Oak defending a Van Black, I have seen everything!" He laughed, "You're an Oak Charlus and Grace is a Van Black, you have no idea the demons she has up her sleeves."
"She doesn't have any demons!"
Lysander looked at his family members who seemed to communicate through their eye gaze. Alain's eyes were screaming the word 'no' they were shaking in dismay. And Grace... Charlus couldn't bare to look at Grace.
"Should I tell him, dear sister?" He smiled.
"Tell me what?!"
"Oh Charlus, you have no idea what she's done to you, what she's hid from you."
"Tell me then!"
Lysander took a raspy breath, "Have you ever asked what Serena—"
Multiple shots echoed in air all at once, a screech escaped his lips as he Charlus closed his eyes with horror, expecting it to be himself.
I'm coming James, he thought.
He stayed still for some time, but when nothing seemed to change, he opened his eyes. To his surprise, Charlus found Lysander's bodyguards lying dead on the ground with a single shot to their forehead.
His eyes frantically searched for the source of the shots, a gasp escaped his lips as he found Alain with half of his face sprayed with blood, standing over Lysander's lay half dead body.
Even as death stood over him, the old crone still had a smile etched on his face. Alain walked past the dead bodies as smoke creeped out of the end of the barrel of his guns.
"You were never going to give me my fathers body," he approached the dead man, "were you?"
Lysander coughed blood, "You... you were always... going to... betray me... weren't you?"
Alain scoffed, "This is for Charizard."
Another shot echoed in the air and Lysander's eyes stayed closed, never to be open again.