Chapter 53: Vendetta

                                    

                                          
No blaring sirens followed the bus off the marked roads to a concealed freight entrance to Obsidian City. The soldiers guarding it stood aside. There was no doubt that the uniforms stepping off the bus belonged to Cipher, but they automatically saluted Jibril and the Commander with the striped scarf.
                          
Theta was desperate to get out of her jail uniform. At this point, though Leucosia still desired luxury, she didn't care. There was no denying who or what she was. Even if she remained in that uniform in her cell for the rest of her life, she wasn't and would never be ashamed. She saw no difference between fame and infamy.
                          
April felt the same way. She was called a 'snob' once, but she had too little time left to care about anything but revenge. The world already hated her. They hated her promiscuous brother, Barnaby. Famous or infamous, his rock band still made him a multi-millionaire.

                          
Shadow Pokémon awaited them at the factory. Leucosia received a Sylveon, Alcremie and Salazzle. Her cold eyes were enough to scare them into submission. Whatever Leroy was actually thinking, he accepted the Shadow Copperajah and Corviknight that Natalya offered.
                          
'A gift for you from Admin Tance.'
                          
'Admin Tance, eh?'
                          
Leroy's tone was dubious, but it wasn't because he doubted Tance occupied an Admin position. He knew Tance thought he was far more important to the Orrean side of Cipher than he actually was. However powerful he was in Galar, he had no power in Orre. That would inevitably bring backstabbing.

                          
Wilmot was like Aubrey. He didn't mind being a supportive shadow, never to become a ruler. As long as what little power he had drew attention from women and he was paid to exist, in exchange for essentially being Cipher's hitman, he was happy.

                          
Theta wanted authority. She didn't necessarily need to be the Grand Master, but she craved some kind of position of power. That hunger was instantly fulfilled. She was to join Natalya and Piruzi as a scientist. Her battling skills were rusty, but she hadn't forgotten everything she learned from her late parents, Lovrina and Ein, about producing the most fearsome Shadow Pokémon. 

                          
She followed Natalya to the lab. It seemed to wound her a little when Leucosia didn't join her, but she wasn't interested. She and April wanted to see their apartments.
                          
The cars lined up by the elevator openly bore Cipher logos. Jibril climbed into one. When Leucosia ushered April into a back seat, she understood. She locked the doors. Leucosia jumped into the passenger seat in time to slam the door in the face of Jibril's girlfriend. She couldn't open the back doors. April was hardly Leucosia's friend, because there were no friends amongst those who were truly evil in Cipher, but her eyes sparkled as a partner in crime when Jibril drove without even glancing back at his abandoned lover.
                          
'What's her name?'
                          
'Aglaia.'
                          
Leucosia expected her to be named something common. Aglaia was a rare name inspired by the same mythology as Leucosia and Raidne.

                          
'That name means "beauty," but I can tell from the sad way she walks that she is actually so ugly.'
                          
'Yeah, I don't really give a hoot about her. She's related to one of our Admins. I hoped it'd get me somewhere. What a joke! Even her own family doesn't give a shit. And now I can't get rid of her. She's, like, obsessed with me.'
                          
The problem wasn't really that Jibril couldn't 'get rid of' Aglaia, or at least not entirely. Their superiors expected them to work together. They expected Aglaia to appear as a respectable Gym Challenger who could befriend any threats to Cipher and, in turn, made Jibril look innocent. He was often out on the field as a Commander and needed the cover. Now Aglaia was trusted enough to be invited to Toru's house of all places, they were never getting out of it.
                          
 Truthfully, since then, Jibril didn't actually want to. He had his own vendetta against Toru. If Danny hadn't been so consumed by his hatred of his brother, he might have been a better father. Dinah might not be dead. Genesis and Ezekiel might not have disappeared, never to speak to their siblings other than Daiki again. Jibril himself might not have considered a foreign criminal syndicate, offering free rent and flights, as his only shot at freedom.
                          
Aglaia had her reasons for serving Cipher. As long as their relationship benefited the syndicate, she wouldn't end it, no matter how much Jibril hurt her. He could do whatever he wanted. It wasn't hard to pick up girls as Blue's grandson. He knew that appealed even to self-absorbed Leucosia. Every time he did something religiously unacceptable, like cheating, he felt like he was getting back at his parents. Cheating with a convicted murderer was a step up.

                          
The apartment prepared for Leucosia wasn't the one she previously inhabited as a Cipher Admin. It was Raidne's old apartment. That was even better. April and Leroy were offered less luxurious apartments on a lower floor, like the one Jamie pointedly placed Leucosia in, but April didn't care. It was better than a cell.
                          
A bag on the glass coffee table contained a fake passport and heavily-protected P★DA. Leucosia set up the P★DA before making any moves. She knew Jibril would stay. Usually, the appeal of sex was the feeling of winning by making her partner desperately helpless, but when she pulled her new lover to the floor, she found she was ravenous for intimacy itself. She didn't get that from the guard she seduced. She was too hesitant and boring.

                          
Jibril knew what he was doing. He was fully aware that Leucosia didn't hesitate to kill a lover for the crime of boring her, so apparently, he never even considered the possibility that he would bore her. Maybe he was right. Even after spending a sleepless night together, when he went off to do whatever his boss demanded and Leucosia met with the Grand Master to be promoted to Admin, since she didn't mind hurting people; she found herself distracted, constantly glancing at her 'morning selfie' with Blue's grandson and aching until they were on the floor again.
                          
She heard him telling a colleague that he got the 'better sister.' Who 'got' Raidne? Someone actually wanted her? Leucosia had no idea until she typed her sister's name into Roto-Search and the first result was Jamie's Poképedia page.

                          
He...
                          
Jamie...
                          
Married...
                          
Raidne?

                          
Leucosia told herself she didn't care if Jamie actually preferred Raidne, as long as Raidne remained paranoid he preferred her. She knew then that she did care. For whatever reason, she always cared... and Jamie indeed married Raidne. He didn't even give up his title. His life went on. Raidne was designing clothes with his sister. They were about to open a new branch of her shop, Underworld, in Quartz Town.

                          
There was one thing that Leucosia and Jibril couldn't agree on: he idolised Jamie, but she wanted to kill him. He was, however, far from the top of her hit list. Raidne Hawthorn Fayed Joyner-Massey didn't even make the top spot. That was occupied by someone whose death would hurt them even more than losing each other.

                          
I will so kill you both... but before I do... you will so suffer... knowing that you could never meet your nasty little child... Jamie... before they were so brutally murdered and you die cursing my name.