[FIN] The Pain We Endure

[Blood_Goddess]

Jerome couldn't remember a time when a pull up had ever been this difficult, never when a pull up had been this painful.
It had been so second nature to him in the past, a movement as fluid to him as opening a door, or walking down the street.
Throwing his own weight around with ease and grace, it was like flying, like freedom.
Its who he was.

Now, the dark tattooed Rocket struggled simply to keep hold of the pole over his head, using every ounce of his willpower to keep the pain from overpowering him.
The screaming of his scars, ripping up his arms and through his chest.

"Gengar gar!" Bro' grunted from Jerome's side, the concerned looking ghost floating around Jerome until he was in front of the growling, grimacing man. the stubborn, stubborn man.
"GAR!" Bro' barked, a little louder

"F'k off" Jerome replied, knowing that Bro' was as well aware of the fact that Jerome shouldn't be pushing himself like this, though the ghost was certainly much more concerned about this advice then the ex-gangster was.

The Gengar puffed up at Jerome's reply, snapping out again, and jerking himself forward into Jerome's face, shoving the man in the chest.

Once upon a time, Jerome would have easily been able to keep his grip agains something like that. but the moment Bro's hands had made contact with him, Jerome's hands weakened, sending the man dropping backwards onto the ground.

Bro' looked shocked down at Jerome. though he didn't move from where he hung.  

[BlackFireKitsune]

There was a time in his life when 'working out' was synonymous with 'gym class' and nothing more, and when every single second of his spare time had been spent researching and studying and poring himself over multitudes of plants. He'd learned quite a lot over the years, much more than he could have simply by reading books on occasion, and it had brought him so much enjoyment.

Or, at least, he thought it had. Now he wasn't so sure.

He'd since began to wonder just how and when he'd started being so in love with plants. No, not in love, that wasn't the word. Enamored? No.. Obsessed? He didn't want to admit it, but the past year without them had given him time to reflect on things and to finally admit that, yes, it had been an obsession. But why? And how did it start?

It was a question he'd asked himself many times over the past few weeks since the anniversary of Aila's death, and not one he could answer. The significance of that date had also reminded him that he needed to improve, and that he wasn't where he wanted to be at all. He wanted to be useful, and to be useful he had to be strong physically and in battle with his pokemon. While he had started training his pokemon much more frequently over the past year, he didn't train himself nearly as often, and Aila's deathversary had reminded him of that fact (as well as a variety of others he didn't want to think about).

Such were the thoughts in his head and the circumstances for his arrival in the weight room, although as soon as he opened the door he paused, looking between Jerome on the floor and Bro floating in the air with a puzzled expression. Finally, after a few moments, he said, "Lo siento. ..uhh... Is this a bad time?"  

[Blood_Goddess]

Feeling as stiff as he looked, Jerome gingerly pushed himself back up into a sitting position, placing one arm against his knee, allowing himself to linger in a still position for a few seconds, staring down at the ground with gritted teeth and a furrowed brow.

That was, until he had heard a noise behind him, the addition of a voice, and accent he recognized.
Glancing over his shoulder, as Bro' looked up, the two stared at the younger man for a few seconds.

"Naw.. M'done" Jerome replied in a subdued tone, stiffly working himself back to his feet, though his leg didn't seem to want to bend all the way.
He looked like he had been there a while, covered in sweat, and looking frustrated and tired. he walked over to where his shirt, and a towel were sitting by the bench press.
"Ain't seen you in a while." Jerome nodded at him, pulling up a water bottle.  

[BlackFireKitsune]

Inigo merely nodded at Jerome's words, looking a bit perturbed by his appearance. Not his tattoos or his eyes or anything like that, of course - he was used to seeing Jerome around the base, especially since they'd roomed together briefly - but by how stiff and sore he looked. Either way he looked a little relieved to hear that the other grunt was done. Despite how much he wanted to ask if the gangster was okay, unspoken conversational rules for men dictated he wait until a more appropriate point in the conversation.

So.

"Yeah, me either," he agreed to the latter statement, readjusting the towel on his shoulder as he entered the room and shut the door behind him. Once fully inside, a small white and gold Chimecho peeked over his other shoulder timidly. "I've just..." He made vague hand gestures, as if to find the right word and make a point with them at the same time, but gave up and dropped them to his sides finally, "been busy with.. stuff." A pause. "What about you? How've you been?"  

[Blood_Goddess]

Jerome didn't take his eyes off of the other Rocket as he took a seat down on the bench, taking a few sigs of his water.
His attention was averted away only when the small pokemon peered up from behind the younger man, keeping the gangster's gaze untill Inigo asked Jerome how he was doing.
Black eyes drifted back to Inigo, as the question momentarily got tossed around in his mind.

A hand drifted over the shaved half of his head joined with a rather simply reply of "Alive"
He sounded as if this concept was somewhat perplexing to him.

Bro' lifted a corner of his mouth, floating absently around the bar that Jerome had previously been trying to do pull ups on.

"Who's this?" Jerome asked, nodding to the pokemon.  

[BlackFireKitsune]

Inigo opened his mouth, thought better of it, closed it again, nodded his head, and sat down on a nearby bench. The Chimecho continued to hover behind his shoulder, though she still peeked over it at the Gangster and his Gengar. "Alive is good," Inigo said as his hands dropped between his knees, his elbows resting on his legs. Oh yes, alive was very good. Very much better than being dead.

Jerome only sounded confused about it though.

But Inigo was momentarily distracted by the question about his pokemon, and he looked back at the psychic type briefly. "Hm? Oh. This is Oriana," he said. "Got her a few months ago or so."

"Chiiime," the bell pokemon chimed very softly, hovering just a tiny bit higher after the introduction.  

[Blood_Goddess]

Eyes slid back to Inigo at the 'Alive is good' followed with a few nodding bobs of his head in agreement after a few seconds.
"best ********' reason any f'us s'here. aight?"
He shrugged again, sitting up a little taller

"Oriana" He repeated "She's pretty"  

[BlackFireKitsune]

"Right," Inigo agreed wholeheartedly, though he couldn't help but sigh a bit too. 'Alive' reminded him that some of their number weren't alive - namely Aila, someone he'd been thinking of a lot lately. Ever since the anniversary of her passing, which was coincidentally right around the time he'd run into Arcadie and a bunch of Aila's old pokemon.

Oh, Jerome was talking again. "Oh, thanks."

"Chiiime," Oriana rang a little more confidently this time, now that she knew the scary man and his scary ghost weren't going to attack them or anything. They were acting nice.

"Have you gotten any new ones lately?" Inigo asked, trying to think of something to say when really he just wanted to ask how Jerome was doing since coming back.  

[Blood_Goddess]

"New one?" Jerome asked, shaking his head as he closed the lid of his water, pushing himself back to his feet.
"Naw, Been whacked enough with the four I got"

Bro nodded as well, pounding a fist on his chest and smirking.

"Kinda nice though, havin' more around all the time. S'not just Bro' n' me." The man shrugged.
"y'handle a lot of pokemon?"  

[BlackFireKitsune]

The grunt nodded a bit as Jerome replied, and as Bro made his.. gesture, the meaning of which Inigo didn't quite know, before nodding again more confidently. "Yeah, I know what you mean. I only had one pokemon for..." He paused to think, his brow furrowed as he stared at the floor briefly as if it would provide him the answer, "about 8 years."

The question about handling a lot of pokemon was one that also made him think. "Uhh.. I guess so?" Another thoughtful pause. "I definitely have more than four, if that's what you mean." He wasn't going to bother making an effort to count them off though. He just knew there were more than four of them. "It's good to have a lot though. A more varied team means you're better equipped to handle different situations." That was something that had been driven home to him on the first and only big mission he went on - when all of his grass-types were rendered almost practically useless against pokemon they had a disadvantage against. It was also, coincidentally, the same mission in which Aila died, which drove the point home even moreso.  

[Blood_Goddess]

Jerome gave the younger boy a curious look, as he slung his shirt over his shoulder, having gathered his things, he approached Inigo and his new pokemon.
"Varied team?" He asked, "Ch'a mean by that?"

Jerom hadn't grown up a trainer, he hadn't grown up learning about the different pokemon, what they did, or taking serious battle. It was only till he joined team Rocket that Pokemon took on a much more vital role in strategic planning.
still seemed so complected to him.

With team rocket's wealth in being able to create and obtain pokemon however, he wasn't surprised with the way they ran things.  

[BlackFireKitsune]

Inigo had once aspired to be a pokemon trainer, but after his parents stomped all over that dream he gave it up. (It also helped that he realized he didn't actually know much about pokemon at all.) For about 8 years he'd only ever had one pokemon, and after that he'd mostly obtained grass-types. It wasn't until his first big mission that he'd realized what it meant to have different pokemon, or what it meant to only have one type of pokemon. "Well," he rubbed the back of his neck briefly, his brow furrowed a bit as he considered how to answer, "like a few years ago all I ever had were grass-type pokemon. That's what I liked, so that's all I got. And then I went on a mission and there were so many fire-types and flying-types that put all my grass-types at a disadvantage.. I didn't have anything else, so there wasn't a whole lot I could do. Made me feel pretty useless actually," he finished with a short laugh.

"Anyway, that's why I like having different types now, so I won't be in that kind of situation again."  

[Blood_Goddess]

Jerome had stopped just in front of Inigo, watching the young man quietly as he explained his reasoning.
The older grunt couldn't say he really related to the situation, at least he hadn't had any experience with it yet. He had full faith in every one of his pokemon, in his own abilities, in his friends.

For a few seconds, the lines in Jerome's face looked more tired, as his eyes appeared distant.
But only for a second, as he looked back at the boy.
"Best s'all y'can do sometimes." a rough hand reached out, clasping Inigo's shoulder. "N'mater what though, s'mtimes there ain't nothin' you can do."

Jerome looked past the boy, and started toward the door, stiffly.
Bro hung back, arms still crossed over his chest, looking at Inigo, and the psychic pokemon.  

[BlackFireKitsune]

While Inigo had full confidence in his friends and teammates, he didn't have full confidence in himself, and Jerome's words depressed him a bit. "I wasn't doing my best though. That's why I felt so bad," he added with a shrug before he stood and shoved his hands in his pockets. Oriana floated up to hover by his shoulder too. The statement of nothing you could do sometimes really hit home for the grunt though. He frowned sadly down at the floor, thinking of poor Aila, slowly dying from internal bleeding on the jet."Yeah... I know."

He raised his gaze to watch the gangster leave, noting how stiffly he walked. Jerome hadn't walked like that before, and the observation made Inigo frown again. "You okay?"  

[Blood_Goddess]

At Inigo's reply, the gangster arched an eyebrow. It wasn't the reply of someone who was simply worried about something. It was the reply.. the look of someone who had seen, been through and dealt with something that they had no power over, and that would haunt them for the rest of their life.
Jerome knew that look.

He had stopped walking, turning back to fully face the younger grunt, his arms falling to his side.
He regarded the question directed at him, but only answered with an undecided hard stare at the boy. Like he honestly wasn't sure how he should answer the question. Yes? maybe? he didn't know, right now it just wasn't that simple.
He felt the answer in that stare, and said instead: "Who y'talkin' bout?" going back to what he had said before the question. "Who' ya thinkin' ya' let down?"