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Hop gazed down at his rippling reflection, it’s murky image wavering in and out with the soft waves that caressed the surface of the Lake of Outrage. He felt it was a fitting place to find himself after the careless blunder he’d just committed.
“Pathetic.” Even while Bede taunted him, Hop’s disbelieving stare never left his Dubwool, battered on the ground, too still for comfort. What had gone wrong?
Towering above him, Bede’s blue eyes glinted with malicious satisfaction. “For someone as weak as yourself, you do talk quite a large game.” The blonde commented, as though wiping Hop’s entire team without breaking a sweat wasn’t enough torment already. Hop didn’t answer, holding onto any last pieces of resentment towards Bede’s harsh truth as he could. Everybody lost sometimes, right? He'd seen Bede lose to Gloria plenty of times! But then again, on how many occasions had Hop himself become another tally on her scoreboard as well?
“What would your brother say if he could see you now?”
Hop’s head finally snapped up at the comment, just in time to catch Bede flicking a strand of pale hair away from his face, moving in a condescending manner like the arrogant piece of shit he was.
“Do you really think you have it in you to be the Champion?”
Hop knew this was exactly what Bede wanted, to elicit a reaction out of him, but he no longer cared, giving into his snuffed-out pride. “Shut up.”
“Still in denial, are we?”
Hop’s dark hands clenched into fists.
“Come on, Hop, even that sorry companion of yours has a better chance than you.”
Hop’s fingers curled tighter. He could feel himself accidentally draw blood.
“You must know somewhere in there that you’ll never be good enough.” Bede’s words cut deeper in Hop’s chest than a Bisharp’s blade. It was just enough to push him over the edge. Before he could stop himself, his arm swung up at Bede, though much to both his distress and relief, the fairy-clad trainer easily side-stepped the blow, a scoff leaving his mouth as he did so. “So you see it too?”
“Get away from me.”
“Really?”
“I said, get away.”
Bede seemed to think he’d done his job to it’s finest, because his lips curled into a smirk and he shook his head at Hop’s now rage-trembling form. “Suit yourself. I would say I’ll see you at the Champion Cup, but,” Bede looked Hop up and down once more, “I don’t think I will.” Turning on his heel, he slid a hand into his coat pocket, reaching the other in a wave of false friendliness.
It was only after Bede had vanished from sight, slinking back into the shadows of the Dappled Grove where he belonged, that Hop returned his recovering Pokémon to it’s Pokeball, tilting the little capsule against his forehead.
“I’m sorry…” He let his shoulders sag, letting the tears he’d been fighting back finally escape his eyes.
Now his Pokémon, restored back to full health, stood collected behind him, casting each other discomforted glances as they tried to piece together what was causing their trainer so much pain. However, Hop gave them no answer, only studying that cloudy portrait further. In previous years—previous days, even—Hop used to compare every feature to that of his brother, but now he could only see himself, a hollow shell of all the things he’d dreamed of as a child. Had he really fallen so far from greatness?
“Even that sorry companion of yours has a better chance than you.” Bede’s voice rang clear in Hop’s head and his thoughts rushed back to the snapshots of his journey’s earliest days. He remembered waking up the morning of Leon’s return to Postwick, his body full of excitement, the warmth that rushed through him when he and Drizzile locked eyes for the first time. He’d been more than sure then, that his brother’s crown would be his destiny, and felt it only right that his best friend, Gloria, walk this path—by his side like she’d always been—as his supporting act. Yet, it was clear to him now—though he would never let that insufferable walking-candy-floss-imposter hear him admit it—that it was always the other way around.
Since the beginning, Leon and Gloria both had been leaps and bounds ahead of him, hadn’t they? Even in an unfair match of two against one, when Hop had the strength of numbers on his side, Gloria, in all her, dare he say it, glory, still bested him. Sure, Leon endorsed him for the Gym Challenge alongside her that night, but a cold laugh escaped Hop in the present as he wondered: Did his brother only endorse him as a plot device for someone else? Leon never hid his opinion on Gloria. He would continuously tell the girl how he saw a special spark in her. So what had he seen in Hop?
Potential, right?
“Potential” was the word you used when you didn’t want to offend someone’s efforts, but weren’t overly impressed all the same.
It was, “Gloria has that fighting spirit, and Hop has potential”.
Hop grit his teeth so hard he could hear them grinding together.
He wanted more than “potential.”
He wanted more than, “Better luck next time”.
He wanted more than one of Leon’s encouraging, “You’ll get there, Champ”'s because you know what, no, Bede was right. He would never get there. Hop would never reach the top, because the throne was always built for someone else. He’d just been blind to it until now.
The golden-eyed boy heard the scream rip from his throat before he actually felt it. Pain shot up through his knees as they collided with the ground, his hands slipping from the earth and into the lake’s cool bind. Dubwool had to grab onto the fur of Hop’s jacket from behind to keep his weight from plunging in completely. Hop didn’t even struggle as the hefty Pokémon slowly dragged him up through the mud, safely away from the water’s edge.
He was too numb.
Too done.
As though their warmth might bring some kind of feeling back into Hop’s emotionless body, his team curled themselves around him, Dubwool placing his head in his trainer’s lap, nudging his nose under Hop’s still-shaking hand.
Hop stared straight ahead, barely registering his partners’ movements, his mind a wildfire of shame and doubt. It was like he’d been standing on a sheet of glass and someone had finally broken the panes, plunging him back down into the sea of reality.
“Why do I bother trying?” He finally asked aloud, hoping the wind might hold an answer for him. It didn’t, and Hop was only met with the eerie silence of his surroundings, both internal and external.
It was always a dream, wasn’t it? Everything he thought he’d been working for.
Nothing but an unreachable dream that he’d stolen from someone else’s destiny.
Not his.
Never his.
It was never going to be him.