Archive of Our Own ^beta

Lara yawns so wide Yoonchae can see her molars through the webcam — which is, like, saying something, because an IT could’ve told her the webcam in question was from the 80s and she would’ve believed it instantly, given the despairing lack of quality.

“Okay,” Lara groans, rubbing her eyes; then, weirdo, she’s closing her eyes and licking her fingers, as if her eyes hold a Michelin star meal deep inside them. Yoonchae thinks the jury may be out on that one. “Yep. Mhm. We’re calling it. My brain is mush and I’m pretty sure I just used Earthquake on my own teammate.”

Which, yeah — Yoonchae just watched Lara’s Garchomp faint on screen, but not without taking her partner’s Arcanine down with it.

Lara shoots out a lazy two-finger salute to the camera, muttering something about being back tomorrow afternoon before scratching her chin, throwing out a considerable glance, and adding, “That’s if I remember what sleep is. So, um, it actually might be a few hours.”

Then, finally, the screen goes black.

With a long, long sigh, Yoonchae picks herself up and snatches her phone, which has made a home on her desk, conjoined with her charging cable, for the past few hours; picking herself up means that the AC hits her body at full-blast, though, and she finds that she’s real cold, the fault primarily lying with the fact that the only clothing she’s wearing is a flimsy t-shirt and thin sweatshorts — so, just as quick, she’s sinking back onto her bed and shimmying beneath the covers, letting the warmth enclose around her.

Once she’s safely out of freezing-to-death range — a feat in itself; the room’s ridiculously cold, okay? — Yoonchae’s opening the sickening contraption (well, phone) that made her get up in the first place.

And simultaneously making the decision to be insufferable; “You’re like my bratty little sister,” was what Lara had said, like, years ago, intended as nothing more than a joke. Except, because Yoonchae is a bratty little sister at heart, she’d pledged to honor it ever since.

Yoonchae huffs, turning off her phone and tossing it onto the floor beside her bed; she stares at the ceiling for approximately — one Mississipi, two Mississipi — three whole seconds before her brain’s scrambling into action and having her arm strain to pick it back up.

Deep exhale.

Yoonchae opens Twitch — she distantly registers that she could, in all honesty, be scrolling through her laptop, since it already has the literal app open, but Yoonchae’s never done anything the easy way, so. Here they are.

Or, well, the real device she’d like to use right now is her iPad — iPad kid, is what Lara would sulkily grouch whenever Yoonchae refused to pay attention to her in favor of grinding Block Blast — but a strange mishap (re: she fell asleep at the library and woke up far too out of it, accidentally leaving it there; come morning, it was gone… RIP MR. IPAD, 2021-2025) has rendered her sufficiently iPad-less. She supposes her new title shall be ‘sorrowful iPhone kid’.

When she searches up Wo-chien, she’s greeted with a plethora of tutorials on how to complete the Wo-chien raid, which is decidedly not what she needs. Yoonchae groans, but keeps going. At some point — a hopefully soon point, she prays — there has to be a video on actually using the damn Pokémon, right? It can’t all be boring, overly regurgitated, probably-spit-out-by-a-bird Wo-chien raid tutorials. Like, come on. This was Youtube content; Twitch was for insanity.

After the fortieth Wo-chien Raid: Easily Beat! video, she’s pretty much proven wrong and is just about ready to give up when Lara’s — who could be re-named the devil — words ring in her ears; “But someone might have a pretty fire build hidden on a stream.”

And, like, Lara had said might, but Yoonchae prefers to live by a ‘thou shalt not listen to what thou does not see’ mentality, which means that might has turned into a thousand percent certainty. It also means if she fails she can make Lara feel bad enough, and then Lara’ll attempt to make a usable set for her — which is, frankly, a win-win situation; a win-win if you’re Yoonchae, anyway.

So she scrolls.

And scrolls.

And scrolls.

skittyluvr
SPECS WO-CHIEN IS REAL (trust me)

It’s, like, laughably stupid.

Nearly all — scratch that. All Wo-chien sets she’d found in her albeit unsuccessful Reddit hunt had used Leech Seed, or Leftovers, or, like, sometimes Big Root; there’d been zero cases of anyone deluded enough to build a set around Choice Specs, not when Wo-chien’s selling point was its surprise factor.

So, whoever this is must be clinically insane.

Most people must’ve had this same thought process, given the fact that the stream only has 19 viewers.

But, then again, those Reddit sets had been such a bore, and this is the first Wo-chien set that’s made Yoonchae blink in surprise, so she might as well hear skittyluvr’s deranged idea out.

When she opens the stream, she’s greeted by camera quality that’s so bad it makes Lara’s streams look less like a college student’s side hobby and more like a professionally directed film.

There’s a girl on the screen, and when she glances at the stream’s description, she finds her name — Megan, Yoonchae silently mouths, tasting the syllables. It feels good in her mouth; “Megan,” she says out loud this time, and finds that it’s stretchy, and vibrant, and awfully reminiscent of some sugary-sweet candy, like a taffy.

Megan’s name feels good in her mouth, yes; Megan also feels good to look at, Yoonchae realizes, once her eyes trail back up to her face. Her hair’s askew, like she just woke up from a nap, some of it tangled and some of it sticking out wildly, and her pink bangs are messily chopped and more than likely hand-cut. On top of that, she’s wearing a stained hoodie with the zipper pulled halfway up, and the color pairs horribly with the wall she’s sitting in front of — it’s the world’s most depressing white wall. Yet, despite the messiness, and the lack of color coordination, Yoonchae’s… charmed.

“She’s pretty,” Yoonchae mumbles; then, she’s awkwardly scratching her head, and wondering if the clinically insane one here is actually her for talking to nothing but an empty room.

When Yoonchae lets her eyes drift to the rest of the screen, as opposed to just calling it a day and staring at Megan’s face, she finds Showdown open to a Wo-Chien moveset.

“— so I know what you’re thinking,” Megan is saying; Yoonchae registers a few things at once: one, she talks fast, barely pausing for breath, almost as if she’s got a time limit and she’s trying to beat it before the clock runs out; two, it’s not just her face that’s pretty, because her voice’s got this jumpy edge to it, and she imagines if a puppy could speak English, it’d speak like Megan; three, Yoonchae might be a little too obsessed with a girl she discovered, like, less than two minutes ago. “You’re sitting here and thinking ‘Megan, this is the dumbest shit I’ve ever seen in my entire life, Wo-Chien has 95 base Special Attack, why would you ever…’ yadayadayada, the whole spiel continues. And look. Look. I get it. I understand the concerns, and I applaud your disturbing lack of faith. But you have to trust the process here.”

She pulls up the damage calculator and starts typing in numbers so fast her fingers are basically a blur; Yoonchae tries to keep up, at first, but it inevitably just bleeds into number number number, and she quits while she’s ahead.

“So, look at this. Choice Specs. Modest nature. 252 HP, 252 Special Attack, 4 Special Defense. Tera Fairy, right?” Megan rambles, rendered nothing more than a fact-spitting machine. Yoonchae watches — hyperfocuses, really; the set, and Megan, have both managed to pique her curiosity — as she moves her mouse again, before she’s even finished her sentence, adding her chosen Wo-Chien moves. “Then you got Leaf Storm, Dark Pulse, Tera Blast, and Giga Drain. Alright, so, now the damage output and it’s like — okay, check this out.”

“I ran a few sims, and 252+ SpA Choice Specs Wo-Chien Leaf Storm versus 252 HP, 4 SpD Gliscor: 355-418, that’s 100.2 to 118%, guaranteed OHKO,” Megan exclaims, only pausing to take a deep breath — which, like, Yoonchae had honest-to-god been worried for a second that Megan simply didn’t breathe, with how fast she’d been talking. If she was there, she’d offer Megan a glass of water; partially for her own gain, because the thought of watching Megan drink, and see the way her throat moved and neck pulsed was incredibly appealing. Except, Megan was a twitch streamer who didn’t even know she existed, and she’d only discovered her channel moments ago… and this whole stream of consciousness was getting entirely too parasocial for her sanity. “Another sim. Dark Pulse into Gholdengo: 372-440, 118 to 139.6%, guaranteed OHKO. Another sim. Leaf Storm into Ogerpon-Wellspring: 289-342, that’s 96 to 113.6%, 75% chance to OHKO.”

This time, she takes a longer pause; she’s staring blankly at the ceiling, and Yoonchae starts counting one, two, three, before Megan does a one-eighty, turning directly toward the camera with a lopsided smirk on her face.

“If that’s not enough to convince you,” Megan says, sounding a tad desperate, hand going up to ruffle her hair, “If you Tera Fairy against Roaring Moon and hit it with Tera Blast, it’s, like, around 684-808 damage. That’s 194.8 to 230.1% against Roaring Moon. By Wo-chien.”

Megan mimes a mic-drop, and it’s so fucking ridiculous, and Yoonchae has to hold in the little giggle her lungs beg to release.

“Now obviously —” Megan starts, switching tabs and pulling up her full team in the builder; then, a blindingly brilliant grin etches itself onto her face, and she’s continuing with, “ — this set has problems. Like, a lot of problems. Wo-Chien’s got a million weaknesses. Bug-types are everywhere, and you’re gonna be eating U-turns for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. But that’s why you pair it with Moltres and Alomomola. Moltres handles the Bug-types, and Alomomola does Wish passing to keep our gorgeous, sweet, amazing, meowmeow snail alive. And Wo-Chien still has Tablets of Ruin, so it’s not like it’s made of tissue paper. Like, +2 Ogerpon Ivy Cudgel is only a 3HKO, and Great Tusk Close Combat is a 2HKO. So, on its own, it’s got fine and dandy defensive utility. And that’s on top of being a nuclear warhead. But we’re building a team that covers all ends. It perfects this build.”

She hasn’t blinked in two minutes, is what Yoonchae realizes with a start. 

Classic Wo-chien: defensive wall, Leech Seed stall. Megan — aka certified crazy — Wo-chien: “Yeah we’re going to turn this guy into a nuke.”

Yoonchae finally blinks. Stares. Megan’s quiet now, dusting off her jacket with one hand, as if that will fix a stain that egregiously huge, and trying to brush her now-ruffled, staticky hair back down with the other.

Her head’s starting to pound, and part of her wants to scream her lungs out right about now — she’d like to keep her ears relatively intact though, so instead, what tumbles out is, “What the fuck.” 

She’s not particularly used to change; or, maybe, Yoonchae’s just not used to change when it comes to Pokémon.

Everything in Pokémon — from region to region, for that matter — is familiar, down to the actual gameplay, the makings of your Pokémon partners, the sets certain types will get, the moves…

But, of course, here comes Megan — Megan, Yoonchae mouths again, because the mere act of biting her name somehow gives her a sugar rush; it’s free energy — shifting the entire stratosphere, making all that’s familiar become terribly foreign at once. 

It makes Yoonchae feel disgusting, because she can’t help but want to throw up everything she’s eaten and smile like God himself has blessed her all in one go. 

As soon as she sends it, she shuts off her phone and tosses it at her vanity; then, she’s quickly scrambling and making sure she hasn’t broken it, because Yoonchae is not paying for another phone.

So, Yoonchae has multiple problems.

For one, she’s, like, really, like, really really, like, the type of thing she’d pinkie promise with Lara on, into Megan, who, in all fairness, she’d only seen on a stream for approximately… ten minutes, but.

See, because, here comes in the second dilemma: 

She’s with this guy.

It’s, like, a new thing — as new as five months can be, anyway.

Like, they haven’t been dating for five months; but, five months ago, her mom had introduced him to her — 

Her mom had turned, wrapped in a dress probably worth more than the entire party, a smile sticking itself onto her face, before saying, “Ah, Yoonchae! Come here, let me introduce you to Akhim!”

Akhim.

That’s his name.

He’s not awful to look at, which Yoonchae supposes she should consider a win, and he makes her laugh sometimes, but that’s usually when she’s A) drunk, B) high, or C) all of the above.

So.

That’s a particularly new development — to, like, most of her friends, and general acquaintances, Yoonchae had always been slotted into a nice, neat box entitled ‘innocent’. 

It’s not entirely a lie; he’d been her first kiss, but she’d claimed it was her third, because she’d felt embarrassed to admit to a guy who’s probably got a bodycount of 30 that the only thing she’d ever kissed was her pillow, a non-sentient object; he’d also been the one to get her drunk, for, like, the first time, which had been more-or-less an unpleasant experience, and she’d considered never doing it again — but when Yoonchae had desperately surfed Reddit the following morning, she’d found that most people struggled with the taste of alcohol the first time too, so, figured it was okay in the end; and getting high for the first time had been with him too, but Lara had also been there, because it’d been a party (this was a first one too), so, it wasn’t really him-him leading this operation.

So, all in all. He’s not bad, and he’s given her some, like, cool life experiences; he’s just better when she isn’t sober. 

His face isn’t really what she’s looking at either — no, not when it’s his hair, a chocolately shade of brown curls, oft frizzy from the sun.

It’s messy, but it’s cute enough, and when Yoonchae squints — like, really squints — she can almost imagine it’s…

Well, in all honesty, it just reminds her of Sophia’s girlfriend, who she’s vaguely met maybe once or twice — Manon, Yoonchae thinks; she mouths the name, once, twice, because she likes the way new names taste on her tongue. She finds Megan’s name tasted sweeter.

And, so, for the sake of honesty, if she’s being honest-to-god honest, it’s his crooked smile that gets Yoonchae as of late, because it reminds her of Megan, who’s just a dumb fucking streamer that she saw a five-second glimpse of, but it’s who Yoonchae can’t, won’t, should, get out of her head.

She’s with Lara, and they’ve had the killer (re: not) idea of getting drunk; it’s soju this time, though, which is leaving her in less headache-y pain and more warm-socks-fuzziness — and… even her thoughts are certainly sounding a little drunk.

Lara’s got her Switch pulled out, because they’ve never quite beaten the lame loser allegations and have decided the best thing to do after getting drunk is to play Pokémon. 

“Yooonchae,” Lara singsongs, slinking an arm around her shoulders, leaning their faces together until they practically make a triangle, “Let’s make a team together!”

“Um,” is all Yoonchae says in response, because part of her is lowkey — well, in all actuality, it’s highkey, but, well — about to vomit her guts out. 

“Um?” Lara repeats, a pout forming on her lips. “Team… come hither… let us build a team of sparkles and sunlight!” She finishes it off with a hand twirl, but with her motor skills at an all-time low, it comes out as more of a hand flop.

Yoonchae snatches the Switch and opens the stupid thing to a new team anyway; this will be the greatest, most amazing, best winning team made in all of Pokémon existence, bar the fact that it was made by two slightly — severely — drunk girls.

“I want Garchomp,” Lara exclaims before pausing; then, she’s batting her eyes, turning toward Yoonchae, before adding, “If you don’t add Garchomp I’m killing myself.”

“I thought we wanted a sparkle team,” Yoonchae protests, forming an X with her fingers. “Garchomp is not very sparkly.”

“Nooooooo,” Lara denies. “Garchomp is very sparkly.”

“Not.”

“Is.”

Lara’s eyes narrow. “Not.”

Yoonchae unfolds her trump card, hiding her grin: “Are you seriously arguing with an eighteen-year-old right now?” 

Two can play that game, unfortunately — Lara unfolds her trump card: “Are you disrespecting your elders?”

“Hm,” Yoonchae considers, taking a few seconds to crack her neck, letting joy ooze from her, like, atmosphere, or general aura, or whatever Lara would call it, when Lara winces at the cracking sounds. “Yes.”

“I want Garchomp!” 

“And I wanted a pony,” Yoonchae declares, condescendingly patting Lara’s cheek, “But ponies are expensive and sparkles are for Fairy types.”

“Ugh.”

They end up making a… semi-sparkly team, in the end.

Lara gets her Garchomp, in exchange for Yoonchae getting her Greninja, which she’d thrown her own five-minute fit about — all in all, they both come out winners, except the team is, well, shit.

It reminds her of… Megan.

She bet Megan would like this team.

Which comes another strange development: boy, drunk, high, Megan, boy, drunk, high, Megan; somewhere in the middle of that, she’d actually contacted Megan, and they’d been in, like, relative contact.

Friends? Friendly neighbors? Associates who both like Pokémon?

So, she’s on her way to go text Megan, and she’s explaining that to Lara, and Lara’s looking kind of confused, spouting, “When did this all happen?”

And Yoonchae’s simply patting her cheek once more and cheekily adding, “Don’t worry about it.”

She’s opening her phone, and… and… 

Her mind’s playing tricks on her; it must be her mind playing tricks on her.

But she’s searching Pokémon in her messages, just to cross reference, just because it might have gotten lost in a sea of contacts, and Lara, Sophia, Lara, Akhim, Lara, Lara, Akhim Akhim… 

The game ends — the curtain falls.

It’s just him, and there’s no Megan for her in this life, or the next, or ever.

She tries not to cry, because Lara’s already asking her, “What’s wrong, babe?” and she’s going to cry if Lara says anything else about this, about Pokémon, about him, about her.

The dam breaks before she can help herself, and like it’s a pacifier, Lara’s understandingly passing her the bottle of Soju.

It’s half past four in the morning when Yoonchae bothers to open her phone again — she goes to Twitch, and she searches Megan’s username, skittyluvr, which Yoonchae had memorized the first time she’d saw her, which Yoonchae had engrained in her soul, which Yoonchae had briefly considering tattooing on her spine, in a moment of drunk weakness.

She’s typing it in S-K-I-T-T-Y-L-U-V-R, and she’s clicking enter, and she’s waiting, and waiting, and waiting for it to load, only for… for…

Nothing pops up.

There’s no specs Wo-Chien video; there’s no streamer named ‘skittyluvr’ in any capacity — more importantly, there’s no Megan.

There’s a reminder that pops up: Take your meds!

It’s then that Yoonchae sits down and truly sobs — not like she had with Lara, baby-tears patted down by a napkin made of alcohol; no, what comes down is painful, felt in every part of her body, from head to toe and lungs to heart, aching, and aching, and aching.

Yoonchae lets her nails — nails, but they feel like claws, nails but they feel like claws; who is she? — dig into the mirror on her bedside. 

The mirror shatters; with it, the illusion, and with it, blood starts pouring from blossoming cuts on her fingers. 

There’s an angel on her shoulder, pleading, begging: “Please, stop.”

There’s a devil in her head who just can’t — the pain erases Megan, who is Megan, who is Megan, who is Megan, and makes her tears subside; salty water is replaced by sprouting red liquid.

At times like this, there’s only one thing she can do, and it’s write. 

Megan… Megan… she’d liked Hamilton, Yoonchae distantly registers.

“Ugh, Yoonchae, literally how do you write like you’re running out of time,” Megan jeers, chuckling when Yoonchae groans. “Too corny?” 

Yoonchae would let a smile (a begrudging smile, hey) slip on her face. “Were you born on the cob?”

“Did Lara,” Megan starts, between a fit of laughter, “teach you that one?”

Yoonchae doesn’t like Hamilton — Yoonchae doesn’t like anything Megan — no, no, there’s no Megan, enough enough enough.

She picks up the pen, even though her right hand, the one she writes with, is covered in blood, enshrouding the paper in a dark red mess.

Yoonchae begins:

“Her lips were red, her looks were free, 

Her locks were yellow as gold: 

Her skin was as white as leprosy, 

The Night-mare LIFE-IN-DEATH was she, 

Who thicks man's blood with cold. 

The naked hulk alongside came, 

And the twain were casting dice; 

'The game is done! I've won! I've won!' 

Quoth she, and whistles thrice. 

The Sun's rim dips; the stars rush out; 

At one stride comes the dark; 

With far-heard whisper, o'er the sea, 

Off shot the spectre-bark.”

She needs to write, she can’t stop, she won’t stop… she…

Yoonchae’s hand aches.

The blood drips.

It keeps on dripping, and she’s wrinkling her nose — sticky sensations have always made her uncomfortable and icky, like she isn’t quite in her body right now.

Pain and the perplexing unrealness of reality go hand-in-hand, Yoonchae finds.

Tick.

Tock.