Clive responded to Yulia asking him if he needed anything with a single chuckle that dripped with sarcastic amusement, followed by a low "Nope." He continued to press one key at a time on his laptop, desperate to document his thoughts before he forgot any details or found himself needing to sleep and recover. Even as Yulia apologized, he continued punching away, painstakingly filling in his running document line by line. He still acknowledged that his partner spoke, only silently, by occasionally glancing passed the side of the laptop screen to look at her before going back to the screen again.
It was not until the tone of Yulia's voice shifted, growing even quieter, that Clive gave her his full attention. The sides of his lips twitched involuntarily as he studied Yulia's face, as if searching for something. Yet, he still listened, and he listened carefully. His gaze never left Yulia's face, unflinching even at the most surprising parts of her story. The Ninetales curse was an alarming factor, but like anything else, Clive knew there was no sense in questioning it until she was done. The rest of Yulia's sentiments, as noble as they sounded, did not stir much of a reaction either. At that moment, Clive was a sponge that was absorbing all of the information, and sponges did not typically have much to say.
Slow, empty, seconds of silence lingered once Yulia had concluded, ending with yet another apology. Clive laid still for a while, before turning himself and sitting up. He glanced back towards his laptop for a moment before pulling it to his lap. After a few key presses, he turned the thing towards Yulia, who would probably notice that Clive turned the camera on. He peaked to the screen to make sure there was a good shot, before snapping the picture, then spinning the laptop back around and turning the camera back off. He then closed the laptop lid and threw it to the center of his bed, before standing up. The new case file, the one about Yulia, will need to be started when he felt motivated to work again.
He probably did not have the energy to spare to just pace the room, but something in his body- maybe adrenaline, cortisol, testosterone- dictated that he would do so. "I never told you about Uncle Richie, did I?" he asked. "He wasn't really my uncle, but he was basically a brother to my father, so that made him basically my uncle too. They were partners. They made a legacy together unlike anything the GRPD, and maybe any PD across Johto and Kanto, had ever seen. Anything I've managed to do since starting my career is child's play compared to the feats they've accomplished."
He stepped passed Yulia's bed, eventually slowing to a stop to lean his shoulder against the wall by the window. He watched the streets below as people weaved their ways through the city, like ants as they carved their way through their mound. "Uncle Richie... Well, he was a pretty top notch guy. Never had kids, or a wife, but he just wanted to lock up bad guys. He volunteered at the food bank, I remember him taking me along once when I was old enough to fit a single can of baked beans in one hand. I think he did some stuff at one of the churches too? I don't know specifically what."
"Locking up the bad guys was his primary way of contributing to society though. And he was good at it, my dad was too, obviously, that's why they were so renowned." He paused, glancing down at the window sill, before deciding it would be welcoming enough to sit on. He lowered himself down before continuing, occasionally glancing towards Yulia when he did, but mostly talking at the room's cool and conditioned air. "If you look around you'll find pictures of my dad some places at the precinct. Three of them to be exact. One in the trophy case, one in the hallway leading to the courts, and one in the chief's office. There are zero pictures of Uncle Richie. None of the old school guys want to even acknowledge his existence. Can you venture a guess why that is, rookie?"
Clive paused to dig under his coat until he found the broken and scarred Pokeball that was given to him by the judge weeks ago. He continued on, whether Yulia answered or not. "We don't usually take kindly to turncoats, traitors, and deserters. For good reason. I mean, we swore our lives to the protection of others. It's a covenant we made to mankind, to Pokemon, and to each other to defend the innocent and to bring justice to those that harm them. Personally, I don't make a big deal of it, but at the end of the day that is what it is, isn't it? So when someone turns their back on something like that... actually worse, opposes it, we can't take it lightly.
'You're probably smart enough to understand where I'm going with this, right Yulia? The reason my dad died, on the field, is because Uncle Richie got him killed. In fact, he might have been the one to do it, no one knows. The bullet in my dad's brain was registered to him. This Pokeball, which is supposed to be locked up in evidence, had Uncle Richie's prints all over it. Uncle Richie was the only one who could have known where my mother was hiding while my dad was working on such a dangerous case, and yet somehow she went missing."
There was visible tension across Clive's forehead, despite his speech being steady. "They never found him. There's a lot of details to the case, and believe my I know them all, but to keep it short he was spotted a couple times with a cartel and that was it. Gone. Far too much time has passed for that case to ever be solved now, not by the law anyway. That man was partners with my dad for longer than I've even been in the game, and for that whole time he had demon's in the closet. He had better plans for himself. It did not matter to him if he betrayed maybe the only person that entrusted his life to him. His other life, the non-detective life, was more important."
Clive drew a long breath, finally letting go of the visible frustration on his face as he stood. He glanced down at Yulia. "All of that being said... thanks for telling me. I'm honored to have been the first person you told. I still have questions about what you just told me, still have doubts, but whatever the actual truth is I know I can handle it. However. I do not want Uncle Richie. I don't want to make that picture the first that goes into my personal file about Yulia Oryolovna, and have to obsess over it like I have with Uncle Richie's, just to keep myself safe. I can not accept more secrets if they might compromise our work, or get me killed. If stopping Avarice really means everything to you, which I believe you when you say it is, then you will answer me honestly- are you still holding anything back, yes or no?" His dark eyes met Yulia's, not quite leering, but his facade was still unwavering.
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