Sometimes, people ask Red why he doesn't speak much anymore.

(This is a lie. Nobody asks, because nobody ever ever ever ever ever—)

It's these same people who ask Red why he has decided, against all reason, to leave Kanto for a strange, faraway region no one has ever heard of. He's just become the Champion of the Indigo League, after all, and Kanto is such a lovely place; why would anyone want to leave? Red has been all over Kanto. He's seen the natural beauty of the region, and met all sorts of wonderful people.

(—pokémon made entirely of poison and pollution; a thousand faces turning away—)

He's been to Pewter City.

(Red screams it over and over again, I forfeit, I forfeit, recall it, because he knows now that his Charmander can't win this battle and he can't let the Onix hurt it anymore for his mistake. Only, the battle still hasn't ended, and Brock stares impassively as the rock-type rears up to attack again like Red hasn't said anything at all. You can't run away from a trainer battle.)

He's been to Cerulean.

(Red pleads with the man, please, just give it back, it doesn't belong to you; and the robber leers, tightening his grip on the whip in his hand.
Later, the house's owner tells Red that it wasn't a big deal. He doesn't need the TM back anyway.)

He's been to Vermilion.

(Red doesn't realize what challenging Surge means until the gates unlock, and the leader's bloodshot, paranoid eyes meet his. The first jolt of electricity comes before Red can move for his belt, and he screams in pain, crashing to the ground with spasms that knock down a handful nearby trash cans. He struggles to reach his Poké Balls with trembling fingers while Surge tells him, laughing, that this is exactly what he had his pokémon do to enemy soldiers during the war.)

He's been to Celadon.

(The Game Corner. They're in the Game Corner, Red tells Erika frantically, still panting from having run the whole way to the Gym. The leader smiles calmly, staring into Red's frightened eyes, and asks: aren't the flowers lovely today?)

He's been to Fuchsia.

(He throws a stone, and it clips the Kangaskhan on the side of the head. Even before the pokemon lets out a scream of rage and confusion, Red regrets his actions, feels sick at himself as he watches the pokémon curl in on itself to protect the baby in its pouch. This isn't like a battle, not like when they attack first, when they don't run away, this is—it's—and why did he think it was, but—but they told him to use rocks. They told him to use rocks.)

He's been to Saffron.

(She's a psychic. She's a psychic she had to have known it would happen, Red demands before Sabrina, feverish, accusing. The Silph takeover. The city lockdown. She had to have known.
Did you want to battle? the leader repeats, her voice flat and dead.)

He's been to Cinnabar.

(Red's slowly coming to understand that it's pointless, but still, he asks. He asks about the journals, and the burned mansion, and the strange, terrible creature that's hiding in the cave near Cerulean City. Blaine bows his head, and Red leaves the gym, with the taste of bitter ashes on his tongue.)

And, of course—of course he's been to Viridian.

(The man, the one man behind all of it, tells Red he's impressed that he made it so far. Red doesn't say anything back. He's figured out by now that nothing, absolutely nothing he says will make a difference what they do, and he just wants to get the battle over with and end this. If they only listen to violence, if they only know how to fight, then so be it.)

Once Red has made his decision, it's Saffron where he goes from the plateau.

The Magnet Train station isn't crowded: around Red, passengers wait for their ride to arrive, idly making small talk with one another to fill the void with meaningless chatter. He stands out starkly among them, a blank-faced boy standing completely still; alone in the middle of the floor and staring straight ahead into nothing. He has nothing left to say.

Green finds him easily.

"You can't leave," the other boy spits, whirling Red around to face him. Green is panting, clearly having run the whole way to the station, and Red wonders idly who told him he was leaving Kanto. Red certainly didn't.

(Red wants to know how he even got here. How Green even managed to navigate this nightmarish maze of traps and men in uniforms, and make it here to the top first, only to stand there before Red with that smirk like nothing is wrong. Green laughs at him, pulling the first Poké Ball off his belt, because whatever Red has to say, however much time they're wasting, their rivalry is so much more important than all these employees' lives.)

"You can't leave," Green repeats, something dangerous and desperate in his eyes. Red wonders, for the millionth time, just why it is that the other boy has decided to make his life revolve solely around Red, around beating Red, around following Red and refusing to let go of Red even if the world is about to end.

Nearby on the tracks, the Magnet Train finally pulls in. The station fills with noise as passengers scramble to get onboard. Wordlessly, Red turns away from his rival and moves to get on as well, but then there's a hand seizing his upper arm and pulling him back with bruising force.

Green snarls something unintelligible and crashes their lips together, violently. Possessively. He refuses to let go of Red for nearly a full minute, and then when he does pull back he looks demandingly at Red, as though this should change things, as though Red should now be compelled to drop everything and follow him the way he always, always followed Red—whether Red wanted him to or not.

And Red could spend hours telling Green about the million ways he just doesn't care anymore about what the other boy thinks and wants and needs from him, but there just isn't any point. Instead, Red says nothing at all, forcefully wrenching his arm back and running to the train without leaving Green so much as a backward glance.

Red's done with Kanto. He hates this place. And even if he has to spend the rest of his life completely alone, has to hermit himself in a strange, unfamiliar land, that's really okay.

Because at least that way, he can pretend it's voluntary when no one listens.