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'You think she'd give half a s**t if any of us were in danger?' Zack raised his eyebrow. A million pokémon in the world and another Ratio attack was being attributed to gas. The nobility needed overthrowing just for that, Zack thought. 'The enemy of my enemy is still my enemy. She'd use us as bait or as a meat shield or some s**t. These are the same people who will kill commoners to stop them from winning the pokémon league. You can't trust them, Mia.'

'Whoever controlled it's gonna look a lot worse, believe me,' Zack said. 'We got attacked in Shalour City by a Cofagrigus who did this to us.' He lifted his and Sal's shared hand. 'Its trainer communicated through the bird, said it was some kind of punishment and that we'd be released on his say-so. Or when we die, whichever. Is there enough left over to figure out where he was transmitting from?'

Zack eyed the suction cup like a kid eyeing broccoli. 'There are less weird ways to get me to take my shirt off, Mia.'

'Darkhorse hunters only go for threats to the league championship,' Zack said under his breath, grinning because he spoke just loud enough for Salieri to hear him. His levity dissolved once Esme was mentioned, and adrenaline flared in his gut. He could not let her see him like this.

'That's right,' he said, 'time to kill. Time to get away from here and do something else in another city. I vote we go back to Shalour. Maybe the guys at the tower of mastery can cure this.'

Leaving Gotengo was like walking into a wall of noise. Cars rushed and people chattered, and Zack immediately felt lost. Of course, he wouldn't admit that to Salieri, so he had to be clever.

'Fastest way to Shalour's gotta be the teleport zone at the center,' he said. 'After you.'

As Sal led the two astray, semi-familiar streets bled into the unknown and Zack soon had no idea where he was. Lumiose as a whole was Kalos's shining light, but here the buildings were shabby and drab. The side streets had fewer people, more ways to lose yourself, and it would take a Lumiosian native to navigate. So why did Zack get the feeling Salieri didn't know where she was going?

'You don't know where you're going,' he said. Not far away, a pair of punks were loitering beside a poster, maybe having a deep philosophical discussion but probably not. They definitely found something very funny, and as Zack and Sal drew closer, Zack saw what it was. The price, at last, had been paid.

'Ey, it's 'im,' said the shorter, skinny punk who wore a pink mohawk, nudging his huger, beefier friend in where the ribs would be if they weren't layered in flab. 'It's the bloody Couture guy!'

The bigger punk itched his chin, looking from Zack to the poster and back. 'I dunno, Trev, 'e's lookin an awful lot less fashionable. Maybe 'e's someone else?'

That was when Zack got a proper look at the poster. It had been freshly mounted on the wall, perhaps throughout all of Lumiose City. A picture of Zack in a stylish white suit, pouting at the camera, eyes glowering like emeralds in a coal pit. His hair had been stylishly tussled but wasn't wholly different to his usual mess, his face masked in light makeup and digitally brushed to seem too perfect. He looked like a clown.

Boutique Couture - 3 Days Ago

'Mmmmove it!' called fashion expert Viro von Silver as he charged through to his studio, hips swinging this way and that. His purple shirt was puffy in a way that was probably meant to evoke a blossoming flower, but to Zack he looked like some kind of effeminate pirate. Of course, as his date meet-up-as-friends with Esme was now in less than an hour, he kept that observation to himself. The studio assistants cleared out except for a few, who dropped everything on Viro's command and lined up before their boss like troops before a drill sergeant.

'Ladies,' Viro said, swinging his gaze along the line, 'Cristophe.'

He said the name of the only male assistant with the kind of weight and venom that told volumes of unspoken history, summed up in Viro's airy pouting and Cristophe's return fire of flickering, perfectly groomed eyebrows. Viro put his lips away, then stood aside to reveal Zack in full. The assistants gasped, one of them screamed, and another collapsed and began frothing at the mouth.

'We have a stylistic emergency,' Viro said, biting his knuckle. 'This poor soul has come to us for help and by our honour as stylists, nay, saviours, we will help him.'
'But Monsieur von Silver, how can we help him when we can't look at him?' one of the assistants cried, her tears threatening to spill onto her cheeks and melt her makeup. The other assistants chorused their agreement, and Zack imagined setting fire to each and every one of them.
'Look past the fashion, you fools,' Viro snapped. 'A true master can see beyond the look before him, and visualise the look that has yet to be. Note the powerful shoulders, the square jaw, the cheekbones that could cut glass.'

Viro clapped his hands on the air above Zack's shoulders, smoothed his jaw, rubbed his fingers along Zack's cheeks. The assistants opened their mouths in surprise, then wonder, then inspiration. Their horror turned to appreciative murmurs, and the collapsed assistant made a miraculous recovery, wiping away excess froth with the tip of her pinky. Zack, who felt like a dissected poliwag, resisted the urge to shuffle his feet as he stared at the blank white photoshoot canvas on the opposite side of the room. Yes, fire would do it, but why stop there?

'We have only a limited time,' Viro took his tone down a notch. 'Are you ready to work... magic?'

---

Half an hour later, the assistants had propped Zack up like a scarecrow and taken all his measurements, some he wasn't sure they needed and some in places he didn't know he had. They were busy bringing cloth to a Leavanny who span it into clothes with the dexterity of a card dealer shuffling a deck. It at least gave Zack something to look at, and pretend he didn't have Cristophe tugging and smacking at his hair and grumbling every other second.

'No good,' Cristophe said with a thick Kalosian accent. 'This is terrible. Viro, you have given a painter mud, I cannot work with this.'
'Gee thanks, a*****e,' said Zack, momentarily forgetting the old wisdom to never insult one's barber. The glare Cristophe gave him could've cut steel, but Viro pranced to his defence.
'Cristophe, dear, if you have to paint with mud then you paint with ******** mud,' the stylist said on his way past to inspect Leavanny's work, ensuring the pokémon followed his design to perfection. Cristophe rolled his eyes, then took out a particularly long pair of scissors, which he angled towards Zack's head.
'Oh relax,' he said, noticing Zack's expression. 'I will remove only the most offending of hairs. Hold still, I am sure you would hate it if I cut style into you by accident.'

As Zack's dead and split ends were separated from his head, he noticed another pokémon in the studio. A Smeargle sat on a foldout chair, kicking its legs absently as it surveyed the busy assistants. It jumped at little when it met Zack's gaze, and stared at the ground until he looked away. Zack was soon distracted when one of the assistants came lumbering in wearing a hazmat suit.

'Angela, over here,' Viro announced, keeping his distance from Zack. 'Once the "clothes" are removed, I will require you to dispose of them. As humanely as possible, please.'
'Yes sir, Monsieur von Silver,' said Angela in a tone like she'd been asked to kiss a slug.
Zack's face went red. 'You have got to be fuc-' Cristophe's hairdryer drowned him out. The stylist worked product into Zack's hair, bringing it into a shape that Zack thought looked goofy. He was at last either satisfied or gave up, and allowed Angela to step in with her gloved hands outstretched.

'Okay, I don't want to do this any more than you do.'
'You sure about that?' Zack shot back, voice rising.
'I'll close my eyes, that way it's easier on both of us.'

Zack exhaled harder than he'd ever done, and looked around the room. Viro nodded at him sagely, and he grit his teeth. Fine, he thought, pulling off his belt with his two working hands, fine. He placed his belt with his backpack on a side table where they'd be safe. Next he dropped his pants in a pile with his shirt, and Angela scooped them up, holding the unstylish clothing at arm's length like they were contagious. Viro seemed to notice that now Zack wasn't wearing much at all, work on his new clothes had slowed to a crawl.

'Are you silly bitches finished?' he snapped, and the assistants jerked back into action, feeding the Leavanny with whatever it asked for and chiming back 'No, Monsieur von Silver!' Viro huffed, and snapped his fingers toward the Smeargle. It hopped off its seat and waddled as it jogged over. 'Leonardo! I will need a full stylistic decontamination.'
'A wha-' Zack was cut off again as Leonardo sprayed freezing water from his tail, blasting Zack from chest to toe.
'Stop swearing and turn around,' Viro sighed while Zack launched a torrent of abuse at his attacker, fighting the spray with his two fully functioning arms. Leonardo soaked Zack in his entirety then, before the trainer could catch his breath, launched a hurricane of air that dried him off in seconds. Zack barely stayed on his feet. The Smeargle yapped something of an apology, then scurried away to safety.

'This place can go to hell,' Zack growled, which would've been far more intimidating if he wasn't stood almost naked in the middle of a studio. Leavanny lifted a finished fold of clothes into the air, chirping merrily. Viro gasped, ignored Zack, and tip toed his way over, inspecting the cut of Leavanny's work with a rare smile. Zack, who had stared down more than his share of rampaging pokémon in the wilds, gulped.

Viro glided over, cradling the new outfit like one might a baby, but Zack's skin prickled like there might be a bomb in that bundle.

'This is definitely stylish?' he asked, thinking of how he had to impress Esme.
'You insult me,' Viro said. 'I am Viro von Silver. This is my most recent creation, and therefore the single most stylish outfit in this flowery shithole of a country.'
'And it's free?'

That gave Viro pause. He had originally agreed to waive the price, but now he grinned like a particularly fast Sharpedo. 'Why boy, everything has a price. Now put these on and pout for the camera. I want your eyes to glow like ******** emeralds in a coal pit.'

Lumiose City - Present ********. Kill me.'

''Ere, int 'e the lad who we got in a scrap with the other day? An' who's that with him?' said Trevor, nudging the other punk in the gut. 'Ice, it's none other than Sali-bloody-eri!'

'The Gotengo girl?' Iceburg cracked his giant knuckles. 'Oh we gotta score to settle wiv 'em both!' Zack glanced sidelong at his handholding partner. Of course she had gotten into trouble with street thugs. Ordinarily he couldn't blame them for wanting a fight, but today he was not only disarmed but attached to Sal and shared every ounce of pain she felt. Why wouldn't they get dragged into a brawl?

Zack rolled his eyes hard at Salieri's reaction. He wanted to ignore her, but the incomprehensible drivel coming out of the thugs' mouths made it a choice between two evils. He decided to ignore them instead, and raised his eyebrows at Salieri's suggestion. She wanted to him to swing her around like a flail? That was like a gift. 'Sounds great. Sure you're up for it?'

'What'd you say you silly slag! The cheek!' Trevor practically shrieked. He glanced at his bigger buddy for affirmation, but Iceburg was busy on his Holo Caster. 'Ey, what's that?'
'Y'nno what they say, mate. Picture's worf a fousand words,' Iceburg grinned, uploading his snapshot of Zack and Sal to social media.

Trevor mirrored Ice's grin. White Flag's sister's hanging around with male models instead of challenging the league like she said? Didn't take much to encourage a photo into a rumour, and in this case people would jump on the idea that One Shot's a loser just like her brother. Apples and trees and all that. Ruining Salieri's rep would be the perfect revenge.

'Looks like they're up to something,' Zack said. 'Better rush 'em before they get the upper hand.'