Impact stepped out of the way, let Charlotte take over. Perhaps it had been unwise to antagonize Shannon. She deserved it, certainly, and Pierce and Charlotte seemed to approve... but he was alienating Renny. He let himself be pulled aside, bent down so he was face-to-face with Renny, spoke quietly. "Upsetting you was... not my intention. And your sense of mercy and love is... admirable. But Shannon's past, that you are so willing to forget, includes her using pokemon for her own purposes, terrorizing helpless individuals with power gained purely through ownership of pocket monsters. And for that, I feel disdain for her. If she truly does prove herself, does good by society, then I will forgive her, and I will apologize. But until then, she's still the trainer I fought, who was trying to rob the bank out of greed. It was immature to express my disdain the way I did, you're right. But after what she's done, and what she would've kept on doing had we not caught her, I cannot think of her as I would think of, say, you or Pierce."
This was actually pretty close to the truth, he realized, thought not entirely sincere. He was completely honest about his seeing her differently than Pierce or Renny (he had come to recognize the latter two, and the rest of the team, as potential, if unwitting, allies) and when he said that it had been stupid to let his hatred influence his short-term actions. The rest was bullshit, but he hoped Renny wouldn't pick up on that.
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