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Pokémon Broken Things

kintsugi

golden scars | pfp by sun
Location
the warmth of summer in the songs you write
Pronouns
she/her
Partners
  1. silvally-grass
  2. lapras
  3. golurk
  4. booper-kintsugi
  5. meloetta-kint-muse
  6. meloetta-kint-dancer
  7. murkrow
  8. yveltal
"welcomes her back with unconditional love" mmmm yes nothing to see here

Young Genesis and chronology fuckery! Fun fun. Arc 3's narrators have been interesting to me in the sense that they don't really delve in any of the directions I thought we were going to go in--Selene's a fresh pair of eyes on armageddon, Cuicatl's chapter was a lot of self-conflict (which makes sense, because she's not affected by the issues in the same way that anyone else is), and this chapter is primarily internal/in the past, with not much by way of moving forward. Kind of unorthodox but for now it's a good way of showing that your personal implosions don't stop just because the world outside is worse.

Genesis crush is also kind of sad to read through, since she really doesn't let herself believe it's real. I understand why we don't really delve into it in the main story/why it's so heavily compartmentalized away, but I wish we understood more of what she thinks of it now--there's some glimpses of self blame (what were you wearing?) and maybe some intentional deception (she was supposed to believe you), but I wanted a better look at what she wants to think at the time as well as what she wants her mother to think. Even if it's confused/fragmented, or even if she ends up thinking contradictory thoughts as she tries to do the mental acrobatics required to reconcile her actions with what she believes are correct actions--I think a better anchor for what she thinks about things now. Has she changed? Does she think she's changed? Can she be happy with who she's become?

The recurring theme of Genesis feeling inclined to defend her parents to people who try to untangle her from them--oof. A really good dynamic.

His question makes you smile; he does still care about you.
oh no. Genesis's inability to Get what's going on always makes her an uncomfortable (in a good way) narrator for me to read.

You screwed it up. No, Kekoa screwed it all up. Cuicatl even tried to help you! Wasn’t even mad you called the death cult she’s in a death cult. Uggggggh. She hates you now, doesn’t she? And you’ll never get a chance to correct it.
I kinda wanted a better idea of what Genesis didn't want to screw up in this conversation. Leave on a high note because she's unaware that she's already screwed up a lot of things in the past? Just leave cool in general, no awkward questions, no lingering thoughts? She has a crush on Cuicatl? I wasn't sure what she was trying to avoid doing here.

Six Years Ago
These felt a hair cheesy to me. I get why she wouldn't do the timestamps like Cuicatl's chapters but these feel very fanficy, "PIKACHU'S POV" or whatever.

Japan. Mother told you about that place recently. They don’t worship Xerneas there, so he couldn’t stop it when Yveltal sent monsters. A city was destroyed. A lot of people died. Now they’re all in a cocoon.
👀

The comfey wraps herself around your arm and you can feel the healing pouring into you. Sarah does a quick check on everything before standing up and starting to walk away. Comfey stays for a little bit as your cuts stop bleeding, become thin red lines, and then disappear altogether. Even the pains from running in shoes that were not meant to run in fade away.
A really nice detail here. They're looking after her physical body at all costs but neglecting everything else about her. Heal all the surface damage but never look beneath.

Fluffy looks up and chitters for a moment before going back to sleep on her web, strung up in the corner between four posts.
Ahhh fuzzy spiders! Love that the spiderweb heiress has cute thunder friends lol

Even if its Lyra.
it's

“My brother and I didn’t meet him until I was eight and he was ten
It's dialogue so it's kind of stupid and phrasing is a potshot, but the "him/he" pronoun switching tripped me up--obviously the father isn't 10 but that's what it looks like at first.

“Some kid beat the Rocket Gang’s leader so bad he stepped down in disgrace. Then the Rocket Gang’s rival companies made TV shows, video games, and everything else they could to rub it in. Made the kid a saint in the process.”
Ha! Very on-brand Persephone description lol. I like the idea that the franchise is a propaganda machine. Would've liked a bit more on "made the kid a saint in the process"--suggests that Lyra disagrees, and I wanted a bit more perspective on what she thinks Red did wrong since on a personal level.

If she’s impressed you’ve heard of him she doesn’t let it show before she plows on.
The ambiguity here is really fun too--either it's "wow good job gold star you know this basic event in history" or it's Lyra not really noticing the rules that Genesis takes pride in following, which is definitely a mood for this chapter.
 

Pen

the cat is mightier than the pen
Staff
Partners
  1. dratini
  2. dratini-pen
  3. dratini-pen2
Gen! My fave oblivious religious cultist and her very straight feelings about her childhood best friend! I enjoyed the swerve down backstory lane. You do a good job showing us the restrictive world Gen's grown up in, and how the combination of her family and her personality keep from the outside world. The time snapshots worked well for me.

Places I wanted a bit more--I know that Gen's flustered by the immediacy, but I would have liked to see some fragments of her prepared speech swirling through her mind. Presumably she's got some arguments that go beyond "I swear she kissed me" by now. The family scene felt a little sparse once she looks up from Dangerous Kitty.

I also felt like the ending cuts off kind of abruptly. We're left in the past, and it makes the chapter feel a little incomplete to me. Even a short closer scene would complete the circle and give a sense of where Genesis is at right now.

But yeah, really nice to get the full story of Gen and Lyra. I'm excited to see where Gen goes from here.

There’s a human-like pokémon with yellow stripes beside him. Wait. “We met in Heahea, right?”
Oh! The dude from when she went out late at night and almost got mugged? That was one of my favorite sequences; I should re-read it with this context.

You swear he’s glaring at Kekoa but can’t quite tell in in the dim light. “After all, you never know who might set their sights on someone like her.”
Hah, dramatic irony is fun here.

Gently, but the message gets across loud and clear. Even to you.
An interesting line in a chapter that is so much about Gen missing very obvious messages.

“Hello, Genesis. Are you hurt?”

His question makes you smile; he does still care about you.

“I am. Are you?”

“Good to hear. I am also unharmed.
I think "I am" is a typo?

“But you’ve sent protection, haven’t you?” He did. He was watching after you the entire time. Because he cares.

“Hector was the one who requested this.”
Wait so is Hector the protection dude? I'm kind of confused by this. Gen doesn't seem to know him, so why would a random bodyguard she doesn't know request to protect her?

Sure, it took the sun going out—but you’re going home!
Gen's unwarranted optimism always stabs me in the heart.

Teleporter? That’s—you were expecting a boat. You had a whole speech planned out for when you got back, but now it’s slipping out of reach as you try to find it. No time to prepare, everything on the line and—and you have to say goodbye, now.
Once again, this sense of how quickly it's happening works really well. Gen is someone who likes to prepare for things and digest them, but all the moments that change the course of her life happen quickly (including the kiss).

A vikavolt’s light. The bug—you never learned the vikavolt’s names since they were usually at work with the spiders—floats behind you and gently presses you closer to the door.
The house being full of sparkle spiders is really cool!

You used to be scared of the big cat, but now you’re just happy she’s here because it means you’re home. For a moment you ignore the other people in the room and hug her back, giving her a scratch on the chin. But it doesn’t last. Eventually Red walks back to her bed and you have to turn and face reality.
Gen trying to carve out these little bubbles of alone-time feels very real.

“You’re back,” she says after what feels like an hour of silent appraisal. “But have you changed?”
Ah, there's that unconditional acceptance you mentioned!

They don’t worship Xerneas there, so he couldn’t stop it when Yveltal sent monsters. A city was destroyed. A lot of people died. Now they’re all in a cocoon. That is why you believe in Xerneas. He can protect you.
I like the simplicity and transactional quality of how she's internalized this.

She glares at the merry-go-round like it’s responsible for everything and for once you know what to do.

You poke a finger into her heart, smile, and run away.
Aw baby Gen making friends.

There’s a book series about a group of knights. There are a lot of books and there’s sort of a bigger plot but mostly it’s just kids a little older than you hanging out with other kids and fighting bad guys with swords, bows, and pokémon. When you run around the track you get lost in that world, sort of, except you’re in it and have friends, a white rapidash, and a sword made of pure crystal. The sword also—doesn’t matter. The point is that you won’t tell anyone any of it. Ever. It’s not real. It doesn’t matter to them.

“Stuff.”

Lyra stares at you like you said something wrong. And maybe you did.
I think one of things that draws me to Gen's character is how internal she is. Lyra's basically her best (only) friend and Gen doesn't even consider sharing her internal life. This makes a lot of sense when read in conjunction with the diary sequence--her family always weaponizes her innermost thoughts against her, so that privacy feels like a defense mechanism, if an unconscious one.

“I mean, you’re nice. If you were a boy, yes. But you’re not, so…”

“Ah.”

And that’s the end of that.
That was easy!

Oh wait, there's more . . .

She tries. She really does. And you start to learn things about them and they learn some things about you. Three come over to your house in October, but Mother keeps two from coming back (one was a liar, the other too masculine) and the third stays away on principle. They let you keep sitting at the table (it’s not your fault your mom’s crazy, they explain, until you start to argue that, no, she isn’t, and one politely changes the topic). There are always jokes you don’t get and there’s a wall between them and you but it’s nice to have other people to talk to. And Lyra’s always there, glancing at you from time to time and making sure that you aren’t too far out of the loop.
Really like how you flesh out the dynamic here, how the family regulates her friend circle.

You don’t like her here. This is your space. Yours. You make your own bed and do most of the chores just so fewer people come in. Having anyone in here feels invasive. Even if its Lyra.
Gen wants her privacy strikes again.

“He worked for the Rockets and he was damn good at it.”

You flinch at the casual swear and take a moment for that to fully sink in. Her father… he seemed nice enough. A little strict. You had mistaken him for a security guard at first with the way he held himself. But you’d never thought he was a bad person. “I think he’s still in it,” she mutters. “Just a little bit. Makes sure that spider silk keeps flowing. Another company, another gang, makes it back home.”

That was too far. “Father doesn’t sell to criminals.” You meet her gaze with a glare of your own, doing your best to keep it up when her brown eyes soften considerably and she looks… sad? You suddenly feel stupid and maybe mean and decide that it’s time to inspect your socks.

“He sells to war criminals. Really, the yakuza are tame compared to his other clients.”

“I…”

She waves a hand—wait when did she start wearing nail polish?—and cuts off your thoughts. “My brother and I didn’t meet him until I was eight and he was ten.
Found this conversation a little hard to follow and info-dumpy. At times I wasn't sure whether Lyra was talking about her dad or Gen's dad, and how she knows so much.

And in Japan that all leads back to Red,” she says the word with a strange mix of awe and disdain. Like he wasn’t just garbage, he was the Mt. Everest of garbage. “Some kid beat the Rocket Gang’s leader so bad he stepped down in disgrace. Then the Rocket Gang’s rival companies made TV shows, video games, and everything else they could to rub it in. Made the kid a saint in the process.”
Fun take on Red. Wasn't sure why Lyra's so against him, though? Is it just that she'd mad her brother idolizes him and then wants to do these rash things?

A lot of ideas whir through your mind but they range from stupid to rude. And most of them come back to one phrase: “I don’t know how to help you.”

Lyra abruptly leans over and wraps her arms around you in a big, tight hug. Out of all the things you should be focusing on, you end up thinking about how nice her blukberry-scented shampoo smells.
Aw, Gen. Her compassion and social awkward really come through here.

he looks terribly anxious and she just got happy and her hair looks very cute today and you just can’t find it in yourself to say no.
"but her cute hair" is v convincing argument.

Just after the car drives off Lyra notices something wrong with your hair, which is annoying because you spent so long sitting still and getting it styled earlier, so she steps over and fixes it. She’s surprisingly slow and has to get a lot closer to you than you would’ve expected.
All throughout Lyra is always pushing the edge of Gen's boundaries. I get that she has a crush, but there's a kind of selfish side to her behavior as well--she knows Gen won't say yes to a date-date so she'd gotten her to agree to a friend-date and then is milking that for all it's worth.

She brightens up like her brother got arrested five times.
Hah what a way to phrase it.

The door is unlocked. You don’t know if you should be surprised.
Was a little confused here. Is the door to the roof normally locked? Is the idea that Gen never tries to go up to the roof, so she wasn't sure what to expect?

she’s pretty and you like it and you’re going to burn with Yveltal
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tAp9BKosZXs


Now you can only pray that Mother will be merciful.
Ending cut off a bit abruptly. I think I wanted a little more here to tie the chapter together.

“She was my friend. Almost like a sister”
Missing period.
 

Chibi Pika

Stay positive
Staff
Location
somewhere in spacetime
Pronouns
they/them
Partners
  1. pikachu-chibi
  2. lugia
  3. palkia
  4. lucario-shiny
  5. incineroar-starr
“For her own safety.” You swear he’s glaring at Kekoa but can’t quite tell in in the dim light. “After all, you never know who might set their sights on someone like her.”
See, I don't think that was specifically aimed at Kekoa (it really would only make sense for it to be if he'd overheard that one Plumeria convo somehow) but... it'd be really funny if it was aimed at Kekoa. :V
You screwed it up. No, Kekoa screwed it all up. Cuicatl even tried to help you! Wasn’t even mad you called the death cult she’s in a death cult. Uggggggh. She hates you now, doesn’t she? And you’ll never get a chance to correct it.
It's really easy to forget just how much weight she puts on what Cuicatl thinks of her.
Father is smiling, either at you or at his longtime pet. Your mother is not, legs and arms crossed and almost glaring at you.
I like the contrast here. It also gets across the impression that it's as if no time at all has passed for her mother.
You’re back,” she says after what feels like an hour of silent appraisal. “But have you changed?”

“Yes. But I didn’t kiss her in the first place! She kissed me.”
This is... somewhat more direct than I was expecting? I dunno, I think I just expected Gen to dance around the subject a bit more. It reads almost like they just went and perfectly resumed an in-progress conversation, or like this is their first time talking about this.
“I’m Lyra,” she finally says when the door is shut. “Or Kotone if you want to call me that. That was my name back home. But a new country means a new name. That’s what dad says.”
I can't remember if Lyra was always intended to be canon-Lyra or if you just decided to lean into it. :P
Mother pretended she could read your mind and kept catching and punishing you for stuff you were pretty sure happened in the rare moments while no one was watching; you only figured out how she was doing it when you made up a little sin you didn’t actually do and wrote it down. Sure enough, you were locked in the library for four hours of silent reflection over something that didn’t happen.
oh GOD. Hnnnggg no wonder she's always afraid to express herself (besides just the social awkwardness.)
“I’ve never been up on your roof,” she asks without asking.
I'm pretty impressed with how astute Gen is here tbh. This strikes me as something she wouldn't have caught onto in the years prior.
Now you can only pray that Mother will be merciful.
Hell of an ending line. Oof. Damn you for making me like Gen. I mean, of course I knew it was inevitable--she's just a kid, she only says awful things because of the way she was raised, she doesn't want to hurt anyone. I knew it was only a matter of time.

Anyway, I guess that's all I've got--I didn't save very many quotes while reading. Got too absorbed. Damn you for making me like Gen.
 
Fighting 3.4

Persephone

Infinite Screms
Pronouns
her/hers
Partners
  1. mawile
  2. vulpix-alola
Might want to hope on over to The Alola Pokedex to read the Oricorio and Hawlucha entries.

Fighting 3.4: Cognitive Test
Meredith

[09:18:40]​

It’s not even the afternoon and you’re already tired. You’re always tired. Doesn’t help that you spent the last week at the edge of Route 2 in ad hoc ten-hour shifts, paranoid that every non-existent shadow held an Ultra Beast. You didn’t even get paid for it. It was “volunteer work” that should look great on grad school apps that can get you off this alien-infested archipelago.

In the meantime, you need money to pay rent, utilities, food, student fees, and pokémon upkeep. VStar is at least promising to pay you better than waitressing. Even if you wanted to keep doing that the restaurant’s closed until everything goes back to normal. And apparently Congress made it so that businesses don’t have to pay unemployment during the apocalypse, but landlords can still charge rent.

The VStar job doesn’t look too bad, either. There’s a kid who wants a Class Five. You help her do that. She gets one and you get a nice payday. Still pays over minimum wage in the meantime. Sure, you’re not exactly thrilled to work for the pokémon capture-and-export trade (and your professors would throw a fit if they knew you were A Bad Person). But getting a kid their Class V isn’t bad for the native birds since none of them even need one. Can’t see the harm in it.

Wolsey lights the way beside you, every flap of her wings sending embers scattering behind her. Most fade quickly. There’s little risk of lighting fires while walking down an abandoned street in the middle of the rainy season. (This damn island has an entire season of rain.)

The Pokémon Center has guards positioned around it. No uniforms or anything. Just individual trainers like you, pokémon at their sides. Some don’t even seem that strong. You ask Wolsey to stay outside and help them for the time being. She’s a strong battler and she can cast some light. Also gives her more time out of her ball. She doesn’t get to spend much time breathing real air when you’re stuck in your apartment night in and night out. Too much risk of her burning down the place.

Inkay drift through the air of the lobby. Their light disappears quickly enough, but it still illuminates about a fifth of the room. One floats over to you when you enter. It’s weird watching them constrict and expand like they’re moving through water. Is that necessary? Psychological? You smile at the inkay once it is close enough to let you see the ground beneath you. A quick glance around the lobby shows the nurse and an obviously male teenager illuminated. Maybe your student isn’t here. Or maybe she prefers to rest in darkness.

“Cuicatl Ichtaca?” You do your best to ignore how badly you probably just mangled the name.

“Here,” she answers, about ten feet away. The inkay starts ‘swimming’ in her direction and you follow. Once you can finally see her you can tell why she was sitting in darkness. There’s a telltale white cane beside her. When the inkay’s a little closer you can see the cataracts in her eyes. She has dark skin and jade hair. Her garishly colored t-shirt has a hydreigon and a one-word slogan on it. Makes her look younger than she probably is.

More interesting are the two pokémon around her. There’s a vulpix on her lap, quietly judging you. A beldum floats above her shoulder. Ah. So that’s why she wants a five.

You sit down and smile, more for your own sanity than anything. “Hello, Cuicatl…”

“Cuicatl Ichtaca,” she says. Slowly and deliberately. So you don’t screw up the pronunciation in the future.

Poor kid. You probably will anyway.

“Hi, Cuicatl, I’m Meredith. I’m studying ornithology at U-Alola. VStar set me up to be your teacher?”

She almost certainly already knows all that but you aren’t sure where else to start.

“That’s bird science?” she asks.

Not what you were anticipating but, sure, you can roll with it. “Yes.”

“Oh.” She frowns. “I have a tyrunt. Birds are close.”

Metagross and a tyrantrum.

Sure, why not? Probably not the right reaction, but, again, you’re too tired for fright or concern or whatever.

“So, you got two ‘mons with Class V evos without getting the license first?”

“Well,” her frown deepens. “The tyrunt was a gift. And I won’t evolve Nocitlālin twice.”

The kid has at least a little sense. That’s good. Wouldn’t want her to get killed by her own metagross after you went and helped her evolve it. You’d feel guilty for a little bit, even if it was her own damn fault. Not that tyrantrum is that much better. Probably. You watched half a documentary on them once before falling asleep.

“I see. And you want the license to keep the tyrunt?”

“Yes.” Her mouth stays open a second longer before she snaps it shut. Something else, then. Probably none of your concern.

“Alright. Do you know how the licensing process works?” She shakes her head. “For a Class Four you’ve got to get me or someone else with a Five to vouch for you, tell the government that you won’t do anything really, dangerously stupid. You mess up, we both get punished.” There are other ways to get a Four as well, but vouching is by far the easiest. Plus, it doesn’t seem like she needs the Four itself as much as she needs it as a stepping-stone to Five.

“For the Five, you’ve got to get a majority of the Class Five-holders on the islands to vote to give you one. You’ll have to get their respect. That might be hard for you.” Certainly was for you, and you were just native and female. Both of those, from America’s old nemesis, and blind? You don’t envy her. “You’ll probably have to give them some research they’ll find useful. I did mine on sensu oricorio.”

You concluded that there was no ethical way to train one, but, hey, if you really wanted to try, ethics be damned, here’s how you would go about it. The researchers were fascinated by the husbandry parts and the battlers were grateful that you put a new toy in their chest. “Research on the trail can be hard, though. You might want to suspend your challenge.”

She shakes her head. “Can’t. Challenge Visa.”

Maybe she could apply for an academic one… but you aren’t even sure if that would work. And even if it was legal, she’d still have to get it through ICE in this administration. You’re honestly surprised she got a Challenge Visa in the first place given all the talk about closing the border. Unless she isn’t here legally. You’ll need to figure that out before she goes for the license, but it seems rude to ask right now.

“I guess you could type it out on the trail if you had to. You’d need a waterproof computer. And, um, you can type, right?”

“I can speak. Then the computer types for me.” She pauses. “But I don’t have a computer. Or enough money to get one.”

Text-to-speech isn’t great. At all. You’ve tried sending text messages with it before and, well, you’ve always had to go back and type it yourself, along with a clarification that, no, you didn’t mean ducking. And if she doesn’t have computer money… “How are you going to feed a tyrantrum?”

“I’ll figure it out later. Wild pokémon, maybe? It’s legal to hunt gumshoos. And she won’t get to full size soon.”

That’s a lot of gumshoos. And the revived tyrantrum are notorious divas. Might not like eating rodents all day every day. You don’t have to tell her that point blank. Don’t want to. Best case scenario is that you lead her on for a while and make some money before she accepts reality on her own. Or, better yet, she gets the Five, you get paid, and then she decides that caring for a tyrantrum while broke is a terrible idea. You can barely afford normal birds.

“Okay.” Time to move on. Learn more about her now. There will be time enough to think of the future later. “Any idea what you could research?”

“I speak Lower and Upper Draconic,” she says. “I could translate some of the myths.”

“Draconic? Like…”

“Dragon language.” You open your mouth but can’t find an intelligent response. “Although I’m told I’m not very good at upper draconic. Better at lower, but that has a lot of dialects. I’ve met druddigon and charizard and they talked different than hydreigon. Growls were longer, sometimes there were hisses when I would’ve expected a snort. I sort of got what they were saying and I think they understood me.” She tilts her head and a small smile replaces her frown. “I am very good at hydreigon’s dialect. And I can mostly understand tyrunt.” A frown again. She crosses her legs, earning a yowl of protest from her vulpix. “I think. I did not understand much of Jurassic Park the book, big words and the recording was fast, but I think it said that really smart pokémon might not know their language and culture when they came back. That’s why the pyroclaptors went bad. And tyrantrum are dragons, and dragons are smart. Maybe I should teach her dragon myths?”

You’re aware into work on parrot and corvid languages, helped along by some of those pokémon being bilingual themselves. But dragons? Hydreigon? You didn’t know anyone had bothered to try. Yet what interests you the most is none of those things.

“Dragon myths? As in, myths about dragons? Quetzlcoatl and stuff.”

She shakes her head and strands of hair fall onto her face. “No. Dragons have their own myths. Alice talked about The Split God, Reshiram and Zekrom. And Kyurem, sort of. Then Quetzlcoatl…or Rayquaza…they call him…” What she says is some sequence of growls that somehow still sounds like language. “He let dragons fly. Oh, and there’s the first dragon. Or the earth dragon. In Anahuac we have to offer him a lot of blood so he doesn’t wake up and kill all the humans. But the dragons like him.”

Oh, cool. She really believes in her country’s murder cult. Whatever. You can work with monsters as long as you’re getting paid.

“Then there’s…” the name is a hiss, a strange growl thing that you’re pretty sure comes from her mouth more than her throat, and another hiss. It sounds sort of like a reptile trying to say ‘Sagaris.’ “But Sagaris isn’t a god. More of a hero. Like… I’m sorry. I don’t know any local heroes. Ohserase? She’s Unovan but…”

“I know the story.” You’re a kanaka girl born under American rule. You’ve heard it. Your high school even put on the play before you got your GED and hit the trail. You always thought it was a silly story: if you just pray to the gods and politely ask the government to care about the people, it will all come to pass. But life isn’t a fairy tale. Shit happens, people die, gods and kings can’t even be bothered to pay their serfs unemployment.

A glance to the side shows the teenage boy staring at you (or Cuicatl, hard to tell). Maybe you should move this conversation. She’s more interesting than you were expecting. “Want to come to my apartment?” you ask. “We can talk more there.”

She starts to stand and her vulpix jumps to the side, letting out a high-pitched whine as she does. Cuicatl’s hand falls to her cane before she collapses it and stows it on her belt. “Can you guide me?”

“Sure.”

Her hand’s a little cool. You grab it but she slides it up to your elbow and rises to her feet. Oh. Yeah, that is a little less awkward. She uses her free hand to withdraw her vulpix. The beldum trails after her, just above and behind her shoulder.

You meet up Wolsey on the way out, preening and pointedly ignoring a baile oricorio’s mating dance. Good girl. At your whistle she flaps up into the air and lights the way back home.

“I suppose I should say more about myself. I’m a third-year student at U-Alola.” Did you already say that? “I help run cognitive tests on birds. Puzzles, occasional speech mimicry. Wolsey here knows some words.”

“Hello,” Wolsey dutifully adds.

“It’s odd to hear about pokémon with religions. Testing them all day, they’re smart, sure, but not like that. Not human.” Honchkrow are smart, sure, but smart like a toddler. Maybe Ophelia is on adult human level. Maybe. Even then you’re never sure how much is her intelligence and how much is from her borrowed spirits.

Cuicatl frowns and turns towards Wolsey. “Do you have myths?” The firebird warbles something. “Stories about gods. Ancestors. The start of the earth.” Cuicatl gets a much happier warble. “Can you tell me? In your own words.” The firebird goes into a long song about… something. Cuicatl nods attentively at times and urges her to go on during breaks. Once you’re almost back to the apartment she thanks Wolsey and turns to you. “She does. A giant bird with one wing made of a rainbow and the other made of ash gave talonflame their fire.” She pauses and purses her lips. “It’s kind of similar to the Split God myth. Just with the Fire Bird.”

“Do, uh, birds also speak dragon? Sorry if that’s dumb but—”

{I’m psychic. I can understand most pokémon.}

“Ah.” The head of the Phantom Pokémon department is as well, but you aren’t sure if he’s ever paid a visit to the ornithology wing. He’s usually busy with… Mr. Mime? One of the psychic-types that tells biology to go fuck itself. Anyway, explains how she learned draconic. You’d kind of just thought that was a thing over in Anahuac, and it might be because that place is an information black hole, but this makes more sense.

You have to withdraw Wosley in the apartment. Then getting up the stairs in the dark is a pain in the ass you don’t really talk much. She seems to manage just fine. Probably all old hat for her. It’s only when you’re right outside the door that you realize something you probably should’ve figured out at the very beginning if you weren’t exhausted: it was a terrible idea to bring Cuicatl to your apartment.

It’s fine. This is fine. You can just smooth things over with Ophelia before letting her in. “Can you stay outside for a bit? My sister hates surprises and I want her to know you’re coming in.”

She grunts her acceptance (you really need to tell her not to do that in front of Ophelia) and slip inside. Your sister appears in the corner, faintly illuminated by pale blue will-o-wisps. “Welcome home, Meredith. You are back sooner than expected.”

You curtsy, unsure if she can even see it. “Hello, Eve. The Pokémon Center was not a good place to talk. I invited her over for tea. Would you like tea?”

She grimaces but nods. “So long as she’s polite.”

“She’s blind and not from here. Can you give her a little grace? Please?”

Eve sighs and looks so very, very concerned. She never used to look like that.

“Perhaps.”

That’s as close to a ‘yes’ as you’re going to get from her.

You go back out and prepare to brief Cuicatl. “She says you can come in. Just be on your best behavior. Full sentences, curtsies, no nicknames, no interruptions. Nothing out of line.”

Maybe she nods, maybe she doesn’t. Or maybe she doesn’t react at all for a long while. “Okay. Is your sister…”

Alright? Bent in the head? An asshole? Definitely not, depends on how you see it, yes but don’t tell her that.

“Some bad stuff happened to her a while back. She hurt her head. Maybe don’t talk about the island challenge?”

That’s all a very polite way of saying that she got hit by a boulder a buzzwole had aimed at one of Selene’s pokémon. The incineroar dodged, of course, because it was very well trained. The champion said she was very, very sorry for ‘the accident’ but mostly she just looked too exhausted to fully care. It took you a long time, but you understand that now. Can’t even blame her.

“I’ll try.”

“Oh. Final thing? Can you—” She’s blind. Obviously, she can’t dance. “Sing?”

“I had classes. I did well in them.” There’s a hint of pride in her voice. Probably good enough.

“Alright. My sister likes music.”

Fuck it, you’re blocking the hall and Ophelia might be impatient. You open the door again, fumble for Cuicatl’s arm for a bit in the dark, and then bring her into the room. Your sister looks up as you enter and looks on expectantly. Yeah, you’re the mutual connection, you should give introductions.

You curtsy again. “Hello, Eve. This is Cuicatl Ichtaca, my student. Cuicatl Ichtaca,” please don’t correct the pronunciation please don’t correct the pronunciation hey I know you’re psychic please don’t correct the pronunciation, “This is Eve, my sister.”

She curtsies and Eve relaxes a little. Can she even see it?

“A pleasure to meet you, Miss Ichtaca.”

You take that as a sign to guide Cuicatl forward to the table. She sits down well enough. Eve’s expressionless. Good enough. “Sister, can you help me prepare the tea? Perhaps Cuicatl can sing to us in the meantime?”

Both get the hint. Eve follows you with sure footing, cold blue flames trailing after her. Cuicatl starts a song. It’s strange hearing her speak (or sing, as it were) in her own language. Very different sounds. Come to think of it her accent’s pretty good for someone who just got here recently. And she is a good singer. Probably not too much in the way of formal training, but a nice voice. And the song’s structure almost sounds like the oricorio songs that you set out to study years ago.

Back then you just wanted to preserve the old songs and dances and maybe relearn some of the old ones. The journey went fine. You did what you set out to do. Beat three islands and came close to beating Nanu on Poni. Pretty good, all things considered.

If you could have you would have given Eve some of your luck. Even if it meant a journey fifty times harder.

You come back with three cups of tea and one of nectar. The nectar is sat in front of Ophelia’s seat. The sensu oricorio is perched in the corner, preening in the dim light. Eve wordlessly nods when you place the cup down in front of her chair. Your sister can’t drink tea anymore but still wants to feel included.

Once you sit down and press a cup into Cuicatl’s hands she stops singing. “What was the song about?” Eve asks.

“A princess meeting her lover in the night.” Cuicatl takes a sip. “It is an old song.”

Eve’s face literally and figuratively lights up at the word ‘princess’ and damn it for a second she really does look like herself. “Perhaps you can teach me, sometime?”

Cuicatl nods. “I do not know how long I will be in the city. Maybe the next time I’m here?”

“I would like that.”

So far, so good. Leading with song was definitely the right way to go about it.

{Your sister is very… faint,} Cuicatl says. In your mind. {Is she a dark bloodline?}

{Something like that.}

{Okay.}

And that’s the end of that. Cool. You don’t like explaining it if you don’t have to. Not in front of Eve and Ophelia, at least.

“Meredith, you have a Class Five license, right?”

“I do.”

“Why did you get yours?”

“All the money in ornithology these days is in hawlucha care.”

The shadows on Cuicatl’s face seem to grow darker.

That was the wrong answer.

You should have known it was the wrong answer.

“What wars did you fight in, then? How did it feel when the tlatoani gifted you your hawlucha?”

Eve’s expression is no less severe than Cuicatl’s, but she says nothing for now. Your pleading look is ignored.

“Cuicatl—”

“What were your captives’ names, Meredith? Where did you grow up in Anahuac?”

“Back in the 80s the king,” or whatever he’s called, “gave some to America.”

“And he stopped being tlatoani when he did. The birds belong to Huitzilopochtli. Do you know what the crime is for stealing one?”

Yeah. The State Department sent you a whole brochure on it. You were looking at San Antonio for grad school but, hey, you might get kidnapped, dragged across the border in the dead of night, and publicly executed so Castelia started looking pretty good in comparison. Lot harder to kidnap you from there.

“I know. It’s not ideal. But I need the money to get off the island and—”

A young male’s voice starts roaring in Nahuatl, right next to you. To Cuicatl. “Ophelia, please stop.” She does, sort of, dropping the voice to a furious whisper. And Cuicatl’s gone still beside you, eyes wide and every muscle tensed up like she’s just heard a ghost.

Which, to be fair, she has.

You grab her hand, partially yank her up, and mostly drag her out the door. The whisper doesn’t stop completely until you’re a block away from the building. Fuck. Fuck. It was going so well then you ran your damn mouth and you never told her why she needed to be formal, hell, girl probably thought she was just making veiled threats at you in front of your autistic sister, and why the hell do you train channeler birds in the first place, dumbass?

Well, your potential paycheck vanished. Might as well not be soulless about it. You bring Cuicatl to a bench and let her sit and lean into you and sob for a bit because, damn it, Ophelia, what did you do?

She stops crying eventually and just leans into you and you have an armed wrapped around her like you didn’t kind of just maybe torture her and still have a right to comfort her. “Your sister is a ghost-speaker?” she finally asks.

“No. My oricorio is. I’m sorry. I should’ve told you that she’s… like that. Sometimes. I thought if you were just formal enough and sang—”

“I’m useless. I know.”

“You’re not. My fault. I’m sorry.”

She snort-sobs and gets some more snot on your shirt that you’re going to ignore. “My brother told me. I knew he must’ve hated me but hearing him say it was—” She breaks up and starts crying again.

Oh. Her brother. That’s. Yeah. You understand that. More than you want to. When Eve…

“It wasn’t him. Oricorio can just use the voices of the dead to speak. It’s… it’s a lot. I know. Trust me. But it wasn’t him, whatever it sounded like.”

She doesn’t answer you. Wolsey does. Sort of. It seems like a song or maybe a story. It doesn’t seem to help and eventually he stops altogether.

“’m fine.” Cuicatl says. Eventually. “I’ll have Nocitlālin take me back to the Center.”

“Noci—”

The beldum zooms into the light and towards its trainer. Oh. How long was it hovering around?

“You sure? It’s not really—”

“Yes.” She holds out her hand and the beldum slips into it. “Goodbye.”

*​

The door opens and you step through. Your sister is in the corner, Ophelia perched in front of her. They look proud, almost. “You’re welcome,” Eve says.

“For what?”

“She won’t threaten you again.”

“And she won’t teach you her song, either.”

There’s a flash of pain in her eyes and for once you can’t tell who it’s coming from.

“You’re safe,” she whispers. “That’s what matters.”

This is hopeless. You’ll sleep and then get back to it in the afternoon once she’s calmed down a bit. Or maybe you won’t. The kid was making death threats, even if she couldn’t or wouldn’t act on them. Is this the hill you want your sanity to die on? This wasn’t the first time she tortured someone with the voices of the dead. Won’t be the last. Might as well not be you.

Eve cuts you off before you can open the bedroom door.

“You said you’re leaving.”

Right. Shit. Yeah. That’s what you get for having people over when you’re tired.

“I’ll take you. Don’t worry about it.”

Pale fire ripples across her body. “Where are you going to?”

“Florida? Unova? Alaska? Don’t know. Somewhere that doesn’t feel like an alien-infested graveyard.”

You close the bedroom door behind you without looking at her face. It’s rude and Ophelia will have words with you when you wake up, but now you just need to sleep. Or try. Truth is, you’re not a good person. You thought you were once. Might have been. Because a good person would’ve accepted the message in your thesis, that there isn’t an ethical way to raise a bird that terrorizes people with the ghosts of dead relatives. Except you’re willing to sit back and let a bunch of terrible shit happen to someone else if it means you get to see Eve’s face in the morning.

No. You’re a bad person and you know it. Most of the time you just wish you were even worse. The kind of monster who could look a sobbing girl in the eyes and feel nothing. Because monsters aren’t hounded by guilt at night.

A real monster wouldn’t be so damn tired all the time.
 
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Pen

the cat is mightier than the pen
Staff
Partners
  1. dratini
  2. dratini-pen
  3. dratini-pen2
ghost bird tea party time yusssss

Okay, but before I get to that, I took a look at the new scenes. I think they both definitely close off the chapters better and give a sense of progression rather than stasis.

There were answers there, but more questions were raised. A goddess approves of your plan. Any of the last doubts tingling in the pit of your stomach or the corner of your mouth are gone. You will go home. You will face your father.

You have other family. N. He could be your first cousin or the descendant of your great-great-great-great-great grandparent’s sibling. He still exists. Shares your gift. Maybe he will come for you. Maybe he will not. You aren’t sure which to hope for. Understanding and family. A link to your mother’s world. But also a threat to your visa, a threat to Alice, and a reminder of someone you’ve lost.

Then… there’s something you forgot. Or maybe something you never remembered at all. People talking… about… your thoughts slide off it like water on a glass window. Something about The Voice, surely. But what? What could you know? And is it important? Dangerous?

You fall asleep, a warm steel-type pressed against you, before you come up with any answers.
Nice to see what the impact (at least short term) of the Reshiram convo is for Cuicatl. Goddess approves of my life choices is definitely a mood.

We better be getting some N after all this N-teasing, lol.

Very 👀 at this last bit.

There’s fire in her eyes that can’t be blamed on the pyroar’s light. “’Trying,’ were you? Tell me, were they also trying to convert you?”

“Cuicatl said—”

“Because from where I’m sitting, I see a different explanation.” You turn to your father but his eyes are locked on his pet. He can’t see your pleading. “What happened on the roof—”

She kissed me!

She cuts you off, again, with a wave of her hand. “So you said before. Does it matter, though? Something awoke within you. We cast you out and away from it and what do you do? You find another deviant to latch onto. Rather than fight the demons you seek out and embrace them, time and time again.”
This progression works a lot better for me. Also, I feel like with this, I can understand the mom's reasoning (messed up as it is). It's not just a one-time thing in her mind; it's a pattern.

“Tell me, Genesis,” she practically purrs with hate right beneath the surface. “Can you look me in the eyes and tell me that girl never tempted you?”

“Of course she didn’t.”

Mother leans back into her chair, a very self-satisfied smile on her face.

“Genesis Elizabeth Gage, you have always been a terrible liar.”
"purrs with hate right beneath the surface" felt like a little much? Is that really how Genesis is perceiving it?

I think the phrasing of the question works better here. Plus it has the nice biblical connotations.

“What about my pokémon?”

Father waves towards the table. You remove your belt and for a long moment you simply hold it in your hand, unable or unwilling to put it on the table. Putting it down feels like you’re throwing the last few months away. Throwing your power away. That is what you came here to do but it still feels wrong.



Maybe Mother was right. Maybe Lyra and Kekoa did wear you down. Make you rebellious and prideful and sinful to the point where you would defy your own parents in favor of a pagan and a transsexual. Maybe you can’t trust yourself with power right now.

You set the belt down on the table and walk towards your room.
Big oof. I love this new ender. Genesis giving up everything she's gained so far. This moment makes the chapter not just about her introspection but gives it some serious consequences. Very interested to see how her story progresses.

.
.
.

Back to tea party time! On a broader arc note, I've been pleasantly surprised by the way this part is completely messing up all the stakes and conflicts set up in the earlier parts with the journey aspects in favor of focusing on the impact of covid-19 the necrozma apocalypse. In terms of "plot" progression, the main function of this chapter seems to be seriously complicating Cuicatl's license V ambitions and giving the poor girl another mental breakdown, but the worldbuilding and personal story of Meredith are what really shine. The chapter stands on the foundations of the Alola Dex entries for oricorio and hawlucha in a way that past chapters haven't as much (another compelling argument for alola dex footnotes imo) and the combination of all that lore and science creates a very rich feeling. The chapter has something of a supernatural mystery vibe. It's pretty clear from the outset that something is up with Meredith's sister, but you do a good job teasing out the various elements of it, to bring the full picture together at the end.

Meredith's exhaustion and apathy are well done--at first it seems like standard grad student fatigue and then slowly becomes more sinister. I did find the amount of lampshading that Cuicatl's various attributes are something a normal person would be freaking out about a little much--I guess it's hard to avoid with the facts of Cuicatl's character and the world. I think at least the psychic aspect could be more normalized? Maybe Meredith's done research with one?

The elements of ritual that Meredith tells Cuicatl to follow were excellently creepy, heightened by the fact that Cuicatl can't really see what's going on. I was curious, though--would someone who isn't blind have been able to see the weird ghostlight and know something was up with Eve? And could Cuicatl not sense the sensu oricorio's aura or tell something is weird with the sister (who is just a channeled spirit, right, she's not actually alive?) The way Eve and Ophelia were intertwined was really interesting. Is it really Eve at all, or just Ophelia's projection? I found the moment where Meredith tells them that they won't be taught the song now particularly poignant. Kudos for drawing such a complex portrait of Meredith in the space of the chapter: her desire to get out of Alola by any means necessary, away from this place that has taken so much from her and given back a shadow; her empathy and its limits; her bad judgement and her exhaustion. I also found it striking how her initial interest in ornithology is something that began simply and naively and has become this twisted part of her life.

All this to say, I've been hype for more on sensu oricorio since I read the ADex entry and this did not disappoint. I think this chapter works really well with the themes you've been exploring of grief, of emotional hurts that don't heal, of who and what you're willing to sacrifice for your emotional needs. In that sense, Meredith feels almost like a warning for Cuicatl (not that she has the context to heed it).

It’s technically late morning now, but you’re bone tired.
I found this oddly confusing--is the implication that you're only supposed to be tired in the early morning? Or that the day hasn't even been going that long and she's already tired? "It's not even afternoon yet, but you're already bone tired." would give me the latter morning more clearly.

Standing at the edge of Route 2 in ad hoc ten-hour shifts, paranoid that every non-existent shadow holds an Ultra Beast, didn’t help.
The first part of this makes it sound like a general statement for repeated action, but in that case it should end "doesn't help" or "hasn't helped."

You weren’t even getting paid it.
"You didn't even get paid for it."

In the meantime you need money to pay rent, utilities , food, student fees, and pokémon upkeep.
Extra space after utilities

Even if you wanted to keep doing that the restaurant’s closed until everything goes back to normal. And apparently Congress made it so that businesses don’t have to pay unemployment during the apocalypse, but landlords can still charge rent.
Very unrealistic, no actual government would do that.

Sure, you’re not exactly thrilled to work for the pokémon capture-and-export trade (and your professors would throw a fit if they knew you were A Bad Person). But it’s not even that bad for the island birds since the only one that needs a five isn’t even native in the first place. Can’t see the harm in it.
Found this paragraph very confusing. Is she assuming that Cuicatl wants the five in order to train an island bird? Or is this about herself? Presumably her professors know about her own license if she's studying ornithology and it's common in that field to get a five to train hawlucha?

Also gives her more time out of her ball. She doesn’t get to spend much time breathing real air when you’re stuck in your apartment night in and night out.
Is Wolsey not allowed to fly around on her own?

Inkay drift through the air of the lobby. Their light disappears quickly enough, but it still illuminates about a fifth of the room. One floats over to you when you enter. It’s weird watching them constrict and expand like they’re moving through water. Is that necessary? Psychological?
Ooh such a cool setting vibe. The mix of the mundanities of grad apps, rent etc with 'it's the apocalypse' is really nice.

Or maybe she’s an edgelord who rests in darkness.
omg. I kind of want to call this line out as tonally dissonant? but it's also kind of hilarious.

You concluded that there was no ethical way to train one, but, hey, if you really wanted to try, ethics be damned, here’s how you would go about it.
rip

“Then how are you going to feed a tyrantrum?”

“I’ll figure it out later. Wild pokémon, maybe? It’s legal to hunt gumshoos. And she won’t get to full size soon.”

That’s a lot of gumshoos. And tyrantrum are probably a little bit touchy. Might not like eating the same thing every day. You don’t have to tell her that point blank. Don’t want to. Best case scenario is that you lead her on for a while and make some money before she accepts reality on her own. Or, better yet, she gets the Five, you get paid, and then she decides that caring for a tyrantrum while broke is a terrible idea. You can barely afford normal birds.
"I'll figure it out later" is definitely becoming a Cuicatl motto. Because wow, she really has not thought this through.

“Draconic? Like…”

“Dragon language.” You open your mouth but can’t find an intelligent response. “Although Reshiram said I’m not very good.” Her lips thin out into a frown. “Maybe I shouldn’t do it.”

“Reshiram?”

“We met on Ula’Ula. I greeted her because no one else would. We talked. In Upper Draconic. Then she had to go.”

“I see.”
This moment felt like it was kind of lampshading Cuicatl's special-snowflake-ness.

Ohserase? She’s Unovan but…”

“I’m know the story.” You’re a kanaka girl born under American rule. Of course you’ve heard it. Your high school even put on the play before you got your GED and hit the trail. You always thought it was a silly story: if you just pray to the gods and politely ask the government to care about the people, it will all come to pass. But life isn’t a fairy tail. Shit happens, people die, gods and kings march on uncaring.
Typo - "I know the story."

Feels like this could be tied more to the current circumstances than phrased in general, for her? I mean, the current apocalypse is showing some truths about gods and governments.

“We can talk more over tea.” With Ophelia. And your sister, probably.
She's thinking about how Ophelia will be present here, so it feels a little odd later when she realizes, wait this isn't a good idea?

You meet up Wolsey on the way out, preening and pointedly ignoring a baile-oricorio’s mating dance. Good girl.
Lol

“I help run cognitive tests on birds. Puzzles, occasional speech mimicry. Wolsey here knows some words.”

“Hello,” Wolsey dutifully adds.

“It’s odd to hear about pokémon with religions. Testing them all day, they’re smart, sure, but not like that. Not human.” Maybe Ophelia. Maybe. Even then you’re never sure how much is her intelligence and how much is from her borrowed spirits.

Cuicatl frowns and turns towards Wolsey. “Do you have myths?” The firebird warbles something. “Stories about gods. Ancestors. The start of the earth.” Cuicatl gets a much happier warble. “Can you tell me? In your own words.” The firebird goes into a long song about… something. Cuicatl nods attentively at times and urges her to go on during breaks. Once you’re almost back to the apartment she thanks Wolsey and turns to you. “She does. A giant bird with one wing made of a rainbow and the other made of ash gave talonflame their fire.” She pauses and purses her lips. “It’s kind of similar to the Split God myth.”

“Do, uh, birds also speak dragon? Sorry if that’s dumb but—”

{I’m psychic. I can understand most pokémon.}

“Ah.” Maybe if you weren’t quite as tired you’d have a bigger reaction to that but, fuck it, the girl owns a dinosaur, she spoke to Reshiram, there are aliens in Alola and everything’s dark, you have a bird that speaks to ghost, the kid has psychic powers and is that really weirder than the other stuff? Guess you’ll need to talk to Wolsey later, then, about… something. Screw it. You’ll figure it out when you wake up next.
This struck me as odd. Psychics seem to be fairly known as a phenomenon--I feel like at least someone in the pokemon cognition field would have been able to run tests with psychics and write a paper on it? This reads like Cuicatl is just casually destabilizing a huge body of researched knowledge.

That’s all a very polite way of saying that she got hit by a boulder buzzwole had aimed at one of Selene’s pokémon. The incineroar dodged, of course, because it was very well trained. The champion said she was very, very sorry for “the accident” but mostly she just looked too exhausted to fully care. It took you a long time, but you understand that now. Can’t even blame her.
I was a bit confused on the context of this. Ultra beast attack? When? Not sure how it's Selene's fault?

Eve follows you with sure footing, cold blue flames trailing after her.
This seems normal.

Back then you just wanted to preserve the old songs and dances and maybe relearn some of the old ones. The journey went fine. You did what you set out to do. Beat three islands and came close to beating Nanu on Poni. Pretty good, all things considered.

If you could have you would have given Eve some of your luck. Even if it meant a journey fifty times harder.
Oof, this bit hit hard.

Eve’s face literally and figuratively lights up at the word ‘princess’ and damn it for a second she really does look like herself. “Perhaps you can teach me, sometime?”
Ditto here.

“What wars did you fight in, then? How did it feel when the tlatoani gifted you your hawlucha?”
Ope, Cuicatl is pissed. Nice to have the hawlucha entry for context here.

“What were your captives names, Meredith? Where did you grow up in Anahuac?”
Typo, should be "captives'"

You were looking at San Antonio for grad school but, hey, you might get kidnapped, dragged across the border in the dead of night, and publicly executed so Unova started looking pretty good in comparison.
Okay I'm confused--I thought Unova was America?

A male voice starts roaring in Nahuatl, right next to you. To Cuicatl. “Ophelia, please stop.” She does, sort of, dropping the voice to a furious whisper. And Cuicatl’s gone still beside you, eyes wide and every muscle tensed up like she’s just heard a ghost.

Which, to be fair, she has.

You grab her hand, partially yank her up, and mostly drag her out the door. The whisper doesn’t stop completely until you’re a block away from the building. Fuck. Fuck. It was going so well then you ran your damn mouth and you never told her why she needed to be formal, hell, girl probably thought she was just making veiled threats at you in front of your autistic sister, and why the hell do you train channeler birds in the first place, dumbass?
Aaand the shit hits the fan. I imagine the fallout for Cuicatl is not going to be pretty.

Oh. How long was it hovering around?
Best Unit is never off the job.

Your sister’s in the corner, Ophelia perched in front of her. They look proud, almost. “You’re welcome,” Eve says.

“For what?”

“She won’t threaten you again.”

“And she won’t teach you her song, either.”

There’s a flash of pain in her eyes and for once you can’t tell who it’s coming from.
This exchange got a lot across about the relationship between Meredith, Eve, and Ophelia. Definitely my fave moment in the chapter.

Is this the hill you want your sanity to die on? This wasn’t the first time she tortured someone with the voices of the dead. Won’t be the last. Might as well not be you.
I really like this--the way you show how she rationalizes every incident, because what is worth it when your own sanity is on the line?

“Your sister is a ghost-speaker?” She finally asks.
Typo, "She" shouldn't capitalized

Truth is, you’re not a good person. You thought you were once. Might have been. Because a good person would’ve accepted the message in your thesis, that there isn’t an ethical way to raise a bird that terrorizes people with the ghosts of dead relatives. Except you’re willing to sit back and let a bunch of terrible shit happen to someone else if it means you get to see Eve’s face in the morning.
Strong paragraph, ties the chapter together well.

No. You’re a bad person and you know it. Most of the time you just wish you were even worse. Because you could sleep at night if you could look a sobbing child in the eyes and feel nothing.

And then you wouldn’t be so damn tired all the time.
Think this could be reworded to land more strongly. The sentences tangle up a bit.
 

WildBoots

Don’t underestimate seeds.
Pronouns
She/Her
Partners
  1. moka-mark
  2. solrock
[09:18:40]
Lol oh noooooooooo.

It’s “volunteer work” that should look great on grad school apps that can get you off this alien-infested archipelago.
I enjoyed the world-building around all of this. Meredith's POV was really enjoyable overall and gave me this vision of an alternate version of BT that's an interconnected set of one-shots and few-shots instead. I don't think it has to become that, but I do think this chapter stands well on its own and has a satisfying arc of its own.

money to pay rent, utilities , food, student fees,
Extra space.

VStar is at least promising to pay you better than waitressing.
!
Aha! Nice to get another nugget of info about VStar.

And apparently Congress made it so that businesses don’t have to pay unemployment during the apocalypse, but landlords can still charge rent.
Huh, why does that sound familiar?

Maybe your student isn’t here. Or maybe she’s an edgelord who rests in darkness.

“Cuicatl Ichtaca?”
LOL

“I see. And you want the license to keep the tyrunt?”

“Yes.” Her mouth stays open a second longer before she snaps it shut. Something else, then. Probably none of your concern.
And my mom's giant three-headed dragon, NBD.

There are other ways to get a Four as well, but vouching is by far the easiest.
you’ve got to get a majority of the Class Five-holders on the islands to vote to give you one.
The four/five split was a little hard to follow, partly because the last time we discussed what license class she has was ages ago. I was also squinting at the Class Five-holder vote being required. Sounds like it would be like herding cats to get them to vote on something. Though I guess the point is that it should be hard to get to that level. Hm.

You concluded that there was no ethical way to train one, but, hey, if you really wanted to try, ethics be damned, here’s how you would go about it.
Oh man, so does this mean she wrote parts of ADex? I second Pen's 👀-ing about adding ADex footnotes to BT.

It sounds sort of like a reptile trying to say ‘Sagaris.’
👀

But life isn’t a fairy tail.
Tale*

With Ophelia.
Excellent, excellent name.

Puzzles, occasional speech mimicry. Wolsey here knows some words.”

“Hello,” Wolsey dutifully adds.
Love.

“Oh. Final thing? Can you—” She’s blind. Obviously, she can’t dance. “Sing?”
👀 She sure can!

Sister, can you help me prepare the tea.
Question mark missing?

Back then you just wanted to preserve the old songs and dances and maybe relearn some of the old ones. The journey went fine. You did what you set out to do. Beat three islands and came close to beating Nanu on Poni. Pretty good, all things considered.
This is a strong character and world-building moment! I can picture how she fits into the ecosystem of trainer life so nicely.

A male voice starts roaring in Nahuatl, right next to you. To Cuicatl. “Ophelia, please stop.”
Woah shit.

My brother told me. I knew he must’ve hated me but hearing him say it was—” She breaks up and starts crying again.

Oh. Her brother. That’s. Yeah. You understand that. More than you want to. When Eve…
I didn't realize at first that it was her brother specifically--oof!! It might've been nice to slow down and catch more of Cuitcatl's reaction in that moment? But this hits hard.

Ghost bird tea party = success.
 
Fighting 3.5

Persephone

Infinite Screms
Pronouns
her/hers
Partners
  1. mawile
  2. vulpix-alola
Fighting 3.5: Ancestor Stories
Pixie

[9:23:51]​

Much has happened the last few days.

First: The Moon was eaten by a monster. You have taken up a quest to scream at the monster, this ‘Necerezma,’ until it gives the moon back. Some of the moon’s light shines through jagged lines in the sky like those in a pane of cracked ice. The Moon can hear you. Her hunter will fear you and The Moon will know that her beloved foxes still care for her.

It is a purpose. It is useful. You are useful. You deserve to be kept. You are better than nothing.

Everyone else must be wrong. You will prove them wrong. You will be the best guide fox and then climb the mountain and make Avalanche take you back and kick out one of your siblings instead.

You’ve already made progress. You scared the eevee so badly that its trainer ran away, too.

You know spend most of your time trapped in a small cave with Skysong, Bloodrage, and two other humans you haven’t bothered to name. There are too many of them and they rarely leave. One of the nameless ones even stepped on your tail. A fire tails would kill them for that. You thought about it but then that might be ‘bad behavior’ and Skysong might think you are a bad, useless fox even though she would be very wrong.

Skysong knows now that you are much better than Eggbreath. One of the nameless humans has a fluffy sparkslinger. You got Eggbreath to see it as food and after two (failed) hunts, she’s now in her ball and away from Skysong almost all the time. Eggbreath is also very dumb. She was asking why the sky was dark so you told her a giant fox ate the world. She believed it. Idiot. A fox’s breath would smell much better than the wind outside.

(People call you bad and useless, but no one has ever called you ugly.)

Eyerock is often somewhere else, which is also good for you. Skysong prefers her as a guide just because she is warm, floats, doesn’t sleep, can see in total darkness, and immediately obeys all orders without question. Even though she is horribly hot, ugly, and has no personality. But at least the rock knows her place. You growl at her to leave and she at least looks away. She doesn’t try to steal food from you. Once she even attacked something when you asked. It is hard to talk to her, but she is a useful servant. You just need to make sure that Skysong doesn’t rely on her as a guide.

The rock is here right now but she isn’t helping with the biggest problem at the moment: Skysong has been poisoned. If she dies there will be no one to give you food and scratches and cuddles. This cannot be allowed to happen.

She has not left her bed since she got back from the bird-smelling human. She will not talk to you. Or Bloodrage. Eggbreath hasn’t been out of her ball since then, but you doubt your trainer would talk to the dumb baby over you. Maybe she’s silent talking with Eyerock. Sometimes the rock even lowers down to touch Skysong only to back away at the last second without helping.

Skysong has slept once or twice, never for long. Otherwise she’s been quietly marking her bedding with saltwater. Humans think it is disgusting to use urine to do it, but it’s fine as long as the salty water comes from their eyes. They are truly strange and lost creatures.

As always, all the work falls to you.

You can’t smell any blood so there will not be a physical wound to look at. Probably was not a bite or sting, then. She must have inhaled or drank the poison. There still might be a bruise somewhere. You need to know if she can walk. With graceful steps you walk to her hindlegs and begin to probe them for vulnerabilities with your paws. Skysong shifts underneath you but never hisses. There is no wound there. You steadily move up her body and aside from a brief swat when you tried to check her groin for wounds you are able to feel everything. No bruising. No bones out of their strange human places. She can walk.

“Get up. We are going to the healing rooms,” you tell her.

“Why?” she mutters, foolishly.

“Because you are poisoned.”

She huffs. {No, I’m not.}

“You won’t move.”

{That’s because…} She growls and rolls over, sliding you off so that you’re between her body and the wall. Rude.

“They can heal poison.” You know. The stupid mushroom bugs sprayed yucky fake snow in your face once and you had to go there. It was the first thing they did whenever threatened. No growls or roars or ice. No fur, even. You’re glad you got rid of them.

{Not. Poisoned.}

You bite her ear because she’s being ridiculous. “Hurt.” She swats you away even though it was just a little nip. A ninetales wouldn’t have even felt it.

“Stop,” she grumbles.

You have an incredibly clever idea. “Have to pee.”

She sighs. {How bad?}

“Now.”

{Can it…}

You begin to howl. “Now.

“I think she wants something,” one of the nameless humans says.

“Yeah. I guess.” Skysong actually swings her hindlegs off over the edge of her bed and begins to stand. For an unimportant human. Instead of for you. It takes everything you have to ignore the insult. Mostly. You still swat her leg with one of your tails.

Skysong ignores it and slips your harness on. You lead her out the door and down the halls. Bloodrage follows at a distance. Rude. You are a better guide than he is even when he can see. You stop at the right door and give the right tail nudges to tell her there’s a door to the right. She does her weird spinning thing and starts to feel for the knob.

“This doesn’t feel like an exit door,” she says. “The kitchen? You still going on about eggs.”

She had been given some this morning. She would not give them to you. Even though you would have wanted them a lot more. Said something about rashes. You are still upset, yes. But this isn’t the kitchen door.

“No.”

“Then what does it lead to.” You don’t answer that one. “The med wing, then. I told you that I’m fine.”

Two of your tails flick into each other in annoyance. She was just supposed to go through the door.

“Do you actually have to pee?”

“Yes.”

“Fine. Whatever. Take me outside.”

“Mind if I come?” Bloodrage asks, finally making himself known. Although Skysong probably heard him like you did.

“Sure. Fine.”

It is a terrible lie, even by human standards. You still take her outside so you can scream at the moon eater and mark your territory. If Skysong won’t let you help her then you will at least do the other very important things that need doing.

Bloodrage starts to talk after you stop screaming and begin to mark. There are a lot of pokémon here who think this is their territory. It takes you a while to tell them all that this is actually yours and they should leave before you kill them.

“You good?”

“Yes.”

He doesn’t seem to believe it. “Anything happen?”

“I had tea with her sister and one of her pokémon. That’s all.”

Bloodrage dramatically exhales. Quietly. Not like a scream. “Alright, who am I beating up?”

“I guess I should say I’m sorry.”

“Uh. What? Nah, she hurt you.”

“To you. Sorry to you. I found out she had a hawlucha and… yeah, I get why you hated me.”

He doesn’t answer immediately. Just listens to the sound of threats trickling out of you. Wait. Eggbreath isn’t here. Hah! She forgot to let the baby out. And you are not going to correct her.

“Thought you already apologized.”

You aren’t going to complain about a chance to stay out longer. You start exploring, Eyerock following close behind.

“Then I’m sorry again.”

He grunts. “This isn’t how you act when you’re mad. Seriously, did she hurt you? Threaten you? Because if she did—”

“Don’t.” The word is almost sharp as it hangs in the air. You glance back towards them, exploration ignored. “Maybe you’re fine if your parents loved you, but if they didn’t…” Her speech breaks up into distress calls and saltwater marking. You trot back to get carry cuddles and help her feel better. Her arms are shaking a little too much for it to be comfortable but you don’t say anything because you a very good and helpful fox.

“I—what does that mean.”

“Forget it,” Skysong mumbles. “Just go away.”

“You said that your mom is a pro trainer, right? Did you run into her or—”

“She’s fucking dead, Kekoa.”

He goes quiet for a long time. “Anything else I should know?”

Cuicatl laughs. Joylessly. Not quite like the bone-human’s terrible, mocking laugh. But not like her usual ones. “You mean ‘what else are you lying about,’ right?”

“Yeah, pretty much.”

Again, humans are bad liars. It was only a matter of time before Skysong’s were revealed, even by a particularly dumb and angry human.

“Not much,” Skysong says. “She was a pro battler. She did leave me—well, my dad,” her heart starts beating faster beside you as she says it, “a hydreigon. Just… please leave.” Her voice breaks down to almost a whisper at the end and more saltwater starts to flow. “Please?”

Bloodrage gets up, even takes a few steps towards the fire-type pokémon lighting up the doorway, before he abruptly stops. “Really, though, who should I beat up?”

“I can kill them, too,” you huff. Humans are terrible fighters. Even the angry ones.

“My teacher…” Skysong sits you down in her lap and gives you a quick headpat. “She has a ghost bird. Please don’t attack her.”

“Ghost… bird… Fuck. Did it talk to the dead, or use their voices or—”

“Yeah.”

Bloodrage starts moving, his footsteps pounding loud against the ground like he’s trying to scare off a predator by making noise. It doesn’t actually work against ninetales. You’re fearless and it just lets you know where prey are.

“Oricorio. Listen, Cuicatl, whatever it said—they’re liars. Horrible liars. I thought about getting one, once, but then I started reading about what they do to people and—just don’t listen to it, okay? It wasn’t your Mom speaking.”

Skysong says nothing. She barely reacts at all.

“Cuicatl—”

“Go. Away.”

It’s practically a bark with fangs bared. One final warning to leave her territory before a fight starts. She couldn’t back the threat up by herself, but you’re there so it is a very serious one.

“I… fine.” And he finally leaves.

“He wasn’t lying,” Skysong mutters once the door slams shut. “If he was, it would hurt but I’d deal. He wasn’t. Everything he said was…”

Him? Dead people? Oh.

“The brother you think you killed?” The whole thing is silly. Not only did she not kill her brother, but even if she had she shouldn’t feel bad about it.

“Did kill.”

“No, you didn’t.” You really are going to have to do more to train her. She shouldn’t act like she’s poisoned just because she thinks she did something she didn’t. That will make it harder for you to tell when she’s actually poisoned. “His cut got runny or,” you stretch out and yawn despite yourself, “something like that.” You barely remember what, exactly, happened, just that she was being particularly strange during that talk. Said that she’d killed someone when she hadn’t. Said that she would never leave you. All lies, even if it sounded like she believed them.

You remember one small detail, though, because you do have a very good memory.

“Your brother asked you not to tell people he was hurt?” It makes sense. Don’t want to appear weak. Become prey.

“Yeah…”

“So how is it your fault?”

“I miss him,” she says, even though it isn’t an answer. “And…” she trails off for long enough that you start to doubt she will continue. Your gaze drifts back up the sky, dark and scarred. Maybe a bird flies under one of the cracks. Or a cloud. Or a giant metal human-made bird. “If one of us had to die, it shouldn’t have been him.”

Now she’s making no sense. Are more than just her eyes defective? She is alive. The living are supposed to survive. It’s their entire purpose. And in any case… “No. I don’t think I would have liked him as much. You are female. Females are better than males.”

“Oh?” There’s some lightness in her voice. That’s usually good. “I guess we are prettier.”

“Definitely.”

Skysong sets you down next to her.

She seemed to have liked the fire bird’s story yesterday. And there is a story about a dumb human who was mad about something similar. Maybe she’ll like it.

“Do you want to hear an ancestor story?”

“A what?”

“A story about the past. Great and bad ninetales, gods—”

“Myths. We call them myths.”

A much worse name.

“Do you want to hear one?”

She huffs but settles down into her bench a little more. “Okay. Just don’t take too long. It’s getting cold.”

“It isn’t cold.” It’s actually still too hot.

“I don’t have fur.”

Oh. That is terrible.

You sit like Avalanche did when she told you stories, hindquarters on the ground and front legs extended, looking down on her kits. Her tails swished behind her with the beats of the story. You don’t have your experience but maybe you can do okay.

“There was a pretty fire tales named Forest Queen. She lived near a village of humans and sometimes helped them think of things in exchange for food and not being bothered.” She might get the wrong idea. Need to correct. “She could have killed the them all if they bothered her. She just didn’t want to do it.”

“Noted.”

“One day…”

*​

One bright morning a very big human came to the edge of her home and waited. This was not the usual human they sent to ask for her wisdom. She curiously approached and asked him why he was there.

“They say you are the wisest creature in these lands,” the man said. And he was right. “I need your counsel.”

“Speak your problem.”

He told her that five moons ago he had his senses controlled by a ghost. Believing he was protecting his family from predators he killed them instead, only to have the ghost leave him once the bodies had cooled. Now he wandered the land to learn what he could do to wipe their blood from his hands.

*​

“No one really gets why he said that,” you add. “There wouldn’t still be blood on his hands that many moons later.”

“Just an expression,” Skysong says. Quieter than usual. “He wanted to know how he could be forgiven. Make up for what he had done.”

Forgiveness. Debts. Humans have strange concepts. Injuries against another ninetales are settled quickly by fang and ice. If the injurer wins then it was their right to do it. Instead humans let it grow and grow until their entire mountain is involved.

*​

“I have nine tasks for you,” Forest Queen said. “One for each of my tails. Then you shall find what you are searching for.”

First, he made her a big burrow with a good scratching post and a series of tubes to drain it when it rained. This would help her raise her kits. Then he cleared the forest of a pack of bone wolves that might threaten her vulpix. He built a series of small rivers from the nearby lake to the Forest Queen’s den so that she might drink easily and then to the town so their crops would have water and they would not bother her every time the rain failed to fall. He found a rare fruit that could heal injuries and planted trees for it in the forest. On and on he did what the Forest Queen asked and served her well. The nearby village flourished and needed to bother her less and the forest was safe for her new litter. The man even took a new mate with the humans he worked alongside.

As the trials went on the man bared his teeth more and walked with lighter steps. At the end, when all his tasks were done, the man returned and asked for one more task.

“Have you not found what you were looking for?” the Forest Queen asked.

“I have. That is why I will continue to serve.”

*​

Skysong leans far enough back that you can crawl onto her chest without falling off. You don’t have to keep the post now that the ancestor story is told. “I think I get it,” she says. “It’s about helping the people who can be helped rather than focusing on the past.”

“No. It’s just a way for ninetales to trick humans into doing work. One of the first things vulpix are taught about humans.”

She hums and her chest vibrates beneath you. At least she’s better sounding than Hummy was. “I don’t think I get it, but I have an idea. What if my thesis was about pokémon myths—ancestor stories? Alice taught me a lot. If every species has them, maybe…”

Yes. Good. This is much better than her lizard talk one. Now you can actually help. And you know a lot of stories to be useful with.

“I will help.”

She reaches a hand to your back and begins to gently stroke it. “Thanks, Pix. I’m lucky to have you.”

You purr in contentment. You helped her. You will help her. You will be useful and loved and she will never leave you.

Life is good.

[9:10:40]​

Life is terrible.

Skysong rolled over onto your tails twice in the night. Her heartrate is still a little fast and she’s still marking her territory with saltwater. You failed to fix her. She might be mad at you for that.

And she let Eggbreath out. The one chance you get to mark your territory in peace is interrupted by a smelly lizard screaming at the sky. You lose focus on your marking and walk over to the place that Skysong is sitting. Still a chance to fit things. It’s a little hard to get onto the bench with her since you can’t just set up the jump by sight. Have to actually stand on your hindlegs and pull yourself up onto it. She notices your effort and rewards you with ear scratches. Excellent. She isn’t mad. Not with you.

You roll onto your back and let her scratch your belly. She’s a little too careful with it. Her delicate petting is really better for head scratches, but sometimes you have to at least try. Besides, petting you makes her happy. When her breaths are almost like pants it can sometimes make her breathe slower. That probably means she’s healed by it. Maybe. Humans are strange.

“Do you want another ancestor story?” you ask. She wants more. You can help her know more.

“I guess it can’t hurt.”

It’s a good start.

Eggbreath jumps up beside you, tail thumping against the bench. “Storytime!”

Less good. You whip a tail into her face before getting into the storytelling pose.

*​

Long ago and across the sea, one clan of humans torched the city of another clan as humans are wont to do. In the blaze, the nest of the Rainbow God was burned. As the Rainbow God descended to survey the damage, he found the bodies of three foxes in his temple. They had come to pray to the Rainbow God to spare the pokémon of the city, but their prayers had gone unheard. The Rainbow God had been too focused on the burning building to hear their pleas. He was filled with shame and revived them into beings so powerful they would never again live in fear of humans.

Generations passed as the Rainbow God aimlessly wandered the skies of the world, refusing to nest again in the world of humans. Eventually his flights led him back to his old temple. There he found many foxes like the ones who he had revived years before. He cast a shadow shaped like a fox and descended. He asked the foxes why they stayed in the ruined temple.

The matriarch answered. “To keep the grave of our ancestors safe and await the return of the Rainbow God, so that we might thank him for his kindness.”

The Rainbow God was moved to reveal his true form. As the foxes looked on in awe, he gave his response to the matriarch.

“For your devotion and service, I will bless you and set you apart from the other foxes. You will be my emissaries and guardians, protecting humans and pokémon alike and enforcing the will of the gods.”

Ashes poured from the god’s wings and became bound to the foxes, transforming them from ordinary eevee into majestic ninetales.

Half a life later a clan of humans engaged in an expedition of discovery. To ensure they stayed in the good graces of The Worldtraveler they brought along a family of ninetales to transmit their prayers and pass on the word of the gods. They arrived on the shores of a new land after many moons at sea.

Alongside the humans the ninetales went from island to island, meeting each guardian in turn. The island gods received the ninetales warmly and each conferred a small blessing unto them. The Sea Guardian gifted them control of the weather itself. The Thunder Guardian gifted them even longer and more beautiful fur. The Mind Guardian gifted them some of her great wisdom. The Earth Guardian gifted them even greater longevity.

*​

“Tapu Koko’s a war god, right? How did he give you nicer fur?”

“Thunder god. Thunder makes fur stick up.”

“Huh.” She runs a hand along your back. “That makes sense.”

“Obviously.”

*​

After receiving the gift of the Earth Guardian, the ninetales were summoned to the top of the world to meet The Moon. The goddess was so impressed by the stories, devotion and wisdom of the ninetales that she became jealous of the Rainbow God. She decided that she must have the foxes for her own. After luring the ninetales to sleep, The Moon cast a spell on them and extinguished their flames. Cold, cold ice was left in its place. The foxes could never again tolerate a long voyage across the warm seas. Instead, they were bound to the mountain and could never leave her for long.

To this day the ninetales honor their covenant with the Rainbow God to guide humans and pokémon and protect the sacred mountain of the Moon.

*​

“She trapped you there and you serve her.” Skysong says it’s so quietly that a human might not be able to hear it. But you can because your hearing is much better.

“She’s jealous, but she’s still a goddess.”

“Hmm.”

Before she can say anything else her phone begins to hiss and rumble.

“Message from: VStar. Read it: Yes or No?”

“Yes,” she says.

“Mission Alert: Capture one finneon per team member, within legal size limits. Location: Hau’oli City. Flashlights and fishing poles may be rented from the central office. Expect waitlists for equipment rentals.”

You have not heard of finneon, but you know what ‘fish’ are. They are good. “Fish!”

“Not for you, Pix,” Skysong mutters. “Sorry.”

“No eggs or fish?” You thought you’d been good. She said she was lucky to have you. Why is—are you still being unlovable?

You want to ask the question more than anything. But you’re… you’re not afraid of the answer. You’re just so sure you don’t need to waste your breath asking.

Skysong stands up but Eggbreath does not jump down. Why? You can hear her breaths in the air, near Skysong’s heart. Oh. Why does she get carry-cuddles and you don’t? You even told her a story. “Pix, can you warn me if anything comes up?”

Nothing does. You follow behind Skysong as she can use her cane to scout for anything that you might miss. Like she doesn’t trust you. When you reenter the room she shares with Bloodrage it does not sound or smell like the nameless humans are present. “Mist and Titania out?” Skysong asks.

“Yeah. Probably out back with Tatty’s chinchou.”

Eggbreath lands with a thud beside you, apparently having jumped out of Skysong’s arms. She hurries to the other side of the room. You hear her sniffing around, probably seeing if the sparkslinger is near enough to kill.

“You get the text?” Skysong asks, lowering herself onto her bed. Bloodrage is above her on his. Odd. Humans usually like to look at each other when they talk. Maybe that doesn’t matter in the dark. Or if one can’t see.

“Yup. You gonna call them to get on the list?”

“No. Will you?”

Bloodrage sighs dramatically. “I’m fifteen. I don’t call people if I can help it. Plus, uh, vocal dysphoria.”

“Oh.” Cuicatl sprawls out on her bed. You jump onto her chest just as Eggbreath rushes back, cutting Eggbreath off from it. She doesn’t fight you because she knows that she’d lose, and she settles onto the much less comfortable legs of your trainer. “You want to talk about it?”

“No. Can you just make the damn call?”

“I would but…” She lowers her voice. Not low enough that you and Eggbreath or Eyerock can’t hear it. Wait? Where is Eyerock? You can’t smell her. “My gift doesn’t work over phones. And my actual English isn’t that good.”

“Eyerock isn’t here,” you tell Skysong. Because that’s much more important than whatever she’s going on about.

“Eh.” She runs a hand through your headfur. It is very pleasant. “Nocitlālin says she’s out back with Mist and Titania. She’ll come back when they do.”

Your tails slump down behind you. “I don’t get to go to places without you.”

{We’ll talk about that later. Promise.}

Bloodrage says some stuff but you ignore it because it isn’t important. Instead, you plot your revenge on Eyerock. Maybe you could stick icicles on her side so she isn’t a good guide anymore.

“Already a waitlist. Somehow. They’ll text me later,” Bloodrage finally says.

“Cool.”

Bloodrage loudly shifts above you.

“Do you, uh, want to talk about it while the kids aren’t here.”

“Nope.”

“I can only imagine what—”

“Do you think we could watch Finneon’s Wake tonight? The others might like it. They’re probably scared with everything going on.”

“I… I think I can stream it.”

Neither says anything for a long time. Long enough that Eggbreath gets bored and hops up onto the bed on the other side of Skysong.

“I’m fine, Kekoa. Really. You don’t need to worry about me.”

He exhales softly. “Fine. Just let me know if you want to talk.”

“Thank you.”

She won’t need to, though. You’re here for her. And you’re good and useful and will help her.
 
Last edited:

WildBoots

Don’t underestimate seeds.
Pronouns
She/Her
Partners
  1. moka-mark
  2. solrock
Ancestor Stories
👀

Most importantly, you scared the eevee away for good! It even brought its human with it!
A hilariously bad interpretation of Genesis’ departure.

If only because the moon went out as well and she is second to only the rainbow god. First you will have to figure out who ate the sun.
Missing commas after well and first, I believe.

There are streams of light zig-zagging across the sky like cracks on a pain of ice.
Pane*
But cool visual.

The shelter she is in is very crowded, forcing her to share a room with three other humans you do not know.
I feel like acknowledging the shelter is crowded is too generous for Pixie. I feel like she ought to just complain about too many strange new humans scrëm, scrëm.

Fox breath smells much better than the wind outside.
Because of Eggbreath, I thought this was a name at first.

Eyerock is somewhere else right now. You know that Skysong prefers her as a guide just because she is warm, floats, doesn’t sleep, can see in total darkness, and immediately obeys all orders without question.
I think these two sentences could transition into each other a little better. But also LOL.

Skysong can’t even see that Eyerock is ugly, even by rock standards.
Sad rock sounds.

Life is good.

[09:15:49]​
Life is terrible.
Hahaha.

Message from: VStar. Read it: Yes or No?”
👀

But, like her other ‘missions’ she will not let you eat the fish.
Might be nice to phrase it like “she says she won’t let you eat the fish”—imply that Pix is thinking loudly and Cuicatl sees where it’s going.

I should probably talk to Kekoa about that,”
I was confused what this was about.

Bloodrage sighs dramatically. “I’m under thirty. I don’t call people if I can help it.
The “I’m under 30” joke felt too old for him to me. But oof at dysphoria.

He says some meaningless and unimportant things to someone who isn’t ther2e before lying back down with a thump.1
*An thump

She has not left her bed since she got back from the bird-smelling human.
I wasn’t sure if this entire chapter came after the oricorio episode or just these scenes.

Yeah.” Skysong starts to get up (for someone that doesn’t even deserve a name!)
Suggestion: (not for you—for some human you haven’t bothered to name!)
For clarity.

He grunts. “This isn’t how you act when you’re mad. Seriously, did she hurt you? Threaten you? Because if she did—”
Awww, Kekoa.

Monster… bird… Fuck. Did it talk to the dead, or use their voices or—”
How did he guess so accurately???

It’s practically a bark with fangs bared. One final warning to leave her territory before a fight starts. She couldn’t back the threat up by herself, but you’re there so it is a very serious one.
Pix protecc too!!

She is alive. The living are supposed to survive. It’s their entire purpose
👀!!

Finneon’s Wake.”
🤔

with only four or five dying.
LOL

ran into the temple to pray to the Rainbow God to spare the okémon
oops

transforming them from ordinary eevee into majestic ninetales.
LOL

Roar match!” Eggbreath starts screaming again before Skysong withdraws her to her ball.
Hahaha. That one will be fun when they evolve. Cue saliva spraying Pix, the wind flapping her cheeks.

Overall—cute chapter, as we expect from Pix. The scene dealing with Cuicatl avoiding processing the oricorio chapter with Kekoa and Pix was my favorite part. I was craving an acknowledgement that it’s bonkers that V Star is continuing business as usual. Cuicatl too, actually—just continuing on and getting a teacher. Looks like Cuicatl was serious about her project though! She calls herself lazy but she sure does stick to something when she sets her mind to it.
 

Pen

the cat is mightier than the pen
Staff
Partners
  1. dratini
  2. dratini-pen
  3. dratini-pen2
Finally, a chapter from a character who's actually important!

That said . . . Pix is always fun, but I had some trouble squaring this chapter with the tone of her last POV chapter. She was really in crisis, last time we were in her head, way back in, wow, 2.1. And I know in 2.5 she and Cuicatl sort of talk things out and make a deal, but that's from Cuicatl's POV and I got the sense that it wasn't a cure-all. But Pix seems very fine in this chapter? Maybe it's just that things are going her way with the departure of the grass eevee, which she totally caused, but the tone felt oddly light and a lot of the Pix mannerisms felt a little exaggerated, almost a parody. I'm not sure we really moved anywhere with her internally in this one, or moved with anyone else either--the reprise of the dead brother conversation felt a little perfunctory to me. The background events we got filtered through her POV--Cuicatl's oricorio aftermath, Kekoa having pokemon trouble and trying to be a good friend--felt pretty muted and not like they were benefiting much from the second-hand. The structure of the chapter was also a bit odd. Last chapter happens midway through, here, and then we go into the myths? I stan myths whenever, wherever, but I did feel like the myths were a bit dropped in--they didn't feel like they had too much relevance to the chapter itself, and they weren't a large enough portion of the chapter to make the chapter feel like it was about Pix telling myths. Overall, it felt like the scenes in this one were a bit strung together, and not quite adding up into a sum greater than the parts.

Much has happened in the last few days.

Most importantly, you scared the eevee away for good! It even brought its human with it!

Also! It is cold! Not as cold as the mountain, but much better than normal!
Love Pix perspective, but whew, that is a lot of exclamations.

Oh, and the sun went out. You should probably be more concerned about that. If only because the moon went out as well and she is second to only the rainbow god. First you will have to figure out who ate the sun. Skysong said it was “a neckrazema.” It is somewhere in the sky. You will screm at the necrazema until it gives the moon back. And maybe also the sun. That seems like another thing you should ask for.
So the moon is a god, but not the sun? Or just that the moon is the only relevant god?

The shelter she is in is very crowded, forcing her to share a room with three other humans you do not know.
More importantly, forcing Pix to share a room with rando humans.

One has a fluffy sparkslinger. You got Eggbreath to see it as food and after two (failed) hunts, she’s now in her ball and away from Skysong almost all the time.
Very cunning, good job Pix.

Fox breath smells much better than the wind outside.
Maybe, "Fox breath would smell much better than the wind outside."

Life is good.

[09:15:49]​
Life is terrible.
Hah! Though I was surprised by how breezy and happy Pix is at the moment.

who isn’t ther2e before lying back down with a thump.1
Don't you mean an th--crap, OSJ beat me to it.

“The screen’s kind of dim, even after I got used to all dark all the time, but I think I can make a movie night work.”

“Can the others watch it? They’re already scared, so if it’s one of those movies—”

“It isn’t.”

“Good.”
This kind of trails off.

Otherwise she’s been quietly marking her bedding with saltwater. Humans think it is disgusting to use urine to do it, but it’s fine as long as the salty water comes from their eyes.
Truly revolutionary point from Pix here. One of my favorite observations of the chapter.

“I think she wants something,” one of the nameless humans says.

“Yeah.” Skysong starts to get up (for someone that doesn’t even deserve a name!)
Pix calling out the NPCs, lol.

Humans are bad liars, but you thought they were all too dumb to catch lies so they all thought they were very clever.
This reads a bit muddled.

“Go. Away.”

It’s practically a bark with fangs bared. One final warning to leave her territory before a fight starts. She couldn’t back the threat up by herself, but you’re there so it is a very serious one
Nicely described.

“Almost?” There’s some lightness in her voice. That’s usually good. “Just ‘almost’ good enough?”

“You will leave me.”

“No, I won’t,” she lies.
Hm, this feels kind of perfunctory? Pix really doesn't seem to believe it right now.

Like “Finneon’s Wake.”
🤦‍♀️

A male fish pokémon mates with a female and lays eggs. Then a predator attacks and the mate and all the eggs but one are destroyed. Are you supposed to hate the predator? From the way the sparkslinger’s human reacts you think so. Why? Humans eat fish. Lots of things eat fish. Fish taste good. Where do humans think the fish comes from? And if they hate hunting so much, how do humans always have so much to eat?

The male raises his one child all by himself. This is apparently a big deal. For humans, maybe. One ninetales can raise seven kits perfectly fine with only four or five dying. Eventually the fish child gets kidnapped by humans because fish are very dumb and do dumb things. The human story at least gets that right. Then the father fish meets another fish and they set out to rescue their child.

That… that feels nice. Maybe if one of your siblings die Avalanche will do that for you.

They fight fish with teeth, big fish with teeth, really big fish without teeth, and fish that are jelly but not fish (or so Skysong says (with her mind after having the nerve to shush you)). They seem to run away from everything because fish, unlike foxes, are very weak. Even their screams do not scare predators away like yours would. You aren’t sure how fish have survived this long.

In the end, the fish son gets together with the fish father and the other fish is just kind of there. Humans seem to love stories that end well. You’ve never seen the point. Most stories end poorly. Especially the useful ones. Why would they ignore that?
Not in love with pokemon describes a movie, part two. And it doesn't seem to have much impact on Pix's thoughts as relates to her family? The thought about Avanlanch seems a lot more passive and hopeful than Pix has sounded in the past--I thought her attitude was more, I am going to return and show I am the best, than, oh maybe Avalanche will come get me (even if that's what she secretly wants.)

Oh! Ancestor stories. Avalanche told you many.
Love that she calls them ancestor stories instead of myths.

spare the okémon
Typo

transforming them from ordinary eevee into majestic ninetales.
Fox supremacy myth, huh.

He was filled with shame and revived them into beings so powerful they would never again live in fear of humans.

Generations passed as the Rainbow God aimlessly wandered the skies of the world, refusing to nest again in the world of humans.
protecting people and pokémon alike
People and pokemon formulation strikes me as odd when humans are referred to as humans other places. Also, the reversal seems pretty sudden from humans being the villains of the story to being the ones who need protection?

Instead they were bound to the mountain and could never leave her for long.

To this day the ninetales honor their covenant with the Rainbow God to guide humans and pokémon and protect the sacred mountain of the Moon. For even if she is a jealous god, she is a god nonetheless.
Kind of contradictory mandates there. Which, sure, it is a myth. I guess these myths feel more to me like background flavor, but in a chapter with not much else going on, I keep wanting to read more character relevance into them.

There’s no way it’s as good as fox stories. Just hearing it might make you dumber.
A very legitimate concern!

{Tell him that he’d be safer with me watching over him until he evolves again.}

{I tried.} Skysong sighs, aloud, and the rise and fall of her chest carries you with it. {But he doesn’t like you or your trumbeak.}
👀 at this. Kekoa really does not seem to be down to respect his pokemon's autonomy. Not sure he deserves the apology Cuicatl gave him about sacred pokemon.

“I get that. But we’re at three. I can have six. And having a pokémon that can teach other pokémon to behave would be good to have on a team. Irreplaceable, even.”

If you won’t be replaced no matter what, why would you need to make yourself irreplaceable?
Yup. Cuicatl's being pretty sloppy with her reassure-Pix wording this chapter--understandably, with brother trauma and all. But once again, there's not much reaction from Pix here?

Right. It’s time to scream at the sky again.

Skysong patiently waits for you to finish.
Big lol here.

Her scratches makes a very good argument. One that you can accept for now.
I kind of feel like we spent this chapter in stasis. Felt more like a recap in Pix voice than a progression, per say.
 
Fighting 3.6

Persephone

Infinite Screms
Pronouns
her/hers
Partners
  1. mawile
  2. vulpix-alola
Fighting 3.6: Birthright
Kekoa

[12:10:30]​

You’re woken up by an insistent chittering, punctuated by an occasional spark of electricity. What? You groggily open your eyes to see, well, nothing. There’s a weight on your chest and the angry clacking of mandibles in front of your face. Another spark illuminates your grubbin before the world is cast back into darkness.

“Did I forget to feed you?”

He hisses. Probably a no, then? Honestly you have no idea how much he understands of what you say.

{Can I have some help?} you think down to Cuicatl. You’re met with a phantom feeling of a brush through your hair. Is she dreaming?

Makani seems to get the same idea. The weight crawls off your chest and skitters over to the edge of the bed. A few moments later there’s more mandible clacking and the sound of sparks below you.

“’m awake” Cuicatl groans.

More insect noises. A surprisingly complex language for a literal bug.

“I’ll tell him.”

{Your grubbin would like to talk to you,} she says / thinks.

{Go figure.}

You can almost feel her eyeroll through the link.

{He says he’s close to evolution. He wants you to let him go now so he can bury himself.}

Your last bit of drowsiness starts to drain away. That wasn’t part of the plan. You’ve fed him, protected him, everything you were supposed to do. And why would he want to go to the wild when he’s the most vulnerable?

{Tell him that he’d be safer with me watching over him until he evolves again.}

A breath’s break. A single clack. A hiss and two clacks.

{I tried.} Cuicatl sighs, aloud. {But he doesn’t like you or your trumbeak.}

Hekeli you can almost understand. She’s a bird. Vikavolt famously don’t like them. But hekeli eats fruit, not bugs. They’ve never really had problems in the past so it shouldn’t be an issue.

{Tell him again.}

Cuicatl goes silent for a little bit. Then Makani starts chattering again, much louder, and apparently rising towards you. You reach for the ball at the side of your bed and withdraw him. It sounded like he might be about to attack, and there are better places to hash this out, anyway.”

{Can we go outside so that I can talk to him? You can repeat the words to translate.}

“Kekoa, can we just… not?” Cuicatl sounds exhausted, even for someone who just woke up.

You consider this for a long time. She’s had a rough time as of late. Makani isn’t going anywhere. Maybe… you can just wait for tempers to cool.

“Fine.”

[10:17:41]​

There’s a pier near the naval base that stretches out all the way to the reef. Ordinarily it would be filled with life and bathed in sunlight at this time of day. Today it’s eerily quiet, the only sound coming from the raindrops and another VStar group or two fishing in the darkness. You shiver and adjust your raincoat. You weren’t packing for cold weather when you left the orphanage. What cold weather clothing you could find for sale now seemed far, far more expensive than you would expect. Double-layering shirts helps, but your arms are only covered by a flimsy raincoat and a thin sweater.

The darkness is even worse. You missed a foothold going down the bunk’s ladder today and almost bent your ankle. You’re surprised it doesn’t happen to Cuicatl even more than it already does. And it’s not normal darkness, either. Even when you close your eyes there’s usually some light passing through the eyelids. Now there’s nothing even with your eyes wide open. Just some vibrant tears in the sky that refuse to let any light come down to you. It’s like the necrozma’s taunting your culture. Your ancestors got here by starlight and now it’s gone and made its own twisted reflection of constellations. Scratches of light on the ceiling of the world.

And the darkness makes it feel like you’re cut off from everything else. Like there’s only you and the occasional sound. Nothing to see. Nothing feels real unless you touch it. You can’t tell if it’s better or worse that this god wants humanity to suffer slowly.

The bastard keeps dropping the temperature every day.

You wonder how the forests will come out of this. Two weeks with no sunlight and constant cold. Which grass-types will survive? Which won’t? What of the bugs and birds that didn’t evolve for the cold? Hekeli demands to come inside as soon as she’s taken care of her business and Makani… well, apparently Makani hates you. If Cuicatl is to be believed. You still aren’t sure about that.

Maybe it’s Cuicatl’s power lust coming through. All three of her pokémon are powerhouses. Tyrantrum and metagross (because of course she’s going to evolve the damn thing, whatever she promises you) are some of the strongest pokémon to ever live. Keokeo fight like a living blizzard, slipping in and out of their storms to disrupt the opponent or freeze them solid. But some people don’t want just power: they want all the power. If Makani leaves you, it might go to her. Then she’d have another nuke in her arsenal.

And she’s unstable now because of the oricorio. Hurt. Maybe lashing out and hurting you to feel better herself. It makes sense; you imagine that the encounter really, really sucked for her. Hearing your parents berate you would be… it would be something. There would be bad feelings, of course, but at least you’d be reminded what they sounded like.

Did Jabari keep home videos? He had to have, right? Somewhere. No way he threw those away when he enlisted since, you know, his parents had just died. But if you asked for them there would be strings attached. It would look like you were just fine with him sending you to foster care for years just because he was sorry enough to give you shit that was rightfully yours anyway. And also a tyrunt. You wonder if he knows that you gave it away. Probably. He does work for VStar and Cuicatl has been talking to them about her Class Five. Someone probably caught on and told your brother. But at least he hasn’t shown himself recently. Just a text asking if you were alright. He got a one-word answer before you blocked him.

Cuicatl starts reeling something in. She says that she’d never fished before (“not with a rod, anyway,” whatever that means), but she can at least reel it in well enough. You still have to cast because you don’t have an idea how to explain it to her in the dark. Not that you’re that good without being able to see what you’re doing. Hit a buoy at least once.

She lifts up the pole and Pix starts growling. Cuicatl sighs and hauls the fish onto the pier where it starts madly flapping. “Magikarp.” A red flash briefly illuminates the docks. “Coco, Pix, you want it?” There’s increasingly frantic thrashing sounds, the faint light of sparks, and the smell of ozone before the fish goes still. Cuicatl hands you the rod to cast again as her pokémon start devouring their lunch.

You would complain. Gyarados get testy when too many magikarp are captured in one place. But that’s the first one she’s had killed today. And the last one slashed your hand up pretty good while you tried to hold it down so she could get the hook out. Probably should’ve just captured it with a spare ball and released it into the water, but pokéballs aren’t free and neither of you has a clue how long you’ll be out here today. Finneon usually hug the reefs. You’re gambling on one coming just a little closer to the shore in the chaos.

Once you’ve cast you hand the rod back to her. She continues to sit in silence, although Coco gets withdrawn as soon as the munching sounds stop. One thing you didn’t consider is that your part of the dock smells like fish blood now, and it probably will until the rain washes it all into the ocean. Then it might scare away the finneon. Great. Just great.

“Can’t believe they’re having us work during The Blackout,” you mutter, more to fill the quiet than anything.

“What else were we doing?” Cuicatl asks. “Might as well make money.”

“It’s fucking dark outside. Dangerous to walk in.”

A gust of wind blows a splatter of water into the side of your raincoat. Pixie hisses beside Cuicatl.

“Kekoa, I don’t really… see the problem there.”

Ugh. Stupid puns. “Yeah, well, you’ve ben training for years. Most of us are still tripping over our feet.”

She giggles. Giggles. “It is fun to listen to. And everything is so much easier to use now. I wouldn’t mind if this went on for a bit.”

“And froze out the fucking forests? And your precious dragons?”

“This is why dragons mastered fire, Kekoa. It makes winters much easier.”

“It’s not funny when it’s your country burning down.”

She sighs, barely audible over the waves and raindrops. There’s a tug on your fishing pole so you have a convenient excuse to end the argument. Even if it gets away halfway through and you have to put on new bait. The pole is just being loaned for free, but you did have to pay for the bait. Paying to work during a slow-motion weather war. Imagine that.

“I don’t know why you’re mad at me,” Cuicatl says when you sit back down. That’s probably a lie. She’s a fucking mindreader. “Doesn’t work like that,” she mutters, confirming that it does, in fact, work like that.

Why are you mad at her? Because she’s trying to take your powerhouse away. Makani hadn’t been spitting in your face as much, you bought him a thunder stone (which blew through most of your savings right at the start of an indefinite crisis), and then out of nowhere she just turns on you again.

“Makani.”

“I thought you wanted me to respect the pokémon here. But it’s fine for you to ignore them, then?” She sounds more tired than angry, but there is a spark of defiance in her voice. The kind that typically precedes someone getting mad. Had to learn that shit when dealing with orphans and state-stolen kids with more issues than you.

The answer to her question is simple enough. “Foreigners keep coming here to catch grubbin and get themselves a vikavolt. Got so bad that they almost went extinct on this island.” VStar was a big part of that. It was the first thing you learned about the company. If you didn’t need to kick out the imposter queen you would want nothing to do with them. “But they’re our birthright. One of our strongest weapons against the occupiers, and they’re just stealing them. If I abandoned her, she’d probably fall into one of their hands.”

The imposter queen herself has one. That will not help the desire overseas to steal every last one of them from your people.

“Even if that’s…” Pixie cuts her off with a series of barks. “Alright, alright.” A flash of red light briefly illuminates her silhouette. “Sorry, she doesn’t like the rain. Just. I’m only telling you what she told me.”

“You’re a telepath. Can’t know what you said to her to make her attack me.”

“Kekoa,” her voice is much, much harder than before. “You don’t trust me at all, do you?”

“I—” Do you? She’s going through a lot right now, and you’ve insulted her dead brother and mom. It’s natural that she’d want revenge. Still, you’ve been traveling with her for three months at this point. You’d trust her not to poison you. To keep you safe. But for Makani to just turn on you… you’re not a bad trainer. A bad person. You were making progress. Cuicatl turning on you only barely makes sense, but it’s the only thing here that makes any.

“Second, I really thought you cared about pokémon. More than I do. Set rules on me for what I could and couldn’t do. But… I don’t know anymore. You get mad that your grubbin wants to leave. Won’t really parent Coco.” Because she’s a dinosaur. A very cute dinosaur that you’ll take on walks or cuddle, but not your child. Besides, she’s Cuicatl’s pokémon. “And then that movie a few days back. You like it, right? But it’s about how it’s bad to capture wild finneon. But you’re here doing that, now. I just don’t get it.”

The finneon capture is necessary because you need money to take back your kingdom. Makani is necessary because you need power to take back your kingdom. And they’re your people’s pokémon. Your birthright. The ancient kings hunted. The island challenge has been going strong for centuries with many kings and kahunas using vikavolt. Besides…

“You’re here, too. Just let a magikarp get shocked to death and eaten. And if Coco asked to leave, would you let her?”

Another bite on your line. She doesn’t respond as you reel it in, taking a moment to let out Hekeli as the fish gets close. It flops onto the pier, flopping wildly but not as much as a magikarp. The flashlight shows—finneon. It can’t really move too well with a hook in its mouth. Its water guns are sloppy. The hardest part is having Hekeli hold back enough that it doesn’t get too badly hurt.

You don’t think about the finneon having a family. A movie studio made that story up. Finneon are dumb. And you’d eat them if they tasted better. Your ancestors would have eaten them, too. It’s fine that you’re doing this.

“Got the first finneon,” you tell Cuicatl.

“Kekoa, I’m a predator,” she says. Probably to answer your last question. And for a moment you’ll pretend that the tiny blind girl that needs help casting for fish could be a predator. “I was practically raised by one. And predators can tolerate prey. Respect them. But the predators will starve if they do not eat the prey. If I need to catch finneon or kill magikarp to feed myself or my pokémon, I will. That’s how nature works.” Sometimes you have to drown someone else to stay afloat. You know that damn well. “And for Coco, I don’t want her to leave. I’d try to keep her happy with me. Since I’m her mother and…” She trails off. “I never really had a mother. Just scattered memories.”

“Memories?”

“Her reuniclus had some stored ones. I’ve seen a few. Enough that I love her. Miss her. Maybe understand her. But she died a long time ago. I don’t remember her myself.”

Shit. That’s way better than home videos. You would kill for that. For a tenth of that.

“But if Coco really wanted to leave, I wouldn’t try to make a dragon stay where she doesn’t want to be. That would end badly for everyone.”

It doesn’t clear up a whole lot. She sees herself as a predator. A tiny, helpless predator. {Fuck you.} A tiny, helpless predator who polices other people’s thoughts. And seems to really, actually see her dragons—hydreigon and tyrunt—as family. That’s… strange. You’d read interviews of battlers saying stuff like that, but it was never something you really saw for yourself. That was something PR firms made up to make their clients sound like folk heroes. The orphanage had an oranguru and porygon that helped take care of the kids, sure, but you were never as close to them as you were to the, y’know, people.

“Maybe you should talk to someone else about this,” Cuicatl mutters. “I don’t know much about your birthright.

[12:23:47]​

The rain stopped. At least you can make the call outside. If you ever make it. You’ve unlocked the phone, held your hand over the number, and watched it lock again three times now.

Kanoa.

You’ve spent weeks practically ignoring her, texting her as little as possible. And she’s busy. You don’t need to take her time. She doesn’t need to talk to someone who abandoned her. She deserves better than that. But you want to talk with someone who would understand. She’s a trial captain. Her boss’s boss is Tapu Lele herself. She would know what to do, right? Even if you don’t deserve to hear from her.

Fuck it. She probably won’t answer. Might as well.

She answers on the second ring.

“Kekoa! So good to hear that you’re safe.” She pauses as you steel yourself to talk. “You are safe, right?”

“Yup. Just holed up in Hau’oli. You’re the one who’s been on the front lines.”

Has she? Probably. Sounds like something they would have trial captains doing.

“It’s been rough,” Kanoa responds, a little shakily. Then false joy is pumped right back into her voice. “But things are actually calming down over here. We have a little bit of light and heat again. I was worried we wouldn’t until everything was over, since, uh…” Her voice dips back to something more natural. “The volcarona refused to shine for a bit, because some kid had just tried to steal a larvesta.”

“Holy shit.” That kid’s fucking dead now, and everyone’s better off for it. If they’d actually succeeded… volcarona are emissaries of Pele and gods in their own right. A lot of people would’ve burned. “Why?”

“VStar.”

Shit. You knew they’d crashed the grubbin population and generally didn’t give a shit about the ecosystem, but poking a volcarona is low for them. How much money would they have had to offer? Several thousand. Maybe a million. Then they would’ve had to either find someone with a Class V or train one.

And if they wanted to train one, they’d have to find some kid with talent and a need to get a lot of money, fast. But uh. Cuicatl worships the sun, right? There’s no way that she’d just go and piss off a sun god or demigod or whatever volcarona are over there.

Right?

“You still there?” Kanoa asks.

“Just thinking about some stuff.”

“You work for them, right?”

“I—”

“Kind of figured between the weird island-hopping thing and, um, not really having much money. Unless your brother is paying for—”

“He very much isn’t.” You wouldn’t let him.

“Just checking.” And judging. She’s definitely judging. Fuck her. Never been through half of what you have, yet she thinks she can judge. “Look, I know you don’t want to go back. But I’ve been talking with my dad, and we think we can send you some money.”

No. If anything, you owe her. Hell, she’d be justified refusing any help you offered, just like you’d thrown away a tyrunt. You had chances to call or write and you didn’t.

“Why?”

“Because I care about you, dumbass.” She shouldn’t. She really, really— “Do you really need that spelled out for you?”

“Kanoa, I ignored you for years. Just. It’s okay to let me go.”

“Well,” she says, still sounding far too cheery. “You’re the one who called me.”

“Right. I need some advice.”

She hums for a second. Lower pitched than Cuicatl’s humming. Not quite as melodic. “About what?”

“Pokémon stuff.”

“Well, that I can do. Ask away.”

Kanoa was raised by ranchers. Probably set to take over from them once she retires from being a trial captain, another job that requires knowing shit about pokémon care. She should know this. And won’t be too biased.

“I have a grubbin.”

“I remember.”

Right. You did use that in her trial. To pretty good effect, at that. “He didn’t like me at first, but he’s been getting better. I bought a thunderstone to try and evolve him.”

“Right.”

“Then last night he got really, really upset with me. Starting chittering and trying to bite me. My friend is—has a psychic-type.” Technically true, although you’re pretty sure the beldum can’t actually talk to people or pokémon with its mind. “She says that Makani, the grubbin, wants me to bury him in the woods with the thunderstone.”

“And you don’t want to?” She doesn’t sound as judgmental as you were fearing. That’s good.

“Yeah. Things were going okay and it’s dangerous out. And if he does stay with me until he evolves, I can return the thunderstone, since they don’t use them up like raichu or jolteon. I don’t see why he can’t just travel with me for a while.”

“You could just go back in a couple months to unbury the stone. I don’t think vikavolt keep them after they evolve. Hell, the DNR would prefer you do that. Keep any wild grubbin from unexpectedly evolving. Although… lemme check something.”

“Okay.” You’re pretty sure you got put on mute given the nothingness over the line. You’re vaguely upset. Kanoa jumped to the least important part. He’s safer with you and… and you need power. A lot of it.

“Still there?”

“Yeah.”

“You aren’t supposed to release charjabug on Melemele. Just have him sent over and I’ll let him out back once the darkness ends. I can rent my own thunderstone from Olivia. Maybe for free, ‘cause Liv’s a big softy. Despite being a rock trainer.” She snickers at her own joke. You wonder how many times she’s told it. Is this really the first?

More importantly: “Once the darkness ends? You sound like it’ll be soon.”

Kanoa groans on the other end. “Can you forget I said anything?”

“Soon, then?”

“They’re going to try something soon. But don’t get your hopes up. They’ve been trying shit for a while with no luck.”

Right. You’re still talking about the false queen and the colonial government. Really, you shouldn’t have any faith in them doing something helpful.

“Alright. I’ll forget you said anything. But—” You don’t have to do this. You can hang up. It’ll be fine. “I’m not really worried about the thunderstone. It’s just. Shit, I don’t know.”

“Feels bad that one of your pokémon wants to leave?” She says it softly. Almost knowingly. A little judgingly. Like she’s talking to a child.

But she’s not wrong.

“Pretty much.”

“It happens. A lot. Pokémon, even the ones that agree to go with people, usually want to go back to their own lives eventually. For bugs, a few months can be a lot of time. A year can be far too much to ask of them.”

“That’s not really it. More that there are a fuckton of haole kids who do this every year, no problem, but I can’t…” Can’t even figure out what, exactly, it is that you can’t do.

“And their pokémon hate them, too. They just don’t care enough to notice.”

“Oh.” That. That makes sense.

“No one really taught you to live with the ʻāina, did they?” Kanoa half-whispers. She’s not wrong, exactly. Your mom was an accountant. You visited Kanoa’s family a lot, but that was years ago. And in the meantime, well, most of the time you were staying with haole in the cities. But once you got to the orphanage and sort of joined Team Skull you started getting lessons about the myths. You should know enough to make things work. “Don’t sweat it. Next time you’re on Akala I’ll swing by to give you some tips.”

You want to scream that you don’t need it. That this is your fucking country and you know how to live in it. How to use it against the conquerors. Plumeria and the other Skull leaders taught you the myths at the base of Lanakila. You know enough. More than the ten-year-old haole brats who waltz through your islands without having a pokémon turn against them. But she doesn’t sound angry at you. She doesn’t hate you. For some reason.

She must sense something wrong. Maybe you took too long to answer. “Again, don’t worry about it. Hanohano taught me a bunch of stuff I didn’t know over the last year.” She pauses. “Oh, he’s the totem oranguru you fought.”

“Thanks.”

You aren’t sure for what.

“Don’t—hang on.” She puts you on mute again. You pointedly do not think about anything that was just said. “Sorry, something came up over here. Take care.”

“You too.”

“Bye.”

[11:17:55]​

It’s a little hard to find places that are both warm and a little private. Thankfully, Tatty left and Mist and Titania are downstairs for lunch. You have a little bit of time to talk to Makani now.

“Hey, Cuicatl?”

She grumbles/groans something below you. Was she sleeping? Why? It’s the middle of the day. Weird time for a nap.

“You up for translating between me and Makani?”

Cuicatl yawns and you can feel the bunk bed subtly shift. One hell of a stretch, then. “Sure. Let me just…” Let me just yawn again, apparently. “You trust me again?”

“Yeah. I talked to a friend and I don’t think you were lying. I was just… anyway, I’ll send Makani out now.”

“Go ahead.” You can imagine her eyeroll and smirk. And maybe you deserve it. Or should at least shut up and tolerate it.

You draw your legs back to you and press your back to the wall. Then you send Makani out at the other side of the bunk. Gives you some warning if he attacks.

“Hey. We need to talk.”

Cuicatl repeats your words. Makani says nothing because he’s a bug.

“Cuicatl can translate anything you want to say.” He still doesn’t take you up on the offer. “Look, I… I am going to make sure that you’re buried with a thunder stone. But—” He starts chittering and hissing.

“Please hear him out,” Cuicatl says. He does, mostly, although you can still hear a slight hiss.

“But there aren’t vikavolt on this island, so I have to send you back to Akala. Where you’re from. And for that I need to wait a little while before they start shipping pokéballs between islands again. As soon as I can, I’ll send you over and a friend will let you go.”

He chirps thrice and clacks his mandibles.

“He’s okay with that, but he’ll start biting eventually if you don’t do it.”

“A lot doesn’t…” Depend on you. But how are you going to explain the situation to a bug when you barely understand it yourself? “That’s fine. I can live with that.”

{Proud of you.}

She says it like a mother talking a stubborn toddler into sharing his toys. You file it away for later, not wanting to immediately start another fight right after the last one ended. Besides, there’s still one last question you want to ask. Even though you maybe shouldn’t.

“Makani, do you hate me?”

Cuicatl repeats the question. And gets no answer. Then a lot of very harsh whistles and chirps.

“Hmm. If you could kill him with no chance of harm to yourself, would you?”

“Cuicatl—” {Please don’t put that thought into his head.}

{How would you explain hatred to an insect?}

She looks down on bugs, too. Hypocrite.

Makani starts answering. Cuicatl pauses for a bit and you hear her shift beneath you.

“Okay. Do you wish that you’d never been captured?”

Another answer. A shorter one.

“He doesn’t hate you,” Cuicatl says. She does not translate exactly what Makani’s answers were.
 
Last edited:

WildBoots

Don’t underestimate seeds.
Pronouns
She/Her
Partners
  1. moka-mark
  2. solrock
I’ll give you some quotes first, then some overall thoughts and feelings:

The blind girl doesn’t take it; you do. Even if she doesn’t want it, maybe you can find a use.
LOL, Jesus, Kekoa.

In this instance “the blind girl” feels a little harsh and distant rather than it does like ribbing.

There’s not a flying trial right now
* There’s no

A talonflame takes off behind her once she’s through the doors. You wonder if the bird cares about the rain.
Seems like an obvious yes, which makes this wording a little funky for me.

Yeah, you’re mad at her for maybe turning Makani against you, but you’re not a monster.
Did we know he was feeling this way from a previous chapter? I get that this is what he’s been telling himself and so there’s a continuous reality from his perspective, but for me it was a little jarring. The conversation on the docks was smoother.

Which definitely does not mean ‘fine.’ But she doesn’t want to share and you’re not going to press her in public.

For once she has to guide you. She has one hand on her beldum and one clamped hard onto your elbow as she drags you along.
Two things: 1) Aww, in that first quoted sentence we can see their friendship at work a little. 2) These two passages need more of a transition.

bathed in sunlight at this time of day in the middle of the mainland winter.
“in the middle of the mainland winter” didn’t feel immediately related. For me, it muddied my mental image and added bulk to your sentence.

The temperature keeps dropping every day.

You wonder how the forests will come out of this. Two weeks with no food and constant cold.
Oof. Big yikes. Though should that be no sun or no photosynthesis instead of no food?

There’s increasingly frantic thrashing sounds and the smell of ozone before the fish goes still.
What’s causing an ozone smell here? Thunder fang???

And the last one slashed your hand up pretty good while you tried to hold it down.
Why was he holding one down???

Kekoa, I don’t really… see the problem there.”
I didn’t see the pun at first because I was so busy going, “Girl, it’s going to create food shortages and shit!”

That’s probably a lie. She’s a fucking mindreader. “Doesn’t work like that,” she mutters, confirming that it does, in fact, work like that.
🙃

you bought her a thunder stone
Later he says he rented it? Also, wait, isn’t Makani male? Am I misremembering horribly?

The finneon capture is necessary because you need money to take back your kingdom. Makani is necessary because you need power to take back your kingdom. And they’re your people’s pokémon. Your birthright. The ancient kings hunted. The island challenge has been going strong for centuries with many kings and kahunas using vikavolt. Besides…

“You’re here, too. Just let a magikarp get shocked to death and eaten. And if Coco asked to leave, would you let her?”
Yes, Kekoa. Don’t contemplate your hypocrisy—just deflect.

Since I’m her mother and…” She trails off. “I never really had one. Just scattered memories.”
I thought this referred to tyrunt at first, not mothers.

A tiny, helpless predator who polices other people’s thoughts.
Wasn’t sure why the italics where on that half of the sentence.

“Holy shit.” That kid’s fucking dead now, and everyone’s better off for it. If they’d actually succeeded… volcarona are emissaries of Pele and gods in their own right. A lot of people would’ve burned. “Why?”
Love the dribbles of lore! Though I wasn’t sure how literally to take the kid dying. Is K guessing, or????

Then they would’ve had to either find someone with a Class V.

Or train one.

Find some kid with talent and a need to get a lot of money, fast. But uh. She worships the sun, right? There’s no way that she’d just go and piss off a sun god or demigod or whatever volcarona are over there.
This does mimic how people’s thought processes work, but it was a little hard to parse.

And when did you start being able to compare that?
This feels incomplete.
*compare that to anything?

Hell, the DNR would prefer you do that. Keep any wild grubbin from unexpectedly evolving.
I like this bit of world-building! I kept thinking Do Not Ressusitate though.

“It happens. A lot. Pokémon, even the ones that agree to go with people, usually want to go back to their own lives eventually. For bugs, a few months can be a lot of time. A year can be far too much to ask of them.”
👀 Yessss. I mean, nooooo, but this was well-addressed.

“That’s not really it. More that there are a fuckton of haole kids who do this every year, no problem, but I can’t…” Can’t even figure out what, exactly, it is that you can’t do.
I’m surprised she didn’t just fire back and tell him, “Yeah, dude, and those kids’ Pokémon hate them, too. They Just don’t care.”

[Where are you staying rn?]
Wasn’t sure why the brackets, but that’s personal taste.

“Hi,” she says. “I’m Lyra. A friend of Genesis’s.”
👀 So she’s with Skull?!?!???!!!! Also “a friend of Genesis’s” is a mouthful.

Woof, okay! I enjoyed seeing Kekoa start to grapple with how his pokémon feel about him ... even if he seems not quite ready to face the music yet. But! Maybe! He’s trading a pokemon for revitalizing his friendship with a human.

Curious to see what “they’re trying something” will entail ...!

Also, it was sweet of birdmom to try to apologize. Maybe Cuicatl will make a friend and get her Five after all. Eventually.

Glad to see Lyra back in play during the present! Her involvement can only mean things getting messier from here—hooray!
 

Persephone

Infinite Screms
Pronouns
her/hers
Partners
  1. mawile
  2. vulpix-alola
Some quick housekeeping announcements: I have one more chapter planned and then I will go on my fall/finals hiatus. During that break, I'll release one more bonus chapter of either The Alola Pokedex or World Myth Encyclopedia. The options are Zacian, Vespiquen, Amoongus, and Dracozolt. Link in my profile, here: https://www.fanfiction.net/u/2733710/
 

TheGOAT

🗿
Location
Houston, Texas
Pronouns
Him/his
Partners
  1. serperior
  2. alolatales-goat
This is a story about not being okay. There will be attempts to recreate the language of downward spirals, suicidal ideation, eating disorders, , anxiety, and possibly other things. I will do my best to provide chapter warnings for chapters dealing explicitly with suicidal ideation. If there are other notices you would like me to add, feel free to ask.

Note on Representation
This story deals with analogues to real world groups, albeit through an alternate universe lens. I have personal experience with some, but definitely not all of the things this story deals with. I have tried to read enough to not make big mistakes in my knowledge gaps, but I'll probably screw up. Feel absolutely free to point out any portrayals that don't sit well or quite work. As a minor disclaimer, not all POV characters are terribly knowledgeable about things. There are some "mistakes" made that I know full well are mistakes. And also the usual "no character could possibly encompass all aspects of an identity" thing.

Character Art by OldSchool Johto
bt_cuicatl_color.jpg
Character Art by Venonat / Surskitty

Mission One: Normal
"Times of transition are strenuous, but I love them. They are an opportunity to purge, rethink priorities, and be intentional about new habits. We can make our new normal any way we want."
-Kristin Armstrong


Normal 1.1: Silver and Lead
Rachel

The room is cold and clean and empty.

You drum your fingers on the table and hear the sounds of metal being struck and all the little echoes bouncing off of the glass and the walls. It fills the room but hurts your hand; you stop and the room is empty again. You think about going back to swinging your legs and sometimes kicking the side of the chair on accident but that hurt, too.

It has been a long time since the police officers left you in here. You don’t know how long. You’re pretty good at reading clocks now, even the old ones with the moving sticks, but there isn’t one in this room.

This is maybe the longest time out you’ve ever been given.

You’re cold. You’re cold and you want to cry. You’re cold and you want to cry and you want Dad to come and hold you but he can’t because Dad’s

The door opens with the sound of metal scraping across metal.

Two police officer men walk in. Their footsteps echo on the floor and fill the room with a power that none of your sounds ever matched. They sit down across from you and the door swings shut.

One leans forward and he clears his throat. Then he presses a finger against the part of the shirt right over his heart like he’s pressing a doorbell. “This is Sergeant Rick Johnson of the Virbank City Police Department. The time is 14:29 on May 11th, 1999. Can you state your name for the record, ma’am?”

You stare at him until he clears his throat again and you realize the last part wasn’t directed at the air or his pocket, but at you.

“My name is Rachel Eliza Bell.”

You speak as clearly as you can, but your voice doesn’t come close to filling the room.

“And what’s your date of birth?”

“Um…”

“What’s your birthday?” He clarifies.

“April 16th.”

“And how old are you now?”

“Seven.”

The other officer pulls out a notepad and a pen and starts writing on it. Did you say something wrong?

“Miss Bell, do you have any idea why you’re here today?”

Dad.

You try to put words together but the officer gets bored first and speaks up.

“The department has been looking into a murder. Husband of a police officer found dead in the woods outside of town, anti-police graffiti on the trees around the area. The deceased was Marcus Bell.”

He looks you dead in the eyes for a few seconds. Was… was that a question?

“Yes,” you say.

“What was your relationship to the deceased?”

“I’m sorry—”

“How did you know Marcus Bell?”

“He’s my father.”

Everyone else keeps using past words. Was. Were. It’s… he’s still your father. Even if

“Right. Miss Bell, do you know what ‘death’ is?”

“Yes.”

Your herdier (Fluffy) was playing in the street and got hit by a car when you were six and a half. You know what death is.

The man keeps going, barely letting your tinny echoes ring out before he smothers them.

“We still haven’t found a suspect in the case. Now, your teacher says that you have an… interesting theory on the matter.” You don’t like his eyes. At all. They’re the eyes your mom has when you spill things or interrupt her while she’s on the phone. “Well, we’re here now. And we’d certainly appreciate it if you knew who did it.”

The other police officer has put the notebook down. He’s also showing you mean eyes, but… less. More like Dad’s mean eyes than Mom’s.

“Mom did it,” you whisper. It’s so quiet that there isn’t an echo at all.

“Can you speak up, miss?”

“My mom did it.”

“Your mother is Evelyn Bell, correct?”

You swallow down nothing and try not to cry. Your mom hates it when you cry and it might be a police thing.

“Your mother is—”

“Yes.”

It’s a quiet yes, but he doesn’t make you speak up again.

“She is currently an eleven-year veteran of the Virbank Police Department, correct?”

“I… I don’t know how long she’s been your friend.”

Officer Johnson sighs, rolls his eyes, and leans back into his chair.

“And why do you think Mrs. Bell killed her husband?”

You squirm in your seat. You just know. The feeling in the back of your head that tells you who took your pencil, or that Ms. Bethany thought you were annoying, or that Officer Johnson doesn’t believe you, or that the other police officer does but doesn’t care.

“Well, speak up.”

“A feeling,” you say. “In my head.”

Officer Johnson smiles. It’s very… wrong with the subject and the feelings.

“Rachel, I can’t imagine what you must be going through right now. But your mommy loved your daddy very much, and she has an alibi. Unless you have some real proof…”

He trails off. Gives you a chance to prove it to him. Which you can’t.

Even if you know that you’re right.

*​

It’s always fascinating watching the espeon eat, even after seventeen years. He nudges a treat into place with the tip of his claw, steps back, and lifts the treat just a little bit into the air. Then he pulls back his whispers and brings his mouth around it before swallowing it whole. No crumbs ever touch his fur.

With his food eaten, Espy levitates the crumbs off the desk and into the wastebasket. Then he stretches out, walks in a circle, and gracefully sits down with his tail outstretched and a paw on your hand.

{You’re tired.} he says.

“I could use a nap.”

{Mind tired.}

You pull up your schedule instead of giving him an answer.

New journey group initiation today. You should stop by that, scan for potential problems before they blow up in your face.

The governor’s having a fundraiser tonight and you’ll be there. He’s a nice man. Genuinely likes you. Has a tendency to talk a little too much when he’s lonely and just a little bit tipsy and thinks he can trust *. And given the way that things seem to be going at home and in the polls, well, he’s very lonely and probably drinking a little more than he should. And it’s your job to be likeable and trustworthy. When the public thinks of your company, they should think of their beloved sports star and hero. When the investors, reporters and politicians do, they should think of the pretty blond girl who either kind of flirted with them in just the way they liked or who gave them the kind of compliments they needed. Put a pretty face on your operation so no one ever wants to peel off the surface and look beneath.

Between the two meetings? Email. Hours of email. And maybe a quick nap, if you’re lucky.

*​

It’s an hour into orientation. Sometimes you’ll stay to watch the full thing, make sure that you know what’s being taught and how. Saves you time when the wrong person leaks the wrong thing (that they remembered wrong) and you have to figure out what really happened before you can tell the press what pretty much happened.

First few hours are nothing important, anyway. Here’s a little about Alola and the island challenge. What are tents and why should you use one? Like your food? Try not to get it stolen. Budgeting could maybe be helpful. This predator lives in these places and here is how you avoid it. The basics of life on the trail, with or without VStar.

The sensitive stuff—payment methods and tables, how to stay within the letter of capture limit laws, corporate facilities and affiliates, mortality rates, advancement paths, mission assignments, legal duties to the company—that all gets crammed in at the end.

Room’s emptier than usual. Only eight initiates, most mid- to upper-teens. It’s to be expected. October is a garbage month for starting a journey since it’s in the middle of a semester and right at the start of the rainy season. Most of your new trainers come to the April, May, and June sessions. The people who come in October are the really over-eager ten-year-olds who can’t wait to get on the trail or teenagers who can’t stay in their home a second longer.

Group isn’t bored yet. Doesn’t pay you too much mind when you sit down in a corner chair. Half of them look at you for a moment before glancing back to the presentation. One girl’s eyes linger for a little until she makes eye contact and immediately turns away.

Okay. Time to start scanning.

A lot of telepaths just read minds like a book. Or as a monitor with code shifting faster than you could ever hope to read, as a former roommate put it. Your talent doesn’t work that way. It’s more akin to sonar. Send out a wave, wait to see what image you get back. Usually it just dredges up a secret or two: the thing that there’s the most resistance to you knowing. If you really focus you can get a basic overview of their personality.

Theoretically you could have your scan bring everything back, but it’d probably take you a week to process and land you in a hospital bed for a few months. If you weren’t lucky it would land you in a coffin.

You click your tongue on the roof of your mouth (not necessary, but it helps you focus) and look at the first kid. And he is very much a kid. Ten, probably. Biggest secret is that his parents don’t want him to do this. Definitely an overeager child whose family won’t or can’t pay for the journey. No security risk, as long as someone sits him down and explains what the non-disclosure agreements mean.

Second ping. Another boy, late teens this time. Got a girl pregnant and ran away to avoid the fallout. Probably doesn’t have the money to pay for a journey and parental assistance is very unlikely. Moderate security risk. He shouldn’t be told anything really sensitive, but you’ll greenlight him.

Third kid. Girl, mid-teens… scion of one of the Big Six landowning families. Why is she even here? VStar gives structure, but it’s not the most efficient way to go on a journey. And the money can’t possibly matter to her unless she’s been exiled or she ran away.

Exile is unproblematic, although it’s the type of gossip you’d like to be aware of. If she did something bad enough that her family would bring hell down upon you for sheltering her, you would have heard what she did by this point. If she’s a runaway her family might give you endless PR and legal hell until you give their daughter back.

Supplemental scan doesn’t dig up much. Kid’s kind of flighty, kind of lonely. Cautious and kind at her core. Very recent trauma with a trail of shame before and ahead of it. And maybe something buried. Supports either theory, but her temperament makes you think she’s not a runaway. Minds like hers are allergic to rebellion.

Fourth is an addict to harder stuff than anything you’ve ever dared experiment with. Only mid-teens, too. What a waste of a life. Moderate security risk.

Fifth is female, probably native. Kleptomaniac. Old enough to have been involved in Skull back in its heyday. Very high security risk. Shouldn’t let her download the app or sit through the last hour of the presentation.

Sixth. Young girl. Probably ten, maybe eleven. And she’s… oh. Abuse. Probably getting away as soon as possible. Smart kid. You’ll look the parents up so you have blackmail at the ready if they try and take their kid back. Low security risk.

Seventh is… familiar? You try to never forget a face but it still just eludes you. By the second minute of staring he’s (she’s?) definitely noticed and you avert your gaze. Secret dredging time then. See what you missed…

Yup. You recognized her. Jabari’s little sister. And for some reason she really, really doesn’t want you to know that. Definitely need to look into that situation. Could be a high risk or a very low one. Probably shouldn’t do a further scan. Jabari might take it the wrong way.

The eighth is in her mid-teens? Early teens? Very short and still rather thin, but her features make her look a little older. Deep set eyes, angular face. Native girl, if you had to guess. Jade green hair. If it’s natural, it’s rare but not unheard of. If it’s dyed, then you need to ask her where she got it done. Kind of weird colorful dress. Probably wool Might be handmade. Big thing? She’s blind. Clouded eyes, white cane, whole deal. Can she really do this? You aren’t going to send a kid out into the woods knowing that she’ll get killed by the first predator she can’t see coming.

Still, in case you don’t rule her out, a secret scan can’t hurt.

A moment later alarm bells of panic and despair and random memories and pain rock your mind. The thoughts came back to you after the scan but it’s like they were cut up in a blender, sharpened into daggers and then launched straight back into your brain. An attack? How? She’s…

Your eyes open wider as it dawns on you. She’s psychic. Probably another telepath. Strong. And not trained in any style you’re familiar with. All that? And native? And blind? This definitely shouldn’t be the first you’ve heard of her. You like to think that you’ve met every other psychic in the commonwealth and not a one has ever brought her up.

You got her attention. She’s slowly rotating her head to survey the room with either sound or some remaining vision, her foot tapping nervously the whole time.

How do you salvage this? It’s literally never happened before, and that’s not something you can say very often these days. Thought process isn’t helped by the thrum of pain in your head, alternating sharp and dull so you never quite get used to it. You breathe deeply and send her a special ping, one with a message attached.

{Sorry. I’m Rachel. Work for VStar. Talk after this?}

Short, simple concepts. They translate best. Especially if she mostly thinks in Alolan. And it’s all you’re really capable of now after the beating you just took.

There’s not an immediate response, but you can feel her mind through the partial connection. It’s a terrible risk, leaving the connection open. If she’s a stronger telepath than you are, and you just gave her an access point to your mind… well, who knows what she could do with that. You’ve seen enough telepaths in your life that you don’t even want to imagine it.

{…hi?} You let out a sigh of relief. She’s not hostile. Not yet. {Are you human?}

You smile in spite of yourself. She might be strong, but she’s either bluffing or she has absolutely no idea what she’s doing. You could probably take her in a fight in your own mind while injured, if you had to. And it’s kind of cute; it’s fun watching the babies learn.

{Yes. I’m Rachel. Work for VStar. Talk after orientation?}

{Okay,} she shoots back almost immediately. A second passes as you ready your response. {Am I in trouble?}

{No. Want to talk.}

{Okay.}

She leans forward in her seat and sets her arms down on the table and sends no further messages. You should probably leave her now. Let her pay attention to the boring travel stuff. She, of all people, is going to need it.

*​

Your alarm goes off at 3:00 P.M. and you swear at the ceiling before awkwardly rolling over in your pop-up hammock and turning it off. It had been a ninety-minute nap (really forty-five since you replied to some emails while lying still with the lights off). And you still feel miserable. How does that work?

Well… part of that’s the mental bruising. A cold and empty memory that keeps resurfacing, feelings of panic when looking at random objects, a slight fog over everything, and random sights and sounds getting turned into metal walls and tinny echoes. Plus you have an absolutely brutal headache. You make a point of taking an aspirin, knowing that it won’t really help but hoping the placebo effect does enough to make you comfortable. Which might negate the placebo effect. Is there a placebo effect where you know that the placebo effect does make people feel better, but that it doesn’t actually do anything physically, but the thought that this might make you feel better even though it doesn’t work makes you improve anyway because you half-expect it to? A placebo placebo effect.

This definitely isn’t making your headache any better.

First things first. You text the instructor to make sure that the possible Skull defector gets kicked out before the mortality tables come up. VStar’s mortality rates are lower than the general journey-goer rates, but dead kids are dead kids and it never feels like there’s anything to say, much less anything good.

Second: a phone call. Two rings. Voicemail. Saw it but can’t or won’t answer. Understandable, since his job involves herding dragons. The room is cold and clean and empty. Focus. Deep breaths. The third ceiling tile diagonal from the corner does not want to kill you. Voicemail. You’re in your office, the year is 2019, and you are leaving a voicemail. The metal—not metal—walls have light blue wallpaper. “Hey, Jabari. This is Rachel. Call me back when you get a chance. It’s about your sister.”

Third: daughter of Ernest Gage, the spider silk magnate. That one you might have to deal with in person, or at least at the fundraiser tonight. He and his wife will probably be there. It would be rude to get the information directly on such a sensitive subject, but there will be other attendees who love nothing more than swapping secrets. The room is cold and clean

Fourth: You pull up the new trainer’s files. Abused girl is Aiko Katou. Mother is a barber, dad is a plumber. Good news is that they can’t really go after the company—the men will never believe you—Bad news is that if the family’s got nothing, they’ve got nothing to lose. Blackmail won’t do much. It might only succeed in letting them know where their daughter went. Still might try and get your hands on Why does the ceiling have teeth? By kings, this headache sucks.

Sixth: Blind girl is Cuicatl Ichtaca. From Anahuac. Fifteen years old. Here on a challenge visa. Explains how you’ve never heard of her. Didn’t report any pokémon. You’ll need to start her off slow or put her with some strong teammates for her protection, but if she’s psychic then she might be worth keeping around. If your interview checks out. Moles can be annoying; a telepathic mole could be a catastrophe of the highest order. The room is cold and. Stop. Breathe. You can’t find anything online about her and the commonwealth’s immigration services can be annoyingly leak-proof on minors, so that’s the end of that investigation. For now.

Seventh—something brushes against your leg. You look down to see Espy looking up at you, holding his leash in his mouth.

Seventh: Go outside. Take your fox on a walk. Stop thinking about work for a minute. Make new memories. Be calm. Outside is warm and dirty and open.

*​

You pull two water bottles and two packets from the refrigerator tucked under your desk and place them on the table. “Water, if you’re thirsty. I know those meetings last a while. And I put some gummies there, too. Good to eat every two hours or so. Good for your brain.”

Her hand freezes in midair right before taking the water. It’s only for a moment, and she proceeds on like nothing had happened.

“Hey, it’s fine. You can’t be responsible for things you didn’t know to do.”

She doesn’t answer that. Natural shyness? Nervousness? Poor English? You never realize how much your scans are a crutch until you find yourself without them.

“Who are you? Besides your name,” she asks.

You smile. Uselessly. Doesn’t matter either way.

“Right. I’m Rachel. I’m one of the Vice Presidents for VStar. I handle new recruits, among other things.”

“…and I’m not in trouble?”

“No. No, not at all. Just don’t get many psychics passing through. I try to meet with them individually.”

“I meant for the, um. Did I hurt you?”

Yes. Yes, you did.

“Not very much,” you say, bringing a smile into your voice. “Napped, took a walk, cleared my head. It’s fine now.” And it mostly is. Espy could help a little once he had some sunlight to power him up.

Her head dips a little. Shame, probably. “Okay. I’m sorry.”

“No, no. Don’t worry about it. I’m the one who,” time to take a drink of water and figure out how to finish that sentence without coming off wrong, “reached out to your mind first. Should have asked. Standard for new psychics.” You set the bottle down. Nailed it.

“Oh.”

Is there a polite way to ask her about her English skills? Because you don’t actually have a Nahuatl speaker in the building. That you know of. Might be a good idea to check.

“You don’t have much training with your powers, do you?”

She gently shakes her head. “No. My mom’s reuniclus taught me a little. I figured some of the rest out. Never met a psychic but my brother.”

“You grew up around pokémon, then?”

Her lips curl into a smile and she makes (near) eye contact as a hundred tiny things change in her expression. She goes from sullen and afraid to absolutely adorable in the blink of an eye.

“Yes. My mom’s team lived near the house. I took care of them. She had a reuniclus, a heatmor, a swanna, a ferrothorn, a conkeldurr,” she really is infectiously cute when she’s excited, with her kind of high pitched voice and its rapid pace, “and a hydreigon.”

Your heart skips a beat. Her face is the exact same but all of the cuteness gone.

“A hydreigon?”

“Yes! Her names are Alice, Dorothy, and Ilsa. Alice was first and is in the center so that’s her one name. But she prefers her three names.”

A wild hydreigon flew within thirty miles of the academy once and they shut down classes for a week. Parents accused them of underreacting.

“Uh huh. And, um, you took care of her? Them?”

“She likes ‘ellas.’ She doesn’t know that there’s more than one language and they have different words,” she says. As if this is just a normal thing.

“I see.”

You are very, very glad that she can’t see the color of your face right now. You know full well that your alakazam is a telepathic monster that can fry a man’s mind in seconds, but you will never, ever be comfortable with dragons. And why should you? You’ve seen one absolutely shred a tank without breaking a sweat. Do dragons sweat? You have absolutely no desire to look that up.

Focus. You need to change the subject a little. Useful information in those statements? She has a brother, but he’s presumably not here. If Cuicatl cared for her mom’s hydreigon, her mom also can’t be in the picture anymore. Or she was horribly irresponsible. Either way? Dangerous topic. She speaks Spanish and seems to have a decent grasp on English. Cuicatl said she doesn’t have any pokémon on the form. How did that happen? Did it happen? She wouldn’t be the first kid to tell a lie on their paperwork. Okay. Alice. Ellas. How did she find out that Alice liked ellas?

“Can you speak to pokémon?”

“Sometimes. Not with Alice. In her mind, at least. But we understand each other.”

“I see. What all can you do with your mind? I can tell secrets and foresee pain.”

“…secrets?”

She runs a shade paler and you can hear her foot tap against the side of the chair. Nervous tic that you share.

“Not yours. Your shielding is very good. Not trained, but effective.”

“Oh. Thank you. Renfield—reuniclus taught me that.”

That wasn’t an answer. But it does explain why it felt so much like the headaches Espy can give you when she’s really, really angry.

“Talking to pokémon is usually telepathy, then. Projecting and reading thoughts. Empathy is sensing emotions. There’s usually some overlap, but not always.”

She frowns. “I think I just have telepathy. Do people usually only have one thing?”

You shake your head. Um. Time to fix that. “Sometimes. You don’t see things before they happen? See things you shouldn’t? Move things with your mind?”

“I don’t see anything.”

Poor wording. Anne would’ve torn you a new one if she’d heard. But Cuicatl doesn’t look too offended. Even smiling, just a little. But not nearly as brightly as before.

“But you can’t do any of those things?”

“Right.”

You give her a chance to follow up. She doesn’t. Just shifts in her seat and idly taps a foot on the floor, soft enough that she probably doesn’t even know she’s doing it. Whatever rapport you built talking about her pokémon, it’s gone now. Time for another subject change.

“What brings you to Alola, then?”

“I wanted, um, to go on a journey? And Unova didn’t want to take me. I don’t have much money so a girl in the Pokémon Center said I should come here.”

There’s a shred of truth in there, but she’s an awful liar. Don’t even need your telepathy to see through that. New topic options: PsiTest scoring seems a little too close to the last question and she doesn’t want to talk about why she’s here so… old pokémon.”

“Did you bring any of your mom’s team with you?”

She freezes up. Full deerling in headlights. Shit shit shit shit abort abort abort.

“Hey its—”

“No, I didn’t.” Speech is off. Breathing is erratic. Approach and escalate? Keep quiet and seem callous? Response depends on the type of breakdown you’re seeing.

…the kid has to be alone here. Half an ocean from home, at least one parent out of the picture, apart from her pokémon for maybe the first time…

She shouldn’t have to have panic attacks alone.

You get up from your seat and move around the desk to kneel beside her. Then you put a hand on her shoulder and press down a little bit. “It’s alright,” you whisper, “we can get you new friends and a new pokémon.”

The waterworks open in full. Before you can decide if you should hug or not, Espy jumps into her lap. Kid didn’t mention owning a dog, fox, or cat, but she’s still a gentle petter. Holds out her hand for a second for Espy to sniff. Then gently pets the ears and runs her hand back in slow, light strokes.

You take the moment to think as Cuicatl’s breaths get steadier. You remove your hand from her shoulder to avoid smothering her. Homesickness? Trauma? Other mental illness? Kid needs emotional support in any case. Ideally something intelligent enough for her to talk to, social enough to cuddle, and fluffy enough to pet. Difficulty of care and bonding shouldn’t be problems difficulty of bonding if she kept herself and a hydreigon alive. Maybe something a little difficult to distract her. Eevee would work. Not big enough to be a good guide, though, even when fully evolved.



There is a pokémon that fits all of those criteria, but she’s trouble. She’d either be a silver bullet for Cuicatl’s problems or a lead bullet straight to her heart.

You put your hand back on Cuicatl’s shoulder and she flinches from the touch.


Chapter 1 Review

— I wanna open by saying that I’ve never read a story structured quite like this one. I admittedly groaned when I realized it was in second person present tense… but then I got to reading it, and you know what? Your prose and the unique pacing of the story makes it work, I think. I actually feel quite immersed when reading, which is a fantastic relief.

— Speaking of prose, I adore how blunt it can be at times. I like its brute-force simplicity.

— Kudos for easing the reader into the early revelation of Rachel’s psychic powers. Making a second person story work requires having a good grip on showing vs telling, and you’ve definitely got it. Because you opened it up with mentioning that “feeling,” it ended up being a lot less confusing than jumping straight into the telepathic conversations in the present, and made it a lot more organic than if you’d just said outright that she had powers like that.

— That brief mention of Team Skull didn’t escape me, and thank goodness for that. Brings up a lot of questions, and perhaps answers a few as well. Is it safe to assume this is taking place post-SM?

— Maybe it’s just timing, but being a college student myself with a fragmented sleeping schedule, I feel like I can relate especially with Rachel. A forty five minute nap? Yep. Sounds about right. You certainly capture that vibe with her really well.

— I like the sudden descriptions of hallucinations during Rachel’s headache, swapping clauses mid-sentence and whatnot. That’s one of my favorite prose techniques lol. And the details were stellar too; they tied back really well to the exact examples of metal walls and dangerous-looking inanimate objects that had been tossed out earlier.

— Ayyyy, it’s Cuicatl! :D

— I see you’ve taken the (pre gen 6) adage that dragons are overpowered to quite an extreme here. iiiiinteresting.

— I have a feeling, based on a certain PMD campaign, about who this “trouble” Pokémon might be, hehe.
 
Last edited:

Pen

the cat is mightier than the pen
Staff
Partners
  1. dratini
  2. dratini-pen
  3. dratini-pen2
This chapter really puts Kekoa's hypocrisies in the spotlight. I enjoyed the way you unpacked just what the pokemon of Alola actually mean to him. Turns out, when he says sacred, what he means is "ours." Pokemon are communal property of kanaka people, a means of fighting back. So Makani's assertion of agency creates a problem--Kekoa's native, he belongs. What does it mean that his pokemon wants to go? It's not so much that he's upset about being a bad trainer--he's afraid that he doesn't belong enough. That he's unworthy of his birthright. You do a good job showing the amount of motivated thinking he's doing on the Makani issue, particularly when it comes to Cuicatl, though in places the internal transitions were abrupt.

The structure of the chapter, as your discord summary highlighted, is basically, Kekoa talks to a lot of people. I'm a big fan of chapters that focus on internality and do it through a series of conversations, but the conversations did feel a little strung together to me. The first scene in particular felt unnecessary--it didn't reveal anything about Kekoa. I'd maybe recommend starting at the pier. The atmosphere in that scene, with the darkness and the slaughtered magikarp and the hooked fineon was strong.

I wasn't sure what the upshot of Kekoa's conversation with Kanoa was. Is he agreeing to release Makani? Makani did feel like the missing presence in this chapter, especially since with how you switch POVs it will be a while before we're back with Kekoa. I would have been interested in seeing them interact from Kekoa's perspective. It would have also broken up the string of human-human conversations with a "conversation" that's not, since Kekoa can't understand (and doesn't really want to.)

Lyra! Very excited to see where this all leads.

Line-by-lines:

She fishes a small bag out of her coat pocket and holds it out to Cuicatl. The blind girl doesn’t take it; you do. Even if she doesn’t want it, maybe you can find a use. “It’s two Flyinium crystals. One for you and one for someone else. There’s not a flying trial right now so they’re a little hard to get.”

“Leave,” Cuicatl repeats. Gentler. Maybe with tears in her eyes. Or maybe that’s just a trick of the dim, ever-shifting squid light.

“Okay. If you do want to contact me—”

“Get out,” you add.

“Alright, alright.”
Hm, this encounter felt a little video-game with a character popping up just to hand over an item. It's not unbelievable that Meredith would do this, I guess, but since none of it means much to Kekoa, it does feel a bit random.

You wonder if the bird cares about the rain.
Wasn't quite sure what this was meant to mean? Like, is he wondering if the talonflame didn't want to fly out in what is presumably raining?

For once she has to guide you. She has one hand on her beldum and one clamped hard onto your elbow as she drags you along. The talonflame girl is thankfully going in the other direction. Even if that does mean that you can barely see anything at all as you walk towards the VStar building.
This paragraph contradicts a little--it implies Kekoa can see less than Cuicatl, but he sees which direction the talonflame girl is going in?

It’s not a great trip, even accounting for the tension and the rain.
The wording feels odd, what makes the trip bad apart from the tension and the rain?

Ordinarily it would be filled with life and bathed in sunlight at this time of day in the middle of the mainland winter.
Had to read this a few times. The idea is that normally it would be warm and sunny here, even though it's winter on the mainland? Why does Kekoa care what's happening on the mainland?

The temperature keeps dropping every day.

You wonder how the forests will come out of this. Two weeks with no food and constant cold. Which grass-types will survive? Which won’t?
Chilling here. I hope we're going to hear more about how the blackout is effecting the wild pokemon,

Pixie seems satisfied with herself, but you’ve noticed that Cuciatl barely lets her tyrunt out of her ball. Hekeli demands to come inside as soon as she’s shit and Makani… well, apparently Makani hates you. If Cuicatl is to be believed. You still aren’t sure about that.
The transition here felt a little abrupt, moving from a concern with grass pokemon, to going through the pokemon he's in close proximity to.

She might be getting jealous. All three of her pokémon are powerhouses. Tyrantrum and metagross (because of course she’s going to evolve the damn thing, whatever she promises you) are some of the strongest pokémon to ever live. Keokeo are full of tricks and masters of hailstorms. Maybe she just wants to have all the strong pokémon between you both. Talked Makani into rebelling so you wouldn’t have a vikavolt.
I know Kekoa's reasoning is supposed to be sketch here, but it's really hard to follow how Cuicatl having three powerhouse pokemon would make her jealous of Kekoa.

Plus, she had her run in with a sensu oricorio two days ago, which, yeah, you don’t envy her. Hearing your parents berate you would be… it would be something. There would be bad feelings, of course, but at least you’d be reminded what they sounded like.
Transition here doesn't work for me. How is this paragraph "plus" following from the last one? It's a complete switch in topic and one from where Kekoa is pissed at Cuicatl to a thing he's sympathetic about.

Did Jabari keep home videos? He had to have, right? Somewhere. No way he threw those away when he enlisted since, you know, his parents had just died. But if you asked for them there would be strings attached. It would look like you were just fine with him sending you to foster care for years just because he was sorry enough to give you shit that was rightfully yours anyway.
This really checks out, and is a very Kekoa bind to be in. I can see why he wouldn't want to reach out and how he's hurting himself by not doing so.

Cuicatl starts reeling something in. She says that she’d never fished before (“not with a rod, anyway,” whatever that means), but she can at least reel it in well enough. You still have to cast because you don’t have an idea how to explain it to her in the dark. She lifts up the pole and Pix starts growling. Cuicatl sighs and hauls the fish onto the pier where it starts madly flapping. “Magikarp.” A red flash briefly illuminates the docks. “Coco, Pix, you want it?” There’s increasingly frantic thrashing sounds and the smell of ozone before the fish goes still. Cuicatl hands you the rod to cast again as her pokémon start devouring their lunch.
How much Kekoa can see here is confusing me. He can see well enough to cast, but the way the magikarp is described only by sound and smell implies he can't see it?

And the last one slashed your hand up pretty good while you tried to hold it down.
This feels very representative of Kekoa's relationship with Alolan pokemon in the chapter.

during a slow-motion Sootopolis.
Ooh, nicely-phrased.

“Doesn’t work like that,” she mutters, confirming that it does, in fact, work like that.
Hah!

Makani hadn’t been spitting in your face as much, you bought her a thunder stone (which blew through most of your savings right at the start of an indefinite crisis), and then out of nowhere she just turns on you again.
Wow at his metrics. I love how this is coming after him thinking about how his brother tried to bribe him to win his affection, and he just unironically adopts the same logic--'but I bought her an expensive thing!!'

“Foreigners keep coming here to catch grubbin and get themselves a vikavolt. Got so bad that they almost went extinct on this island.” VStar was a big part of that. It was the first thing you learned about them as a kid and if you didn’t need to kick out the imposter queen you would want nothing to do with them. “But they’re our birthright. One of our strongest weapons against the occupiers, and they’re just stealing them. If I abandoned her, she’d probably fall into one of their hands.”
Ah, so he sees native pokemon not as beings to be respected, but weapons in the righteous struggle.

“Kekoa,” her voice is much, much harder than before. “You don’t trust me at all, do you?”

“I—” Do you? She’s going through a lot right now, and you’ve insulted her dead brother and mom. Still, you’ve been traveling with her for three months at this point. You’d trust her not to poison you. To keep you safe. But for Makani to just turn on you… you’re not a bad trainer. A bad person. You were making progress.
I couldn't follow the progression of his thoughts here. The fact that she's going through a lot is a reason not to trust her? He insulted her dead brother = she's trying to take revenge or something? I think I just want this to be a little more explicit.

The finneon capture is necessary because you need money to take back your kingdom. Makani is necessary because you need power to take back your kingdom. And they’re your people’s pokémon. Your birthright. The ancient kings hunted. The island challenge has been going strong for centuries with many kings and kahunas using vikavolt. Besides…
It's a possessive thing, huh? They're his birthright. They don't belong to outsiders, because they belong to his people, him. Very different model than Cuicatl, who sees pokemon as beings with agency, not property.

“Kekoa, I’m a predator,” she says. Probably to answer your last question. And for a moment you’ll pretend that the tiny blind girl that needs help casting for fish could be a predator. “I was practically raised by one. And predators can tolerate prey. Respect them. But the predators will starve if they do not eat the prey. If I need to catch finneon or kill magikarp to feed myself or my pokémon, I will. That’s how nature works.” Sometimes you have to drown someone else to stay afloat. You know that damn well.
This checks out for Cuicatl. Her philosophy makes sense as one she'd have from growing up with a hydreigon.

Shit. That’s way better than home videos. You would kill for that. For a tenth of that.
I liked this moment of Kekoa being jealous of what Cuicatl's powers give her. Just as she'd be jealous that he has a living brother who doesn't hate him.

The orphanage had an oranguru and porygon that helped take care of the kids, sure, but you were never as close to them as the humans there.
Never as close to them as the humans there? Don't follow this. Makes it sound like Kekoa isn't human.

When you met back up outside Lush Jungle, she demanded to know where her brother had been. That. You’re better than that. You were supposed to be better than that. Unlike Jabari, you don’t just abandon family for years, whether or not you’re related by blood. And yet.
Lots of Kekoa hypocrisy this chapter.

Your responses have been short and polite. Because as much as you want to, you can’t just yell at her until she never talks to you again. Or leave her cold. Again.
I had kind of forgotten about this character. I don't know if there's anyway you could work in these texts in previous chapters (or maybe you have and I'm just forgetting) so that she feels more like someone who's been on his mind?

Then joy is pumped right back into her voice. “But things are actually calming down over here. The volcarona refused to shine for a bit, because some kid had just tried to steal a larvesta.”
Stealing a larvesta is something potentially disastrous, right? Why does she get excited talking about it? Seems off.

Find some kid with talent and a need to get a lot of money, fast. But uh. She worships the sun, right? There’s no way that she’d just go and piss off a sun god or demigod or whatever volcarona are over there.
I can follow the train of thought, but it does feel a little abbreviated.

“You work for them, right?”

“I—”

“Kind of figured between the weird island-hopping thing and, um, not really having much money. Unless your brother is paying for—”

“He very much isn’t.” You wouldn’t let him.

“Just checking.” And judging. She’s definitely judging. Fuck her. Never been through half of what you have, yet she thinks she can judge.
This is so Kekoa. Don't you dare judge me for working for the evil org that's stealing sacred pokemon!!

“Kanoa, I ignored you for years. Just. It’s okay to let me go.”

“Well,” she says, still sounding far too cheery. “You’re the one who called me.”

“Right. I need some advice.”
I like Kanoa. She's clearly had practice putting up with Kekoa's shit.

I rented a thunderstone
Earlier it says bought? Don't get how renting works, are thunderstones multi-use?

“She says that Makani, the grubbin, wants me to bury him in the woods with the thunderstone.”

“And you don’t want to?” She doesn’t sound as judgmental as you were fearing. That’s good.

“Yeah. Things were going okay and it’s dangerous out. And if he does stay with me until he evolves, I can return the thunderstone. I don’t see why he can’t just travel with me for a while.”

“You could just go back in a couple months to unbury the stone.
I like how Kekoa leads off with this bullshit pretext. If the thunderstone cost were all he cared about he could just return it and release the grubbin.

Kanoa jumped to the least important part. He’s safer with you and… and you need power. A lot of it.
🙃

Pokémon, even the ones that agree to go with people, usually want to go back to their own lives eventually. For bugs, a few months can be a lot of time. A year can be far too much to ask of them.
Nice, I like the distinction about the lifespans of bug-types.

You want to scream that you don’t need it. That this is your fucking country and you know how to live in it. How to use it against the conquerors. Plumeria and the other Skull leaders taught you the myths at the base of Lanakila. You know enough.
Mmm. This feels like the crux of the chapter and hits hard.

She leaves you on read again.
Lol, I love how much Plumeria gives no shits and Kekoa gives so many.

You doin return because might as well minimize the shit you’re in.
Typo, missing space.

“Hi,” she says. “I’m Lyra. A friend of Genesis’s.”
! this should be fun

Last sentence is clunky, and the "of" already makes it possessive, so you don't need the apostrophe.
 
Fighting 3.7

Persephone

Infinite Screms
Pronouns
her/hers
Partners
  1. mawile
  2. vulpix-alola
Fighting 3.7: The Real Monsters
Lyra

[12:04:39]​

Gela’s leaving.

You can’t blame her. Not really. She likes pokémon well enough, but camping? Not a fan. Even before The Blackout you were getting worried that she’d quit early, go home, and start applying for college. Being trapped in a hotel room for a week and a half certainly hasn’t improved her view of the island challenge.

You’ve pleaded with her. Reminded her that she loathes her mom. Hell, she only hit the trail to get away from the woman. You couldn’t see Gela roll her eyes, of course, but you know she was doing it.

“I survived sixteen years there, I can live a few months more. Especially if I don’t have to see her face.”

And that was that. Nothing else you could do that would get her to stay.

Well, you could’ve kissed her.

That would’ve gone real fucking well.

The waves crash against the beach and the cool water goes all the way up to where you’re sitting. Shit. Didn’t realize you were that close to the surf. At least you have extra underwear at home. And if it’s already wet, might as well stay here longer, lost in your thoughts.

Nisshoko lands on your shoulder. A moment later the noibat gives a reassuring squeal into your ear.

“Hey, buddy. It’s fine. I really don’t need that.”

He squeals again out of either victory or defiance. Then he flies off.

Your starter, Mirai the absol, is huddled down at your feet, occasionally moaning softly. Poor girl. She started going nuts right before Necrozma arrived and has had a headache ever since. Too many disasters going on. Jishin the mudbray digs down into the dryer sands. None of them seem to mind the temperature too much. Noibat live in caves, mudbray have thick skin, and absol live on Lanakila.

Unfortunately, the cold does bother you. Your wardrobe was meant for cool nights at the coldest. Mirai at least has warm fur and a willingness to cuddle. And Nisshoko can help with the darkness. You’d caught her for help navigating caves, but totally dark apocalyptic hellscapes are also right up her alley. You have nothing to provide light. The internet says the best options in the unnatural darkness are staryu and inkay.

Both are undesirable for the same reason.

Even if you did have light, you’d have another problem: you’d be traveling alone. No one to talk to on lonely nights, no one watching your back, no one for moral support when you need it. And if the worst were to happen, there’d be no one to report your injury. Solo hiking is a terrible idea. But Gela had to up and leave because of a teensy tiny endless night.

You’d contact Genesis. Ask if you were maybe forgiven and if she’d travel together. You’ve heard that her parents kicked her out. If there’s one upside to the kiss – okay, the kiss itself was an upside – it’s that she’s finally away from her toxic parents.

You’ve tried to get in touch with her, but… the league doesn’t publish the names of trial winners to make it harder for stalkers and abusive relatives to find them. She has no social media presence. (“Too many temptations.”) You even tried to hire a PI but he wouldn’t take money from a kid. Father refuses to involve himself in what he sees as an internal affair of the Gage family.

So you’re stuck here. Alone. In frigid, dark air.

You dig your feet into the sand for warmth, only to realize that the sand is even colder than the air above it.

[12:12:59]​

You’re woken up by nightmares. That’s not unusual. The first has been normal as of late: Genesis kicks you over a railing and you fall to your death. The second, a particularly dedicated buzzwole chasing you around Route 3, isn’t normal. No idea what your subconscious was doing there. The third… the damn psychic and his alakazam…

2011​

You’re tied up on a couch. A man with cruel eyes stares into your brain while an alakazam meditates in midair beside him. You can feel the man’s crawling into memories and he doesn’t care that you know he’s doing it. You try to avert your eyes, but the feeling doesn’t stop. He doesn’t need eye contact, so you meet his gaze again out of defiance. He smirks. “Your daughter is brave, Mondo.”

Your father doesn’t respond.

“Real shame you couldn’t keep your mouth shut around her.”

Cold panic runs up your spine and you start testing the limits of the ropes around you. You try to be subtle enough that the man doesn’t notice, but he does. And he laughs. He laughs long and hard and you have time to plea to Ho-oh for a fast voyage to… whatever comes next.

“Relax, kid. I’m already finished.” What? How— “Try to remember what he told you.”

The man is here because father… you were walking through the forest or—no, it was in this room and—

“Exactly.” The psychic turns to his alakazam and places a hand on the pokémon. “Do be more careful in the future, Mondo. I might not be able to make so clean a cut next time.”

Both pokémon and master disappear in a spiral of twisted space. Your father rushes over with a kitchen knife and starts cutting your bonds, profusely apologizing for doing something you can’t even remember.

*​

His cruel eyes bore into yours even once you wake from the dream. It’s almost worse when your waking mind can think it over. At first you thought that he just took a memory. But how can you be sure? He could have given you new ones, made you forget people, even changed your entire personality. And you wouldn’t know. You don’t know. You’ll probably never know.

Usually, you chase that nightmare away by turning all the lights in your room on and staring at the ceiling for hours until you fall asleep again. You can still try it (and you do), but it isn’t quite as comforting when the light barely expands to cover the lampshade.

Screw this. You’re better off just starting your day. You take a very long shower, hoping it washes your worries away.

It doesn’t.

Then you start journaling. You have to do it on your phone now, since you couldn’t really write on a dark page. That’s not ideal. Phones can be altered in a way that books can’t be. You won’t make it easy on your enemies, though. After you finish writing down yesterday’s events and today’s plans, you email the note to three separate accounts. Then you log into one of those accounts and forward it to another. Someone would have to not only alter your mind but hack several different websites to change your reality.

For good measure you update the “Who I Am” document to make sure that nothing critical gets changed. That also gets forwarded onto all your accounts. It’s unnecessary – you haven’t really changed that much as a person in the last month – but it’s reassuring.

You exhale. Inhale. Exhale. Inhale. Deep breaths. Not working. You fumble for your phone in the dark and turn it on. 6:51 A.M. The Pokémon Center will open up soon. You need to pick up Rigan-ryū, your pyukumuku. She got attacked by something on the way to Hau’oli and you couldn’t really treat the injury in the dark. Nurse said she’d be fine, though. She’d just need a few days. That was fine. Not like you’d be doing much of anything.

Might as well get ready to pick up your pokémon.

Appearance can be a shield. When you have to deal with dad’s business contacts, you put on your nicest dress and a half-hour’s worth of makeup and wear them like armor. If you look and act like you’re in control, then the people around you can start to believe it. Now it’s too dark to properly apply your makeup and it wouldn’t be appreciated anyway. You’re left with just your clothes between you and the world.

You pull up the Pokémon Center’s address and begin the walk, Mirai keeping pace beside you. She can’t actually see in the dark, but her disaster sense means that she tenses up right before you’d trip or run into something. Really, anyone who spent any time at all around an absol would learn that they stop disasters, not cause them. But the old superstitions are hard to break. You'd probably still get weird looks from senior citizens if anyone could even see anyone. Cold air gets into your slacks as you walk through the eerily quiet city streets. Your jacket fares a little better against the cold, but only just. By the time you reach your destination you’re trying to remember the highest temperature at which you can get hypothermia.

Ho-oh above and Lugia below, how cold is it?

Forty-five, your phone says. It’ll be below freezing in a few days if it keeps dropping like this.

Maybe Gela was right.

You finally reach the Pokémon Center. Only the doors are illuminated by a faint glow from the inside. Inkay light. Great. Just… great. At least they’re government owned. And you’ve just updated your diaries. You swallow and step inside.

The receptionist looks up at you when you enter. “Can I help you?”

“Yes, I’m here to pick up a pokémon.” You flash her your best smile once you’re fully in the light. She glances at, no, beside you. Then promptly looks back to you with a smile of her own. Not too opposed to absol, then. Good. She looked too young to believe the old superstitions, but sometimes you’re surprised by just who pulls you aside and gives you a warning in hushed tones.

You get your pokéball after a few minutes of waiting.

“Since you cleared a trial within thirty days of the blackout, you’re welcome to get breakfast here,” the receptionist says. It’s probably not good breakfast. Pokémon Centers vary in quality, but they’re rarely more than tolerable. Booking a hotel room was an easy choice. Once you managed to find one, of course. It was a very stressful afternoon when you first got back to Hau’oli.

Breakfast is breakfast, though, and right now you’re steadily depleting your rations with every meal. Might as well deplete someone else’s.

There aren’t many people eating breakfast at this hour, even though the Centers are supposedly super crowded. A pair of older teenagers huddled together in a table as far away from the inkay as they can get. And then one girl your age with a vulpix sitting beside her and a beldum floating over her shoulder. You flinch at the beldum, but it’s probably fine. The Pokémon Center’s inkay wouldn’t let someone else’s pokémon assault you, right? Unless the psychic-types are working together…

You recognize the trainer, though. Green hair, dark skin, clouded eyes, and bird-like limbs. Very different from Genesis, but not unattractive. When you fought a long time ago she’d only had a vulpix against your pyukumuku.

You grab your food. The only option for lactose-intolerant vegetarians is a box of dry cereal. Lovely.

From what you remember of the girl she’d been quite clever, even if her vulpix was weak. Figured out how to bait your pyukumuku into extending her innards without being able to see the pattern. Might be worth getting reacquainted. You’ll need new traveling partners, after all, and even if she isn’t thinking about continuing on when this all blows over, she might know someone who is.

She looks up when you pull out a chair.

“This seat taken?”

The girl shakes her head and you sit down.

“I’m Lyra, by the way. We fought way back when in Hau’oli. Your vulpix against my pyukumuku.” Said vulpix starts growling softly before a nudge from her trainer quiets her down.

“I remember you, yes.” Her face is mostly neutral, but she seems a lot more interested in swirling around her spoon in what little is left of her breakfast. Right. Probably doesn’t have fond memories of that loss. “I’m Cuicatl.”

“Anyway, just wanted to check in and see how you’re doing.”

“Fine, I guess.”

Cuicatl goes back to picking at her breakfast. You consider leaving it there, but you have nothing else to do and to be honest you’re a little starved for human contact after however long in your hotel room. Not like there’s anyone more interesting around. Besides, there’s always one thing that trainers love to talk about.

“Nice team you have there. Any others?”

A ghost of a smile appears on her face. Nailed it. “A tyrunt.”

You blink. “A what?”

Her smile grows. It takes her a moment to respond as she chews her food. “A tyrunt.”

“Shit. Between metagross and tyrantrum—”

“And ninetales.” The fox yips in approval.

“—and ninetales…”

She shrugs. “I like predators.”

“Why?”

Her spoon halts right below her mouth. “…why?”

“I, uh.” You might have gotten a little ahead of yourself. Just. There are monsters in the world who envy the predators that can hurt anyone, any time. If they can have that power for themselves, they’ll gladly take it. Thankfully those assholes usually tell on themselves pretty quickly. “Like, why do you want that much power? Be the very best? Like in the cartoons?”

She scoffs. “Different cartoons in Anahuac.”

Oh. Yeah, maybe a military brat trying to prove she has what it takes, even if she’s blind.

“And…” The smile vanishes and her spoon clatters back to the bowl as she tucks her hands into her lap. “No one hurts the predators. They can go wherever they want without fear.”

Ah. She wants that for herself. It’s impossible, of course. There are people who can hurt her and make her grateful for it, no matter how powerful she gets. But you don’t know how to explain that to her in a way she’d understand.

After all, no one else seems to.

But it’s a good answer and you like her more for it.

“What are your pokémon?” She asks. An obvious ploy to change the subject, but one you’ll oblige.

“You already met my pyukumuku. Then there’s an absol, noibat, and mudbray.”

She raises an eyebrow. You idly wonder who taught her how to do that. “Not going for a theme?”

You shrug. And then realize that she can’t see it. “Sort of.” You take another bite. Dry. Flavorless. At least there are raisins. “They’ll help me explore someday. Except the pyukumuku, maybe, but you can catch a lot of trainers off guard with it.” She winces. “Even some totems,” you say conciliatorily.

“Why do you want to explore?” she asks. A faint smile reappears as she hums. “You get to ask me a why question, I get to ask you one.”

“Well, I’ve always enjoyed going places,” except Japan, “and I’d like to see more someday. Lots of places that no human’s gone, you know? Most of Antarctica and the ocean floor, the interior of the Congo, the depths of Mammoth Cave…maybe I can find something there that no one else has. Do something that’s too big to be forgotten.”

“I wish you luck.” She says it kindly, but there’s a hint of dismissal. She makes no effort to stand and leave, though.

“Any places I should visit in Anahuac?”

Cuicatl tenses up and puts down her spoon again. “You probably shouldn’t,” she half-whispers. “They really don’t like Americans there.” She relaxes a tiny bit. “And I wouldn’t know what’s good; I’ve never seen any of it.”

When she smiles at her own joke there’s a moment you can see the building blocks of someone very cute. Different clothes than her athletic shorts and graphic tee. Maybe a white dress. Or blue or pink. Style her hair a little differently and do some contouring to round out the harsher lines on her face. Yeah. With her thin (but still somewhat toned) limbs and small size she could nail the cutesy aesthetic with a little effort. Regal would be a touch harder given her height, but with her predators it might be a look she could aim for in the future. Especially if she bulked up a bit. Toss in some heels and the right dress…

“Lyra?”

Ah, shit. Zoned out upon meeting a cute girl. Story of your life.

“Still here. Just thinking.”

Cuicatl nods and goes back to her meal. She’s not a fast eater, though. You have time.

“Planning to stay on the challenge after this is over?”

“Yes,” she replies. “I’m here on a challenge visa.”

Good. “So am I. Friend recently bailed on me, though, and I don’t think she’s coming back when this is over.”

“Same,” Cuicatl says. “I liked her, even if she was a little… traditional. Had to talk her out of some of her worse beliefs. But she went home and I don’t think she’s coming back.”

Isn’t that relatable?

“Which traditions? There are fundamentalists of all shades.”

“Church of Xerneas,” she responds. Ah. Your least favorite. Even if you’re technically on their membership rolls. “Was really against gay and trans people. Thought I was a pagan. She was making progress, but…” She sighs. “It doesn’t matter anymore.”

“What was her name? I have contacts who might be able to help?” It’s not entirely a lie. You probably know someone who knows someone. Went to one of their schools long enough to have a network going.

“Genesis Gage.”

Your heart drops and your eyes almost pop.

Shit. Shit shit shit. They took her back. And you doubt it was unconditional, either. What now? Put her into conversion therapy on the mainland? They already put their other daughter out of sight and out of mind? You were supposed to have helped free her, not get her locked up until she’s eighteen (or older). Ugh, fuck, you aren’t dealing with this in public. Need to retreat, think, calm down. Figure something out.

“Can we exchange numbers? I have a meeting to get to now, but I might be up for talking later.”

“Sure, my number is… wait do you have your phone out?”

“Yes.”

“Good. My number is…”

[12:17:31]​

You pace around the room, careful not to stray too far in the dark lest you hit the walls. On balance you slam your feet into the ground hard enough that you’d definitely get a noise complaint if you weren’t barefoot. Might get one anyway. Mirai watches from your bed, unsure what to do.

That’s fine. You’re unsure what to do. You can’t just go into the Gage residence guns blazing to get Gen out. Her father’s a billionaire in the private security business and he’s probably increased his guards to deal with UBs or looters. Sneaking in with the password won’t work because you don’t actually know the password. One of his staff always let you in. Even if you somehow got to Genesis she might not want to leave. She can be very set in her ways. You remember one conversation where you tried to talk her onto the cheerleading team. She was interested at first until she came back the next day trying to talk you out of it with some nonsense about sin. Wasn’t the first or last time you’d seen her talk herself out of something she wanted or into doing something she didn’t.

Fuck,” you snarl. “How are you so goddamn stupid?”

You aren’t sure if that question is directed at Genesis or yourself or both.

Your stomach growls and you almost swear at that, too. Word on the socials is that there’s a food shipment in later today, which should make the rationing a little less severe. At least one thing is going your way. You stomp again and huff, face scrunched into some grotesque parody of itself. You hear Mirai climb off the bed and walk over to you. She nuzzles her face against your side and you slowly exhale. Right. This isn’t helping anyone, least of all Genesis.

If you can’t do it alone, you’ll need help. Maybe someone in the staff will be sympathetic to Genesis, but probably not enough to defy their notoriously litigious employer. Your dad isn’t pissing off The Rocket’s business partner so some of his associates helping is off the table. The Skulls would just take Genesis as a hostage themselves. Maybe even execute her if Plumeria goes way off the deep end with her revolutionary schtick. Gangs are predictable; self-branded freedom fighters are less so. And you still aren’t sure how serious she is about that. Seems like Skull’s just been harassing tourists like they did under Guzma, just with more moralizing about it. Even odds she’s in it for the money. Genesis would still be a valuable hostage to her for the ransom.

The governor is one of Mr. Gage’s golf buddies. Some are half the Commonwealth’s judges. The FBI handles kidnappings but you aren’t even sure if this counts as that since she went willingly. A trump card for later, at least. Although you’re pretty sure Mr. Gage has the president’s personal cell number, so that might not even matter in the end.

It’s just you left. One girl to kidnap the daughter of one of the most powerful men in the world. Even if you succeeded there’s a good chance you’d rot in prison for life. Or the Rockets take care of you themselves for messing up business. Or both. You shudder at the thought.

Doing nothing isn’t an option, though. Can’t be. You’ll think of something, just...

Cuicatl. Cuicatl might have a metagross and tyrantrum someday. You’ve never seen any of the guards with anything close to matching a metagross in battle. Even tyrantrum can probably tank gunshots and crush smaller pokémon. And if Gage does send his daughter to the mainland then it might actually be easier to break her out. If you can get in Cuicatl’s good graces, train up your own pokémon, and figure out what the hell you do after you free Genesis, then you have a path out of this mess.

And she’ll be looking for a new traveling partner. Maybe even money to pay for her pokémon’s diets. You can fill both needs.

The endgame of that path involves aligning with a metagross. A potent telepath that likes humans in the same way that torracat like rattata. A game and a meal. But if you can be there for a while, get it to like you…

You sigh and shake your head before running a hand through Mirai’s fur. It’s a little coarse. Overdue for a brushing. Fine. You can do that. Something small to take your mind off of everything else.

Oh, the things you’ll do for your Genesis.

[13:01:17]​

A cargo ship docked in Hau’oli harbor with a few military ships escorting it. The governor announced a press conference shortly after. It’s both important news and a welcome distraction, and you happily tune in. Mirai is still out of her ball and sprawled out, part of her torso resting on your lap as you absent-mindedly brush her.

The press conference is difficult to see when it starts. It’s probably filmed in a dark room, and then you’re seeing it on your dim phone screen. There are two podiums, one with the governor behind it and the other with the champion. Selene’s almost entirely hidden behind her podium and she looks like an absolute mess. Her hair’s clearly been charred in a few places and she’s not even bothering to hide it. She’s wearing a t-shirt with visible mud and there’s either dirt or ash or dried blood on her face. Poor thing. At least she’s not trying to dress up. You remember seeing her at a fundraiser dolled up and looking incredibly uncomfortable in her own skin, eyes flitting around the room and breaths quick. You didn’t really want to be there, but you could at least hide it. It looks like she never learned to slip into a disguise; she just embraced facing the world as she is.

Good for her.

You would never, but good for her.

Selene clears her throat. “Good evening. Earlier this morning, we planned to meet with a solgaleo from a planet several lightyears and dimensions away. He could have opened a hole between dimensions and brought us to the necrozma.” But they failed, of course. The lingering darkness gives that away. “The solgaleo was intercepted and now has to find another wormhole to cross into our dimension and then cross the remaining distance on our plane. We do not know how long this will take. Even when he returns, there is no guarantee we will be successful against the necrozma.”

The governor’s glaring at her. Kid hasn’t learned to sugarcoat things. If anything, it sounds like she’s hedging by playing up the dangers.

“The darkness has not expanded in the last seventy-two hours. The world outside of the Mid-Pacific is entirely unaffected. Since it’s dangerous here and safe everywhere else, the Navy has begun sending ships to evacuate anyone who wants to leave. I encourage you to—”

“Thank you, Miss Perry.”

“I—”

“Moving on, almost all of the Ultra Beasts have been destroyed. No more have arrived after our young champion’s,” he scrunches up his face, “unfortunate failure to stop this calamity.” Is he trying to throw her under the bus? Imply that all of this is her fault? Shit. You knew he was a lonely, desperate old man, but that’s low even for him. “We also received our first shipment of supplies from the mainland today. More will be coming as the navigation logistics get worked out. There is no need to leave Alola. I repeat, there is no reason to leave Alola.”

“Sir—”

“We’re Americans here. We’ve faced challenges before and we can face this one, too. Heroes are working around the clock to keep our home safe and supplied. But they can’t do it alone. They need help. Your help. Every one of us contributes something to our home.”

“Sir—"

“If we are to survive however long this takes we will need people here to hold down the fort, to keep our homes safe and the economy running. Then, when the darkness recedes, we will stand taller and prouder than ever. But if we leave, if we run away, then there will be nothing left to return to. Not only can you stay, but it is your duty. To your family, your commonwealth, and your country.”

“There are still Ultra—”

“Alola is reopening for business. The island challenge and schools will reopen to ensure the good parents of Alola can help our economy. Furthermore, we are lifting the punishing rations and other emergency restrictions so that we may all eat well in our time of need.”

“The emergency is still ongoing—”

“Thank you all for what you’ve done so far and what you will do in the future. May Xerneas bless us all. Good night.”

The feed cuts out.

There’s cheering from down the hall. And outside your window. Are people celebrating this? Why? And what? That they can leave? That food is back? The island challenge? Just the tone of the speech? And didn’t they hear the champion trying to tell them that it wasn’t safe yet? Or see the look in her eyes as she realized she was sharing a stage with a madman?

“REOPEN ALOLA!” Someone shouts outside your door. You can hear him chanting the same thing as he runs down the hallway, until he eventually falls with a loud thud as he trips in the dark.

You ignore the chaos and start thinking about the important things.

No rationing. Getting any food could be difficult until ships start coming regularly. If ships start coming regularly. Wouldn’t be the first time a failing politician told a big, dangerous lie. You’ll need to snap up whatever food you can get as soon as it hits the shelves. You send out a few texts to the people you know in Hau’oli (especially the ones whose families probably do their own shopping) and set up alerts for a few shops and news channels.

Then you start thinking about longer term patterns. Namely, is Cuicatl even staying if this is what the island challenge is like now? You shoot her a quick text. You think she’ll stay. She’s blind and only one of her pokémon would actually mind the cold.

She answers shortly after. “On visa. Will slay.”

Probably a text-to-speech error there. You don’t correct her.

If she’s staying, then you need to figure out what you’re doing next. Staying with her would probably earn a lot of goodwill. But it would be dangerous in the darkness and cold, especially if the temperature keeps dropping and the wild pokémon become increasingly desperate. Most of the plants here are tropical. Hard freezes will kill many of them off. No plants means no food for herbivores. No herbivores means no prey for carnivores. Except, of course, for the people and pokémon that come to them. Cuicatl’s team has serious potential, but it’s still a little weak. She mentioned another traveling partner but supposedly he only has a trumbeak right now. That means that Mirai is by far the strongest pokémon any of you have access to. She’s tough, but not enough to stave off a braviary or salamence. Even a zoroark or particularly large raticate or gumshoos could be a threat. You’d also have to buy winter gear as soon as it becomes available again. Unfortunately, you’d been way off trail on Route 3 when The Blackout started, so by the time you got to Hau’oli all the shops had already run out. Not that they ever carried much in the first place. There’s exactly one mountain with regular snow in Alola and most trainers never even try to climb it.

Everything in you knows that you shouldn’t do it, but everything in you also knows you will.

You’ll never get another chance to ‘see’ Alola like this. A tropical land succumbing to darkness and cold is one hell of a thing to explore. And you’ve read about cave and arctic explorers for years. If there aren’t UBs, you can handle yourself. Maybe make a blog or write a journal you can later use for a book. No one’s ever traveled through a place quite like this. No one. You’d be one of the first in a world with fewer and fewer places left where no human has gone before. It’s practically handing you success. And all of the battle experience you might get. The power. It can’t keep you safe from everything, but a good team can help with a lot.

Maybe even with rescuing Genesis. And that’s what’s really most important, however much you want to explore for the sake of exploration.

Most people suck. The powerful hurt people, the powerless wish they could. You have to look strong to keep people from hurting you. Then no one will make you their plaything just because they can. Cuicatl at least had that much right. But she was wrong about one thing: there are people that no amount of strength can protect you from, because they can hurt you and make you love them for it.

Genesis never understood that. Almost refuses to. When she hurts people it’s because she’s trying to help them or genuinely doesn’t understand the harm in what she’s doing. She doesn’t deserve to be chewed up and spit out by an uncaring world. You owe it to her to get her away from her parents. She deserves it. Deserves to live without people trying to mold her into being heartless, just like everyone else.

If you stay you’ll get strong yourself. So will Cuicatl. You can get close to her (and her metagross) so that they’ll be on your side when the time comes. So you’ll stay. Explore. Train. Live out your dreams and try to save Genesis from your nightmares.

[14:11:40]​

Beldum are okay.

Your research showed that they aren’t powerful enough telepaths to voice their thoughts, much less alter those of others. And Cuicatl was right about them being excellent guides in the dark. It’s even pleasantly warm in the chilly air. Your hand brushes against Cuicatl’s while you both hold the beldum. Does she get little flutters when her hand brushes a cute girl’s? You aren’t sure if she’s gay. You actually hope she isn’t. From what you’ve heard her say about Genesis it doesn’t sound like they were on the path to becoming romantic. But you’d hate it if you went through the work of breaking Genesis’s closet door down only for someone else to reap the rewards. She isn’t even that hot either. She could be pretty, but you are.

By the time you get to the store there have to be five hundredth in line or something. And it won’t even open for another hour. Thankfully Cuicatl is in the Pokémon Center and you still have some rations, but you really doubt that there will be anything of value left by the time you get there. Dumbass governor lifting rationing. What did he think was going to happen?

It’s a little odd that Kekoa isn’t here. You met Cuicatl’s other traveling partner yesterday. He glared at you but agreed to take you on if you “paid your way.” That later got negotiated to half of expenses. You would’ve fought harder for your share being just a third but it might have irritated Cuicatl. You’d initially thought she had money if she could afford a visa out and tutoring to get her accent almost perfect, but she seems worried every time you talk about the budget.

There are also a lot of little things. She routinely thanks the Pokémon Center staff and cleans up after herself as well as she can while blind. Outside of her phone, cane, and beldum she doesn’t seem to have any fancy accessibility aids. And she’s staying in the Center in the first place. If you had to guess she’s middle class for Anahuac, which is probably working class or lower in Alola. Doesn’t explain the visa and accent, though.

Someone comes out to redirect the line into a different shape. It’s utter chaos in the dark as people shout and jostle to keep their place in line and accusations of cheating – and maybe a few fists – fly. Suddenly the area lights up. It’s a lot brighter than even a starmie could produce. You look closer and see something fairly tall and very bright in the middle of the street. An ampharos, then. There weren’t that many in Alola before the Blackout, and most were on Akala owned by farmers who weren’t eager to sell away their light source. Apparently, some dumbasses tried to steal them from the farmers, only to accidentally get a few killed in the crossfire. Your parents eventually bought one for a couple million a few days into the Blackout. You doubt they’d pay the same price for you.

If a fairly conventional grocery store has one then the government must have sent a few with the cargo ship. That’s good. They probably can’t be used in Pokémon Centers and the like since electronics and powerful electric-types don’t usually mix, but at least some of the larger businesses might get them.

“Any reason Kekoa’s not here?” you ask once the crowd’s noise settles to a dull roar in the background.

Cuicatl grunts. “Thought it was a lost cause. Got in line for clothes instead.”

“Might be right,” you mutter. Or maybe he won’t get clothes, either. The first few supply drops are going to really quickly until rationing is reinstated or a lot of people leave the islands. You’ll probably need to go through a scalper when you need food. But it probably can’t hurt to at least try to get it now. You weren’t going to be doing anything else, anyway.

“I’m not actually from Alola,” you tell her. Might score some empathy. Help smooth things over. Also opens up a chance to fish for information.

“Oh?”

“Yeah. I was born in Japan. Dad moved here for work about a decade back.”

She hums in consideration. “Was it strange to move?”

“Little bit. Didn’t like leaving my friends and my Galarian wasn’t too good at first. Got teased for it a lot by schoolyard bullies. Yours is great, by the way.”

“Ah. Bullies.” She scowls. “I’ve dealt with them. Mom’s American. They didn’t like that.”

You feel a pang of empathy at that. The bullies never really bothered you; you’d already stared down much scarier men at that point. But for a blind child of an outsider, it must’ve been particularly rough. “That’s one thing we have in common, I guess. Being bullied for our parent’s homeland. I take it your mother taught you Galarian?”

Cuicatl nods. “And television helped.”

“Feel that. I had Galarian tutors back in Japan, yet American cartoons taught me as much as they did.”

You lapse into comfortable silence as the line grows longer and longer behind you. Probably should’ve gotten here an hour before you did. Or more. Honestly should’ve camped out. But that would really require winter camping gear, and you’d have to camp out in front of a store to get winter camping gear…

At least you probably have the money to pay a scalper when all this is done. Might need to call your parents to beg for blood money, which you’re loathe to do, but it’s better than freezing to death or being stuck in Hau’oli for a month.

One more week stuck in your hotel room and you might kill someone.

“What was Anahuac like?” you ask. You’re getting bored and your phone is on low charge because you’re a fool who didn’t plug it in overnight.

“Well, there are sort of two Anahuacs. The capital and the large cities are really big and elaborate and fairly rich. Then there are a bunch of rural areas that aren’t. I was from one of those towns so I can really only talk about that.”

“Bit like Japan. Although the small towns weren’t really poor or anything. Just not rich.”

Probably. Honestly you rarely ventured out of Kogane. Your knowledge of small towns mostly comes from movies and television.

“What was Japan like?” Cuicatl asks. You take the chance to back off an awkward line of questioning.

“I lived in Kogane, one of the biggest cities. It was nice. The city has levels, sort of like a rainforest. There was the ground level. Then a bunch of the skyscrapers had bridges between them so you could walk across downtown from a hundred feet up. Oh, and there was an entire city built underground, too. Think it was meant to be a bomb shelter during the Cold War. Now there are a bunch of businesses and even apartments down there. We basically have three cities in one.”

“I suppose it’s nice,” Cuicatl says. “Not as cool as a city built on a lake, but still nice.”

“If you say so.”

The store doors open. A massive wave of bodies rushes through but it’s still barely a dent in the line. It takes you five minutes just to get to the entrance. Once you actually get into the overcrowded store, holding Cuicatl’s hand tightly so she doesn’t get swept away by the crowd, the shelves are almost bare. All you can find are a few bottles of bug spray and sunscreen, which are worthless in the cold and dark, and some lip gloss. You think about snagging the lip gloss when a fight breaks out behind you as a blond woman tries to steal from someone else’s cart.

Yeah. It’s not worth going through checkout.

“Total bust,” you tell Cuicatl. “Let’s go.”

You walk past at least four other fights on the way out. Employees are mulling around in the periphery, unwilling to step in and moderate. Can’t blame them. Not their fault the governor caused this shitshow by ending rationing when he did.

It takes a few minutes to get outside and reunite with Cuicatl’s beldum. It dutifully floats over when you exit and lets you put your hand onto it and guide Cuicatl’s there. After a few minutes of quiet walking you can’t hear the fights from that store anymore. By that point you can hear the yelling at another store as an employee on a loudspeaker tries to tell an angry crowd that all the food is gone. Similar scenes are probably playing out across the commonwealth right now.

It's truly Alola as no one has ever seen it before. Just not in the way you or the governor had hoped for.
 
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WildBoots

Don’t underestimate seeds.
Pronouns
She/Her
Partners
  1. moka-mark
  2. solrock
She likes Pokémon well enough, but camping? Not a fan.
Gela is incorrect. Also, you've capitalized pokemon here, and I don't think you usually do.

Especially if I don’t have to see her face.”
I wasn't sure if this was because darkness or not. It wasn't until later in this chapter that I was sure that the darkness is limited to Alola, and we don't know Gela so I wasn't sure if home for her was Alola or not.

And your brother isn’t answering your calls because you get to go on a journey while he can’t,
He did go for a little bit though, right? I'm not fully remembering.

Rigan-ryū the pyukumuku is filter feeding at the edge of the surf
Hahaha, I liked this detail.

well, the cold never bothered them anyway.

At least you have Nisshoko.
This transition is a little funky. The previous sentences are about her other pokemon, but I feel like it should follow sentences about fear, about the darkness and what it means.

If only you’d caught a sandshrew already. Then you’d be all set. Not that it would do you any good right now. Even if you could legally leave the city, there wouldn’t be anyone watching your back going forward.
I wasn't entirely clear what the significance of a sandshrew was to her here. To deal with the cold? I was also curious about her fixation on having a teammate and wanted that to be expanded more.

because of a teensy, tiny, endless night.
Hahahaha.

Jishin gallops over to protect you, just in case, and Nisshoko lands on your shoulder. If your pyukumuku has noticed, she’s not doing anything about it. Oh well. You knew what you were getting into when you chose your starter.
Aww, sweet. And then womp. It IS an odd choice for a first pokemon. I wanted a little more about why she'd chosen it, especially given it's ... uh ... not very cuddly.

The Skulls aren’t the Rockets. Not really. They’re less mafia, more freedom fighters. Or terrorists or incompetent fools, depending on who you talk to.
Sounds like she's got people in her life who sibscribe to each of those ways of viewing the Skulls. I like that they get to be a little complicated here. She's not sure where she stands.

The soft light on her face makes—salazzle. There’s a salazzle right there, and you’re not going to be a useless lesbian when Gen’s life is on the line.
This is another place where I wish we had ADex footnotes! I haven't read the salazzle entry yet. That cutaway made me think at first that she was noticing the salazzle and freaking out about how cool/powerful it is, not that she was noticing it manipulating her.

And I’d rather not have a dead white girl’s face plastered all over the news. That would mean war, and I don’t want one right now.
She sure sounds like she's In Charge of Things here, and I wasn't sure how much of that was intentional. Who is she to say to Plumeria what she wants on the news?

Your stomach churns. The one upside to the kiss—okay, the kiss itself was an upside. The second upside is that she finally got away from her shitty parents. And that just went up in smoke.
D'aww. It is interesting that she's calling getting away from her parents an upside when she doesn't really know what Gen has been up to all these months. I'm also wondering why we didn't get any tie-in here from her previous enounter with the group!

Psychics. The beach falls away and you’re tied up on a couch, a man with cruel eyes staring into your brain, an alakazam meditating in midair beside him. You can feel the man’s crawling into memories and he doesn’t care that you know he’s doing it. You try to avert your eyes but the feeling doesn’t stop. He doesn’t need eye contact, so you meet his gaze again out of defiance. He smirks. “Your daughter is brave, Mondo.”

Your father doesn’t respond.
I liked this sequence a lot! Really puts into perspective her pragmatism, fears, and approach to the skulls. Definitely scary.

Genesis kicking you over a railing to fall to your death. A particularly dedicated buzzwole chasing you around Route 3. Gen bleeding out as Plumeria towers over her. The damn psychic and his alakazam.

Usually you chase that nightmare away by turning all the lights in your room on and staring at the ceiling for hours until you fall asleep again. You can still try it (and you do), but it isn’t quite as comforting when almost all the room is still engulfed in treacherous shadows.
🙃
I appreciate how much thought you've given to all these different ways the darkness affects people.

the league doesn’t regularly publish the names of trainers that win trials. Makes it too easy for criminals and abusive family members to know where their target is.
Oooof that checks out, especially since so many of them are minors.

the little scrapes and burns that come with being a trainer
I liked this textural detail.

The Rockets win before you even know there’s a fight. The Skulls lose all the time and just take their loss.


He’s the gang member. You should make him feel like he’s in control.
Ooh, she's got experience dealing with these folks and knows how to fight back.

I have a single trumbeak.
Awww, he's committed to letting Makani go.

Or that Gen herself will want to leave. When she gets ideas in her head, they tend to stay there no matter how hard you try to knock them out.
Yyyup.

Long story.” Which just means that he doesn’t want to tell it.


You make her sound like a demon,” he mutters. “She isn’t. You don’t even know her.”
Nice to see him defending her here!

It looks like she never learned to slip into a disguise; she just embraced facing the world as she is.

Good for her.

You would never, but good for her.
Hahaha. Though, from Gen's POV she did seem to be pretty open and out there with her feelings and her forwardness.

None have arrived since our young champion’s first battle with Necrozma.” Is he trying to throw her under the bus? Imply that all of this is her fault?
I wasn't clear how this was blaming her. It almost sounds like trying to credit her with the lessening of the UBs.

If you can learn to deal with the cold, you can carry on your lives as normal. We even invite tourists to come experience the islands in an exciting new way. I trust that our champion will eventually fix the problem, but until then we can’t just put our lives on hold. All emergency restrictions will be lifted on Melemele, Akala, and Ula’Ula tomorrow. The island challenge will continue on those three islands, and the timer on trainer stays in Pokémon Centers between trials will start running again. Even if this alien has stolen our light, we cannot let it crush our spirits.”

“There are still Ultra—”

“Good night.”
Eeeek.

Wouldn’t be the first time a failing politician told a big, dangerous lie.
Nope, it sure wouldn't. I wouldn't know anything about that.

And one was around your Genesis for months. Is she still the same person?
A juicy question for her.

I enjoyed this peek into Lyra! Especially interesting was the alternative take on psychics, psychic-type pokemon, and their dangers. (Seems like Lyra should be fretting less over that sandshrew and more over getting a dark-type!) The scene with her being held hostage by a Rocket while Dad kinda watched was tough stuff, but compelling, and sure explains a lot of her behavior here.

What I didn't understand about her quite as clearly is why she cares so much about having another human to watch her back. It drove her to swing from being wary of Kekoa to trying to convince him to join her pod travel with her, and I needed a little more to support that. I love that she's getting so into the mix though. Some nice juicy conflict for Gen to return to. :D

I also appreciated the moment of celebrating Alola reopening ... and then someone promptly tripping. Reopening is going to go so, so well. Selene is having a bad time of things, oof. It seems like she's almost too tired to even want off this ride--she's on autopilot just moving forward. But she also seems to be nearing a breaking point. She's been hoisted into the political world, but doesn't actually have much political power, it seems.

Lyra's reasoning for wanting to stay is interesting. Obviously it's about Gen (which makes me wonder if she's tried to get in touch after the kiss and how that went!), but she also seems genuinely interested in becoming a literal dark tourist. She's very afraid of psychics, but is pretty down to take on other kinds of risks.

Hope you rest up during your hiatus!!
 

Pen

the cat is mightier than the pen
Staff
Partners
  1. dratini
  2. dratini-pen
  3. dratini-pen2
So we meet Lyra! You did a really nice job portraying how terrifying that kind of psychic manipulation could be and the impact it's left on her. I almost wanted even more--does she have a habit of writing herself notes when important things happen, to make sure she still has the information, even if her mind is messed with? Does she check her watch frequently, to make sure she hasn't lost time? I was surprised that none of her pokemon are dark-types--would seem like a natural for someone who never wants a psychic to be able to mess with them again.

I was interested in the final line of chapter, about getting stronger. It left me wondering what Lyra wants, beyond saving Gen. In the opening section she seems almost ridiculously eager to set out again, and couldn't quite figure out why. How eager she is to continue also has the effect of making her decision to stay not really feel like much of a decision, since that's where the chapter starts. It would seem natural that she'd want to get strong enough so that people don't have power over her. I wonder what impact seeing Selene at that fundraiser made on her. Selene is the definition of strength through pokemon, and she seemed to be able to do what Lyra can't--be her herself. But then, at the press conference, we see the limits of that kind of power, and where political power cuts in. I'm curious how the apocalypse impacts Team Skull's plans. The devolution of social order and recklessness of the government seems like pretty ripe grounds for them to assert themselves.

Lots of potentially volatile elements thrown into the air in preparation for the next arc. I'm a bit surprised that everyone's plans still seem to be business as usual, but I guess we'll see how long that lasts.

You’ve pleaded with her. Reminded her that she loathes her mom. Hell, she only hit the trail to get away from the woman. You couldn’t see Gela roll her eyes, of course, but you know she was doing it.

“I survived sixteen years there, I can live a few months more. Especially if I don’t have to see her face.”

And that was that. Nothing else you could do that would get her to stay.

Well, you could’ve kissed her.

That would’ve gone real fucking well.
Gela sounds pretty much like a replacement Gen here. Guess Lyra has a type . . .

“Hey, buddy. It’s fine. I really don’t need that.”

He squeals again out of either victory or defiance. Then he flies off.
Hah, very adorably realistic animal behavior.

You’d caught her for help navigating caves, but totally dark apocalyptic hellscapes are also right up her alley.
Get you a pokemon that can do both!

If only you’d caught a sandshrew already.
Didn't quite follow what sandshrew are for? Something to do with them being ice-types?

You sigh and dig your feet further into the beach’s sand.
A reminder that the sand is cold here might be nice.

She would want to hurt Gen to get to her family. Avenge the crimes of her great-great-grandfather.
This felt a little abbreviated. Does Gen find this reason valid or ridiculous? She's in a similar position with her family and the Rockets, does she worry about the same happening to her?

The one upside to the kiss—okay, the kiss itself was an upside.
Lyra's voice comes through strongly here.

Maybe send her to conversion therapy on the mainland until she turns eighteen. They already put one daughter out of sight and out of mind.
Oof, yeah, I hadn't thought about that, but that is the precedent in Gen's family. Yikes.

“I’d prefer she be freed,” Plumeria says. “It’s a distraction for some potential enemies. If you could help with that, well, it’d probably be gentler than if I got her out alone.”

You can’t even imagine that. Gen waking up in a Skull compound, either scared shitless or being unreasonably defiant of the sinners holding her hostage or both. But… maybe you could get her out yourself and keep her away from both her parents and Skull.

Plumeria extends her hand again, this time with a card on it. A name, an address, and a phone number are written in surprisingly pretty handwriting. “One of our members was traveling with her. He may help you.”

“Thank you—”
This exchange felt like it skipped a step or two. Gen's thought process here feels very compressed. I'd expect a little more skepticism. Plumeria's given a reasons she doesn't want Gen dead, but Lyra has had enough mob experience to know that there are things on the spectrum between free as a bird and dead.

I was also thrown by Plumeria's use of "freed"--that's how Gen thinks about it, but is it really how Plumeria thinks about it?

You can feel the man’s crawling into memories and he doesn’t care that you know he’s doing it. You try to avert your eyes but the feeling doesn’t stop. He doesn’t need eye contact, so you meet his gaze again out of defiance. He smirks. “Your daughter is brave, Mondo.”

Your father doesn’t respond.

“Real shame you couldn’t keep your mouth shut around her.”
Oof. Chilling scene. I like how physical it is.

Both pokémon and master disappear in a spiral of twisted space.
Nice phrase.

Usually you chase that nightmare away by turning all the lights in your room on and staring at the ceiling for hours until you fall asleep again. You can still try it (and you do), but it isn’t quite as comforting when almost all the room is still engulfed in treacherous shadows.
I was a bit confused as to what she's doing here. Inkay light everything now, right? So what does turning on the lights look like?

Then it’s time to get dressed and put on makeup. Less than usual. That unnerves you. If you have to deal with dad’s business contacts, you put on your nicest dress and a half hour’s worth of makeup and wear them like armor. Now you consider dressing down.
The wording here was odd. When it says "Less than usual. That unnerves you." it sounds like her putting on less makeup is something outside her control, rather than a choice? And then at the end of the paragraph she considers dressing down for the first time?

Forty-three, your phone says. It’ll be below freezing in a few days if it keeps dropping like this.
Yikes, this must be going to devastate the wild pokemon.

Questions that need answered, but not outside in the cold.
Typo, "answering"

He can’t be older than nineteen, and the league doesn’t regularly publish the names of trainers that win trials. Makes it too easy for criminals and abusive family members to know where their target is.
Huh, what do criminals have to do with it? With the analogy of sports competitions and Kekoa being a legal adult (unless it's different in Alola?) I don't see why that info wouldn't be published. Is there a known high correlation between people with abusive families and people being trainers?

You’d rather not be out again, but in the lobby someone would hear your words and in his room someone would hear your thoughts.
What a claustrophobic situation to be in.

When she gets ideas in her head, they tend to stay there no matter how hard you try to knock them out.
Quite an interesting way for Gen to be thinking, in the same chapter that's all about how her parents have had thoughts knocked out of her own head.

“Okay, so it’s not a great plan,” you admit. “But we can work on it together. We can’t just leave her there! I don’t know what her parents are doing to her now, but it’s not good. And they might send her to the mainland for conversion therapy any day now.”
It feels like she's treating Kekoa like a normal acquaintance here, when only a few sentences ago she viewed him as a Skull thug who had to either be deferred to or commanded. Maybe a moment where she decides that he's not really on Rocket level and she can relax more?

She knows Skull isn't interested in Gen for Gen's own benefit, so it seems like some effort to put this in Skull terms would be natural, ie, if they send her to the mainland, she won't be here where Plumeria wants her.

“It doesn’t matter. Tell Plumeria that I’m not helping without backup or a plan.”

“We could travel together for a bit.”

“What?”
Heh, my reaction too. It does seem a bit sudden.

“Psychics can remove memories. Add them. Change people while being so subtle that their victim doesn’t even know anything happened at all. Trust me, I’ve… I’ve been there. You can’t win against them because you’d never even know there was a fight. You’re best off staying far, far away.”
Ah, interesting to see how Lyra's anti-psychic attitude meshes with Kekoa after his own worries about Cuicatl manipulating his pokemon.

You’re best off staying far, far away.”

“Reshiram trusts her.”
This felt like a bit of a non-sequitur to me. I guess I hadn't realized that moment made a difference for Kekoa or that he considered Reshiram a god worthy of trust. Is Reshiram considered a god to people in Alola?

Even gods make mistakes. Big ones, sometimes. Just ask the bodies at the bottom of Hoenn’s seas.
Oof.

At first you thought that he just took a memory. But how can you be sure? He could have given you new ones, made you forget people, even changed your entire personality. And you wouldn’t know. You don’t know. You’ll probably never know.
That's a really destabilizing thing to deal with.

Even if you just met him, even if his boss scares you a lot, that’s not something you’d wish upon him.
Not sure you need this! I think the section would end on a stronger note with it cut.

You remember seeing her looking incredibly uncomfortable in her own skin, eyes flitting around the room and breaths quick. You didn’t really want to be at that fundraiser, but you could at least hide it.
Nice Selene characterization.

she just embraced facing the world as she is.

Good for her.

You would never, but good for her.
Makes a real contrast to the Lyra of Gen's memories, who seems so authentic and free-spirited. I guess that's the distinction and why Gen means so much to her, that she can be herself with Gen.

None have arrived since our young champion’s first battle with Necrozma.” Is he trying to throw her under the bus? Imply that all of this is her fault? Shit.
This sounds like it's praising Selene? Like her battle scared the ultrabeasts off?

I trust that our champion will eventually fix the problem, but until then we can’t just put our lives on hold. All emergency restrictions will be lifted on Melemele, Akala, and Ula’Ula tomorrow. The island challenge will continue on those three islands, and the timer on trainer stays in Pokémon Centers between trials will start running again. Even if this alien has stolen our light, we cannot let it crush our spirits.
There’s cheering from down the hall. And outside your window. Are people celebrating this? Why? And which announcement? That they can leave? That food is back? The island challenge? And didn’t they hear the champion trying to tell them that it wasn’t safe yet? Or see the look in her eyes as she realized she was sharing a stage with a madman?
“REOPEN ALOLA!” Someone shouts outside your door. You can hear him chanting the same thing as he runs down the hallway, until he eventually falls with a loud thud as he trips in the dark.
Very on the nose here. Hm. I've been appreciating the parallel, but I'm not sure I buy it completely here. It being dark and cold isn't something people can easily ignore. I doubt tourists want to deal with it. And I feel like only the most rabid trainers would? It's not like covid where it's business as usual until whoops I've caught the plague. It's stepping out your door and shivering and tripping when you walk a few feet on uneven ground.

buy winter gear as soon as it becomes available again
That is a huge issue. Especially since I doubt Cuicatl has the budget for it, unless v-star decides it's worth it.

you’ll never get another chance to ‘see’ Alola like this. A tropical land succumbing to darkness and cold is one hell of a thing to explore. And you’ve read about cave and arctic explorers for years. If there aren’t UBs, you can handle yourself. Maybe make a blog or write a journal you can later use for a book.

No one’s ever traveled through a place quite like this. No one. You’d be one of the first in a world with fewer and fewer places left where no human has gone before.
This was compelling, though. Lyra's not the average person.

Most people suck. The powerful hurt people, the powerless wish they could. You have to look strong to keep people from fucking with you. Then no one will make you their plaything just because they can. And then there are people that no amount of strength can protect you from, because they can hurt you and make you love them for it.
She deserves it. Deserves to live without people trying to mold her into being heartless, just like everyone else.
These lines were a good distillation of Lyra's character and perspective.

As long as she’s here, you can’t leave.

As long as you’re staying, you might as well get stronger.
I think the penultimate line may be the stronger closer here.
 

windskull

Bidoof Fan
Staff
Partners
  1. sneasel-nip
  2. bidoof
  3. absol
  4. kirlia
  5. windskull-bidoof
  6. little-guy-windskull
  7. purugly
  8. mawile
Broken Things
Man, I really needed to get back to this. It’s been way too long. I ended up rereading the first 8 parts just to refresh myself. But let’s pick up where I actually left off, 1.9

1.9
God, you did a great job of setting up the dread and tone of a disaster like what the events of emerald would have caused. You know the drought music? The tone of this scene captures that tone perfectly in my opinion.

I feel like I had at least kind of expected Kekoa to be orphaned, but I didn’t expect him to be in the foster system/not raise by his brother at all. That one caught me by surprise. And on one hand I feel for him, because he needed the support it obviously messed him up. But at the same time, I can’t be angry at Jabiri because he was in a tough situation too, being barely an adult and in a tough situation where he had to try and figure out what was best.

Also, that last scene, oof. Kekoa was being an ass on purpose, but he also had no idea of knowing that he hit a sore spot. Cuicatl, on the other hand, knew that her words would hurt, so that was… really uncool of her, tbh. I don’t blame her for being upset, but…

1.10
I was a wee bit confused by the first couple of scenes from this chapter. Are these memories that Cuicatl’s mom had that Reinfield is sharing with her? For the sake of clarity.

I’m curious if the gods mentioned are analogous to any particular pokemon (like what you do with rayquaza), or if they’re just straight up aztec gods.

Ce is adorable and I’m really sad she doesn’t end up being a permanent party member. More on that later, when I get to that chapter. Smart of Cuicatl to get a head start on catching the Paras, though. That was my understanding, at least.

This chapter had the first steps towards Kekoa and Cuicatl understanding each other. But I wonder how long that will last?

1.11
The opening scene continues to explain a lot about where Kekoa is coming from. I’m curious why Plumeria is in charge of the Skulls at this point. I’m assuming that 1, this is post SuMo after Guzma left Team Skull, and that this scene is relatively recent. Oooor maybe Guzma was never in charge in your timeline. Or maybe I’m overthinking things. Who knows.

The whole scene with Uffe was -chef’s kiss-. It poked a lot at the little flaws in the way that Kekoa thinks and, while he kind of shuts things down here because he’s stubborn, I hope he eventually learns a bit from it.

Also the last scene. I loved the last scene. I loved that Kekoa and Cuicatl are starting to make a connection, even if it’s just baby steps at this point. Cuicatl seems like she put a lot of trust in Kekoa. I can’t help but wonder if something is going to happen later that will strain this. Or worse, if this could cause some trouble later with Kekoa telling the wrong person about Cuicatl’s psychic powers.


1.12
I don’t have a whole lot to say about this particular chapter. I did feel like Genesis felt a little bit like… like her flaws just jumped up significantly. Up until this point a lot of her flaws had felt a lot more subtle. There were bits and pieces before that felt stronger (i.e when she brings up cheerleading in her narration in an earlier chapter) but this almost feels like it went a bit… too far? It made her a lot more difficult to connect to in comparison to the others. Like she’s missing her more likable traits. In the previous chapter when she made the nasty comment about Cuicatl’s home country, even if she didn’t apologize she seemed to at least recognize that what she said was, well, bad. While she feels very stuck in her head here.

I feel bad for her, sure. It’s very obvious that she’s been raised with a very us vs them, expy of conservative traditionalist christian ideaology. And sure she has room to grow and there’s definitely hints about something fishy going on between her and her family but… I dunno, this chapter just was rough for me to read, definitely my least favorite chapter of part one. I hope she improves in the future.

Inferno is cute tho. I feel for him.

1.13
My complaints about 1.12 set aside, I really liked 1.13. It gives us insight into several things: Pixie’s past, a direct view of what life is like for wild pokemon (particularly pokemon like Pixie that are carnivores, but still small enough to be prey to other pokemon like weavile), and why she has a lot of the issues she does. Particularly both abandonment issues and issues and why she’s so afraid of Cuicatl getting other pokemon.

And man, while I feel for her, she’s an absolute ass at the end here. Which isn’t a bad thing, but I hope it is something that is explored and that she improves on later in the story. On a related note, I really hope that Ce shows up again at some point later, even though I really don’t expect her to.

1.14
Coco. Is. Adorable. And this whole section is so good. I always love your pokemon perspective chapters because they feel so distinctly not human. And this chapter really exemplifies tha, perhaps more than the Pixie chapters. Part of that is, perhaps, because Coco is such a young character that doesn’t have experiences with humans to build upon.

Also, it’s just kind of a nice breath of fresh air to get a pov character that doesn’t have a lot of baggage and get a break from all that. As a treat.

At the same time, I love the bits of tension you get to see in this chapter (particularly during the section where they’re all watching The Land Before Time) specifically because of the perspective we’re seeing it from. From someone young and clueless.

1.15
Oooh, this chapter seems to be setting up the first little tantalizing bits of a bigger plot. Thus far, the story has been heavily character driven. To the point that there’s not really been much of a bigger plot beyond “Vstar might be a little shady and also these kids are going through the trials through them.” Every other story beat has been driven forward by the characters’ personal plots. It’s not a conventional method afaik, but it’s definitely interesting and for the most part, it works. The only times it really doesn’t are in instances where I just, can’t get into a character’s head. Which is what I think happened with 1.12, for example.

As for the actual content of the chapter, I have no clue where it’s going. But I’m definitely quite curious about it, if nothing else.


At this point, I’ll briefly mention that I read the recap as well, but I really didn’t have anything to say about it, so I’m just going to wrap up here. I enjoyed the majority of part 1, and it’s definitely left me wanting more. So at some point in the near future I hope to be back for part 2. Until then, take care!
 

Chibi Pika

Stay positive
Staff
Location
somewhere in spacetime
Pronouns
they/them
Partners
  1. pikachu-chibi
  2. lugia
  3. palkia
  4. lucario-shiny
  5. incineroar-starr
3.4

There’s a vulpix on her lap, quietly judging you.
A+ description.
“I see. And you want the license to keep the tyrunt?”

“Yes.” Her mouth stays open a second longer before she snaps it shut. Something else, then. Probably none of your concern.
Definitely just for coco. No other dragons to be found here, no siree.

I like how this chapter gives a good look at the real steps Cuicatl's taking toward getting Alice back. Even though it's still a goal waaaaaay off in the distance, it feels more real having an actual set of steps she has to take in order to accomplish it. Also, I still just generally love the idea of trainer license levels. It makes a lot of sense that there wouldn't be a one-size-fits-all approach to Pokemon handling.
It’s fine. This is fine. You can just smooth things over with Ophelia before letting her in. “Can you stay outside for a bit? My sister hates surprises and I want her to know you’re coming in.”
I think this part in particular was what made me have to double back a lot to sort through who exactly Ophelia and Eve were because this made them seem like the same person, but then they weren't, but then all of Meredith's anxiety was connected to... both of them, so they were? No, they weren't, but impressing one of them would placate the other? (I get it now, of course, but I was a big ol' pile of confusion while reading, haha. Maybe that was the point.)
Your sister can’t drink tea anymore but still wants to feel included.
This was actually the moment I finally pieced together the fact that she was dead. xD (Okay, I know she was descibed with will-o-wisps before, but idk, I think I just assumed that she had a ghostly affinity or something. What, our protag is psychic, leave me alone.)
“All the money in ornithology these days is in hawlucha care.”
I actually said "oh shit" out loud at this. ;rowlanxiety;
A male voice starts roaring in Nahuatl, right next to you. To Cuicatl. “Ophelia, please stop.” She does, sort of, dropping the voice to a furious whisper. And Cuicatl’s gone still beside you, eyes wide and every muscle tensed up like she’s just heard a ghost.
The voice "roaring" actually made me think Ophelia was mimicking her dad's voice for a second (I guess I just associated him with yelling at her.)
The door opens and you step through. Your sister’s in the corner, Ophelia perched in front of her. They look proud, almost. “You’re welcome,” Eve says.
Hm. Still on the fence as to whether that's... actually her sister at all? Meredith straight-up says that Cuicatl's brother wasn't actually him, just Ophelia copying the voice. But she acts like it's different with Eve somehow, buuuut I'm starting to think that's just denial talking.

3.5

Oh no. The Moon is important. You will have to scream at the moon-eater until it gets scared and gives her back.
Pix is on the job, no one else has as solid a plan to stop Necrozma.
When Eggbreath was out a few days ago you told her that everyone and everything had been eaten by a giant fox. She believed it.
Every interaction between these two is gold.
Skysong has been poisoned.

She has not left her bed since she got back from the bird-smelling human.
Oh. :<
Bloodrage dramatically exhales. Quietly. Not like a scream. “Alright, who am I beating up?”
I really enjoy how he immediately jumps to her defense here. They are FRENDS.
“Oricorio. Listen, Cuicatl Ichtaca, whatever it said—they’re liars. Horrible liars. I thought about getting one, once, but then I started reading about what they do to people and—just don’t listen to it, okay? It wasn’t your Mom speaking.”
Oh man. That hits pretty hard that he actually considered it.
“The brother you think you killed?” The whole thing is silly. Not only did she not kill her brother, but even if she had she shouldn’t feel bad about it.
I really enjoy how perfectly on-point Pix manages to be regarding this. (And no, that's not ironic! Unlike most Pix commentary.)
If she lies in bed all day because she’s sad about something she shouldn’t be sad about, then you will get fewer walks. And that’s terrible.
When no one was looking, Cuicatl slept through 40 walk opportunities. That's as many as four tens. And that's terrible.
“No. If you had died instead I wouldn’t have met an almost adequate servant.”
I enjoy writing Pokemon expressing ""affection"" for their trainers in this manner. :P
Alongside the humans the ninetales went from island to island, meeting each guardian in turn. The island gods received the ninetales warmly and each conferred a small blessing unto them. The Sea Guardian gifted them control of the weather itself. The Thunder Guardian gifted them even longer and more beautiful fur. The Mind Guardian gifted them some of her great wisdom. The Earth Guardian gifted them even greater longevity.
Ahh, I like this connection between Ninetales lore and the four Tapu.
After receiving the gift of the Earth Guardian on the largest island, the ninetales were summoned to the top of the world to meet The Moon. The goddess was so impressed by the stories, devotion and wisdom of the ninetales that she became jealous of the Rainbow God. She decided that she must have the foxes for her own. After luring the ninetales to sleep, The Moon cast a spell on them and extinguished their flames. Cold, cold ice was left in its place. The foxes could never again tolerate a long voyage across the warm seas. Instead they were bound to the mountain and could never leave her for long.
As with this connection between Lunala and the Ninetales gaining the ice type.
Skysong ruffles the foul-smelling and ugly feathers on Eggbreath’s neck. “I’ll tell you some, then. Let’s start with… The Split Gods.” The story is entirely in lizard talk. Not that you care. It’s a lizard story. There’s no way it’s as good as fox stories. Just hearing it might make you dumber.
Very curious what the dragons' take on Reshi/Kyu/Zek would be. 👀
“When the light comes back and we get some more training in, I’ll let you wander around the campsite while we travel. Even at night, if you want. Unless the area is so dangerous that I need you nearby to protect me.” She scratches your ears and you lean into it because she’s learned how to do it just right. “I need you to protect me right now. Please.”
I really enjoy how good Cuicatl's gotten at navigating Pixie negotiations (or at least, as good as a human can probably get, anyhow. :quag:)
 
Fighting 3.8

Persephone

Infinite Screms
Pronouns
her/hers
Partners
  1. mawile
  2. vulpix-alola
Fighting 3.8: Necessity
Cuicatl

1995​

You can’t decide if you like the snow or not.

It makes it harder to tell where the barely frozen puddles are hidden, and on Route 8 some of those puddles house stunfisk that will not react kindly to someone stepping on them as they hibernate. At least you’ve stocked up on paralyze heals. The nurse back at the Center had been very insistent on that as she lectured you over the counter.

(You think you have everything? Because trust me, kid, you don’t. Socks, paralyze heals, freeze heals, super potions, hand warmers, burn cream—because you wouldn’t be the first kid with a fire-type to try getting a little too close for warmth—there it is. Get it and come back. I’ll run over the list again until we get this right.)

She’d sounded like your mom. Which made you miss Mom. You’d called home. She’d also run through a packing list. And then she’d run on a little too long with her own journey memories.

(She’d had a sawsbuck back in the day, you know, before she met your father and moved to an apartment that was a little bit too small for an adult deer to live in. He’s somewhere out on ranch upstate. Anyway, Bucky was just coming out of heat…)

Mom’s never explicitly told you to come back home for the winter, but you wonder if you should. She sounds lonely, and you don’t want her to be alone on the solstice. But you also want to get a badge or two in while the waiting lists are short. Maybe you’ll even find a rare beartic up in the hills. Your team up to this point have been pretty easy to care for—you wouldn’t mind a bit of danger in the last slot. Something to throw Drayden for a loop in the rematch. Smug bastard.

A snowflake almost hits your eye, only to get caught up in your lashes.

Right. Snow. Can’t decide if you like it or not.

Because even if it hides stunfisk puddles and threatens to hit you in the eye, seeing Route 8 covered in a fresh layer of snow feels right. On your journey you’re supposed to see Unova in all of its glory: the pleasant and unpleasant alike.

[19:11:00 – January 8, 2020]​

You really wish it was snowing.

Then it wouldn’t be raining.

Your cheap raincoat and wool skirt don’t keep cold water from hitting you in the face. Pixie asked to be withdrawn. Pixie. In Winter. Nocitlālin still floats beside you, seemingly oblivious to the weather. Coco is resting in her nest ball; attacking cold raindrops was fun for a few minutes, until she decided that it really wasn’t at all and she would like to stop now.

[THREAT DETECTED. INITIATE RAMMING.]

It’s impossible to say if it actually was a threat or not, but something gets rammed by a very determined beldum and runs away with a mix of pained and vulgar cries. Nocitlālin was told to keep threats away, and she is really embracing the job.

Ordinarily, Route 2 would be perfectly safe. There are some predators and omnivores here, but the abundance of berries means that there are plenty of herbivores for them to hunt instead of humans. The rangers also cull anything that would be too dangerous to people on this route. There are growlithe and raticate, but no arcanine or snorlax.

These are not ordinary times. New berries aren’t growing, sight-based hunters are starving, and the temperature drop, darkness, and recent alien attacks are setting the wild pokémon on edge. It’s best to attack anything that gets too close right now. Not that Nocitlālin seems to mind. Or Coco, once the rain stops. Although you’ll have to be careful that she doesn’t get in over her head.

Kekoa sloshes on behind you. It’s funny that you’re guiding him these days. Lyra’s somewhere behind him guarding the rear. Her absol is probably the strongest pokémon any of you have and isn’t too bothered by the dark.

You remember Kekoa’s reaction to seeing Mirai for the first time. He’d gone quiet for a long time. Lyra asked him if he really believed the old stories about absol causing natural disasters for fun and he just shook his head.

“They tried to warn Hoenn,” he said. “But no one important would listen.”

You gave him a discrete hug later. And told him that discrete hugs are easy in the dark if he needs more. He hasn’t taken you up on the offer, but he also didn’t reject it.

*​

Charles gathers the firewood while you set up the tent. The gurdurr has always been helpful to a fault, but he got knocked out quickly against Drayden and now he feels like he has to make it up to you. He doesn’t. You told him that. He doesn’t believe you.

Spike is sitting still in the snow. The snow is apparently a fun and fascinating thing to sit in. At least the ferroseed is easily entertained. Tchaikovsky is also sitting in the snow, but the swanna mixes in critique and insults as you get camp around. He could definitely do it better, but he really doesn’t want to so you’ll just have to take his word for it.

Calling his bluff will just lead to bird shit coating all your stuff in the morning. You endure the insults in silence.

Searah doesn’t like the snow. Her fire melts the ice into water and that’s hard on the poor heatmor. You let her rest in her ball. Renfield is using his telekinesis to clear out a small, messy circle for a fire. The duosian definitely has more control than when you met him, but he’s still not a strong telekinetic. He’d much rather just punch his enemies in the mind.

Charles comes back with lots of firewood just as you finish the pulley for your food to hang from overnight. The wood should be enough to at least start a fire with, although you’ll need to send him back out later to find more. Or you could do it yourself. But if the gurdurr is willing, who are you to stop him?

*​

It turns out that it’s hard to pitch a tent if no one can see it. Pitching two tents is even harder.

Especially when your teeth are chattering and your hands are shaking and it feels like the cold rain is running through your bloodstream. And you can’t even wear gloves because the poles just slide right out of them, so you have to keep touching freezing metal.

Kekoa struggles through his with a fair bit of quiet cursing, aloud and on the tip of his tongue. It doesn’t sound like he’s too cold. Maybe you’re just making too big a deal of it. You’re from the tropics. Even in the foothills it never got this cold.

You keep yourself busy by helping Lyra with her tent. Kekoa would fit in it but he insists on setting up his own. He wants to keep the tent because he doesn’t trust Lyra to stick around with “poor losers like us” but you don’t know why he had to bring it along with him. VStar rents out storage lockers in Hau’oli.

The rain suddenly begins to let up, as if taunting you. No point using the stove tonight. You’ll just have to feed Coco some precooked meat from the cooler. You can eat trail mix or something or nothing. Nothing sounds fine.

At least in the dark no one can see how fat you are. Maybe if you do an intense diet while this is going on you’ll be at least halfway thin when it ends.

“Noci, can you find a tree to hang our bags off of?”

[Alarm Level 10: Unit Desigante Cuicatl Ichtaca Will Have No Protection;
Ambient Threat Level = 1001;
Mission = Protect Unit Designate Cuicatl Ichtaca;
Risk To Mission Unacceptable]

{It’s not that dangerous,} you mentally grumble. The beldum does not dignify you with a response. You let out Coco and Pixie. {Now can you find a tree?}

[Affirmative]

She zips off while your other pokémon stretch out.

“Wet!” Pixie whines.

“Do you want to go back into your ball?”

She ponders this for several seconds. “No,” she finally answers.

“Okay, then, you can stay out.”

“Wet!” Pixie whines.

You sigh. {Nothing I can do about that.}

“Wet…” she grumbles.

Coco headbutts your leg. “You want to go back inside?”

“Play!”

“Mommy is busy setting up a tent.”

A pole clatters to the ground and Lyra hisses in annoyance.

“We can play afterwards.”

“Play…” she grumbles, before you can feel her brighten up through your link. Pixie cries out in pain and indignation a moment later.

It’s amusing. Sort of. You’re a bit too cold to really enjoy it or anything. You just want in the damn tent.

“Coco, Pix, can you watch the camp? Something might try to steal your food.”

Pixie growls. “Eevee?”

Sure, why not?

{Yes.}

The air gets noticeably colder. You shiver even more.

“I’ll watch for playmates!” Coco plomps down into the damp grass. Or a puddle. You’re not sure which.

“You seem to understand your team well,” Lyra says. You wonder for a moment if she’s onto you before deciding she isn’t. You’ve been careful to keep communications with your pokémon silent around her.

“I come from a long line of trainers. Picked up some tricks along the way.”

Technically true. Your mother and grandmother were trainers, and mom’s grandfather did the gym circuit in Korea. Her other grandfather would have but that was illegal in Georgia at the time. When he was old enough to move to Unova and settle down he didn’t have the energy to travel anymore.

And your father’s father was a soldier. Probably your grandfather’s grandfather’s grandfather and everyone in between as well. Just something that’s expected in Anahuac, even if your father got out of it. He’d delayed his conscription to study abroad, and by the time the recruiters came knocking again he was a single father and widower who was exempt from service.

“I think you’re selling yourself short. Tyrunt aren’t known for behaving and yours at least doesn’t throw tantrums.”

You laugh joylessly. Maybe you shouldn’t keep talking but it’s a distraction from your numb everything.

“Can you blame them? They live in a world that’s wrong and are taken away from their mother or stay and are raised by a mother who didn’t have a mother to raise her, so she has no idea what she’s doing. If you can just explain things to her everything goes easier.”

The last pole slots into place. “Alright, I think we can put things inside now,” Lyra says. You eagerly do so. It seems Kekoa’s already finished and moved his things into the newly christened Boy’s Tent. It’s hard to describe how, but you have a general idea how big spaces are when you walk in. Might be echolocation, might be air flow, who knows? You can instantly tell that this tent is way bigger than the old one. Like, twice as big, minimum. You can have all of your pokémon sprawl out if they want. Pixie runs in behind you and pounces onto your lap. She immediately shakes off, spraying cold water all over you. It takes all of your willpower not to launch her away.

“Wet,” Pixie says. You can swear there’s a smirk in her voice. Coco tries to enter the tent a moment later. Tries. She manages to hit a pole instead. You can hear the tent crumpling around you as Lyra stamps her foot. You stick your head out of the tent and withdraw the dino before she can cause more trouble.

“I’ve got it,” she mutters. “Just don’t let her do that again.”

“Sorry.”

When Lyra comes back in she stumbles. Her hand slams down on yours hard enough that it would hurt if it wasn’t pretty numb.

“Holy shit you’re cold,” she says. Before moving her hand. Because pointing out the obvious is more important than getting off your damn hand. “Seriously, uh, can I touch your forehead.”

“Fine.” You feel out her hand and bring it towards your forehead. Because you don’t trust her to find it in the dark.

“Okay so I’d need to get my thermometer but you’re really cold. Hypothermia cold.” She begins to pull her hand back. For a moment you lean into the warmth of it but it eventually slips away. “I don’t have a fire-type—”

“—shouldn’t cuddle them. Can make burns.”

“I know, I know.”

Noci. Noci is warm, but not burning.

{Nocitlālin, I need your help.}

{Initiate Ramming.}

{Don’t break the tent.}

{Lowering ramming speed.}

“Can you open the tent up?” you ask Lyra. “I think I hear Noci coming back.}

“Really? I don’t hear—holy shit.” A rod of metal zooms by her the moment she starts unzipping. You hold out a hand and it nuzzles its warm, warm body against it.

{Alarm Lvl 1010: Unit_Designate_Cuicatl_Ichtaca Possesses Abnormally Low Body Temperature}

“Can we cuddle for a bit, Noci? So you can keep me warm.”

She slowly eases herself over to you and you wrap your arms around her before pulling her down. Then with great reluctance you move one arm to your backpack so you can get your sleeping bag out. This way you can keep her warmth in the bag. With you.

“You’re literally a lifesaver,” you whisper to her.

{Negation. Class = 001, not “lifesaver.”}

You hug her even tighter. Never felt better to be sassed by a robot who doesn’t understand what sass is.

“Um. I’m going to warm up in here for a bit then I can go out and warm some water up. Maybe make you dinner?”

“Don’t. You’ll just burn yourself. Trust me, I did the first few times I tried cooking blind.” You still have at least one of those scars. And many more scars and callouses from later attempts at cooking while blind. It was still worth it every time your brother told you he liked your cooking.

“I’m still making you water.” Her tone of voice doesn’t leave room for questioning. You allow it. Warm water sounds heavenly right now. And that’s the end of that. For a while you stay painfully aware of every shiver wracking your body.

Your phone buzzes.

“Voice Message from Vana Iosua (Plant Girl). Read it: Yes or No?”

“Read it,” you mumble. Might as well. You haven’t heard from her in a few days.

“Hi! Just wanted to see how you were doing. I made it to my cousin’s place in Vegas. My team is enjoying the warmth and light. You still in Alola or did you go back to Anahuac? If you did then we’re still close. Kind of.”

Your home is nowhere near the border. You would not be close. At all. Still, she’s just twelve. Best not be rude to her.

Cuicatl Ichtaca: Slayed. Challenge visa. Pixie likes it. Coco does not. Nothing bad so far.

Wait, no, that’s a lie.

Cuicatl Ichtaca: Have hypothermia right now.

“Voice Message from Vana Iosua (Plant Girl). Read it: Yes or No?”

“Read it.” Is there a way to automatically read voice messages if you have that chat open? Maybe someone from VStar can help you when you get back to Hau’oli.

“Oh no! That’s terrible. Have you gotten somewhere warm?”

How do you tell her that there is nowhere warm to go to? Before you can figure it out Lyra unzips the tent and crawls in.

“Hey, I have water.”

Wait. Did she bring warm water into the tent? Feels like she could’ve dropped it super easily. Not that you’re complaining. You take the water in trembling, numb hands and slowly take a sip. It’s wonderful. Even a few drops makes you feel warm in the best ways. You want to pour it all straight down your throat but know you aren’t supposed to.

“You said earlier that you explain things to your tyrunt.” Lyra asks. “How?

Did you say that? You take another long sip and consider your options. Thankfully you have a good one now. Just have to be more careful in the future.

“I speak draconic. She speaks something similar. We can understand each other.”

“Really?” Lyra drops her packs to the tent floor in surprise. “Can you understand my noibat?”

“Sort of?” Really well, actually. You remember reading somewhere that noivern can learn to send telepathic messages. “A lot of it’s too high or low to hear, but what I can make out sounds like draconic. A version of it at least.”

“Can you translate for my team through him?” She sounds very excited about the prospect. Definitely more than Kekoa was. Or Genesis. You drink more water while you think. Your stomach is starting to radiate good heat throughout your core now. Every sip is heavenly.

“Maybe? I’m not sure if your noibat can understand the rest of your team. Pokémon have different languages and all. You could also get a translator of your own. Psychic-types are sometimes good at it.”

Her mind blanks for a moment before erupting in a rapid-fire burst of half-formed words. Most vulgar. Huh. Stronger reaction than usual. Bad history with psychic-types? You’ll make sure to be extra careful about concealing your gift around her.

“Primarina or lapras, maybe. I’ve thought a little about zoroark or other ghosts.” Her tone is level. She’s good at masking whatever that was before. You’d press more but you’re worried she might catch on. Or at least accidentally come to the right conclusion.

“I’m writing a book of myths,” you say instead. “Pokémon myths. As in, myths told by pokémon. I’d like to talk to your noibat later. And any pokémon he can translate for.”

“That’s also cool.” She unzips her pack and starts taking things out. Her pace is slow and methodical. Probably isn’t used to unpacking things she can’t see. “Any cool ones so far?”

“I got Pixie to tell me where ninetales come from,” you say. She yaps in approval and taps a paw against your chest. Huh. She was here, too? Didn’t notice her before. You wonder who took her place on guard duty. Or if Coco is also here. No. She’d let you know if she was awake. You slowly roll over and move Noci to your side so Pixie can sprawl out on top of you. Her reward for being a good storyteller. “They were reborn after a tower burned down far away. Then they were brought here, imprisoned by the moon, and blessed by the Tapu.”

“Burning tower, huh?” Lyra finds what she wants and zips the bag closed again. You can hear something slowly inflate on her end of the tent. Oh. Sleeping mat. You should probably set yours up. Whenever Pixie gets off you, at least. “We have a story like that in Johto. Her story involve Ho-oh?”

“A rainbow god, yes.” Pixie perks up at the mention. Probably didn’t know Ho-oh’s human name before.

“Supposedly a lightning strike burned down the largest town in Japan.” Lyra says. “A few important temples were lost, including the two most important. That’s probably what she was talking about.”

“Pixie says it burned down in a war.”

Lyra sighs and you hear her crash down on her sleeping mat. “That’s probably true,” she mutters.

“Talonflame also have a rainbow god story,” you say. Sounds a little like Ho-oh, too. “Said that the god gave talonflame their fire.”

“She’s fond of that kind of thing,” Lyra murmurs. “Metalwork. Resurrection. Enlightenment. Making things better than they were before. Obstacles are just tests to let us be broken down and reforged. Even the worst things have a purpose.” Her mat crumples and you can imagine her turning to face you. “The audacity of it all. She hurts you because he loves you.”

Her words strike something uncomfortable deep inside. Your father… punished you for correction’s sake. But you do not wish to be punished any more. You will only go back once he cannot. Is this proper? He created you and has a right, but you no longer wish to give it to him. Was everything before that…

“You okay?” Lyra asks. She sounds genuinely concerned. “Not too cold, are you? We can call for an evac if you really need it.”

“I’m fine. Already feeling warmer.” Warm enough to stick an arm out of the bag, even. With a few practiced movements you pull Pixie’s brush out of your pack. She must notice because you can feel her tails start flapping against your legs as she wags them. It’s a little awkward to brush her properly while lying on your back but you manage.

“Do the gods of Anahuac hurt people?” Lyra asks.

“We do that for them.”

That shuts her up for a moment. “Why?”

You pull the brush through some matting at the base of one of Pixie’s tails. She immediately lunges forward to bite your hand.

“Watch it,” you admonish her.

“You hurt me!” she cries out.

“It’s getting matted. You want me to deal with it or not?”

She huffs and you continue, ignoring her occasional cries of displeasure.

You decide to answer Lyra’s question with a question, because outsiders don’t like the real answer: the gods give you things you need. Food, water, clothing, luck, protection, light. All they ask for in return is blood and breath. Not necessarily your own. “Do you worship Ho-Oh and the others?”

“I don’t anymore. They’re obviously real: two of them almost sunk Hoenn. But if they’re going to hurt us, why worship them?”

You remember asking Pixie a similar question a while ago. Ironic, isn’t it, that now you’re the one defending your gods. “Because we need them.”

The rain subsides to a solid drizzle. For a long time you sit back and run your hands through Pixie’s newly brushed fur. She’s content to simply lie sprawled out on top of you.

“For what?” Lyra asks.

She grew up in a safe country. Her family’s rich. You wonder if she’d get it. But you’re a little bored and are going to be spending time with her. And she seems open minded enough. Immediately wanted to know what her pokémon think. Hasn’t judged you so far for being Nahua. Not even in her head. And she’s already changed her entire faith before. She’s a bit stern. Closed off. The opposite of Genesis. Still nicer than Kekoa to people she’s not friends with.

You’ll give her a shot.

“To protect us from the things that we can’t protect ourselves from.” Droughts. Wars. Disease. Light-stealing aliens. Humans are a very, very small part of a very, very big world. People just don’t like thinking about that. Its why dragons scare them so much. They’re a reminder of where we really are on the food chain.

“And how’s that worked out for you?”

You wince. Harsh. The gods are only so strong and no one else is still offering them blood. It’s hard to be the only culture that still cares. It’s hard to care about the end of the world and be punished for it.

“Sometimes all you can do is pray.”

She doesn’t answer for long enough that you almost drift back off to sleep.

“Maybe,” she finally admits.

*​

“Danielle Lee?” You look up at the receptionist. “The gym leader is ready.”

“Thank you.”

You carefully make your way to the arena entrance. Sixth badge matches occasionally get televised, especially in the off season, and your mom would never let you live it down if you were on television in flats. Even though it’s her fault that you’re short enough to need heels in the first place. That’s how genes work, right?

Thankfully the stone walkway isn’t slippery. The same can’t be said for the arena itself. It looks like a giant ice-skating rink, with a giant hole in the middle revealing a big pool of water. It’s a good bet that the rest of the arena conceals water as well. Makes beartic more menacing and undermines fire-types.

The gym leader is on the other side of the rink. His shirt is sleeveless despite the cold of the arena. Probably for the cameras. He used to be a moderately successful movie star before he retired. You can still clearly see it. Maybe a little too clearly. You lower your gaze to the hole in the ice.

“Miss Lee, is it?” Brycen asks.

“Yes.”

“Good to meet you.” He sounds sincere, even though he’s probably sick of meeting challenger after challenger. “It’ll be a four on four today. Switch clock is set at three minutes. Is this acceptable?”

Now he’s starting to sound a little robotic. “Yes.”

“Ref’s still on break. He should be back in a minute or two.”

“Okay.” Should you talk to him? Is there anything to say?

“You hiking between towns?” He asks.

You pause. Right. There are trainers who just take the trains around and battle in the cities. Cowards.

“Yes.” Should you continue? Probably. It’s a little bit intimidating talking to any gym leaders, but gym leaders who are also celebrities are something else entirely. “It was my first time traveling in snow.”

He chuckles. “Well, you get frostbite?”

“No. I have a—” Maybe you shouldn’t reveal your fire type. “I got a lot of good advice before I sat out. And my pokémon helped a ton.”

“You did better than I, then. First time out in the cold I almost lost my hands. Thought that I needed to thoroughly wash them before my meal and I was in such a hurry to eat that I forgot to dry them off. Ten minutes later there was a layer of frost on them.”

You aren’t sure if you should laugh, but you do anyway. It’s nice that he’s helping you calm down. Maybe not to his advantage, though. Stress decisions usually aren’t the best ones.

“Mom made sure that didn’t happen. And if it did, she’d probably take a lot more than my hands as punishment for being stupid.”

“You’re a lucky lass, then, having a mom like that. She travel back in the day?”

“Yes. She only got four badges, but—” The door opens and a man in a referee uniform hurries through.

“Sorry I’m late.”

“No problem, Doug. I was just talking with Miss Lee.” He turns back to you. “Well, let’s get on with it, then. See if you can make your mother proud.”

*​

Your second day on Route 2 brings you near the sound of waves. The rain stopped last night and hasn’t picked back up. You’re even feeling a lot warmer. If it weren’t for the idea of freezing water it might even be a good day to hit the beach. Rare beach day where no one else can see your body. Whole place to yourself, too, since no one wants to go swimming when it’s five degrees out. (Kekoa tells you it’s actually forty, because he’s an uncultured American who can’t metric.)

“Break,” Lyra calls. “There’s a beach access here and I need to let my pyukumuku filter-feed.”

“I could also use a break,” you call out. Kekoa been surly all day and you’d rather not have a fight on the trail. Still a few kilometers to go before the place you were hoping to stop for the night.

“…fine. Ten-minute break.”

“You don’t like her,” you comment once she’s out of earshot.

“No.”

“Then why’d you agree to travel with her?”

He sighs. “We need the money. Even with her cash and connections we still barely got out of Hau’oli with half of what we needed.”

“You’re not wrong. But can you at least pretend to like her?”

“She doesn’t get it,” he mutters. His pack falls to the ground. You follow suit and take out your water bottle.

“Doesn’t get what?”

There’s a pause where the only sounds are the distant cries of pokémon, the lapping of the waves, and the steady glug glug of water leaving your bottles. “This is just a fun adventure for her. Some of us are just here because we have to be.”

“You could’ve left,” you add. And he could have. They’re setting up refugee camps on the mainland. Supposedly you don’t need money to get in.

He slams the lid of his water bottle shut. “I’m not abandoning my home.”

That’s still a choice. He’s here because he wants to be, she’s here because she wants to be. You could have gone home yourself, but then you’d have lost your visa and your chance at making enough money for things to be okay.

You scoot closer and give him a side hug. Then you slump down and your head finds itself on his shoulder. This always calmed down Achcauhtli when he was riled up. And you like the warmth leaking out of his clothes. “Your voice has gotten a lot lower,” you tell him. “And you smell different now. It suits you.”

He laughs. Sort of. It’s really just a big exhale with some noise. “Missed my last two periods, too.”

You feel out his wrist and squeeze his hand. “Proud of you.”

And you are. At least one of you gets to feel good in their own body.

For a long time you both sit there, feeling the subtle sounds and movements of breaths and heartbeats. “I just don’t want to always be at each other’s throats,” you finally tell him. “It wasn’t much fun the first time.”

He doesn’t answer until Lyra’s footsteps draw close. “I’ll try,” he whispers. You give his hand another soft squeeze.

“That’s all I can ask for.”

*​

You struck out at the moor.

There were two beartic and a cubchoo living there at the time. You spoke to the adults. Well, the female spoke to you. Very loudly. Something along the lines of “Get away from me and my son.” The male didn’t see the need for a trainer and you weren’t going to try a hard sell on a bear. When he finished ice fishing, you politely said goodbye and left. No need to keep bothering him.

There might still be an older cubchoo in the mounatins and your seventh badge awaits in Driftveil. You set off on the road through Twist Mountain. The first part, the endless switchbacks in the snow, really sucks. Even the view at the end, a sea of white fields and green conifers and the twinkling lights of Icirrus, isn’t worth the climb.

You have a choice there. Keeping going up and over the mountain, or go through it. There’s an old tunnel in the mountain that used to be a road before the wilds took it over. They still let rangers in to put up lights for traveling trainers. Supposedly your great-uncle had a hand in negotiating that. Up top there are beartic. Straight through doesn’t involve climbing.

Having met beartic, you think you can live without one.

The tunnel is foreboding, full of flickering lights. The edges probably used to be smooth, but rock- and ground-types have terraformed everything until it looks like a normal cave. Side tunnels run in and out of the main one and there are even holes in the ground, some going so far down that you can’t see the bottom. It’s not the easy walk you were hoping for, but it should have more wilds than you were expecting. That’s a good chance to train.

It doesn’t take long for a woobat to drop down from the ceiling, hovering in front of you until you send out Tchaikovsky to deal with it. The two engage in a short, pitched aerial battle before the swanna lands enough water blasts that the bat retreats. Definitely not worth trying to catch it. You’re trying to keep your team balanced, with at most one of every type. Even psychics. That way you can downplay your gift, like Mom keeps insisting.

The rest of the day’s hike goes on in roughly the same way. Something shows up—usually a (s)woobat or gurrdurr—and you send it packing. Nothing ever outright attacks you. It seems an oddly organized environment. Good job, uncle.

You stop traveling well before the lights go off for the night. Wouldn’t do to get stuck in total darkness. You pitch your tent on a smooth, flat concrete platform that was clearly made for traveling trainers. It’ll kill your back, but at least you won’t keep sliding to the side or waking up to the feeling of sharp rock lumps under you. There’s also a small bowl carved in the wall, alongside a container filled with free plastic gloves and bags. You can pee in the toilet, but poop has to be hiked out.

Lovely.

You don’t want to cook something in a cave since you’re not sure where the fumes would go. You settle for jerky and trail mix after the team is fed. Your meal is interrupted by the sound of hissing and gnashing teeth in a side tunnel. A rabid pokémon? You signal Renfield to be ready for a fight. He’s the least melee-oriented and you’re pretty sure his biology is too weird to get rabies.

A black and blue lizard walks out. Its head flicks from side to side, tongue flashing out, as it intermittently growls and hisses and clashes its teeth. Multiple scars and wounds, some still bleeding, cover its body. A deino.

And you thought beartic were powerful.

“Hello, little guy.”

He freezes up, turns towards you, and hisses. Right. Can’t talk to him. Or feed him. The rangers wouldn’t want dragons frequenting the trail.

“You looking for something?”

He assumes a ready stance, as if anticipating a battle. It looks enough like the posture you’ve seen from a dozen other pokémon today that you can guess what he wants. You could use Charles for this, but the type advantage is a little unfair. Searah and Renfield have the opposite problem. Spike’s strengths aren’t things a deino would value. That leaves your swanna.

You send out a batch of messages. The bird lands in front of you and calls out a challenge while your other pokémon back away to the sidelines. Except Spike. The ferroseed stays exactly where he was.

The deino charges head-first. Tchaikovsky gets into the air and fires off a water pulse without being asked. He knows the drill. The deino keeps stumbling forward until he notices that his opponent isn’t in front of him. He turns around and sends out a stream of dragonfire, but it goes wide. Poor guy. Can’t even aim his attacks. Another water pulse punishes him for even trying.

The dragon lowers himself to the ground and you can feel the energy charge around him, accompanied by a soft red glow. Work up. He’s only getting stronger and angrier from here. Best to finish it quickly. {Ice Beam.} A bolt of freezing water falls from the sky and the deino hisses in pain, red aura fading. His next blast of dragon breath is much, much larger than before. It strikes true. {You fine?}

{I will murder this insolent fool.}

He’s fine.

Another ice beam sails across the arena and this time the deino shrieks as it strikes him directly in the head. The next dragon breath sails far to the left. It’s much smaller: the work up was too short to last long. Still, you should probably finish this sooner rather than later.

“Wing attack.”

{You shitting me? I am not getting close to that thing.}

{You want a cave in?}

{Fuck you.}

“Defog, then wing-attack.”

{Fine.}

The winds pick up and the deino squeals as the fur on top of his head gets blown to the side. Out of the corner of your eye you can see Renfield struggle to stay aloft while Charles digs his pillars into the ground.

Spike has no reaction.

Your starter dives down when the winds are strong enough. He slams into the dragon and knocks it off its feet. A bite lands on the swanna’s chest, but he powers through it and flies back into the air.

{I. Will. Murder. Her.}

{Her?}

He honks. “Thought the dragon was the blind one.”

“Forgive me for not knowing how to sex a dragon.”

“Guess I shouldn’t be surprised.” He rolls out of the way of another dragon breath. “You don’t know how to sex a human, either.”

Tchaikovsky dives down again, this time swooping to the side to avoid another bite. The dragon crashes into the wall and mewls in surrender, head bowed. The winds die down and Tchaikovsky circles back towards you to use roost.

The deino walks forward on unsteady feet, finally stopping a few feet away with her head bowed down to the ground. Poor girl.

You toss an ultra ball at her. There’s barely any resistance at all. When it stops moving altogether you lift it up and let out your final team member. She stares up at you in silence, tongue flicking out to take in her new team. You pour some jerky on a plate and set it out before her. She eats all the jerky, but also half the plate. Oops. You’ll pet it on the ground next time.

“Welcome to the team, Alice.”

*​

You keep drawing on your mother’s journey as the temperature keeps dropping. She was the best: went through Unova in winter alone when she was your age, won eight badges and got to the semis of the beginner’s tournament, raised a hydreigon well enough that ellas stuck around to raise her kids out of loyalty. It’s a shame you never got to meet her. There are things the memories can’t make up for, after all. You don’t know what her hugs feel like. Or what her voice sounds like when she whispers comforting things into your ear or tells you the hard things you need to hear but don’t want to. Sometimes you imagine those things and it feels like a memory just out of reach.

Now you really wish she was here. There are scraps in her memories that help, but not everything was preserved. Some was for the best – you definitely don’t want to know some things about her relationship with your father. Other gaps are way more irritating. She traveled alone most of the time. Most other people, even your grandmother, only hop in for a moment and slip out just as quickly. You don’t know what she would do with someone who would hate her for her gifts. Or what she would do with traveling companions in general. But maybe she’d have advice if she was here. She was smarter than you, after all. Instead, you’re left to thread the needle alone.

And she would’ve kept you from getting hypothermia. It’s only getting colder and it’s not like you have warmer gear than you did on the first day.

At least today’s dinner’s coming along well. Lyra has her own (nicer) camp stove so you can cook two things at once. Great for cooking meat and vegetables alongside rice without one getting cold. The meat was cheap, too. No one really wants to cook in the dark. It’s ready-to-eat stuff that’s super expensive. Cooking for you is the same as it’s always been. The same scents of the vegetables browning. The same sounds of boiling water or popping oil. The same heat rising from the stove. You barely have to think about it.

Which makes it a good distraction for something you have to put a little more thought into.

“Alright, Nisshoko? Ready to start?”

You can make up some story about noibat learning Galarian easily enough. Lyra seems to think the bat understands her perfectly and that’s all that matters. It saves you from embarrassing yourself in front of him with your terrible pronunciation in draconic. Still a little sensitive after Reshiram criticized you for that. Not your fault that your throat can’t make proper growls or roars.

The noibat happily chitters away as you stir the rice. “Yes! I’m glad you’re finally talking to me, by the way. I’ve known you can but you always ignore me.”

“Sorry about not speaking to you earlier. Been busy.”

“No, you haven’t.” He screeches and you move to cover your ears before remembering you’re holding a spoon. Hot water sloshes onto the ground before you can catch yourself. His voice gets a little less as an apology. “You’ve been hiding. Quiet One doesn’t like mind talkers.”

“He calls you Quiet One,” you tell Lyra. Make her feel a little in the loop.

“He’s a noibat,” Kekoa answers. “Hate to meet someone he didn’t think was quiet.”

He screeches again but thankfully your hands weren’t holding anything important. Maybe you shouldn’t have done this while making dinner. “I am quiet! The big fangs called me Silent Wings! That’s how quiet I can be! She just never raises her voice!”

Yeah. Unsure how much of that you want to translate. Not eager to be the translator while Kekoa gets into an argument with a bat. You go with the bare minimum. “His name was Silent Wings,” you tell Lyra.

“Silent Wings,” Lyra murmurs. “Was the name in Galarian?”

“No. That’s just the closest translation. It’s actually…” You try your best at the screech, but Silent Wings immediately tells you that you’re at least three octaves off. You busy yourself with flipping the meat instead of translating his thoughts on your voice.

“Does Musei work?” Lyra asks. “It means silent in Japanese. My home’s language.”

“Yes,” Musei rumbles. Probably wouldn’t have picked up on it at all if it weren’t for your gift. “It is a good name.”

You don’t think it fits very well, but it seems to make him happy, so you won’t give your opinions. “He likes it.”

A drop of hot liquid flies out and hits your hand. You flick it off without making a big deal of it.

“And do you like being with me?” Lyra asks.

“Yup. Get to see lots of new places.” See is a very rough translation. It’s what your gift tells you, but the actual word is something closer to ‘hear’ in draconic. Probably the same concept for noibat. “And you’re nice. And Mirai is fun to play with. Still trying to scare her. She always knows I’m coming and moves away.”

“Yeah. He likes going to new places and trying to scare your absol.”

The absol huffs. You can’t translate, but you imagine she’s upset at the idea that a tiny bat could get around her own gifts. Or maybe you’ve just spent too much time around Pixie and started projecting that onto other pokémon.

Speaking of, Pixie’s been awfully quiet throughout this conversation. She’s pressed into your side eagerly awaiting her dinner, but otherwise staying out of it. Probably still down after Ula’Ula. Don’t know what to tell her there. Yes, she’s a pain in the ass. So much so that lots of people have left her over it. But ‘try not to be really annoying’ would require changing most of her personality and you don’t think you’d want that, even if she could. Maybe toning it down a little would be good, though.

Mom’s then-gurdurr felt useless like that for a while. Can’t quite remember how she resolved it in the end. Might have to look through some more memories later.

“And… do you want to go home?” Lyra asks.

The noibat’s truly quiet for a little bit. You go back to stirring the rice while waiting for an answer.

“I would have left eventually. I’m not mad about that. I just wish I could’ve said goodbye to everyone first.”

That strikes home and you wince in sympathy. {I’m sorry. I know what that’s like.}

He perches on your shoulder a moment later and you almost panic. Tuns out he can fly silently when he wants. “Not your fault,” he says as he wraps his wings around your neck. Is that a thing they naturally do or did he learn from watching Lyra hug people? You like it either way.

Lyra’s been waiting patiently so you finally clear your throat. “He wanted to say goodbye before he left his…” Family? Friends? You settle for something neutral. “…his home.”

“Oh,” Lyra says. It’s a quiet sound with a hint of horror in it. She’d probably never thought about that before. And maybe there were also people she hadn’t had a chance to say goodbye to. “I… we’re getting close to where I caught you. We can stop by if you want?”

Musei trills happily (and at a reasonable volume) on your shoulder. Pixie hisses beside you, annoyed at another pokémon giving you comfort. You set the spoon and spatula down and scratch her ears. {Love you.}

She doesn’t answer.

“I think I can talk to your mudbray as well.” {Can you just make noises sometimes?} you ask Musei. {It’ll make her think you’re translating.

She shrieks yes.

“Just maybe not in my ear,” you mutter low enough Lyra probably can’t hear it.

The mudbray stirs and snorts. “I don’t like lying to her.”

{Then tell the truth.}

You go back to stirring as the mudbray thinks. “I meant about how we’re talking.”

“Do you want to talk to her?” you ask aloud. She once again takes a while to mull it over. A very thoughtful horse.

“Yes.”

You wait a second for Musei to ramble on about his favorite berries. Haban are the best, but they’re rare so he’ll settle for pechas or bluks. Useful information to pass onto Lyra later.

“Did you have a name before you met Lyra?”

“No.” You can hear her kick some dirt up a few meters away. “I was my mother’s foal. I didn’t need a name.”

“He didn’t have a name before,” you tell Lyra.

“Does she like hers now?”

“It’s fine,” the mudbray mumbles. “I don’t mind it.”

The rice is done so you lower the temperature down a bit while you translate. Meat could still cook for a bit longer.

“That’s awfully nonchalant.” Lyra sounds a bit concerned. You can hear her cross and uncross her legs in the grass. Or some other fidgeting. Probably crossing given the pattern.

“Names are a human thing. If it makes her happy, I like it.”

“Jishin it is then. So, um,” she trails off. It’s weird to see Lyra uncertain like this, as if she’s a primary schooler asking her classmate if he likes her. “Are you happy with me? You seemed to adjust well when you first joined.”

By the time Jishin responds you’ve already turned the other stove down and started putting dinner into bowls. “Mother says the mudsdale were made to help humans. They made us big and strong so we could carry things. I’m supposed to help them. It’s what I was made to do.”

You make a mental note of the story for later. It makes sense that a domesticated breed would see humans as creator gods of sorts, even if you’d never thought about that before. Mom’s swanna grew up on a farm and he sees humans as his servants, not his gods. You’d thought all barnyard pokémon might be like that.

Kekoa starts eating as soon as you hand him his bowl. Lyra doesn’t. You do. If your mouth is full it gives noibat a break to ‘translate.’

“Do you want to go back to your mother?” Lyra asks. “I don’t mind. I’d take you to her.”

“You can’t,” she snorts. “One day I went out to graze and she wasn’t home when I came back.” Jishin pauses to kick at the ground, like it took her mother from her. You want to hug the horse but don’t know how she’d react. Besides, you’ll leave that to Lyra. Her noibat’s already a little too friendly with you and you don’t want to give her the idea you’re trying to steal her team. “I think a human caught her. Maybe you’ll run into them someday.”

Lyra does move over to try and hug her mudbray once she hears that. “When I meet a trainer with a mudsdale I’ll let you out,” she promises. “Until then I’ll take care of you.”

And you don’t doubt that she will. Lyra seems to know what she’s doing with her pokémon. Logistically, at least. Taking Musei away without letting her say goodbye was rude, but hardly the worst thing a beginning trainer has ever done.

Come to think of it you never told Noci she could go off and talk to the other beldum. You just kind of let her wander and assumed she’d take care of it.

{Did you get a chance to tell your family where you were going?} you ask her.

{Query Meaning: Family.}

Oh boy. Right. She’s not exactly organic.

{Your creators and the others you were created alongside.}

Simple enough. She can probably understand that.

{ProgenitorUnit is aware of present mission.}

Progenitor, huh? A metang? You don’t think there are wild metagross in Ula’Ula.

{You’ll have to tell me about your progenitor sometime.}

{Order acknowledged. Preparing Data Logs on Unit001_110010;
Warning: Requested information is above classification level of UnitDesignate Cuicatl Ichtaca;
Redacting Data. Please wait… Redactions Complete;
Unit001_110010 Created Unit001_101110110 17.4496 Local Solar Cycles Ago;
End of Available Information. Query Complete.}

You stop eating. It’s good, for once, but that’s a lot to process. You’ve received a lot of answers when asking people about their parents, but “it’s classified” is new. And a Unit100? That’s a metagross, right? Will they be mad you took their kid? They know and you’re alive so they can’t be too upset. Probably. Hopefully.

And Noci’s older than you are? How? What has she even been doing the whole time?

…maybe Lyra isn’t the only one who needs to learn about her teammates.
 
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