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Starlight Aurate

Ad Jesum per Mariam | pfp by kintsugi
Location
Route 123
Partners
  1. mightyena
  2. psyduck
lolllll so when I saw Chapter 8 was out, I was like "Yay! I'm gonna be the first to review it!" only to see you've gotten like 5 reviews since then 😅

Certainly, they never said anything important or incriminating in front of her, but she got the impression that it was because what they needed most was to joke and complain, not because they were being careful.

Well isn't that a mood.

reg1sTEred tr4iner MÅ18x0ÑSTAn—li3paRd.
GIBS!

Pokeballs were supposed to be waterproof, but ….
I used to use four-dot ellipses until I was told that three-dots are correct in novel writing; idk if you've heard the same or not but thought I'd point it out 😅

"You're right—enough trash in the ocean already."
YOU'RE DARN RIGHT
Plastic pollution is one of the most imminent problems the oceans face and we don't need anyone adding to that okay my environment rant is over

Interersting that Natalie vouches to not have Gibs thrown overboard even after her thoughts about Mark--I get the impression she's got quite a soft forgiving spot or that she doesn't hold the Liepard to the same standards she holds his trainer.

Tabitha had yet to arrive, and Mark had no doubt her timing was purposeful, more of her usual psychological bullshit.
Given that I also have a Tabitha and a Mark, this just reads so funny to me haha

They were going to save the world—because no one else would.
Love how this is their ideology.

Zig checked his watch with a flourish and asked, "Is anyone, like, keeping tabs on Tabs?"
Lol until this I thought that Zig was a literal Zigzagoon XD

Real interesting to see how you portray obedience amongst the teams here, if mainly because I can't stop drawling comparisons to my fic. I have Team Aqua as the whole "you obey without question, no excuses," and Team Magma is more "this is what we're doing and why, we want you to fully understand this" while giving more misinformation. It's interesting to see you have Team Magma as demanding obedience without question!

The explosion had launched a drum the size of a gigalith clear across the river to Liberty Garden, and it had also released five thousand pounds of hydrofluoric acid into the air. Benzine in the groundwater. Lead in the soil.
Great!

Love the detail about Natalie rocking Gus to calm him down <3 I wonder what their history is!

Your Shelly appears! And she has red curly hair, too!

All around, the marsh was on fire.
And that, kiddos, is why you don't take it in your own hands to clean up the environment by destroying carefully-built infrastructure. Stick with picking up litter.

Without planning to, Natalie unhooked a ball from her belt. His voice burned inside her, taunting: You could make a difference. Her anger swelled, lifting her along with it and carrying her forward, first at a walk, and then a run.
Yeah, go Natalie!

I like that this chapter included more Pokemon and focused on them than the previous one. And we've finally seen Gibs!!! Looking forward to seeing Luna in action again (I assume. I'll be sad if not, but that's just because I'm a Mightyena fan). This was quite an eventful chapter, and I enjoyed it!
 

WildBoots

Don’t underestimate seeds.
Pronouns
She/Her
Partners
  1. moka-mark
  2. solrock
Kint—omg you did the thing. 👏

Okay, it's me, playing catchup for a ton of things, starting from like chapter 2 I guess since somehow I never actually got around to writing reviews and just shitposted in DM's instead. Most of my thoughts have been said over DM but here are a few general ones that somehow escaped? I think?
DMs help a lot—and actually I think the shitposts do too—but it’s lovely to have all this laid out. ❤☀ Beeg thank.

Steven Stone Chapter--maybe could've come pre-protest?
Oh, I see why it feels like an outlier. We’re getting more Steve-o SOON. That chapter went there because it happens next chronologically: The Mark/Cora chapter is a couple hours after the protest. The Natalie/Archie chapter is late night after the protest. Steven chapter is the morning after. Maybe I’ll know better how to integrate once I get him moving a little more consistently, or maybe it won’t feel so out of place once it’s clear where we’re headed.

The protest arc is a really nice exercise in things falling to shit,
🙏

Prose really hits its stride in the last two chapters I think;
This is lovely to hear ... and also so stressful lol. Perfectionism senses tingling. But that’s silly—no more beeg edits for now. Gonna catch those pesky errors you and Love spotted and then keep it moving. 💪

in fact, everyone is horrible to everyone lol.
Oops all assholes.

But for the most part they're doing it because they want to protect someone/some thing, so they at least feel grounded and sympathetic in that regard.
Thank god. Yeah, right now I just want them to be compelling. We’ll work on niceness later. Maybe. 🙃 We’ll see if it’s in the special effects budget.

Dunno! I spent six months trying to come up with smart things to say about this and drew a moka pot in a cape instead. So it goes.
You say this like Heroic Moka Pot wasn’t the single best contribution to art and culture in 2020. It makes my heart go clonk clonk.

It's a really good read so far.
:quag:

Subplot for how the power-limiters always mysteriously malfunction during contentious arrests and they can never explain why, when?
Golly GEE. It’s so MYSTERIOUS.

haha this is a really dumb nitpick but the cadence feels off here--no way/not today being 2/3 syllables makes it sound like it'd be hard to chant. Plus the "no pipeline / no way" to me conveys that there's no way they'll do this thing without a pipeline, which is the exact opposite of what they'd want. Maybe "A pipeline / No way / No pipelines / Today" but also crowd chants are really stupid and i watched someone try to lead a fucking poem and was really upset when no one could keep up with the words so like it's pretty reasonable to have weird phrasings here
I feel like I remember googling this, stealing an existing chant, and swapping their two-syllable word for mine. Not that these things flow organically from the interwebs, but it does mean someone used it somewhere. For now, I’ll let them keep it. I don’t mind it being a little clunky lol. Also omg a whole-ass poem. Great idea, lol. ... Might steal that for a future chapter.

This line felt very progressive for Natalie haha. I get it, sort of; it's puffbird on a big scale so if course she'd dislike it, and it sets up for how she really doesn't know what's coming.
Yeah, she’s kind of a sponge. She hasn’t yet decided what she wants, so it’s easy to be swept up by others’ passions.

I sorta wanted more from both of them here--he's supposed to be a good recruiter after all, and I do think Natalie was almost convinced! In later chapters she has some dialogue that suggests that she almost joined, except ORCA showed up, but here it really just seems like she's confused and not super leaning down that path.
Ah, that’s fair! I hadn’t considered that. My thinking was that he usually does pretty well ... but he doesn’t know how fucking contrarian and puff bird she is and takes the wrong strategy. And also life intervenes. But, certainly, she could ask a question here or something. And that would play into his belief that she’s playing him, lol.

I was wondering how he was allowed to register for a gym trainer position with a scrambled roster like that? Seems like that'd be something they'd check, akin to a background check or a drug test, even if it's just for stolen pokemon or whatever.
(Cue David Attenborough) The plot hole in its natural habitat—

Nah, but I think he just temporarily swapped pokeballs during the hiring process, stayed out of trouble for a few weeks (or, more likely, said he would and didn’t), and then swapped em back. The point is just to avoid getting doxed, but, like, your employer will still know all your official shit. Also really sad that the tradeoff here, like with Shelly’s sealeo, is swapping the freedom of the trainer/fighting for the movement for probably never getting that pokemon back. I bet this mechanic will come up in more detail eventually re: Natalie joining the ranks?

that's right! mark doesn't follow fictional heroes who drown things; he follows real leaders, who name themselves after fictional heroes who burn things down!
Yeah, wow, it sure would be weird if all his pokémon were named for writers and then he’d allied himself with a guy who shares his name with a literal book burner! I’m sure it’ll end well for everyone.

look I'm pretty sure I am legally obligated by the moka pot committee to flag this sentence and pretend i'm saying something remotely clever about it
Wow such clever! * golf clap *

so relatable! I could grab a beer with him!
Haha, right, especially because his “working while he trained” was going to business school, lol.

Best nickname; sad it's wasted on someone who isn't gonna come back.
I know, RIP. If I thought May would get much or any screen time, I would’ve saved it for her blaziken instead, but alas.

forgot about this thread tbh. I imagine it's going to be important soon again but I honestly dunno when it's going to have time to come up
Ah, I think most of what I’m trying to point at there is that DevCo isn’t unaware of Aqua and Magma ... and intends to do something about it. Target acquired.

Dunno if this is new but I did have an easier time picking up on this being the dream sequence here
I think it is new! Glad it’s working.

This one feels like the core of the argument going forward, but then in the pipeline chapter it really gets walked back and turned into "they'll poison the water just to prove a point"--which feels very contradictory to the idea presented here of wasting energy by trying to work within the system. Also true that there's a lot of fundamental misunderstandings going on here, and I could see the idea that he's just throwing mud at the wall to see what will stick, but I guess from someone who doesn't really know why they're feuding at this moment, it feels weird to get this nugget of misinformation.
Ah, so! I think this will be a little clearer in the aftermath of the pipeline. I’m expecting a sequence of Natalie curled up on her parents’ couch with * sad Fox News sounds * and getting some headlines + some kind of statement from Magma, which will confirm that they’re trying to swing at DevCo and the government itself. Archie didn’t really clarify what ORCA is doing, if not that, but the answer is guerilla geoengineering, lol. Forget changing the government. I’ll fix it myself with paper clips and bubble gum! So, what Archie said in chapter 6 is accurate, he’s just speaking in anger in the pipeline chapter.

Dunno of those patch changes got pushed through! Take a quick ctrl+F for crobat; I think there are references to him having ones in the earlier chapters.
Damn it. The joys of updating on multiple platforms. I think it’s fixed in my copy but not here. I think that also happened with a couple typos here, actually. Grumble, grumble.

Mmmm, love the tension that gets set up in this chapter. It never really lets up.
Good to hear! I worried she was too over-the-top.

I really hate alternating POV mid-chapter but I think you've made a compelling case for it here--there's such a trainwreck happening and we get to see the parallels play out on both sides, where they both get the chance to walk it back and then don't.
I sweated over this so hard but finally concluded it was the best option. I also just love the stupid gimmick of calling it oil and water and then putting my two separate POVs in a jar and shaking it. :D But, yeah, get ready for me to do you one worse in the next chapter. And then back to single POV chapters for the conceivable future.

I admittedly haven't played ORAS and I mostly just have an understanding based on Persephone's hottake summaries (which mostly surround encouraging magma/aqua to summon deathgods so that she can ultimately get Rayquaza's attention)--so it's interesting to see her so definitively on a side here, unless she's playing both? Big eyes. Also, lol whismur.
Yeah, I’ve read the Bulba summaries and that’s about it. I really didn’t think I was gonna use her at all until halfway through this chapter! But I think she’ll help me nudge Mark and Natalie around. Like a push broom. Also I like her, so I’m happy to get to play around with her. :D

The hope spot at the end here was nice too--even though I knew this was coming it felt genuine/believed.
❤ Excellent! I struggled with this, too. I considered a few ways that Mark might resist this plan or show his doubt. I finally decided that he’s Maxie’s creature, only dissenting on the inside (for now). Buuuuuuut he’s not stupid enough to like any part of this. I’m sure none of them do. It’s an ugly thing.

Really good closer, holy shit.

good fic upd8 moar
:quag: I’m on it!!! o7

Thanks so much for the kind words. And! For letting me bounce ideas off you in general and for helping with the early chapter cleanup in particular. 🙏
 
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WildBoots

Don’t underestimate seeds.
Pronouns
She/Her
Partners
  1. moka-mark
  2. solrock
lolllll so when I saw Chapter 8 was out, I was like "Yay! I'm gonna be the first to review it!" only to see you've gotten like 5 reviews since then 😅
LOLLLLL
To be fair, some of it’s catnip and earlier chapters. And it’s not a race! I’m always happy to hear your thoughts.

I used to use four-dot ellipses until I was told that three-dots are correct in novel writing; idk if you've heard the same or not but thought I'd point it out
Oh man! So! I googled the fuck out of this and I’m still a little frustrated because it seems like there are multiple answers and I’m dying. It sounds like
This ... is correct
And this . . . is correct
But this... is not? But this one is also so common (in published fiction, too) that I don’t say anything when I see it.
I started going with the top one, and at least I’m using it consistently lol. But! When it ends a sentence, you do still need another period to end the sentence. Apparently.

Plastic pollution is one of the most imminent problems the oceans face and we don't need anyone adding to that okay my environment rant is over
Team Aqua wants to know your location.

Real interesting to see how you portray obedience amongst the teams here, if mainly because I can't stop drawling comparisons to my fic. I have Team Aqua as the whole "you obey without question, no excuses," and Team Magma is more "this is what we're doing and why, we want you to fully understand this" while giving more misinformation. It's interesting to see you have Team Magma as demanding obedience without question!
Haha, yeah, I think you’re right! My Aqua is more laid back and chaotic, and my Magma is much more tightly structured and hierarchical.

But yeah, haha, the overlap in names between our fics really amuses me. Especially Mark liking Shelly. :D I can guarantee you my Mark does not, lol.

Love the detail about Natalie rocking Gus to calm him down <3 I wonder what their history is!
He’s her newest capture! The literal baby.

Your Shelly appears! And she has red curly hair, too!
Yup, declaring my age, haha. RSE kid. I practically grew up in Hoenn. I get why they redesigned for ORAS, and in many ways I think the new designs are strong. But in my heart of hearts, Shelly will always have red hair. I gave Scarlet the black hair instead. Made her up when I was in high school, and she also had red hair. 7.8/10, too much redhead.

I like that this chapter included more Pokemon and focused on them than the previous one. And we've finally seen Gibs!!! Looking forward to seeing Luna in action again (I assume. I'll be sad if not, but that's just because I'm a Mightyena fan). This was quite an eventful chapter, and I enjoyed it!
Yes, I was actually thinking of you a little bit here! It’s probably going to continue to be stop and start, but I promise I haven’t forgotten the pokemon, haha. Poor Luna is telling Natalie to get off the boat. And, I guess, she did. 🙃 We will see a bit of Luna next chapter! Though she’s not the star of the scene. She’ll have time to shine in the future, though. She’s Natalie’s best girl!!

So glad to hear you enjoyed it!
 
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love

Memento mori
Pronouns
he/him/it
Partners
  1. leafeon
Chapter 4 has been read, by me

Behind him, his gigalith launched hunks of rock and asphalt at a pelipper that so far seemed to be avoiding them

I would rewrite to get rid of the "seemed to be". This is case where there isn't an in-between.

The pavement cracked where the machoke landed, and it didn't get back up.

To me it was kind of unclear why the pavement cracked. Did it get slammed down?

Mark had turned away to deal with the armaldo now bearing down on his darmantian

Either I missed something, or the armaldo's appearence here is very sudden.

The light l surrounded her

We picked up an extra l

The bastiodon took the opportunity to ram the crawdaunt, knocking it back but not down.

I think "the opportunity" refers to the starmie's retreat? I had a very hard time figuring that out.

Then Mark turned to recall his fallen pokemon and his still-swinging gigalith

To be honest, I forgot the gigalith was there

And, there, several yards away, was Luna's pokeball.

Bordering on nitpicky, but maybe replace "was" with "laid". Replacing variants of the verb "to be" when possible is something I've been working on, myself.

The same advice as the previous chapter applies regarding the filter verbs. There were a few places to weed those out.

I kind of had a hard time following that whole fight scene. I don't know if that's just me, but I had to read it, like, 3 times. Maybe because I wasn't super familiar with the pokemon involved, and they kind of all just get thrown in at once.

Anyway, Natalie's got herself in quite the situation. Caught between Magma and Orca. I wonder what she'll do in the end? I wonder what she *should* do? We'll have to learn more to find out, but now we're at a point where we're invested in doing so.
 

WildBoots

Don’t underestimate seeds.
Pronouns
She/Her
Partners
  1. moka-mark
  2. solrock
@love Thanks again for reading and for your thoughts!
This is really exciting, actually, because I’ve gotten the least amount of line-by-line feedback on this chapter, so it’s nice to know where it’s most confusing. Though—

I kind of had a hard time following that whole fight scene. I don't know if that's just me, but I had to read it, like, 3 times. Maybe because I wasn't super familiar with the pokemon involved, and they kind of all just get thrown in at once.
It’s somewhat intentional! Natalie is totally dazed and overwhelmed. AND there are F O U R trainers at play here. I want it to feel like chaos. Sounds like it doesn’t feel intentional though, So that’s something to work on.

I would rewrite to get rid of the "seemed to be". This is case where there isn't an in-between.
Ah, this was a spot where I was trying to show some of Natalie’s bewilderment. I can easily change it though. :)

To me it was kind of unclear why the pavement cracked. Did it get slammed down?
Ah, yes! I’ll rephrase to make the cause and effect better.

Either I missed something, or the armaldo's appearence here is very sudden.
It does appear a little bit before this, but only briefly.

I think "the opportunity" refers to the starmie's retreat? I had a very hard time figuring that out.
This is probably the weakest moment in the entire chapter—you’re right. I’ll sit with it and see what I can do.

The same advice as the previous chapter applies regarding the filter verbs. There were a few places to weed those out.
I don’t doubt it, haha. It was written around the same time as the previous one. Maybe this weekend I’ll have time for a deeper edit when I can really hunt those down and root them out. Cheers.

I wonder what she'll do in the end? I wonder what she *should* do? We'll have to learn more to find out, but now we're at a point where we're invested in doing so.
:quag: This is what we like to hear! 👏
 
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love

Memento mori
Pronouns
he/him/it
Partners
  1. leafeon
Chapter 5 time

He kept catching his hand dip down to the empty space on his belt where Gibson, his first, was supposed to be.

"He kept catching his hand dip down" sounds kind of weird to me. I would just say "He caught his hand dipping down..."

Magma only messaged through an encrypted server,

Should it not be "encrypted connection?"

By the time he was allowed to leave with his care instructions (dropped into the first trash can he passed)

I like this little moment of characterization. The text message conversation also characterized him a little. I think he's charming, no-nonsense, passionate, and maybe a little reckless.

Right now what he really wanted was for Gibs to throw his paws onto Mark's shoulders and butt his head against his face until Gibs' purring rumbled through Mark's entire body

I think we could replace a couple of those names with pronouns.

I like that you're showing all the precautions that Mark is taking, and I also really like that we're not letting go of the fact that Gibs is gone. Gibs absence makes me feel a lot more invested in Mark's situation and gives me a reason to hate Orca along with Mark.

"Is she the sick one?"

"The cellist." He didn't like the pitying look that crossed Cora's face.

That's some good dialogue right there 👌

This was a nice chapter; so far I enjoy Mark's perspective more than Natalie's, to be honest. I feel like he's been characterized pretty well here. We see his toughness and his vulnerability. It's pretty cool.

I'll throw in my thoughts on chapter 6 as well:

she didn't think she'd imagined that it had gotten worse in the past few minutes

she didn't think she'd imagined?

They'd come to a stop, and a pair of catamarans had joined them

"They'd come" -> "They came"

Anyway, if the worst thing these Orca guys do is team up with pirates to blow up oil tankers, then, well, that's not so bad. I also don't see why they can't get along with Magma, since Magma is also clearly willing to break the law to achieve their goals. Even if they disagree on certain things, I don't see yet how it managed to get to the point where they're fighting one another. I am a little concerned about that.

Still not terribly interested in Natalie, especially now that these other, seemingly more interesting characters have been introduced.

And thoughts on chapter 7:

So Steven could be interesting, I'm glad he's got something going on other than just being Mr. Evil Corporation Guy. Don't really care about his metagross, but maybe it will be important later.

Anyway, can't wait to see what comes of that data leak 👀

Dream sequence was pretty cool.

Chapter 8:

When Natalie didn't respond, Scarlet offered airily, "I thought about tossing the thing overboard."

On this episode of "characters that I want to see die..."

You wanted to know the difference between us and them? There it is. We fight to keep oil out of the ocean, and Magma spills it to make a fucking point."

I think *this* actually makes sense as a reason why Aqua and Magma wouldn't get along with one another. I think it would have made sense for Sinbad to mention that Magma does stuff like that earlier.

She didn't know what she wanted.

This pretty much sums up why I don't find Natalie's perspective interesting so far.

Without planning to, Natalie unhooked a ball from her belt. His voice burned inside her, taunting: You could make a difference. Her anger swelled, lifting her along with it and carrying her forward, first at a walk, and then a run.

Good, I'm glad she makes some kind of decision here.

I understood the action this time, which was nice.

Anyway, Magma sucks, I am now convinced that Orca are the good guys, except fuck Scarlet for stealing Gibs.

Anyway, looks like things are getting interesting. This is certainly a tragic note on which to stop reading. And there is something terrible about the fact that Orca and Magma basically have the same goals but fight each other anyway.
 
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WildBoots

Don’t underestimate seeds.
Pronouns
She/Her
Partners
  1. moka-mark
  2. solrock
@love !! You got caught up fast! I addressed some of these in DMs, but I'll do it for posterity out here.

Should it not be "encrypted connection?"
Ah, good call!

I think we could replace a couple of those names with pronouns.
You know, looking at it again, I think you're right. I was worried about clarity because they're both he/him, but I'll play around with it some more.

I also really like that we're not letting go of the fact that Gibs is gone.
It's going to continue to be a problem!

I think he's charming, no-nonsense, passionate, and maybe a little reckless.
I feel like he's been characterized pretty well here. We see his toughness and his vulnerability. It's pretty cool.
Haha, glad to have a Mark stan aboard. He's ... contentious, lol. Charming is not a word I'd use, as much as I love him, but I think reckless is a good fit. I don't think he would self-describe that way, but sometimes we can't see ourselves very clearly. :)

Even if they disagree on certain things, I don't see yet how it managed to get to the point where they're fighting one another.
This will eventually become clearer! The short answer is petty human drama. 🙃

I'm glad he's got something going on other than just being Mr. Evil Corporation Guy.
Oh yeah, Steven is not very invested in the corporate world. He's invested in rocks.

I think *this* actually makes sense as a reason why Aqua and Magma wouldn't get along with one another. I think it would have made sense for Sinbad to mention that Magma does stuff like that earlier.
I think Archie could probably describe why he hates Magma in 17 different ways. He's got a lot of complicated feelings about it--hard to hold all of that in one conversation, I think. And he didn't know they were going to do this. Also! His organization has done lots of shitty stuff too, TBH. More on that later.

> She didn't know what she wanted.
This pretty much sums up why I don't find Natalie's perspective interesting so far.
Fair enough! It's interesting to see the range of reactions. It sounds like Kint wants her to slow down and reflect more, and it almost sounds like you want her to speed up and take more action. She's definitely taking some time to reflect soon and then taking a bold step in a particular direction. I'll keep my eye on ways to tinker with that balance in future drafts ... but some of it's inevitable. She enters this story having zero idea about this world and its players, and she's got a lot to take in and reconcile.

Anyway, Magma sucks, I am now convinced that Orca are the good guys, except fuck Scarlet for stealing Gibs.
Welp, don't be surprised if you change your mind again later on. They're both pretty flawed. But well-intentioned. :) We'll keep getting to know them both, haha.

Thanks again for reading along and taking the time to offer feedback. <3
 
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Flaze

Don't stop, keep walking
Location
Chile
Pronouns
he/him
Partners
  1. infernape
I'm finally here! after three weeks of reading this fic, very very slowly thanks to real life happening, I'm finally caught up. It's actually kind of sad it's taken me this long considering it only has 8 chapters so far. Guess I was lucky it didn't have more yet.

Anyways, my rambling aside, this review won't involve quotes because then I'll be here all day, but instead, I'll be taking a more general look at the story and what I've liked or took notice off while reading it, probably the best review format but considering it's eight chapters to cover it's kind of the best I can do right now.

I think what I enjoyed the most about this story is the way you ground the premise of team aqua (sorry, ORCA) and magma so that they function more like a proper activist group that's actually going after a legit goal rather than a couple of vaguely defined criminal organizations led by a couple of megalomaniacal psychopaths that want to awaken gods for...that part was never clear to me. It goes beyond just the teams though, one can see it in the way training is handled more like a sport that, while popular, is kind of seen as something that only teenagers or people that haven't "figured out" their lives do. This is doubly interesting because trainers would technically be the people who'd have pokemon trained enough to protect people from police brutality in the protests for example, but of course, they're unaware of the things outside of what they want to achieve, which is an interesting way of reframing the way the games go about the two teams and makes them feel kind of like propaganda.

To add to that, there's also all the brands you mention as well as smaller moments of worldbuilding that make it all feel richer and lived in, to say something of the focus you take on the environmental issues that Hoenn is going through, the different ways in which people interact with said issues and how both impact society. Chapter 3 and four stood out to me especially for how you portrayed the protest. The way you focused on how protesters came off to onlookers, how a protest can start peacefully and then just completely go off the rails, I even like how you left it ambiguous as to who actually caused it to go off the rails. Was it an undercover officer or a protestor? we may never know or maybe we will later, still a fun little detail either way.

Chapter 7 for its part stands out by giving us the other side of the coin and focusing on Devon, showing us that they're clearly not as innocent as they would want the general public to look at them. Steven in particular is interesting to me, being a fan favorite character, not many people would paint him in the light you have. I don't think he's a bad person by any means, but he seems like a performer like he's always making sure that his facade doesn't break down. He's aware of his standing and of people's opinions on him and that causes him to be more careful of what he says or does, but that also ends up making the fact that he's willingly turning a blind eye even worse. Plus I find it interesting that you capture Steven in a period not many people tend to focus on, that being after losing his title to May, who I wonder if we'll see later. You also throw a pretty...interesting idea on the table with what Steven is researching, which I assume to be the Regis. Where that will lead is something that remains to be seen but considering they're beings tied to Hoenn's ecosystem I wouldn't be surprised if they make an appearance.

That leads me to ORCA and MGMA or orca and magma because it's easier to type. I like the little cast you've built around this two groups and they both have their share of colorful personalities. So far I'd say orca seems like the most interesting one to me if only because Archie being Natalie's brother and Natalie being unaware of orca makes it easier for us to get a look at how the team operates and how they all relate to one another, Shelly especially seems interesting cause she kind of seems like the anchor that dials back the others when they get too rowdy. I also was surprised that you added Zinnia into the remix, but I wonder if she's truly an orca member or if she's just playing for both sides.

For magma there's still isn't too much I can talk about outside of Mark, Cora and Tabitha but Cora wasn't around long enough, we still don't know much about Tabitha and Mark I'll talk about later. I'm sure you'll give us a proper look at the group once they all gather though since so far they seem to function on a less unified front than orca, and they also seem somewhat smaller.

However what I will highlight is both of their philosophies and the differences between one another. Magma is trying to change things by force, making people realize how bad the system is, while orca just wants to change it by its hands. Of course this causes them to clash but I find it interesting how magma's willing to even cause damage to the environment if it means opening people's eyes. That's not to say that what orca does is necessarily better but it does lead one to wonder if maybe the ends don't justify the means in this case.

Having said that, none of this would work as well as it does without the two most important factors to this story. The characters and your prose. The characters are fun to read about and the dialogue scenes they share have a natural flow to them that allow us to quickly get to know, understand and even feel for them. While I think that it took me a little to properly understand Natalie, later chapters give us more detail on her background and her world view and I think you handle her journey from directionless trainer to someone that realizes she doesn't just want to stand on the sideline while the rest of the world suffers.

Mark's another interesting case. I like him because he's someone that's dedicated to his goal of helping make the world a better place, he is tired of having to stand companies just swing their weight around without a care for who they hurt, especially with what happened at Virbank when he was growing up. However, while his heart's in the right place, he's also starting to develop standards on how far he's willing to go. Vandalism and justified protest against a company is one thing, but actively doing something that might cause more problem for the people and pokemon they're trying to protect is another subject entirely and I think it's one that Mark's going to find himself exploring more and more. He's got layers is what I'm trying to say, someone that at first glance seems like he's figured out his place in the world but more and more it's becoming evident that he's kind of falling inline with someone else's philosophy.

That theme is an important one I noticed throughout this eight chapters. There's a lot of focus on characters not only exploring their own independence but also trying to understand what they want to be. They all want to accomplish something, but don't know what it is or maybe they don't know how to do it, like Natalie who's still trying to make sense of where she stands or Mark who's slowly coming to terms that magma might not be entirely what he hoped and even Steven who's trying to fight between his previous identity as a champion, the identity his father wants him to strive towards and the one that he himself wants but can't seem to get.

All of that is contrasted with Archie, Montag and even president Devon, who all represent a different side of this conflict and who've all figured out what they want to achieve and how they want to do it, to the point that maybe they've become blind to the ways in which their goals affect others.

I've rambled a lot but what I wanted to focus on last was your prose. The way you write your seems is very quick and has a great flow tht makes it easy to get invested in what's going on. It also helps keep things from feeling too bogged down by the subject matter, which can sometimes get heavy or serious. A lot of stories miss or don't apply this balance which can cause the story to become to serious or ruin the tension, but you strike a good balance that really works out.

And well, that's all I have for now. I know it's not exactly the best or more detailed review, I hope I can give it more proper ones now that I won't have to read eight chapters, but I really loved what I read and I'll be paying attention for when the next one come in.
 
Chapter 9: Fault Lines

WildBoots

Don’t underestimate seeds.
Pronouns
She/Her
Partners
  1. moka-mark
  2. solrock
Chapter 9: Fault Lines

Mark had almost gotten clear of the fire-zone when Ore's constant hum in his mind became a warning shriek, demanding wordlessly for him to turn, look. First he saw the mightyena bounding towards them between patches of burning grass. And then behind it, he saw her. She'd masked her face with ORCA blue, but her hair still stood out flaming red.

Despite the press of heat all around, despite the pirates somewhere behind him and the chilly throb of his banette wound—he stopped in his tracks. Un-fucking-believable. Blood rushed to his head so suddenly that, for an instant, the edges of his vision wavered.

Ore was simultaneously several feet away and also there inside Mark's bubble of rage, taking it in and pulsing back an undercurrent of righteousness through his thoughts. Without language, the solrock told him, I am with you. As Mark took the first step towards Natalie, the light shield was already reforming around him.

If she wanted to finish what they started in that Rustboro parking lot, he was more than ready.

The mightyena moved toward them in syncopated bursts, cutting in and out of shadow. Orwell glided in front of Mark, buzzing in distress each time the mightyena vanished. But Mark wasn't worried. As he tracked the mightyena's zigzagging path, his anger settled into icy calm. Even shadow-hopping, there were only so many places it could go without rematerializing among the flames.

He stepped back, into the heat, trusting Orwell's light shield to protect him from the worst of it. The mightyena would have to run straight at him to avoid the fires sputtering behind and to the sides. Sweat dripped down his face and neck, but he ignored the flames licking at his back, his gaze fixed on the mightyena. When it vanished from sight again, Mark closed his hand around his next pokeball. He flashed a smirk that remained hidden behind his bandana, and then he released Rand.

His darmanitan burst forth with a roar. When the mightyena reappeared mid-lunge, Rand was already swinging. He caught the mightyena upside the head with a smoldering fist, smacking its jaws shut. Leaving it no opportunity to recover, he beat it back with several quick hits to the ribs.

Mark followed his darmanitan forward. "Keep it tight, Rand! Don't give it room to jump between us."

Gritting his teeth through the stab of pain in his shoulder, Mark swiveled toward Natalie. She stood frozen, her eyes wide, just as she had when ORCA had arrived and blown her cover. The reminder made Mark's blood boil. He'd gone out of his way to protect her, and what had she done in return? Lied to him. Led him into ORCA's path. He'd lost Gibs because of her.

As she fumbled for another pokeball, he saw his opening. She should've kept her mightyena closer.

To Ore he said, "Go for her head."

The solrock's eyes flashed violet. A soundless wind ripped through the grass—and then Natalie clutched her head and doubled over like she'd been punched. Her expression was difficult to read at a distance, but her shock and alarm showed in the way she moved. She stared at him for a long moment, arms drawn protectively around herself, before flinging down the pokeball.

Her wingull rose easily on an updraft. It was even smaller than Mark remembered, but he knew better than to underestimate a threat from above. He didn't wait to find out whether it was coming for him and Ore or for Rand.

"Go, Octavia."

She might have escaped the worst of the explosion, but she wasn't in great shape. Her flight was crooked as she approached the wingull. But there was nothing he could do about it now. If he recalled her, they'd be open to attack from the air. Let it play out, then; Octavia could manage for a little while. He just had to finish this quickly.

Clenching his jaw, Mark turned back to Natalie. He counted two more balls at her belt, but she hadn't reached for either yet. Too slow. "Again, Ore."

This time Natalie's knees buckled. He watched with surprise but not pity as she dropped. No more tricks up your sleeve, huh? You really had no idea what this was like.

From her knees, she finally sent out another pokemon, the gurdurr. It tottered momentarily and then, at her command, lurched towards Mark's darmanitan. Rand was leaping away from the mightyena's teeth and couldn't see the gurdurr drawing back its fist behind him, but—she keeps forgetting about Orwell.

His solrock knew what he wanted before he'd even finished the thought. Ore spun to face the gurdurr, freezing it mid-swing. For a moment, it strained uselessly against the invisible hold, but then it toppled as if its legs had been knocked out from under it. Ore lifted the gurdurr and tossed it out of sight, through the veil of smoke. At no point did the solrock leave Mark's side.

"Good work," he said, giving Ore a grin the solrock would sense even if it couldn't see.

Overhead, the wingull was a white smudge, weaving and twisting to avoid Octavia's snapping jaws. To the right, Rand pinned the mightyena by the throat with one massive hand and pummeled it with the other, ignoring the shadows lashing his face and chest. The mightyena snarled and then blinked out of sight; but it hadn't managed to move out of striking range, and Rand caught it with a left hook before they tumbled together through the haze. Flame spilled across the grass on either side.

But it wasn't about beating her pokemon. He'd bled for his team and his convictions countless times, and he'd do it again—but he didn't think she would be so ready to accept the real price. Next time, she'd know better and stay the fuck out of it. He'd make sure of that.

Mark started forward, ignoring the pain that shot through his back. "Come on, Ore. Let's finish this."



As Mark strode towards her, Natalie struggled to her feet, her head throbbing. Something dripped hotly under her bandana, and she wasn't sure if it was sweat or blood. Red-hot lines webbed Mark's light shield, but the solrock bobbing alongside him sealed the cracks with pulses of light like they'd never been there. And, gods, she still had nothing.

She closed her fingers on her last pokeball, picturing her whismur's velvety nose and quivering whiskers. The metal was slippery in her grasp. It didn't feel fair. Gus wasn't ready for this, but—

Mark was close enough now to hear him. His voice came distorted from behind the light shield, but the malice was unmistakable. "Get the fuck out of here."

The solrock's eyes began to glow again, so Natalie pressed the release button and threw down her pokeball. The whismur's silhouette formed from the red light, ears unfurling—

Again, the bone-rattling hum filled her head, squeezing against the confines of her skull and wrenching her sideways. She screamed—

—and her scream poured from Gus's mouth. The sound stretched until it was unrecognizable, booming with such force that dirt and sparks and flaming debris flew.

Mark's light shield burst like a soap bubble. This time he was the one who ducked his head and pressed his hands to his ears. He straightened stiffly, flinching as he lowered his arms—he was hurt.

Good. He deserved it.

Heart pounding, Natalie scrambled to right herself. She drew in a smoky breath and shouted with all her strength, "You leave!" Gus amplified her voice, the sound vibrating through her shoes. "HOENN ISN'T YOURS!"

Mark stumbled back, and his solrock wobbled. It was trying to reconstruct the light shield, but the light flickered out again with each reverberation. Behind them, Samson was back on his feet, but he had stopped to clamp his hands over his ears, too. And Luna. Where was she? Natalie couldn't even see her anymore.

When Natalie quieted, so did Gus. Mark's voice made Natalie jerk to attention. "Rockslide."

As the first pebbles showered their feet, Gus sucked in a breath and started to howl again. But the rocks kept falling, each one larger than the next. Huge shapes hurtled through the haze, outlined in purple light—great hunks of the ruined overpass, Natalie realized, some of them almost as large as her.

"Gus!" she shrieked, but she couldn't hear herself over the whismur's cries. Natalie recalled him moments before an enormous concrete block dropped where he'd been standing. She narrowly avoided being crushed herself. Concrete dust showered her as she skittered out of the way, leaving rubble scattered behind her.

Natalie fought for breath. Each gulp of the smoky air burned her throat. Mark was drawing closer, his solrock ablaze with violet light. Their eyes met. For a moment she thought she saw a softening in his face, but then his mouth opened, and he said, "Again. Take her down."

A rock flew past her ear, forcing her to duck. The concrete chunks that lay all around lit up and lifted shakily into the air. Mark watched, arms folded.

The first rock grazed her shoulder, and then another struck her leg. It was no bigger than a tennis ball, but Natalie stumbled and almost went down again. As a third rock flew towards her, Natalie shut her eyes—but no impact came. She blinked. The air in front of her shimmered blue. Then the keening call of a wingull rose over the roar of the flames, and Amelia swooped to land at Natalie's feet.

But as rock and concrete clattered against Amelia's light shield, it began to crack, blue shards splintering off the edges. "Hang in there, Amelia!"

In response, Amelia lifted her wings, beak open in a threat display ... but she was such a tiny thing to hold back so much weight. Her wings trembled. Natalie's heart felt ready to burst. The shield wasn't going to hold, and Natalie couldn't bear the thought of all that rock coming down on her brave little wingull.

She reached for Amelia's ball, and then hesitated. Natalie couldn't outrun this. If she recalled her ….

Amelia trilled, and Natalie raised her eyes—but the wingull was too bright to look at directly, the white of her feathers incandescent. Natalie shielded her face in the crook of her elbow. From the corners of her vision she watched Amelia's silhouette ripple and stretch, blazing ever-brighter, and then bloom into something new.

At last, the sound of rocks battering the shield faded away. The air hung thick with dust and smoke. But the air was clear inside the unbroken dome of blue light where Natalie crouched behind Amelia, who flexed her new pelipper wings.

Natalie couldn't see Mark through the smoke—which meant he couldn't see them either. They had one chance for a surprise attack. "Amelia," she said with a ragged voice, her lips cracked and dry. "Water pulse."

Amelia flapped, scattering smoke and sparks as she lifted into the air, and she opened her beak to release a torrent of water. The blast cut through the dusty haze, then smashed into the solrock's light shield with enough force to drive both it and its trainer back several yards.

But, through the smoke, the solrock's shield still glowed a steady purple. Silhouetted against the flames, Mark reached to his belt again.

Natalie cast her eyes around wildly. Could she run? Sam toddled towards them—but Luna! Natalie still couldn't see her anywhere. She couldn't just leave her.

Behind Mark, a second, smaller figure cut through the smoke, a crobat flying at their side. The trainer caught Mark by the arm, their faces close, and Natalie wondered if she was saved. But instead of attacking, the crobat turned its back to the solrock, watching the rear while it guarded the front. They knew each other. She didn't stand a chance against two of them.

Mark shoved off the other trainer, who grabbed the front of his sweater instead and pulled. Straining away, Mark twisted to face toward her one more time—she could feel the venom in his gaze even if she could make out none of the details of his face. How had she ever admired him?

Natalie wanted to return the glare with even greater ferocity. She wanted to tear him down and make him hurt as much as he'd hurt her. But she didn't have anything left in her, and instead she shrank back.

But, to her amazement, he turned away and recalled his pokemon one by one, red light flashing through the smoke until only the solrock was left. Then he and the crobat trainer turned and ran towards the trees.

She didn't watch them go. Hands on her knees, she let herself drop to a crouch, gasping in tearless sobs of relief. She felt like she might throw up or pass out.

The entire fight must've lasted only a minute or two. How had it spiraled out of her control so quickly?

At a squawk from Amelia—a new, lower register—Natalie lifted her head. Samson had rejoined them. "Sam! Are you okay?" Legs shaking, she clambered over to lay hands on him and assure herself that he was whole. He was covered in ash and dirt, so she couldn't tell the full extent of his injuries, but at least he was on his feet.

Still woozy, she forced herself to stand up again, scanning for signs of her mightyena. She could hardly see anything but flame and curtains of smoke. "Luna!" The shout tore at her throat, but she could still hardly hear herself. "Luna!"

There was no response.

"Come on," Natalie said in a voice pinched with panic. "We have to find her."

With Sam on her heels and Amelia coasting overhead, she plunged through the smoke in the direction she'd last glimpsed Luna, calling her name. Even with the bandana over her nose and mouth, she was arrested by a coughing fit. Then she saw Luna, a lump of fur on the ground just ahead, illuminated by the encroaching flames.

Heart in her throat, she ran. She directed Amelia to fight the fire back from them, and then she dropped to Luna's side, cradling the mightyena's face in her hands. "Luna? Oh gods. Luna, baby, are you okay?"

Luna lifted her head and whined.

Natalie swallowed hard and gingerly pet the top of Luna's head. "I'm so sorry, Luna. You're so good and, gods, I screwed up. You're okay. I'll take you to the pokecenter, and you'll be okay."

With another whine, the mightyena weakly wagged her tail.

Natalie's stomach felt like it was full of rocks. She bent to press her face against Luna's cheek and then recalled her. The pokeball came away covered in dark fingerprints; her fingers were black with soot from Luna's fur.

The heat was oppressive, a reminder not to linger. Amelia wheeled, gliding low to douse the flames and then rising again, but the fire was still moving forward. At heavy footfalls behind, Natalie spun around. Sam, rejoining her at her side. Hadn't he already been right behind her? She paled at the thought of leaving him behind without even realizing. She knew better now than to rely on Amelia alone if another of the MGMA came upon her, but she also couldn't afford to slow to his pace. The fire was moving fast now. "Good job, Sam," she said, recalling him. Then she shouted over her shoulder for Amelia and moved towards the open air.

A pelipper's plaintive call brought her up short. For a moment, she thought it was Amelia in trouble. Then, from beside her, Amelia trumpeted an answering cry. To the left, where the smoke was thinner, blue shadows circled in the air. Below them, the fires were settling down, and trainers stood in the thick of the smoke and steam that rose when a spurt of water hit flame. More trainers waded in the shallows, commanding their pokemon to stem the flow of oil down the coastline. Among them was the glowing outline of a starmie, and Natalie thought she saw Scarlet turn to look at her, but it was hard to tell through the haze.

Natalie gave a start at the realization that, all along, ORCA trainers had been less than a hundred feet away. Not that it had helped when she'd been fighting for her life. She wasn't one of them.

And, of course, that meant the rest of Magma might've been nearby, too. She'd gotten off lucky.

Amelia landed beside Natalie, smoke eddying in her wake. She called out again, craning towards the other pelippers.

"You want to go to them," Natalie said softly.

She imagined how she might move through the fray, Amelia carving a path with wind and water. They could put out fires, redirect the waterflow. They could help.

Amelia's head came to Natalie's chest now, her wings almost as large as doors. But already her feathers had gone gray with smoke. She wasn't invulnerable.

Just past the ORCA trainers, scraps of flame floated across the water. And farther ahead, at the heart of the roiling smoke, splotches of burning oil rained down, and flames taller than buildings continued to spew into the sky. ORCA was making their way towards that column of fire, but so much was still burning in between. Maybe too much even for them.

No. Natalie had already done enough—and her pokemon had paid the price. For once, she knew when she was beat.

"Amelia, let's go," she said, voice quavering, and turned towards the main road. She paused to cast a look over her shoulder. Awash in orange smog and still listing towards the shadows of the ORCA pokemon, Amelia gave another squawk. But finally, she took to the air, sailing up and away from the fire. Natalie breathed out in relief.

It was a long walk to Slateport, but there were no other options. Natalie wasn't about to wait for a ride home. Not tonight.

As she walked, Natalie pulled off her bandana, sucking in the cool air. Her mouth tasted like iron, but the smell of the ocean was so sweet that she felt maudlin with it. She moved almost in a trance, mystified by her own ability to keep putting one foot in front of the other. Down the road, red and blue lights flashed, too distant for her to hear the sirens yet. They'd come far too late.

Amelia wiffled past, and then she was a white dot receding towards the city lights, leading the way home. Don't look back, Natalie told herself. She kept her eyes on Amelia and kept her feet moving.



The spare key was in the lock box hooked under the back stairs, like always. Natalie's own key was in her backpack … which, of course, was still many miles away in Rustboro. She shook her head at herself as she spun the number dials—but how could she have known that she wouldn't return to the hostel after the protest? That felt like a thousand years ago.

The moment she opened the door, she was hit by cool air and the smell of laundry. There was something else too, a smell she had never noticed before and couldn't quite pinpoint. The definitive smell of home.

Natalie pulled off her filthy sneakers and padded through the house like a thief. The dark rooms were like museums of normal life: the kitchen table covered with bills to be paid and one of Mom's articles, half-edited and scattered with three colors of pens. The remote and the empty beer can next to Dad's chair. The school portraits, a younger Natalie with no front teeth and a teenaged Archie smiling cooly. The carpet looked freshly vacuumed. Natalie, conscious of her unclean hands and clothes stinking of smoke, touched nothing on her way to the bathroom.

She sat on the edge of the tub, and for several moments, she was so overcome with exhaustion that all she could do was stare at the tiles. But, although she knew her team would be fine in pokeball stasis, she couldn't stomach going to bed without tending to them. So she made herself sit up.

The pokecenter had admitted only Luna. Natalie had never had a reason to visit a center late at night before and had been surprised by the "emergency hours" policy. The nurses on shift were stony and impatient, asking terse questions about the cause of Luna's condition. She'd stuttered through her story of being attacked by a rogue trainer. It wasn't untrue, and her ragged appearance made good evidence, so they sent her off with little more than a cautionary word. Guilt wormed through her, but she was grateful they'd turned away her other pokemon. She wouldn't have felt safe walking home alone.

One at a time, she released her remaining pokemon into the tub. Sam was dirty more than anything else. He grunted and groaned in protest as she began to wipe him down with a wet washcloth. From upstairs, a floorboard creaked. Natalie shushed him, straining to hear. She hoped she hadn't woken her parents; she couldn't face them right now. There were no more footsteps and no knock on the bathroom door, so she finally turned back to Sam, sprayed him with one of the potions she'd bought on the way home, and then returned him to his ball.

Gus she feared would come out screaming loudly enough to wake the entire block and probably damage the walls too, so she bit her lip but decided to pass over his ball until the morning. That left only Amelia.

For the first time, Natalie had the chance to really look at Amelia's new shape: a broad and unyielding wedge like an axe head, but with the same golden eyes and speckled wingtips she knew so well. Still Amelia. The pelipper nibbled at her fingers, and Natalie allowed herself to smile for the first time since she'd seen fire on the horizon.

Gently, she stretched open one wing and then the other to check for damage. A few feathers had been ripped out, and ash streaked her breast and head, but nothing looked too serious. Then Amelia half-turned and revealed the dark splashes down her back, shimmering with chemical rainbows. Each black splotch was like a stain on Natalie's heart.

She scrambled to find dish soap and a fistful of paper towels. When she returned, Amelia had turned her head, bill pouch folding and wrinkling, to groom the oiled patches on her back. Natalie bit her knuckle to stop herself from crying out in horror. "That's poison," she hissed, wresting Amelia's beak away. "Don't touch."

As Natalie worked the feathers into a brown lather, she was powerless to stop the angry tears from running down her cheeks. She rubbed her face into her shoulder but didn't stop what she was doing until the water streaming off Amelia's back ran clear. This must be how Archie felt after Devon Horizon, she thought. This must be how he feels right now. Greasy suds swirled around the drain. Natalie felt sick thinking about the oily dregs most likely running back to the ocean, but she didn't know what else to do about it.

Finally, she planted a kiss on Amelia's beak, earning a too-enthusiastic headbutt to the shoulder, and recalled her. She drooped against the side of the tub with her head resting on her arms ... and then jolted awake again a moment later. If she didn't get up now, she wouldn't be able to.

When Natalie stood, she caught sight of herself in the mirror. Her tears had cut two tracks through the soot on her face, and dried blood crusted under her nose. She didn't look like any kind of hero. And she wasn't—she knew who was responsible, and she'd watched him run.

Badges and bullshit, she thought with a grimace. Mark could burn in hell, but he'd been right: earning badges hadn't made her strong in the ways she needed to be. She cringed thinking how her pokemon had fought those bullshit battles for her, for an empty prize.

Natalie turned her back on her reflection and ran the shower. As if she could wash away her disgust with herself as easily as the dirty fingerprints on the side of the tub, she scrubbed herself until she swayed on her feet in exhaustion. When she collapsed into her bed at last, her hair still smelled like smoke.

She pressed her fist to her lips, curling into a ball, and armored herself with a promise. She didn't know when or how, but she would find a way to make Magma pay for what they'd done. As she plunged into a black, dreamless sleep, a final thought chased her down: I bet Archie didn't run.



From the fire escape, Route 110 was little more than a red glow peeking through the Mauville skyline, but Mark saw flames every time he closed his eyes. He floated in the haze between sleep and waking, thoughts churning too hard to fully relax but too tired to do more than laze on the steps with a borrowed cigarette. In his dormant form, Rand curled up on the landing below, stone head fused to the crook of his stone elbow. Eventually, Mark would have to try to sleep, too, but he wasn't excited about the idea of lying down.

When he'd shown his back to Sienna, asking, "How bad is it?" he'd been ready to hear a sharp intake of breath or sounds of concern.

What she said was, "Huh."

There was no bleeding gash, no tears in his pullover—just five sewing pins. He had to take her word for it: each one had evaporated the moment she'd pulled it out. Immediately, he'd been able to move more freely, even rolling his shoulder all the way around. He was grateful. But a check in the bathroom mirror later had revealed five star-shaped bruises across his shoulders, still tender to the touch.

Somehow, he didn't trust the injury not to worsen when he wasn't looking, even though he knew he was being paranoid. For now, he leaned his elbows on the top step, leaving his back open to the air. Mark shivered, the nape of his neck still damp from the shower. He imagined Gibs warm against his side, but the thought made him feel more alone. Watching the smoke swirl in the languid breeze soothed him, though. He'd already inhaled enough smoke that night to last a lifetime. And yet.

On his return to the hostel, Mark had encountered a trio of trainers who'd bought out the liquor store to celebrate earning their badges. "What happened to you?" one of them had blurted at the sight of him. "Bad run-in with a camerupt?"

"Yeah. Yeah, that's about right."

That had set them giggling and, in their minds, made him one of their own. They pleaded for him to join them—"You've earned a drink! It's on me!"—but they were already shitfaced, and he suspected he wouldn't have wanted their company sober either. But he didn't mind bumming a Blue Ring off them and then slinking off to nurse his guilty thoughts alone.

Their laughter and tinny phone music still drifted down from the roof like sounds from another planet. Mark wondered if his teammates, now scattered to separate corners of the city, were celebrating in their own ways. Were they also up watching the fires burn, or had they already glided into dreams of a better tomorrow?

Mark's phone vibrated in his pocket, and he jolted. It had to be Montag. Who else would call at this hour? Except … no, it was his personal phone.

At the sight of his sister's name on the screen, Mark stubbed out his cigarette as if he'd been caught in the act. He tipped his face to the sky and breathed slowly. I can't handle another emergency tonight. But if she'd been hospitalized, Kathy wouldn't be calling—Mom would.

He weighed the phone in his hand for a moment and then, fuck it, answered. "Hey, Kath."

She squeaked.

"Hello?"

"I didn't think you'd answer!" Scoldingly, she added, "Isn't it like three in the morning there?"

He did the math. In Unova, it was still yesterday afternoon.

"I can hang up instead if you want," he said.

"I was gonna leave a voicemail."

She did that from time to time, nonsense postcards in audio form, anecdotes about her performances and the weather, interspersed with car alarms and the rumble of traffic. Mark wasn't much for talking on the phone, but he appreciated the reminders of home. It was a softer place through her eyes—he almost missed it.

Kathy asked, "Did I wake you up?"

"Nah. I've been awake." Sitting up, he tucked what was left of the cigarette through his boot laces, not yet ready to be done with it but unwilling to dirty his shirt pocket. "You sound out of breath."

"It's fine," Kathy said sharply. "I'm just walking home."

He pictured it: Her cello case, strapped to her back, was broader than she was. She'd made him carry it for her enough times that he knew it wasn't all that heavy, despite its size. She was definitely straining, though. Castelia was a cleaner city than Virbank, the avenues wide and sometimes tree-lined, but it was still smoggy and gray most days.

Mark wished yet again that she'd chosen a school in Hoenn or even Alola. But it had to be CAM.

"Yeah. Alright," he said.

"Don't do that."

"What?"

She went quiet, and he knew she was making a face. "I haven't had a flare-up in months."

"I didn't say anything."

"Hmm."

Mark rolled his eyes. He wasn't going to apologize for worrying, but he knew enough to leave it alone.

"Anyway," she said. "How are you? I haven't heard from you in forever."

Now he winced. "I know. I'm the worst. I'm sorry."

"Yeah, you are, you jerk." But there was a smile in her voice. "So, you've been pretty busy, huh?"

"Ha. Yeah."

"Gym stuff?"

Ah, shit. He hadn't considered what he'd tell her about that. After a moment he said, "I quit, actually."

"What? How come?"

He settled on a partial truth. "The gym leader's a fucking corporate sellout. She's signing away wilderness for political favors. I couldn't just sit there and watch."

"Yeah, that sounds like you."

"I'll figure something else out." Then he paused, because this was the real sticking point. "It'll probably be a little while before I can send money again, but—"

"You really don't have to, you know. Mom and I will figure it out. It's not the end of the world if I take out a couple of loans."

"Yeah, well. I want to help."

There was a lot he couldn't do for her, but this one problem he could solve by throwing money at it. Mom shouldn't have to shoulder it by herself. Meanwhile, Dad had insisted he'd be happy to support Kathy getting a degree in a "practical" field, as if it had anything to do with him, but he hadn't had the opportunity to prove it. Or fail to.

Of course, the air in Castelia was killing her slowly, but the music wasn't Mark's to take away from her. And he was glad to know there was still something beautiful left in Unova.

Kathy made an exasperated sound, and Mark smiled.

"So when are you coming home?"

That caught him by surprise. "I ... don't know. I don't have any hard plans for my next visit."

"If your job isn't keeping you anymore ..."

No, I've still got a job to do here. MetFalls wasn't done yet, after all. There were still lines left to draw, boundaries left to defend. But he couldn't tell her about those things without telling her too much. How could he explain that he was a soldier and the fight for Unova's soul had been lost before he was born?

Kathy continued, "The leaves are turning. It's been really pretty out lately."

"What would I do in Unova, Kath?"

"Eat Mom's food. Come to my concerts. Read too much. Complain."

"Sounds pretty good."

"I mean, you can be a trainer anywhere, right?"

The words flared up in him like Roman candles: Hoenn isn't yours.

Fuck Natalie. What did she know? She hadn't even been to a protest before—he didn't think that part had been a lie. But the sinking feeling stayed with him even after he pushed the thought away.

Mark closed his eyes as a new wave of fatigue swept over him. Maybe it was time for him to take a break. Just for a week or two. For a moment, he was tempted to tell Kathy, Yes, tomorrow. No one would stop him, not even Montag.

But how could he go home without Gibs? And what would Mark say when Mom and Kathy asked where he was?

"I'll think about it and keep you posted," he said.

Kathy sighed. "Sure." They both knew he meant no.

"I miss you, though," he said. "Send me some music sometime soon?"

"I just got in. Give me two minutes to set up and I can play you something right now." She paused. "It really is late there, though. I should let you sleep."

"I'm not going anywhere. Get set up."

In the absence of conversation, Natalie's voice crept back in. He turned his phone as loud as it would go, smashing it to his ear, and let Kathy's music chase her out.

He didn't recognize it at first as a lullaby. Smartass. He smiled. Leaning his forehead against the railing, he shut his eyes against the fires burning in the distance. He tried to imagine himself in Castelia, but it was a fruitless effort; he hadn't visited Kathy's new apartment yet, and his mind offered nothing but an empty room. She played on, and he reached instead for a memory of Montag.

They'd been at the threshold of the dark woods, Montag driving an unblinking stare into him: Hoenn belongs to anyone willing to fight for it.

There had been anger in his voice. A challenge. A benediction. But never a single shred of doubt.

rGq5KxA.jpg
 
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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
oh shit! stealth updates, oh my.

I think it's really interesting that in the heat of the moment this battle becomes about personal stakes rather than public ones--the oil spill takes second hat. Now it's just s/he angy, no step on turf, boo, bad.

And I thought that was a really interesting development for them both--what are Magma and ORCA doing in the meantime? Are they also brawling? Are the police showing up? First responders? I don't think this necessarily has to get answered in the heat of the moment/even in this chapter but I am curious about how everyone else takes this, and if it's just Mark and Natalie deciding to use this as an excuse to brawl with each other or if this is how most of these conflicts end up going. Does she give Scarlet the slip? Does Scarlet somehow not see Mark and/or see someone who's higher priority to her and/or decide to help contain the spill instead? Why would the rest of Magma choose to stay at the pipeline and not turn tail?

But for the front half of this chapter I think it really works--they both get sucked into their own personal biases on this battle and the fight becomes personal rather than for any other reason they've said motivated them. Angerrry puff birds. The battle is nice and snappy, and it's a good parallel to the gym battle now that Mark's 1) no longer flirting and 2) gloves are waaaay off. And yay wooh the trainers get some skin in the game too, oh dear.

(Kinda waiting for the other shoe to drop on that one--I get the feeling that being attacked by strangers + their pokemon isn't super normal; this is the second time she's had some quasi-legal shit go down; and by both of their accounts Mark did fuck her up pretty badly, so I'm curious to see where she'll go now that she recognizes she isn't strong in the ways that matter to her).

Overall a lot of fun in this chapter. The POV switch in the middle was kind of wonky for me but the battle is really intense and it's good to see it from both sides, and the parallel cooldowns with their caged bird fren figures is nice too. Big whoops, lots of baths, everyone is fine!

line comments:

The tree line and the promise of rest were in sight—when Ore's presence rose from a background hum to a shrill whine at the front of Mark's thoughts, demanding wordlessly that he turn, look.
as an em dash lobbyist I'm obligated to shill them, but I don't think this one works? I'm not sure + punctuation is sort of subjective so I really have no grounding for this, but I think it would work better as:
> The tree line and the promise of rest were in sight when--Ore's presence rose [...]
or even, the horror:
> The tree line and the promise of rest were in sight when Ore's presence rose [...]
The second half of the sentence is already enough jumbled thoughts that the sense of panic comes across clearly even without the interrupt, I think.

Without language, the solrock told him, I am with you.
Interesting detail!! A lot of Ore's stuff has been nonverbal/non-translated, so I kind of catch myself wondering what's different here?

And this wasn't a gym battle.
Felt like a bit of follow-up would help here--what does he plan on doing differently? It becomes pretty obvious that the gloves are off so I'm not sure if you need to elaborate, but it felt a little empty hanging off on its own.

The mightyena would have to run straight at him to avoid the fires sputtering behind and to the sides. He ignored the flames licking outside his light shield, the sweat dripping down his face and neck
yes, good, perfectly normal behavior, burning yourself to improve your chances of hurting other people

The smoldering fist caught the mightyena upside the head
disembodied body parts??

To Ore he said, "Go for her head."
oh shit lol, psychics are broken as fuck in this setting. Do humans have defenses to this? Can solrock just telekinetically fling her head into a wall? Skull crush like a rock throw? Put a protect shield through her brain? I think trainers being involved in battle is always badass but they're really fragile and it's hard to think of excuses for how they wouldn't immediately get killed lol.

Kindness demanded he recall her—but already Octavia and the wingull were circling each other. If he brought out his gigalith, he'd be as likely to hit his own pokemon as hers.
I didn't quite follow the lack of recall logic here/why he can't recall her and then send out his gigalith--does the pokeball range get blocked here? Or is it that the wingull is too agile and gigalith lobbing rocks is more likely to just miss and cause collateral damage?

As Mark strode towards her, Natalie struggled to her feet, her head throbbing. Something dripped hotly under her bandana, and she wasn't sure if it was sweat or blood. Red-hot cracks webbed his light shield, but the solrock bobbed alongside, sealing them with pulses of light. And, gods, she still had nothing.
The POV switch mid-scene is kind of unorthodox! I'm not sure! At the time it felt weird to read but I also understand why you wanted to do it--stakes on both sides, the battle flows well into Mark beating her down and then Natalie having to claw her way back up, but it gets kind of sloshy at the transition point. I like how this and the last chapter have been mixed POV, since it really brings out the conflict between them, but this bridge here wasn't working for me but at the same time I'm still trying to figure out what would've worked instead

Again, the bone-rattling hum filled her head, squeezing against the confines of her skull and wrenching her sideways. She screamed—

—and her scream poured from Gus's mouth. The sound stretched until it was unrecognizable, booming with such force that dirt and sparks and flaming debris flew.
this sequence was really slick

Behind them, Samson, her gurdurr, was back on his feet
I dunno if she needs to clarify this from her POV? Format of fanfic and "Sonic, the jolteon" intensify.

"Again. Take her down." She met Mark's hateful gaze for a split second before a rock flew past her ear, forcing her to duck. The concrete chunks that lay all around lit up and began to shakily lift into the air.
"hateful" feels a bit too simple of a word here
Why does he avoid just smooshing her brain with psychic?

Mark shoved off the other trainer, who grabbed the front of his sweater instead and pulled. Straining away, Mark twisted to face toward her one more time—she could feel his gaze even if she could make out none of the details of his face.

Natalie stepped back.
I sort of wanted more here--what does she feel in the gaze?

"I'm so sorry, Luna. You're so good and, gods, I screwed up. You're okay. I'll take you to the pokecenter, and you'll be okay."
ah yes good, going from Mark never using pokecenters because of his fear of getting caught straight into this; I'm sure nothing will go wrong!!!

"Amelia, let's go," she said, voice quavering, and turned towards the main road. She paused to cast a look over her shoulder. Awash in orange smog and still listing towards the shadows of the ORCA pokemon, Amelia gave another squawk. But finally, she took to the air, sailing up and away from the fire. Natalie breathed out in relief.
Woooosh. I liked that Amelia gets a bit of her own personality here; feelsbad that she's gotta listen to Natalie on this one. I kinda wish we'd gotten more of her earlier--even just to set up for this and the evolution scene. The pokemon here do serve as powerful indicators for what their trainers are thinking; here, Natalie's certainly evolving her convictions on ORCA and I get that, but this moment works more for Natalie's arc than it does as an event for a separate character. Dunno! Kinda blurry.

When she came back and caught Amelia grooming the oiled patches, she bit her knuckle to stop herself from crying out in horror. "That's poison," she hissed, wresting Amelia's beak away. "Don't touch."
ah no babbbby

Badges and bullshit, she thought with a grimace. Mark could burn in hell, but he'd been right: earning badges hadn't made her strong in the ways she needed to be. She cringed thinking how her sweet, brave pokemon had fought those bullshit battles for her, for an empty prize.
Mmm, yes, the new summary really helps nail down that this is where the fic was planning on going, I think. Strong in the ways she needed to be! Good development here.

(OSJ-ism spotted: "her sweet, brave pokemon"--I think it comes up in the first chapter as "sweet, smart Luna" or something--the repetition was nagging me from somewhere and for a while I couldn't place it.)

At the sight of his sister's name on the screen, Mark stubbed out his cigarette as if he'd been caught in the act. He tipped his face to the sky and breathed slowly. I can't handle another emergency tonight. But if she'd been hospitalized, Kathy wouldn't be calling—Mom would.
Ooof I like how he already has considered what the order of operations for an emergency would be.

She went quiet, and he could feel her glaring through the phone. "I haven't had a flare-up in months."

"I didn't say anything."
The dialogue in this section is really good--and it's interesting to see him savagely defending Kathy as "the cellist, not the sick one" in previous chapters, but he still can't shake those gloves off when he's talking to her face.

(lotta unseen glares being felt in this chapter)

No, I've still got a job to do here. MetFalls wasn't done yet, after all. There were still lines left to draw, boundaries left to defend. But he couldn't tell her about those things without telling her too much. How could he explain that he was a soldier and the fight for Unova's soul had been lost before he was born?
ugh that uncanny valley moment where the angry edgelord says things that I think are poetic and fair

Kathy chose a lullaby—smartass. While she played, Mark leaned his forehead against the railing, his eyes shut against the fires burning in the distance. He let the music chase Natalie's voice from his mind and reached instead for a memory of Montag. They'd been at the threshold of the dark woods, Montag driving an unblinking stare into him: Hoenn belongs to anyone willing to fight for it. There had been anger in his voice. A challenge. A benediction. But never a single shred of doubt.
I love the image of him not being able to focus on Kathy here--she soothes him and lets him forget about Natalie, but Magma's consuming him. also he falls asleep thinking about his boi; little does he KNOW montag is already TAKEN * sad sinbad sounds *

I sorta wanted a bit more spacing out here? The paragraph transitions quickly from Kathy to fires to Natalie to Montag, which may have been the point, but if you wanted more of the feeling of drifting into this thought I think it would've been more effective spaced out into a few more paragraphs--even just the same sentences split out more?
 

Pen

the cat is mightier than the pen
Staff
Partners
  1. dratini
  2. dratini-pen
  3. dratini-pen2
The words flared up in him like firecrackers: Hoenn isn't yours.

So Natalie and Mark finally have the confrontation the story has been racing towards. I really liked how you handled the back-and-forth of the battle. Mark is clearly more accustomed to and proficient at fighting "real" battles, but Natalie's moments of pushing back made sense. Amelia is a pokemon who is clearly identified with the shores of Slateport, so her evolution to protect Slateport felt earned. And the moment with Gus functioned as an externalization of Natalie's emotion. In this moment, she's like a child, screaming that this is her home and they have no right to take it away. That emotion may be naive or even selfish, but it's very powerful in its simplicity and moral force. And in this chapter, it's not clear that Mark has an answer.

The paralleled aftermath, where both check in with home, was very effective. For Natalie, home has transformed from something that just is, to something that could be in danger, if it's not protected. The description of the house really reinforced that--home isn't something she can take for granted anymore. It's a motivation to act. And so in this chapter, there's a fusion of the personal and political, setting Natalie on the road to ORCA.

For Mark, the situation is more troubled. He's given up on his home; with what right does he claim Hoenn? His conversation with Kathy is poignant, for the distance he feels the need to keep between them both physically and emotionally. I might have liked to see him wrestle a bit more with Natalie's words--does he try to tell himself that she's selfish, for only caring when it effects her? Can he ignore the way he feels towards the people who despoiled the air in his hometown? But maybe these are questions to be wrestled with later. I definitely feel like Mark is going to have some soul-searching to do. Montag says Hoenn belongs to anyone who will fight for it, but is that what he did here? And can Montag absolve him?

I didn't expect Continental Divides to focus so much on themes of home, but I'm very here for it.

A last thought re Natalie and selfishness. The scene where she screams via Gus reminded me a lot of a scene with Tiffany Aching from Discworld:

Tiffany’s Third Thoughts said: Then turn selfishness into a weapon! Make all things yours! Make other lives and dreams and hopes yours! Protect them! Save them! Bring them into the sheepfold! Walk the gale for them! Keep away the wolf! My dreams! My brother! My family! My land! My world! How dare you try to take these things, because they are mine! I have a duty!”

Kind of hoping we get some Steven Stone next chapter. Corporate reaction to the aftermath? 👀

The tree line and the promise of rest were in sight—when Ore's presence rose from a background hum to a shrill whine at the front of Mark's thoughts, demanding wordlessly that he turn, look.
This opening felt a bit disconnected to me and didn't set me in the scene. What does in sight mean here? I don't know if that means pretty far away, since sight can stretch over long distances, or really close, because the smoke has been obscuring things? I also don't really remember trees being a part of the landscape last chapter, so it was odd to open in the middle of the action from last chapter, but feel confused about what's going on.

I think something like, [Mark had almost reached the edge of the fire-zone, when Ore's hum rose in his mind to a warning shriek. Turn, look.] would set me in the moment more. Agree that in any case, an em dash isn't the right punctuation for this sentence structure.

She'd covered her face with ORCA blue, but her hair still stood out flaming red.
Some very subtle play here with red and blue, fire and water.

As he tracked the mightyena's zigzagging path, his anger settled into icy calm. Even shadow-hopping, there were only so many places it could go without rematerializing among the flames. And this wasn't a gym battle
Oooh, love the shit-getting-real vibes.

He took several steps back, into the heat. The mightyena would have to run straight at him to avoid the fires sputtering behind and to the sides. He ignored the flames licking outside his light shield, the sweat dripping down his face and neck.
This confused me. At first I was like, why would the flames deter the mightyena if they're not bothering a measly human? Is it that Ore is shielding him? But not fully . . ?

Maybe even reordering would clarify: [He took several steps back, into the fire. Sweat dripped down his face and neck, but his light shield made the heat bearable. Now the mightyena would have to run straight at him to avoid the fires sputtering behind and to the sides.]

To Ore he said, "Go for her head."

The solrock's eyes flashed violet. A soundless wind ripped through the flames—and then Natalie clutched her head and doubled over like she'd been punched.
Oh my! Psychic pokemon seem pretty OP. I guess the options for countering this are limited to dark-type, ghost-type, fellow psychic, or really strong shield?

Kindness demanded he recall her—but already Octavia and the wingull were circling each other. If he brought out his gigalith, he'd be as likely to hit his own pokemon as hers. And if he called Octavia back, he'd be open to an attack. He'd just have to finish this quickly.
Didn't follow the logic here. Couldn't he simultaneously release and recall? Or do the recall when Natalie is being psychic-attacked a few moments later?

You really had no idea what this was like, did you? Next time, she'd know better and stay the fuck out of it. He'd make sure of that.
Huh, I'm a little confused about who he thinks Natalie is. I thought he thought she was a trained ORCA agent sent to infiltrate, but the language about knowing better and staying out of it sounds like he still thinks of her as an outsider?

For a moment, it strained uselessly against the invisible hold, but then it toppled as if its legs had been knocked out from under it.
The concrete descriptions of physic attacks are really good.

The world beyond was lost to an ocean of fire, and Mark and Natalie were the island at its center, eyes locked across the distance.

As Mark strode towards her, Natalie struggled to her feet, her head throbbing.
Not loving the unnanounced POV switch here. Any reason you didn't throw in a line break? It was jarring, and made me have to jump back and reread, breaking the battle flow.

Red-hot cracks webbed his light shield, but the solrock bobbed alongside, sealing them with pulses of light.
But as rock and concrete clattered against Amelia's light shield, it began to bend, blue shards cracking off the edges.
I really like the physicality of the light-shield attacks.

She screamed—

—and her scream poured from Gus's mouth. The sound stretched until it was unrecognizable, booming with such force that dirt and sparks and flaming debris flew.

Mark's light shield burst like a soap bubble. This time he was the one who ducked his head and pressed his hands to his ears. He straightened stiffly, flinching as he lowered his arms—he was hurt.

Good. He deserved it.

Heart-pounding, Natalie scrambled to right herself. She drew in a smoky breath and shouted with all her strength, "You leave!" Gus amplified her voice, the sound vibrating through her shoes. "HOENN ISN'T YOURS!"
! Whismur mic drop moment for Natalie. I don't really get how this worked--whismur aren't psychic?--but it was a cool enough moment to make me not care. The pokemon, the battle, it's all serving as amplification for the clash of their ideals, so this works.

The third ricocheted off the empty air inches in front of her face. When the next rock bounced away, she spotted the blue glint of a light shield hanging in front of her. Then the keening call of a wingull rose over the roar of the flames and Amelia swooped to land at Natalie's feet.

Her heart felt full to bursting.
Had to reread to understand what was happening here. I think "spotted" is too neutral a word? Also, it's weird for the rock to bounce off empty air when the protect glows blue.

Like, "She closed her eyes as third rock ricocheted toward her, but no impact came. She blinked, and was met with a blue glint--a light shield hanging in front of her. etc

She reached for Amelia's ball, ready to recall her and run, but found she couldn't focus her eyes on the wingull.
Not sure "but" is the right connector here.

But the air was clear inside the unbroken dome of blue light where Natalie crouched behind Amelia, who flexed her new pelipper wings.
Nice.

A second, smaller figure cut through the smoke behind Mark, and a crobat flew alongside him.
Maybe, [Behind Mark, a second, smaller figure cut through the smoke, a crobat flying at his side.]

But his solrock and the crobat ignored each other, and her heart sank.
Think you could be a little more specific here, emphasize the crobat making no move to attack?

Natalie stepped back.
This felt a little bare.

Then she saw Luna, a lump of fur on the ground just ahead, illuminated by the encroaching flames.
Bit of a nitpick, but I feel like we're told a lot about the flames, and that they're moving, but I don't really have a sense of what's going on with the fire. I never really get the sense that the fire is posing an issue for the characters; it feels a bit more like a theater backdrop.

The pokeball came away covered in dark fingerprints; her fingers were black with soot from Luna's fur.
Big oof.

Heavy footfalls behind Natalie signaled Sam's arrival, to her surprise; she'd thought he was already behind her.
Didn't follow this.

To the left, where the smoke was thinner, blue shadows circled in the air. Below them, the fires were settling down, and trainers stood in the thick of the smoke and steam that rose when a spurt of water hit flame. More trainers waded in the shallows, commanding their pokemon to stem the flow of oil down the coastline.
Wonder if ORCA will get a friendly mention on the local news.

Her mouth tasted like iron, but the smell of the ocean was so sweet that she felt maudlin with it.
Mm, lovely.

The dark rooms were like museums of normal life: the kitchen table scattered with bills to be paid and one of Mom's articles, half-edited and scattered with three colors of pens. The remote and the empty beer can next to Dad's chair. The school portraits, a younger Natalie with no front teeth and a teenaged Archie smiling cooly. The carpet looked freshly vacuumed. Natalie, conscious of her unclean hands and clothes stinking of smoke, touched nothing on her way to the bathroom.
Really nice. Love the sense of how mundane life feels both distant and untouchable to her, something that's already a relic.

Shushing his grunts and groans, she wiped him down with a wet washcloth and then sprayed one of the potions she'd bought on the way home. Gus she feared would come out screaming loudly enough to wake the entire block and probably damage the walls too, so she bit her lip but decided to pass over his ball until the morning.
I was a bit confused--are her parents at home at the moment? If so, a moment where she thinks she hears one of them and freezes would be nice.

When she came back and caught Amelia grooming the oiled patches, she bit her knuckle to stop herself from crying out in horror. "That's poison," she hissed, wresting Amelia's beak away. "Don't touch."

As Natalie worked the feathers into a brown lather, she was powerless to stop the angry tears from running down her cheeks. She rubbed her face into her shoulder but didn't stop what she was doing until the water streaming off Amelia's back ran clear. This must be how Archie felt after Devon Horizon, she thought. This must be how he feels right now.
It's nicely done how you're moving Natalie to an ideological position through these very specific moments that are about home and hers. I think it's very realistic to how people actually form the positions they stick with.

Badges and bullshit, she thought with a grimace. Mark could burn in hell, but he'd been right: earning badges hadn't made her strong in the ways she needed to be. She cringed thinking how her sweet, brave pokemon had fought those bullshit battles for her, for an empty prize.
I like how Mark's words are coming back here with a new resonance for her, one that she's coming to on her own, rather than blindly parroting his confidence.

She curled up with one fist pressed to her heart and the other to her lips, holding tight to one thought: she didn't know how, but she would find a way to make Magma pay for what they'd done. And him most of all. Then she plunged into a black, dreamless sleep.
Think this closer could use a bit of reworking. The impact doesn't hit its max on the last line.

Somehow, he didn't trust the injury not to worsen when he wasn't looking, even though he knew he was being paranoid.
* shudder *

Ghosts are scary in OSJ-verse

Their laughter and tinny phone music still drifted down from the roof like sounds from another planet. Mark wondered if his teammates, now scattered to separate corners of the city, were celebrating in their own ways. Were they also up watching the fires burn, or had they already glided into dreams of a better tomorrow?
Nice parallelism between Mark and Natalie.

"I didn't think you'd answer!" Scoldingly, she added, "Isn't it like three in the morning there?"

He did the math. In Unova, it was still yesterday afternoon.

"I can hang up instead if you want," he said.

"I was gonna leave a voicemail."

She did that from time to time, nonsense postcards in audio form, anecdotes about her performances and the weather, interspersed with car alarms and the rumble of traffic.
A lot about their relationship comes out in this short exchange. "I can hang up instead if you want," from Mark struck me in particular. He's not going to explain why he's up at 3am, but he'll pretend he's not if it makes her feel better.

"You sound out of breath."

"It's fine," Kathy said sharply. "I'm just walking home."

He pictured it: Her cello case, carried on her back, was broader than she was. She'd made him carry it for her enough times that he knew it wasn't all that heavy, despite its size. She was definitely straining, though. Castelia was a cleaner city than Virbank, the avenues wide and sometimes tree-lined, but it was still smoggy and gray most days.
Ah, and he can't stop himself from helicoptering her health, yet won't visit to see how she's actually doing.

"What would I do in Unova, Kath?"

"Eat Mom's food. Come to my concerts. Read too much. Complain."
Aww, she knows him.

The words flared up in him like firecrackers: Hoenn isn't yours.
He let the music chase Natalie's voice from his mind and reached instead for a memory of Montag. They'd been at the threshold of the dark woods, Montag driving an unblinking stare into him: Hoenn belongs to anyone willing to fight for it. There had been anger in his voice. A challenge. A benediction. But never a single shred of doubt.
Strong closer. I like how Mark is listening to a lullaby played by his sister, but what's actually bringing him comfort is a memory about Montag. Even though he loves his family, he's always distancing himself from them.

It felt like a bit of a long gap for Natalie's words to still be echoing in his head. I think we need a little more here, maybe her words returning, him pushing them away, trying to listen to the melody, but then turning to the memory of Montag instead.
 
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WildBoots

Don’t underestimate seeds.
Pronouns
She/Her
Partners
  1. moka-mark
  2. solrock
@Pen & @kintsugi--thank you, as ever and always, for the insightful and helpful comments. 🙏 Splitting these up by who I quoted from, but some of these are answers to both of you because you both called me out on it hahahaha.

in the heat of the moment this battle becomes about personal stakes rather than public ones
YES.

The stakes are always much larger, but … humans are much more equipped for dealing with the personal. I haven’t had a chance yet to read it, but there’s an interesting text about hyperobjects, things that are too large for humans to properly grapple with. Like, say, climate change. The players here care about the big picture, but they’re also hopelessly mired in the petty and the personal, and that’s the only reason they’re even invested in the big picture at all.

I don't think this necessarily has to get answered in the heat of the moment/even in this chapter but I am curious about how everyone else takes this, and if it's just Mark and Natalie deciding to use this as an excuse to brawl with each other or if this is how most of these conflicts end up going. Does she give Scarlet the slip? Does Scarlet somehow not see Mark and/or see someone who's higher priority to her and/or decide to help contain the spill instead? Why would the rest of Magma choose to stay at the pipeline and not turn tail?

Some of this might get answered officially later, but some might need to be clarified somehow. Coming up against the limits of her POV, though. The short answer is that 1) many things are happening very fast 2a) Magma is supposed to be dipping out and not engaging. Mark is the tail end of them exiting … before Tabitha shows up to drag him off by the ear. 2b) Probably some slapfighting is happening, but Aqua cares more about trying to contain the spill than fighting Magma once the pipeline blows up. Though! They probably would’ve helped her if they’d realized what was happening. They were preeeeeetty busy, and visibility was bad. 3) Natalie sees the beginnings of the first responders on their way, but they have to trek out from the city, so it takes them a while.

a good parallel to the gym battle now that Mark's 1) no longer flirting and 2) gloves are waaaay off. And yay wooh the trainers get some skin in the game too, oh dear.
Yes, the two modes: flirt and destroy. But, NOPE, folks here did not come to play.

The tree line and the promise of rest were in sight when Ore's presence rose
Funny enough, this was how I first wrote it, but I got some feedback that it was a lot to parse, even though it is a technically correct sentence.

A lot of Ore's stuff has been nonverbal/non-translated, so I kind of catch myself wondering what's different here?
I’m not sure! Those words really stuck with me, so I let it stay in as a sort of Mark translation. Maybe it's the duress? Maybe tis but a quirk of a draft that will be subsumed by edits.

oh shit lol, psychics are broken as fuck in this setting. Do humans have defenses to this? Can solrock just telekinetically fling her head into a wall? Skull crush like a rock throw? Put a protect shield through her brain? I think trainers being involved in battle is always badass but they're really fragile and it's hard to think of excuses for how they wouldn't immediately get killed lol.
I might need to clarify here, too. (Though, again, I struggled with not straying too far from his not-exactly-rational rage-out.) He’s not trying to kill her: he wants to teach her a lesson ( 🙃 ) and she won’t have learned the lesson if she’s dead! But, yeah, if she would’ve kept Luna in front of her to absorb the psychic waves (?), she would’ve been protected from this. Luckily, Mark also has a dark-type to—wait. Hmmmm.

And I’m sure people do die in these kinds of fights, just like real-life gangs fighting over turf. Certainly, in Chapter 5, Mark gives us
The mightyena bite on Mark's arm took twelve stitches to close—a new scar to match his other arm. He could've died instead, he reminded himself, but the hour under fluorescent lights and the drudgery of hospital paperwork had dulled the urgency of that thought.

In any case, if you don’t actually want to cross a line, I figure the way to be restrained is to attack with the pokemon that’s all up in your head and responds to your thoughts before you finish thinking them. ALSO, solrock is not a strong special attacker. It’s more of a zen headbutter than psychic (though it definitely can learn psychic). But, like, an alakazam? Nice knowing u.

I dunno if she needs to clarify this from her POV? Format of fanfic and "Sonic, the jolteon" intensify.
Yup. Though, to be fair, the last time his species was named was five whole chapters ago. Which were first posted almost exactly a year ago, lol. You’ve read the early chapters more recently than most readers will have, thanks to that batch of editing. I’ll consider pulling it, but. Sigh. The challenges of the format.

Woooosh. I liked that Amelia gets a bit of her own personality here; feelsbad that she's gotta listen to Natalie on this one. I kinda wish we'd gotten more of her earlier--even just to set up for this and the evolution scene. The pokemon here do serve as powerful indicators for what their trainers are thinking; here, Natalie's certainly evolving her convictions on ORCA and I get that, but this moment works more for Natalie's arc than it does as an event for a separate character. Dunno! Kinda blurry.
I meannnn are any of my pokemon full characters? (Oopsie.)

I did try to set up last chapter with this kind of stuff:
Only Amelia was untroubled by the rolling of the deck, but she was much more interested in chasing and amicably squabbling with the other wingulls and pelippers that followed the ship. Some definitely belonged to the crew—occasionally swooping down to beg their human for treats or to give an affectionate nip—but others seemed to be wild, coming and going at will. When Amelia first flew up to join them, Natalie's heart clenched in momentary panic that she wouldn't be able to find her again. But only Amelia had speckles along the edges of her wings, and only Amelia came when Natalie whistled.

Was Amelia glad to be heading home? Surely she could sense that Slateport was close. Had she missed her family, Natalie wondered, or would she be disappointed to return to familiar shores and find them smaller than she'd remembered?

Natalie didn’t quite make friends on the ship, but Amelia did! But mostly, yes, this is just Natalie-feels-by-proxy.

(OSJ-ism spotted:
Hmmm fuck. In fairness, this is more of a Natalie-ism than anything. Mark would never and Chris would never. But! Good call. I’ll reword.

Ooof I like how he already has considered what the order of operations for an emergency would be.
It’s deeeefinitely happened before.

The dialogue in this section is really good--and it's interesting to see him savagely defending Kathy as "the cellist, not the sick one" in previous chapters, but he still can't shake those gloves off when he's talking to her face.

(lotta unseen glares being felt in this chapter)
Yessss. Shamelessly drawing from being aware of my own bad behavior, lol. If someone came at my sister for her diagnosis, I’d flip out. But I’m constantly raising my eyebrows at her and trying to chalk her life choices and behaviors up to a diagnosis. I think family is just like this. Worrying about someone can make us act unkindly, funny enough.

Also, oops! I’ll see what I can do … but I’m a little hampered by the circumstance. Everyone is hidden or half-hidden from view. :c I do feel like you can tell when someone is dogging you even when you can’t see them super clearly, so some of it will stay, but you're right that there's a lot.

ugh that uncanny valley moment where the angry edgelord says things that I think are poetic and fair
I don’t think that he’s actually been right yet at any point, but yeah, I hope that in a few places he’s been not-wrong.

If I stole Pen's chapter-naming scheme from DD, Mark would be The Soldier, The Soldier, The Soldier, The Brother for two seconds, The Soldier, rinserepeatforever. Though, we’re now finally approaching the moment when life is going to force him to reevaluate that self-identification. It’s a few chapters away yet, but I can see it on the horizon. Natalie, meanwhile, is rapidly flipping: The Sister/The Helper/The Gym Challenger/The Daughter/The Citizen of Slateport/The Sad, Confused Kiddo Help. She’s lagging behind while she catches up on all the everything, but I do expect her to eventually take up a singular role that she chooses herself rather than one that’s been handed to her.

but Magma's consuming him. also he falls asleep thinking about his boi; little does he KNOW montag is already TAKEN * sad sinbad sounds *
CONSUME. LIKE A FIRE.

Oh no, I hope this is just shitpost and it doesn’t actually read as romantic subtext. Montag is very much chosen family Dad … but not Daddy. (For Mark anyway, lol. We’ll give other characters time to say something else about that eventually.) The next set of Mark chapters will deal with this very directly.

Throughout, you made some very elegant suggestions for rewording--cheers! (Poor you, being denied a Google Doc. I'll probably start poking you for feedback again next chapter, but I just wanted to throw these two up. Too excite 4 fire.)

For Mark, the situation is more troubled.
Isn't it always.

The paralleled aftermath, where both check in with home, was very effective.
🙌

I might have liked to see him wrestle a bit more with Natalie's words--does he try to tell himself that she's selfish, for only caring when it effects her? Can he ignore the way he feels towards the people who despoiled the air in his hometown?
Ooh yes, thank you! I knew I wanted something more from him here but couldn't quite figure it out. This is what it was.

I didn't expect Continental Divides to focus so much on themes of home, but I'm very here for it.
Can't have a turf war without an idea of what place and home and mine mean. ❤

a scene with Tiffany Aching from Discworld:
Ahhhh We Free Men! What a good pull. I totally forgot about this. Fitting that you're calling Natalie out for foot-stamping and that this is advice being given to a literal child, lol.

Some very subtle play here with red and blue, fire and water.
Listen, sometimes you just have to smash your metaphor through the glass. What would Archie do??! Smash things and name a boat the Motherfucker. So here we are.

Oh my! Psychic pokemon seem pretty OP. I guess the options for countering this are limited to dark-type, ghost-type, fellow psychic, or really strong shield?


Didn't follow the logic here. Couldn't he simultaneously release and recall? Or do the recall when Natalie is being psychic-attacked a few moments later?
You know, this made sense when I was writing it, but when I started to type things about it, my reasoning sounded goofy even to me. I really just needed a reason Amelia could swoop in out of left field. Back to the drawing board.

Huh, I'm a little confused about who he thinks Natalie is. I thought he thought she was a trained ORCA agent sent to infiltrate, but the language about knowing better and staying out of it sounds like he still thinks of her as an outsider?
Chapter 5:
His thoughts flashed to Natalie, how guileless she had seemed, so eager to prove herself. And maybe that part had been sincere, but it was ORCA she was eager to impress. A new recruit, probably.

He thinks a) she fucked with him b) which was extra stupid of him because she clearly doesn't know what she's doing. I can reiterate/echo this sentiment somewhere in here.

Not loving the unnanounced POV switch here. Any reason you didn't throw in a line break?
LOL. Welp. Wanted to see if I could get away with it. Asked and answered. The line break feels odd to me since it's in the middle of one continuous scene, but it might be the best solution.

! Whismur mic drop moment for Natalie. I don't really get how this worked--whismur aren't psychic?
They're not psychic, but they're speakers! I decided to let it play out like a living LRAD.

Bit of a nitpick, but I feel like we're told a lot about the flames, and that they're moving, but I don't really have a sense of what's going on with the fire. I never really get the sense that the fire is posing an issue for the characters; it feels a bit more like a theater backdrop.
BUSTEDDDD.
Yes, will reevaluate and reshuffle.

Wonder if ORCA will get a friendly mention on the local news.
Cue Natalie watching the in-universe equivalent of Fox News at home later.

I was a bit confused--are her parents at home at the moment? If so, a moment where she thinks she hears one of them and freezes would be nice.
Ahh, good call! They're definitely home, so this was an oversight. I'll plug it in.

I think it's very realistic to how people actually form the positions they stick with.
🙌 💯

Ghosts are scary in OSJ-verse
They're just casual beings that subsist on spite and guilt. What's not to like? Though, to be fair, this is partly Mark being :c about getting hurt and not yet fully caught up with it not being as bad as he thought lol.

A lot about their relationship comes out in this short exchange. "I can hang up instead if you want," from Mark struck me in particular. He's not going to explain why he's up at 3am, but he'll pretend he's not if it makes her feel better.
Yes, completely. And! She's not asking. She doesn't want to know either.

Kind of hoping we get some Steven Stone next chapter. Corporate reaction to the aftermath? 👀
Ask and you shall receive!!!!

Made some adjustments! (y) I'll have to double back at some point to adjust the issues with sense of space and fire(???), but for now I'm excited to get on to the next twists and turns. ❤ Thanks again. Big appreciate.
 
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Starlight Aurate

Ad Jesum per Mariam | pfp by kintsugi
Location
Route 123
Partners
  1. mightyena
  2. psyduck
I'm a simple girl. I see Continental Divides is updated. I click.

Also side note, the title "fault lines" is also the title of a song by a favorite of mine lol

He stepped back, into the heat, trusting Orwell's light shield to protect him from the worst of the heat.
I'd think you could do without "into the heat;" just makes the sentence sound repetitive imo

Her expression was impossible to read at the distance, but her shock and alarm showed in the way she slowly straightened and gaped at him for a long moment before flinging down the pokeball.
I'm wondering how she's gaping if half of her face is covered with a bandana.
To the right, Rand pinned the mightyena by the throat with one massive hand and pummeled it with the other, ignoring the shadows lashing his face and chest.
Luna noooooo

She closed her fingers on her last pokeball, picturing her whismur's velvety nose and quivering whiskers
Huh. I didn't know Whismur had a nose or whiskers!

Natalie cast her eyes around wildly. Could she run? Sam toddled towards them—but Luna! Natalie still couldn't see her anywhere. She couldn't just leave her.
Awww so glad to see how much shares for her Pokemon :)

The pelipper nibbled at her fingers, and Natalie allowed herself to smile for the first time since she'd seen fire on the horizon.
This is a cute image, but considering how huge Pelipper's bill is, that just sounds like it could be so painful if Amelia's not careful XD

Natalie felt sick thinking about the oily dregs running inevitably back to the ocean, but she didn't know what else to do about it.
Provided that Slateport is a modern city with proper wastewater management, that shouldn't be a problem. Still definitely not something you'd want to do, but it shouldn't end up going directly back into the ocean.

There was no bleeding gash, no tears in his pullover—just five sewing pins. He had to take her word for it: each one had evaporated the moment she'd pulled it out. Immediately, he'd been able to move more freely, even rolling his shoulder all the way around, and he was grateful. But a check in the bathroom mirror later had revealed five star-shaped bruises across his shoulders, still tender to the touch
Ouch. Was this some sort-of Ghost type move?

At the sight of his sister's name on the screen, Mark stubbed out his cigarette as if he'd been caught in the act.
Waitwaitwaitwaitwait--Mark has a sister? Was that mentioned before and I just forgot?

He pictured it: Her cello case, carried on her back, was broader than she was. She'd made him carry it for her enough times that he knew it wasn't all that heavy, despite its size.
Aw yeah, musicians represent!

He didn't recognize it at first as a lullaby.
This made me laugh out loud XD

Leaning his forehead against the railing, he shut his eyes shut against the fires burning in the distance.
I think you could do without the second "shut."

Overall, I enjoyed this chapter. I thought your description of the battle scene at the beginning was beautiful, and very effective. I also appreciated the parallel scenes of Natalie and Mark going home. I do wonder how Natalie feels about it--will her parents be happy to see her? Upset? Does she know what she's going to say to them? Of course, she's exhausted and very concerned about her Pokemon, so I'm not surprised that we don't get those answers right away. We do see a bit of that with Mark's call with his sister, where he doesn't know what to say to her but clearly loves her and loves to talk to her.

I'd like to see a bit more of the scope of the battle outside of Natalie and Mark's perspective, though it makes sense that you wouldn't focus on that given that the chapter was about the two of them. But I was curious as to whether first responders or police were coming (police are mentioned as Natalie walks away--did she run into any?).

Also interesting to see the growing dynamic between Mark and Natalie. Though they clearly regard each other as enemies (and didn't know each other for long) they're both obviously hurt by everything. The fact that Mark couldn't stop thinking about her when talking to his sister is a pretty big deal.

Glad you included and focused on the Pokemon more in this chapter! :D I always love to see the relationship between Pokemon and their trainers. It was also so nice that Amelia evolved (did Octavia evolve too? Because if so, that's awesome!) and it makes for nice development. Thanks again for posting this, and looking forward to more!
 

WildBoots

Don’t underestimate seeds.
Pronouns
She/Her
Partners
  1. moka-mark
  2. solrock
@Starlight Aurate Thanks so much for dropping by!

I'm a simple girl. I see Continental Divides is updated. I click.
:quag:

"fault lines" is also the title of a song by a favorite of mine lol
Hahaha, I believe it. A lot of my titles here are idioms. I shamelessly love them. Who's the song by?

Huh. I didn't know Whismur had a nose or whiskers!
The official art doesn't! But, like ... it should, IMHO. How else is it gonna smell stuff? And most mammals and mammal-adjacent things have whiskers. I feel like lil rabbity whismur could use them.

but considering how huge Pelipper's bill is, that just sounds like it could be so painful if Amelia's not careful
Yo, pelipper could WRECK YOU. Like, Nat is pretty small but ... the top of its head comes to my chest, too! So much bird!

Provided that Slateport is a modern city with proper wastewater management, that shouldn't be a problem. Still definitely not something you'd want to do, but it shouldn't end up going directly back into the ocean.
That's a good thought! I don't know what knowledge Natalie would have of sewage systems, so I'll probably leave it. If anything, I'll modify slightly to cast a little more doubt on this assertion.

Was this some sort-of Ghost type move?
Not exactly! If anything it's curse? I don't think Mark is super cursed or anything, though. He's got bruises and hurt feelings. I think this is what happens when a banette fazes through you: feels cold, might leave pins behind. Free, bad acupuncture! Hooray! 🙃 Good thing it didn't actually land the shadow claw.

Mark has a sister? Was that mentioned before and I just forgot?
The first time she came up was a scene I know isn't your cup of tea, so you might've just missed it. Also, that was published months ago, so I wouldn't blame you for forgetting.
From Chapter 5:
She bent to examine the one decoration he'd taped up, a photo over the desk. "This your sister? She looks like you."

"Mm."

"Is she the sick one?"

"The cellist." He didn't like the pitying look that crossed Cora's face.

"Oh," she said. "Is that the other one?"

"There's just the one." Mark sat on the bed heavily. "I don't really want to talk about my sister right now, Cora."
There's also a teeeeeeeny tiny hint in the revised Chapter 1:
"Do you even like working at the gym? The way you were battling …." She caught herself, wondering if she was crossing a line.

But Mark shrugged. "I won't be there forever, and until then … I've got responsibilities, and it's decent money."
And chapter 8 also touches on her and on Unova as poisoned home:
Last year, the refinery had finally closed for good—but only because it had self-combusted. A corroded pipe, the reports had explained almost sheepishly, as if it could've happened to anyone. The explosion had launched a drum the size of a gigalith clear across the river to Liberty Garden, and it had also released five thousand pounds of hydrofluoric acid into the air. Benzine in the groundwater. Lead in the soil.

By then, Kathy had already started at Castelia Academy of Music, thank gods. But by then, she'd also already lost half her childhood to hospital visits and countless days when the air quality had been so bad she'd had to stay inside.
This chapter is the first time we've gotten much tangible detail though.

Aw yeah, musicians represent!
Aw, what do you play?

The fact that Mark couldn't stop thinking about her when talking to his sister is a pretty big deal.
She. Hurt. His. Feelings. By pointing out an uncomfortable truth about his own behavior that he's not ready to process.

Good call on some of those line edits. As I said in DMs earlier, this is a version 1.2 instead of 2.0. I wanted to fix the accidental Mark/Montag subtext, because that's not a thing, and pushed through an update before I've reaaaaally finished my edits. I'll make sure I catch those in the next couple days though. Good eye.
 
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love

Memento mori
Pronouns
he/him/it
Partners
  1. leafeon
For chapter 9

I'm kind of confused as to why Ore doesn't just knock Natalie out---after all, it can give her headaches remotely, so I would think it could do that? Of course, that concern pertains to more than just this specific battle, but it wasn't until now that it really stood out to me.

Mark was close enough now to hear him.

This one kind of threw me for a moment. Maybe "Mark was close enough now that she could hear him." would work better.

The solrock's eyes began to glow again

This is a really small thing, but I would get rid of the "began to"

Heart-pounding, Natalie scrambled to right herself.

I think we don't need the hyphen.

The concrete chunks that lay all around lit up and began to shakily lift into the air.

I would also get rid of the "began to" here.

Natalie wanted to return the glare with even greater fury and ferocity.

I would pick either "fury" or "ferocity" since they are basically synonymous.

But didn't have anything left in her, and instead she shrank back.

We are missing a pronoun.

But, to her amazement, he turned away and began to recall his pokemon one by one

I would also get rid of "began to" here.

How had spiraled out of her control so quickly?

Missing an "it".

Also, I think wingull is cuter than pelipper, so the evolution is kind of a shame from my perspective, but oh well! There's also probably some symbolism going with what Shelly said about pelipper and wingull in chapter 8, but I don't totally get it right now.

Her mouth tasted like iron, but the smell of the ocean was so sweet that she felt maudlin with it.

This kind of just reads oddly to me, specifically the "with it" part.

The dark rooms were like museums of normal life: the kitchen table scattered with bills to be paid and one of Mom's articles, half-edited and scattered with three colors of pens.

I think the second "scattered" should be "scribbled over" or something?

She cringed thinking how her pokemon had fought those bullshit battles for her, for an empty prize.

I like that she is acknowledging the stupidity of recreational pokemon battling, even if only incidentally.

A rock flew past her ear, forcing her to duck.

I don't think "forcing" is exactly right.

I like the chapter overall, particularly the way in which Mark and Natalie both feel kind of feel defeated after their encounter. Nobody is really "winning" here. I also like that I could follow the action pretty easily this time. I wasn't sure who would win, because on the one hand, Mark should be more experienced and street-smart when it comes to fights like this, but on the other hand, he also does come into the fight with a disadvantage. So it was kind of suspenseful to me, and the fact that Natalie loses anyway drives home her inexperience---at least when it comes to, shall we say, informal battles.

Particularly, the way Mark fights kind of illustrates his edge over Natalie there. He stands in the fire to protect himself from her pokemon and uses the surrounding rubble to attack; meanwhile, Natalie is basically helpless against Ore's psychic attacks. One of these trainers is used to being targeted in a fight, and the other isn't.

I liked Natalie being angsty while she washed Amelia off. And the moment where she has to stop her from preening her dirty feathers kind of subtly forces one to consider the implications of the oil spill for all the other pelipper and wingull who don't have someone there to tell them not to do that. It makes it feel a little more personal.
 

WildBoots

Don’t underestimate seeds.
Pronouns
She/Her
Partners
  1. moka-mark
  2. solrock
@love Thanks a bunch!

Lol I love how I’m creating new typos as I fix the old ones. One of those I think is even autocorrect? Ugh. Good job, OSJ. But thanks for catching those.

I'm kind of confused as to why Ore doesn't just knock Natalie out---after all, it can give her headaches remotely, so I would think it could do that?
From a perspective of stats: I actually don’t think it can. Every time it’s totally swept something away, it’s been a fighting-type. IDK what humans are—maybe normal-type, if anything—but they’re not elementally weak to it, and solrock is actually not a good special attacker.

From a perspective of character: Mark isn’t trying to knock her aside and move on. He’s also not trying to kill her. He’s trying to be fucking mean and “teach her a lesson.” He’s basically slapping her over and over instead of yeeting her over a cliff. And in past battles, Mark didn’t have these kinds of openings. He was busy defending himself, and his opponents were protecting themselves better.

This is a really small thing, but I would get rid of the "began to"
In the other two places, I agree. Here I’m gonna leave it because it’s suggesting her acting right before an attack hits her.

There's also probably some symbolism going with what Shelly said about pelipper and wingull in chapter 8, but I don't totally get it right now.
It’s a couple things. I’ll put it in spoilers because it’ll probably become more apparent later (and in case you don’t want me to hand you answers.) The biggest thing is Archie telling child-Natalie she can catch her own pelipper someday; she’s come full-circle from the child who admired him without knowledge to an adult (?) who understands why he’s made at least some of his choices. Shelly’s stuff is a little different. She tells her that only babies get fed, so if Natalie = wingull, then she’s expected to be an adult and handle her own shit. But! Wingulls/seagulls can get help by sticking close to a pelipper/pelican. And when she’s stronger, she should pay it forward. Shelly is basically hinting at a willingness to take Natalie under her wing ... but also reminding her that bigger birds sometimes eat smaller birds.

I think the second "scattered" should be "scribbled over" or something?
No, the pens are laying on top of the pages. I hadn’t realized I’d repeated the word though, ugh. I’ll replace it with something else.

I like that she is acknowledging the stupidity of recreational pokemon battling, even if only incidentally.
Yup, we are super done with gym battles. We’re still in Hoenn, but we’re not in Kansas anymore, Toto.

Glad that, overall, the stakes of the battle were interesting and compelling for you! And, yeah, oil spill angst for dayyyyys. Lots of angst to go around. Many flavors.
 
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Flaze

Don't stop, keep walking
Location
Chile
Pronouns
he/him
Partners
  1. infernape
FIIIIIIIGGHHTHTTT

I'm sorry, as much as I love super complex stories with really interesting characters and thought provoking themes...I can't resist a well written battle scene and you've just written one of the better battle scenes in a while. Mark and Natalie's "battle" is not only laid out perfectly so that we know what each character is fighting for, what led to them fighting like this and, most importantly of all, it's hard for us to root for any of them. We know that Natalie, as the less experience battler, is in real danger if Mark pulls off all the stops, but we also know that Natalie's in a state where she could hurt Mark as well if she gets the chance.

And all that culminates in the two having an emotionally charged battle that's delivered with a lot of...just a lot. The pace is perfect, fast, to the point but also carries the weight of every movement, every action and feeling behind the attacks. You're constantly shifting the weight and letting out new tricks and ideas (Gus the real MVP) in a way that doesn't feel overwhelming. A lot of fights try to pull off the back and forth but it's very easy to make it feel artificial, you don't do that here. Instead every change of the baton, from Mark taking out Luna to Natalie managing to throw him up with Gus, to Mark almost burying her and Amelia with rock slide. It all carries weight.

Again, all this wouldn't be possible if we didn't know these characters and what they each stand for, plus it's the first time we get to see the two of them go all out, for better or worse. There's also this feeling that both of them are fighting to protect what they believe in, to protect their ideals and independence that they're each trying to carve out in the world.

The post-fight scenes are...god, they're brutal. Natalie washing off her pokemon while trying to keep herself standing was heart breaking, specially when Amilia was covered in oil. She's slowly realizing what it is Archie was talking about and that things aren't as clear cut as she thought. But where will that lead her I wonder? It's clear this even put an even bigger wedge between her and magma, but would she actually consider joining orca? She wants to make a difference, she wants to help, but slowly she's realizing that she's diving head first into something that might lead to her and her pokemon getting hurt.

Mark's scene was also great, because I think it's the first time we've seen him this vulnerable. We've seen him vulnerable before, yes, but usually it's always in a scene where he's trying to keep some level of composure of a veneer of confidence. With Cora he was trying not to break, with the other magma members he always kept his thoughts on the mission. But here, all alone, in the dead of night, Mark can't help but ponder on everything that's on his mind and it's interesting to see how complicated his relationship with his family in Unova truly is and how he feels responsible for helping Hoenn.

And, since I'm finally caught up.

She'd masked her face with ORCA blue, but her hair still stood out flaming red.

This sets up a really beautiful image. Like I just imagine Natalie surrounded by flames, her red hair shining brightly and contrasted with the background, the orca bandanna standing out all the more as she holds it close to her face. Really good image.

He stepped back, into the heat, trusting Orwell's light shield to protect him from the worst of it. The mightyena would have to run straight at him to avoid the fires sputtering behind and to the sides. Sweat dripped down his face and neck, but he ignored the flames licking at his back, his gaze fixed on the mightyena. When it vanished from sight again, Mark closed his hand around his next pokeball. He flashed a smirk that remained hidden behind his bandana, and then he released Rand.

Really good way to showcase Mark's strategic approach to battling, his eyes are constantly on what he wants to achieve.

He'd gone out of his way to protect her, and what had she done in return? Tricked him. Lied to him. Led him into ORCA's path. She was the reason he'd lost Gibs.

</3 Why can't they just get along ;c well there wouldn't be a story if they did. But really Mark, Natalie had little to do with any of those things D:

She closed her fingers on her last pokeball, picturing her whismur's velvety nose and quivering whiskers. The metal was slippery in her grasp. It didn't feel fair. Gus wasn't ready for this, but—

Gus, baby, noooooo. I actually felt bad when I read this one.

—and her scream poured from Gus's mouth. The sound stretched until it was unrecognizable, booming with such force that dirt and sparks and flaming debris flew.

This was a really, really, cool use of a whismur and one I actually hadn't seen before. I love how Gus ends up giving Natalie an edge here when he's technically been framed as her "weakest" pokemon cause of how young and unstable he is. But here he acts as both a way to throw Mark off and also a way for Natalie to bent out her rage.

In response, Amelia lifted her wings, beak open in a threat display ... but she was such a tiny thing to hold back so much weight. Her wings trembled. Natalie's heart felt ready to burst. The shield wasn't going to hold, and Natalie couldn't bear the thought of all that rock coming down on her brave little wingull.

She reached for Amelia's ball, and then hesitated. Natalie couldn't outrun this. If she recalled her ….

Another moment that had my heart going crack. You really paint a good picture of what's going through Natalie's head and it puts us in her shoes, plus it showcases how much she cares about her pokemon.

How had spiraled out of her control so quickly?

I feel like you missed a word here or something, like "How had things spiraled out of her control so quickly?"

Then Amelia half-turned and revealed the dark splashes down her back, shimmering with chemical rainbows. Each black splotch felt like a stain on Natalie's heart.

D: that reminded me of those videos of seagulls trapped in oil gook :c

Their laughter and tinny phone music still drifted down from the roof like sounds from another planet. Mark wondered if his teammates, now scattered to separate corners of the city, were celebrating in their own ways. Were they also up watching the fires burn, or had they already glided into dreams of a better tomorrow?

Mark's starting to question his resolve a little more here. Not too much, but he's still trying to come to terms with magma's more drastic measures.

He settled on a partial truth. "The gym leader's a fucking corporate sellout. She's signing away wilderness for political favors. I couldn't just sit there and watch."

I actually hadn't asked, gym leaders are allowed to just sign away lawn?
 

Rainfall

minVP ADC atomic step action potential
Location
blue-green spinning rock
Pronouns
he/they
Partners
  1. minior
Hi Old School Johto!

Note: edit 1024-08xx hrs UTC / minor language things in review fixed or improved. Example: changed an "and" to a "though". Almost nothing was changed, but there are various small places that previously didn't read correctly or read poorly that were improved.
_____

Here with the catnip review! Finally, that is--so very sorry! I finally finished smoothing out my response for chapter 1 after finishing up the one for chapter 2.
Most people finished on time, and a few took a few days; meanwhile, I have taken [--REDACTED TIME REFERENCE--].

Honestly, I imagine that I may have some vested interest in Hoenn and Team Aqua/Team Magma fic, and I was really lucky to get Continental Divides as my first catnip! :quag:
The reverse is so less trueeeee 😅

My review for this one (1) first chapter will probably be longer than any other review I give (for my still ill-defined would-be "typical"), but the wpm words-per-day is still low! (I tend to quote a lot, so there's also not necessarily that much of my writing!) I should also warn and remind up-front that I like to go off-track all the dang time.

Regarding story consumer style, I'm the kind of person who doesn't follow plots and hidden details very easily, forgets stuff immediately, and doesn't have that much meta-knowledge. I'm sure there's people like me out there who watch movies and read books, anyway. Another element is my comparative inability to guess how plots will likely unfurl. So I can add my thoughts as that kind of oblivious reader! (*if I even get to that!)
________________________________________

CHAPTER 1: The Dive

Okay!
Here on chapter 1: The Dive. I very much enjoyed this introduction for Continental Divides : ) For some reason, I imagine that you have revised your first and early chapters, perhaps fine-tuning them from time to time? I don't seem to have read about that explicitly somewhere, but it looks to me that this is a carefully crafted chapter, sporting a recent edit date (which may have just been for bookkeeping, too).

Beginnings are important, and it's neat to kick off in the middle of the city street in situation: stranger danger. Natalie is walking along, minding her beeswax. Piece by piece we find out what she's been doing that day, and about how the mysterious hooded figure began tagging her like a transient yet unshakeable spectre.

The street behind Natalie remained empty no matter how many times she looked over her shoulder, but the hairs on the back of her neck prickled all the same. Still there. Somewhere.

Spooky! In one sense, there's nothing happening, yet it's immediately gripping.

She had first noticed him—her?—among the crowd in the park, a skinny, hooded figure in all black. If she—they?—had worn a knowing smile and followed Natalie with their eyes … well, it was a park battle.

The line reads curiously, and I'm unsure whether I'm reading it right! It seems to adopt Natalie's point-of-view. It proceeds to leave a thought unfinished or unspoken, and then it cuts away to what she was doing (the park battle). The park battle is why she hadn't given the hooded figure her full attention. The park battle is also possibly Natalie's initial assumption for why the hooded one was interested in her.

The problem was … whoever was following her definitely had pokemon of their own. She hoped they didn't have more than three. Or other friends waiting and watching.

That's an (unfortunate, yet relieving?) thing about reality--simple numbers can overwhelm even significantly different proficiency levels.

So, what, was she supposed to just wait for them to ambush her? No way. She'd proven it before and she would prove it again: she could fight back.
You're okay. Of course she was. Bullies didn't know what to do when someone hit back, and Natalie had given them a reason to pause before they tried that again.
Walk it off.

Hardy soul. Natalie can hold her ground and she can tough it out. In this case, Luna's companionship helps a lot.

She steadied herself. But the surrounding shadows revealed nothing, and there were no sounds but faraway cars.

I really like this part! : ) There's some alliteration going on, and it's a nice contrast between/among Natalie's mental shoring-up, the invisible enemy, and life going on as usual, but far removed from the deserted and tense vicinity.

Luna spun and snapped her teeth at nothing—and the nothing screamed, high-pitched and human-sounding.
The shriek that followed this time was distinctly inhuman. Luna furiously shook her head, and for a second Natalie glimpsed the thing caught in her jaws: doll-like with floppy arms and a gleaming crescent of teeth.

Banette can sound human? It's certainly a skin-prickling introduction to our cloaked and unknown adversary. Showing the enemy little by little does wonders for the imagination.

As she held it under the light, the pin began to smoke and dissolve until there was nothing to show it had ever been there but the dot of blood welling from Natalie's finger.

Very cool and sinister.

Then she knelt to Luna and pulled her close, digging her fingers into her fur. "Good girl." Sweet, smart Luna, who had eaten a pair of her sneakers in middle school but who always knew when something was wrong. Lightheaded, Natalie held on tight and listened to her thundering heartbeat, trying to slow her breathing. She only let go when Luna started whining and licking her face and Natalie had to push her off, laughing despite her still-jittering hands.

This whole paragraph is wonderful. And I can't help myself, my only comment is 🐶 (^^)

Luna trotted cheerily at her side, but Natalie couldn't stop glancing over her shoulder anyway.

Nervousness/caution reigns, especially when the shakeup is still fresh. The tension can finally be released when she makes it to a secure, populated zone.
________________________________________

On the Rocks probably wasn't in the guidebook, a world apart from the flashy cocktail bars and clubs downtown, but Natalie liked this better.

Just an aside, I like the reminder that there's so much we miss out on, if we only follow the one recommended path. Opportunity costs exist at every turn. At the same time, there's no point in visiting everything. You choose what you visit, and value it for what it can bring you.

There was a lot she didn't know about her brother's life.

Good transition here : o from her situation to thinking about her brother.
[I had a note to revisit this, but I have nothing to add (for now)!]

On visits home, he'd humored her, taking her out on the bay for a pokemon ride or schooling her at checkers, but they hadn't talked about anything real. Was campaign work what he'd wanted or just something he'd fallen into? What did he remember about his mom? Did it matter to him that she was only his half-sister? Had he ever been in love? She'd imagined dozens of conversations [...] but his imagined answers were flavorless and unsatisfying.

(There's so much we want to know about someone, and sometimes there's no good chance to learn. Sometimes maybe for good.)

Natalie could tell they liked her cheering for them even though they both acted like the whole thing was no big deal.

: 3

But that hadn't stopped him from teaching Natalie how to train: when to give treats, how to establish authority. "She sees you as her pack. You've gotta give her a reason to listen to you."

A snapshot of Luna's origin story! Tying in Bubba, and it also provides contrast for young Luna against the older, wilder Justice.

One trip home, he'd brought back a poochyena. Hers. [...lines...] "She sees you as her pack. You've gotta give her a reason to listen to you."

The loud scrape of a barstool jolted Natalie out of her reverie. Right. A quick rest to figure out where she was going, avoid any more strangers in black, and then back to the hostel to finally get something in her stomach.

Ok, this seriously feels natural, as embedded. I swear if I hypothetically tried something like this, then either the way I write it, or the fact that I'm actively planning it that way, would make me think it wouldn't flow.

She'd never seen a gym trainer battle like him before, like it was personal. And then, sudden as a skidding car, he would recall his pokemon, sometimes even if it looked like he was going to win, and wave the challenging trainer ahead. Natalie had heard that the gym leader herself was known to occasionally award badges to trainers who had actually lost to her, if they impressed her, but this was something else. He seemed bored, boiling under the surface.

Fascinating. (Sorry to quote the whole thing here.)
He simultaneously battles baring his whole soul, and also remains fundamentally disinterested in the battling itself, in a sense.
I really like that dynamic where Roxanne and Mark don't need to rely solely on battle prowess as the determinator for advancement. (Maybe plenty other gyms do this, too. Maybe few do. Maybe there are varied gym challenge structures.)
________________________________________

And now we get to the core of the second major scene, Natalie and Mark meeting for the first time!

They had never spoken—Natalie had only watched his battles from the sidelines—but there was no doubt that he recognized her, too. His smile made her wonder again whether the stranger in black had more friends watching her. But a gym trainer? Maybe not. Then again, what were the odds of running into him here after what had just happened?

Natalie took out the scrap of fabric and squeezed it tight as she strode towards the gym trainer. She tested the words in her mind: Recognize this? Or maybe, Care to explain?

But he spoke first, his tone lazy and almost playful. "So, you following me now? I can offer advice about Roxanne if you want it that bad, but I don't think it's worth that much effort, to be honest."

She ground to a halt. He thought she—?

[--skip 2 lines--]

"No, I …." He was as surprised to see her as she'd been to see him. Of course. What had she been thinking? Natalie laughed in relief, feeling her face color.

Ahahaha yes, I love it! Mutual misunderstanding of the same vein, although for quite different reasons. One: suspecting potentially grim undertakings. One: assuming typical ambitious league-ladder-climbing. Thankfully the misunderstanding was quickly dispelled for both.

His smile made her wonder again whether the stranger in black had more friends watching her.
(Re-subquote. Fun to note: whatever happened most recently or whatever is presently in one's mind directs where our train of thought goes, even for deduction. Naturally. And thus worthy of being aware and careful of such bias.)

Under the string lights and surrounded by chatter, the incident already felt far away, easy to explain. Now it made for a good story—after all, nothing bad had come of it.

This is true. Something that could have gone bad but didn't result in real loss makes for a good story.

Not to say that the following comments applies to this case! Just speaking generally. Getting away with too much can make us brash. Constant punishment or a string of failures may make us falter a little too early, when better times and/or success is unknowingly within reach.

(Even more generally and definitely on tangent: consequences are often not traceable/pinnable to any one thing someone did.)

She glanced at the chalkboard menu and her eyes immediately glazed over—too many options and none of them familiar.

(Nothing to note here, just relating--Yay! me too, me too, when I'm at any social outing, more so with regard to alcohol)

"Must be nice getting paid a salary to battle."

Don't be too jealous. I'm hourly."

(Typical disclaimer), I don't analyze things too critically, but this is interesting. Surely battles typically don't take up a lot of time? I might be showing my ignorance here, but I don't think hourly workers usually get paid different rates for different stages of work (such as being paid more for, say, the construction part of the job, vs the paperwork/administrative-planning-marking-documentation side). I'm guessing that the prep and wrap-up work gets covered under work hours, as well as other associated duties that enable the battles to happen.

Did she want this to go further?

Her drink came and she was grateful for something to do with her hands. She took a long drink, taking a moment to imagine how the rest of the evening might play out. It hadn't been a bad night, actually. She'd won her battle in the park and earned some cash. Then she'd fought off an attacker—an invisible one, at that. And now … she was enjoying herself, actually. If nothing else, she decided, it could only enrich the story of her night.

Just commenting here that it's open-ended (expectedly!), and it's about enjoying it for what it is. Well, that goes for Natalie, likely for Mark, and for me as the reader.

The thought that training could become another job to weather through was a sobering one.
[...]
She didn't want to think too hard about what she'd do when she decided she'd had enough of this lifestyle.

That's sobering as all heck, yes. Living itself involves work, and the jobs you do are a big part of your life, too. How much do you enjoy different aspects of your life and your job(s), and how much stress and demand does each piece put on you. Naturally, even the more fashionable (I'm making an assumption regarding the Leagues) positions and careers aren't all magically-effortless-dreamworld lifestyle.

almost none of them can see two inches past their own ambition. They have no clue about anything else going on. Just badges and bullshit.

(I may come back to this. Thinking about myopia.)
Ambition and focus can be great to have, for being productive with goals. Sometimes that focus can be set on comparatively unimportant things. And sometimes that focus makes you lose sight of other things that matter (which could even the stated intended goal!). Sometimes ambition can be too selfish egotistical...?

It wouldn't be a lie to say that she was training and rounding out her team ... but she didn't want to hide behind excuses. She wanted to talk to someone about it, and it certainly wouldn't be her parents.

At last Natalie said

Oh! this is an opportunity to be vulnerable and real, with a stranger, even! Of course, one enabling factor is that they are not close people, such as parents, for which case this conversation would be difficult, involved, charged. Mark seems to have a good head on his shoulders, a secure demeanor, and a kindly side, so he may be a great choice for someone to talk to about these matters.

Also, that's good--she took her time to gather her thoughts. I do do that sometimes, but I would often be anxious about taking my time, too 😅

Another note! I just noticed that you put spaces on both sides of ellipses! And looks like there are different conventions for that! I think the one I can't stomach immediately is the one where there's a space before, but not after. (I had come back and wasn't sure if I was quoting with a skip or not.) I also see now that you use four periods when the ellipse directly precedes the end of the sentence!

At last Natalie said, "I've been thinking about my brother a lot since I left home. Like, I'm probably walking all the same places as him. Especially here in Rustboro. He was a trainer too, for a while, but he quit, I guess. Ended up here working on an election campaign. And then ... he disappeared."

This is it. And while I haven't read ahead or read other reviews, I've seen enough inside (and outside) of this chapter here and there to see that Bubba is a huge part of what drives Natalie's journey, and potentially a background driver for future actions and decisions.
I don't really know yet what the major conflict and subject matters are, but it's interesting to note that Bubba's last known role was an election campaign...

"Maybe? Not necessarily. I mean, what am I really gonna dig up that the police couldn't? Probably nothing."

Right. Keeping expectations low and realistic, while also hoping to discover things that will lead to more light on what happened, which would hopefully provide a sense of understanding and also a sense of closure.

She flashed him a grateful smile. "I guess I feel closer to him when I'm here. I don't want to forget him, you know? He was such a good person—better than me, anyway."

Memories are important, both when the people are alive, and after they are absent from your lives, whether temporarily or interminably.
I wonder how many people identify with that last line, the idea that others are much better people than they are... probably a great many. This thought-sentiment would probably be to some good consequence (most hubris is probably bad, including moral hubris), as well as to some detriment, when taken too far (low self-worth impacts self-efficacy, relationships).

Mark still had her fixed in a stare she couldn't quite read. But she appreciated that he was listening so intently.

Actually being listened to can sometimes be a rare good.
[leaving note here: to expand on? for general, particular cases?]

Like with Devon Horizon.

Mm, such naming. 👀
[Deepwater, and Devon, very nice; it (subtly?) rhymes in my pronunciation of it, and has a very nice ring to it.]

Mark smiled humorlessly. "I can guess. Pipeline failed?"

"No, but you're close," she said, surprised. "An oil tanker. It crashed into the reef off the coast of Slateport and … I was pretty little, but I remember it was bad. They had to close the beach for a long time.

Oh, that's neat! I suppose in Natalie and Mark's world, they encounter similar environmental challenges that we would. Large-scale pollution accidents are definitely a major concern. I wonder just how many industries Devon Corporation (name?) is involved in.

Most of us would be less bothered by the general environmental losses and more directly bothered by lack of beach access, not to mention any impact on economic shipping transport and fishing expeditions. (So much damage to wildlife, for a long spell.)

Bubba—my brother, I mean—he came home to help with the cleanup, and he even convinced Mom to let him foster a pair of pelippers in the guest bathroom."

Bubba may have been on a job to help with cleanup. Maybe he went and searched for one. I'm reading that surely, the damage to the environs and wildlife hit him, and he wanted to do his part to help make that better. It's quite apparent when he planned to foster the pair of pelippers.

She still remembered the pelippers' reptilian yellow eyes. Her parents hadn't let her near them, and for good reason: they were raggedy with stress, but each still had a wingspan more than twice the length of her little child body and the strength to break her neck with one wing swipe. But just once, after making her swear up and down that she wouldn't tell her parents, Bubba had let her pet the sleek feathers at the crown of the female's head. He'd kept a firm grip on Natalie, ready to snatch her back if needed.

When he finally released them back into the wild, Natalie had cried.

Note one--description of pokemon traits and capabilities! Birds are descended from reptiles, that checks out. I think too much, I live in game-space Pokemon, where everything is pretty-pretty and lighthearted, and kids can train nearly any pokemon without too much trouble. Wingulls and pelippers are common in Hoenn (in CD, too, I assume). And yet they can be perfectly potent and dangerous, just like real-world animals. A common pokemon can break a child's neck without extreme exertion. That's a fearful thought. Bodies are in some sense frail, and necks are weak points, of course.

Note two--I know it's doable, but I don't have the knowledge yet to describe how you did it, but after just meeting the pelippers through the eyes of little Natalie, I briefly wanted to cry, too.
Maybe this is why: part of it is the wild, recovering pelippers. Part of it is Natalie: young, starry-eyed at these common yet majestic creatures. Part of it is Mark caring for the pelipper, being protective of Natalie, while also letting her appreciate the pelipper for what they are.

When he finally released them back into the wild, Natalie had cried.

"Aw, don't worry, Small Fry," he'd said. "You can catch your own someday."

That had been about ten years ago, too. They didn't know when exactly Bubba had disappeared—he'd been busy, after all, and had sometimes gone weeks without calling or emailing—but it had certainly been the last time Natalie had seen him.

Mark's voice broke Natalie from her thoughts.

Okay, super long quote. But this whole things flows from one idea to the next. I sometimes worry I comment too often that things flow, but this does, and I again don't have the concepts yet as to why, ahaha...
Maybe a big part of it is immersion? The story is real, so I don't feel a sense of jarring?
(I honestly feel like if I had tried to write such a sequence using a similar structure, it probably would have felt awkward to me. That's hypothetical, because I wouldn't have experimented and come about to this structure, but still. Maybe a small part of it is that readers don't necessarily feel additional sense that something doesn't work quite right? I don't know.)

That had been about ten years ago, too. They didn't know when exactly Bubba had disappeared—he'd been busy, after all, and had sometimes gone weeks without calling or emailing—but it had certainly been the last time Natalie had seen him.

I can't imagine what's worse. Knowing the exact moment someone disappeared, or slowly coming to the more certain but still uncertain realization that they're gone, but you don't know what happened to them. Both are awful in their own way.
It's more than a little sad that time can cause chasms in relationships, as it fades while the people in them continue to change and live.

Mark's voice broke Natalie from her thoughts. "Not a lot of people are willing to look closely at the fucked up parts of the world and try to do something about it."

Hmm. If we pendatically break this statement down into three pieces:
(1) look at problems in the world
(1b) look closely at these problems
(1c) try to do something about it
You can probably have four categories on non-"hard and fast" scales for yes/no regarding (1b) and (1c).
Those fulfilling either of those would be less common, and certainly those fulfilling both.
I think most people see the problems from their vantage, and don't necessarily look closely, sure. It's possible to have people who actively fight for a cause they believe in, having once done the soul-searching, but perhaps not having done proper research or having updated their knowledge lately. And most of us probably notice the problems that affect us, but don't really make the concerted, enduring effort to make a positive difference...

She winced, thinking of a line from one of Bubba's emails that had hurt to read: I never thought the man who taught me to shoulder my responsibilities with pride would be so fast to abandon his own.

How do these things happen?
This is just rhetorical here. There's a few stray thoughts I have for this big open-ended question. One, involving psychological bias and the ease with which we engage hypocrisy without even really realizing we do it. Two, the concept of practice what you preach. Three, maybe the things we care most about are things we struggle with?
[I shall just leave these points as is, without going in depth.]

It wasn't a secret that he and their dad had fought—the Armstrong family showed both love and anger with loud voices—but she hadn't realized it was like that. She couldn't exactly ask Dad about it without reopening old wounds … and explaining

Oh hey, I know something about that! Some families, I suppose some cultures, do that. One side of my family is passionate and loud, so much so that describing something with excitement verges on sounding like arguing, perhaps?

That sounds like quite the rough frayed relationship : (
I wonder what happened. What duty did Bubba think that Dad had abandoned? I'm guessing (in the dark) that it's less about misunderstanding here, and more about conflicting priorities and tradeoff decisions, and/or maybe disagreements about the solution to a serious problem? Yeah, completely in the dark, for now. The fact that Natalie can't broach it isn't fun, but even if she were aware, I wonder whether her dad would be willing to discuss those sore subjects with her.

It had been so long since she'd had a conversation that went beyond battles and travel stories.

I've read that people in general are getting more starved for real friendships and (I believe) also a chance to bare their souls and troubles.

"What do you mean? I just told you my entire family history."

"That was your brother. What about you? What do you care about?"

"A lot of things but …." The room suddenly seemed louder and smaller than it had before. She was reminded uncomfortably of Mom asking, But what's next? "I'm trying to figure it out, I guess. I'm not really political like he was."

Oh mm. Yes, we can define our world by what surrounds us and what we care for, not necessarily by what we alone do and represent. (<-that can be stated better...)

This may be the first-person myopia talking, but the world seems to be increasingly open-ended and less-structured. Heavy constraints remain in place (and some are growing), but there's more paths and combinations available to us now for how to live. Not-being-sure of what-you're-about seems normal. Not being sure of what you stand for seems normal. There are so many causes out there that need labor.
Wandering or being lost can be beneficial, though it is also not always a great state to be in. Some people have strong convictions for what they want to do and achieve in life. For others, they may not be in that state yet.

It was obvious who he meant. She had long, long hair and spoke heatedly with a small group sitting in the corner, too far away to be heard.
"[...]If she leaves, then all her friends stop coming too, and the owner doesn't want to lose all that business. Erica Spitfire is a hippie, but people around here listen to her."
"She's got an interesting story: A couple years back, she was close to taking the title and a big cash prize." He paused for effect, spreading his hands wide and then turning it into a shrug. "But she came back instead. She decided she was a better organizer than a trainer, and now she's one of the last things standing between DevCo and their pipeline."

Not understanding, Natalie nodded anyway.

"The point is, you don't have to be a politician to do something. You just have to give a shit."

"I guess so."

He smiled, leaning forward, and there was hunger in it. "I think you could make a difference in the world," he insisted. "If you really wanted to."

Mmm! Here is another one who's not just smouldering but positively on fire. (Also the breloom is cute. A bipedal fungus imbibing fermented goods, eh?) She's not afraid to relinquish her place after concerted effort and the possibility of a big battling prize (it's possible the pressure got to her, but sounds more like she didn't think it was worth it?), in favor of work she decided was worthwhile to pursue. Getting buy-in and staying power against a large, profitable company with lobbying influence can't be easy!

Heh, oversharing of myself in response to your first chapter of CD here, but I find myself--at different points in my life--latching onto strong and successful people as role models for what achievement can look like, (unfortunately) usually without following up fully on my end to manifest my own output.

Mark is pointing out Erica as an example after hearing Natalie's more nebulous answer. Mark thinks Natalie has the base character material to make a real impact. That's a pretty nice appraisal coming from a stranger.

"Everything okay? Emergency at the gym?" she teased. Her heart sank, just a little.

"Something like that." He set his jaw and smiled grimly. Then he turned and gave her a real smile. "We'll have to finish this conversation later though."

Ah, no fair, Natalie didn't get to end the convo on a strong note. An open-ended consideration for what she would want to get involved in is not a bad note, though! And the conversation will continue (^^). Hopefully without too much star-crossed friendship, based on the prologue note and other things (^^' ).

I also like the realism. Keeping the conversational tone light, while being a little sad at a good moment having to conclude abruptly. I wonder if Mark has to go off to a political engagement that we'll find out about soon enough. (Or maybe his Google Home/Nest/whatever+ is telling him he left the stove on?? : P )

Natalie let out a long breath and leaned back against the bar. What a weird day. She reached for her beer. Then she thought about the long, dark walk that awaited her, and she abandoned it on the counter half-full.

That's a mood. Long day, and then electing to take the rational step than the easy inertial action.
Choosing the less easy path can pay off, for some cost.
________________________________________

Natalie licked grease from her fingers and fought the urge to laugh, thinking badges and bullshit. She considered chiming in with her own story, flashing the scrap of banette cloth to see their stunned faces, but it wasn't worth the questions that would arise. Natalie was tired and didn't have to prove herself to them—they'd be on to the next town by morning.

Different people's earnestness over seemingly superficial matters can definitely seem frivolous! How is it that we find ourselves chasing after each of our preferred escape-zones? Is it because they do just that, provide an escape? Gamify a pursuit and provide an easy setting to inhabit?

And then there's our need to tell others about ourselves, our thoughts, our opinions. It can be hard to suppress that urge! Even when we expect little to come from the interaction.

But what are you doing here in Rustboro, Natalie? Still a good question. Who was left to prove herself to? Bubba was gone—and had been for years before she arrived.

Natalie begins this story with wandering and seeking. Will she have her causes and actions thrust upon her by the story and the powers that she encounters? From one note I saw, maybe she continues to wander (well into the early chapters)? I wonder.

Rustboro already had Bubba, and it wouldn't have her, too.

Yes! it's ok to weep for lost ones, and it's also understandable to fight for revenge. But throwing oneself away without purpose or impact for something or someone that's gone also seems... additionally destructive and wasteful.

Tomorrow, she decided, she'd claim her badge and be done with it. And then … well, she didn't have to decide what she wanted to contribute to the world all at once. For now, she could handle dishes and then sleep. Tomorrow she could figure out making the world a better place.

I rather like this ending to the first chapter, I think. It's the beginning of where this story is told. Natalie has started on her journey. She doesn't have to know where she's going yet. She'll get there, bit by bit (or all at once, in contrast to what she thought?). Life is largely mundane (which doesn't necessarily mean boring). Great undertakings are all composed of little mundane practical steps.
________________________________________

[Oh snap, "actual" summary commentary that I usually don't write?]

This was a great first chapter. The whole thing feels very nicely weaved together. It feels natural. It shows bits and pieces and holds back. Not too much "action" happens, but there is so much happening, and a lot gets unveiled naturally. I especially love the thread with the recovering pelipper, to characterize Bubba, Devon, environment, wild pokemon, Natalie.

Very nice artwork at the end, it's good to put a rendition of their profile/countenance to the characters! [Do you draw these] I know now that you drew this, and I assume you also drew the sea cityscape sunset in the prologue? I do enjoy landscapes. The sea is interminable, but a lot of this one seems to be taken up by the city and the ships. Orange dusk sky, dark blue ocean.

There are whispers of upcoming conflict with the major sociopolitical(?) upstarts/powers. Natalie, with her trusty partners (Luna is precious and capable!), is seeking knowledge and closure about Bubba. Some standalone character or group is already targeting her, when she is yet unaligned. What was their purpose? Natalie has memories; they dog her, they galvanize her. She has a journey ahead, and a desire to do something meaningful beyond a trainer's journey. She's still unsettled on a sense of self-identity. Mark appears capable. He's already involved in some cause full-heartedly. It's a cause he may seek Natalie's support in.

Where do we go from here? If it were not mentioned in the prologue, I would have half-expected a deuteragonist of the same team! This sounds like it will play out more painfully (that Natalie and Mark may often find themselves opposed), which would at least give it that much more intrigue.

We've heard mention of MGMA, Magma, and nothing solid about who they are or what they are for yet (nor about Team Aqua!), except for the sense that they may be a group to be watchful or wary of.
Since we're at the beginning, it's fun to wonder, how much of the central plot and social conflicts explored will be environmental, how much of this will be sociopolitical?

I should also wonder, Magma and Aqua are surely opposed at the outset. What other lines of division will be drawn; what fault-lines will separate one from another?
________________________________________

That's my review of chapter 1! If I ever get to writing more than one every few months, some things will be apparent, as in this one.
The anatomy of my responses typically go like:
- hi!
- some comment / unnecessary notes
- occasional or frequent rants inspired by some section or content, but not related to the writing
- heavy use of quotes
- quotes with comments like "this part is neat, but I don't know why"
- quotes
- "actual" commentary (usually absent)

Future reviews (20 years later) will very likely not be as long (or as careful, sorry)!
I'm excited to see where Natalie and Mark go from here, learn more about the teams, the structure of Hoenn society, the causes and conflicts, and how it all interwines!
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Rainfall

minVP ADC atomic step action potential
Location
blue-green spinning rock
Pronouns
he/they
Partners
  1. minior
CHAPTER 2: Testing Grounds

Note: edit 1025-08xx hrs UTC / no major changes. some small additions, and again some things previously didn't quite read correctly or read poorly that were improved. Almost no changes to latter ~40% (for now?), besides a few adjustments made at the end.
_____

Here with a review for chapter 2!

As is more typical for me, I don't have that much to say in this review, and it's mostly quoting heavily throughout. I also could have posted the review for this chapter along with the previous chapter, but I decided to do it separately just because! (Looking again, it seems closer than I imagined to the length for chapter 1's, so maybe both/either the first review wasn't as long as I thought, and/or I quoted and wrote more for this one than I realized!)

Looks like we get a gym battle and find out more about what Mark is working toward, and whether (or how) Natalie wants to join the mission!
________________________________________

Hilary paused long enough to get a good look at him and then did a double-take.
I totally get what this means! At least, the idea behind it! Though I'm wondering if someone would look hard, and then do a double-take? I have probably done this myself; it just seems interestingly out-of-order!

Civic engagement. Mark smiled crookedly, which made him wince in pain.

Instead, he took a slow breath and then told her the story he'd prepared. "I went for a bike ride after work yesterday and somebody doored me."

OH SNAP. This is real.

"How's your bike?"

He paused for a fraction of a second. "Scraped up, but it'll still get the job done."

"Wow. I'm glad you're okay though." Hilary leaned against the lockers. "I didn't even know you biked."

"Oh yeah. It's a great workout."

AYYY lmao XD
Poor "bike" :' )

(Also I'm imagining a hulking Mark riding a tiny bike a la caricature/chibi-style drawing, and laughing)

He waited.

She took a deep breath and blurted, "What I'm trying to say is you're entitled to your opinion, but I don't want to get involved. I really, really like this job, you know?"

He couldn't help himself. "You're not gonna lose your job for attending a meeting."

"No, I know. It's just, you know. Not my kind of thing."

Mark hadn't expected a lot from her, but he'd hoped a self-professed nature-lover would at least be interested in becoming more informed about what her employer was allowing to happen at Meteor Falls. He set his jaw, considering his words carefully. "I don't think Roxanne is a bad person. I just don't agree with everything she does. But I'm still part of the team. I won't bring it up again."

"Thanks," Hilary said with obvious relief. "And thanks anyway for including me."

"Yeah, sure." He put on a smile, though his heart was bitter, and then turned for the door to the gym.

Ooh, like damn. Mark seems like a really staunchly driven and good person. I identify completely with Hilary right now. I believe the environment is .very. high up on the list of concerns we should have. And yet, I haven't done anything substantial for it, and honestly, I would do as so many have done, which is to put my myopic self-interests ahead of the whole picture. Especially if that meant avoiding even a small but real promise of threat to my job security. Ow. : (

Now. This also means Mark has tried recruiting Hilary to the cause. Then the reason for not mentioning the "bike incident" (i.e. not mentioning what actually happened) isn't solely that he keeps his participation to the cause a secret (from say, his coworkers). Maybe it's the extent of the mission. Coming back after the chapter, maybe the incident was an extracurricular event that wasn't something that he had planned.

He stopped with his hand on the doorknob, puzzled. Then he remembered: the girl from the bar. Natalie. "Red hair?"

"Yup." She smiled knowingly. "Friend of yours?"

"Maybe." He grinned. "I guess I'll find out." With that, he stepped through the door.

Hahaha... So, if you cannot fight for the cause on the right side of history (from his perspective), will Mark not hold you in proper regard? (so I say, jumping to conclusions.) That's totally understandable, I think most of us do that for some cause or belief. It can also make for understandably dicey relations.

each command and roar amplified by the big screens on either side.

Hmm, I suppose many? some? all? gyms are also showcase stadiums. It would be a loss not to take advantage of the potential entertainment/educational/commercial value. My first reaction was that it doesn't fit a schoolteacher to be showcasing a gym battle. But if her primary or a major subject she teaches is regarding pokemon battling, it makes perfect sense. Devon Corp is also big in Rustboro, and possibly has a entertainment and/or pokemon battling wing. It could also be another large corporation with such a division or primary focus.

"I raked the gravel when I got in,"

Sendimentary gym maintenance and upkeep at a rock-type gym! Mm! rocks rocks rocks

but his job was to filter out incompetent trainers, not to figure out who was actually skilled. His ratio of wins to losses had been too high this month, according to Roxanne. Higher than hers. So if a challenger demonstrated any kind of basic knowledge … he'd let them continue on and become her problem.

Mm, being a gym trainer or gym leader very much requires its own set of company policies and requirements, including quotas for win/loss stats, apparently!

[...] Mark threw the match and took Aisha's place on the sidelines, which was even more boring. In theory, he was supervising the match to ensure fair play. In reality, it required little from him but to announce the rules and then wait for the fight to end. Today, at least, he had plenty to think about.

Then he switched places with Aisha to do it again. And again.

Many jobs, even potentially seemingly glamourous ones, can be repetitive and be a chore!
________________________________________

His smile became a wicked grin when, rather than taking her usual place against the wall, she pulled a number from the dispenser and took a seat on the bench.

Finally! Something interesting in the workday! Huhuhuhuhuhu

During his next battle, the cut above Mark's eyebrow opened again, stinging from the sweat and dust.
Readers already know he was involved in something that affected his visage, most likely, that could be explained away as a biking accident injury (getting doored). Looks like we're slowly getting a picture of what damage he has. The details might not even matter as much as the fact that it's quite noticeable and worth sympathy for the pain.

He felt grit in his teeth as he inevitably did after spending any amount of time in the gym. But he suddenly didn't mind so much.

Ah, environmental hazards on the job. Lovely. Can't fully avoid them. Is there optional personal protective gear?

When pain and suffering are worth the reward, it's so much easier to push through.

He ended the fight and then waited for the challenging trainer to finish high-fiving his machop before waving him ahead to Roxanne

Ah, that's quite sportsmanlike. Let the trainer celebrate each step.

Aisha looked over at Natalie, who stood at the top of the stairs, and then back at Mark. She raised an eyebrow. "Well, I won't say no to a longer break."

Huhuhuhuhuhu

He guessed eighteen, nineteen—not a huge gap between them, in the grand scheme of things, but enough to make a difference. Young wasn't necessarily a bad thing. It meant idealistic. It meant being willing to take risks.

Evaluating for fit and readiness, to sharpen the blade for a crusade.

she looked like many of the rookie trainers he saw in the gym, except for the look in her eyes. Most trainers stared through Mark. To them, he was one more obstacle on their way into the spotlight. Natalie seemed to be actually paying attention. Alert. Curious.

There are people who have their wits about them, paying attention to their surroundings and paying attention to people. A cogent mind and alert senses. It can probably be self-trained to some degree. As an oblivious person, I wonder how : )

he stood almost a foot taller than her. In response, she raised her chin and rolled her shoulders back.

Yes! Stand tall, don't shrink back.

He played it for a laugh, pleased when she did. But the look in her eyes made it clear she intended to try to get the rest of the story out of him later.

We'll see about that.

Huhuhuhu yessss, get the story please.

There was only one gym-approved pokemon left for him to choose from. "Let's make it count, Orwell," he said, and released his solrock.

Oh, it's Orwell! Solrock (and lunatone) are awesome.

Immediately, he felt the prickle of Orwell's presence along the edges of his mind, an unintelligible buzz. With no command, the solrock took a defensive stance between him and Natalie, raising a shield of purple light over Mark like it did every time. He imagined that, from its perspective, there was no distinction between a gym battle and any other kind of fight. It was a good habit.

This is a very natural sense of solrock as a psychic type.
Of course the trainer needs to be aware in battle, too. They can get hurt in the scuffle, or in extra-battle situations. It doesn't hurt to have the pokemon play defense, if it can spare the energy and/or calculation cost.

Sometimes the particularly aspiring ones, like the kid with the lotad, got creative and tried to cover both bases simultaneously.

Ah, neato. In some circumstances, leveraging two or more advantages may make the difference in securing victory. However, this case might be better defined as an either/or scenario, where chasing after different modes of attack means that neither is as incisive as one single decisive choice would be. (But also, I don't know. Maybe there is a synergistic gain from using both water-type and plant power.)

Mark felt his solrock's impulse to get between him and the mightyena—something that might have been anxiety if Orwell were a creature that felt emotions the way humans did.

Oh! solrock, at least this one, can be protective : o

"Stay put, Ore. Let's see what she'll do." But he already had a good idea. Mark ignored the mightyena for now, watching Natalie instead. "Get ready."

Ore is a nice shorthand name for Orwell! Also brings a connotation of being a rock of value. The phonetically identical "Or" is hard to parse as a noun and a name, of course!

Looks like at the start of the battle, Mark is opting to watch the control tower rather than the knight.

"Alright, Luna, do it!"

Evidently there's been enough training and planning before time to execute a particular move or method with a simple command.

The next moment it lunged and vanished in a swirl of black vapor.

Oh, I wonder how mightyena does that--whether it be cloaking itself, (moving quickly), or de-materializing (I would imagine the last one is primarily for ghost-types). Is this for a particular move or set of moves? Do different dark-types also have access to such techniques of disappearing?

Orwell made a low keening and slowly spun in place as it tried and failed to find the mightyena.

Low turning speed statistic, hmm? I wonder what affects and limits the turning ability of a levitating psychic extraterrestrial(?) lithic being.

All at once, a black cloud flowered in the air above the solrock and the mightyena leapt from within. It pounced, trailing black vapor, and knocked Orwell to the floor.

I am a fan of this dark fog and verbs description.

By the time the mightyena managed to slide to a stop, sections of the rock wall were already crumbling and crashing down on top of it.

Ah, so the rock slide uses rocks existing in the vicinity! That's logical.

The mightyena shook its head, started forward, swooned, and turned to snap its teeth at an imaginary foe. It staggered into the rim of the fiery ring and then reeled back whining, the reaction delayed.

I like the sentence structure here!
Action verbs a-one, two, three, and four (with alliteration). Another s- verb into some imagery and also a scattering of four r- words, with final descriptive clause. ( : p ^somewhat meta comment)

The mightyena shook its head, started forward, swooned, and turned to snap its teeth at an imaginary foe. It staggered into the rim of the fiery ring and then reeled back whining, the reaction delayed.

"Rockslide. Finish it."

"Come on, Luna! Jump through!" As the first rocks tumbled down from the arena's edge, the mightyena tucked its tail and whimpered. "Luna, go! You can do it!" The mightyena lowered its head, tensed, and then bounded between falling boulders and through the fire. Mark could smell the burning hair. The mightyena moved clumsily, less a run than a three-legged jumble in motion. Rock tumbled all around. Many of them hit. Still, Natalie's mightyena flung itself toward the solrock.

"Bury it."

"Crunch it!"

The mightyena barked and, from nowhere, a pair of shadowy jaws appeared around Orwell and snapped shut. The solrock tried to spin free, but the shadow-teeth yanked it down. As it struggled, the solrock let go of the light shield over Mark and let rocks drop at random all over the sandbox.

The mightyena wove between fallen rocks and drew closer—still wobbling, but it didn't matter now. It bared its real teeth, and the shadowy phantom jaws pressed tighter around the solrock. Pieces crumbled off one of Orwell's fins.

Mark winced. He hated leaving Ore exposed, and he wished he could send out Gibs to catch the mightyena from behind.

Once again, I don't know why it is the case, but the battle passage flows from one line to the next!
[I don't have many additional notes here, and probably won't edit more later! Well, here's a rehash line, oops!] It goes from battle narration, punctuated by a quick contrast of battle commands, shows Luna limp-running, getting hit by and also evading hit by rocks to get shadow jaws on Ore, who is eventually snared and releases the rock barrage. As Ore goes out, it cuts temporarily to Mark's thoughts.

The mightyena threw its head back in a howl, and its shadowy jaws clenched harder, squeezing and squeezing until Orwell's light went out.

A side note, it's nice that the move crunch is manifested dark energy (not that type of dark energy), rather than just purely physical action. The move depends on the pokemon's control, but it doesn't just follow the posturing in one-to-one relation.

He'd better let Ore take it easy for the rest of the day—they had a long day ahead of them tomorrow.

There's more work to be done, mm? Coming back, sounds like there's a big and tense protest coming.

Natalie looked up at Aisha, waiting for the official call that she'd won. Her mightyena, though, watched Mark. That was good, too.

This is a fun (anti)parallel! Mark keeps his eyes on trainer Natalie at the start of the match.
Luna keeps her eyes on trainer Mark following the conclusion of the match.

At the same time, I'm not 100% sure what "That was good, too" is getting at!

Natalie started to shoot back a reply but stopped herself, frowning—even her thoughts were loud. She lowered her voice and asked, "Did you lose on purpose?"

At that Mark grinned. "No. You won."

(*waves* Hello, fellow loud thinker!)
And yeah, we want our achievements to be real, not just in name.

The gym would almost certainly not be open tomorrow, but he couldn't say that here. And if she came back to the gym at her usual time—

(woah wait, what now?) Does the protest involve the gym, too?

"Hey, Mark?" Aisha tipped her head towards a waiting trainer at the top of the stairs.

He nodded for Aisha's benefit and said quickly to Natalie, "Is there any way you could come back tonight? I want to talk to you."

She flashed a self-satisfied smile, cheeks coloring. "Yeah. I've been thinking about what you said yesterday, actually."

"Oh yeah?" And Mark knew then that he'd been right: she was already half-convinced. It wouldn't take much more.

This recruiting process for the just cause is well on its way? Maybe?
Aisha straining to be professional while the two take up some time from the next challenger is fun to read, too.

How should he explain things to her? As the battle below started in earnest and Mark knelt to tend to Orwell, he briefly entertained the idea of bringing Natalie to the protest with him tomorrow—he could watch out for her, keep her from getting into more trouble than she could handle. But he knew it was a bad idea, and not just because he'd already have his hands full. She didn't act timid and complacent like Hilary, but neither was he fooled by her show of bravado: she was unsure of herself. He didn't want to scare her off with too much too fast or give her the wrong idea. Better to keep it in a space where he could control the conversation.

There was no reason to rush.

Practical thoughts, great paragraph. A long line with an em-dash that flows.
Being able to keep a handle on the subject matter will be important, especially early on. A protest gone wrong, or even too heated, would not likely give a good impression. That seems like a good early reading for Natalie, I assume.
________________________________________

There was no reason to rush.



Outside, Natalie was already perched on the stair rail with a wingull on her shoulder.

Oh, neat! Here's the only scene change/break in this chapter. (I'm also happy that someone uses a short line as a scene break in a serious work!)

Also, hi wingull!

"Oh. This is Gibson." His liepard slunk behind him, half in shadow. No way was Mark walking home without an extra set of eyes after last night.

Clues little by little, that's perfect. I had expected that Mark had gone looking to do something, and actually did not expect his bike accident might have been a reactive defense.

"Nah. Can't use him in the gym, but Gibs was my first."

Natalie hopped down from the rail, prompting her pokemon to take wing, and held out a hand for Gibs to sniff. The liepard ignored it, eyeing Natalie's wingull instead.

"Don't even think about it." Mark nudged Gibs with his knee until the liepard flicked his tail and turned away from the wingull, rubbing his face along Mark's legs. Mark rolled his eyes at Natalie. "Keep an eye on your keys and your phone too. Sneaky bastard thinks he's hilarious."

She grinned. "He's your baby."

"I don't think he's my anything. He's made it clear I'm his."

Sorry, no comment! Just: CAT. 😼
Also, Gibson, rude. : )

At a leisurely pace, Mark led them down a quiet side-street. He caught a glimpse of Gibs before the liepard slipped inside a shadow and faded from sight. Hunting. Mark smiled, knowing Gibs was close, maybe even right underfoot, and nothing would be able to sneak up on them without him knowing.

It feels a bit as though that dark types can seemingly teleport.

That's a fun parallel. Both Natalie and Mark's first pokemon are species associated with what we'd consider to be typical pets. Both are dark types that can seemingly vanish to nowhere. Maybe it's due to the dark type, or maybe it's due to being a feli-canid and a feline, that both Luna and Gibs are understood to be highly proficient at detecting even someone attempting to cloak their presence.

"So," he said, "you've been thinking?"

Natalie let out a sigh but smiled. "Yeah. About pipelines. Except I thought more and now I'm not so sure. Like … I'm just one person, you know? I don't even know where to start."

At that, Mark grinned. She was making this so easy. "No one gets anything done alone. It has to be a coordinated effort."

First comment--how did Mark not know the Devon Horizon oil tanker spill in Slateport?
Pipelines aren't necessarily oil spills, so it's not Mark's area of interest, but in this case they're both about environmental protection! Mark could be focusing on pipelines in the present, specific to the region around Rustboro, and still be aware of such a large spill in the region (nation) that caused environmental damage on the timescale of years, right? ("They had to close the beach for a long time.", so I assume measure in years is a reasonable anchor.)

That's cool for Mark, Natalie is interested in action for the cause.
And absolutely, many things rely on coordinated and trained teams to execute. Social causes, manufacturing production, tactical warfare. "I'm just one person" is quite the identifiable sentiment.

He paused to gauge her reaction, then added, "I know a local group, if you're interested. There's an open meeting later this month."

"Later this month I'll be in Lavaridge." She tipped her head back to watch her wingull's gliding path. "So, you're kind of involved in local stuff, huh?"

"Kind of," Mark said with a shrug, holding back a smirk.

"You going to the protest, then?"

She flashed him an impish look as he faltered mid-step. How had she—? But he shouldn't have been surprised. He'd seen some of Spitfire's crew handing out flyers on neon green paper, and it had to be all over the social networks, too.

She already knowwwssss! Gotcha pew pew.

A month to travel from first to fourth badge feels kinda fast. I wonder how people travel in Hoenn! How much is by foot, how much by bike, by rail or train, by personal vehicle, by private or public, small medium or large boat or ship, or by pokemon of different kinds! I won't think too much about it.

Natalie puffed herself up. "I've got more on my mind than just badges and bullshit."

Mark barked a laugh of surprise. He felt a rush of flattery at hearing his own words from her mouth—but also an undercurrent of wariness. She was so earnest.

"Have you ever been to a protest before?"

She deflated slightly. "First time for everything."

The concept returns!
Sounds like Mark is afraid that the earnest interest might cause Natalie to get involved too quickly too deeply too early? And bowl in, burn fast, and burn out?

"Have you ever been to a protest before?"

She deflated slightly. "First time for everything."

"Yeah, that's what I thought."

Natalie slowed to a stop, still smiling but now with a hardness to it. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"Just that it's not gonna be like you think. But the group I mentioned—they do trainings.

Mark is being serious about this. They're going to fight, but they're going to fight smart and fight decently, properly. Natalie is on guard against being seen as inexperienced and/or unready to fight.

"Wait, are you really trying to tell me not to go?" Natalie snorted. "I thought that was the point."

"I'm saying," Mark said, fighting to keep the frustration from his voice, "that there are other first steps. This one is gonna be ugly, Natalie."

The instant the words left his mouth, Mark knew that they'd been the wrong ones.

Natalie crossed her arms and cocked her hip. "I'm not scared of ugly."

No, fuck—there had to be something else he could—

That's a common concept, learning the fundamentals so you have a solid foundation of proficiency to brace or stack your applied skills or output on. I'm personally not a big fan of the mundane and worthwhile work, day in and day out, put into building and practicing basic skills. Building castles in the air often doesn't work.

Ahhhhhhh hahahaha ooops, Mark 🙃
You didn't exactly mean for cautioning against this protest to be about Natalie not "having what it takes", but that's how it came across for Natalie!

She drew in a sharp breath and said, "You know, it's okay. I'll figure it out. I'll see you around, maybe." Without waiting for him to answer, she whistled for her pokemon and cut down another street.

And that's how Natalie sees it. She won't be belittled, she won't be looked down upon. For this moment, there's no chance to talk out intentions and discuss things further. The dice are cast.
________________________________________

End of chapter 2! There's plenty going on in this chapter as well! Technically the main action could be seen as the gym battle, though the social/environmental cause situation for Mark and Natalie is escalating. It's bringing them closer together yet immediately driving a small wedge before it even starts. I hope they can be friends. I also look forward to seeing how Aqua and Magma are characterized, and where they play into the scheme of social causes, possible business involvements, and terraforming agendas.
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Chapter 10: Fool's Gold

WildBoots

Don’t underestimate seeds.
Pronouns
She/Her
Partners
  1. moka-mark
  2. solrock
Chapter 10: Fool's Gold

Brendan's boot prints wound through the dark behind him, but ahead, the fine, pink sand lay undisturbed. By the end of the week, it would be a jumble of footprints as journalists, academics, and surveyors made their way through the temple. The floor would be swept, staked, and digitally imaged. It was only sand ... but the thought that they were changing the space forever just by walking saddened him.

He paused in the center of the room, solar lantern held high, and turned in a slow circle. The last chamber had been much bigger. The tiles shone where his footsteps had revealed them; steadying the camera atop his lantern, he snapped a few photos of his footprints, proof that, for a few moments, this had been his alone. In the preview window, the chamber looked like the surface of the moon, beautiful in its austerity. He wondered if this was how the first astronauts had felt.

Harrison and Steven were somewhere nearby, but they'd split up to cover ground more quickly. Brendan couldn't think of a time he'd been so completely alone: even after May had gone her own way, he'd always had his pokemon at his side. He would've liked their company, but he could too easily imagine any one of them trampling delicate artifacts underfoot. Indie in particular could be a menace with that tail. Time had done damage enough here already.

As he moved forward, he spotted a lump in the sand. He nudged it with his toe to reveal a few broken pieces of pottery. One looked like a handle. Brendan photographed the shards and then stepped carefully around them, taking mental note to return later with a bag. Everything would be saved and studied, each mystery prised apart … but they'd come looking for something bigger than pottery shards. He should keep moving.

If Harrison had come this way, he would be trying to figure out what this room had been for, making Brendan his whetstone while answering none of his questions.

No, that wasn't fair. Brendan hadn't forgotten what an honor it was just to be here with both Brandon Harrison, the world-famous archaeologist and Frontier brain, and Steven Stone, former champion of the Hoenn League and Trainer Today's Man of the Year, the very image of class and power. Brendan still didn't know what he'd done to deserve their company. Really, he hadn't done anything—it had been Steven. He and Harrison had already been poring over texts for months when he'd invited Brendan to join.

Ahead, the back wall had been carved into shelves, the upper ones lined with fat clay jugs, each thick with dust, but the lower two empty. Depleted stores? Or missing? The shards must've come from here, sometime when there had been less sand on the floors to break the fall. Had the temple been abandoned in a hurry, he wondered, a jug tumbling from hands gone clumsy with urgency? Or had it been a careless raider? He hated to think that anyone had beaten them there and stolen artifacts they wouldn't know to miss. Regardless, it hadn't happened recently, and it probably wasn't relevant to their quest.

"Birch!" Steven's voice echoed from another room.

Brendan scrambled to the doorway of the small side room. From there, by the warm half-light of the tripod-mounted lamps, he saw no one in the main chamber. They had to be farther in. "Did you find something?" he called back.

"Come see this!"

He followed the sound of Steven's voice deeper into the enormous main chamber. The layout of rooms was too linear and purposeful to be natural, but the walls were irregularly shaped, a line that wavered and folded back on itself as if drawn by a child's hand. Raising such a structure must've taken a lot of pokemon—and long before the invention of pokeballs, too. Later, he'd ask Harrison how they'd managed it.

"Where are you guys?" The uneven walls twisted Brendan's voice and threw it back at him.

"Over here!" Towards the back and to the left.

As he passed under the carved archway in the center of the room, Brendan slowed and craned his neck. The upper reaches were lost to shadow now, but when they'd first entered, Harrison's bronzong had lit it in full: the carving was a perfect copy of the tablets from the museum, the ones marked Regirock. The image had been eyeless and maybe even headless (it was hard to tell) but had still seemed to be watching him. He felt it even now, despite the dark.

A guardian, he decided firmly.

Beyond the arch were several doors, simple cutaways in the rock. He ducked through the lefthand one. The passage was narrow, lined with more carvings that stretched floor to ceiling, depicting mountains made of simple geometric shapes, groups of robed figures, and what had to be pokemon—but he couldn't let himself linger. At the end of the hallway, light spilled from two doors engraved with glyphs. Brendan clicked off his headlamp, pulling it down around his neck, and pushed through.

The room was bright with the abundance of lanterns and pokemon, and Brendan blinked as his eyes adjusted. Steven's claydol, Mazda, floated patiently in the center of the room like a chandelier, beaming light from each of her golden eyes. Steven and Harrison crouched across from each other, their hand lanterns forgotten on the floor beside piles of sand and a stone slab. They'd uncovered something. Sankara the bronzong hovered overhead, the glow from its bell like a spotlight on the two men and the dark tunnel gaping between them.

"You don't think so?" Steven was saying, his voice excited but hushed.

"Might be," Harrison answered. "But it could go anywhere."

Brendan slowed his steps, suddenly feeling like an intruder. He wouldn't have wandered off by himself if he'd realized they would be sticking together. What had they talked about without him?

But at the sound of his footsteps, Steven turned and called out, "Birch! There you are." He flashed Brendan a grin that he couldn't help returning. "Can you believe this? Secret tunnels! This place keeps getting better and better."

Even kneeling in thousands of years of dust, Steven looked like a clothing ad. He'd traded his usual suit and tie for more practical attire, but all of it was sharply creased, and the Stone family crest glinted green and silver at his breast pocket.

As always, Brendan felt shabby next to him. The nicest things he wore, his boots, had actually come from Steven. I bought the wrong size by mistake. You don't happen to want them do you? Brendan hadn't believed him for a second—Steven Stone didn't make mistakes. But he recognized the kindness, and he also saw Steven's point; he'd worn the same pair of shoes from one end of Hoenn to the other, and it showed in the way the soles had begun to peel away from the canvas uppers.

But he'd loved those shoes and their mismatched laces, one red and one black, from when he and May had swapped. He'd tried threading the new boots with the old laces, but they'd looked even worse against the shiny, dark leather. In the end, they were just ratty old laces, and he wasn't so sentimental he couldn't throw them away.

Steven gestured for Brendan to join him and Harrison on the floor beside the mouth of the tunnel. It cut straight down. Even Sankara's light only shone so far before the darkness swallowed it up.

"It looks deep," Brendan said. He knelt cautiously, nervous that a careless step would send him falling in headfirst. "Do we know what it's for?"

"That's the question, isn't it?" Steven said, beaming.

Harrison cut in, "Few people would've known the answer to that. Probably only high priests. Some nobles, maybe." His voice was gruff, as ever, but Brendan recognized that elated look in his eyes of a late-night, coffee-fueled breakthrough. At Brendan's frown, he added, "You didn't see the markings on the doors? Like the ones outside."

In other words, intended to keep people out. The temple door was a puzzle, one that had taken them months to solve.

First, they'd had to find the temple. Harrison had translated (and re-translated) the tablets, and Brendan had scouted out the locations Harrison identified—guesswork as much as anything else. At last, one of those guesses had brought Brendan to the cliffs bordering the Hoenn desert. Behind a stone slab that didn't match the surrounding rock, he'd uncovered both the entrance, set into the cliff and framed by intricately carved pillars, and another riddle.

The door was featureless except for a heavy stone wheel embedded in the center; spinning it did nothing but reveal an indentation the size of Brendan's fist. Glyphs marked the wheel's bottom edge, but, regardless of which way the wheel was turned, the most Harrison could make of it was, "Gods of gods? And then ... huh. A participle, best as I can tell." He harrumphed and added, "Enough goddamned gods to trip over around here. Sounds like a temple at least."

Nothing they did to the wheel or the indentation underneath had any effect on the door. Despite Steven's wincing protests, they even tried tunneling under. But, bizarrely, not even Steven's pokemon could penetrate or shift the rock surrounding the door or the cliff. One manic week later, they were still no closer to solving the riddle. Steven had gloomily collected his things to return to civilization, saying, "Just … please do let me know if there are any updates."

One morning the week after Steven left, Brendan woke before dawn. In his dreams, he'd been following May down a wooded path, falling further behind the faster he walked. Too restless to return to sleep, he'd unzipped his tent and stepped out into the morning chill. Above, the stars of Balen the wailord still shone faintly in the sky. Not wanting to disturb Harrison and not sure what else to do, he made his way back to the door with his camera. But when he saw the door, he froze. By the dim light of the not-quite-risen sun, new glyphs shone bluish on the stone wheel, completing the circle.

Brendan paused only long enough to snap a few photos before running to rouse Harrison. He was glad that he had. By the time Harrison shuffled up the slope—his leg was worse first thing in the morning—the sun had crested the horizon, and the second set of glyphs was gone. But Harrison managed a translation from the camera display screen: As dust from earth, so gods from gods.

While Brendan was still struggling to make any sense of that, Harrison burst out, "Dust from earth … ha!" He bent for a fistful of crumbling red soil and then pressed it into the indentation behind the stone wheel. There was a rumbling deep below their feet, and, at last, as it had so many times in his dreams, the temple door grated open.

For the first time, Brendan had felt like a real part of the team. Now, though, he was back to being along for the ride. Already, Harrison and Steven had opened an entire door without him, while his contributions had mostly been dumb luck.

Brendan turned away from the hallway door, back to Steven and Harrison, squinting against Mazda's eight slow-spinning lights. At the side of the tunnel, Harrison was staring at him, a plastic bag in his outstretched hands.

"Here. Take a look. We collected these from the floor."

Inside were more pottery shards. A layperson would've taken the scattering of dots as some kind of decorative pattern, but Brendan recognized it as writing. Not that he could read any of it. Harrison was one of the few scholars who could make any sense of the ancient writings, and even he wavered on his interpretations. Once, Brendan had broached the idea of learning, but even the simplest of the "constellations" had baffled him. Though, turning the bag, Brendan spotted a pictogram he did recognize—

"Trapinch," said Harrison. "The ancients most likely saw them as protective totems. I'm surprised we haven't found any nests in here yet."

Sensing a lecture coming on, Brendan cast a helpless look at Steven, who was contemplating the hole in the floor, his head tipped to one side; clearly he'd already heard the speech.

Brendan surrendered to the inevitable. "What is it?"

"It's a clay seal," Harrison answered in a tone that almost sounded scolding. "Or part of one. It could've been another barrier to entry, or it might've simply alerted priests that the door had been tampered with."

"So someone did break in." Thinking of the pottery shards in the other room, Brendan added, "I hate to think what they might've taken."

"Don't worry. He didn't get very far."

Brendan turned in the direction Harrison pointed, and—skeleton. He'd been so focused on Steven and Harrison when he entered that he hadn't seen it against the wall. It lay on its side, one arm reaching toward the only door. The skeleton still wore wireframe glasses and a few strips of frayed cloth, but sand spilled from between the exposed ribs and grinning jaws.

Harrison clapped a steadying hand on his shoulder. "Relax. He's already dead." And had been for a very long time, considering the state of decay. There was little in the way of moisture and wild pokemon in the temple to help break down a body.

"But he died in here." Looking around with fresh eyes, Brendan noticed for the first time a stone lectern against the wall. Scrapes in the sand marked where it had been recently dragged from the mouth of the tunnel. At one point, someone had wanted that trap door to stay shut.

"What if there's—?" He couldn't help it: his eyes went to the cane resting against Harrison's good leg, the handle carved into a leering cofagrigus. Brendan tore his gaze away, but not quickly enough.

Harrison took the clay seal back from him, scowling. "If there are vengeful ghosts around, there's no point worrying about which room you're in, boy."

No, walls didn't matter much to ghosts, not even walls of thick stone. It wasn't a comforting thought.

Steven cut in cheerfully, "I think if there were any danger, Mazda and Sankara would've let us know by now."

"No, I know," Brendan said, sitting up straighter. He forced himself to look again at the skeleton. It wasn't really so different from any other artifact or mineral he'd handled before, right? "Just surprised me."

Steven smiled mischievously. "Time to find out where this tunnel goes."

They anchored their ladder to Delorean, Steven's metagross, one loop around each of its front legs. Steven leaned down and tugged at a rung. "Seems sturdy enough to me. Thanks, Del."

The metagross shifted its weight, and the aluminum rungs jangled all the way down the dark shaft. Brendan shivered, but when Steven caught his gaze, he forced a smile.

"I don't mind going first," Steven said, switching on the headlamp hanging around his neck.

"Floor might be unstable," Harrison warned. "Take it slow."

"Of course. I'll be careful." In one smooth motion, Steven took hold of the golden cross curving up from Delorean's jaws and swung himself down onto the ladder. He paused to rap his knuckles on the metagross's foot. "One for luck." He winked, an eclipse of one blue eye before he dropped below, the beam of his headlamp jouncing with each step.

Watching made Brendan's stomach seize up, so instead, he stood to look around the room again. No one but us has seen this room in hundreds of years, he reminded himself. The worshippers and priests were long gone, but this place still felt holy. And it was beautiful. The dust couldn't hide the fluted pillars or the engraved altars under half-domes of stone tracery. So he busied himself with his camera, listening all the while for sounds of distress from down in the tunnel. Not that he could do much if …. It's fine. He's fine.

Harrison's grumbling made Brendan pause and look up from the viewfinder. He'd brought out a collapsible camp chair and was easing himself into it, massaging his bad leg. "Sankara, c'mere. I need more light."

"You're not coming," Brendan said, the thought somehow occurring to him only then.

Harrison gave a derisive laugh as he pulled a tiny notebook from one of his many pockets. "Come on, kid."

Brendan's face colored. "No, I know. But I mean ... couldn't Sankara—?"

"I try not to get into any position I can't get out of by myself."

He had a point. The opening was too narrow for either of their pokemon to fit through. Steven had recalled his claydol on the chance there would be room to release her again somewhere below. But if there wasn't, Harrison could be stranded.

"And I've got plenty of work already." He tapped on the camera hanging around his neck. "I could be here all week translating what's in the main room alone. Cynthia'll shit herself when she sees some of these." At that, Harrison chuckled, but it sounded hollow to Brendan.

Steven's voice rang out, distant and echoing, "I've reached the bottom!"

Brendan secured the camera to his chest harness and crept to the edge of the opening. "Everything seems alright?"

Far, far below, Steven's light was like a tiny, trembling firefly. "There's a tunnel! Looks like it bears south!"

Brendan exchanged looks with Harrison, who rolled his eyes. He smiled. "Alright. I'm coming down!"

Tipping his head back, Brendan met Delorean's impassive gaze and felt a prickle down the back of his neck. He wouldn't be trying Steven's trick. Instead, he grabbed one of the ladder's aluminum crosspieces, steadying himself against the stone lip of the tunnel. Then, with a deep breath, he gingerly lowered one foot into the hole until he finally caught on a rung. The ladder swayed as he put his full weight onto it. For a few moments, he hung there, simply breathing until the ladder stilled.

"Birch." Harrison said it like a command, making Brendan stop short of taking the next step down. "Don't let him do anything stupid down there."

Right. As if anyone let Steven do things.

"I'll do what I can," he said, and let the darkness envelop him.

The climb was long, and soon Brendan began to lose his sense of scale. He couldn't shake the sensation that beyond his headlamp beam was an empty void, that he was floating. For a moment, the uncertainty was so powerful that he had to stop and reach a hand towards the opposite wall. His palm met rough stone before he'd even extended his arm all the way, and he breathed out in a rush.

Steven's voice startled him, closer than Brendan had expected: "You're almost there. Just a few more feet."

He moved down a few more rungs—and then jolted at two quick smacks on the back of his calf.

"The bottom is right here. Four more and you can jump down if you want."

He didn't. Steven's light moved along the wall under his own now, but Brendan climbed the rest of the way down, rung by rung. His leg still tingled where Steven had touched him, a welcome reminder that he existed in space and all his limbs were attached.

"Nicely done, Birch."

Buoyed by those small words, he managed, "That wasn't so bad."

The bottom of the shaft was no wider than the opening, and the entry into the tunnel was barely bigger. Crouching to keep from brushing against the ceiling, Steven had stepped back into the tunnel to avoid coming nose-to-nose with Brendan. There was definitely no room for Mazda—or any of their pokemon.

"Are you alright to continue?" Steven asked. "Do you need a moment?"

"No, no, I'm okay. I don't know why I got so spooked. Stupid." Laughing nervously, he tried to catch Steven's eyes—

But Steven was already cupping his hands around his mouth. "Harrison! You still there?"

The tunnel entrance was a dim square that looked no bigger than a postage stamp.

After a pause and some grumbling came a reply that sounded terribly far away. "Of course I am! You think I've got something better to do?"

"We're going to follow this tunnel as far as we can! If we're not back in a few hours ..."

"I've got the ranger station on speed dial."

"Beautiful," said Steven, laughing. "Del, you alright up there?"

The metagross answered with a horrendous grating that vibrated the walls until sand came hissing down.

When all was quiet again, Steven said in a low voice, "Shall we?"

Brendan's heart was still skittering from the climb down, but he returned Steven's grin. His boyish excitement was infectious.

Steven led the way, his pale hair luminous in the gloom. The tunnel was cool and smelled of damp earth, and sand muffled their steps. The bare walls were close, always within the headlamp beams; being able to see the walls and ceiling so clearly made Brendan very aware of the many thousand tons of rock overhead.

In the temple above, only traces of life remained. But this tunnel had never been a place for humans.

Brendan wanted badly to touch something living. When Indie was still a treeko, he'd been small enough to perch on Brendan's shoulders, tail curled around his neck. Maybe he should've let him stay that way.

It didn't matter. None of Brendan's pokemon did well in the dark anyway. They thrived in sunlight.

What would happen to them if he never made it back to the surface? How long would their pokeballs hold them in stasis? Five hundred years from now, would some enterprising archaeologist discover them among Brendan's bones?

Steven had slowed to a stop. He turned halfway towards Brendan, the headlamps cutting his face into harsh shadows. "Birch, will you do me a favor?"

"Of course," Brendan said reflexively. Then, "What is it?"

"Would you turn off your headlamp for a moment?"

Brendan swallowed. "Sure."

The very moment after he switched off his light, Steven switched his off, too.

The darkness was complete. It was nothing like the nights he'd spent on the road with May. Even on the darkest nights, the stars and moon had shone overhead, and the air had been alive with lotad and zubat calls. In the tunnel, there was only dead air and dust. He couldn't even hear Steven's breathing.

Brendan stepped forward and reached for the wall, anything to keep him from drifting away into the endless black. He gripped his headlamp hard, not sure how much longer he could stand—

Steven whispered, "Amazing."

Brendan snapped his light back on. He had to cup a hand over it to protect his eyes from the sudden brightness.

"It's like the rest of the world doesn't exist! No emails down here." Steven laughed, his smile a white crescent. "Turns out the secret to inner peace was right under our feet all along. How long do you think it would take for them to hunt me down and find me here?"

Right. No reason to be afraid. But he didn't relax until Steven switched on his light and started walking again. Brendan followed with a fast-beating heart.

As they walked, his legs began to ache from crouching. He imagined they had to be halfway to Mauville by now. The sand gradually sloped higher and higher up the walls. At first, Brendan thought he was imagining it, but before long, his boots sank with each step, the sand dragging at him. Where had it all come from? As the level of the sand rose, Brendan had to bend lower and lower.

Then Steven gasped and came to such an abrupt stop that Brendan nearly ran into him.

"What? What is it?"

Steven had to lean to one side for Brendan to see around him. The passage ended in a pair of doors, blocked by a tall pile of sand. Brendan didn't understand what had so startled Steven until he squinted and realized what was sticking out of the sand halfway between them and the doors: a skeletal hand.

"Gods," Brendan breathed. "What do you think happened?"

"Maybe a cave-in?" Steven offered, sounding actually concerned for the first time. But when they aimed their lights at the ceiling ahead, the stone was still smooth and unbroken.

"Huh." Steven considered the doors and adjusted his sleeves, though the fold was already immaculate. "Well, seems alright now." He started forward.

"Shouldn't ...?" But Brendan trailed off, unsure how to even begin trying to turn Steven Stone away from something he'd set his mind to.

Steven paused and smiled winningly over his shoulder. "Don't you want to find out what's on the other side?"

Brendan didn't have to look back to feel the dark pressing behind him. Ahead, Steven's profile was like a blade cleaving the shadows. "Yeah, alright."

Steven edged along the sides of the passage, but he couldn't avoid the skeleton completely. Sand slid off it as he passed, exposing the top of the skull and a bent knee. When his turn came, Brendan couldn't help staring. It had to be hundreds of years old, he reminded himself, noting the desiccated flesh gone black with age. Had the skeleton been buried after death, he wondered, or had he suffocated under all that sand? It would be a horrible way to die.

"Help me with this." Steven had waded through the sand and stood beside the doors, alternating between shoveling sand out of the way with his hands and tugging the door open a few centimeters at a time. "If you dig, I'll pull."

"Should we go back up for the shovels?"

"Let's see what we can do without them first. I'd hate to have to double all the way back now."

They turned sideways to fit beside the doors, each bracing his back against the wall, but it was impossible for Brendan to keep from knocking into Steven as he worked, shoulder hitting thigh and knuckles striking knuckles. As Brendan scooped at the sand, his fingers met something hard hidden underneath. He caught it just as Steven gave out a cry of effort and triumph, wresting the door open far enough to squeeze through.

Brendan lingered on his knees in the sand to examine what he'd found, tilting it in the light. It looked like the broken clay seal Harrison had shown him, but instead of a trapinch, it bore the image of a vibrava. He shook his head and pocketed the clay fragment. Sliding, he climbed to his feet and then slipped between the doors behind Steven.

The moment he was through, he knew immediately by the quality of the sound that they'd entered a much bigger space. There was finally room to stand straight again.

Several yards away, Steven turned in a broad circle without his light striking a wall, and when he craned his head back, the headlamp beam stopped short of the ceiling. His footsteps echoed. Satisfied, he sent out his claydol. A few moments later, her light revealed a large, high-ceilinged room, utterly bare except for another set of doors set into the far wall.

The elaborate carvings on the doors were the first real sign that the tunnel had any relation beyond proximity to the temple above. Like the other doors they'd passed through, these were built of thick stone covered in glyphs—and they were firmly shut, a strange lock laid over the seam where they met.

Steven laid a hand on the carved glyphs and groaned. He pushed, but, of course, the door didn't budge. "We're so close. I can feel it."

Brendan unholstered his camera, secretly relieved. Without Harrison, they had no chance of getting this door open today. They'd have to turn back now.

When the flash went off, Steven startled away from the door. "Ah, I'm in the way, aren't I?"

"Just a little," said Brendan, cracking a smile. "Probably making Harrison's job harder, but at least you look good."

He froze, watching for Steven's reaction. What on earth had made him say that? In his head, it had sounded funny, maybe, but out loud ...

Steven flashed him a polite smile but did not meet Brendan's eyes. "Well, better not give him additional reasons to complain. All yours."

"Right. Gods forbid we annoy him," Brendan said, too earnest by half. He ducked behind the camera like a squirtle tucking into its shell.

Once he'd taken a few full shots of the door, he sidled up for a better angle on the lock. It took him a moment to realize why it looked familiar: it was another clay seal, this one intact. "He'll be happy to see this thing in one piece, though."

Weird to use something so fragile as a lock.

Brendan lowered the camera to look at the seal with his own eyes. Clay filled the crack between the doors—it looked like it had been hard-fired in place afterward, probably by a pokemon—and gathered into a pokeball-sized knot at eye level. A flygon had been etched into the surface in surprising detail, bookended by more dots. "I wonder," he said, "what was stopping someone from just smashing it." Curious how solid it was, he reached to tap a fingernail on the surface—

—And it exploded. Scattering fragments. A burst of light. A wavering, almost melodic whine.

He didn't know when he'd ended up on his back. Ears ringing, he squinted against the flying sand. A dust devil spun above him, humming, and from out of the sand rose something solid and large with a lashing tail, two wings, and eyes like stained glass. A flygon.

"Birch, move!"

A dome of purple light flared over Brendan's head. Sand peppered the shield, then sprayed against it, sloughing off noisily. He scuttled backward and then, still one-handedly clutching the camera, lurched to his feet. The room had gone to shadow again with Mazda diverting her energy into light shields and attacks. She hovered between him and Steven, shielding each of them. A fusillade of violet bolts, sparking like fireworks, shot out from the claydol and then disappeared into the dust devil. The air was so thick with dust that Brendan could hardly see Steven and his cradily a few yards away, lit intermittently with purple light. He couldn't see the flygon at all anymore—until it ripped past Steven, slapping the cradily down with its tail.

He had to help. With one hand, he jammed the camera into its harness, and with the other, he reached towards his belt. Definitely not Henry—the sandstorm would rip his wings apart. Indie? He'd be vulnerable waiting for the flygon to come close enough to hit. Then there was only—"Walton, we need you!"

His ludicolo spun in a circle and shivered, making an unhappy sound.

"I know, I know. I'm sorry," Brendan said distractedly, peering into the gloom. He was grateful for the light shield, but it made seeing into the dark even harder. At a glimpse of green, he pointed. "There! Ice beam!"

Walton moved sluggishly but fired a blue beam in the direction Brendan pointed. The wind caught the gust of ice, drawing it up into the vortex of sand until the blue light was gone. Brendan wasn't sure if it had actually hit the flygon at all.

"Again!"

Between the sand showering the light shield and the keening wind, he couldn't hear Steven's commands, only that he was shouting, too. Brendan could hardly see anything except the occasional swoop of movement and bursts of violet lights. Green fire lanced at Steven's shield, then into the air, and then at Brendan, hot on his face even through Mazda's shield. Walton teetered out of the way and then sent a retaliatory blast of ice in the direction the fire had come from.

A scream tore the air, the humming died out, and something thumped to the ground. They crouched behind their shields and waited, but no further attacks came. Slowly, the dust began to settle.

"Lotus," Steven said to his cradily, "Give us light." The light welled up in a spreading ring, pink-hued like her, until it washed over the fallen flygon.

With a sigh of relief, Brendan turned to check on Walton, who let out a plaintive whine. The ludicolo was breathing hard. His fur was full of sand and singed on one side, but he seemed okay. "I know, I'm sorry. I didn't warn you," he said, brushing sand from Walt's fur.

A metallic creak and a thud made Brendan jump. When he turned, Steven was scratching his skarmory under the chin. Brendan hadn't even realized he'd sent it out. The skarmory held out one wing at an odd angle, ice crusting the green feathers—

"Oh gods, I didn't mean to ... is he okay?"

"Oh, Thunderbird has seen worse. I'll give him a rest, though." He recalled both his cradily and his skarmory and then rounded on Brendan with a grin. "And you said you weren't much of a trainer."

Brendan flushed with pride. "Oh, I ..."

He was spared having to answer by Walton grabbing a handful of his shirt, yanking until Brendan, staggering, began to pet him and make soothing sounds. "It's probably too cold in here, right? Poor guy. I'll see you outside." Brendan recalled him and said, "We do alright. But you make it look so ..."

Steven had already drifted away, towards the narrow opening between the doors. "This is it," he said breathlessly.

"You think it's here."

Steven gestured, rings gleaming in the light. "One way to find out."

"What about the flygon?"

"It's not getting up anytime soon."

Brendan glanced back at the narrow, sand-choked tunnel they'd entered from. "It won't be able to get out. It's trapped here."

Steven shrugged. "I didn't bring any extra pokeballs. Did you?"

Oh, of course. Brendan patted his pockets, grinning when he finally felt one tucked in a pouch of his camera harness. He moved closer, wary even though the flygon lay still. It was smaller and paler than the ones he'd seen before, the antennae more pronounced. Maybe they had spent more of their lives underground when the temple was built. He tapped the pokeball on the flygon's head, and it was swept inside without resistance. "I'll release it when we get outside."

"Sure, good idea. Now could you please help me with this door? It's quite heavy."

Together, they pushed the door until it creaked open to admit them. With Mazda hovering ahead to light the way, they stepped inside.

The air here felt thicker, older. Four sets of stone steps ran down to a square pit. And there in the center was Regirock, standing upright but motionless.

Steven didn't even pause, taking the stairs at a run, but Brendan froze on the top step. "Is—is it real?" He felt as if the wind had been knocked out of him. After everything, he hadn't expected to open a door and find it just sitting there. As much as he trusted Steven, he hadn't even been sure he believed it existed.

He had assumed the tablets were a crude representation of the real thing, but the hulking form before them was as advertised, not like a thing carved from the earth but like something made by smashing rocks together until the remaining pieces were vaguely human-shaped. It was massive, easily a story tall, even sunk one flight of stairs down. Glyphs marked the space between its shoulders, in the middle of what might generously be called its head. Cupped in its fingerless hands was a huge, perfectly round and perfectly polished red stone.

Brendan raised the camera to his eye—only to discover that the lens had splintered in the fight with the flygon. The preview window had cracked, too, a jagged line running from corner to corner. An awful thought seized him, and he scrambled to open the side panel. Inside, the memory card was still whole and undamaged. He let out a sigh of relief.

"Hello!" Steven called up to the stone titan. "My name is Steven Stone, and I've come to set you free."

A lump rose in Brendan's throat, but he stood still and watched.

"You've been sleeping for a long time. Now, I'm calling on you to serve once again." Steven waited several long moments and then reached to touch one of its marbled legs. There was no reaction at all. "Regirock, can you hear me?"

Mazda drifted to investigate the corners of the room.

Steven began to circle the inert Regirock, calling out to it with less and less conviction. Then he shrugged off his rucksack and pulled out a pokeball. Oh, of course, he'd been saving his. Steven drew back his arm, and then in a perfect arc … the pokeball bounced off the rock face with a hollow tok.

As Steven picked up the scuffed ball and examined it, Brendan made his slow way down the steps. As if remembering for the first time that Brendan was there, Steven glanced up at him and said, "Well, I hardly expected to catch it on the first try, but …." He smiled, but his tone was affronted. "The ball didn't even open."

"Maybe it's not the real thing?" Brendan offered. "Maybe it's just a sculpture. Like an altar?"

"With that level of security leading up to it? No." Steven shook his head, looking pained. "There must be a way to wake it up. Something we're missing." He turned and, catching his own eyes reflected on the surface of the red orb, broke into a smile.

Beside him, Brendan blanched. "Maybe we should wait for Har—"

Reaching up, Steven laid hands on either side of the orb. "It's warm," he said, surprised. Then he easily lifted it off and brought it down to eye level.

There was no noticeable change in Regirock. Brendan thought perhaps he felt a tremor in the floor, but it was gone so quickly he decided he must've imagined it. Steven's only reaction was a slight frown.

"The clarity really is amazing. You can practically see through it." His face brightened then, and he knelt to tuck it carefully into his rucksack. "I'm sure Harrison will have plenty of thoughts on this."

"Whether you want them or not," Brendan agreed.

Steven smiled, and some of the tightness eased from Brendan's shoulders.

"Let's see what he has to say about some of these markings. Take some time to clear our heads." Brendan waited a moment and then added gently, "No one expects you to figure out everything right away. I don't think the big guy is going anywhere."

"No, of course. You're right. We should go back before Harrison gives us up for dead."

"Definitely," Brendan said, more forcefully than he'd meant to.

They started back up the stairs, Brendan taking the lead and Steven trailing after with his head hanging. In the middle of the staircase, he stopped and cast a longing look back at Regirock. "You know," he said, "there is one more thing I could try. You don't have a pocket knife, do you?"

Brendan reached for it automatically, pausing to wonder why he wanted it only when it was already in his hand. Steven's expression was so expectant that Brendan couldn't deny him.

"Perfect. Thank you, Birch."

With methodical calm, Steven descended the steps one more time, his back straight and his head high. He knelt between Regirock's feet, and for a long time, he simply stared up at it. Then he flicked open the blade and wiped it carefully on the hem of his shirt.

The moment before he raised his hand, Mazda cried out in alarm.

Steven turned up his left palm and carved a line across it as if he were drawing a picture. By the time Brendan made it down the stairs, the cut was welling up. Steven squeezed his fist over one of Regirock's stone feet until a trickle of red hit the dust.

Brendan and Steven both held still to watch for signs of movement. For one wild moment, Brendan half-expected Regirock to groan and extend its arms down to Steven.

When it was clear it wouldn't, Brendan dropped to Steven's side, fumbling in his pockets for something to stop the bleeding. "I can't believe you did that. I hope it doesn't get infected."

"The first aid kit is in my backpack," Steven said. When Brendan moved for it, he added, "I can get it."

In silence, Brendan watched him take out cleansing wipes and gauze, wincing as he wrapped the injured hand. Finally he said, "Steven … why'd you do that?"

Steven wiped the blade clean before snapping it shut and handing it back. "Well, now I can say I tried everything, can't I?"



Brendan had never been happier to feel sunshine on his face. Sprawling on the rocks, his pokemon soaked up the morning's first rays. He smiled to see Walton in particular looking more relaxed, tucked against Henry, his tropius. But Brendan couldn't help sneaking glances at Steven, who leaned in the shade with his phone to his ear, nodding and frowning. The cliff loomed many stories above him, unremarkable and unwelcoming with the doors shut and the rock slab back in its original place.

"What do you think happens next?" he asked Harrison. "Is this the end of our little treasure hunt?" It was a sad thought, but at the same time …. Even at a distance, he could see the white of the gauze wrapped around Steven's hand. He needs a break.

Harrison didn't answer, utterly absorbed in his laptop screen, where he'd pulled up the pictures Brendan had taken of that final door.

With a sigh, Brendan turned his eyes toward the red sand stretching to the horizon. The dunes looked flat except for the odd bit of scrub or stone, but he knew that, below the surface, dozens of trapinch churned the sand, creating worlds of their own. And below that … Regirock still waited.

Steven wanted to wait to reveal their discovery to the press. Harrison had grumbled, but Brendan was privately pleased to keep it their secret for now. Maybe Regirock would be waiting for another five hundred years. Maybe it should.

Brendan touched the new ball on his belt, wondering if the flygon felt a difference between that stasis and waiting inside a clay seal for what must've been several thousand years. He'd decided to release it when they were ready to leave; he wanted to be far away when it came to. And at the same time …. He wondered how much the desert landscape had changed while it had waited deep below the earth. Would it awaken to a world it still recognized?

"Groudon's eye," Harrison burst out.

"What?"

"The orb, that has to be it. That's what it says. Right here." He held up the laptop, but the thing was more rubberized armor than screen, and Brendan couldn't see the details from where he sat. Besides, by now he knew better than to get too invested in Harrison's first translations.

"If it has a name, there are bound to be other texts that reference it," Harrison continued, but Brendan tuned him out. Steven was coming back, a thunderous look on his face.

"Are you okay?" Brendan asked.

"They attacked Ridge Access. They couldn't have picked a worse time to make a mess of things."

"What? Who?"

"ORCA, Magma—it doesn't matter. They're all a bunch of thugs." He dropped onto a rock with a frustrated sigh. "I'll never understand some people."

Brendan looked to Harrison, whose expression was unreadable. "Wait, so … what does that mean?"

Steven said flatly, "I have to go back to Rustboro. The media is having a field day with this, and someone has to smooth things over. I'd rather stay here, but …." He thumped his uninjured fist on his leg. "It feels like every time we make a little progress, something like this happens."

"Just as well," Harrison said. "This stuff doesn't translate itself. And I need some sleep in a real bed."

"Maybe … rest would be good for all of us," Brendan said. "As much as I hate to leave without knowing …."

Steven turned toward him with such sudden intensity that Brendan stopped short.

"But I've got you as my eyes on the ground, right, Birch? I'll make sure you and Harrison get whatever equipment you need, of course. But we can't give up, not now that we're this close."

When Brendan opened his mouth, his protest not yet fully formed, Steven spoke in a softer voice. "Brendan. Why do you think I chose you? You're an explorer, like me."

It wasn't true. Brendan had been scared down in that tunnel. He would be alright not knowing the answers if it meant not going back there.

But Steven must've seen something else in him. Brendan had once watched him pick geodes from among the ordinary rocks, knowing which to leave and which would split neatly to reveal a glittering core. Steven was looking at him now like he could see what was written on his heart, and he smiled in anticipation of Brendan's answer. Whatever he saw, that was who Brendan wanted to be.

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