Pokémon What the Gods Gave Me

[tomatorade]

What the Gods Gave Me

When a common raven gains the form of a god, he seems to be the only one not particularly concerned about that. And he's not the only one the universe has chosen. In their change, they will be forced to find the new meaning of their existence.​

Spoiler: Author's note

Figured I'd finally post something from the backlog, especially as that backlog continues to stretch and gets sadder the longer I take to throw it into the internet. And this is something I'm actually quite excited about, if somewhat meandering and unplanned. Feel free to criticize anything you'd like.

Spoiler: Content Warning

General CW for existentialism, near-death experiences, some gore and violence and swearing, self-esteem issues, general mental anxieties and general adult themes. If I'm missing anything, feel free to message me.

One:
Aeimlou

In a violent wave of new memories, a fickle little idea sang at him, passing by in a repeated blur as he stared at tangled strands of grass stuck with flecks of dirt.

A name. He should have one, for whatever reason. Aeimlou. He liked the sounds it made in his mind. The importance of this exercise blew past him like the passing of trees beneath his wings, but he’d never distrusted his gut before. It had let him survive many winters, beyond the weaker chicks and unlucky flocks.

A sudden coldness seeped over him at the image. He did not understand it.

Then his thoughts consumed him with the strangeness of his body. He had not been this thing the day earlier. And he did not comprehend the stream of information pouring through his mind

His talons had migrated to his chest, now clumsy and thin and instinctively tucked in. He had rounded and lengthened and grown to a size that would not lend itself well to perching on branches—he certainly could not imagine building a nest to his size. He had no legs and he mourned his wings. He kept his feathers, now black and white spread across a pointed snout rather than a beak. But his wings had been replaced by useless fins jutting straight from his back, those which former members of his flock perched on as he lay immobile on his stomach. His former flock made an awful racket, cawing and screeching at this new intruder.

He craned his neck to stare at the gathering. He had to tell them. He understood the message, a warning, a defending of territory. But they would not understand his meanings anymore. His mind supplied that to him as well, this sense of superiority to the ravens as a former brother darted into his vision and twisted its head with a detached curiosity that beaded also in his dark eyes.

The sounds he used to make would not come, his throat too odd and long. Something heavy in his chest sounded instead and the raven escaped in a burst of feathers.

Once again, something cold settled over him. Liquid pooled in his eyes.

He did not understand.

He did not understand.

~0_0~​

Eventually, these pleadings dried into a trickle. He could think about things with the clarity of a still pond. His flock had left.

His flock had abandoned him.

They had realised he posed no threat and had grown tired of pecking him and fled into the trees, black flickering into green. They left him with a great rustling, a chorus of caws fading into the distance as the stinging of their pecks faded from his skin.

Aeimlou sighed. Instinctively. Then stopped to puzzle over the sound. He repeated it, coming to no conclusions except that his stomach ached in hunger.

Spending an atrociously long time trying to flap imaginary wings highlighted his predicament, however. And forced him to reach out with his new claws, digging them into the roots carpeting the forest floor and pulling himself along. His belly ached, feathers shedding as he grunted and dragged himself along. His fins, too, sent bolts of pain down their length every time they bumped up against a trunk. They were more sensitive than he expected.

Through all the grunting and moaning, eventually he rounded a shady grove and lucked upon a berry bush—with the small blue ones. He practically threw himself into it, shoving clawfulls of berries and leaves alike into his muzzle until he slumped into the grass, sticky and out of breath.

He preferred meat. Occasionally, the armoured orange creatures threw themselves from the river, flopping and gasping, offering themselves to his flock as a feast. Those gelatinous eyes were especially his favourite.

Berries were not meat, but they were food. And he enjoyed that these ones looked like eyes. They filled him, too. Their juices coated his face, a sickly sweet scent that also stuck to the grass and glued it to his mouth as he tried to raise his head. They made him warm and tired and longing for more. It gave him an appreciation for the new length of his neck, at least. He could stretch up to reach for more berries without moving from the forest floor, picking them between his teeth and grinding them into paste.

Another binge and that satisfying warmth overtook him, dampened his aching chest, and he slept in the bush.

He continued all through the next day.

Even with all these new thoughts, he failed to understand his next steps. Flight had left him grounded, but unlike other creatures, he had no legs to stand on.

His second night he spent watching stars in a gap through the trees, the darkness of fliers blotting them out on occasion. Unlike the plentiful stars, his bush had no more berries to give. The food no longer satisfied him, either. Instead, the stars crushed him. Another new feeling. One of uncertainty. The end of things and his helplessness to stop them.

He found himself breathing heavily, gasping like those dim orange creatures flopping on the banks.

Did they feel this, too, in the precious pink curls that spooled from their stomachs and into the beaks of his brothers?

~0_0~​

Aeimlou did not feel inclined to leave the bush. He hungered. And thirsted—mouth so dry he struggled to peel his tongue from the roof as he opened it to whine.

All motive had left him. He did not know what to do, what he could do. Once, he might’ve ruffled his feathers and kicked up a fuss, but that nature no longer appealed to him. And he could not stop thinking about his flock. It served no purpose anymore; it should leave his mind as they left him to die on the forest floor, but that never happened. He could not forget.

He let the water pour from his eyes until he had no more to give, growing weaker each sunset. He watched creatures pass: some old rivals like the jays, and the predators. He had no name for them except predators. Back in his flock they tore through the forest with foreign powers, launching strikes at each other and ruining all the good perching spots. They either ate the weaker creatures or ignored them.

And now they avoided him, freezing at the edge of his vision with wide-eyed stares, shrinking and muttering lowly noises to themselves and turning back to where they came.

Even in his weakness, Aeimlou found a certain warmth in that. He must look intimidating. Certainly, he must be the largest creature in the forest now. He would die happy knowing this would be his territory. Regardless of whether he had the chance to defend it.

But, ah, that did not remain true for long.

The one who found him would be a… what would he call it? The ravens rarely concerned themselves with much, but the biped creatures with fleshy skin and furry heads were an exception. Certainly, they dominated the landscape. In their cube nests. But not nests. But nests: Aeimlou had no other words for them. They controlled the empowered creatures, too, with stiff hands to draw elements from them.

Unlike their empowered charges, they had a mixture of concern for the flock. Sometimes they chased them off and sometimes, in the green spaces between their nests, they palmed seeds and fruits for them to eat.

This one in particular had flowing white cascading from its shoulders, a large swirl of brown fur on its head and softer features than some Aeimlou had previously seen.

Aeimlou would have been concerned; he would have raised himself up, but he barely possessed the strength to slip his claws beneath his stomach. He settled for a shaky growl as it paused under the bow of a string tree. Green drew lines across its expression, though Aeimlou would’ve had difficulty interpreting the wide eyes and open mouth into a readable emotion anyway.

It murmured to itself. Something Aeimlou would not have appreciated before. The sounds startled him so much it took a moment to focus and realise he understood them.

“--Incredible! But so far from Hoenn? Goodness, it must have been a long flight, do I— can I come a bit closer?”

He understood them? He understood them. Though he did not understand the meaning. The creature’s voice had a pleasant lilt to it. Like the whistling through the trees, but with power behind it. A chorus, perhaps. It could be the novelty, but he would be happy to listen to that noise until he died.

In wondering, Aeimlou held unblinking eye contact for a very long time until he realised it had addressed him.

“Sorry, was I not loud enough? I don’t want to make you uncomfortable; may I approach you?”

Staring. More staring. It began to shuffle in place. Only then did he realise what he was missing.

Ah. He had to respond.

Aeimlou tried to imitate the sound, but his odd, dry mouth filtered it into something like a wheeze. It broke into coughs soon after.

“You seem to be struggling. Let me help.” It approached anyways, without answer—hands raised to the sky. This must be its territory for how bold it was. If true, Aeimlou supposed he must oblige. The best he could do was lay his head back on the grass, moaning as hunger flared in his stomach again.

“Alright, let’s get you untangled from these bushes.”

It spoke to itself as it worked, peeling thin branches away from Aeimlou’s bulky form. Truthfully, he wouldn’t have had an issue extracting himself, if not for the weakness.

“Odd colouration,” it mumbled, patting Aeimlou’s neck. Strange to feel the pressure and warmth press into his feathers. “Not consistent with other sightings in Hoenn. We’ve always thought there was only one of you, but this pokes holes in that theory, huh?”

Yes? These thoughts it shared were so complicated that Aeimlou could not tell how to respond. He tried not to break eye contact—difficult when it began circling him. He craned his neck backwards, but unfortunately could not fold himself in half.

It hissed once finished, showing teeth. Aeimlou blinked. Curious sound. That one he could imitate, pressing his teeth together and forcing his breath out through them.

It jumped back, both hands held out before it.

“Oh, sorry did I hurt you? I didn't mean that.”

How fun. He did it again. And again, watching its face harden. The creases around its brow deepened.

“Something’s wrong?” it asked. “Are you hungry? Thirsty? Can you move?”

Yes, yes, yes, no. He would like not to be here anymore. He would like to live.

Still, he had no way to express these things. So they sat. In their individual bubbles, watching across a boundary drawn in roots and long grass. It tilted its head, face scrunching up in what Aeimlou assumed was sickness.

“Nod your head for yes and shake for no. Do you understand that?”

Ah. Brilliant. He could do that. He repeated sluggishly, a wave of dizziness cresting over him as his chin skimmed the grass.

“Great. Good job. Now, hungry?”

Nod.

“Thirsty?”

Nod.

“Can you move?”

Shake.

Questions finished, it settled. The worry in its face did not.

But none of that mattered; Aeimlou had done it. He spoke! He warbled in delight, tired voice cracking. A warmth bloomed in his chest. One unlike hunger and the pain of dragging himself across the roots. The creature did not share that, instead making a low sound. Shaking its head.

Which, as he’d learned, means no.

“I don’t have anything for you out here, can I… hold on one second,” it said. It looked around, limbs drawn into its sides, one hand vanishing in its white. After a moment, it sighed and drew an object out from inside, holding it out in front of Aeimlou’s nose. Red on top, white on the bottom Some sort of orb, so perfect in its shape, in the separation of its colours, it could only have been made by the creatures.

The orb being in their possession was also compelling evidence to that fact, true. But it did not hurt to be thorough.

“I know you probably don’t like it but it’s the only way to get you out of the woods and back to Nuvema.”

The creature must have taken his stillness as permission because it shuffled forward until Aeimlou could see his own reflection spread in the polish.

And that became so much more fascinating than the object itself.

Aeimlou watched his new face, awed by this complete understanding. He twisted back and forth, the black arrow of his snout stretching and distorting as he moved. This was the fault of the orb, though. And he understood that. The world existed in so much more clarity than before.

He cooed happily as he continued, widening and narrowing his eyes, flexing the new muscles on his face. He opened his mouth and inspected the inside, all those sharp teeth like cliff stones. A much longer tongue now, too.

Then he discovered how wide his face could get as he moved closer.

Ignoring how much strain it put on his neck, he happily slid back and forth into his reflection, getting closer and closer until finally his nose met the cold hard metal and it sent a shiver down his body.

Which was not as shocking as when it cracked open at his touch.

He did not have the chance to wonder if he broke it before a violent flash of red overtook his vision. Then, nothing.

 

[tomatorade]

Two:
Welcome

Aeimlou was excited to discover how much he bored Juniper.

That was the human’s name—something she (because she was a she) explained in great detail to him as he sat on a soft bed in her nest. Along with assorted other details, most of which he did not understand and promptly filed away in his mind.

He had not died, as he first thought when that odd sphere vaporised him. No, he had simply been transported to some artificial world and taken with Juniper. It could also have been a dream, but either way clearly artificial. It housed fewer colours than outside. And no food nor life. He felt nothing inside.

Fascinating in its own right, if eventually dull.

Aiemlou preferred when he bored others. Like Juniper.

He’d been released in a white, white, place, with blinding lights from the ceiling and holes to outside that calmed the rising panic he felt at being so confined. Mostly, the nest housed boxes. Lots of boxes: those that sat on the floor for other boxes to lie on, those that pressed against the wall and held rows of snug colours, those that shined and blinked with unknown lights in the corner.

He got to lie on his own box, long and squishy and covered in soft bedding materials.

It warmed him. And he happily wrapped himself in it—struggling a moment with those jutting fins on his back—leaving a bare opening just for his snout and eyes. He cooed at the warmth. Juniper took an ecstatic interest in asking questions once he had settled.

But this is where the boredom set in. For as many questions as she asked, she had only given him the language to say yes or no. He had nothing more complicated so for many (nearly all) questions, Aeimlou simply sat there, blinking. She slowed the longer they went on, brows furrowed and lips drawn down. The face of dullness, he presumed.

Other things took her interest after that.

Once again, Aeimlou had no way to apologise for being so dull.

And then she began talking to herself. And to another box—black and sleek and reflecting the light off her skin as she held it to her ear.

“Hello. Yes, thank you for picking up, I know you’re busy and— no. Not exactly. That’s, well—” She paused to shift something from one ear to the other, keeping it pressed there between her shoulder and head. “Do you have time to stop by? I have a… another big problem if you understand what I’m saying, and I think you could help me a lot.”

She paused at the far end of the nest, turned on her heel, and headed behind a wall. Aimlou couldn’t see her, but could still hear her voice drift slowly around the corner.

“Yes, you. I’m serious. He’s not here and— sorry, Undella? This time of year? No, of course. I’m sorry to hear that. I understand.”

She reappeared from the other side of the wall, using both free hands to tie up the long, brown hair on her head.

“So you’ll do it? That’s great! It will be nice to see you again. Agreed. Goodbye.”

Perhaps she’d recovered some interest, because she headed for Aeimlou after. She crouched before him, level enough for eye contact. Aeimlou cooed in his warm little world and waited for the inevitable question.

She traced the line of her mouth with a finger, pursing her lips as they stared at each other. Her gaze had this odd spark of intelligence that Aeimlou had never understood before. He revelled in it.

“So, you do understand me?”

It was the most important question. One she’d asked many times before. He’d answered the same way every time, but it never stopped. He could only wonder why: did she not believe him? Not trust him? Or maybe it was she who couldn’t understand him. He saw no reason to repeat the question so often.

It grew frustrating.

Instead of nodding, this time he shook his head. Just for fun.

Those piercing, intelligent eyes narrowed.

“Are you messing with me?”

He shook his head.

She paused. Perhaps to think about it for a second. A great sigh broke from her mouth and she pinched the bridge of her nose.

“Alright, I can take a hint. You’re just strange, is all. I expected something different from a legendary.”

Aeimlou perked up at that, long neck tenting the soft nest over his back.

Legendary? Is that what he was now? He suspected she meant something more proper than the definition his mind supplied, but he liked to think he was also remarkable. Perhaps this is why she had been so bored with him. If he was remarkable, why, then, had he done nothing but sit around and eat food and drink water and answer questions? He imagined plenty of other creatures that could also do that.

But he had nothing remarkable to show her. He just watched as she fretted about her nest—interacting with objects he had no name or purpose for, occasionally sending glances his way. He acknowledged each one with a sharp chirp. It did nothing to lift her expression.

He would have to come up with something. For now, he lay his chin back down to rest.

Time’s passing changed little. Aeimlou relaxed, watching light lengthen across the floor as the sun blew streaks of orange across the treetops. The wind ushered the pleasant forest in and he hoped Juniper would also relax, but she seemed as flighty as he used to, scampering from invisible enemies inside her nest. For a brief period, she escaped outside, returning with food—an exotic smell Aeimlou picked up on from where he lay. She ate across from him, stabbing into her container with white utensils and lifting piles to her mouth.

Aeimlou watched, equal parts confused and intrigued. The whole process seemed unnecessarily sophisticated when she could have dug in with her hands or face, but he also appreciated it. It left no mess. And it conveyed a subtle sense of superiority. She did not have to use her hands as other creatures did, she had constructed tools to be her hands.

Aeimlou decided he’d like to try some day. He wiggled his claws, unseen beneath his body, and wondered if they were good enough.

“Are you hungry again?” Juniper asked, shoving the remains into the flighty white bag it came from. Aeimlou shook his head. “I have a friend coming soon that should be able to help you. She should be here any moment.”

Alright. He was not certain what he needed help with, but boredom also crept up on him and friendly company sounded interesting. He would like to see other creatures.

And true to her word, they did not have to wait long. A loud knock sounded from somewhere behind and while Aeimlou flinched and shrunk under his bedding, Juniper got up to take care of it. A creaking sounded behind him, cool draft following.

“Always punctual, Hilda,” Juniper said. Another voice, echoey and high mumbled something back. It laughed. Juniper laughed. A harsh slam and the subtle breeze cut off. The sounds of ruffling fabric, casual chatter and footsteps followed them back around. Then, quiet.

And more quiet.

Only then did Aeimlou chance a peek.

He burrowed his nose through layers of bedding. Blinked in the harsh light of the nest. His vision focused, the thin nose and tan flesh of the so-called Hilda appearing close enough to reach out and grab. A wild forest of brown fur tumbled from the white crest on her head, framing two eyes grey enough to fly through. They had an intensity Juniper’s did not, sharpening around the edges as they met his.

He tried for a greeting. Something whistley and light.

She snorted. “I thought Latios was blue. Dyejob?”

“Sounds like a prank my father would pull.”

“True,” Hilda answered. She stepped back and took a seat beside Juniper. “So uh… though I’d be dealing with a rampaging emboar or something. I’m not exactly a peacetime, let's-be-friends kind of call.” She leaned back and lifted one leg over the other. Unlike the narrow, pointed foot of Juniper, Hilda's was chunky and black, the overhead light casting deep shadows in the valleys on her sole. Aeimlou furrowed his brow at the sight, he could not imagine walking on those.

“Oh, don’t sell yourself short. You’ve always been a great help to me. And anyone else I called would’ve had a greatly different reaction.”

“Is that another way to tell me I’m boring?” She asked. Juniper tried to stutter out a response, but Hilda waved it off. “ Anyway, let’s get into it. What’s his problem? Just point the way and I’ll handle it.”

Juniper got that concerning, wrinkly look on her face again. It softened as Aeimlou nodded at her. He did not have much to agree with, he only wanted to be part of the conversation. She sighed.

“Well, Steven tells me Latios has been spotted recently in Sootopolis, so this is… another one. As impossible as that should be. The issue is, he’s struggling to communicate. I’m hoping he isn’t injured or sick, but he let himself be captured freely and hasn’t attempted to fly once, among other odd behaviours. Probably nothing, but you know what they say about birds who won’t fly. And I will not be the professor that let a legendary die in her lab.”

“So what can I do?”

“Could you bring out Atlas? Hopefully that will let us set up a direct line of communication.”

“Knew it. You only talk to me for my pokemon.”

“Hilda—”

She held up both palms. “I’m joking. Sure, I’ll bring him out.”

Hilda reached to her hip, fumbling with something a moment before bringing out an orb and holding it out on her palm. It took Aiemlou a second to recognize it as the one that had taken him to Juniper’s nest. She pressed the button.

To Aeimlou, it was fascinating to watch the bright lance of red light shoot from the capsule’s open mouth and strike the floor. At first it existed only as energy, yet that coalesced into a formless blob. In milliiseconds, the blob became a creature, floating at Hilda’s side with practised ease, the jiggle of green gel obscuring segmented limbs and a chubby, white body. He could not recognise the creature, but it emanated something powerful. Aeimlou drew back at the feeling, shaking his head as if to shake water out of his feathers.

The creature turned to their summoner, as if to have a conversation. But whatever they shared, they did in silence. It turned around equally as confident, but Aeimlou could not imagine much had been conveyed with those static, unblinking eyes.

At least, until he heard it.

It started as a subtle knock on the back of his mind. In the form of something forgotten, of the knowledge that poured into his mind when he changed, which had ascended him. He let it in.

Good evening. A voice echoed in his skull. It sounded wet. Pleasant, with a slight bubble to it. I am Atlas. It is my pleasure to facilitate our psychic connection today. Briefly, the echo dulled, some layers stripped from it. In secret, allow me to express a hint of admiration. It is not often mortal pokemon meet one like you, This voice rang louder, instinctively personal and bright. Aiemlou swelled at the power of it.

These were words. But also not words, layered with so much feeling as to drown in it. Aeimlou felt immediately overwhelmed, sharing in a sense of sincere awe that he intellectually knew wasn’t his. But he knew also of his revealing—Atlas must sense him just as strongly.

Outside his head, he watched Atlas turn back to Juniper and Hilda. Then all eyes drew to him.

Ah. They were waiting. He tried to copy it.

Good evening, he said back, good evening, good evening, good evening. You are Atlas? I am Aeimlou.

Perfect. We shall not waste time. We suppose our first question is about your health.

Aeimlou tried to send out a warm thought, the thought of eating berries and napping in the sun. I have no issues. I am content and warm and greater than I had been days ago. I miss many things, but these are not my health.

Why have you not flown?

I have no wings to fly with. Aeimlou wriggled under his bedding, tugging at it with his claws until it piled over his neck and revealed those jutting black monoliths his wings had become. Only these useless fins.

Is your psychic damaged, then?

His what? The word meant nothing to him. He blanked and, although he did not want to, the thought rattled through their connection. In turn, something harsh and white rattled back. From all points.

“You what?” asked Juniper. She leaned forward, bringing her seat closer.

The unexpected outpour of emotion made Aeimlou shrink back, ducking back into his fort. It subsided shortly after, an intimate warmth taking over, but that shock still lingered.

We apologize. Nobody intends to judge you here. We are simply confused, Atlas thought, Hilda wonders about your age.

I am of age for a partner.

A new warmth appeared. But this was sharp. Prodding. Not sunlight warm. In some sense, Aeimlou found it more exciting than their happiness or concern—his cozy bed supplied the former quite readily. He’d like to feel the sharpness again.

Could you place that in years?

Years. What an interesting concept. He had a vague clue what that meant, but little idea of his own. Or the purpose of keeping track. He’d never bothered to count his days. Perhaps it was a competition: who could live to the longest number. In that case he’d oblige with a fun new number he’d discovered.

One billion.

Much to his pleasure, that spiky emotion came through again.

You could just say you don’t know.

I apologize. I was under the impression you wanted an answer.

Neither Atlas nor Juniper seemed impressed. Hilda, however, let out a dry snort and a chuckle.

“Sarcastic little shit, isn’t he?”

Ah. He had impressed her. He did not know how, but he saw the wide arch of her mouth and mirrored it. He attempted to mimic it.

Please, ignore her. Where have you come from?

From where I was taken.

Truly? Nobody has seen you here before.

I used to be smaller.

And again. Spiky. Though without as much joy. Perhaps the novelty had begun to wear off. Hilda laughed again, louder this time.

Perhaps this may take a while.

 

[tomatorade]

Three:
Leaning, Learning

They’re deciding what to do with you, Atlas said.

It had been a couple days and, according to him, whatever it was Juniper and Hilda wanted had not shown. They wanted him to fly—and he could not. They spoke of psychic abilities, but he had no concept of those no matter how often they were explained to him.

This all made sense once he realised that they did not, either. Though that begged why they would attempt to explain something they did not know to him. Atlas said it was a human thing. The reuniclus (which was a very fun thing Atlas called himself) had taken on the mantle of teacher because of of his partners’ frustration.

On the second day, someone had decided Aeimlou deserved some fresh air. They took him out, redundantly laid a soft fabric over soft grass in the shade of forest at the back of their nest, and ate of the berries and meats they brought. The humans sat on their own, chattering in the background.

Hilda also brought five new creatures. None stayed beside Atlas. They gave a slit-eyed glance, a huff of steam, a shake of the leaves spooling from their spine, a dry hiss, a clip of the blades, a dip of whiskers. Then they fled to do their own thing in the forest, leaving Aeimlou open-mouthed and blinking as he dragged himself around the grass.

They’re quite independent, Atlas’s sound echoed in Aeimlou’s mind, As am I. It’s as if Hilda went out of her way to seek us, specifically, from our homes.

Atlas attempted to mime something, the mass of his gel shifting into odd shapes as he floated around Aeimlou’s head. His massive arms gestured, but to what nobody could be certain. If he wanted a response, he did not wait.

Then the lesson started. It did not stop starting for a good while—long enough to watch the shadows stretch and the humans grow silent.

So, supposedly, his psychic was a physical force accessed metaphysically, which connected to his mind which was in his skull and enabled by the precise assemblage of biology and abstracts unique to his species, yet also shared by every other psychic species. With this thing that was real but not real, he could fly. And communicate. And levitate objects. And perform illusions.

Truly complete nonsense.

I do not understand, Aeimlou expressed after ages of frustrating back-and-forth. He moved on to glaring into the distance, at the wildflowers growing from the roots of Juniper’s nest and the deep pink wrinkles under the flower petals. Their connection had been somewhat tainted: strained to the point where each thought sent it vibrating, the noise squealing and burying their talk.

Meanwhile, Juniper and Hilda had taken to watching their mood flatten. Hilda, in particular with a sly grin on her face.

You could at least express it differently, Atlas said, patience plainly turning to threads as Aeimlou used to turn bits of refuse to threads with tugs of his beak, Perhaps: ‘could you repeat that?’ or ‘give me some time to think on this’ would add some variety to this nightmare.

I am trying to be clear. I would like to learn this quickly, and I would not like you to repeat it, rather to repeat it better.

Atlas bubbled. You’re frustrating. He tilted himself to catch some encouragement from Hilda. Then took great effort to settle his bubble into a simmer. This connection we share is psychic in nature, so describe to me what you think it is.

An interesting question. Novel, too, thankfully. For him, it felt like a very direct line of communication. While he couldn’t actually speak the way humans did, and by Atlas’ explanation the reuniclus had no means of speaking at all, they had something very intimate here.

Is it an expression of intent? Of motive or emotion?

Atlas attempted to clap his hands together, but they sank into each other with an unsatisfying gurgle. He sent something warm and smooth, soothing after ages of friction. Aeimlou cooed, revelling in it also.

Excellent! I’d call that progress. Intent is a concise way to facilitate your psychic.

So I simply intent to fly and I will fly?

Not precisely.

And back to the frustration.

They did not stop as food was brought to them, nor as clouds hid the sun, nor as Atlas’ friends returned, the humans attempted to usher them inside and were roundly ignored. Although talk of psychic became tired in the way it ground them against each other.

They moved on to each other.

Aeimlou enjoyed this. More than anything in his life, perhaps even more than the scavenging—finding something dead and stripping it to its skeleton with the help of his flock. This felt like so much more. Every sentence felt complex and layered and Atlas quickly revealed himself to be quite interesting beyond appearance and species name.

He had, for instance, a truly bizarre relation to Hilda. Partners, yet not. It had alarming shades close to the previous conversation. Still, the puzzle here had a lifetime of stories behind it. And Aeimlou gladly listened.

I do not think I have been to Nimbasa, Aeimlou said after hearing of Atlas’ birth and life in the forest outside Nimbasa. Division, he called it. He had a fascinating lineage of memory—foggy ideas he’d taken from the parent he split from. He’d lived communally, which Aeimlou found solace in.

If you follow the river from the sea, it’s directly beyond the desert.

Aeimlou hummed, imagining the path, the streaks of water below him, gleaming gray towers piercing from the ground and spiralling through the clouds. He passed them, passed beyond a beige landscape he’d rarely stopped at for want of food. Landed in a forest. Remembered creatures similar to Alas—small and round and clustered together between the branches like berries ripe for plucking. If only they weren’t larger than him.

Perhaps we have seen each other. I remember flying through there.

Flying? I thought you couldn’t.

This body is new to me. I could, once.

Aiemlou looked out. Ravens lived everywhere, so it was not surprising to find some perched not far away, teetering on the fence cutting them off from the front. The birds always kept them in sight. Strange to think he had been among them.

You’re serious? Atlas asked, seeing how he focused on the birds. A raven?

Yes. Is that odd?

A mess of emotions came through, forceful as a slap. Aeimlou could only shake his head and try to reorient himself against them.

It explains a lot, I suppose, Atlas said.

Aeimlou looked up, trying to meet him at the eyes as he floated above. That face held nothing. One thing he’d learned about the reuniclus was his own stasis—unable to match the form of expression inherent in others, at least in a physical sense. That knowledge travelled with something tired and flat.

I apologise.

It’s not your fault. You must have done something incredible to be chosen like that.

He blinked. He had not even considered his ascension a result of action. He knew it had nothing to do with growth as he’d seen others in his flock age and die, but he’d imagined it as something more random. Another disease or attack.

And if he had done something incredible, he did not remember. He did not understand.

But Atlas had grown tired of hearing that.

I suppose, he said

Atlas accepted that with a warm pulse of energy.

And helped him inside after.

~0_0~

Aeimlou watched plans come and go, distantly. Juniper talked. Mostly to Hilda, but to anyone else who would talk, too, even Aeimlou, despite him having no thoughts on the future.

He had known that spiky feeling for a while, migrating from the others to him to a degree he had difficulty expressing. Only then did he find a name for it:

Annoyance.

He missed flying. It seemed petty, but he found himself thinking about small things in between larger thoughts—he did not appear to be made for prolonged grounding. His belly itched as he lay on the floor for another hour. Not even the softer bedding helped, and he could not lie on his back with fins like his. He missed the wind, cloistered as he was in Juniper’s nest, and the free range and watching the stronger creatures shrink until they could not reach him. He missed preening, his feathers already matted in oil and dirt, skewed out awkwardly and itching also. But he could not reach them. Not until he had his psychic. Juniper, especially, tried to help, but her knowledge did not extend that far and he did not let her after one clumsy attempt.

Atlas tried, too. Without much success, but his gel fingers were cool and pleasant and drew light coos from Eimlou as they fumbled over his back. They lay outside, then—out in the grass and beating sun. Atlas also spared some power to levitate him in some approximation of flight at his own suggestion.

He held some guilt at irritating the others, because it did not feel good. Their conversations drifted around him, and their time wore away and their eyebrows sank as he asked for further explanations. They found reasons to leave him alone more often.

Atlas had no such qualms. Even through discomfort.

They sat on the lab’s open upstairs one day, overlooking the human children and pokemon children meeting each other for the first time. A starter ceremony, according to Juniper. She’d allowed him to watch. The children also watched him as they came in, arms curled up to their chests, wide eyes open and sparkling.

She snapped her fingers at them as their attention wavered, but he did not mind. In fact, she began snapping her fingers at him once he started chirping and whistling to draw their attention while she bored them.

So the human children become mothers? He asked, after a while of watching

Atlas shook, fully. Aeimlou had allowed him to perch between his fins, so he felt the motion even though he could not see.

I would not describe them like that.

But they rear the chicks.

Their connection dipped. A coldness crept in—as it did when Juniper left the lab window open one night. They train them. They are too young to be mothers.

Perhaps I do not understand the difference. Where are the mothers, then? Would they not be a better option?

They breed them, giving them up to humans for the children to train.

That is not an answer.

The coldness only intensified, frost lurking between thoughts. Two gelatinous fists gripped his fins tighter until they sent cold shocks down his spine. Aiemlou let out a dull whine and got an apology in return.

Yes. They would.

Aiemlou allowed some silence after that, not trusting the connection. He watched young creatures scamper and scrap below, weak bursts of elements meeting each other, skipping across the gleaming white floors.

He did not understand how the children were not mothers. Not as they held a soft blue head close to their own, or wrangled stray vines and expressed so much purpose as if to glow.

But Atlas got warmer not long after. He sank onto Aeimou’s back with a deep gurgle and tried, once again, to sort out his feathers. Not successfully. Again. But Aeimlou ducked his head and closed his eyes and let him.

They try their best, I suppose.

Atlas would not say who they were.

~0_0~

Atlas had an unexpected physicality to him. He liked to be close, liked to touch more and more as the days passed by. Aiemlou could not say what exactly had changed, but the reuniclus slept across from him now, out of his ball, on another spare bed pushed up against the wall. He glowed green in dim light and their connection thrummed in sleep also, beating with waves from the other’s dream.

Aiemlou did not sleep those nights. He watched the ebb and flow of an unconscious body, hearing an ocean reflected in his mind.

~0_0~

The humans had come to some sort of decision by morning. Their reserved chatter died down and they instead orbited around each other in the lab, though whether in satisfaction or disappointment Aiemlou could not tell.

According to Atlas, Hilda could not stay much longer. They would be leaving later. The thought of Atlas departing put Aiemlou in a strange sort of mood—starved, almost, picking through the underbrush for scraps and longing for something greater.

Thankfully, Aeimlou came to a solution of his own.

Constant practise with Atlas had not borne fruit as easily as he wished, but he had grown the capability to prod. From across a space, a room, a field, even through walls, Aeimlou could turn his burgeoning psychic into something blunt and use it to touch others.

They found it annoying, mostly. Especially on initial discovery, when he abused it, focused it hundreds of times and watched Hilda itch at an invisible sensation while she twirled a fork over her breakfast. She found out quickly. And stomped over to him with a sour pout. And threatened to tape his muzzle shut if he didn’t stop. Not that it could stop him. Which she found out not soon after.

Well, Juniper rescued him eventually, hands full of clippers and a few choice words for Hilda. Atlas found it amusing, at least.

Previous experience helped in executing a plan. It only took one prod for Hilda to sigh, pick up a roll of tape and march back over, crouching to stare him directly in the eyes and tilting her head in a way that was decidedly not playful.

“Well?” she said, “Don’t make me do it again.”

Aeimlou chirped, snapping his claws together the same way he’d seen her do when someone else had been talking to her. She squinted, then her mouth widened.

“What, you need to talk?”

He nodded.

“Atlas is outside for a sec. I guess I’ll just… hang around. Play the waiting game on your new best friend.”

Aeimlou blinked. He was not sure how to treat Hilda in the best of times. But she seemed to take his confusion some other way, waggling a stray finger over his snout. “Eh, c’mon. The only person he talks to that much is me, and I took two years to get that far.”

Oh. Well, that made him feel quite special. He smiled at her and let out a light coo.

She rolled her eyes. “Yeah, whatever. Don’t feel too bad or anything.”

Lucky Hilda didn’t seem to have much to do, because the waiting led on for quite a while, watching Juniper pass through occasionally and shoot them stray glances. She brought food, at least, a tray of vegetables for them to share. And sat silently for a while sharing unseen words with Hilda. Aiemlou had no concern for them. He simply watched the door until Atlas’ telltale green mass floated through and he met the reuniclus with a quick chirp. The other was eager to connect, and it only took light prodding to bring Hilda into the fold. Juniper, too—simply for her presence, he supposed.

“So whatcha need?”

Do you remember those children who picked up their starters?

“Do I remember something that happened yesterday? I dunno…”

Well, in case you need a reminder—

A quick sharpness cut him off. Irritation. Yes. And a brief scan of his companions’ faces convinced him he would not have to elaborate.

Alright. In any case, I would like to be Atlas’ starter.

Perhaps he should have kept the conversation more insulated, because the wave of conflicting thought that hit him sent him reeling. Outside his head, the reactions were not much more reassuring.

Juniper blinked. “Excuse me?”

And Atlas sank noticeably in the air, his distinct signature vibrating between a chaotic buzz and a touching warmth.

That’s absurd, he whispered.

“What the fuck?” Hilda coughed around a carrot she’d been chewing, thumping her chest. “Yeah. Absurd. I don’t even know—Juniper set you up to this didn’t she?”

Now Juniper was blinking at her, instead.

And Atlas felt very prickly for some reason.

“No, believe it or not I didn’t tell a grounded legendary to be your pokemon’s starter pokemon.”

“Well who the fuck else could’ve given him that idea? He’s—” she gestured to him, palms out. “Y’know.”

That prickliness sharpened itself on her words.

I think it’s a fine idea. I see no problems with it, Atlas shot back, voice echoing with a certain airiness. He floated over the table—giving Hilda a long stare before plopping himself down beside Aeimlou, one arm draped over his back. He could learn much from me. He already has.

“You’re only saying that to be difficult!”

Perhaps. And there’s no reason why not.

And as Hilda spluttered and Juniper leaned in with open palms, Aeimlou suspected the conversation had quickly left his territory. Perhaps he would simply set his chin down and watch.

They seemed happy enough to ignore him, besides.

“Oh, come on! There has to be some league shit that prevents it.”

Everyone turned to Juniper, who rubbed the bridge of her nose with a tired sigh.

“They reserve the right to remove trainer status from anyone for any reason, but there are no pokemon-specific regulations regarding training or trainer privileges.” She tried to set a hand on HIlda’s but it was quickly brushed off. “I don’t see why you’re so opposed to this, he’d essentially be de-facto your pokemon.”

“Oh, yeah. No problem, then!”

“Hilda—”

“Nah. No, we’re not doing this. What have I been saying for years. To both of you idiots. I’m done with it—if I never have to train a pokemon from zero to hero again, I’ll be happy. This is at least a couple steps beyond that.”

The silence that followed meant nothing to Aeimlou. It had an air of finality to it, but searching between people or trailing stray bits of dust floating around the room revealed nothing. He let it sit for a while, all the while wondering if he should interject.

Finally, Juniper sighed and touched a hand to her head and tucked wild strands of fur behind her ear.

“I haven’t put anyone up to anything. You’re right, I would have asked anyways, but that’s because I trust you.”

“I guess I can’t refuse, then.”

“Of course not—you can always say no.”

But Hilda had this odd twist to her expression as she sharpened her teeth on another carrot. She seemed cornered, knees drawing to her chest in the folds of the couch. Atlas’s hand grew unsteady over Aiemlou’s back, wobbling in a way he couldn’t ascertain.

Hilda, he said, please. It’s alright.

But she did not have much for him except a glare.

Juniper cleared her throat. “It’s a lot of responsibility, I know. It’s not like I expect you to take him for free. I’ll fund it.”

“Oh, well, what excuse do I have?”

“Hilda—”

“I don't know what to tell you, Juniper.” She scowled, raising an angry finger. “It doesn’t piss me off that you asked, but I hate you pretending there was ever a chance I’d say no. You know me.”

Juniper bit her lip, nodding distantly.

“And you know I’m just gonna do it.”

She nodded again, slower this time.

And with that, the room was hers, buried under an unspoken purpose. It struck an interesting figure over their connection, partly because of how outside Aeimlou was from it. He had no connection to these stories so he allowed himself to sit back, to watch and feel while Atlas and Juniper sent out things that hesitated, bouncing back halfway between them, or shuddering and wilting like fall grasses.

“You’ve got me in a ranting mood.” Hilda stood, brushed crumbs off her legs and looked down on them. “ All this taking advantage; It fucks me up that whenever I take a job, everyone acts so surprised that they need to pay me; like I should be rich by birthright, like saving their asses got me anything.” She sniped, arguing with some invisible creature. “But it’s not like they paid me, or helped, or did anything—they just sat on the couch and waited for someone to clean up their shit.”

She paused, took a breath, a fire lit in her eyes that Aeimlou only then realised had been there the whole time.

“Sometimes I wish I would’ve let team plasma win, just to see the look on their fiucking faces. Life stops kissing their boots, handing them shit and they probably curl up and die.”

Juniper did not react, but Aeimlou could feel the tension. “You don't mean that,” she said.

And allowed the moment to sit. Although whether Hilda relented because she truly meant it, or because Juniper looked up at her with sad eyes, Aeimlou could not tell.

“No. You’re right,” she said. A sigh broke her facade. “I would’ve given up fucking everything and been turned into some dumbass statue that kids take field trips to for bothering. So congratulations, everybody. You’re getting your way. At my expense. The fuck else is new?”

And although the others wilted further, Aeimlou felt quite pleased. He let out a quiet chirp and bobbed his head soldily. Just for himself. For a moment, Hilda stared and seemed as if she would break out the tape again, but she only sighed and put her attention on Atlas, who had recovered enough to lean into Aeimlou again.

I won’t apologise for expressing my opinion.

“Didn’t expect you to. Won’t let you trip up, though, you’re in charge of him. Just don’t be a hypocrite, Atlas.”

She ended with a quirk of the brow. He ended with a simmer, a faint hint of disappointment that Aeimlou felt through the cold touch of his gel. He felt that coldness also as Hilda turned to him with a snap of the fingers.

“And you. You little shit, I know your type.”

Psychic, as I have been told.

“Very funny. I’m not letting you poke the ursaring and run away. If you start pushing me, there will be consequences, understand?”

For a moment, Aeimlou considered testing the order, sending another prod her way and watching the ensuing punishment. But Atlas seemed to sense those intentions not long after they sprouted. Don’t, he warned. So Aeimlou did not. He simply nodded instead.

And although Hilda nodded back, she did not smile.

“Great. Welcome to the team. Well, Atlas’ team, I guess, since he’s offering to take care of you. And I’m holding him to it. Good luck, idiots.”

Off she went, not sparing a glance behind her as she stomped out the door. She only returned at nightfall. Hours after they were supposed to leave.

Instead, they left the next morning.

 

[tomatorade]

Four:
A Great View

Up above, hundreds of metres in the sky, Hoenn shone. The waters, mostly, which flowed in the gaps between land, almost seeming to crawl up the beaches and through the rivers to mainland mountains and lakes. The blue felt so solid and still from this height, but Latios had good memories of dipping down at speed, dragging a claw through the whitecaps and crashing through the larger waves with hardly a flinch except the cool shiver of seawater running through his feathers.

The land, too, seemed so green. In between routes carved through the land and all those new, human structures that shone also as if to compete with the sea.

Latios held a breath deep in his chest as he hovered amidst a mess of currents trying to drag him every which way.

This was the ideal place to view Hoenn, he believed, from so far above as to take in every aspect. Though he could not see the wingull diving, nor the gyarados thrashing, nor the lesser creatures cowering, he felt them intimately. A psychic hook in his chest that tried tugging him down amongst them, but hadn’t yet realised he’d been the fisherman this whole time.

He allowed himself the slightest of grins beneath a faint show of lips.

That warmth also spoke to him of a great ambition—he could tell other creatures did not know the world as he did. Not even the other legends. He’d ascended so long ago; then, he had been awed. Now, he knew them.

Speaking of, he’d felt a great psychic pulse of teleportation nearby. A signature very familiar to him, spry despite the way it increased gravity around him. One that always predicated a childish giggle. It was why he’d stopped flying in the first place. He knew nothing would come of trying to avoid her. She had time enough to find his nest, to wait weeks for him to extricate himself from the company of Rayquaza or Latias and find himself alone.

And there she was. Mew. Drifting along through the winds as if they were a stream carrying her on a raft of leaves. As she passed below him, she opened her eyes. Regarded him with a childish curiosity, and once he saw his own reflection in them (scowling, always scowling in reflections) her tail flicked. She drew her paws from behind her head and she pretended to paddle through air until she hovered beside him.

Well, off they go.

“I’ve got some very interesting news for you,” she sing-songed.

Unfortunate that her mood was bright. Though she rarely had a bad day, the good ones meant lots of conversation of the most roundabout sort. Of course, she outstripped him in almost every way so he could only sigh and bear it.

“Don’t keep me in suspense.”

“That’s no fun.”

“News is never fun.”

She twirled around to his muzzle, eyes wide in fake shock. She tried tapping him on the nose, but he drew back and she tumbled forward instead, righting herself as if she meant to.

“You lack perspective.”

“Perspective?” he snorted. Did he not have the ideal perspective? He looked down once more, knowing that few others could look at Hoenn this way. “Don’t talk to me about perspective. You will never change my mind about anything, just tell me this news you think is so important.”

“And isn’t that tragic?” she said, with no room for elaboration. “Meh. Whatever. We’ve got some new ascensions going around and I promised I’d tell you last time.”

Latios tilted his head up, drifting around to hide the thoughtful wrinkles striking his face. This was interesting news; she certainly didn’t lie about that. Of course, she knew his ambitions. She knew from his own ascension, from the first look in his eyes and the first catty smile she shared with him in some forgotten forest somewhere.

But he would not worry about her either way. This could be his moment. He whirled around, holding out his claws for her.

“Where is this creature?”

She only batted his offering away with her tail

“Oh, so eager,” she giggled, “what’s someone like you gonna do once I tell you, huh? Get yourself a playdate?”

He scowled. Playdate. How does one of the originals so fully miss the point?

“Don’t condescend to me. You have no idea who you’re talking to. My motives—my abilities; this creature could hold so much potential for me.”

He regarded her. Begged her to understand the poignancy of the situation she gave him. Hoped that she felt how his psychic whirled around him, cutting through the wind with expectation.

What he did not miss was the way her tail stilled.

“Oh, I know you.”

“You don’t.”

“Is there irony in desperately reaching for the tippy-top of the pecking order while still wishing to stay invisible?”

“I’m above pecking orders already.”

“But you consider yourself a god.”

“You know what I mean. I will not play semantics with you.”

She shrugged, floating closed until she left his vision. He refused to compromise his dignity by stretching his neck to follow her, but that didn’t seem to matter once he felt the soft brush of her fur against his back as she decided to sit on him.

He grumbled, seething internally.

“Who’s the king of dust in the land of dust? Is that you?”

Oh, save him, here come the riddles.

“I will not play riddles with you, either.”

“I’m just sayin’.” She straddled him now, her tail looping around a fin. “All the ants and primitive creatures operate on instinct so much that their suffering is different from yours. They will never feel this existential pain you do. So if you become the new rayquaza, I hope you can look back and laugh.”

Really. Existential pain? Rayquaza?! Interesting. He felt no such thing, of course. He’d grown beyond that, too, since he’d ascended. And he intended to grow beyond Rayquaza, as well. All this proved was how little Mew had known him. It’s odd for a single line to put into question an entire relationship, but that did it for him. And he could fire back with a new lightness he hadn’t felt since she’d ambushed him.

“I’d always hoped to replace you, actually.”

But she did not even tremble from her place on his back.

“Shows what I know, I guess.”

“Indeed.”

Still, a bristle of something hot fired between them.

“I do know you, Midas.”

He fired back just as strongly, throwing her from his neck. She spun through the air, recovering feet away with a warning pout.

“Don’t,” he snapped, “call me that. Perhaps you should have gone to Rayquaza with this information, if only to spare me.”

She tilted her head. Bit her tongue so it barely poked from her muzzle.

“Meh. He wouldn’t hear me like you would.”

“You can’t harass him like you do me, you mean.”

“You have potential.”

“You don’t know me.”

She flicked her tail at him, waggling a paw.

“I know you’re gonna go back to rayquaza once I tell you. You’re not even gonna tell him we had a chat, just dump all that context and all the other cool stuff we talk about and pretend like you figured it out on your own, because the protege potential—hah! Alliteration!--means more to you than icky things like ethics or morals or honesty and you’ll never even admit how much fun you had with me.”

He grit his teeth and turned back to Hoenn. Moments like these were the most frustrating ones with Mew. This baffling amount of insight set him on edge already, but she couldn’t help acting like a child, as if aching to prove her own incompetence. Even as the world seemed to still in her presence; it warped around her despite her own power. If that stunning psychic force that trailed behind her like a hurricane vanished, he was convinced that nature would bend regardless.

And he wanted that. Anyone would.

“Just tell me where it is.”

“You won’t like what you find. I don’t think you’ll have very much fun at all.”

As if he was looking for fun.

“Why even bring it up, then?”

“I think you could learn something.”

He scoffed.

“I have nothing left to learn.”

She giggled.

“So arrogant. That settles it, I guess. They’re moving right now, buuuuuut…” She paused, brow furrowed, searching against the line of the horizon. Then she blinked, eyes widening. “Oh, wow! Another one! Cresselia’s already on that, too!”

He craned his neck sharply, trying to follow her gaze.

“Competition?”

“Who? Cresselia? Nope. If he’s who I think he is, she’ll be happy for the lack of competition. Probably take him on a beach vacation or somethin’. Good for her.”

“I don’t care. Where are they?”

“Ah… Undella bay, I think. All of them, too. What a coincidence! It’s funny how these things work out, isn’t it?”

He cursed. Undella bay? He had no clue what that was. He knew only some of the towns in Hoenn, but judging on her direction this place existed far outside.

“And where is that?”

“You big baby. Go find a map or something.”
“And if I can't read?”

“Then learn. Enrich yourself. You’ve got time.”

Oh, how he wanted to throw her off into space. But just as he felt his psychic tighten in response to his rage, Mew gave him a wink and blinked off. Her own power shredded through his with simple activation, sending it limping through the winds.

Which left him alone once more. To the sound of his breathing and the creeping chill of night.

Hoenn shone beneath him.

So, so far away.

 

[tomatorade]

Chapter Five
Isaac

Isaac didn’t remember when he was born, but the events were told to him many times over with the sort of airs they got at service, one basking in nature, taking in all Mew had to offer with wide grins and open arms.

“He’s got the fire inside him,” the priest, supposedly, said, holding a chunky, wailing baby that would one day grow lanky and awkward. “A blazing passion burning like the sun. For the love of pokemon. Thank Mew for imparting this miracle.” And he smiled and it glowed like the sun as well, blowing through his earthen robes and tinting them red.

Supposedly.

At the beach house Isaac’s mother, Alma, had a designated armchair no one could touch. She sat at it on rainy days when stories like these were told. And she, as she often did, had some complaints. If Isaac were to list the general complaints she had about anything, he would never stop. The extended family often avoided her if they wanted to speak without being interrupted every thirty seconds.

Her important clarification was about the priest’s newness. This amateur had forgotten the important bit. What he’d been specifically told to say.

Alma would grumble it from her chair, interrupting his father as he told the story:

“I can sense greatness inside him.”

And she held it there and looked at Isaac as if waiting for a stormcloud to form above him.

It seemed redundant. Yet, as Mew created every living creature with great purpose and intent, so did every accident become purposeful. The priest hadn’t actually forgotten anything; it served something else’s plan.

Isaac wasn't sure he believed, but he still thought about that often.

~0_0~

As he grew, he grew alongside trained pokemon. And these were trained. Winners in every sense of the word. They did not play. They did not laze about. His mother’s krookodile, especially, seemed more like a statue than a living creature. It stood beside her at all times, towering over everyone in the room. The family got used to it, but when guests came over they suffered through long silent spells, just staring it in those dark marblelike eyes while a fork dangled between their mouth and plate. Alma, of course, would spit and sneer at the idea that someone couldn’t handle a simple conversation without rudely breaking eye contact and the relationship would be ruined before it started.

Anyway, Isaac first got to observe them fighting from a distance. Hunkering in the forest on his little scuffed knees and watching them tear up the training plateau with sharp blasts of energy, swipes and stomps that threw up head-sized chunks of rock and rubble. And sent them through the trees and into the ocean with great splashes.

They got calls after. The ringing of phones underscored a lot of Isaac’s life. Especially watching from above, legs dangling through the upstairs railing, watching Alma rant down below, slam the headset back on the hook and stomp off only to return for another call seconds later.

One day, her team was gone. Alma could not keep them anymore and she made sure everyone knew it by the many choice words she tongue-stuffed into the speaker of her phone, more vicious than ever. Isaac would not get to watch them anymore.

By the time he was eight he transitioned instead to league coverage. If not being kicked out of his room and locked out of the house for the day, Alma watching sternly behind a sliding glass door, Isaac spent all day on matches. Old recordings of pre-Alder Unova, tapes from back in Johto’s heyday, that one great match between Cynthia and Steven that lasted nearly an hour—fall season, two thousand fifteen. Over and over, until the TV blanked out and reflected his wide-eyed, slack jawed wonder, looking for all the world like a beached magikarp. Later, he watched it on a new flat-screen all his own.

At fourteen he volunteered at the arena, redrawing the lines with a roller that rattled and sprayed chalky dust over the hard clay ground. He sneezed a lot that year. And the itchy dust got in his eyes and scratched them. Lucky, then, that he also volunteered at the pokemon centre when they lived at the beach house in Undella. He got some eyedrops there and when they didn’t work his parents got a light scolding and he got to see all the foreign pokemon and brought them water and food and snuck pictures when he thought nobody saw.

At sixteen, he finally got the opportunity to do it himself. To climb the cliffs around Undella, look out over the shining sea and the flocks of squabbling wingull and tell himself…

Maybe he wasn’t ready.

Those whitecaps looked sharp and the wingull screamed too loud and the sun blazed bright and stung his damaged eye and his legs ached just from climbing the staircase up (because he’d never quite made it up the cliff face).

But sixteen was a natural state for self-doubt. So said his father and his teachers and the guidance counsellor and the therapist. Alma, though; she must have heard his thought. Her hawlike vigil turned sharp in this period. And she always had that same tilt of the mouth that she did when someone got a story wrong.

It did not seem to surprise her when he moved back in at eighteen. He got no words. she‘d never given anyone comfort, but she seemed happy to let him drift in and out of the house, now. On her chair, with the demeanour of a starving liepard.

His father, Natan, knocked on the door as he spent another day locked in his room. Ducking under the covers and refusing to face him made his face burn, but he’d been questioning his maturity for years anyways. So he could only hear Natan’s soft sigh and the way the bed sank as he sat at the other end.

“You can always try again. Rookies don’t often make it all the way first go.” he said, voice soft. Maybe he sensed the way Isaac’s heart sank, because he cut back in quickly. “And if that doesn’t work out, there’s… a lot more out there, y’know.”

Isaac sat there in his sweat, insulated by his clothes and the thick layer of blanket. He breathed in the humidity and curled in on himself as Natan’s hand landed softly on his shoulder. Then, a shake. Another sigh. Natan’s weight left the bed. Isaac counted to ten and chanced a peek only to find him waiting in the doorframe, tired eyes obscured by thick-rimmed glasses.

“You have a purpose, Isaac. Maybe it’s not training, but that… it could be anything. Believe that.”

Isaac watched him scratch a cheek, half-shuffle out the room and hesitate a couple times before finally letting the door clamp shut.

He thought very deeply about those words, too, but only felt the emptiness of them.

~0_0~

Isaac remembered the summer. Stood out on the Undella beachside, reffing for the trainers that shouted commands over the surf. The sand itched as it got in his socks and the sun burned as it poured over his arms and the sea smelled awful through the morning rot of yesterday’s seaweed washup. He could not complain about these things, though he often did on his own. And bit his tongue in the company of family, who stared at him over the dinner table, baffled blinding stares reduced in the overhead light of the beachhouse’s chandelier.

Did summer vacations used to be fun? He liked Anville town more. It’s not that much changed, replace the sound of the sea with the trains, and the smell of smoke, and they registered about the same--but he could be alone there. He knew the forests around, and if he wanted to vanish for a couple days he could. Where could he go in Undella? The pokemon center? On rainy days the nightmare stretched on forever as everyone fought over the same board games. They were so overused that every unfolding threatened to split them in half. The family would do about the same.

But these things were growing less important.

All he could do now was watch the ceiling. Don’t twitch. Don’t speak. Don’t remind yourself of what the nightmare’s done to you. Hope that this all turned out to be a dream and wait for a prayer to come that proved it.

Temptation crept in.

He could not help but lift a hand up to the flickering of his bedroom light.

As he woke up from the nightmare, he knew it had warped him. Sometimes he twitched a finger and the warm touch of fingers against palms instead felt chill and sharp. He’d once narrowly evaded the cold spike of a night slash against his leg—close enough to cut through his pant leg, stain his ankle black and leave a lingering chill for weeks.

He would never forget the feeling.

Or the jagged black sillhouette floating between him and the light.

~0_0~

An ice blue eye stared back at him in the mirror, shaking, pupil small as a pinprick.

He fixated, Trying to breathe so softly the image wouldn’t move. But a flicker of the ceiling light caught him. He tensed. Then shivered as he saw it reflect, breaking the image like ripples in a pond. The form seemed to ripple, too, body something not quite solid. Even those legs—which were more like briefly-tangible stilts that brought no sensation at all as they walked him across the floor. Until they vanished. And he nearly slammed his head on the dresser counter trying to catch himself on the way down. He could float if he kept his concentration, though it felt like an infinite fall.

Everything else felt so alien—the white wisp blowing from his head like smoke; a red crest jutting in front of his face, letting him hide behind it. It looked like some monster’s dislocated jaw and a trace of the claw showed it felt uncomfortably like flesh—spongy, but solid, tensing as he pressed it. And the yelp and alarming spike of pain as a claw sank in.

He spent a good while, claws raised at the mirror. Waiting. For the reflection to make a move, maybe. Obviously it never happened; much as he wanted to smash it, the trembling shadow monster in the mirror robbed him of any fire. Here, it had weak arms, a backlight that cut through its body like sun through mist, a terrified eye and all the posturing of a newborn girafarig. Behind it, the beachouse bedroom’s glass wall let in a quaint early-spring Undella landscape, with all the gentle waves and bright sand and pokemon playing in the surf.

In the nightmare, it struck something in him. It loomed over him. Those claws cut into his hand as he took them and his lungs shrank until he wilted like a deflating balloon.

Out here, it was pathetic. Some scared, wild thing he’d stumbled into traipsing through the brush.

“Hello?” he said. Not in his own voice, but the heavy bass and scratchiness reminded him less of a monster and more of himself at fifteen going through puberty. He tore away from the mirror, shrinking in on himself before he remembered those claws and extracted them again.

He spent the rest of the morning sitting on the bedside and pretending not to exist. Sometimes pokemon passed on the beach or boardwalk below, alone. He hardly saw another—well, a human for hours. When he did—one of the white-dressed nurses from the pokemon centre—he wasn’t sure whether to duck behind the bed or give a shy wave. But it didn’t matter. She hurried by, swaddled in her own scrubs, face against the wind, head drawn down too low to spot him. It seemed cold outside, but his last memories were of summer.

He must’ve slept a long time.

~0_0~

Big, blocky letters spun on screen, slamming forward with impact as if they’d actually ran into the glass. Unovan International. UI. On a screen that nearly swallowed the whole wall, the sound of it rattled through the surround sound into his bones.

His bones. Did he even have bones anymore?

The letters spun off again, revealing four men, all clean cut with too-small suits riding up on their shoulders and showing mismatched socks under polished shoes that dangled beneath the presenter’s desk. They talked, smiling politely the whole time. Every minute or so they’d cut to a new clip. None of which Isaac recognised. He tried to squint at the faces of trainers on either side of the arena, find something there. Nothing. Some later ones were against Iris—always of a braviary or stoutland or something ducking beneath dark lasers unleashed from the mouths of her hydreigon. He settled there, on some new blonde-haired Unovan stepping out onto the field and facing Iris with a smile.

Championship fights had already started. He almost lifted a hand to rub his eyes, but flinched away from it as the black claws entered his vision.

He’d been out for months. It’s strange that he’d be more disappointed for having missed most of training season and the off season, but…

Well, he struggled to feel anything. Like being dragged under, the weight of water keeping him down, chilling him.

He shimmied further into the couch’s embrace as the graphic came back. Then faded out to models sprinting across the beach in shiny new tracksuits. NEWSTEP slapped onto screen with just as much force. As the commercial faded to black again, he caught his reflection for a second and almost had a heart attack.

He blinked away his fear, coughed awkwardly and looked around the living room as if anyone was there to see. Maybe he wasn’t as settled as he’d like to be. Maybe he should do the smart thing and learn something about his new body instead of sitting around. But then he looked down at his claws again.

Fuck that. He’d rather watch TV. Even as pricks of panic dug into his shoulders and threatened to choke him. And shockingly, hours later, when his vision turned bleary and the long moments when he had to shut his eyes forced his nightmare to rip across the back of his eyelids, it was not the panic that interrupted him.

A knock sounded at the door.

Isaac froze. He dug his fist into the pleather couch cushion and winced as it tore. The thought that someone had come to open the beach house struck him. Then he realised they wouldn’t knock if they had. His second thought was to say nobody’s home. He would’ve meant it seriously and it would’ve been humiliating, so thank Mew he hadn’t, but that still left him staring helplessly at the door.

Another knock sounded. Heavy, like some gothic door knocker that they certainly didn’t have. It did not sound human.

Still, he found himself clambering up the side of the couch, shredding up the sides as he tried to hover and kept failing.

He did make it to the foyer. Eventually. It must have taken a half hour and had him drag himself across the tile floor as he exhausted himself trying to hover. The knocking never stopped. Evenly, every minute or so it rang through the house again.

There, he dragged himself onto the empty shoe shelf. He had a blurry view out the frosted window stretching from the door’s side—floor to ceiling, and to another chandelier dangling above him. Darkness stretched on outside. Even if he could make out the shapes beyond the window, it would remain a silhouette against the dull blue glow of the television still streaming across the house.

He huffed, slumped against the wall, out of breath, and wasted even more time thinking of what to say. But the knocking came louder right next to the door and his patience wore to threads.

Fuck it. If they wanted to kill him, why bother knocking?

Stretching over with a shaky claw and a groan, he barely flipped the lock and leaned against the handle when the door flung open and forced him back against the wall.

In a harsh slam and stomping footsteps that shook Isaac more than they did the furniture, a bisharp entered. And entered might be a soft word: really, it strode through as if the door weren’t there a second ago, those thick, clawlike feet cutting deep lines in solid tile. It paused, towering at least a couple feet over Isaac as he sat, flashing a glance from over its shoulder. Down, over the gleaming silver claws and blades that reflected harsh moonlight and Isaac forced himself deeper in the wall and felt the sick bubble of anxiety in his gut as death stared him down. Sharp mandibles cut against each other in its mouth and dark, human eyes narrowed once Isaac locked onto them.

But quickly as it came, the bisharp brushed him off, carried on into the house. The harsh clanking of metal followed in its wake and left it surveying the area—to the open kitchen island, and living room all bathed in the TV’s light; to the lobby and staircase beside, climbing up to a glimpse of the hallway and the bedrooms beyond. But it seemed almost instantly bored. It shook its head, the axelike blade flashing wet like blood in the light, then turned back to Isaac.

“I felt your size,” it said, in a voice Isaac felt he shouldn’t understand—all clicking and shearing, almost industrial and grating.

Isaac still understood, though. And nodded dumbly for no particular reason.

Which elicited little more than twitch, somehow conveying such intense displeasure that Isaac itched.

“So?” it asked, sharply.

“Uhm… hello.” Isaac said. He could not pretend to be comfortable, but without threat of death, the danger trickled away and he relaxed enough to talk. “Why are you in my house?”

“To challenge you.”

Isaac blinked. He looked around the room, for whichever invisible person the bisharp might be speaking to. Then deeper in the house when that failed—to the games chest, with a chessboard carved into the top.

“To chess? Ah… what? I mean…” The bisharp seemed so human standing there in the lobby, with such an intelligence in its eyes that Isaac forgot how pokemon usually challenged each other. He held up his claws, then. “I can’t fight. Uh… sorry.”

They kept eye contact for an uncomfortable time. Isaac wanted to slam his head into the floor. Sorry. That’s what you say to someone who broke into your house to fight you. Right.

“Come here,” it said.

Despite himself. Or, more likely, because of all the prominent blades, Isaac found it an easy command to obey.

In theory.

In practice, he trembled too much trying to right himself. Anything less than complete concentration would not let him float or materialise anything to walk with, so he managed to clamber up the wall and take a single step before crumpling back to the floor, a jarring slam that left him face up to the lofty ceilings.

The bisharp filled his vision moments later, those heavy, pillar-like legs leading up through a maze of knives and an unimpressed stare.

“It seems my journey was pointless. I’ve won.”

But its voice kept flat. Even as it drew up a foot and dug it into Isaac’s chest until he wheezed, the bisharp’s claws drooped at its side.

“What—” Isaac started, then wheezed again as the bisharp withdrew, “do you want?”

“To challenge you. To defeat you. I hardly had to try, you seem weakened.”

“You don’t know me. I’m not, like, a threat. Or anything. I’m just some guy.”

“I felt your size,” it repeated.

“I don’t know what that means.”

But the bisharp didn’t seem interested in explaining. It wandered off, stepping into the kitchen and leaving Isaac to draw up on his elbows, the shadowy mass of his body whipping about of its own accord.

“Excuse me?” he continued.

Not that it got much response. The bisharp had already thrown open the fridge door, bathing the kitchen in a white glow and letting a chill breeze creep along the floor. The fridge was empty, of course, so it grunted and shut it shortly after. Then it set its sights on the TV, drifting into the living room, planting its claws on its hips and tracing the battle playing out on screen.

Isaac just sat there, blinking.

“Hey,” he said. He meant to shout, but hesitated and overthought it and the word sort of limped out quietly. The bisharp still heard it, though, judging by a flippant wave of the claw. “Can you… leave? I mean, if you're finished. Please.”

“You have no way to challenge me.”

“I just— I was asking. I don’t have anything for you.”

“I will not leave unless you force me.”

“Oh,” Isaac muttered.

Which left him on the floor, watching the bisharp linger beside the couch like it owned the place. The TV roared, shoutcasters punching through the tension with their usual rounds of cheers. Strobe graphics and canned cheers played over the fallen form of Iris’ hydreigon.

Even despite finding some brief elation, he sniffed and idly traced the bisharp’s form in dust on the ground.

The situation hadn’t quite struck him yet. Though maybe that wouldn’t change much; he always got looks for what he thought was important. Yes, he cried more when Hilda dropped from the championship than when Nana died. Sometimes he cried, sometimes he just thought. And back then, he thought it was not sad that she died. She was old. He knew what happened when people got old.

The audience cheered again, as if to agree. Or to urge him.

Time to move, they shouted. With the waving of flags and blaring of vuvuzelas.

So he made a lot of noise trying, but with a while to calm down and the endless support of the TV, he crawled himself up the wall and managed to float again. And with minimal scratches on the pristine white walls. And with a limp self-pat on the shoulder.

The bisharp, of course, watched the whole thing solidly, not bothering to lend a hand, let alone a word. It also watched a wobbly Isaac hover into its space and plop down on the couch again with a quiet sigh, snuggling into the warm corner he’d left.

And now what? It still wasn’t leaving.

“How long are you staying?”

“Until I get the fight I wanted.”

“You’re staying forever?”

It raised up a claw and clacked it. Isaac got the impression of a betrayal, holding on to his rope, dashed against the side of a cliff by rain and wind, only to look up and see the bisharp with his lifeline between its claws.

That claw dropped like a dead fish. “Until I die. There are no other chances like this. I will let you heal, first.”

Isaac blinked. The vision morphed back into boring, mundane reality. Only, what the fuck was he talking about? Boring, mundane, reality. Okay. He still had no clue what was happening.

“Okay,” he repeated. To himself.

The bisharp nodded.

He nodded

Thay sat and watched TV…

A bird’s-eye of the arena faded into shakycam in the lockers, rows of flushed faces straining to fight past each other and make it into focus. But the camera had its sights only on the winner, and followed him out.

…and kept watching…

It was the blonde kid. Den Mercer, who smiled with all the confidence in the world and wore a coating of dust and sweat as battlescars from commanding the field. He had a belt of basic red-and-white pokeballs and department store track pants and teeth with a slight hint of yellow and years without braces.

…until focusing stung and tears started to pool and roll down Isaac’s cheeks.

“I don’t think I’ll ever be able to fight you.”

“Then I will die.”

“Don’t… do that. That’s— that’s not great.”

But the bisharp had some unreadable expression beneath all those moving mandibles. It—

Hold on.

“Sorry, what gender are you?” Isaac asked.

It blinked.

“I mean—” Isaac shifted uncomfortably, sniffling and rubbing his eyes until they stopped stinging, suddenly hoping the couch could swallow him whole. “I’ve been calling you it this whole time.”

It kept blinking. “You haven’t referenced me at all.”

“Uh, in my mind, I mean.”

“I don’t care what you think.”

Oh. That’s good. But it didn't answer the question.

“Soooo…” he started, dragging it out in hopes the bisharp would jump in with an answer. But he only stared a good minute until Isaac ran out of breath and sputtered out, wheezing and coughing awkwardly.

Only then did it chime in with a gruff: “I am male,” and continue to look at Isaac like a housefly buzzing around his head.

“Cool. I mean, I guess it doesn’t matter. I should’ve asked your name first,” he mumbled and, learning from last time, capped it off, “so what’s your name?”

“That has no relevance—”

“I’m never going to fight you. Probably—and if you’re going to stay here forever or until you… until I find a way to get you to leave, then I think it’s good if I know what to call you.” Isaac paused. “I’m Isaac.”

The bisharp—now a he and a real, looming presence in Isaac’s life—turned. The roar of the tv drowned in the intensity of his stare.

“Call me King.”

 

[tomatorade]

Chapter six
Sunlight

Isaac might’ve been in the middle of a meltdown. He didn’t sleep or eat—though he couldn’t tell if he had to do either anymore—but he continued feeling exhausted and confused. He’d migrated from trying to find comfort in the embrace of the couch to splayed across it, head craned off one end watching the gaping maw of the open door as wind blew it gently back and forth.

King left it open for the unwelcome daylight to slowly crawl out the doorway. He’d gone. Well, he came and went, leaving the door open with the confidence Isaac wished he had. He didn’t talk much after their first conversation. Isaac didn't try very hard to keep it up to be fair, mostly he watched King watching TV or rummaging through the house with the air of a bored parent being shown a cool new toy.

Isaac felt faintly pathetic that it only took an hour lying there, staring at an empty doorway, to want him back.

He shook his head sadly. No, he didn’t think that. Not King; the bisharp didn’t seem to care for anyone, let alone him. Isaac just desperately needed someone to talk to.

What people could he call if he had his phone? Any of his friends in Anville: Mark, who’d definitely be there; Sarah, who’d probably not be there, or the constant procession of people leaving for training or university or work? These were five-year-old thoughts. Anville got emptier by the year. Here, in Undella, he knew the one pokemon centre nurse—Kloe—on a first-name basis, and that was about it.

So, family? No. Maybe aunt Vivian or any of the kids or his dad (though not really), but he wouldn’t want to talk to anyone else even if he were still human.

He didn’t want to watch TV anymore, but it still comforted him from the wall. Commercials swam through his head as he craned up to watch the ceiling instead, counting specks in pure white paint. The shadows leaking from his body rose to meet them.

And he might have stayed there, letting the TV sap his power until King showed up again and he actually felt like doing something. But repeat phrases got lodged in his head. Faint whispers from the broadcast that drew his attention again.

Undella town. That’s where he was. And some reporter went on about it incessantly, which must mean she was talking about him.

Isaac turned over to watch. A blonde, smiley, buttoned up lady sat behind a desk with scrolls of text streaming above her head.

“--not unusual for the eccentric Miss Vivian Allbright, but certainly a new one for the sleepy Undella beachside,” she said, chipper and practised. She held up a hand and a chunky box appeared, flashing a date. Comparing it to the date in the corner gave about a month’s difference. “In any case, it’s shaping up to be a strange summer. Now, back to Dan with the Unovan league.”

Isaac blanched at the mention of his aunt. And watched, full focus as the broadcast switched to Dan and he pointed at neon-red graphs washing over the winning championship match. But Isaac had seen the analysis a dozen times over the day and while he’d normally welcome another couple, now he wanted the woman back.

She never came back. No more mentions of whatever would happen in a month, no mentions of Vivian or Undella, the broadcast ended on a graphic smashing through the screen and flickered instead to the beginnings of some eighties-era pokemon soap opera.

Wrestling with the remote and scrolling through the guide revealed nothing. His mother didn’t like the family wasting electricity by watching the tube on vacation, so to avoid temptation she paid for exactly one news channel and whatever came for free. None of which helped right now. In the age of Xtransceivers that shouldn’t be a problem, but Isaac wasn’t reborn with his.

He dropped the remote, grumbling and crossing his arms with only a little bit of hesitance. Nobody would have left their computer.

Just then, a breeze came through the door. It creaked in concern.

Of course, there was one place that was always open.

~0_0~

As he hovered outside Undella’s pokemon centre, Isaac thought he had made a mistake. He blended into the darkness out on the boardwalk. The smokiness of his body didn’t even reflect the harsh fluorescent light blasting from the centre’s windows, and the rest of the boardwalk was mostly closed even during the day. Another month and they would wake up again.

It couldn't be that strange for a pokemon to come alone. He could tell himself that, but a paranoia settled in him as he faced the automatic doors. It would certainly be strange for a pokemon to come alone and ask to use the computer.

But he couldn’t think of anything else to do.

Isaac floated up to the polished glass, claws twined together. He stared at the little red dot in the door sensor all the while. The glass parted for him, as it should, and greeted him with a wave of cold, sterile air. He paused. Listening for the bell to chime so he could dive back outside and crouch in a bush. Then he remembered it sat on the counter—this little electric beeper stuck on between the harsh backing of two monitors at reception.

The nurse must be busy. Or gone. Maybe nobody was there, they just forgot to lock the doors. It was certainly possible. Isaac had done it before.

Isaac held onto that idea as he floated across polished white tile. It reflected his shadow like the form of a great beast lurking underwater.

The free computers stared at him from the far wall. Some small-frond ferns hid in pots on the desks and windowsills, conspicuously nailed down on little metal ties. An attempt to green up the room, sure, but Isaac could spot bits of white receipts and plastic bottlecaps in the pots, too. He wondered if he should clean them up a little. If the ferns were drooping a little sadly. If he should login as a guest or use his old employee account. These all felt like strange things to wonder even as he kept an eye on the shiny wood door behind reception, waiting for the occasional muffled scratching and footsteps to manifest into an open door and catch him out.

It didn’t happen. He slid one of the cheap metal chairs out, wincing as it squealed, sat down on it, and took an extra long moment to survey the room.

Nothing but the sound of a distant AC and the smell of glass cleaner. Alright.

He ended up using a guest account. The keys felt under his claws, tap-tap-tapping away harshly in a quiet room. Beyond that, he left little chips and dents in them each time he struck, scraping through the white letters.

He moved a bit slow watching the counter, but in only a couple minutes took to the browser, the clumsy typing of ‘undl bey’ in the searchbar. Miraculously, the computer seemed to understand that. Isaac got what he wanted by the second result. Massive, black font on faux-newspaper background. Unovan Times. More a rag newspaper than anything, but Isaac wouldn’t complain.

News. Regional. East Coast :

Summer Seance at Undella beachside.

The normally sleepy mid-spring Undella beachside will be seeing summer crowds early as a public ritual expects to draw eyes. Just last week, Vivian Allbright, the millionaire part-owner of Bright Tech and known eccentric, announced a Seance would take place at their beach house early next month. By her account, this involves a procession of over a hundred participants, including the hiring of security both before and after the event, consultation with spiritual experts from Celestial Tower, and will involve opening the boardwalk nearly a month earlier than custom to house and feed all the participants in this nearly-week long event. It’s not open to the public, though businesses are unlikely to close again after.

The seance comes a year after the sudden death of the Allbright family’s middle son, Isaac Allbright…

It continued, but Isaac didn’t need to read more. He sat there. Blinking through the harsh blue light.

Dead.

Did he feel any particular way about that?

Well, he wasn’t dead, so they were wrong about that. And if he were dead, he didn’t think he’d be that upset. He’d be dead of course, and probably wouldn’t feel much at all, but even in a strange situation where he died and wasn’t dead somehow, then everything would be fine. So he clicked the next link, onto his messages, and resolved not to think about it anymore.

His first thought was to send a message to everyone telling them he was alive, but imagining himself getting something like that changed things. First thing, he’d drive down to Undella to make sure.

So he didn’t. Just scrolled through all these heartfelt goodbyes in his feed. A strange thing to do—text dead people. There were a surprising amount of strange people trying to talk to a supposed dead person. And from all kinds of people he’d never met before. He only recognised a few names—his aunt’s mostly, dozens of times. He scrolled over them quickly, burying them in a sea of quick, one word farewells.

A pit formed in his stomach. He scrolled back up, clicked back to the article. A seance. Hundreds of people. He wasn’t even dead. A little worm of guilt settled in him thinking about all those faces showing up, seeing him there and hating him for disappointing them. Or scream, more likely.

But he didn’t want to think about that, either. He glanced back at the counter, wondering if the squeaking of a door was just his imagination. Still nothing. Then, watching a curious black wisp seep from his chest and caress his claws as if to comfort them, he figured he could learn what he’d become before going, at least.

Back into the searchbar he went, where ‘dark, scary, shadowy creature’ led into the wrong forums, and ‘pokemon, smoke, dark, claws?’, popped up images of basically every pokemon, some umbreon sitting peacefully next to a campfire, an absol watching over a sleepy village. Cute. But not helpful.

And unfortunately, every search involved some very tempting tournament clips stuck right in the browser, playing as he scrolled over them.

Isaac knew his own predilictions.The computer was tempting him.

In his defence, he held out for a couple minutes. Until he recognized the clip of an old umbreon wish strat from nearly a decade ago and found himself obsessing over it again.

See, the standard practice with competitive bulk is to keep them alive and on the field as long as possible, through walls of bubbling purple poison, fire, water, anything to create distance, especially with some ability to keep or restore energy mid-battle. Obviously variants on protect became popular then, particularly during the circuits a decade ago. In fact, it became so popular that nearly every pro team needed an answer for them.

In comes the Unovan Minor league, august 2010, Ace Pery versus Ace Dawnquist. Pery has an umbreon, and you can tell from the way Dawnquist chats with his team, everyone knows what's about to happen.

Only it doesn’t. Really, what’s so brilliant is Pery’s counterplay. The stadium watches his umbreon turn glowing red eyes skyward, feels the arena fill with warmth and light and love. Then waits, yawns in store for the shimmering wall of light to cascade between him and the opposing sawk. It never comes. Instead the umbreon sends out a prodding dark pulse, a seeping poison trail that grazes the opponent’s side. Dawnquist is shouting over the chaos, can’t keep up with the commands—he expected half a minute of waiting or otherwise blugeoning the wall and wasting energy, but by the time the sawk manages a weak counter that keeps the opponent at bay an aura of sparks settles over the field and the umbreon’s ears perk up again.

An interview—Pery’s winner talk, all smiles and glowing satisfaction—later reveals the umbreon to be a reserve. He doesn’t even know the technique.

By the time the video finished, Isaac was in awe all over again, leaning into the desk and the bluelight of the screen. Then the video flickers to black. And a startling blue eye cuts through the dark.

But Isaac was so enarmoured already, he didn't flinch. Watched, for a time. That eye wasn’t human. It had an ethereal edge to it, the pupil shimmering with power.

He held up a claw.

Had a thought.

And before he got time for a second or third thought to correct the first, a gasp shattered the silence. Then, a clattering. The rolling of glass across a vinyl floor.

Isaac found himself so overwhelmed by his single thought that he couldn’t even be shocked. Just look back at the counter and watch the nurse back away, arms raised.

He’d always had a hard time telling the nurses apart from each other. They hid their hair in white caps, and all had the same sharp uniform somewhere between scrubs and those old nurse outfits that only exist in desaturated tent photos from the Unovan war. He’s certain this one was Kloe, though. She had a mole on her neck and an accordion of thought wrinkles between her eyes and a sleeve of harsh, black tattoos wrapping around her left arm that peeked from below her sleeve as she held her hands aloft.

Isaac used to have a crush on her. Well, no, he pretended to because all the kids in battle camp thought she was pretty and he wanted to fit in. They got to be friends, later, during his volunteer hours, when he rambled to distract himself and she was the only nurse who seemed excited to hear about the up-and-comers on the Unovan circuit.

And there she stood. Again. Buttons tight against her chest with held breath and a spark of fear in her eyes.

“This is just a hospital,” she said. So calmly, as if she’d faced threats like him often. “You can have whatever you want as long as you leave the pokemon alone.”

Isaac took a very long time to consider that. In a way, he was surprised, though he shouldn’t be. He knew what he looked like now. The thought sent some awful images playing against the back of his mind, but he could ignore them to watch Kloe tilt her head in anticipation.

He didn’t really want anything, did he? He was tempted to ask for one of those lung inflation machines he remembered seeing, but that would be stupid. Something his parents would scold him for thinking. Maybe he wanted to talk. But even as he tried to open his mouth, the words wouldn’t come. This whole situation would probably be very strange to her. And even with the promise of company, all of a sudden he felt shackled to his own loneliness.

Yes, she would think this was strange. And he was strange. And if one truth could be gleaned from the past however many years of his life, it’s that the only thing he liked less than being alone was sitting at the end of a table and having a blinded, blinking face stare back at him as if he’d landed there from space.

So as calmly as he could, Isaac floated to his feet, steadying a claw on the rolling chair and wincing as it tore a line of stitches. He slid it under the desk. Allowed himself tentative movements across the room. Kloe watched all the while, backing up into the swinging doors behind her as he passed the counter.

Her hands had sunk, one reaching behind, one pawing at her hip for pokeballs that weren’t there. A terseness had sunk into her, on the wrinkles in her forehead and the drawing up of her shoulders.

Maybe Isaac expected this. It didn’t matter now, as things had become uncomfortable and left him fidgeting. He certainly didn’t mean to scare her.

So he mumbled a ‘“sorry,” watched as her expression morphed into surprise again, and drifted back until the sound of the sliding glass door greeted him again. When it shut, distorting the inside with streaks of dried rainwater and dirt and glare from the dawn’s first breaking light, she still watched back.

~(0)~

King was back by the time Isaac worked up the courage to cross the promenade. He’d left the door open, of course, a trail of ants marching over the marble floor like a caravan under the watchful eyes of some chickadees chatting on the coat rack. Neither of which gave Isaac mind as he floated past. He had an easier time seeing in the dark now, but could still feel the difference between early morning outside and the dark, musty beach house. Only the dark made him more comfortable, now. He closed the door. Eyed the chickadees as they scattered from the slam. Promised himself he’d let them out later.

Isaac found the bisharp in the walk-in closet beneath the stairs. He’d been doing… something as Isaac entered, working between a pile of shoes dumped from their shelves, and clothes spread out over the carpet in a patchwork of summer colours. Not wrecking them, really, a couple minutes watching had him pick something off a shelf at random, hold it up to the darkness, then dump it on the floor without a second thought.

And although that one fuzzy wool sweater his mom liked stared at him, buried halfway under the pile, Isaac couldn’t find it in himself to care that much. He still though he should say something.

“I uh… lived here before. You know.” As if that would stop him. King didn’t even notice. “I was human, before. I guess that doesn’t make sense—I’m not sure why you’d believe that.”

But King paused, a billowing purple blouse held between his claws.

“I don’t see how it wouldn’t make sense. I found you in a human home. You have no concept of yourself,” he said. It sounded like he’d continue, but instead he took a silk belt from the blouse, placed it in his lap and tossed the rest aside. “Don’t talk to me about this any more.”

“And I went to the pokemon centre. The uh— nurse—Kloe—saw me there.”

“Fine.”

“I think she could call someone. I’m not sure who. Like, a ranger or something, I guess, and then they’ll come here.” Which also reminded him, “there’s a seance happening, too. That’s in a month, but it’s— y’know. You’ll probably have to leave. Maybe me, too. I don’t know. I haven’t decided yet.”

King let a harsh sound escape from his mouth. It was too alien to decipher emotion from, but Isaac suspected it might be irritation.

“You talk as if all this information is equally important. It isn’t.”

That had Isaac fidgeting awkwardly in the doorway, wishing he couldn’t spot King’s murky silhouette sitting cross-legged in the darkness. Wishing that it hid him under a heavy doorframe and no backlight.

“There will be challengers,” King said, “Others will come and try to take you. Kill you. Defeat you. As I have, and intend to do again.”

Oh. That didn’t sound great. Maybe it should be more discouraging, but it had Isaac mostly thinking about the seance again. Imagining what a fucking disappointment it would be.

And then his single thought. The one he’d let go of in the pokemon centre. It returned, here in the closet and struck him again, stronger than ever.

“Could you teach me how to fight?”

Now—and maybe for the first time—Isaac caught King’s attention. He dropped a pair of shoes he’d been extracting the laces from like guts from the body of a shrimp. Turned and scanned Isaac from top to bottom. With a heave and plenty of heavy shearing, the sounds of factories in his joints, King rose to his feet, brushed past Isaac and went back into the hallway. The quick glance Isaac got of his metal pincer was cold enough to make him shiver.

“I never gave you a tour,” Isaac tried to cut the tension. All it got was a withering glance from King. He drew his claws into his chest, choosing to examine the angles of King’s shadow splayed out In the hall “I mean, I guess it’s not that important, just… hospitality, you know? And you’d probably rather not uh— train me. If you still want to defeat me.”

“You have an arena.”

Isaac blanked. Then thought it was a question and nodded. Then realised it was rhetorical once King waved him on and stomped down the hall. A faint burn of shame rose through him—for the whole situation, really. Normally he had someone around to shut him down and curb all the stupid things he thought, but here he felt unfiltered. And King hadn’t said no. And Isaac didn’t want to walk it back now that the bisharp cut through the house with his authority.

“Sorry.” Isaac mumbled.

“Never apologise to me again,” King said.

And led him through the hall, out the house, beyond the beach, and into the forest. Isaac followed meekly behind, hiding in shadows the sun threw across the beach.

He didn’t have to hide when they got to the trees. Even King seemed to relax, shoulders dropping and pace settling into something more manageable. Isaac had to look up, squint through the leaves and notice those yellow smears splashed against the canopy in order to find sunlight amongst the ferns and moss and cool rot crowding below.

It seemed the whole forest was a shadow.

And it took far too long for Iaac to realise they were in king’s territory, now.

 

[tomatorade]

Chapter Seven
Now For Plan A

Route fourteen had a sense of mysticism to it. Could be the fog spewing from the waterfall on one side and sea on the other, which liked to gather under the treetops and make all those towering pines seem like the gnarled legs of massive creatures. The waterfalls also came and went along the path, filling the area with a constant rumble and showing up around every corner. Pokemon lurked there. Isaac sometimes spotted the red glint of a golduck’s forehead gem as they ducked underwater. Or a drifblim passing silently overhead. They paid him no attention. Not even when he was a human, which is why Isaac liked them over the city pokemon that crowded ankles for food and covered his pants in shed fur and scratchmarks.

Not many places in Unova felt exotic anymore, but Route Fourteen still had some magic left.

Even if he couldn’t tell whether King helped or hindered it.

The bisharp approached the forest the same way he did the beach house. Plowing through it, daring something to get in his way. So while Isaac felt some childlike wonder at being led into the misty woods to be trained by a mysterious stranger, the image was ruined somewhat by the heavy thumping of metal feet through rotten logs and over rocks, leaving a trail of chips and dents in everything. Isaac barely had to mumble directions to the forest arena to start King on his warpath. But he made quick travel. They got there before noon came—just as the sun found the perfect angle to strike them through the trees.

The arena showed the most signs of winter. The rest of the forest could handle the snow and cold and wind. There would always be fallen logs and leaves scattered around. But when you level out a flat bit of ground out here, a couple months without maintenance and it became a warzone left after the elements.

Isaac winced as he first saw it—imagining the work he used to put into it. Shallow ponds had formed in all the potholes, muddy water leeching brown from the compressed dirt. Stray pebbles manage to lodge themselves everywhere, sheltering the roots of thistles and tall grass. Add a scattering of leaves and fallen branches—some too big for Isaac to lift on his own—and the arena certainly…

Needed maintenance.

“Can we lift those logs?” Isaac asked. King took to the other side of the field. The fog obscured him. Partially, the glint of metal shining through a gray haze.

“There’s no reason to,” he called back.

Isaac looked back out over all the bumps and hurdles and tripping hazards. Then down at himself—floating a cozy couple feet off the ground. There was no reason for him to, at least.

“Um, I don’t think it’ll be fair, that way. I mean, you could trip or uh— hurt yourself. Or something,” he mumbled, trying to follow along as King tested his weight on a fallen log. It crumbled, and he ended up kicking bits of mushy wood off his foot. “Shouldn’t this be even?”

“You would have no chance against me no matter the circumstances.”

Isaac scratched at his collar, the odd pain of a claw dragging across flesh grounding him slightly. He supposed that was true. He didn’t feel great about it though. And that didn’t seem like the point of a battle. Even through the jitters at facing King who, frankly, still sent bolts of panic through him when those dark, alien eyes met his.

He’d like this to be something like the image in his head. A camera view from above, with harsh white lines keeping violent blasts of energy contained to a neat square. Two opponents facing each other until one bowed. The energy frightened him somewhat, but his own body reassured him, too. There didn’t seem much tangible there, between the smoke, to be injured. He hoped.

And he was supposed to be dead anyway, so what did it matter? The seance would make more sense then, at least.

Yes, this would be fine.

But tracking King as he set himself down on a bulging rock outside the field, Isaac had a feeling a different image of battle lived in the bisharp’s head. He didn’t seem overly violent or bloodthirsty, but had a scary kind of apathy to him. Isaac doubted he’d get much help if he were cut down.

Isaac floated up before King, stray wisps from his body floating off to meet the fog. He swore he could feel it—cool and dense.

“So, uh… how do we start?”

King thought for a moment. Or did he? He clicked his mandibles together in a way that might be thoughtful. Scraped a claw across stone and leaned back under the shadow of a tree.

“You are not capable. I want to know your strategy first.”

Isaac perked up, drifting quite a bit further above the arena. Oh, he had a lot of thoughts on that. But he came down to earth as his mass followed, a haze of black smoke bubbling from him in his own excitement.

He wasn’t sure what that was. What pokemon he was. What he could do or how to do it.

He sank again, meeting the ground with two thin, ephemeral legs.

“Defeat me with your words.” King continued.

“I’m not… we’re not defeating anyone here, are we? I mean, we’re just battling.”

King rose. Quick enough for Isaac to jerk back.

“We’re always defeating someone,” he droned. Standing now, watching him felt like the battle had already started. A thick kind of pressure pushed Isaac back further. “ The only two languages are strategy and violence. Then, every interaction is a battle. Every battle ends in defeat. Whether you or the other is the only question.”

“O-okay.”

He pressed forward. Isaac floated the same space backwards. A corded, rotting log blocked the path, but that didn’t matter to King. Not with something full and iron in his heart, sprouting out through all those blades, uncontainable.

“Tell me what you can do.”

His voice took a softer tone, but it didn’t help. Isaac still stuttered and gripped his claws together so tightly they sank into a single, dark mass. He still felt his form shiver, his hover dropping.

This is exactly why he couldn’t be a trainer, he remembered. Out there, on the field, any plan left his mind, vaporised by the blare of spotlights and the shouting of the crowd. He had a venipede named Posey who tried very hard with him—hard enough to evolve and carry him to the second gym—but she couldn’t save him from himself as the attention started to ratchet up. He couldn’t please her, he couldn’t please the crowds or his family or himself.

He certainly couldn’t please King. He had a feeling nothing could.

Still, his mind raced with details. What could he do? He could fly— but no, flying type didn’t fit—he had no wings, and didn’t feel the pull of true flight and, well, fire or poison didn’t fit despite being synonymous with smoke. Ghost? Dark? Maybe. But that implied a huge range of powers and all he knew was his own claws.

So he ended up staring down at them again. Uncertainly, this time, with heart rising to his face. Until King butted into his vision.

“I-I don’t know. I only got this body a—a day ago.”

“Strategy’s a time to eliminate possibilities. Now, you can do anything.”

Isaac blinked, looking up to meet King’s eyes. They weren’t friendly, but they missed the cold edge Isaac had grown used to.

“Are you going to hurt me?” Isaac whispered.

That got no response. Isaac coughed. Tried to clear his throat, but felt it harshly and watched a stray sunbeam glance off one of King’s chestblades. Only then did he really regret this whole thing.

“I’d run, I guess,” he mumbled, “get a ranger. Or a trainer or something. I mean, they'd be around, wouldn’t they? It’s only spring. Early spring, I guess.”

“They won’t help you. Not as you are. They only help humans.”

Only humans. Of course. Isaac thought to correct him, felt almost ashamed, then wondered why.

Had so much changed that he wasn’t allowed to consider himself human anymore? He didn’t think so—he felt very much the same. His problems hadn’t shifted that much. It didn’t seem to matter what body he had, he would always feel trapped because he was the cage.

Of course, he doubted King would understand.

“I uh… could curl up in a ball and hope a tree falls on you.”

“Unlikely.”

“D-do I Have to do this?”

“You requested it.”

And he did, he had to remind himself. Even though it stemmed from one reckless thought, Isaac had been stupid enough to speak it out loud and this is where it led to—

“I can tell you aren’t going to learn anything by talking.”

Something cracked under King’s foot. Harsh and scattering and followed by the rolling of rumble like dice across a table. Then, silence. For a beat before he tilted his claws and the grinding of metal cut through again.

“Let’s get into the violence.”

Even though King made no more sudden moves, Isaac yelped and threw himself backwards, his legs dissipating and sending him to the ground.

“No! N-no, I didn’t—you didn’t give me much of a chance!” he stammered, digging his claws into the loose earth and coming out with handfuls of rotten leaves. “I can’t fight! All I have are my claws!”

“Then use them.” King stepped forward. “Earlier, you asked if I would hurt you.”

Isaac nodded dumbly, a brief speck of hope shining through at the question. Maybe he’d get mercy?

“I will.”

King stomped forward. Isaac screamed, not even bothering to follow his arc. He scrambled over a fallen trunk nearby, hoping to get some shelter. A violent cracking broke through. And a sudden rattle against his spine and a shower of splinters followed.

Isaac had no heart, so instead the stray black mass trailing after him thrummed, rippling like a pond in an earthquake. It simmered at the spike of fear punching through his chest. Then spread. One moment, Isaac sat, tensing every muscle and hoping King got himself stuck. He blinked. The world vanished into darkness.

He stilled. His fear fed back into him, jerking him back and forth in an attempt to find an out. But none came. And King wasn’t far away.

He held his breath, creeping alongside the tree as agitated smoke poured from his body, blanketing the area until the only signs were the dull thuds of King feeling around. But a sudden glint through the fog got him to gasp. The same moment he realised he could breath the smoke he had to throw himself to the ground once more, rolling away in a tangle of not-quite limbs.

Still, King managed to cut through something. Isaac felt the cold punch of steel. Hitting him all at the same time. Like once, when he fell off a playset and winded himself slamming chest-first into the sandpit and choked on mouthfuls of sand as he struggled to take in air.

Only here, some of himself went with it.

He stumbled out of the fog. Tendrils of black void clutched desperately around his limbs as though trying to keep him inside. Instead, he dragged some of them out. He couldn’t truly understand why until he’d exited, gaping at the lingering black cloud he’d left behind, smelling overwhelmingly of sulfur and ash.

Then he looked down. He gasped, which turned into a coughing fit. Something sick crawled down his throat. A stump. Oozing black smoke like blood. Where he expected an arm.

Isaac wriggled his stump around. Heaved. Clutched with his remaining claw, letting it sink in and the cutting pain and spilling of black ink. That piercing bite of grit in his eye. Blinding, burning pain of sunlight. He tumbled to the floor, desperately trying to draw in breath. But too late. Another flash from the smoke. King’s silhoutte encroached against the black and trees, like watching a leviathan emerging from the deep.

Isaac tried to drag himself back, but flopped onto his side with a grunt. He curled into a ball instead, one twitching eye trained on King.

“You took that well,” He said, stepping out from the smoke. It began to dissapate at his exit. Black flecks shrinking into white and green and brown and gray. “Now, get up.”

But Isaac had only just taken a breath.

“Y-you—” he sputtered. Once again, unfolding to drag himself away. Only now, he found purchase. And stared at a slender, black arm coiling back out where five seconds ago he though there was none. “What?”

“You are incorporeal. It reformed. Get up.”

Isaac huffed. Tried to take a deep breath. Tried to count. But for the first time, King had begun to truly upset him and he wasn’t sure what to do about that.

“Could you— could you s-slow down. Please. Please…”

King stopped on a pin. Mid stride, almost, before settling into a neutral stance. He didn’t break eye contact, but paused way too long to seem certain of anything.

That almost frightened Isaac more.

And his stare changed, this time. He squinted. Tilted his head, folded out his mandibles and drew them back into a tight pinch with only the briefest sigh. He stepped back.

“We will try again tomorrow.”

Isaac slumped, finally taking that breath he’d been searching for. But as King moved past him, the implication settled, too.

“Tomorrow,” he whispered. Mostly to himself. Head turned, he watched King wander back across the arena. He looked back down at his body. His arm, mostly. Still there. Though the weight hadn’t quite left his chest and the image of a short nub of limb broke through his mind as he closed his eyes.

“You wanted this.”

Isaac opened his eyes again. He’d though King left as he had a moment to himself, but no. Instead, the bisharp lingered at the edge of the forest. The fog had lifted at this point, and the sun reached fully between the scattered pines and oaks and in a wide, yellow wash, he stood stoic as one of the trees.

“I— not that. I wanted… a battle, y’now. Like…” Isaac wasn’t sure he even had the words to explain it. As he tangled with them, waiting for King to react or move or do… anything, he wondered for the first time where the bisharp had come from. He blinked. Was King upset? That didn’t make any sense.

“Friendly,” he continued, finally rolling over to meet King face-to-face. His form still shimmered, but it kept in on itself enough for his confidence to trickle back. “I don’t—I just thought we would… spar—is that what you’d call it? Like on TV. Or, I mean, not on TV if they aren’t sparring on… TV. Yeah.”

Beyond another tilt of the head, King didn’t respond.

Which meant Isaac had to fill the silence.

“You scared me. I mean, you always kind of do. I don’t know if you mean it that way—I didn’t really know what you intended.”

More silence. And how strange it was for that silence to slide things off kilter. Just slightly. King always seemed alone—becuase he was alone—just this brute who’d forced his way into Isaac’s life. Here, somehow, he seemed far more alone than someone standing off by themselves. Isaac assumed the forest was his domain. But he didn’t respect it. He didn’t respect the arena. He didn’t take to it like home.

“You were afraid,” King said.

Isaac nodded. Slowly, wary of another trick question.

“I did not intend that, fully. Violence does not scare me. I was not afraid when the humans came to my home. Not with fists. Not with swords. Not with guns or bombs or all of my brothers turned back to kill us.” He paused. Broke eye contact for the first time, searching the forest for something. Whatever it was, he never found it. “I was afraid when they spoke to me. Words are an illusion. They mean nothing except to obfuscate intent. They made me uncertain enough to let the humans in. But their intent had never changed. I understand uncertainty.”

Isaac wasn’t sure what to feel about that. One question had been answered, but…

Well, maybe King saw the way Isaac drew up his claws, because he shook his head.

“Do not feel sorry for me. The mistake was not mine, in the end.”

Isaac blanched, the image of his stump at the fore of his mind again. Then he imagined a human in his place. He shivered, scooting back slightly.

“D-did you…?”

“Yes,” he shot back, “I killed them. They would have killed me. They are worth less than the mud they returned to and I refuse to feel anything for them.”

Oh. Okay. Isaac could only hum in response, hoping King didn’t read anything from it. He busied himself trying to stand again. He didn’t feel up to hovering, so he let his legs form. Still, they shook slightly as he stretched.

“Do we have to do this?” he asked.

“Yes. For the future, anything you say I will accept fully.”

“S-so you’ll leave the beach house?”

“No. I will simply accept you want me to leave. As I accept you want to learn to battle.”

Isaac sighed, taking some tentative steps forward. Finally, as Isaac teetered over a log and past the faded edge of the arena, King stomped back into the forest. It was strange to think he was waiting for Isaac, but he glanced over his shoulder as if to confirm it.

“But I will try to create a ‘friendly’ battle for you. Something more amicable. A better learning experience.”

Well, Isaac had never seen him friendly, so he wasn’t sure that meant anything.

Still, under King’s watch, Isaac could only nod subtly and follow along.

 

[tomatorade]

Chapter eight
Hovering

On hitting the road Aeimlou expected he, Hilda, and Atlas would get through quickly. He turned out to be wrong for a number of reasons.

First, though humans had several means of transportation, many faster than any individual creature, they could not use them until reaching the human colony of Castelia. Well, Castelia to Atlas or Shithole to Hilda. Aeimlou could not be sure which name was true.

Humans had a strange barter system where they exchanged imaginary goods with no value for tangible goods or services with actual value. Atlas did not seem to understand it fully and Hilda actively hated it. They insisted on using it for transport. Aeimlou could only wonder why they obeyed it.

“We have to pay to get to Castelia. And again to get to Undella. I don’t like it, but I’m not going to bitch about it and constantly remind myself how empty my account is.” Hilda snorted. She adjusted her fabrics—changed and smelling of sweet sitrus from those white things she’d draped herself in yesterday. “Haven’t figured out a way to get free rides yet, but I’m close.”

So while they could not move swiftly, Atlas had been convinced he would not travel by forest—and it had to be forest, deep forest, by Hilda’s command—until he could fly. Aeimlou would not mind this. He had dreamed for the first time the night before, and it had been one of flight. But he did mind being grounded and only able to move by Atlas’ psychic manipulations while he struggled. The reuniclus tried to simulate wind and atmosphere as he totted Aeimlou a couple feet above the roots and wet layer of last year’s autumn leaves, but it could not compare. Certainly not as Atlas grew tired quickly and could not talk as he tried.

Second, Aeimlou expressed a brief flicker of confusion at the phrase ‘hit the road’. Though after a few minutes, he did not think it that strange. A brief explanation sufficed.

The others did not seem to think it would.

If they enjoyed talking so much about a mere three words, he would smile and let them, he supposed. He figured out quickly that if he sat there, allowed some low chirps, blinking dumbly, they assumed he did not understand and would continue talking indefinitely.

So certainly, much of their wasted time was his fault.

—it’s not literal, really. Merely an expression, understand? Atlas said, gesturing vaguely as if his arms could also explain.

And he did understand, but the thrum of excitement Atlas sent over their connection was so infectious he sent back his own little uncertain chord and received the same, again, but in different words.

And without Juniper around, Hilda seemed to need something to talk to, also.

“--y’know, shoving two ideas together. Hard as a rock, get it? A metaphor. You know what a metaphor is, right?”

And once, again, he learned. But if he confirmed, the conversation would die under the drooping shade of a great willow, watching droplets of rain patter on the moss outside. So that meant extending his forced lack of understanding onto other things. It started with a curious roll of the eyes and a dry shake of the head, and the topic of metaphor became the focus.

Hit the road is hardly a Metaphor, Atlas butted in, resting on the same bed of moss Aeimlou laid on. But concerning metaphor, it’s a comparison. Taking one object or idea and using it symbolically in connection to something else.

“--I already explained that,” Hilda said, kicking the mud off her boots against a rock as the rain’s trickle sped into a steady rumble.

Not very well.

She’d already released her other pokemon. They left as the rain came. Strange, to Aeimlou. From videos she and Atlas had shown him, released pokemon tended to sit and wait for instruction. Hers did not. As the ethereal red glow faded from them, they took a glance around their alcove, gave Hilda some bare acknowledgment as she stood back, hands on hips, and let them flee through the leaf curtains surrounding them.

They never seemed interested in talking to Aeimlou. They noticed him, certainly. The longer, green one cut its chin up at him as they met eyes. A long pink tongue shot out to meet the air. A complex hiss seemed meant to communicate something. Though what it was, Aeimlou could not be sure and Atlas would not relay.

So he watched. Somewhat blankly, wondering if he was meant to communicate with them. He cut his claws under a bed of roots and dragged himself over, poking his snout through the willow leaves. Empty space met him through a wall of other trees. And the cold patter of rain against his snout forced him back to waiting. He felt strangely lacking in these sorts of interactions, but recognised he must wait to fly so he could keep up.

But ah, he had distracted himself too long. The others had been talking.

“--we’re not talking about semiotics, Atlas.”

Why not? It’s interesting. I’d like to reach that far with Aeimlou, Atlas said. He sent out a psychic prod for Aeimlou, who—truthfully, this time—had no concept of semiotics and so stared flatly. Atlas received it with a disappointed gurgle. Ah, that’s to be expected. Perhaps we should move on.

But Aeimlou looked back out at the pounding rain and recognised he would not be getting very far for the moment.

Semiotics? Are those related to these metaphors you spoke of? he said, making an effort to smooth out their connection into something approachable. Atlas disturbed it almost immediately, sending it thrumming and thrashing as he drew up from his rest and hovered up beside Aeimlou.

Hilda watched with a tired frown and sat against the tree, rubbing her legs in an attempt to stir felling against the dulling cold creeping in with the rain. She did not attempt to interfere otherwise. So Atlas spared her his attention and leaned against Aeimlou, his cool gel sending a pleasant shiver down his neck.

Well, you see—

The explanation took hours. But listening was more enjoyable than training, so Aeimlou hardly complained.

~(0)~

Change seemed more certain now than ever before. It was something Aeimlou could only appreciate in a new body; his old routine had been so predictable, in hindsight. Here, excitement and uncertainty came every day, as they moved further towards wherever Hilda’s destination was. And his charges often were the least predictable of all. They were quite complicated creatures, he found. Progress swarmed around them.

Of course, he also betrayed himself. He had looked forward to flight for many days. And could feel it coming the more he tried.

Aeimlou could not tell who bored first under the willow tree. In either case, conversation dried to a trickle and he and Atlas defaulted to what they always seemed to as a dense weight settled over their connection and they met tired eyes each. Training.

Neither liked it. But Atlas constructed a series of exercises that meant nobody needed to argue about it. Aeimlou would extend his power, find the edges of it—those nebulous lines that wavered in speech and stretched thin as he sent them to touch others across space—and slide them beneath himself. Extend them, finding his own shape against the ground, and tightening until he began to rise. With some training wheels, as Atlas described them. Another fascinating idiom that paled in the face of Aeimlou’s newfound joy at finally being free of the grit and wet and general discomfort of the ground.

Aeimlou spent a good while basking in that. Managing to push himself forward with ease, chirping and cooing and marvelling while Hilda and some of her stray flock watched on with half-lidded eyes. He rejected Atlas’ training wheels in minutes. Banking into playful circles around the reuniclus until he became dizzy and wobbled back to earth to rest.

Finally, he could hover under his own power. And could not understate the sunlight warmth he felt even in the shade.

Though this did not come without bad habits, according to Atlas—with example, he should not be using his psychic to push the ground away, for it took more energy and performed rather inefficiently. Rather, he should be lifting himself up. Still, he managed another couple circles, receiving a halfhearted applause from Hilda. The spare few feet below him as he rocked through the air, in circles around the willow’s trunk, were not inspiring. But he could still imagine the moss was a vast swath of trees below him and the ants were all those creatures who never knew he flew above them because they did not look up.

And Atlas was proud. Their connection sparked with energy the rest of the day. Every word after felt so much more colourful.

Hilda shared in that, somewhat. While she did not respond to his flight beyond a tired grunt, she took back to walking with a renewed vigour. Understandably so. They had spent many wet hours in one place, and from what Atlas shared, Hilda did not stay in one place often.

It’s the life of the trainer, really, he said, trailing beside Aeimlou as they followed Hilda deeper into the woods. He bubbled still with shared joy. Flitted around Aeimlou, gently prodding him whenever he began to drift off course. They are a busier type than other humans. You might understand, I can’t imagine you stayed grounded often.

This was true. In both the known literal and learned metaphorical sense of the term (although the temptation to cock his head and feign ignorance remained; his companions certainly never figured him out). In retrospect, Aiemlou never felt much attachment to a single place. He had fragments of images, all half-formed, with the human nests and the trees. But territory was scarce and fragile and often took only one stronger creature to upset.

If Hilda had to contend with every other trainer and their own flock, Aeimlou understood.

This was also her explanation for travelling deep through the woods. She did not seem to enjoy the moss and rot and chilling shade that wanted to travel with them. Her flock noticed. Atlas first, but though all her other partners tended not to stay, they still exchanged brief words with the reuniclus which found their way to her.

She did not seem much more receptive to their suggestions.

“I don’t want the hassle,” she explained the first, fifth, and twelfth time someone suggested she was unhappy with her own arrangements. And she dragged her fingers through her hair and let her brows dip. “All these fuckin’ trainers—all the bullshit—I hope, in Giratina’s name, that we don’t gotta deal with idiots who spot a Latios for the first time and think it’s a great opportunity to talk. ‘Oh, can we trade? Can we battle? Who do you get one, it’s not fair!' Yawn. It’s gross. The city sucks, too, honestly.” She finished by sticking out her tongue. Wrinkling her face—which Aeimlou took to mimicking.

She chuckled at that. But still sounded tired and left him with Atlas, who left him to think.

He was a Latios now, Aeimlou reminded himself, though the word seemed uncertain. A supposedly powerful creature. And rare. The second known in existence. Which, he supposed, was less than the many hundreds of ravens he had seen in his life. He did not understand the significance. But he knew some power now, so he was inclined to agree.

Speed became a detail that stuck out most. Atlas faced education with a manic joy, and especially liked to feed him statistics.

Faster than the speed of sound, Atlas would say, in a reverent whisper echoing beneath their connection as they floated along. Hilda’s flock broke in and out of strange formations around, some poking into the conversation at their leisure. They left quickly and with a faint turbulence.

Aeimlou had no comparison for the speed of sound. Except now that he could fly faster than it (well, not yet). Atlas could stress that further—gesturing and miming and explaining how Aeimlou could one day circumnavigate the globe in around eight hours, by his estimate.

Aeimlou didn’t have a frame of reference for that, either. Neither partner had the energy to elaborate. Though he figured he could prod answers from either eventually.

Then Atlas stopped a moment.

Wait, he said, freezing in midair, arms outstretched and rippling with gelatin and reflecting green shards of sunlight. Take this moment in. Remember it.

Aeimlou cocked his head. First at Atlas’ static expression, then at all the trees waving through a gentle wind and the creek that trickled by. Remember what, he would not say. But Aeimlou liked these sorts of tangents Atlas went on, so he let himself reflect the green light and feeling of sunlight and obliged.

The day passed dully, though not without incident. The forest did not relent and seemed also to tire of them, with other inhabitants breaking through the trees with roars and hisses and warnings that were always met by a greater volley back from the flock. Hilda was the loudest of all, stomping on dry sticks with bone-breaking cracks and throwing her arms out and drowning out the others’ warning growls with her own shouts. Most smaller insects and wild tangles of fur and flora skittered back into the bush.

A stray few, those especially who stood tall and puffed scaly chests, remained and were talked down by Atlas or the long, green one who liked to curl closest to Hilda’s side. Or, if their snout split in a sharp growl, were launched back into the forest with a decisive attack. The strange, floppy, furry one especially liked to draw up gracefully. Then launch forward with a kick so strong the offender’s body launched through the weaker trees in a shower of splinters and screams.

Their only remains were distant whimpers.

Some lingered. Aeimlou had grown skilled enough to feel where a mind could reach, and here they sent wisps in the direction of the injured creature. They did not last long. Nobody paid much mind to them as they left. Aeimlou might have enjoyed the spectacle, if only he hadn’t seen too many of his own nesting trees destroyed by such displays.

He took his place after the floppy one. Through a ruins of trunks and stumps—laid out like plucked weeds in the darkness—a gleaming spire crowned a long white snout, attached to a darker body scarred even before the attack. Dark black eyes met Aeimlou. They watered steadily. The creature whimpered. Aeimlou reached out with a psychic prod and the creature seemed to sense that. It drew back with a whine. Injury kept it slow, but it still had enough energy to limp back through the woods.

Aeimlou let out a dry chirp and turned his attention back to the trail of destruction. He would not spare many thoughts there. He had his flock, distant as it was. Mostly, Aeimlou mourned the trees.

A cold hand settled along his neck, sticking in his feathers. Atlas drew close—his presence mixed warmly in their connection and Aeimlou responded in kind.

It’s not easy. But there have been worse incidents—worse injuries on either side. We must excercise some force, when necessary, understand? I’ll teach you to defend yourself eventually, but we could keep you away from the battling, if you would prefer that.

Aeimlou let himself lean in further, rumbling unsteadily. All this energy between them, it narrowed, filtered as a stream would into a lake. And all the thoughts like fish swimming mindlessly away. Something strange had happened. He tried craning his neck around to Hilda and the others. They did not have anything for him.

Aeimlou sat there, blinking.

And the fish started to converge once more and Atlas’ grip tightened around him in some mix of protection and fear.

He did not understand. And he did not mind battling. And he would prefer this feeling to leave him for the moment.

I see, he said. Their connection condensed again. Warmed. He liked that. But an impression remained.

As Atlas withdrew, he let himself sink slightly in the air, still fixed on the distant forest as a wash of light spread across a disturbed patch of flowers.

~(0)~

Later, with much thought and careful picking around Atlas’ feelings about the creature which threatened them, Aiemlou made a careful observation that perhaps, if Hilda wanted to avoid attention, screaming might exacerbate the problem.

She gave him a very deep stare. One hand drew to her belt, to the ball that Atlas should have taken, but that he only handled from great distance with his psychic. It presented a certain threat, according to the reuniclus. One he was quick to usher Aeimlou away from.

She’s not that serious, Atlas reassured. Not well, by Aeimlou’s account, because Hilda would not stop staring at him, hand unmoving on her hip. Just give her a few minutes. She’ll listen, but obstinately refuse to let you know. A tremor of frustration rumbled between them. Atlas shook heavily in the air. Just something to get accustomed to.

So he complied, somewhat. Keeping just in range to hover, yet far enough to seem as though he were practicing—exploring the hollowed knots of trunks and prodding around thick bushes for stray berries.

Atlas’ words were true. She did not send him back to the ball. They ran into many more pokemon. Hilda let her flock take care of them much more quietly. Her stare returned as a vengeful challenger. But Aeimlou had no more words for her. She had, indeed, listened.

Then, nothing happened. And continued to happen. Their paced picked up as trees began to clear for flatter plains and distant, sloping grass trailing into sand and sea. It was Aeimlou’s turn to concentrate on hovering to keep up, so he still could not converse beyond brief words. And once they stopped to rest the flock fled and Hilda and Atlas were tired also. They liked to share the breadth of that backpack she lugged around. And chat faintly about Aeimlou’s progress.

He did not see the need to talk about what was obvious. He had made progress, but not enough.

Finally, after many more stops and starts and as the smell of salt overtook that of moss, darkness arrived. Time to rest. Atlas initially tried to convince Aeimlou to stay out of the ball, but Hilda suggested otherwise and he did not mind so inside he would go.

Atlas had some last words for him.

Alright, he said. Hilda had started a fire to cook on. Only stray embers remained. Glowing angrily against darkness like a predator’s eyes opening through the thicket. They were enough to cast Atlas’ pale body in a warmth that vanished still into cool darkness.

Still, Aeimlou did not need to see. He simply let their psychic maintain the warmth of the fire. Felt Atlas through that. He learned quickly that a physical form never became as detailed or expressive as this.

It’s been eight hours, Atlas said simply. Breathlessly.

Aeimlou thought about it for a while. He remembered being asked to remember.

Eight hours to circumnavigate the globe.

And breathlessness came for him, too.

Aeimlou knew a certain awe that came through when others faced him. For the first time, he felt it also.

Eight hours was no time at all.

He could go anywhere.

Suddenly, he understood his own strangeness for not minding the ball. He felt himself strangely, too. The ball was static. Unreal, by Hilda’s explanation. He had everything outside, and no reason nor lack of ability to find it. But what was everything? Where could he find it? Why did he need it?

These ideas reminded him of Atlas’ lake of thought. Aeimlou sensed a certainty there. He could not explain it.

So instead he sat his chin in the sand. Squinted into fading light. Clacked his beak together in a steady rhythm and whistled a little tune underneath it. The others were resting or building a nest for everyone to sleep in.

He drew little circles in the sand and counted as they came into existence within seconds; he would like to circle the globe—

(The thought drew a sore pang through him. From deep in his mind, into his chest and up his fins.)

—Well, not yet. He had stopped hovering from an exhausted, beak-pulled psychic and could not do much even energised.

While Hilda and Atlas set up a flimsy, flapping nest to shield them against the night, Aeimlou stayed on his belly, watching the embers fade into the night. He sat there. Whistled lowly to himself. Blinked dumbly and did not know what to think.

 

[tomatorade]

Chapter Nine
People and People and People

The flock shared a single moment atop a hill.

Castelia waited beyond. Over many human paths cut through acres of forest. Aeimlou faintly recognised some as a resting spot he and the ravens once shared between long journeys. A great long structure stretched across the water—for all the humans and their vehicles to cross. At the end, silhouettes of human nests blinking with confused light.

For once, the others did not flee. They waited. Alongside him and Hilda and Atlas. And shared in their connection and were otherwise silent. Hilda put her hands on her hips and fingered the straps tying all her supplies to her back and this is all reflected in their connection with one, great sag. The others fired off, also. Aeimlou was versed enough in the weight Hilda added. Or the complicated, ever changing landscape of Atlas’ mind, but these other minds plucked unevenly on his psychic like all these beaks dipping into water to find the last morsels floating there. He could not tell which feeling belonged to which creature. Not even as he studied pointy snouts and whiskers and washes of purple fur beating steadily over a heart and wondered.

This did not matter so much. They were all disappointed. Apathetic. Bemused. Worried. Exasperated.

Even Aeimlou, as he wanted to fight this sticky tree-sap feeling they left him with. He had seen Castelia. He had flown over it and thought nothing. Atlas explained each blinking square as a home, like Juniper’s, for a human, pokemon, mate and family.

And so it made sense for those nests to be large. There were many humans, after all. Perhaps even some thousands.

But he was also set up to feel some kind of way about it. Hilda made plain her hatred. Atlas his slight, fearful awe. He expected his change to introduce some sort of shift, but it did not. His feelings as a raven were fleeting, but he was not impressed back then either.

So Aeimlou smiled. He let a faint warble of happiness slip through. The others met him strangely.

Their connection was quite in line. Truly, he felt in-tune at that moment.

He knew it would not last. The others left soon after.

He would like to get closer.

~(0)~

There were many reasons Aeimlou no longer accepted requests to go into the ball. Hilda assumed because of Atlas’ influence which, while a reasonable assumption considering the way Atlas sighed wetly at every suggestion, was not the case.

Neither was it the case that he simply wanted to be difficult, as per Hilda’s second suggestion. Though Aeimlou had heard her describe nearly everything as ‘difficult’. From him, to each other individual in the flock, to the weather as it rained, and her own body whenever she rested on a toppled log and rubbed at her chest or sides and sighed deeply in the direction of the city.

Truthfully, it hindered his ability to train. Earlier, he did not have the language to describe it, but Atlas called it ‘draining’ and Aiemlou felt that an adequate description. The ball somehow created less than no stimulation. He could not focus for thinking of how bland and unengaging the artificial forest was—holding no winds or smells, the sounds repeating every so often. He might have bore it. If not for the promise of an entire globe of things to engage him.

His decision seemed to come at a bad moment.

“Are you serious? Now?” Hilda said.

It’s his choice, Hilda. Atlas said, bubbling like the mouth of a creek. But warm and self-satisfied. You should respect it.

Yes, even Aeimou knew the reuniclus had waited many nights for him to reject the pokeball. Waited with a hidden glee that Hilda saw through quite easily.

“I’m not gonna force him.” Hilda huffed. “I’m just telling him he’s being a pain in the ass.”

Maybe he likes the attention, Atlas retorted, waving a hand at Aeimlou. He shared that full feeling with a light whistle and a smile.

“Right. And you? You’re gonna have a great time on the trip through? Out and forced to talk with me and a bunch of strangers?” Hilda shot back. She had already begun walking, leaving in her wake the expectation they would follow. And the path laid itself out before her—all this dark earth still rugged from previous rain—the hundreds of pawprints a first sign of human community.

The wet and mud that Hilda stepped through seemed also to afflict Atlas’ connection. He sagged midair, feeding Aeimlou his chill.

I suppose I’m not exactly an extrovert. But I’ll bear it for Aeimlou.

Atlas managed to find something strong in his response. Or the way he crept close to Aeimlou, reaching a sun-warmed fist to mould around one of his fins. He shook mildly midair, but had enough presence to bear it with a coo.

Hilda paused for a moment in the middle of the path, something tugging down the corners of her mouth, her eyes. She stuck her hand to her hips and surveyed back and forth, up and down the path, letting Aeimlou follow her along with a faint, befuddled stare. He was not quite sure what she wanted to find. Other humans, perhaps, and hopefully; he enjoyed Hilda and Juniper and if the rest of Hilda’s flock was not interested in him, other humans might be.

But if she searched for humans, they were not there. Not down the path and not on his or Atlas’ faces when she looked back at them. And thought for a while. The emotions that played across her face reaching out to Aeimlou as the sound of dirt creatures waking up for warm months.

“I’m too fuckin’ nice, aren’t I? I’ve raised you terribly, Atlas. Should have told you to hold everything close to your chest. Or something.” She shrugged, scratching a speck on her arm.

Atlas gripped tight around Aeimlou’s fin. Emotionally, he often seemed to be something like a blunting branch for a bird’s talons—only for Hilda, instead. Here, he had nothing. He, himself, grew sharper.

Aeimlou could not tell what idea he took umbrage with there. But the idea of other humans grew more energetic in his mind, and waiting in the middle of an empty path did not inspire him. He prodded Atlas. Then Hilda. They shook from their thoughts a moment.

How many humans nest in Castelia? When do we get to see them? There is nothing in this forest that interests me.

And then both stared Aeimlou between them. Neither had an encouraging energy to add to their connection.

See? He’s made his decision, Hilda, Atlas said, now unlatching from Aeimlou and pressing forward, beyond even Hilda as she dug further into the mud.

She watched. Remarkably unfazed for what Aeimlou knew of her.

Though Atlas’ connection wobbled like a spiderweb picked through by beaks. Maybe she could sense that.

~(0)~

On a night closer to Castelia, only Hilda was up. She caught Aeimlou on his belly. In the dark shadow of the grass just outside the glowing remains of her bonfire. The light caught her cheeks and chin. The rest of her features hid except a glint reflected in her eyes.

It had grown cold over the course of the day. Unseasonably so.

Perhaps for the first time, the whole flock was out and sleeping. Some together, entwined, Aeimlou supposed, for the warmth of another body. Atlas hovered off by himself. Still sleeping, but with no need to stay grounded.

Aeimlou found that sort of autonomy fascinating to watch. And yet he gravitated more towards those sleeping bodies he did not see often. Chests rose and fell lightly against each other. All these hills of fur and scales and skin, and Aeimlou seeming to soar above them without landing.

He found it strange. Everything else seemed comfortable to approach him in this new body. And he had tried, also, to approach them. He’d sent out some signals, some prods and trails, only to be ignored.

Irritating, really. Being ignored was something he quite minded.

He huffed, scattering some dry leaves across the dirt. Hilda watched from the other side, raising her brows. Though she did not smile.

“They’re not talking to you, huh?” she spoke for the first time in a while. She slept late, and at the moment searched through her bag.

Aeimlou could not speak without Atlas. And did not yet have the ability to form his own connections. He gave a light whistle he hoped sounded like a confirmation.

Hilda shrugged. Her hair pooled around her shoulders, let down from those ties she wrapped it up in. Though Aeimlou could sense a vague ambivalence from her, he felt numb not having the full scope—vulnerable like the sleeping flock not far from him. Nights were quiet. Something consistent across his life.

“They probably won’t. Especially not with you creeping around, waiting for them to be interested in you.” She slipped off her shoes next—something Aeimlou had learned were not part of her feet and could be removed—settting them beside her tent. “Just saying.”

Aeimlou watched as she performed her night routine. Rubbing her face with a handful of water scooped from a nearby river, nibbling on little snacks she had pulled from her bag.

“They’re not obligated to like you or talk to you. This isn't a friendship. I don’t know what you think it is, but—” She hesitated, taking a deep breath. The hole to her shelter flapped steadily against a light wind. “I dunno. I’ve talked a lot about what being a trainer is, but I haven’t said that yet. It’s important.” She met Aeimlou’s eyes. Grew stronger in her repose. Night crept steadily along. Those stray threads of thought flowing through the air sagged, waiting to land amongst the grass and sleep, finally.

“All these kids fucking around—and I get it—they’re young, kicked down, laid out, waiting for someone to give them a chance, and they think they have something. Someone will finally be forced to give a fuck about them.”

She slid her outer layers off. Her skin prickled in the cold but she did not seem to notice even under the bare protection of a white fabric hanging loosely off her shoulders. She scowled and , as her head tilted, the light flickered and cast the rest of her face in a flat shadow that stretched and morphed as she spoke.

“But that’s a lie. You’re not family. You’re not friends. Not coworkers. Barely allies, I guess. If nothing gives a fuck about you at home, they sure as hell aren’t when you’re dirty and starving in the middle of the forest. So I don’t know what you think it is, but it’s not any of that shit,” She said.

Aeimlou blinked, trying to catch up to her words. Hilda sighed. Some of her anger had returned. Hot and creasing over the bridge of her nose.

“Ol’ bleeding heart Atlas told me about you. I don’t know how it’s possible for a raven to become—” She gestured at his whole body. “--that. But fine, I’ve seen wilder shit. Just listen when I tell you it’s not a pack or whatever. This is conditional.”

That, he understood. And took to watching the sleeping bodies again. He could not deny wanting what she spoke about. Yet, he could not have it? Hilda spoke a lot about what this was not, but she had yet to tell him what it was instead. Aside from training. And that word became more complex every day.

Hilda was not done speaking.

“If you want them to respect you. Talk to you or whatever, you need to put up something they want. Sepira wouldn’t even give Reshiram the time of day without battling first—honestly—and it’s taken me years to get to the point we can all just sit here, alone together.”

She stood up now. Shook the irritation off her, expression morphing into a yawn which morphed into something fading and tired. Aeimlou found it contagious, unable to stop himself cracking his beak open, letting faint tears pool at the corners of his eyes.

She looked over at him once more, seeming as if she wanted to keep speaking on and on. It was true, in Aeimlou’s opinion, that despite herself, Hilda liked to have someone else to talk to.

But tonight wore on her. She broke into another yawn. Her energy gave up on her. She shuffled off with a quiet goodnight, leaving him to watch her shadow play on the fabric on her shelter until the light flicked off also and left the area dark.

Aside from the coals.

Aeimlou tried to watch the not-flock through the darkness. Their outlines blended together until they formed one mass, Atlas reflecting green-tinted moonlight above them.

He was inclined to believe her. But was not sure what he could give them, like he was not sure how to do something remarkable, like he was not sure how he became what he was.

Once he knew how to fly, he could bring berries and dead creatures from the rivers. But he remained weak. And could admit his own impatience. Watching the not-flock traipse through the woods on their own stirred something in him.

As Aeimlou tried to sleep in a nest of stray grasses and fabrics, he settled back on Atlas’ signature.

He would have to ask sometime.

~(0)~

They waited at the foot of the bridge.

They had been waiting for quite a while.

Hilda sat on some wooden, human constructions and travelled her fingers along her glowing square and rubbed the morning light from her eyes as it forced its way through the bridge’s many red spires and branches and across their little plains of stone and shallow puddles.

Aeimlou could admit to being excited. The morning did not hurt him the way it hurt Hilda. Atlas, too, who reclined on the bench beside Hilda and bubbled with a morning sickness Aeimlou heard through their connection.

The rest of the flock chose to stay in their balls. They were in before Aeimlou even woke up. He would like not to be upset by that.

But besides, he was excited. He exercised some newfound height by feeling around the stubby barriers on all sides of their platform, poking his beak through little gray diamonds that took cold nips at his face on contact. Great budding trees spread before him and into the sea. The passing of human craft did not disturb them. And sent faint giggles through him as they passed through the oppressive shadow of the bridge. White peaks met them on all sides. A nice smell came up from the water. Salt and decay, as he liked it.

He knew now the reason the others were not so excited for the city itself. The buildings were large, but very flat, and they were not able to go into any of them. They would be travelling through.

Still, those dots travelling along the boxy stone beaches across the water were exciting.

Why have we not seen more people yet? he asked, still turned to the ocean. One sigh and one grumble answered behind him.

“You’ve met me already,” Hilda cut through. Her voice was still gummy and deep from waking. “How can you want to meet anyone else? I can’t have made a good impression.”

You have impressed upon Atlas, Aeimlou reminded, eagerly. A spark of warmth skittered from Atlas. Though he seemed far too tired for much else. Juniper was nice, also. And you still have food left in your bag. Do you think the other people will have more? They have hands. Surely, they carry it around. Unless they have bags like yours. Were you born with it or did you make it yourself?

Aeimlou turned, looking Hilda in the eyes. Though they were already dark, they seemed to sink even darker now. And as Aeimlou thought of another question and chirped and opened his mouth, Hilda’s box made that irritating, shouting noise.

That meant she would be sighing and ignoring him to talk to her box for however long. A common sight, if one she always frowned and grumbled through.

Aeimlou let out a low whistle and turned, instead, to Atlas.

Only to find that he had fallen asleep, a green mass on the bench.

Which left him alone.

He blinked, looking out over the area. A cold wind blew across the stone, kicking scraps of leaves up from the crack.

What should he do? He would not prod Atlas. Not today, when he was tired and would wake up upset. And Hilda had grown remarkably agile with it. She would not react in the moment. She would wait. Later, she would find him after he guided Atlas to sort through his feathers and ruffle them with a vigorous hand, ruining the work.

He would find other solutions, but she proved too clever for the moment.

So he found himself floating along the perimeter again. Prodding at the barrier. Cold and hard slipping between his claws. The staircase back down tempted him, but he was not much interested in the forest. Across the other side, a ramp led up into the gleaming spires and across the water.

Both were empty. Aeimlou grumbled to himself. He had waited very long for other humans. Neither Hilda nor Atlas promised anything, but they had also worked against him in this case—the reason they woke so early was explicitly to avoid other humans.

He could only circle.

He tried training once more. Off in the corner, on his own. He watched the others all the while—neither budging. Hilda would glance over her shoulder in dry pauses, but by the way her lips thinned, Aeimlou suspected she did not understand or care.

And he could not focus. The humans should come by either entrance, limited as they were to ground paths. Nature made itself known—whether by the chirping of insects or chattering of other flocks or indistinct rustling and scratching against the rocks.

Unfortunately, Aeimlou did not have enough experience to intuit what sound a human would make. And so he distracted himself by watching. At the worst moments, as he floated a length higher than usual and thought he heard a conversation and coasted a little off until he clipped his wing against the fence and tumbled to the ground with a yelp and a ruffle of feathers, harsh noise resonating from the barrier.

Whether Hilda heard his tumble and reacted, or simply finished her conversation with the square, he could not say. But once Aeimlou recovered enough that his blurred vision became solid again, she stood above him. Atlas, too, peeked back at him over the bench.

“The bus should be here soon,” she said, hands on hips. “We should head down to the road.”

Bus? Atlas grumbled from the bench. He could lift himself slightly, now. And project his turbulent wakeup in the form of thousands of invisible currents. I thought you said we wouldn’t need to be recalled. The last instance, our driver was fairly clear on their policy.

Hilda scoffed. She waved a hand.

“Since when do you care about policy?”

Well, I certainly remember what happened last time.

“That was before I saved Unova.”

Atlas gurgled lowly. He had picked himself off the bench and floated dully around the chunky stone exit framing the staircase. Aeimlou tried to send him a signal, but got no response. The conversation was rapidly leaving his understanding.

I don’t believe that matters to the bus driver. And I thought we were meant to get through Castelia without incident.

“Nobody wants to go into a pokeball, so I don’t know what you want from me. Bird boy isn’t gonna fit in a cab. We sure as fuck aren’t walking.”

What I want is for you to listen to your own concerns.

Hilda snorted. “Uh-huh. Sorry, who’s talking?”

A prickle of irritation spread out from Atlas’ connection.

Good luck convincing them, I suppose.

But if this was meant as an appeal, it had little success. Hilda clicked her tongue and strolled up to Altas’ side, lingering by the barrier. Only after a long period of eye contact did Aeimlou realise she wanted him to follow.

“I’m not afraid to throw my weight around. What are they gonna do?”

And so she trailed off back down the stairs, ignoring the waves of irritation she left in her wake. But there was not much Atlas could do except clench his fists until they dissolved into a great green mass. And usher Aeimlou down the stairs behind her.

Unfortunately, that lead to more waiting. They found a bench leaning in a grove of overgrown whiteflowers, each big and bursting across the slick black that denoted many human creations. The fabled bus took long enough for both Hilda and Atlas to fall asleep once again, each snoring faintly on their own sides.

Here, Aeimlou could only wait.

His own irritation built quite neatly. Prickling and restless in a way that caused the others to twitch in their sleep as they felt it also. The woods watched on—he spotted the eyes of pokemon peering on through walls of foliage. But none stepped out or responded to his prods with anything more than a yelp. They retreated back into the dark.

Until the bus came.

He heard it before he saw it, his chin down on one edge of the bench, staring down the deep rivets dragging up and down the dirt path. A rumble sounded. At first, so small it might have been another sound from the forest. But it increased. Sawed through everything in a way the insects’ incessant buzzing never did.

He faintly recognised sounds like it—those that rumbled the foundations of their bench and could be felt from very far away. By the time it broke through a thin layer of fog, tumbling through the trees and roaring onto the dirt, his companions had been rumbled awake.

It…

Was a box. Tall and unsurprising—he did, actually, recognise similar things from long trips watching over human settlements. He simply had not had the chance to come so close. Here, it was an unnatural red and quite intimidating. Some rows of seats poked into vision from within. Some with great spaces between. Humans occupied some. Though the seats vastly outnumbered them.

Well.

Aiemlou snorted. He did not understand the humans’ obsession with boxes. Everything needed to be square to them. Even the openings. Those too-small squares that were hardly large enough to allow creatures to clamber through. He could see through them to the other side, also, with a sliver of space between walls which was not inspiring. He tried to send out some signals, but a bleary Atlas had only woken up then and their connection only just struggled to life.

Aeimlou lagged behind as they yawned and stretched and approached. The door folded open on its own for them. Another human leaned forward in their seat, surrounded on all sides by buttons and knobs and lights that all lined up eagerly to be prodded. But while Aeimlou would have liked to poke around, the human held his attention. A new face. One with bushy, bristly hair sprouting from a pointy chin. Dark eyes narrowed at Hilda. Narrowed further at Atlas squeezing through the entrance.

And shot open. Wide and shining in the harsh yellow light stuttering from the ceiling. The others stepped up the stairs and around the first row of seats. But they hovered. Hilda, especially with a quirk of the eyebrows and the thinnest smile.

“Whuh—” the human mumbled. He blinked, shuffling in his seat and tugging at his sleeves. Then he cleared his throat. Sent a stern look back at Hilda. “Dunno what this is. Ditto or what,” he grumbled, “Can’t let ‘em on free like that, though.”

“Yeah you can. You already have.” Hilda sniped. She tapped her fingers against the railing she leant on.

“C’mon, lady.”

Hilda— Atlas bubbled into the conversation. At least try not to make a scene.

“What? Why would I do anything like that?” She said, “He’s not a ditto, by the way.”

Once again, the human’s eyes widened. He gripped tightly to his chair. Atlas slid back into the aisle, floating between Hilda and the other human as if anticipating a fight. Of course, his attention was fully pointed at Hilda.

You’re making it sound like a threat.

“He can call the rangers if he wants. I’m not fuckin’ budging.”

And the human bit his lip. One hand grabbed a device nestled at his hip. He fumbled with it a bit. Held it up for them to see. Traced the buttons with a finger.

Hilda did not twitch. She let out a quick breath through her nose. Then climbed back up the stairs. She did not make it to the aisle before being interrupted.

The human sighed. “Could ya just put… him away?” And a point to Aeimlou, to which he pointed back.

“He’s not mine. Wouldn’t listen to a damn thing I say, anyways.”

“C’mon!”

But far too late, she’d already fled. Heavy stomping following her through. She vanished beyond a floor-to-ceiling partition which blocked the rest of the bus. Her thumping continued on, but muffled, then settled. Here, some indistinct chatter leaked through, swirling with faint hairs of emotion. Aeilou only noticed them now. The man’s was most strong—strong enough Aeimlou could sense how it swirled and clung to the even cracks in the wall behind him.

The human looked at Aiemlou. Aeimlou looked back. He tried to smile, but the man frowned. He would like to say hello. But Atlas’ connection did not include him.

So silent seconds passed. And the man seemed to age in real time, wrinkles deepening over the bridge of his nose. He shook his head. Waved a hand and faced forward once more, mumbling something about his schedule.

Nothing to do for it, now. At least we won’t be confined, I suppose. Atlas said. One gelatinous arm reached out to Aeimlou, draping over his neck.

He let the reuniclus guide him up. Though he had not lost his focus on the man.

Hilda and the man were kin, in many ways. Or reasonable to each other, at the very least. Yet she seemed more hostile here than she had been with Juniper. And all these humans did not seem from separate territories—they spoke like they knew of each other, if only faintly. They did not seem in competition yet neither did they seem cordial.

Strange.

Does Hilda approach all humans that way? He asked.

Atlas did not hesitate. Yes. Everyone and everything, he said, I mean, it’s not like she’s less stubborn around us.

But they are both human, at least.

Nevermind. Now Atlas hesitated, stuck between the partitions and painting the beyond—all those seats and spaces, the dangling legs of people poking beneath his pale body—in vibrant green. Something heavy settled over them.

What does that matter?

I understand our differences. We are strangers in body, all of us. Some distance makes sense. Humans are the different, I believe, but they grate together as they do with us.

And you believe that's natural?

Yes.

Atlas’ weight increased. He pressed against the wall. Turned. Though his eyes could not be squinted, Aeimlou had the sense those two black specks were trying.

In what way? We are different? But are you and I not close?

Yes. I believe so. But we do not have to be.

And Atlas simply sat there. It was his turn to sit dumbly and wait for Aeimlou to talk. A memory of Aeimlou blinking washed over their connection.

But Aeimlou agreed with the image. He had no more to say. He did not know why the reuniclus had turned like this—feeling both hot and cold at once.

He could not dwell. He could not answer further.

A gasp sounded from the aisles, breaking them from their little circle.

Most of the seats were empty. But on a close one, just a couple rows away, a very small human leaned over their armrest, hundreds of coiled strands of hair flowing down from their scalp. Bright, sparkling eyes fixed Aeimlou in place. Her mouth widened. Only until he noticed, then the human yelped and jumped back into hiding.

We can discuss this later, Atlas said. As if this was an important discussion. As if Aeimlou would commit each word to memory.

He still did not know why he should.

Atlas must have sensed his confusion. The reuniclus shook faintly in the air.

You’ll get to meet humans here, at least. Have a good time. I’ll be back with Hilda.

Atlas, though complicated, could not help but show did not have a great control over his emotions. As he left, clearing the hallway to a full view of many humans peeking as the little one did, the heat followed him. Shameful and burning in a way Aeimlou had not felt from him.

It hurt. Aiemlou could not pretend otherwise.

The little human returned. This time she poked out with a smile, tugging a larger lookalike over her seat with her.

“Latios!” She giggled. Pointed. “See! I told you!”

And the lookalike gasped.

And Aeimlou wanted to enjoy this.

But Atlas had already settled in a chair beside Hilda and he found that quite strange.

 

[tomatorade]

Chapter ten
The bus chapter

The upright beams of Skyarrow bridge whipped by in a gray blur. The first signs of the city came through as colourful smudges of early-morning cyclists puffing their way alongside them. Atlas stirred beside her. Despite sulking in his chair, acting like a petty bitch made from melting jello, he couldn’t stop sneaking glances at Aeimlou as the busy bee nibbled on some little girl’s apple.

If there’s one benefit Hilda thought would come from the bus, it would be the easy distractions. Shiny metal things and shinier Unovan urbanites to keep Aeimlou occupied. Plus, enough space for him and Atlas to trail after each other like confused litten and leave her alone.

She should’ve known never to assume things would just work out. To be fair, she didn’t expect Atlas to be the one causing problems. Of all the times he decided to show his age and yammer on about dumb shit, it had to be now, trapping her against the window of a bus.

Hilda rubbed her eyes. Maybe she could pretend to fall asleep.

Oh, but who the fuck was she kidding. This was Atlas. He’d just read her brainwaves or some shit.

“I don’t know what you expected,” she grumbled. Leaned back. Tried to crick her neck against the scratchy, fabric headrest.

It’s jarring to think about, Hilda. Even acknowledging these sorts of hierarchies worries me.

“He was a bird a week ago, what the fuck are you talking about?”

He’s quite intelligent.

“He was a bird!” Hilda snapped. Across from them some wet-haired guy in a suit glanced at her over his newspaper. So she lowered her voice, forcing the words through her teeth in a quiet hiss. “He was like, born a week ago. Let me say this again: what the fuck did you expect? It’s a miracle he can function at all. Who cares he’s not gonna tear down the establishment with you?”

It isn’t about that, Atlas rumbled. His thoughts were so loud Hilda could catch glimpses of faint images—black specks passing through an open sky, a group of humans huddled around an open fire, flickers of energy, blasts of water, electric lances.

“Then what?”

Atlas took a while to answer. He couldn’t keep his attention away from Aeimlou, either—and Hilda was forced to share in some of that even as he clearly tried to steer the mix of different warmths from comforting to burning.

She scratched her neck. Tried to draw attention away from it. She should be familiar with these kind of images. It’s most of how he talked, anyways, but she couldn’t help but feel intrusive. Only these days, though. There used to be a wonder there that now only poked out in one of Altas’ rare moods.

Atlas was her only concession to selfishness back when she still rooted around for pokemon like a tepig rooted for truffles. She had wandered through route 5. Got slapped by an image so strong she still hadn’t forgotten it. And after a quick bit of research resolved to catch herself a solosis. Atlas. She wanted to believe he’d sent her the image, but that was probably bullshit.

And just a memory of a river, anyway.

Atlas found his bearings.

I don’t know. I suppose I’m insecure. It’s not my place to teach in this way. It’s too close to what I dislike.

He paused. Calmed a little and seemed to let her have some quiet. She huffed and took it, at least until she gathered the courage to be compassionate and reply.

They passed through the big blocks, the bank blocks and highrise monoliths that drowned the bus in solid fields of shadows as they shuttered to a halt at every overzealous jaywalker and traffic light. Aeimlou still poked his nose at every brief stab of attention, but didn’t seem to notice the honking and commotion just barely leaking through the bus windows. Would he even care? There were millions of people out those windows, but he couldn’t reach them from in here.

Turning out onto the sideroads, up to highway east, took them over another river and into view of the distant smokestacks across the way.

“What did you think you were agreeing to?” Hilda asked, finally. Her breath misted the window and hid her reflection.

Something different.

“We have to teach him, Atlas.”

I don’t trust we’ll do a good job.

Hilda shrugged, leaning into the harsh plastic wall of the bus.

“You don't trust I’ll do a good job, you mean.”

To his credit, Atlas didn’t show much shame. Some disgruntled creature wriggled through their connection. One he definitely stole from her.

Interpret that any way you want.

“Yeah, well…”

They sank back into silence. Not awkwardly, though. Hilda’d known enough of that in the back of government cars. Awkward silence was trying to find something to say—this was knowing what the other would say and not needing to elaborate.

Still, there were some gaps. She leaned to her other side. Against the armrest, feeling Atlas’ cool gel slick the hairs on her arm. A hand trying to warm her in the cold.

Maybe she’d visit her mom after Undella.

“You’ll fuck him up no matter what you do.”

That didn’t seem to comfort him. Those turbulent waves started roiling.

That’s the issue.

“Is it? Just try. It’s all you can do. Otherwise, he’ll go somewhere else and get fucked up there.” She bumped his arm in some weird example of a handshake. He jiggled slightly but did not react. “I mean, I trust you more than most other people. He likes you.”

And Atlas wouldn’t say shit to that, but she could feel him press back against her.

The bus rumbled out of the city centre and into the suburbs, all these plain-roofed squares of shingles sprawling beneath the slats of the Pedestrian East bridge crossing the river. They wouldn’t spend much time there. Already, the houses thinned and the roads widened and rows of strip malls sat marooned in great parking lots where the lawns used to be. Hilda let out a breath. She leaned back against her seat. Her hair was greasy, pooling around her shoulders and sticking around her neck.

It was too cold to swim, but she’d get a shower in Undella. If only at the pokemon center. She was used to rivers, though, so how the fuck could she complain?

“Yeah, I get it,” she said. To herself.

She couldn’t be the one to make Atlas happy. Still, she was the only person he talked to. Could find a good kind of silence with. Aeimlou was his second best and they'd only know each other a week or so.

“I was talking to him,” she slipped in. Slyly, she hoped.

About what? Atlas asked, sitting up as much as he could. His body jiggled and the squiggly patterns on his seat turned to wobbly little smiles through his gel.

What? Concerned, maybe? Hilda could almost smirk.

“I’m not telling you.”

He rippled.

I should be worried, then.

“You could always ask him.”

He paused, an electric shock passing between them as if he’d been caught. It scattered quickly, into a dulling chill.

Oh. Very subtle, Hilda.

“Just have a fuckin’ conversation with him. Why are you still here? Poor bastard hasn’t been able to needle a single other person yet without his talking-mouth blob to speak for him.” She crossed her arms, waggling her eyebrows at the young couple confusedly trying to sort out what Aeimlou meant by a series of coos and hand gestures. “And it’s not like there’s ten million other opportunities and a hundred years to do that shit. He needs it now, mom.”

Atlas sighed--an odd gurgling sound that echoed in Hilda's skull.

Fine.

He pushed himself off the armrest, leaving a carpet of stray fabric hairs reaching for him from the seat. None stuck to him, somehow.

Whether his turbulence on rising was because of the bus rolling out onto an uncertain, pothole-ridden highway or his lingering discomfort, Hilda couldn’t tell. He pretended to be finished with her. Took a long look back and sent her something strong. As if he’d decided this.

Drama queen.

At least she had a second to herself.

Well, until she looked out the window. A solid rush of green blew past a second. Then she blinked and the dead, gray ocean stared back at her. They couldn’t be far off, now.

Great.

 

[tomatorade]

Chapter eleven
Opposititis

Undella beach should be empty. Early still in time and season. At least, the desolate square of gravel lined by stilted log benches said so.

Well, not quite desolate. One dark car—a solid black from tires to windows—watched, lonely, across the sea and to the faint crowns of rocks that hid with the bobbing of the waves.

And the man who leaned against the hood and tried very hard to look like he belonged.

“You guys should go,” Hilda mumbled. Atlas and Aeimlou hovered behind her, still watching the far road, squinting through a cloud of dust that lingered in the wake of the bus. “Just get lost for a while. You remember the pokemon center?”

A hard question bubbled up from Atlas and dangled between them. Then he must have seen it, too. He cut the question and let it flatten against the road.

He bobbed midair.

I understand. Come, Aeimlou. We can talk elsewhere.

Aeimlou tilted his head. Pointy nose scrunching up between fast blinking eyes.

Hilda couldn’t feel it directly, but Atlas showed him something. Intimate, based on what she’d known. A memory deep in the corner of Driftveil, thin tent nylon against her back, shivering. She couldn't hug a cold body like she used to hug her blanket, so they could only share comforting thoughts.

I understand, Aeimlou said. And nodded. Like she used to when she didn’t understand.

But he still floated after Atlas and into the forest and that’s all that mattered.

Now for the team.

Releasing your pokemon needed more of a delicate process than dumbass teenagers realised. Hilda had her own strategy. Sepira first. As respect, though the serperior didn’t like to pretend she cared. All she needed was a spot to unfurl, fernlike and regal. And a bow to send her off.

Kid and Butch always came out together. A scrafty and mienshao were an unlikely duo, especially since she found them halfway across Unova. Especially since half the time they came out hissing and spitting at each other. But whatever. All they did was brood when they were alone and she had no clue what knotted bullshit they got their relationship into. So they came out together. This time was nice enough. Thankfully for Hilda’s mood they decided they’d listen and took a head start down the rocky beach path and across to Undella proper.

Ace would probably never fully trust the rest of the team—blame that on waking up a million years after your species went extinct—but she could at least tolerate them now. Even if that meant forcing Hilda to release her last so she could dart to the nearest tree, rip up through understory in a mess of cracking branches, prehistoric squawks and loose feathers, and perch on the summit, a flimsy, bendy arm of pine bowing under her weight until she felt comfortable enough to glide in whatever direction she decided. Screeching the whole way.

And Hilda wondered if Ace knew she wasn’t actually last or just feigned ignorant for Hilda’s benefit. Either way, Giran always came out last. Some dumbass once told her releasing a chandelure without backup would kill her.

Coward.

She kind of got it, though. Giran liked to throw a fit no matter how many times she told him people didn't build mansions in the middle of forests and those they did build tended to have people living in them. But he was too sensitive of a candle to do much harm except to the carpets of dead leaves or Sepira, when she let him.

Juniper said once she’d found evidence chandelure existed before the mansions they liked to haunt. Which seemed like some sort of existential crisis, but whatever. There were plenty of empty buildings in Undella for him to fuck around in, so Hilda gave him the good news, took his happy little chime on the chin, and watched him float after Kid and Butch.

She almost found herself smiling. Or at least unfolding her arms.

And then she turned back to the very, very, very inconspicuous figure. He’d turned to her, sunglasses perched on the tip of his nose, hair slicked back. He didn’t have his suit on, but a blazer and collared shirt didn’t make him look like less of a cop.

Dickhead. It’s not even summer yet.

~(0)~

It wasn’t even summer yet.

Isaac knew he shouldn’t stress about people coming to Undella because that’s what people do and that’s what Undella is for. But one lone, black car parked on top of the cliff was weird, wasn't it? Nobody was supposed to come to Undella for a while. Not for the seance, definitely not for vacation.

Isaac should still have until summer.

He tried to breathe. Curled his claws around the glowing curtains still draped over his window until they met and ran through his train of thought again. One car didn’t mean a sudden invasion. It didn’t shift the calendar. Spring still filled every little nook of the house with a wet cold and the sun still barely warmed anything. And he shouldn’t be shivering either because he wasn’t cold. It’s not something he felt often anymore.

Mostly tired.

He hadn’t been sleeping. He didn’t think he had to. Sometimes the light would collapse over the forest and he would instinctively yawn despite not knowing where his mouth was. He’d lie on his old, dusty, still sheet-covered bed, and stare at the ceiling until King popped by and dragged him out to train or he got bored.

Except now dull prickles stung the corners of his eyes and found himself unconsciously rubbing them like a crying toddler. The images that stained his vision when he drifted had grown stronger and stronger until they grew colour and form and didn’t leave easily.

He just hoped the nightmare wouldn’t stop by when he finally crashed.

Isaac peeked back through the curtains, struggling to force his eyes open against the light.

The man had left. The car’s dull white headlights stared him down, but at least the man left.

He sighed and slumped against his bed, claws curled around his knees.

When would King get back? The question popped up too much for comfort. It’s not like the bisharp had proved himself besides being a general threat.

He had an aura though. Some sort of boogeyman. That took a liking to him for some reason. Was it weird that Isaac felt safer him with around? Maybe not stomping around the beachouse, but when King went out to wherever he liked to go to, Isaac felt free. An empty beachouse seemed kind of sinister and made him think of his own death that hadn’t actually happened, but the thought that King would be back later kept the heaviness of it away.

Well, normally. When he wasn’t exhausted.

Isaac rose, dragging himself up by the curtains with a grunt. Another cautious glance confirmed that yes, the man had left, so he could dart over the bed and back into the hall without much but a whirl of dizziness passing him under the unlit doorframe. And he could tumble back downstairs and hover across the kitchen and through the living room and find his little comfort spot on the couch, surrounded by a growing pile of things King had shifted around or destroyed. Layers of dissected clothes over moved furniture—stools and chairs and pillows—all on emptied kitchen drawers dumped out and the insides painfully rearranged in metal rows that glowed orange at daybreak. Like the guts of moving boxes waiting to be put in their place.

Isaac fidgeted but would never ask. When he was a kid he liked to build his little kingdom of toys and sticks in the forest, where everything felt strange and un-homely—so the beachouse must be the same to King.

He kept his stare for a while. Hummed to himself and dug his knees so far into his chest they sank in. The light touched him. The soft, fabric brush against his back comforted him. The sounds of the ocean through—

He jolted. His eyes flickered back open, breath held high and tight in his chest. His claws shot up, pinching the edges of his mass and tried to force his eyelids. Open. Not that it had worked the first time—his mass seeped around his claws and settled into a dry squint.

Maybe he should watch TV.

He broke, whining, sounding something like a broken stereo, and thanking everything that King wasn’t there to see him melt down again. Maybe literally, this time. His edges seemed to blur and smudge the corners of his vision an ashen black.

He fumbled forward, claw stretched out to the coffee table. But as his mind caught up to his body and his claws tapped at an empty slab of glass, he found nothing.

Then drew his attention slowly to King’s pile. He couldn’t sort out one thing from another, in there.

Fine. Fuck it. He gave up. Deflated and sank back into his arms, eyes forced shut.

“No nightmares,” he whispered. “No nightmares, no nightmares. Please I— uh… please.”

Even when he tried to force his chin into his chest, counting his breaths and waiting, sleep did not come. Fear kept it away, snarling and biting at the dark whenever it threatened to take him under. Some nausea came with it—whether his fear protected him or not, Isaac still hated it and curled further into himself from it.

And then a knock sounded at the door. Three taps, sharp and resonant.

He almost didn’t want to acknowledge it.

And then thought about it for a moment. Little panicked thoughts shooed away his turmoil for the moment.

He drew himself from his mess. Daylight let him see through the foyer’s floor-to ceiling front windows. Even if they were icy and turned everything on the beach into pixellated blobs of beige and black.

Only now, something pastel floated there, bobbing up and down in migrating dots of yellow, pink and blue. Isaac coughed, but then it caught in his throat.

He felt it.

Even from his spot on the couch, a kind of atmospheric pressure felt over him like a dense, wool blanket. Equal parts stifling and comforting. A sort of instinct that Isacc thought he could let decide for him.

His mind drew back to first meeting King.

I felt your size, the bisharp ground out, echoing still from days before.

Is this what others felt from Isaac? Did everybody else get caught in this funnel that swirled around him? Theirs chased away his sleep, but he didn’t think his would be so inviting—probably ugly and strange and discomforting. Thought that begged the question.

He cleared his throat, still stuck a couple days in the past and wondered if he should open the door instead of desperately trying not to fall asleep..

“Uh… come in!” he called. Maybe too quiet. But not. The door cracked open. A curved head entered first, pale and glowing faintly and built in some facsimile of a swan’s.

They turned this way and that, glowing marble eyes taking in the house with a musical hum.

For the brief moment when their eyes met Isaacs’s and they smiled, he felt younger. In his mind, his snivy’s similar curled snout jerked up at his as she accepted him. A burst of genuine, actual joy cratered in his chest.

What was that?


~(0)~

So what was that?

Midas hissed. He tried to slow, the plume of water kicking up from the surf beneath him thinning to a mist. Even still, psychic pressure compressed under his fins until they dug between his feathers and built in his muscles. With a grunt and a stretch of the neck, he angled himself left, pointed to the human-built bay and let his psychic release, forcing him up and away from the surf.

He put his cloak on just in case. Sensation cut out. Flickered a while until it settled over him like the mist he’d left.

Invisible. Flawlessly. Even to his own eyes, the snout that once prominently stuck into his vision had vanished.

Perfect.

Midas coasted along the cliffs, up and over the trees until he met a sea of resting wingull rather than water. They ruffled as he passed overhead, the minute swirls of current he created eliciting some tired murmurs and croaks.

Otherwise, no fuss. They were incurious creatures.

He’d felt a pulse. A very strong psychic presence cutting through his musings as he felt along the coast for Undella—as directed to him from a discarded human document he’d barely managed to translate with the human words he’d learned. He huffed as he caught sight of the human settlement. He would certainly like not to go near any structure that white, unsightly or unnatural as the homes they built, but…

But the presence didn’t last long enough for him to pick it apart. A teleport, most likely. Also most likely not the new ascension. While Midas picked it up easily, for the average creature teleportation could take years.

Still, the settlement had the same shape as the Undella he expected, and he knew he wouldn’t be the only one speeding over either to take them on or take them in.

Which only meant he wasn’t first.

“An advantage,” he huffed to himself. Revelling in the mist of his breath and the confused waking of some wingull beneath him.

They must have known ahead of time. Mew told them, likely. She had always liked to throw some chaos where it didn’t belong.

Midas could not do much about that, though. Only curse her out and hover along the treeline, watching the occasional hazy silhouettes of people and pokemon alike meander along the path and through town. He could only watch so much, though, when the silhouettes vanished behind a treeline or into a home and the beach quickly emptied, replaced by nothing.

He squinted, ducking closer and closer until his chin brushed the green-budding branches and smelled the cold rain still lingering there.

This was supposed to be a settlement? It seemed remarkably empty. Primitive in the sense that a human creature would need such fortified buildings—and only to leave them alone and undefended. But fine enough—he supposed that made things easier even if it set him on edge to skulk around like a pest.

Hopefully the new legend had killed most already. Doubtful, though he’d heard of worse happening on ascension. Regardless, he took the opportunity to reach fingers of psychic out, twining them through thin branches and over sturdy rocks until they reached where he thought the pulse had come from and split. Millions of invisible needles fired off and the area became awash in every little electric and psychic impulse that had passed through for the last few hours. All pink and vibrant in his mind’s eye.

And he got two mountains and a heavy, sinking void.

He blinked. His first impulse was to imagine he’d done something wrong, but that seemed absurd. And sure enough, shaking his head to dispel it, wrinkling his snout and firing off one more time revealed the same.

Right. Well, he certainly wouldn’t be approaching that void. While the creature next to it almost seemed to fill the hole, Midas could still sense the darkness under it. And it projected something like a claim—not that Midas would want to teach something like that. So the dark thing was unapproachable. And its psychic counterpart seemed refined, far too shiny and edgeless for a newborn.

He scoffed. So the lone mountain it was. With all its ragged, broken edges waiting to be sanded into something useful.

The road met him as he coasted down. A pair of harsh black lines cut through the filtering layer of leaves and led him on, across the open path and to what would be his target. In a few moments, when it emerged from behind the thicket.

He waited, nose fielding so close to the ground that the smell of asphalt and wet leaves consumed him.

And waited.

The first sign was another black path, the long, feathered end of a snout. A sharp triangle cut off by a long white neck and the sudden reemergence of black.

Then Midas recognised the creature. Because he saw the same in the water every morning.

His cloak began to flicker before he could catch it. There, in what seemed like the hours of fumbling to mask himself, a pure, unfiltered, justified heat took him over.

That vile fucking creature.

Midas cut it. Shut himself off. With only the energy to keep still, trembling. He barely knew who he referred to between spikes of rage. Mew or this abomination floating before him, blinking dumbly at the trees with its pet reuniclus beside it.

Either one would be hearing about this.

But he could not move. Even as he ground his teeth until he tasted iron. Even with claws so tight they approached bone. Even as he wanted to rush up to it and take its neck and force it to know his rage.

This thing was born only days ago.

It could not know.

It would be prudent not to let it know.

Midas would not let himself mistake caution for empathy, here. He was only doing this to spite Mew. She would like him to get upset and not care if he cut the head off her… what? Pet project?

No.

Replacement.

What a good word to have echoing around his skull as he watched it scan the road for traffic—as if a car shouldn’t be trivial.

Replacement.

And for what? Only approaching a century, still young, more able and more willing and more competent than every single mortal creature, nevermind the slew of crushingly dull legends he had to contend with.

And yet he was the one being replaced.

It was a sign. One to really start forcing his way to the top rather than playing their game and waiting another thousand years to eat out of someone’s hand for it. But he’d already thought about that, and either way he’d need to train some prodigy.

His Replacement. Or otherwise that dark, void creature.

As the thought caught up to him Midas spat and swore, cutting his teeth on all the worst words in his silent, little bubble, and only quieted when he remembered that he was watching someone.

Who was gone.

Well enough, Midas didn’t think he could stand seeing its face.

And so he took off. In a teleport—still too uncertain about his own rage to move. A brief suction surrounded him, his cloak vanishing into it first. Then all feeling went.

And reappeared all at once.

The smells and sights of earth were replaced by blinding white and cold. Nothing waited in the clouds except him. But the clouds themselves shifted beneath him as if alive and the sounds of the earth pounded like a heartbeat in his ears.

Which might be his own.

~(0)~

It could have been his own.

Aeimlou still buzzed with excitement, breathless and only hovering mildly beside Atlas on the outskirts of the forest. All the stimulation of meeting strange humans on the bus had him sensing everything. From the huge, lingering wave of emotion after, to the baser instincts of creatures like those he used to fight for scraps, to Atlas bobbing absently beside him.

This meant also that he had some difficulty parsing his own feelings from those outside him. Atlas especially, turbulent as ever, filled him with many strange contradictions.

The reuniclus had taken off from Hilda’s side to connect him with the humans on the bus. Aeimlou only considered now that he had quite an advantage with Atlas communicating for him and felt he should be able to learn. He should ask.

But they had talked on Atlas’ request. After leaving the bus, though that same turbulence that he felt through Atlas kept their conversation away a few more moments.

Atlas also acted strange about them talking. He had stressed many things, putting enough emphasis on certain terms that they felt literally heavy between them. And although Aeimlou had listened and intellectually understood every word, his energy had made it difficult to internalise any of it.

So he sort of hummed and nodded along.

Really, Aeimlou could not get his mind off the bus.

How would I impress the rest of the flock? He asked after a while watching Atlas brood. He had peeked at them going off on their own and not one had peeked back.

All the trees shadowing green in Atlas’ gel made a jagged look against the solid lump of his body. He passed through that at the edge of the road, facing the rocky cliffs tumbling down to the beach.

The sea was massive behind him.

Is that what Hilda talks to you about?

In some cases, Aiemlou said, head tilting back and forth, in one case actually. We talk about training sometimes. Or we talk about you. We also talk about the forest and other humans, some other things also that I cannot remember.

And impressing the rest of the team interests you?

Aeimlou sensed a hook on those words. It was something Hilda also liked to include. Some kind of trick to her sentences that always took the conversation in a direction Aeimlou did not understand.

He enjoyed the game, at least.

Yes. They seem interesting.

How so? They don’t talk to you.

They are all different shapes. And they all vanish as soon as they appear. I do not think you have talked to them, either.

We have nothing to talk about.

Atlas shuddered so slightly Aeimlou only caught the motion with a change in the sunlight’s reflection off his body.

Well, I would like to talk to them. I must impress them.

He got more silence. Atlas plucked little strands between them, sounding out faintly with each one but never quite resonating.

I can help, I suppose.

But then why did he sound so disappointed?

Aeimlou supposed he understood what the hook was about though. He must wait. And so he did, staring out over the flat-top human nests and into the ocean. It did not interest him as much as he thought it should. Everybody he had spoken to liked to talk about it at length. He thought it might be something relegated to Hilda and Atlas—who spoke about it with the hint of a relieved sigh—but everybody on the bus seemed eager merely to pass by.

There certainly was a lot of water.

Which did not hold his interest long. Eventually, he turned back to Atlas, expecting a response.

Atlas had shifted. Only now Aeimlou noticed the chill.

And another creature standing close, just exiting the forest around the near cliffs. It froze as they met eyes. Atlas froze in turn.

Aeimlou did not remember a tall red like that. Nor the clicking-clacking pincers and rows of sharp blades. It looked quite strange. It did live, however. The rise and fall of its chest spoke to that.

He chirped something light.

Hello? He warbled. But to no success. Not a word. Not a twitch. He nosed Atlas’ side for support, the cold of his gel leaving an impression on his cheek.

They’re a bisharp—a dark type. They won’t connect, Attlas responded, shaking him off. And I have no ability to speak out loud. I doubt you’ve learned speech on the bus, correct?

I have not.

Which left them quite awkward between the bisharp and the cliff behind. The terse bonds between them made it obvious Aeimlou should not ignore the threat.

Yet threat seemed an overbearing word. The bisharp simply stood there. Eyes sunk into darkness under its crown. And all of Aeimlou’s attempts to reach psychically simply passed through and felt instead the production of leaves and grass beyond.

Still, it tilted its head. Those mandibles did a pensive shuffle.

It’s time to go, Aeimlou.

Why?

It poses a threat.

It is not doing anything.

Regardless, I have little defence against it and you are inexperienced. How is your flight?

Atlas prodded him backwards and Aeimlou understood the message immediately. A trip down the cliff did not scare him.

Neither did the bisharp.

Why will it not speak to us?

Atlas’ prodding stopped. Or transitioned into an invisible hand over his neck—corralling, holding him closer. More intimate than forceful, but no less stern.

I don't know. I can’t tell you why pokemon won’t talk to you, Aeimlou, he grumbled, regardless, you can have Hilda’s team. Pokemon I trust, at least to be friendly. Not this.

Aeimlou supposed that was true enough. He had memories of less-friendly creatures. Even those who would scatter seeds across the grass only to chase him off, or wrap themselves around him as he ate, squeezing so tight he feared his feathers would stick in and pierce his little heart.

So He let Atlas ease him backwards, wobbling tentatively midair until cool currents of wind curled under his fins and a great expanse of muddy yellow cliffs cut down the scene.

The bisharp watched them all the way.

Goodbye, bisharp, Aiemlou attempted. It would not hear.

And even supposing it did, it made no response.

Finally, Atlas released. Aeimlou wobbled a moment in midair, but caught his bearings quickly. A flutter in his chest travelled up his neck and caught his chin. The mechanics fit easily in his mind, now.

Below him, the human nests hid like bleached shells embedded in the sand

Aeimlou used to like the shells beyond what they spilled out when crushed under the weight of human transport. Sometimes halves survived and he matched them to those on the beach.

Well, Atlas said, almost amused as they backed further up and over the water. They certainly made a strong impression.

~(0)~

What a strong impression.

Another legend around Undella. And another. King could sense. They never did anything to hide themselves. Old myths from every corner of civilization told you to love them. Or hate them. Fear them, either way.

King could watch. And feel nothing they didn’t send thoughtlessly. Isaac was proof of that—the subconscious. He didn't exhibit pressure on purpose. He didn't seem to understand anything about himself. Therefore, not purposeful.

It was a wonder if Isaac did anything purposefully.

Though he had something in his intuition. It was refreshing not having to tolerate someone trying to take the numbers from every situation and use them against you.

Still, a worry. Other legends would want to supplant Isaac eventually. If they hadn’t already. Which necessitated supplanting King.

He crossed the road. He didn’t bother to look for cars. If a human made the mistake of hitting him, he wouldn't be the one dead.

Beyond, the floating ones had vanished in the distance. They feared him. Not unexpected. They left no signs on the rocks or the sand below. They did not seem to have gone into the homes. Not Isaac’s home. Truly, they had vanished.

King clenched his claws. Always cold—you would never feel heat from a bisharp except the blood from your mother’s wounds. A burning in every way. He could still remember the winds.

Which must be the same winds here. They grew warmer by the day. Soon it would be summer. A summer of letting the rocks dislodge from sea walls and tumble into the water.

By the end of summers like these, erosion completes itself. One day, everything will become Undella beach.

And Undella beach will be empty.

 

[tomatorade]

Chapter twelve
Our Dearly Departed PT I

N needed more time, above all. This is what Hilda thought. Almost from the moment she met him, this odd green man staring at the brick sidewalk below his feet as though waiting for the scraggly weeds to grow before him. He needed Ghetsis to have died years before, he needed Plasma to stay a twinkle in his eyes, he needed the forces of Unova to never have noticed him.

And then maybe she would have believed him.

There were so many pivotal moments, in retrospect. Just sitting. Talking. At a cafe after her first gym, her knees hidden under the table, still pale and knocking against each other in the cool summer night. Maybe that lonely moment stuck with him at the top of Nimbasa’s ferris wheel. He had some strong ideas. This beautiful, sprawling image in his head of the world after.

It struck her, though, in Iccirus. Right before he met Reshiram.

It snowed late. An early october storm, fat flakes of snow landing limp and wet against her collar. They stood in the tall grass, alone for the first time since the ferris wheel. Her knees were scarred, now, and creased with the green of the grass and smears of dirt.

N explained to her a future of rolling fields, gold eyes blinking deep in the thicket. Pokemon trickling out of the caves and crannies and out into the urban sprawl. Creeper vines would line the gutters of towering brickwork. These were only words, though. No matter how hard she squinted, the future stayed dark.

But really, he just needed more time. Seeing Danial again reminded her why he never got that. And why he go to fuck off and she got stuck here.

~(0)~

Danial showed up like that the first time, too. Back then, she spotted him across the parking lot., same as now Unfit in a sea of teenagers and the older Hoenn immigrant population that lived in that corner of Castelia. Nobody wore a suit there. Nobody drove a car as shiny and blacker than the asphalt beneath its wheels.

Danial was barely a person. Just a couple lines on a coffestained document shoved to the very back of the dingiest, most dented file cabinet in the worst-paid government building. He didn’t really say words--he espoused opinions.

Once, Hilda had tried to treat him like an actual human being—a long time ago, when somebody being interested in her wasn’t yet a threat. Not possible anymore, of course. The tightness in her jaw could’ve been the first signs of a stroke, but watching him lounge against his car hood, taking in the breeze and flickering sunlight like he deserved it boiled her blood.

Conversation started like it always did. He had to let her know he’d seen her this whole time, she told him to fuck off, maybe a bit more professionally. A blunt reminder that he worked for the government, a rebuttal, a re-rebuttal. Repeat until the sun explodes. And the questions. Why send her pokemon away? What’s she doing in Undella (she says, but he knows because he managed to find he, and she knows he knows). Where’s N, where’s Reshiram, where’s Zekrom?

She always answered the same, but it didn’t matter. She met Zekrom. They wanted to. Any answer that didn’t lead them to him was a lie.

So only once he’d run through his script and his own exhaustion fell visibly over his face did he start to resemble something like a person. When his hand found more reasons to rub away the creases in his forehead and the weight of the day settled on his shoulders.

He’d finally got to the bottom of his notebook—this little spiral-bound thing he kept in his blazer pocket. That and his solid black monolith of a pen. Still, he lingered, eyeing Hilda with that same desperation she recognised. He’d like to keep asking.

He also must have noticed her sharpening her nails against her teeth.

“It’s frustrating, you know,” he said. A tilt of the head revealing just a sliver of his eyes above dark sunglasses. “You never seem happy, but you keep meeting these legends. Always send them off—go away! Go away! You could create a lot of good if you just took the opportunity to make some change, Hilda.”

“What, for you? You wouldn’t like the changes I’d make.”

He ignored that last part. He’s fucking awesome at ignoring shit.

“For Unova. The good of the region, Hilda. The future was in your hands, did you ever think of that?”

No. Not particularly. By the time she and Zekrom parted all her dreams had been beaten out of her. She shrugged. Pursed her lips. He dropped his hands completely, letting them slap against his car with a dull thud.

“It’s frustrating,” he repeated. And combed it back quickly—all these loose emotions he’d let out. He shoved them under a flat expression again. “And for the record, we don’t believe you have no clue where Zekrom went.”

She bit her tongue. Really, she was the one who should be frustrated. Or more frustrated, but she’d reached some sort of horizon where the repetition washed over her.

Whatever. She should go. He clearly wasn't going to take this farther so she gave him a dismissive wave, testing the waters a little and only getting a shake of the head in return. She wandered across the shoulder of the road, kicking gravel into the lot. Meandered around to the cliffside—peering over for the wandering path she remembered hid amidst the grass and shale overhangs. Sure enough, a tilted rope rail thick with salt and fraying in every possible direction waited. He didn’t stop her. Not really. Mumbled a bare: “You’re here for the Seance? I’ll be seeing you around.” and turned to watch the sea.

But she caught herself there—fist wrapped around the rope, scratchy and sucking the moisture from her palm.

“If you want to find him just go to the airport. Take a flight to literally anywhere, he’s probably waiting to pick you up at arrivals.”

He scoffed.

“Very funny.”

She wasn’t joking, but maybe it would be better if he thought she was.

“I don’t get why you keep harassing me about this shit. You should know—Zekrom talked about it with me. And you still had your fucking bug on me.”

He hesitated, hand hovering over the pocket he kept his little notebook in.

“I don’t recall anything relevant.”

“On the flight? We fucked off for like a week and didn’t shut up the whole time.”

The hesitation grew. He nodded, but only to himself, and with an uncertain squint and the slightest crack of lips to show teeth.

Hilda blinked, watching to see if his expression would change—if the epiphany would hit and he’d sink back into his stoicism. He didn’t.

So she didn’t bother to hide the ugly grin that split her face. He didn’t know. Years of surveillance—of Hilda watching dark cars circle her hotels, of checking the straps of her bag for mics and standing on stools, taping up the vent-slats into the corner, all that paranoia, all the building tension between that—and he’d still missed something.

And then she remembered that exact moment Zekrom came to her in a hurry, shredding through her tent with a burst of static and beating of wings. She barely had time to pick herself up and rub the dots from her eyes and, in only her bra and some pjs—not even shoes, she climbed between the stiff wings crowning his spine, held close so his tingling heat protected her, and tried not to scream as he took off.

Oh, if Danial wanted to track her then, they would’ve needed to stick her brain with microchips.

He noticed her grin. He curled his lips into a thin line.

“We had a great talk, I’ll tell ya,” she sniped.

His confusion solidified into something sour.

“I should remind you that it’s your duty to Unova to tell me what you two spoke about.”

“Fuck off.”

“There’s a lot we could do about this, Hilda.”

He tried to reach for something at his hips, but he wasn’t in uniform. A thin, clumsy hand fumbled against his belt loop.

What bullshit. All he could really do was stand there.

“Actually, Zekrom would never come to you. You’re a fuckin’ coward—”

“Try to keep this professional.”

“-- but he’d tell you to do it. He’d stand behind you and tell you to torture me if you thought I’d squeal like a pig. But you won’t. Tell me I’m fucked up for not using legends whenever I see them, but you wouldn’t either. Just sit there like a bitch and wait for daddy Unova to swoop in and take everything from you.”

She dug her fist into the rope railing as she talked, the stiff fibres pricking her palm.

“You’re just proving my point,” he said, “It’s exactly why we need to find Zekrom. A legend of that strength and with that temperament—that’s a big thing, is all. Very useful.”

He could act cool all he wanted, but Hilda saw right through it. She figured he would’ve gone off for another assignment after the Plasma nightmare, but he stuck around. Always showed up around a drafty corner somewhere. Kept tabs. Called. Once, just as she landed in Hoenn, visiting cousins, and as she picked through the waiting crowds of people scanning past her with hopeful smiles. Her phone buzzed with an unknown number. Are you meeting with Zekrom, was the first thing she heard.

She’d grown out of that desperation. That teenage fury that had her trying to beat down every gym with just the bare scraps she’d earned. Or maybe she’d given up. Whatever. He’d done neither. Whenever he talked about legends he got this gleam in his eye and started licking his lips. If only he knew what they’d talked about, he could kill or her. Or worship her. She couldn’t say.

“Yeah. Fine.” She huffed. Hoped he didn't notice her withering enthusiasm. “Sorry you didn’t get lucky, I guess. You’ll die before you find him, but nobody would cry for you so you don’t have to feel too bad.”

He held on her for a while, like he had more to say, but his eyes trailed back down the road and to the city.

“Luck isn’t real,” he muttered, “I don’t need it. I’ve got all the resources I need at my discretion, Hilda. Try not to wander off until I get back.” And if he noticed her shift, he busied himself over it. Out came the notebook again. And the phone and the car keys, jingling from a finger and drawing him back to the driver’s door. His phone buzzed in the crook of his neck before he even closed the door.

And then he sped off. Back to Castelia. Eager to bring a posse of identical dickheads to make her life miserable.

She sighed, looking out to the beach and the dull red roof of the pokecenter. She didn’t even have a room yet.

Man, she wished N was here. She let her smile creep back as she pictured it.

He and Danial would have a lot of fun together.

And she would get his spot, palling around with gods somewhere at the edge of the world.

Out on the boardwalk, she spotted the distant blur of Aiemlou and Atlas making their way to the center. She sighed.

Oh, who was she kidding? She remembered. She’d hate that shit, too.

 

[tomatorade]

Chapter Thirteen
Our Dearly Departed PT II

Isaac always felt awkward, to be fair. He craved silence, his mortal enemy. He didn’t get along with moments or ever sit down and decide to relax and actually end up doing that. His father always called him neurotic, his mom a crazymaker. These were things he was passionately aware of in the abstract but would never be able to see coming. There were a thousand filmed moments of him trying and failing to pose as a trainer that would forever be burned into his mind.

Or maybe more the after. Watching all that back, stuffed in bed with his arms wrapped around his knees and realising he’d been a child all along. All night long until the flickering screen burned the images into his eyes and he blinked awake again in a pool of sweat.

So, anyways,

“I think I love you.” was the first thing he said to the creature as she made it into the foyer and closed the door with a gentle psychic push.

Even as Isaac sank back into the couch, mind screaming back at him, that familiar ice seeping into his cracks, she did not respond. A rich house fit her. She looked like some stained glass ornament his aunt would fawn over in the window of an occult shop. All smooth, blemishless shapes that flowed through the air and caught the light strangely. Weightless. And despite some of the sharpness King had, here similar edges seemed natural. The kitchen welcomed them like any other member of the family. And let them exit into the living room.

Isaac only gathered his words by the time she’d reached King’s castle of objects. A familiar psychic glow manifested around a fork poking from one of the fabric piles, drawing it to a pointy yellow snout until a telltale condensation dulled the reflection. She hummed. And put it back precisely where she found it.

“N-not like— I mean…” he mumbled, watching her hover around a row of neatly-arranged shoelaces, “I haven’t felt this happy in a long time. I think. Maybe sometime when I was sleeping, but that- that’s not happening.”

Nothing changed between her meandering and the dull psychic pressure that spooled around them, but Isaac sensed agreement. It wasn’t enough. The silence frayed his edges again.

“That’s King’s,” he mumbled as she finally did a full circle around the collection. “He’s— it’s— I dunno. A nest… I guess. Bisharp don’t make nests.”

She gave a musical, clipped little vocal.

“It’s a nice piece of art, regardless.” She smiled. “Oh, apologies. I’m deciding how to approach this. I’ve taken welcoming you upon myself. To the ire of many, I assume—though I can’t pretend not to enjoy existing about a world which assumes I’ve done so irrationally.”

Isaac blinked. He looked at his claws, still shivering like wild creatures pulled from the ocean. Should he know? Her words sailed past him, to someone who wasn’t there. Well, he assumed. Until he glanced around the back shadow of the couch and confirmed that they were alone.

That was enough of a distraction he didn’t notice her closing in, close enough he could touch those odd crescents frozen in orbit around them, trailed with flecks of darker red and yellow. These opalescent curls of texture like the planetary rings they were emulating.

“Do you know what you are?” She asked.

“Human,” he said before thinking. And again, after a couple beats, “I’m human.”

“I see,” she responded. But with this vibrant monotone. It had layers to it, seeming dynamic even balancing on one note. He only noticed now that they sounded like space. She narrowed her eyes. Tilted her head and leaned closer until his haze threatened to stain the whites of her eyes. “You haven’t been sleeping, have you? You should. It’s only healthy.”

“What are you?” He asked.

“Cresselia. Your counterpart. Is there a bed somewhere? I imagine it’s more comfortable than the couch.”

“Oh.” He blinked. Again. Then found himself holding. Sinking. A wave of warmth wrapped around his shoulders, trying to drag him down. Until it turned sharp and waves of blackness took over. He jerked back with a gasp, the bleary light seeping through the windows suddenly harsh and prickling the corners of his eyes. He shrunk in on himself, trying to draw away from Cresselia.

“It’s the nightmare’s fault, I think. I mean, I guess it doesn’t make sense, I just— saw… myself.”

She hummed a quiet little note. A pink paw reached out, tethered to an invisible psychic force. As it sank into the darkness seeping from his shoulder that joy came back again. Soothing, if forced. He liked it. But he couldn’t tell whether he should. He’d taken some drugs before, both prescription and from the hands of other trainers travelling the road, and they did all sorts of things to his head. Still, even watching closely he decided not to draw away.

She drew her paw back to her chest, clasped in prayer, and smiled, but cutting. Thin and immovable. A shake of the head broke her depression before Isaac could get nervous.

“Darkrai always attracts the sensitive ones, goodness knows why. The last one was strongest, but a recluse near the end and helpless to his own mind. And he chose you.” She huffed, casual as anything.

And suddenly Isaac bled questions. Slowly, seeping under the weight of the morning, but he couldn’t help it even despite the exhaustion. And couldn’t help stuttering and whispering out the first word that swam to the surface.

“D-darkrai?”

She pointed back at him.

“That’s you. Nightmare. The Long Shadow. The Masculine—what have you. A position that’s existed for centuries in one form or another.”

That slow, draining feeling became a flood. All of Isaac exiting in a moment, dropping to the floor and leaving him cold.

“Humans used to paint your face on the ceiling of their caves,” she continued, “You decided to die not long ago but, well…” She gestured vaguely in his direction.

“I’m not dead,” he said. Responded. Asserted. Whatever. He thought becoming some sort of pokemon was overwhelming enough. And he hadn’t lived that long. Well, she was being metaphorical, but he couldn’t think about it that long without feeling that age wash over him.

He stood. Or tried to, digging his claw deep into the fibrous stuffing of the couch and wobbling midair, drifting faintly sideways until he couldn’t hold and slumped instead against the cold glass coffee table, scattering the few magazines with polished faces smiling at him from beneath glossy paper headlines. Once again, like he seemed to default to these days, he sank his head into his claws and tried to shut out everything else.

But he could still hear her. Even floating there she emanated a faint buzz. Old myths liked to imagine the hum of the earth. This was that, he supposed.

“Maybe I am dead,” he mumbled, muffled through his claws. It echoed in that space.

He’d always agreed with the other kids, in their little brainstorming sessions when summer storms brought the sea out to play and kept them inside. One of those rare moments where he engaged and thought deeply about what it would be like to be a pokemon—powerful obviously, but sometimes not. Sometimes scrounging in the grass for acorns and digging burrows swerving through the leglike roots of trees. Sometimes just to talk with other pokemon, to those in the forests and hanging from the sides of cliffs. And later, those he trained, to know how he’d failed them. He wouldn’t describe it as a dream. It was pragmatic, maybe. Some kids wished they were astronauts, and he didn’t think any of them would like space with all the emptiness and swirling debris and freezing cold. No, it was a means to an end. They had the same goals, really. Even if he mostly watched from the back of their groups.

So no, becoming a pokemon did not excite him. It did not make him want to crawl around on all fours and growl up at the legs of the adults until they got sick of it and let him watch tv. He did not want to imagine himself razing mountains and boiling oceans and ruling over a blocks-and-toys kingdom.

He especially did not want to acknowledge the one word that kept assaulting him in burning red text.

“I’m not like— I mean, we’re… we… I—”

“You’re a legend, yes.”

Cresselia’s warmth remained but it didn’t touch him anymore. It sat, stagnant, before him. Isaac tried to breathe. Heaving long and heavy until he could almost feel his lungs through his chest.

“I apologise for not having more sympathy. It’s been a long time since we’ve seen a new change. Here. Open your eyes.”

Isaac coughed. Sniffling to himself a few moments until the awkwardness of waiting drew him out and back into the light. Cresselia had taken a position on the couch. She did not seem to fit well on it in any way, still floating a sliver away from any contact and eyeing the dulling white fabric with a slight frown.

Once she noticed him again, those eyes turned meaningful., a slight gleam catching his attention.

“The legends have always liked to leave newborns flailing for a while. Cause a few disasters and tear themselves down so someone can intervene. Whether to later play the hero or simply because they can’t be bothered until it becomes a problem, I do not know. Honestly, it does not matter, all that does is that your interests should be your own. Someone will summon you eventually and you cannot allow them to believe that you need their help,” she said. So earnestly Isaac could only nod. “Of course, I reveal my own hypocrisy. I’d like to help you. Mentor you, in a sense. Hands-off, of course, but your new life will become complicated rather quickly.”

In that moment, Isaac wished he had a mirror. He’d like to look something like last year’s champion, Den Mercer—or like Hilda. Or any champion, going way back in tomes of monochrome and parchment. He’d like to glow like that, so full of confidence he couldn’t even imagine the cameras and all those hundreds of eyes waiting to see that smile and cheer.

He got this instead. He did not understand it. He did not know what to feel or do about it. He’d been trapped in that moment on the bench. All his pokemon sleeping in their balls. Alone for the first time in so long, nursing his aches, eyes shut tight against the blaring lights—cars speeding across the night overpass and the faint breeze that wanted to push him over and into the grass. Recordings playing back in his head and being forced to watch them back over and over until every mistake felt like another cut piling onto the thousand. How many times could he try? He didn’t even have his third badge. He’d read the comments.

Oh, he’d look like shit anyway.

He decided.

“I already have a mentor,” he said, a hint of clenched fists detached somewhere beside him.

She sighed in a way that removed the warmth and made him ache.

“I suppose I can’t force you.” She waved a paw. “But I’ll be staying in Undella, watching from afar. And perhaps I’d like to meet them, anyways. Do you train here?”

Whatever conviction he’d mustered quivered at the response. And her power crept in and soothed it. His fists unfurled, limp against the table.

“I uh… sometimes. It’s mostly talking.”

“Wonderful. Do you mind if I stay? I won’t be trouble. I’ll clean. And won’t touch King’s installation.”

“I— I guess?”

She smiled, casting off the couch with a gentle pat but noticeable lightness and new glow to her crescents.

“I’m sure we’ll all get along famously. Now, there’s one thing you must do.”

Isaac blinked. Not even up to speaking anymore. She held out both paws, tilting forward in some kind of reverence. Her voice dipped to a whisper.

“You must sleep,” she said.

He felt his eyes grow heavy.

“For him.”

 

[tomatorade]

Chapter Fourteen
The Fifth Season

Undella Bay had a magic to it as springtime started to warm. The jagged edges of waves softened and turned to caressing the shore instead of cutting through it. Alarming pins of white glistened still, but faintly and hibernating under layers of wet leaves. Signs of life mixed with the beach—some human and marked by sandy tracks on the boardwalk. Some wandered openly. Krabby scuttling from crags, wingull drifting in and out of the surf.

A shadow waited at the dock.

~(0)~

If he thought it once, Atlas could think it forever.

At least Aeimlou was happy

“Emergency,” Hilda spat. She squinted at a bit of laminate crudely taped to the inside of the pokemon centre door. “What kind of emergency closes a hospital?”

Of course, the latios didn’t mind being outside. He murmured something about boxes through their connection, then set off down a barren boardwalk, chirping back up at crows as they shouted him down from the cliffs.

He didn’t seem to mind anything at all.

Atlas did, unfortunately. So he waited and watched tiny shoots of grass struggle through the scuffed wooden decking. He thought about poetry.

Undella had been a haven of sorts for poets many years ago. Maybe it happened to be the place, but humans had crafted something wonderful in poetry, to be sure. With mere words, and them which he had no access to until meeting Hilda. She had her phase reading flimsy paperbacks to him and rubbing her eyes and turning over on her bed so she faced the wall instead and he couldn’t see her cry. By the time pragmatism took over and those books had turned to kindling, the damage had been done. He had stolen the books and memorised each page and found within it a new obsession and ongoing existential crisis. He liked the words to sing, he liked to imagine things he could not ever see or show, he assumed himself passing this knowledge onto his divisions in the future, as humans seemed compelled to do.

He would never share this with anyone And he would think too strongly about that forever. But could live on easily. Be liveably upset. The pressure had stabilised. He feared it that way; he could imagine living like this forever.

So he lived on a balancing scale. And pokemon would not write poetry. And if they did, they would not title them.

~(0)~

Then summer came. Painful in a lot of ways. Things burned as you touched them, typically the sand, the metal siding on the center, the big, empty glass windows on the homes, asphalt blistering bare feet, and even the wood, sometimes. It’s through the mercy of strong winds and frequent thunderstorms that the beach was even liveable. You could watch the clouds roll in, so heavy they seem to bulge with water. Fingers of lightning flick down and strike the earth.

The shadow didn’t move. It casted its own shadow in the brief cut of light. It was long enough to reach across the sand, to climb up the cliff and find him where he woke up burning on the road.

~(0)~

Aeimlou had long since stopped trying to understand why his companions decided to be unhappy. He understood it only sometimes. When they disagreed, for instance, and Aeimlou felt those same needles pricking him at every word directed his way.

But that did not seem to be the case now.

Although the sun came and bathed them in warmth, and the world smelled much fresher than the road and bus, their mood had not changed. Atlas sulked quietly whether around him or not. Hilda…

Well, she never seemed happy. Perhaps that was her default state.

Actually, Atlas did not seem happy often, either.

Now that he thought more on it, perhaps he had been the strange one. When he woke up and thought nothing, his first instinct was to believe in the joy of eating an oran berry and dipping his snout in the river to drink. Well, Hilda’s water bottle more often now, but the water still kept fresh and delicious. He had never seen either of them eat a whole oran or drink from a river, so perhaps that could be a workable idea.

He would not mention it, though. Not for now. Hilda still had that roll of sticky rope on her.

For now, in an effort to understand, he decided to practise being upset at the flying creatures up on the cliffs. He craned his neck up, floating as far as he would dare off the ground. They mocked him, flapping wings he did not have and tossing loud caws back and forth in a language he did not understand anymore. He paced up and down the small section of rock he chose, neck craned up and watching. He tried to match their noise, interrupting their little conversations with caws of his own and dragging their attention to him. It did not do much. They looked at him strangely. Shuffled in their little rock nests, uncertain. But never coming down to meet him. Still, it did make him smile when they began to huddle together as if trying to keep secrets from him.

He would like to savour this. Hilda had brought them to another box, and while he imagined it must have a great number of strange human things to prod at, the better he got at flying, the less he enjoyed the concept of a roof.

How unfortunate that the black birds scattered and reformed at the top of the cliffs.

Only… what was that?

As he watched, squinting at the green line of grass springing over the rocks and crags, A snout peered back at him.

His own snout. His own glare aimed down a pointy white muzzle. But not really. Unless the undersides of trees had secretly been reflective all these years.

They might have been. Aeimlou did not often look up at the undercarriage of a tree. But it did make more sense for it to be another of his species.

Only, as he looked to Atlas and called him over, by the time he looked back, the face had gone. He blinked into the vast, empty forest instead.

Yes? Atlas asked as he floated over. He joined Aeimlou, a curious tilt to his arms.

Did you see that?

What?

Another me. Or my face, at least. I did not get a full view, only the snout.

Atlas shimmered. He lifted himself, watching where Aeimlou had been.

I cannot confirm. I feel something strong, however.

But if this meant anything, he did not explain further. He floated only high enough to peer over, and back far enough not to be ambushed. Coming back down, he shook his whole body in place of a no.

Whoever they are, they’ve gone. We should keep watch, though. I’ve felt that type of power before.

Atlas looked at him and force a great meaning between their connection. In times like this, Aeimlou wished they shared a species. He could not easily tell the meaning of even Hilda’s body language often, but Atlas could be impenetrable if he wanted to.

Here, Aeimlou imagined the weight—heavy and pointed and holding above him as he shared the moment with Atlas.

“Fuckin’ finally.”

Though they were interrupted by Hilda. Now standing triumphantly, hands on her hips and sweat pooling around her neck. The door opened before her, askew in its frame. A trail of scuffmarks stained the otherwise pristine floor below.

Really, Hilda? Atlas sniped, floating over to her.

She shrugged.

“It was open when we got here.”

Atlas looked back to Aeimlou.

Well, Aeimlou said. Blinking. I do not remember that. Was it open, Atlas?

A curious noise sounded over their connection. A high whine with a lilt at the end.

Are you serious?

“Are you idiots coming in?”

Aeimlou blinked at Hilda now. She stood inside, flicking a number of plastic knobs on the other end of the pokemon centre, scattering splashes of light across gleaming white tiles.

It is open now, he chirped. And floated inside.

Atlas gave a long suffering sigh that only he could hear, and followed inside.

~(0)~

Fall trembled then scattered all around him in a rush of leaves like snow. So many leaves, bringing the chill with them and settling in a thick carpet on the beach. They simply passed through the shadow.

He sidled alongside it, feeling the strength of the sun wane even as he moved. Everything seemed orange and red and yellow and slow.

And then time paused. When he looked beside himself, he saw his own face. Another black mass facing out to the ocean, wind cutting through its form and winding ribbons of shadow through the air. Those eyes were so blue.

“Hello?” Isaac whispered.

The shadow turned to look at him.

~(0)~

Hilda was definitely caught by the security cameras. She only noticed when she stomped inside. Big black dots staining the perfect white insides of the center. Moldy little splotches in the corners. And nah, of course she couldn’t see through a goddamn transparent door the twenty seconds before when she was either: breaking and entering, or vigorously cleaning the door glass, depending on your perspective. Fucking naturally.

And they probably wouldn’t be impressed by her turning on all the lights or standing in the middle of the room, glaring up at them like this was their problem. Whoever they were—the one guy tanning in the harsh blue glow of monitors, smuggled in the tiny-ass security room.

She’d been in security before. In Castelia, too. If that place was a prison cell, Undella’s would be a toilet.

Of course, the two big babies who came in on her heels didn’t help. Atlas hated centres, unsurprisingly. He could at least stand not to simmer like that—visibly pissed at any odd and end jumping out at him. But he’d only prod her mind snidely and settle on one lone chair sandwiched between a pair of towering potted ferns. Aeimlou managed only a bit longer before he found out that the nurses tended to keep all the interesting stuff out of sight and joined him, pawing at the plants like a bored cat.

They must look like vagrants.

Hilda sighed. Dug her fingers under her collar, wiping away the sweat and digging out itching strands of hair that sprung loose from under her hat. She refused to regret breaking in. Emergency meant emergency. Right. Time to ring the bell.

Unlucky for her, kicking her posture back into line and strolling up to the desk revealed no service bell. Luckily, she knew the nurses had their own button right under the far edge, in reach of the keyboard. She found it with a bit of casual feeling around, forcing a skewed smile at the camera and only knocking over one mug of pens, sending them clattering to the tile in a wimpy little avalanche of hollow plastic clacks.

No sound came from the button. Or anywhere else. Normally you’d have to wait a bit. Watch down the far hallway for a shadow or hear the confident slapping of tennis shoes.

But not moments after pressing it, a sharp yelp echoed down the hall.

Hilda acted, hand shooting to her hip on instinct. Her mind caught up to her before she could remember her team was elsewhere. And a prompt command couldn’t exit her lips before a human voice cut through the uncertainty.

“Coming!” it broke. A young woman’s, clearly trying to be light but mixed with a dry rasp.

Hilda recognised the woman it was attached to as she came around the corner. Not in those clothes, maybe—she wasn’t used to nurses half in scrubs, light pink-swathed legs wrinkled and tucked into mismatched socks, kinda hidden under a baggy I HEART UNDELLA T-shirt—but, sure.

Kloe was her name. And a familiar face from her journey. She spent a month in this exact center, and Kloe was one of like, three workers back then.

Now, she looked alone. And tired. She couldn’t keep up a smile as she entered, squinting instinctively at the light. Hilda empathised with the sting. That and the dark bags and greasy, untamed hair and pores that implied a day toiling in the mud more than just a bad night’s sleep.

“Good morning,” Hilda said. Was she trying to be a dick? Not even she knew at this point.

“I ah—” she blustered, sliding her way behind the counter. She paused. Only then looked down at herself, and spent a second smoothing out her clothes. “I thought I closed the center.”

Hilda looked back at Atlas. Good thing he was physically incapable of rolling his eyes, because she sure felt the full weight of his exasperation trying to hold her back.

“Nah. I just walked right in.”

Kloe yawned, hand up and chipped pink nails scratching at her nose.

“I should kick you out. Honestly. There’s a bit of an emergency around here.”

“When isn’t there an emergency? Isn’t that your thing?”

Kloe snorted, eyes shutting and staying shut a long, painful beat. When they flickered open again, she blinked.Tilted her head, dipped and leaned a bit closer over the counter.

“Oh. You’re Hilda,” she said maybe a foot away, casual as anything.

Oh. Hilda leaned back. Oh no, she could see where this was going.

“Yeah.”

“Actually, it might be good that you’re here.”

Fuck.

Hilda stepped back. Brought her arms up, face souring, the lights of the centre suddenly buzzing fluorescents, the plants in the corner wilting, Aeimlou and Atlas pebbles trapped in her shoe. Probably got dark outside now, too. Raining and miserable. And all of this on instinct. An allergic reaction. She shook her head and let it out with a click of her tongue.

“Uh-huh. Can you believe I get that a lot?”

“You’re the champion.”

That might be reverence in her voice. Or exasperation. One came after the other, usually. And resignation, somewhere along the line. These were the building blocks of Hilda’s life.

But Kloe also had this sad, tired, aching smile that hurt to look at. It reminded Hilda, once again, that this was a real person standing in front of her, asking for her help. And every other real person before her, draped in a sopping yellow raincoat, knees sunk in the mud; or one standing tall at the precipice of a crumbling staircase, hands out and hair tangled and smile so gentle; or a weakling bird miserable and young, flailing around in a tank too new for it to survive.

So she stacked her blocks up again. She wouldn’t smile or anything, but saying yes was more than enough work for one day.

And the smile would distract from the exhausted wrinkles sinking into her forehead.

“Yeah, fine,” she said. Tried not to turn it into an accusation somehow.

Like a spell, years of work fled from Kloe’s face.

“Thank you. I couldn’t tell you how much this means to me. I tried with the rangers, but—” She shared a knowing look, sinking into her chair and rolling it over to her monitor—and yeah, Hilda knew; it made sense why Dan was here, now.

“Here,” Kloe continued, “does this mean anything to you?”

You’d think a question like that would be followed by… really, anything. But Kloe spent a good while pushing papers around the desk, Cleaning up the stray pens Hilda had knocked over and signing into her computer while humming a broken little tune. Hilda almost fell asleep to the scratching of her nails on the keyboard.

“Here.”

Hilda tuned back in to a turned monitor, Kloe tilting it back so she could see the fuzzy ten-years-too-old screen over the counter. And a strange black streak of a pokemon prominent in a still from the security camera, lurking in the digital entrance of the pokemon center.

Hilda didn’t recognise it at first glance. Mostly, she wondered if Kloe would be looking back through the security tapes for her.

“What the fuck is that supposed to be,” she said, holding back a yawn.

“Darkrai.”

The word exited her mouth almost like a prayer, quiet and reverent.

It meant nothing to Hilda.

“Alright.”

“You’ve dealt with legendaries before—”

It wasn’t a question. Nobody ever needed to ask. All of Hilda’s pictures were her stood, postlike, plantlike, rocklike under Zekrom’s chin.

“--well, this could be, like, scary.”

Hilda looked back to Aeimlou. He’d snuggled in beside Atlas, squishing him against the side of the chair. He absently nibbled on some fern leaves and stared outside.

Had she noticed him yet?

“Right. Yeah. Scary.”

Kloe stared at her. Stumbled over the weight of this new energy she lifted from dragging feet.

“I mean…” she raised her shoulders, almost defensive. “Look at it! Read this—a malevolent being of shadow— yeah, yeah— horrible omens, nightmares—I’ve been feeling the nightmares, believe me, this is no joke.”

Clearly she had never interacted with another legend. Hilda would wipe the floor with Darkrai, if she had to. And that wasn’t bluster. She had done a lot worse.

But, once again, Kloe was a real human woman who had to work a real job at a pokemon centre. She had a real life and real feelings and that energy was turning to panic in her eyes.

“I’ll deal with it,” Hilda said, simply. She might have to pick up some pokeballs, but that might also not matter anyway. Whatever.

Kloe sighed, slumping back in her chair. The monitor came down with her and she had to juggle it a bit to keep it off the floor, but she recovered. At least enough to huff silently to herself and not turn the beads of sweat trickling down her forehead into a waterfall.

“Thank you. Thank you so much. I can’t— there’s a seance going on soon—strange, I know. A seance. This year—but I’ve got to get ready for a hundred people and a lot of money kicking around. I don’t have the resources for this.”

Hilda shrugged. Oh boy, did she already know about that.

“That fucker could add to the atmosphere, who knows.”

It drew a quiet laugh from Kloe, at least. Whisked away a couple more wrinkles.

“Risky. I’m not asking you to… y’know, end it, that’s against the code.”

“Which code?”

“Well, both. The moral one and the doctoring one.”

Ah, the classic duo. Not that either stopped anyone before.

It was naive though. Not that Hilda had to kill Darkrai or even thought that was an option. If one thing was made clear to her, it’s that most legends didn’t give a shit about anything until you started bothering them and their own. Didn’t matter who liked or hated the guy, either. It took one plasma member to try and fuck with zekrom and reshiram sent that guy’s ass into the ocean.

The talking was the problem. She could catch the guy and get nothing but a couple side-eyes, but where would that lead her? Another liability. Another mouth to feed. Another excuse to intrude on her life. Another bullet. Another shovel of cold dirt scattered over her body, sucking away the warmth still pumping through. So talking. Something that came famously easily to her and never led her down any dark, stinking alleys to get mugged. By fate or something.

What other option did she have? She wasn’t smart enough for this.

“Where is he? Do you know?”

Kloe had been tidying her desk while HIlda thought. She perked up at the question.

“That, I can help you with.” She stood, leaned over the desk and stretched her arm out to point out the far window, down the boardwalk, across the path north and into the west mountains, back and up from where Hilda came and all the rich villas and vacation homes spoiled the nice, gray-ass, shit rock.

“He’s hiding in there, somewhere,” she continued, “in one of the homes. There’s never any light on, but you can hear noises coming from thataways. I think I see doors open and close sometimes, though that’s in the morning when it’s too misty to follow.”

“And you think he’s using doors.”

And living in a house, for some reason.

“Well, he used the centre doors.”

That’s true. And odd. Actually—

“And what did he do here?”

“Use the computer. And ah— I mean, that’s it. It left after I saw it.”

Hilda blinked. Watched Kloe like she’d just spat out all her teeth. She got the same incredulous stare back. And looked over to Aeimlou, now fully asleep and snoring silently, snout dug under one of Atlas’s arms while the reuniclus squirmed.

She had some thoughts on that. Some pretty horrible thoughts.

Kloe gasped.

“Is that latios?”

~(0)~

The shadow’s eyes were piercing blue. Like a memory.

Its voice came like a thousand whispers, creatures clung to the underside of the dock and ramming their bony fingers through the cracks.

“You will never be happy. You will never get what you want,” it said.

Isaac recognised it. He thought he shouldn't be scared. He broke eye contact and held his breath, petrified in his chest.

All around them, winter came and passed.A sprinkling of snow that formed a white wall seconds later and simply passed through them on the dock. It reached his ankles, felt like nothing, and before he could puzzle that out it had melted again, rivers of water flowing down and soaking the wood.

“I— I mean, I… don’t know.” His voice cracked. Sounded like static. Like he was just a vision on the radio, knob turning slowly to one side. He tried to clasp his claws together. Tried to feel them, but they mixed together, numb and unfamiliar. “I don’t know. Can you stop? Are you my n— n— well, you know.”

The voice came again. Isaac watched the waves come in faster and faster until the glimmering highlights of a new spring burned his eyes.

“Look at me.”

Every lap at the shore took more sand, exposed more wood. Cliffs by the beach crumbled. Rocks pitched themselves into the ocean without a sound.

Isaac did. Looked it in the eye, paralysed and waiting.

“You have nothing; you are nothing. You will never be happy.”

He twitched.

“Look at me.”

All around them, the world moved so fast. Most of the sand had gone. So many waves of leaves had grown and fallen that the ocean became thick with them. And thick with sand, turning it a muddy soupy brown. Off in the distance, behind the smoke from his shadow’s form curling up and blackening the sky, all the trees had toppled, all these pathetic little matchsticks drowning, crowns stil growing and bobbing up, gasping for air. The docks moaned below him. He did not want to look behind.

His breaths came so heavy. He shuddered, body spiralling, wisps breaking off and writhing and tangling back together. Something in him died—he couldn’t break from this.

“I’ll never be happy,” he whispered.

And the shadow said nothing. It continued staring, silent and unmoving like a stain.

Isaac’s eyes built with tears, vision smearing a murky black. He sniffled. Blinked and tried to rub the pain away. By the time he caught himself—jerking up again and waiting for the admonishment—the shadow had gone.

The weight had not lifted.

He turned.

All behind him, the land had eroded away. Nothing remained. No buildings. No cliffs. No roads or trees. Even the sea had calmed, stranding him in the middle of a dead ocean, one a lonely dock.

Isaac forced down the brick rammed in his throat.

Suddenly, a spark of warmth flickered beside him. He caught a blur of pink.

“Well, he’s certainly dramatic, isn’t he?”

~(0)~

Isaac woke up.

Exhausted.

Watching the ceiling, pins prodding the corners of his eyes, rubble pinning down his limbs. His heart ached—he heaved, lungs stinging. Even the shadows were limp, merely squirming across the bedspread he’d been laid out on.

Dead. He had died.

He wheezed. Coughed. And as he craned his neck, he trembled, he swore he heard a strained moan. A streak of light stabbed through him as he met it, forcing a hiss. From the window—the bedroom window. He recognized those wedding-dress curtains.

And a silhouette met him between them, backlight. Kind of stoic, awkward, arms dangling and sharp.

“King?” he whispered.

The bisharp shifted.

“Yes. You were sleeping.”

Did he know? Cresselia had left, he supposed. Good. He hated the idea of anyone seeing him like this.

Except King.

“I’m tired.”

“Then sleep longer.”

“I don’t— I didn’t want any of this. I hate it. Being this thing. I died. I— I wish I had.” he croaked.

King said nothing. He let his body talk. Creak and squeal through even slight movements.

“C-could never do anything. Never went anywhere. Failed anything I ever tried at. I don’t think I’ll ever be happy.”

King said nothing. Isaac felt the tears well up again. His arms were too heavy to lift. Cold trails felt down the sides of his face and soaked into the blanket, cold and stinging in the morning air.

“Can’t stop acting like a child. I hate it, but I don’t know how else to act. So… I— I mean, e-emotional. Don’t know how else to act. Can’t stop just, talking. I wish I could shut up. I wish… somebody could look me in the eye and not think I’m some little… like, creature begging outside in the rain.”

King said nothing.

“I hate this. I hate it.” he finished with a hiss. A pathetic attempt to flail around. He only managed a squirm, barley ruffling the bedsheets and squirming more in embarrassment after.

He sunk back in on himself, watching the ghosts of dust and spiderwebs hang from the ceiling. The words sat heavy in the room, now, and he hated them too. He needed something.

“Could you lie down with me?”

Silence met him. For the longest moment, he thought King had left. But no, when the bisharp moved, he threw his shadow across the far wall and up the ceiling.

“That’s…” King started. Strangely quiet. Strangely uncertain. “Lie down with you?”

“Please.”

Once again, Isaac tried to move. Gestured weakly with his claws.

Things passed so slowly. His eyes threatened to flutter closed again. He could track the shadow moving across the wall.

Then, to his utter surprise, a weight settled beside him.

They didn’t touch. Didn’t talk. Isaac didn’t expect him to, this seemed far from the bisharp’s comfort zone. Despite himself, his heart marched on. A light hum broke through his misery, Made him nervous to look at King, now.

“Thank you.”

“I don’t understand how this benefits you,” King chimed in. Not unkindly.

It did. In some way Isaac couldn’t explain. The nightmare faded. He didn't think so much about everything else.

Then, silence reigned for a while. Sometimes Isaac closed his eyes. For the tears or not. He never stopped hurting and did not change his mind, but at least the words didn’t hover around him so much. He couldn’t see them like this.

“It does feel more comfortable than the forest,” King said.

And Isaac almost laughed.