[Pokémon] Communication

[Sike_Saner]

Hello and welcome to February's one and only update!

That's right: from here on out, this will update monthly rather than biweekly--even I think the latter was too darn often. So yeah, look for the next on the 1st/2nd of March.

The next after this one right here, I mean.

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Chapter 37 – Easy Come, Easy Go​

Training for the job was remarkably light: just a tour of the place, really, with restricted areas pointed out so the new security staff would know where to keep the public from going.

Keeping them from entering about half of these areas were voice-activated doors, which only DeLeo could open. Or so he thought, of course. But Solonn had no intentions whatsoever of enlightening him, nor much of a need to sneak in. He knew what was behind those doors—they all did. DeLeo had shown them, with assurances that all of the unfamiliar equipment therein would help bring about the revival of humankind in some way or another.

Said equipment included a holding cell of some kind: a large, round platform that turned into a transparent, glowing tube when activated. "For detaining troublemakers," DeLeo had explained. Which, Solonn had supposed, was a sufficiently digestible answer. But something about the cell still made him uneasy, and it didn't take him long to figure out what.

Solonn had his own memories of a holding pen made of energy. A time when he'd been judged a "troublemaker" himself, to put it very mildly.

He hoped DeLeo had a milder punishment for anyone who landed themself in that tube than the pokémon center back in Lilycove had intended for him.

As the first assembly he'd be working at approached, thoughts of his personal mission began crowding out all others; he all but forgot all about DeLeo's cell. When that evening finally arrived, the possibility of an imminent reunion intruded upon his thoughts to the point where he vaguely wondered if he might forget to do his job.

Said job would have him watching the youth assembly, keeping an eye out for people who didn't belong there. He was to escort any such people to the adult assembly, or to DeLeo's feet in an unconscious heap if necessary. He was also charged with informing Cain about the hitmonlee's own tasks for the evening.

To that end, he headed toward the room set aside for the youth assembly, rounding the corner that would take him backstage. The space beyond the curtain was quiet, for now. At any moment, the children would start filing in.

And he could very well be among them.

Solonn shook himself back into the present with an effort. He soon found Cain with one hand holding a cup of something orange and the other flipping through a stack of papers. The hitmonlee put both down when he noticed the large shadow looming over him from behind.

In the blink of an eye, Cain turned on his heel to face Solonn. His eyes were wide, but whether or not he was actually startled was hard to tell. "Shouldn't sneak up on people," he said. "Just because no one here would split your skull for it doesn't mean the same's true everywhere else."

"Noted," Solonn said, wincing a bit. "Sorry about that." He glanced at the papers on the table—from the looks of them, at least some of them detailed tonight's lesson plan for the kids. Does he already know?

Just in case he didn't, "I take it you've already gathered that you'll be addressing the crowd tonight," Solonn said, nodding toward the curtain.

"Yeah, that hasn't been news since this morning." Cain reached back to retrieve the cup, then drank from it. Or appeared to, anyway. He held it more or less where Solonn would expect a mouth to be, and it certainly sounded like he was taking a sip, but as far as Solonn could see, there was no mouth there.

Solonn had yet to raise any questions about that, and wasn't about to start now; both he and the hitmonlee had better things to do. "Were you aware that you'll be doing so alone?"

Cain lowered his cup once more. "…No. No I was not." He ran a hand back over his head with a faint rustling of short fur. "So are we skipping the puppets tonight, or…?"

"As far as I'm aware, no."

Cain sighed, but not heavily. "I'm never gonna be free of 'em, am I."

"Can't say. But I'm sure you'll do fine," Solonn assured him.

And not a moment too soon. The doors beyond the curtain opened audibly, and chattering voices could be heard alongside footsteps and flapping wings and slithering bodies. Automatically, Solonn peeked out into the audience, hardly daring to breathe as he scanned the small crowd of pokémon for snorunt.

Five such scans later, Solonn got the sinking feeling that Jen wasn't going to be showing up tonight after all. Disappointed, he slipped back behind the curtains and slunk off to the side of the stage, concerned that maybe Jen was home sick.

He saw Cain step out onto the stage, the stack of papers now clipped to a board under his arm. Seconds later, the hitmonlee leaned back through the curtains, gesturing for Solonn to join him. Nudging his way out past the side of the curtain, he glided over toward where the hitmonlee stood looking over his papers again.

"Yes?" Solonn called out to him from a couple of yards away to avoid sneaking up on him this time.

Cain tore his eyes from the page. "Closer," he said, half-whispering. "Don't need them hearing." He threw a glance into the audience.

Solonn complied, wondering what Cain would want to keep a secret from the kids. Part of him began to mildly dread an awkward discussion. Can't that sort of thing wait?

"Okay," Cain said in the quietest voice he could muster, "okay." After casting another furtive glance into the audience, "…Do you think I could get away with cutting the puppets from the program?"

That… was not what Solonn was expecting. "Er… that depends on who you're trying to sneak the changes past. Is it Mr. DeLeo or them?"

Solonn looked at the crowd himself on those words—and then all but forgot what he was talking about. There, toward the doors, a snorunt and a wobbuffet were making their way further into the room. And even at this distance, Solonn was sure he recognized that snorunt.

"It's him," he whispered, eyes bright with joy and relief.

"Uh… were you listening there, buddy? I said it was the kids I was asking about. But…" Cain sighed again. "It really probably isn't such a good idea to just spring that on them. 'Hey kids, no more puppet pals!' Yeah, that'd go over real smoothly…"

Cain, it seemed, had made up his mind. Good. "If that's all you needed, I've got something else that needs my tending." Though not the something he'd prefer. Not yet, anyway. He still had a job to do, and he imagined it was in his best interests to do it well… just in case. Much as he hated to consider it, there was a chance, however slim, that he was wrong about that snorunt's identity. And even if he wasn't, there was no guarantee he'd really get a chance to rescue him tonight. He didn't want to lose his job here, not when it made it that much easier to keep track of his brother.

Not when there was a chance, however small and distant, that DeLeo's vision could become a reality.

Solonn descended into the crowd, which gave him a wide berth as he approached. He came to a stop before the snorunt and wobbuffet—before Jen. Something hitched in his chest. There was no doubt about it at this point.

"Blessings," he said. The greeting nearly slipped his mind; it hadn't become habitual yet. Not to mention he was more than a little preoccupied at the moment.

"Blessings," Jen and the wobbuffet returned in unison. It sounded rather more automatic coming from the former. How long has he been coming here…?

With an immense effort, Solonn turned his attention more toward the wobbuffet. "Pardon me," he said, "but could you come with me, please?"

"…What for?" The wobbuffet had worn an apprehensive look ever since their eyes had first met, but now he looked and sounded legitimately frightened. He was even shivering as he stood there, and Solonn knew he was doing a perfectly fine job of keeping his chill to himself.

"I'm sorry, but this is the youth assembly. You'll want our adult group." Which was the truth, and one reason why Solonn wasn't tending to Jen directly yet. The other was concern that his brother would react poorly to some of what he had to say, much as he had back at the Haven.

Though the fact that Jen wasn't acting as though he were face to face with one of his kidnappers this time was… promising…

The wobbuffet nodded, with a wordless noise of acceptance. He was ready to go. Solonn… suddenly wasn't so sure himself. Had Jen been cured? Had this place perhaps done what Adn couldn't—or likelier wouldn't do? Solonn turned back toward him, helpless to resist, momentarily paralyzed by indecision.

He snapped out of it. Not yet, he told himself, though with little force. There was no way to be certain that Jen's bewitching was undone at this point. Or that Adn hadn't simply replaced it with programming of another sort. He couldn't risk making a scene. Let the crowd thin out first.

So he instructed himself, as he began leading the wobbuffet away at a rather faster clip than he'd meant to. But even then, he only hoped rather than knew that he was doing the right thing.

Solonn didn't slow down as he proceeded through the corridors of the oddly labyrinthine building. He could hear the steady pattering of the other's feet behind him, and no panting accompanied them. The wobbuffet was apparently keeping up just fine.

"Excuse me, uh, sir?"

Solonn slowed, though barely. Maybe the wobbuffet was having more trouble than he'd thought. "Hm?"

"What's your name?"

Oh. Satisfied that he wasn't leaving the wobbuffet in the dust after all, Solonn sped back up. "Solonn," he answered, "and you?"

"I'm Esaax," the wobbuffet responded.

"Ah, all right, then. Pleasure to meet you, Esaax." And it was, really. It wasn't Esaax's fault that Solonn had left Jen behind for the time being.

All the same, Solonn was more than a little glad that he didn't have much further to go before he could turn back.

"I'm afraid we're already a little late," he said, "but the good news is that I know a shortcut through the building that'll keep you from missing too much more of the assembly. We'll just go right around here, and—"

Solonn stopped halfway around the corner and midway through his sentence. The doors to his right had opened rather abruptly, catching him by surprise. When DeLeo stepped out through them, the surprise turned to a current of worry.

Don't be nervous, he told himself. You've got no reason to be. After all, it wasn't as if he were wandering aimlessly. He was doing his job.

Meanwhile, it seemed DeLeo was not, and in spite of himself, Solonn took open notice. "Sir… don't you have a client to tend to at the moment?" From what he understood, DeLeo generally devoted meeting nights to one-on-one sessions with particularly troubled Hope attendees.

"He didn't show," DeLeo responded. "And I suspect he's not gonna. He was doing an awful lot of sniffling last time. So I thought I'd take it easy and grab a bite to eat instead."

It was then that he properly noticed Esaax. His eyes and smile widened. "Hey there! Haven't seen you around here before!" He stooped slightly and offered his hand to the wobbuffet, who took it after a moment's delay. "The name's Sylvester DeLeo, and I'm the president and founder of this fine establishment. And you are…?"

"…Esaax," the wobbuffet replied.

"Glad to make your acquaintance, Esaax," DeLeo replied, still smiling. He certainly seemed happy to meet this person, Solonn thought. "Say… do you mind if I ask a quick question?"

"Uh… No, I guess not," Esaax said.

"Okay, then. Tell me, what clan are you from?" DeLeo asked.

"Evergray," the wobbuffet answered.

"Ah." DeLeo straightened his posture. "All right, Esaax, if you'll just follow me, I'll take you to my private counseling office," he said, gesturing toward the room from whence he'd come.

The wobbuffet matter, it seemed, was now securely out of Solonn's figurative hands. "If you'll excuse me…" he said, though part of him had to wonder, as he departed, if DeLeo had actually heard him. There was definitely something about Esaax that was commanding the human's interest. Hoping he was right in assuming he wasn't needed there any longer, he swiftly made his way back to the youth assembly to check on Jen again.

Only to find that he wasn't there.

Solonn tamped down the panic that threatened to arise. He's probably just fine. He probably just went to the restroom. He'll be back any minute.

But countless minutes passed, and he sat there with Cain's puppet act and the audience's participation in it going on at the very edge of his attention until, to his dismay and discomfort, the hitmonlee announced the end of the meeting. Another scan of the crowd confirmed the bad news: Jen still hadn't returned.

Solonn's heart sank. Suspicions that Jen hadn't been cured of his bewitchment after all returned, stronger than ever. The snorunt might well have been concealing his fear, or at least most of it, acting unaware of the "threat" he faced until he had an opportunity to escape. And escape he had, apparently.

With a sigh, Solonn picked his way through the departing crowd, heading backstage once more.

"Hey, how'd I do?" Cain asked him as he passed. Solonn didn't stop, though, already too keen on doing a sweep of the building just in case Jen hadn't completely left the scene. "Come on, man, wait up!"

Might as well, Solonn finally figured, though in truth it wasn't as if he were making any real effort to shake off the hitmonlee behind him. Nor was Cain having any real trouble catching up; he'd be at Solonn's side for sure at this point, were there room. Solonn barely needed or bothered to cut his speed at all.

On the chance that Cain might've seen Jen leave, and might at least be able to tell him when it happened, "Did you happen to notice when the snorunt left?" Solonn asked.

"Yeah, I did; it was just a little after you left," Cain said. "Around the time I brought ol' Billie and Barry out. Could be he's had enough of 'em. And hey, maybe if kids keep walking out on that bit I'll have more of a case for retiring the puppets. What do you think? Was it that bad?"

"I… wasn't really paying much attention to the show," Solonn admitted. "I had a lot on my mind. And still do."

"Hm. Fair enough, I guess. Ah well, I'm sure I'll get enough votes against to drop 'em eventually."

Solonn had nothing to say to that, really. The hitmonlee's puppets and weariness of them weren't exactly top priority at the moment. Keeping an eye out for yellow shells and glowing eyes was.

"Say, that kid you're asking about… That wouldn't happen to be the one what's-her-face mentioned to Sylvan, would it? Now why the heck can't I remember her name," Cain mused aloud. "Elaine or some such, wasn't it?"

"Evane." At least Solonn thought that's who he was talking about. "And… yes. That's exactly who that snorunt was."

"Ah, okay. No wonder you were distracted. Well, if it's any comfort, he shows up every week, without fail. You'll have another shot at your little family reunion sooner or later."

"I hope so." But the hope was rather dimmer now, and grew moreso as his search continued to yield nothing.

Maybe he was wrong about why Jen had left, he conceded. But from what he could see, the evidence told another story. And if he was right, the snorunt would likely book it the first chance he got next week, too.

One of the others needs to talk to him first, he determined. Jen might never have seen any of the Sinaji defectors before. And if he had, and was still bewitched, odds weren't bad that he saw them as the good guys.

Best to arrange for this now, he decided, and went off in search of DeLeo.

He found the human in much the same way as he'd found him last time: a door opened right next to him, and DeLeo very nearly bumped right into him on the way out.

"Whoops!" DeLeo ruffled his hair, looking slightly embarrassed. "I probably oughta give a little more warning before I do that, huh?"

"Oh, I heard you coming," Solonn assured him. Then it was his turn to feel a little embarrassed. "Maybe I should warn you."

"Ah, it's fine. We didn't crash; that's what matters, right? Oh hey!" He clapped his hands together abruptly. "Just thought of something. I'm gonna take the opportunity to chill in my study for a little while. Why don't you join me? You and all your buddies. I know I've told you quite a bit about me and my institute, but I wouldn't mind getting to know you guys a little better, you know?"

Uncertainty briefly flickered in Solonn's eyes; he knew there were a fair few things about himself that he'd rather the human didn't know. And given the other glalie's former affiliation, he doubted they'd want to go into too much detail, either.

But, ultimately, what they shared or didn't was up to them. "I'll go see if they're interested. But… first, if it's all right, there's something I'd like to ask of you," Solonn said.

"It's as all right as all right can be. What do you need?"

"A reassignment. Some position where I'm… less likely to be seen. I think I frightened one of your young attendees away earlier." It wasn't the best feeling, admitting a thing like that. Put mildly. "At the very least, it might be a good idea to assign me to the adult assembly instead."

"Hmm… yeah, I suppose you've got a point there. See, I'd thought the kids'd be safer with the likes of you around. Anyone there who wasn't supposed to be would've taken one look at you and said 'nope, I'm outta here'. Now, I figured sending the steelix in there would've probably resulted in some puddles to mop up, but you…" He shrugged. "Guess I underestimated how scary you were. No offense, of course."

There wasn't offense, but there was something a lot like guilt. It wasn't your fault, he reminded himself. He never feared you before they got a hold of him.

"So… will I be reassigned, then?"

DeLeo nodded. "Consider it done. You'll be on patrol next week. Sound good?"

"Yes," Solonn responded, with one unspoken caveat: Provided I can slip out of sight if he wanders…

"All right. Guess I'll be seeing you later, then?"

"I suppose," Solonn said, then left to meet up with the others.

He ran into Moriel first. Before he could say a word, "Did you see him?" she asked.

Solonn sighed. "Yes, but only briefly. He fled as soon as my back was turned. It seems he still thinks I'm one of his abductors."

The light in Moriel's eyes dampened. "I'm so sorry."

Solonn shook his head. "Don't be. You didn't bewitch him. And you're not the one who sent someone he was likely to distrust into the room with him."

"That… wasn't the smartest arrangement, no. DeLeo should've thought of that."

"I should have thought of it." He sighed again. "I was just… too excited to see him, I guess."

"I think I would be, too, if it were my family on the line." Moriel began to turn at this point. "Do you want to talk about it with the others, maybe? Or at least with your dad?"

"I do, but…" This seemed as good a time as any to bring up DeLeo's proposal. "Do you suppose they'd be interested in doing so with DeLeo in his study? He offered to share his downtime with us. Apparently he wants to get to know us a little better."

"…How much better?" Moriel asked. She sounded slightly apprehensive.

"I don't know, but he gave us a choice in the matter. We don't have to go if we don't want to. And presumably—hopefully—we don't have to tell him anything we'd rather not if we do go."

Moriel mulled it over in silence for a moment. "Okay," she finally agreed. "Maybe we'll get a little extra information about him and his mission while we're at it. It might give us a better idea of whether he actually knows what he's talking about."

She set off then, and Solonn followed her. They located the rest of their party in clusters who were chatting amongst themselves when Moriel and Solonn found them. While Evane showed similar misgivings to Moriel's at first, ultimately she and all the rest decided that yes, they'd be joining DeLeo later in the evening.

 

[Sike_Saner]

Chapter 38 – The Nexus of the Crisis​

When the time came, the five glalie and the claydol filed in, forming a near-circle around DeLeo where he sat waiting for them in his chair. Said chair had been moved forward a bit to allow them to nearly surround him rather than having to bunch up in front of him, presumably to allow him to make eye contact with any one of them just as easily as with any other.

Grosh, meanwhile, lingered in the hallway with his head hanging over the threshold. There was just no fitting any more of him than that in the room beyond, not unless everyone else traded places with him.

"Glad you could all make it," DeLeo said once everyone was settled. "Sorry we haven't had a chance to just shoot the breeze before now. Last couple of days have been pretty hectic on my end.

"But enough about me! You guys have the floor this time."

There was a moment of awkward silence; then, "So… what do you want to know?" Moriel asked.

"Oh, lots of things! Where you come from, just for starters. I'm guessing you're not from the same place, originally speaking, right?"

<We are not,> Oth confirmed. <They are all from Shoal Cave. Grosh and I have our own separate origins, and we met these glalie separately.>

DeLeo nodded, absorbing that. "Now, of course, I've gotta wonder about the circumstances involved. You know, seeing as Shoal Cave is an island and all, and I don't take either of you ground-types for swimmers. I'm guessing humans had something to do with your meeting up. Am I right?"

"…To a degree," Grosh answered from the doorway. "They weren't the only ones who had anything to do with it, but.." He rumbled to himself in apparent discomfort; a restless rotating of some of his segments could be heard over it.

DeLeo raised a hand. "Now, now. If you're not comfortable going on, you're free to stop anytime."

"…I appreciate that," Grosh said, relaxing his posture a bit. Solonn couldn't blame him for not wanting to continue, given the direction the conversation seemed to be taking.

"I will remind you, though: if it's talking about the humans that's hard for you… that might not be the case forever," DeLeo said.

"You say that, but—" Viraya broke off. A growing, approaching noise had caught her attention as well as everyone else's—it sounded like a car headed their way. That noise abated almost as soon as it had arisen, only to be replaced by plodding footsteps, followed by a loud, hollow roar and the sound of something crumbling just outside the room.

In an instant, the room filled with deep blue light, and DeLeo dove for cover in the space between the now-shielded bodies surrounding him. Solonn moved back, tightening the circle as the rest of the glalie did likewise and Oth joined DeLeo behind them.

The wall before them blackened and began to disintegrate, as if it were rotting. A huge, gangly, blue creature stepped through it, head slung low, with sharp teeth bared and an arm outstretched—

—for about a second and a half. Then a crack rang out, and down the intruder went. Solonn stared down at him, trying to make sense of the pokémon who now lay sprawled out and unconscious before them. The thing had four very long legs; he must have stood at least eight feet tall. He had a long neck and tail, too, the latter of which was jet black from end to end. Solonn had never seen such a creature before, neither in person nor during any of Exeter's lessons.

But he knew what the pokémon reminded him of. That sort of creature… that, he'd seen within the past few hours.

Was this a coincidence?

He felt Oth move up and out of the ring through the air. In nearly the same instant, he heard DeLeo getting back up to his feet.

The human let out a sigh. "You could've just knocked, Esaax."

Solonn felt something inside him go deathly cold, even by his standards.

No. This was no coincidence.

"…Okay, what the hell was that? What just happened?" Alij demanded. He broke from the ring to circle the insensible pokémon, clearly trying to make sense of him.

"That right there? That's a kwazai," DeLeo said, "and an unsatisfied customer, so to speak. But I'm gonna see what I can do about the latter. Grosh?"

"Yes?" The steelix's eyes pulled away from the kwazai and locked onto DeLeo's with a bit of an effort.

"Come with me. You and… oh, you." He pointed at Solonn. "I'm gonna need you to help get this guy to the tube. Can't carry him myself, and I don't wanna leave him out of there. And neither do you. These things pack a punch."

Solonn didn't doubt that, not after seeing what the intruder—the same person he'd spoken to mere hours before, who'd seemed utterly harmless then—had done to the walls. Not after seeing those teeth—they paled in comparison to his own, of course, but he still knew the teeth of a predator when he saw them.

He nudged Esaax closer to Grosh using a small, rolling wave of ice. The steelix carefully scooped the kwazai up in his jaws and dragged him out into the hallway and out of sight. Solonn and DeLeo left the room behind him.

Once there was enough room to do so, Grosh craned his neck backward and draped Esaax over his back, slowing his pace further as he carried on from there to reduce the risk of catching the kwazai's long limbs and tail underneath himself.

To that end, "Father? Would you mind if I used some ice to secure him to you?"

"Not in the least," Grosh said. "That'll give me one less thing to think about."

Solonn went to it straight away, pinning the gangly limbs to the steelix's sides with shackles of ice.

"…Did you say 'father'?" DeLeo asked him once that was done.

"Yes…"

"Wow." DeLeo shook his head a little, his eyes wide. "Guess I really do have a lot to learn about you guys."

Grosh made an inscrutable noise at that, but no one else had anything to say until they closed the remaining distance to the room with the holding chamber. They stopped before the doors; then, "This is Sylvester DeLeo, requesting entry," DeLeo said.

"Voice recognition confirmed," a computerized voice responded. "Please state password."

"Password," DeLeo said.

"Password valid. Access granted."

Solonn had raised an eyebrow at DeLeo in an unspoken really? every other time he'd presented the password, and this time was no different. "Sir… may I make a suggestion?" he asked as the doors parted.

"Sure thing."

"You… might want to consider something harder to guess. For the password, I mean."

"He's got a point there," Grosh put in as he slithered into the room beyond with the kwazai still affixed to his back.

"But see, that's the beauty of it," DeLeo countered. "Someone trying to bust in would assume I'd know better. The answer's hidden in plain sight. Besides, the system only responds to my voice anyway, so."

"If you insist…" Solonn couldn't say he had much confidence in DeLeo's reasoning where the password was concerned, but let the matter drop for now. There were plenty of other things vying for his attention, and they had no real trouble wresting it from the previous topic.

"All right, get him on the pad," DeLeo said, then crossed the room to a terminal awaiting him against the wall. "Make sure none of him's spilling out or else the field won't activate."

Solonn sublimated the ice restraints. Apart from automatically sprawling out over the steel surface beneath him, Esaax didn't make a move; he was still down for the count. Grosh carefully brought him over to the pad, rolling over to tip him over onto it, then pushed the head, limbs, and tail onto it with his snout.

With the click of a button, the terminal's control board lit up in an array of colors. DeLeo's hands danced over the keys, faster than Solonn had ever seen anyone type before, and with a steady hum, a column of light flickered into being, trapping Esaax between the two pads.

"All right," DeLeo said, "all right." He sounded short of breath, and his fingers began drumming against the plastic wrist guard as he spoke. "Grosh: I want you to go back and guard that hole in the wall. Tell the others back there to split up and start patrolling in case anybody else decides they can't wait til business hours to have a word with me. Got it?"

"I got it," Grosh said, then slithered away noisily.

DeLeo watched him leave; then, "You stay here, okay?" he said to Solonn. "Just in case we need to knock him back out in a hurry."

"All right," Solonn said, watching the kwazai who still lay folded in a heap on the chamber's floor. He doubted Esaax would be getting back up anytime soon, but he put a sheer cold on standby anyway, ready to unleash it at a moment's notice. He didn't know what Esaax was capable of now, neither with regards to his techniques nor his temperament. Evolution could do strange and sometimes terrible things to people's minds.

So he considered, and he hoped that was the only motive behind the kwazai's violent break-in. Hopefully Esaax didn't have a bone to pick with DeLeo or his cause after all.

Hopefully DeLeo didn't have it coming.

"You know… given his current state, I am kinda glad he didn't wait til we opened back up to drop by," DeLeo said. "We need to have a talk, him and me. He probably had a lot racing through his brain when he busted in. And I'd be lying if I said I wasn't in the same boat."

The human's fingers went still, only to flutter back into motion to punch in a few more keystrokes. There was a whirring sound that pulled Solonn's attention up toward the ceiling—and what he saw there made his thoughts freeze in his head.

A compartment under the chamber's lid had slid open. A long, spindly, robotic arm was emerging from within.

In his mind's eye, Solonn could see an identical pair descending toward him, and he remembered the utter helplessness he'd felt when he'd seen them coming down.

He almost didn't hear the footsteps passing him on the way to the glowing tube, still fixated on the robotic arm as it lowered a revive crystal toward the insensible figure below. Once DeLeo crossed into his field of vision, he automatically tore his gaze from the device and moved to join him in front of the kwazai, just for the sake of reminding himself that he could move.

Before them, the kwazai finally stirred. He lifted his saurian head, groaning faintly. His long, eyed tail rose with it. Esaax looked up; the arm was retracting with another bout of whirring. Once it disappeared, he turned his attention to the people on the other side of the glowing barrier.

His reaction was immediate.

He rose to his full height alarmingly quickly, his eyes and tail locked onto DeLeo. With a snarl, he began snapping at the force field and clawing at it with his long, spidery fingers. The wall of light held, but flashed whenever he struck it. The flashes only got more frequent by the moment.

Then there was a hiss, one that didn't come from the furious creature held prisoner before them. Within seconds, Esaax's posture relaxed, his arms dropping to his sides. Soon after, he dropped to his knees.

He'd been gassed, Solonn realized. Something had been pumped into the tube to make the kwazai more docile.

But he still looked angry. Both his eyes and the eyelike organs encircling his tail remained firmly fixed upon the human face beyond his cell. He wasn't smiling. Not even close.

"Shh… it's all right, Esaax," DeLeo said. "You're exactly where you need to be right now. I'll bet you've got a lot of questions about what's happened to you, and I've got all the answers."

He walked right up to the tube, stopping directly in front of it, and leaned against the glowing wall as if it were ordinary glass. It glowed all the brighter where he pressed against it. "You probably didn't know you could evolve, did you?" DeLeo asked. "I know most wobbuffet don't. So I'm gonna tell you a little story, Esaax. One that'll explain why this has been kept from you—and why you shouldn't be scared of it. No, you should be anything but scared…"

There was a distinct note of awed excitement in DeLeo's voice. Not only did he apparently know more than he'd let on about Esaax's kind, he also seemed legitimately happy about what had befallen the former wobbuffet.

Why, Solonn wondered, should DeLeo care so much?

DeLeo took a step back from the containment field and clasped his hands in front of himself. "There's a legend," he began, "hundreds of years old, about a king of the Mordial region named Asotura. His reign was glorious but short—he was killed by an assassin who was never found.

"The king's body was discovered by his most faithful pokémon friend. And that friend was a kwazai, Esaax. Just like you are.

"Anyway, according to the legend, this kwazai refused to let the king be taken from him, and so he called on his 'ultimate inner power'—and actually raised Asotura from the dead."

Solonn's eyes went wide. So… that was why DeLeo was so happy about a kwazai breaking into his building.

Maybe a little too happy.

Maybe a little too prepared.

Solonn's heart sank, his throat going dry. No…

"Now, that was the good news for the king. The bad news was that the people decided they didn't want his reign to continue. They didn't exactly like the tale of Asotura's resurrection, you see. They called it unnatural, and they called him an abomination.

"And the kwazai became demons in their eyes. The ancient Mordialans decided to just slaughter every kwazai they could find. And they did the same thing to wobbuffet and wynaut, too, in order to make sure the kwazai were exterminated completely. Asotura's own army even sided with the public. They went against the king's orders to put an end to the killing and instead joined in the effort to eradicate your species. Doesn't it just make you sick?"

Whether it did or didn't was impossible to tell. Esaax neither said nor did anything in response. He just kept staring.

"Well, anyway…" DeLeo resumed, "as for Asotura himself, there wasn't anyone around who didn't want him dead—and permanently this time. But when they stormed the castle, he wasn't anywhere to be found. Nobody knows how he got away, but he did, and he also managed to rescue a handful of your kind along with himself.

"After he escaped from Mordial, he looked for a place where your people could continue to be protected for generations to come. Apparently one was provided right here in Hoenn by a legendary pokémon—nobody knows which one. Whoever they were, they gave their home to the refugees. Then they used their legendary powers to hide the refugees' new sanctuary before taking off for who knows where. You might've heard of this sanctuary, Esaax. These days, it's known as Mirage Island.

"Anyway, the people of Asotura's former kingdom tried to keep his story and the secret of your people's final evolutionary form from surviving the ages. But their efforts ultimately proved useless, because that story was recorded—supposedly by Asotura himself—on a little something called the Tablet of Asotura. The tablet went missing for centuries, but it was eventually found by a human explorer from Pacifidlog. But before he could go public with his discovery, well… you know what happened fourteen years ago," he said quietly.

"Luckily, though, one of the explorer's pokémon bothered to take care of the tablet after the explorer passed away. That pokémon eventually decided he wanted to see kwazai brought back into the world, and ultimately he found us and sought our assistance in that matter. Once he told me the story of Asotura and what his kwazai could do… well, there was no question about it. None. I knew I had to help him."

DeLeo stepped back up to the containment field. "Do you remember what I told you earlier, Esaax? About why I founded the Hope Institute? This—" He gestured toward Esaax. "—ties into that. We turned you into this for a very special purpose, Esaax. A very, very important one."

The weight inside Solonn sunk further, and his jaws parted in dismay of their own accord. There it was—DeLeo had admitted it. He was responsible for Esaax's evolution. For forcing him to evolve against his will. To change into something he never asked to be in the name of someone else's cause without asking for his consent.

With sympathy and horror all mixed into one, Solonn stared at the imprisoned kwazai. I could've stopped this, he realized. I could've prevented this if I'd only known…

DeLeo pressed his hands against the force field once more. "You'll see," he half-whispered, sounding slightly crazed, his smile spreading wide across his face. "It's gonna be just like the old days. Only better."

He then turned away from Esaax and headed for the exit, striding past Solonn along the way. The glalie watched him in silence for a moment, still in shock. Then he sent an apologetic glance back at Esaax and turned to catch up with DeLeo, his eyes burning with anger.

DeLeo opened the doors with his voice command once more, then motioned for Solonn to go on ahead of him. Solonn did so automatically, too preoccupied to question it, but he did at least think to shoot the human a vehement glare as he moved past him.

That glare stayed fixed on DeLeo as the human began making his way back down the hall, and Solonn remained stuck where he hovered, quivering with outrage.

"How could you do such a thing?" he finally demanded, sounding equally angry and hurt.

DeLeo stopped in his tracks and turned to face him. "…What? What are you talking about?"

"You did this to him," Solonn said, still shaking as he spoke, "without his consent? Without even so much as his awareness that he could be changed in such a way?"

DeLeo blinked at him, bemused. "What… what's it to you?"

Solonn's eyes narrowed. "You have no right to inflict a change on someone who doesn't ask for it first." He moved forward, causing the human to take a step back. "No one has that right. You disgust me, DeLeo."

Fear, or something resembling it, began showing through DeLeo's expression. "Look… I'm sorry you don't like how we've gone about this whole kwazai business, okay? I really am. But… don't you understand what we're trying to do here?" he asked, pained frustration in his voice. "Were you even paying attention to anything I said in there other than the parts you didn't like? We're trying to restore lives, Solonn! And let me tell you something: once we've restored certain lives in particular, I promise you Esaax is gonna be so happy that he's not gonna care that he didn't have a say in whether or not he evolved."

"And what if this legend you spoke of is just that—a legend?" Solonn asked. "What if it turns out you've just been chasing a damn rumor all this time? Did you consider that possibility for even a second? Did you consider what it might do to Esaax if he were told that he can bring back people he cares about when in reality he can't, to find out that he was subjected to a change—one that has obviously upset him very much—for nothing?"

DeLeo only stared at him at first. Then his face twisted in as much of a look of anguish as it could produce. "…It's more than a legend," he insisted. "I'm sorry you can't see that… and I'm not gonna let you get in the way of our proving it!"

With an inhuman speed, DeLeo's hands swung out at Solonn, and each of them split down the middle with a faint click. They opened like the covers of a book to expose dark, metallic nozzles. In nearly the same instant, jets of fire came roaring out of the newly-revealed weapons—Solonn only narrowly conjured a protect shield in time to deflect the flames, hissing and recoiling in fear from the attack even as he thwarted it.

His eyes then blazed a bright white, and the sound of the sheer cold attack he released in retaliation echoed through the hallway. The attack hit its mark; DeLeo immediately passed out and dropped heavily to the floor.

Solonn looked down at him in lingering disbelief, still shaking in primal fear for a few moments, then called out with the full force of his voice to his co-workers in the Hope Institute, not comfortable with the notion of leaving such a dangerously augmented human unguarded despite DeLeo's present condition.

He couldn't undo what DeLeo had done to Esaax. But he could at least see to it that the human paid for his crimes.

Alij was the first to arrive. His eyes went huge at the sight of DeLeo lying prone there. "Whoa, hey, what happened here? Who did this?"

"I did." Solonn watched the rest of the glalie filter in shortly after Alij's arrival, with Grosh and Oth taking up the rear.

"What… but why?" Evane asked.

The hurt in her voice made Solonn wince slightly. She won't want to believe this. Gods knew he didn't, either. "He's a crook," he told everyone gathered there. "That pokémon who burned through the wall, that kwazai… DeLeo forced him to evolve. It's driven him mad."

"I…" Evane began hesitantly. Her eyelight wavered as she stared down at DeLeo. "…I don't know. Are you sure he forced him? Why would he do such a thing?"

"For his goals," Solonn answered. "For his plans to revive humanity. He seems to think kwazai can raise the dead." He couldn't have sounded or looked more skeptical if he'd tried.

"Well… what if they can?" Moriel asked quietly.

Solonn met her gaze with dismay in the color of his eyes. You can't be siding with him. Please. But… in spite of himself, and with a snarl of disgust turned inward, he realized he couldn't blame her. Not entirely.

He sighed, frustrated with a number of things at once. "I don't know," he said finally, honestly. "But… ultimately, I think whether or not Esaax uses those powers—if he even has them," he stressed, "—should be up to him." His gaze shifted unconsciously, in the general direction of a towering hotel that, as far as he knew, still stood near the edge of town. He swallowed hard. "That much, at least, should be his choice."

"We should try to convince him it's the right thing to do, at least," Evane said. "If there's any chance we could see her again…"

Whether or not there was going to be more to that sentence, Solonn couldn't say. Once it had been left hanging long enough for him to doubt she'd continue, "You can talk to him. But you can't force him. Please."

"I would never…" Evane assured him.

"None of us would," Viraya said seriously.

Then something at the floor caught and held her eye. "Sister, look…"

Evane followed her gaze. So did everyone else. "His hands…" she remarked, bemused.

"Artificial," Solonn said. "With flamethrowers hidden inside. He turned them on me, but he wasn't quick enough."

Grosh recoiled slightly, then shook his head. "Well I'm glad you're all right, more than glad… But this is crazy. Oth… are you sure this guy's human after all?"

<All evidence I found during my last scan indicates that he is. There was nothing to suggest otherwise.>

"Maybe he'd found a way to hide the truth from you," Viraya said, "just as he kept his weapons hidden."

That… wasn't a comforting thought. At all. Solonn had trusted Oth's psychic perception for a long time. He'd known it wasn't infallible; the claydol couldn't scan dark-types. But now… now he had to wonder what else might be able to deceive them.

"I'd heard rumors that some humans weren't typeless," Viraya went on. "Do you think… is it possible he's actually a dark-type?"

<No,> Oth said. <That much, at least, I can confirm. A true dark-type would have ejected me from their mind. Painfully.> They rattled to themself once more. <At this point, I can only suspect he used a device of some kind—an implant, perhaps—to control what I could detect within his mind.>

Solonn realized he'd begun shaking and stilled himself with an effort. He looked down at DeLeo for signs that he might be coming around sometime soon and found none, but even that much was difficult to trust at this point. He let out a held breath. "Something needs to be done about him. The city's authorities need to know what they'd been harboring."

"I'll go," Moriel volunteered. "I think I know how to get to the police station from here, and if I'm wrong…" She gave a quick tilt of her head. "I can find someone, I'm sure."

"…All right," Solonn said, at which Moriel sped off without delay. "And… I think it would be best if we got DeLeo away from here. Away from Esaax." He didn't want to give the human—or whatever DeLeo was—an opportunity to turn those flamethrowers or any other secret weapons upon Esaax. DeLeo had done more than enough to the kwazai already.

"Leave it to me," Grosh said. "Someone needs to go back and guard that breach anyhow. Might as well be me."

"Father…"

"Come on, now. I'm made of sturdier stuff than the lot of you. No offense," Grosh added quickly.

Alij grunted irritably, but no one else had any objection.

"Just… be careful, all right?" Solonn said.

"Will do," Grosh assured him, then lowered his head over the unconscious human and plucked him up off the floor by his shirt.

As soon as Grosh had left the scene, Alij moved past Solonn to the double doors barring access to the holding chamber. "We should have a talk with… Esaax, was it? Just to see if he's as mad as you say. If he's not, well… I'd kind of like to find out for sure whether he was duped into this or not. From his own mouth."

He looked the doors up and down, then frowned. "…These are some of those voice-doors," he remembered aloud.

"Yes," Solonn confirmed.

"…All right, then how are we supposed to get Esaax out of there?"

Solonn knew a way. He could open those doors right there and then. But if it could be avoided… He swallowed audibly. "I'm sure the authorities can get in without any—"

BOOM.

Four faces instantly turned to face the source of the noise.

"Moriel…" Evane whispered, and Solonn thought he felt his heart stop for a moment. The sound—the explosion, he was all too sure—had come from precisely the direction she'd gone.

No one gave the command. No one had to. In an instant, all five of them were off to investigate. Please, let her be all right… Solonn prayed silently as he pushed through the air.

Even in the worst-case scenario, she might be fine, some other part of his mind dared to point out.

He hissed at it. I can't expect that of him.

To say nothing of the fact that he really didn't want to find her in the kind of condition that would necessitate that.

He soon discovered heat signatures up ahead. Varying temperatures. Varying species, though he couldn't guess which.

But he didn't have to. An arbok had just rounded the corner—and looked very sorry to have done so—with a… Solonn squinted at the pokémon striding along behind the arbok, trying to identify her, but couldn't. But she did look suspiciously like a wobbuffet, he thought; she had the eyes and the blue skin and the black, eye-bearing tail of one. Or four tails, from the looks of things. She was rather taller, though, with twice as many arms, half as many legs, and a more humanoid face. Evolved, he suspected, at which something inside him went sour.

Was DeLeo responsible for another one?

The… whatever-she-was set something down on the floor with a heavy thunk, drawing Solonn's eyes to it. To him. A nosepass, Solonn recognized, albeit barely; several portions of the rock-type were simply missing.

Solonn had a very unpleasant notion as to why.

"Stay put," the unfamiliar pokémon hissed to the plainly-nervous arbok as she stepped up to stand beside him, "and try to stay calm. Please."

"What are you people doing here?" Alij demanded as he came to a stop a few feet away from the three strangers; the rest of the team did likewise. He moved a few inches to the side, peering past the arbok, and his eyes narrowed as they found the broken nosepass there. "Actually, never mind that. I think we've already got our answer," he said, and nodded toward the unconscious rock-type.

"You were responsible for that explosion?" Solonn asked the pokémon who'd been carrying the nosepass.

"Yes," the blue pokémon answered evenly, "but we hadn't intended to cause one. It was all just a misunderstanding. We ran into one of your people unexpectedly; he—" She gestured toward the arbok. "—attacked her out of panic; and things just sort of escalated, unfortunately. Don't worry—she's still alive, although she does need to get some medical attention soon."

All of the glalie's eyes widened at the news, and Alij swore aloud. "Where is she?" he demanded.

The blue pokémon pointed back toward the room from whence she'd come. Alij and Solonn rushed off in that direction at once, as did Oth.

A hole in the wall caught Solonn's attention the moment he entered the room, and he made for it at once. Rushing over the littered floor, with only the occasional bit of rock scraping his belly—bits of a person, he helplessly reminded himself—he hoped dearly that the strange pokémon had been telling the truth about Moriel, and that she wouldn't be hurt too badly to save…

"Oh gods," Alij murmured, already at the breach and looking inside. "No…"

That… wasn't promising. With dread, Solonn joined him to see Moriel's condition for himself. What he found was, thankfully, not quite as bad as Alij's tone had led him to expect. But it was still rough, seeing her as she was: a horn broken, half her armor missing. And gods, the blood. No more of it was escaping at this point—Alij had already patched up the wound, Solonn guessed, if the fact that the armor was now regenerating by a will that was neither Moriel's nor his own was anything to go by—but the pool that still lingered there and the amount of mist that hung over it still told a grisly tale.

He heard the sound of something slithering into the room then, something much lighter and less craggy than the serpent he knew personally. Solonn turned to regard Viraya, the arbok, and the latter's two companions for a moment before drifting forward to meet them. Oth moved forward, as well, and Evane went past the two of them to look in on Moriel herself. Alij and Viraya stayed put.

"Why did you come here?" Solonn asked of the intruders, his voice heavy.

"Because someone here desperately needs help," the blue pokémon said. "I don't know if you're aware of this, but there's a pokémon here who's been forced to evolve. He's elementally unstable—he needs a psychic-type of his own kind to serve as a vessel for his excess darkness. Please… you've got to give me a chance to balance him out. He won't survive otherwise."

Oh gods… DeLeo's crimes, it seemed, were worse than he'd realized. A fresh bolt of sickness shot through Solonn at the fact someone's life could be in danger because he'd failed to see this coming.

"Do you mean Esaax?" he asked. The question came out of its own accord.

"Yes, I do. You've got to let me see him," the blue pokémon—another kwazai, apparently—said urgently.

"She could still be lying," Alij pointed out.

Solonn sent a glance back toward Alij and Evane… or only toward the former, he found, and he hoped that was because Evane had gone out for help. He looked away, frowning. He wanted to believe the kwazai. He wanted to just rush to Esaax's aid then and there.

But he'd already been fooled once today, with grave consequences.

He sighed. "Would you consent to a psychic scan in order to prove that you're telling the truth?" he asked the kwazai. Even as Solonn spoke, however, he remembered how Oth's last scan had been tricked. He bit back a hiss. Please let me trust this, at least…

The kwazai didn't bother to keep herself from scowling. "Will it be quick?"

<Yes,> Oth assured her, <and it will be painless.>

"Fine, then," she said.

Without hesitation, Oth brought themself to hover right in front of her, lowered their head, and closed all but the foremost of their eyes. Soon afterward, <She is completely truthful in her claims.>

Solonn hoped to all gods that was the case. Especially since he didn't have the heart to obstruct her any further. Not when there was a chance that Esaax really was in mortal danger. Not when part of him still blamed himself, and what trust he'd given DeLeo, for the wobbuffet's forced evolution.

"All right," he said quietly. "If you'll follow me, I'll take you to Esaax." He made his way past the strangers to the corridor that led back toward the holding chamber. "I hope for his sake that you succeed," he said earnestly as he heard the sounds of slithering scales and dainty feet following him out. "He's already been through enough that he didn't deserve."

"I hope I succeed, too," the kwazai said, her tone subdued.

Before they'd gotten far, Solonn heard a voice in the distance. A loud, furious voice—a roar, really. He couldn't make out what, if anything, its maker was saying, but he was sure he knew who it was. The direction it came from made it all too easy to guess.

Thud.

The origin of that sound was a lot closer. Solonn turned at once to see what was going on and found the nosepass on the floor, with the kwazai standing unnaturally still, her tails—or rather the branches of a single tail, he realized—fanned out wide.

"What is it?" the arbok asked.

"Esaax," the kwazai said in a voice filled with pain and fear. "He's returned to my perception—and he's in pain…"

"What? How bad is it?" the arbok demanded worriedly.

"It's horrible… Dear Night, it's like his own body is rejecting him…"

Oh gods, not good. Not good at all… "We're almost there," Solonn told her. He tried to sound confident, assuring. He fell short of both.

No sooner had he spoken than the kwazai rushed out in front of him, staggering slightly and clutching her head in obvious pain but still moving very fast. The doors, Solonn recalled, and hastened to join her. Maybe she could open them by force, but maybe she couldn't. She'd need him in the latter case.

He caught up with her just in time to see her double over in front of the doors and let out a terrible scream. He rushed to her side to keep her from pitching over, and she took the hint, leaning against him readily. She fixed her posture, for the most part, and her scream died out almost as quickly as it had come. But a hand still gripped her forehead, her sharp teeth bared in a grimace.

There was no more time to lose. The rest of the pokémon were arriving on the scene now, Viraya helping the arbok carry the nosepass… but Solonn shut them out just as soon as he'd spotted them. How they'd react to what he was about to do… was a concern for another time. Right now, the only thing that mattered was the tormented creature beyond those doors.

"This is Sylvester DeLeo," he spoke up, "requesting entry." The voice wasn't his own. The language wasn't his own. But it was just what the computer keeping the room closed off wanted; it prompted him for a password just as it did for its true master. "Password," Solonn responded, still using the borrowed voice and words.

The doors slid open. Solonn and the kwazai entered first, with Viraya and the arbok bringing in the nosepass behind them as Oth drifted at their side. And there before them all, still encased in a column of light, Esaax slumped against the barrier, panting and groaning with his tail lashing and his hands gripping his head tightly.

The female kwazai ran to him at once, pressing all four of her hands against the wall of energy, weeping openly all the while. Without taking her eyes off of Esaax, "How do you get him out of this thing?" she demanded.

"Over here!" Solonn called, and made for the control panel. She followed him without delay.

"I don't know how to use this!" she told him.

"It's all right; I do." At least, he hoped he recalled the sequence correctly. "Just do exactly as I tell you, and we'll have him out in no time."

"You're… you're going to be all right," a soft voice sounded from somewhere behind them as Solonn relayed his instructions to the kwazai beside him. It was the arbok, no doubt, most likely trying to console Esaax.

But it seemed to be in vain; Esaax cried out again, his voice deep and howling like the wind. At the same instant, the other kwazai convulsed hard, echoing Esaax's scream. She staggered, and Solonn moved quickly to break her fall.

"Dear Holy Night, he's tearing himself apart!" she cried.

"You're almost finished!" Solonn told her, trying to assure them both.

Sure enough, the containment field soon vanished with a faint humming sound. The female kwazai ran back to Esaax, dropping into as much of a kneeling posture as her stiltlike legs would allow and throwing her arms around him.

"Ntairow…" Esaax said as she cried into his chest, his voice hoarse and quavering. "I'm—" He broke off momentarily, giving a pained groan, at which Ntairow embraced him all the more tightly. "I'm glad you're here. I'd… given up on us ever finding each other again." He closed his eyes, lowering his head.

"I should've found you sooner…" Ntairow lamented, her voice barely above a whisper. "Dear Night, look at you… you're so broken…"

"I don't think you can fix me now," Esaax said quietly. "I'm… I'm not gonna make it."

"No," Ntairow responded, her voice suddenly charged with a fierce resolve. "You will survive this… and your son will finally get to know the father he's been missing all these years."

Esaax just stared at her for a moment, his eyes filled with disbelief and wonder. Then a smile spread across his muzzle in spite of his pain. "…You're serious?"

Ntairow nodded. "He is called Zerzekai. And unless I'm mistaken, he's just begun his life as a wobbuffet."

Esaax managed a faint but earnestly joyous laugh, then wrapped his arms around Ntairow, hugging her as hard as his rapidly-waning strength would allow.

Ntairow, meanwhile, took on a look of deep concentration. She's doing it, Solonn guessed. She's balancing him… He willed her to succeed. He prayed for her to succeed, for Esaax to be wrong about his chances.

Her expression changed right before Solonn's eyes. Suddenly she looked another sort of troubled altogether—more than anything, she looked confused.

No one got a chance to wonder why.

A dark aura flared around Esaax as he roared in a voice as vast and hollow as the depths of space and fired a black beam at the other kwazai, striking her with devastating force. A bright pink aura flashed around her at its impact, an autonomic and completely futile mirror coat response, and she collapsed on the spot, scattered black patches forming on her skin as she hit the ground.

With a hollow howl, the black aura around Esaax suddenly tore free from him, allowing an erratically-flashing, bright orange aura to surround him instead. The shadow took flight, rushing through the air, leaving the screaming kwazai behind.

Whether or not the shadow was truly a separate entity, Solonn couldn't say for sure. But he wasn't about to chance it. He fired an ice beam at the dark mass, and a hyper beam and a volley of poison sting needles flew forth in an attempt to stop the shadow, as well. But none of them connected, nor did the nhaza set off in the same moment. The disembodied darkness evaded all of the attacks effortlessly, destroying electronic equipment and killing the lights as they dodged every attack. Before anyone could strike again, the shadow smashed into the far wall and promptly burned through it, letting early morning light come pouring in. Once outside, the shadowy mass seemed to dissipate entirely.

Shaking, with no real idea as to what in the hell just happened, Solonn turned back toward Esaax. The kwazai was crumpled in a heap on the floor, orange sparks flickering all around him for one last moment before ceasing. Esaax then toppled over onto his side, panting arrhythmically, dark blue blood flowing from his eyes and mouth.

"…Esaax?" the arbok spoke up tentatively in a very faint, cracking voice.

Solonn felt something nudge his side. "Should we go?" Viraya asked.

Solonn was at a loss for an answer at first. "…You should," he said finally. "Go see if the paramedics have arrived. Tell them they're needed here, too."

Viraya nodded, insofar as the nosepass on her head allowed, then lowered the rock-type to the floor and left the room.

Solonn, meanwhile, went right back to watching the two kwazai, his attention wrenched the rest of the way back toward them by the arbok who continued to call out Esaax's name. Esaax was still alive, and he'd lifted his head ever so slightly. The arbok tried to get his attention again, but his cries seemed to fall on deaf ears.

It was easy to guess why. Esaax's gaze had fallen upon Ntairow, at the sight of whom he gave a very faint, pained sound. She wasn't breathing, Solonn realized. Esaax had just slain someone he loved… all because of DeLeo's ambitions. Ambitions that may very well have been in vain.

But gods, did Solonn ever hope they hadn't. If DeLeo was correct—Solonn couldn't think of him as "right"—then at least the worst of this could be undone. Esaax couldn't have his old form back, but Ntairow could have her life back. Maybe they both could.

With an immense effort, Esaax rolled over onto his belly and pulled himself up to lie beside Ntairow. He lifted a shaking hand, reached for her, and laid it down upon a still-blue patch on her arm.

A soft, multicolored glow surrounded him, then spread from the point where he touched her until it radiated from every square inch of her skin, as well.

Solonn's jaws parted of their own accord, his eyes bright and flickering and very, very wide. It's happening… he realized, or decided. He really couldn't think of anything else it could be. His breath halted inside him, and he watched with a stream of prayers flowing through his mind, begging the phenomenon before him to succeed.

The glow surrounding the two kwazai suddenly grew to such an intensity that Solonn had to shut his eyes and turn away. Even then, some of the light made it through his eyelids. Once it was gone, he turned back toward Esaax and Ntairow just in time to see their shared aura burst into a cloud of tiny, colorful sparks, which fell in a brief, luminous shower over the two kwazai.

As the last sparks fell, Esaax looked down upon Ntairow. She was completely restored, at least in appearance; all of the strange burns were gone. He smiled gently, weakly, and kissed her forehead. Then he lay down next to her and quietly exhaled.

He didn't breathe in again.

Ntairow inhaled suddenly and sharply, awake in an instant. She sat up abruptly, then immediately rolled over onto her hands and folded legs, her shoulders heaving as she coughed and sputtered uncontrollably.

As soon as she caught her breath again, she started looking about frantically, confused. Her eyes fell upon Esaax, who was surrounded now by no colors other than the deep sapphire of his own shed blood.

Her cry of sorrow rang out for a very long moment.

Solonn stared in silent disbelief at the scene before him, his heart going leaden. No… His eyes screwed shut, his teeth bared all the further and quivering, and he shook in midair with the force of his dry sobs. The kwazai did have the power to raise the dead, just as DeLeo had believed. But that power, it seemed, came with a terrible cost.

"What… What's going on?" a concerned voice demanded from somewhere behind Solonn as Ntairow's voice faded out; Evane, he recognized through the fog settling over his mind. "What happened?"

"He saved her," Solonn managed weakly, and that's all he managed. He turned away, moving past Evane and Viraya and a team of chansey who'd just arrived in the corridor. In spite of their efforts, DeLeo's desperation had cost Esaax his life, and Solonn could bear to look upon the scene of their failure no longer.

 

[Sike_Saner]

Chapter 39 – Come to Collect​

In an alleyway that lay largely untouched by the midday sun, a cardboard box hopped and rattled about as if under its own power. Rustling sounds could be heard from within, had there been an audience. But no one was around to watch the box dance.

Just as well, as moments later, it toppled off of the small mountain of boxes it had perched on, emitting a very un-boxlike shriek as it fell.

Whumpf.

It wasn't the most graceful landing, nor the most dignified. The nanab peels splayed out on his head like a bizarre wig didn't help matters. But at least the rattata had finally gotten himself free from that box, and at least he'd finally secured the source of that enticing berry smell.

He shook the scraps off, then delicately took one of the peels in his front paws and sat back on his haunches to enjoy it.

Then a shadow passed overhead, and he forgot all about his own lunch, fearing he was about to become someone else's.

Hoping and praying he hadn't been spotted yet, he darted into the gap between two trash bins and waited anxiously behind one of them, ears and whiskers twitching at a frenzied pace. A sound like wind filled the alleyway, but the air remained perfectly still. Whatever the thing was, it was still around. Still prowling.

The rattata's pulse quickened painfully. It was starting to look like he hadn't escaped the hunter's notice after all.

The shadow snaked its way into the rodent's hiding place—a shadow cast by nothing at all. Maybe it was a ghost, the rattata thought, trying to calm himself. Maybe he could avoid the worst of their powers.

When the dark mass suddenly darted at him like a striking snake, narrowly missing, he decided he didn't want to chance it.

He tore out from behind the bins, out into the open daylight, hoping desperately that the thing couldn't handle the sun, or at least disliked it enough to decide against following him.

The shadow flew out into the light, seemingly undaunted, and lanced through the air at the rattata with a tornadic howl.

His blood ran cold, and that was the only reaction he had time to give before the dark mass struck and engulfed him, sinking in like a chill in the air.

The rattata's fur darkened. His eyes flung wide open and filled with a piercing white light. He let out a distorted cry, spasming violently—and crumbled to powder, right then and there.

The shadow fled the scene, scattering the gray dust of their victim in their wake as they thinned out to invisibility once more. The search for a host that could handle them wasn't over yet.

* * *​

"And remember: if it ain't Nutten's, it ain't nuttin'!"

The television in the waiting room had been blaring the entire time, but no one there really paid it any mind. Solonn had checked out of whatever it'd had to offer once he realized they'd missed the news—not that he'd exactly relished the idea of being reminded about the night before. Nor did he really need reminding. He could still see that blinding rainbow aura when he closed his eyes, could still hear the strange, hollow roar of… whatever it was that had torn free from the doomed kwazai.

He was sure it all would've given him a hell of a nightmare, had he actually managed to fall asleep the night before.

All the same, the news might've shed some additional light on the Hope Institute, which might've made finding Jen a little easier. It might've also yielded more information about DeLeo—though odds were it had just focused on one of his most unusual traits, which they'd already learned about from the authorities earlier that morning. There in their cell, he'd admitted how he'd survived the Extinction: he wasn't human after all. It turned out he was an ordinary meowth, one who'd been masquerading as a human being with the help of an elaborate animatronic disguise.

Why he'd been doing so remained unknown… though Solonn had his guesses, in the wake of some of the things DeLeo had said. "It's gonna be just like the old days." The disguise, much like his dreams of resurrecting humanity, was probably just another way of clinging to a past that DeLeo desperately missed.

Solonn might've felt sorry for him under other circumstances. As it stood… no. He couldn't sympathize with him. Not after what DeLeo had done to Esaax.

Where thoughts of yesterday didn't intrude, a more powerful sense than ever that Jen needed to get out of this town right now dominated Solonn's mind—it was all he could do not to go tearing out of the Haven and resume his search right away. His surroundings weren't helping matters. The gardevoir might well have been present, and a member of his party was in a potentially vulnerable position at the moment.

So it behooved Solonn and the rest to see to it that Moriel returned to them, safe and sound. What Jen's captor could possibly want from her, no one could guess. But no one knew what the gardevoir had wanted with Jen, either.

Solonn heard chansey feet padding along in the hallway outside, as did everyone else; they looked and found the normal-type coming to a stop at the doorway with a familiar glalie in tow.

"I'm happy to report that your friend is as good as new," the chansey said, smiling.

Moriel certainly looked the part; even her broken horn had been restored. Her eyes met Alij's, and the latter came rushing past the chansey to hover before her. She glanced past him, giving the rest a smile, though she didn't quite look happy to see them. Just relieved.

"So. I guess we're done here…?" Alij sounded genuinely unsure.

"…For now." Part of Solonn wanted to see if that gardevoir really was available this time. Part of him wanted to confront him. The rest was well aware of how much harder it would be to rescue his brother from jail, or from whatever remote corner of the world the gardevoir might decide to warp the meddling glalie to this time.

"Take care, all right?" the chansey said as the small group of glalie and the claydol who accompanied them filed out past her.

"Will do," Moriel assured her with a quick backwards glance. To her companions, "I'm just glad none of you had to be let out with me," she said, half-sighing. "What happened after I blacked out? What did you do about the intruders?"

Solonn bit his tongue involuntarily as he emerged into the open air outside the Haven, where Grosh was waiting to rejoin them. No, there really wasn't any getting away from the previous night's events. "It's… complicated," he said wearily. But she'd been taken in by DeLeo just as he had. She had every right to know what had happened, why she'd gotten into that fight in the first place.

He just hoped the rest of his friends were prepared to pick up the story if he found it too hard to continue.

* * *​

The house was empty, save for the snorunt in the living room.

Syr was out, off somewhere quiet to be by himself for a while. After what he'd heard about the night before, Jen couldn't blame him. That made two friends his adoptive father had lost within a very short span. He could only hope the arbok would pull through all right, especially given his unwillingness to go to Hope meetings with him.

There was a knock at the door, at which Jen hopped off the sofa and made to answer it in no particular hurry. It was followed after a beat by six more in rapid succession—with wide eyes, he picked up the pace. It was him!

Sure enough, when he pulled the door open and turned his gaze upward, he was met with exactly the face he'd expected. A gardevoir stood there, blue-haired and orange-eyed, and he was smiling warmly. A whismur stood at his side, looking slightly apprehensive.

"Adn!" Jen greeted him eagerly. Before Adn could respond, Jen spotted the plain little bundle he carried. His eyelight brightened. "Is that…"

"Yes." Adn into the living room, opening the parcel as Jen shut the door behind him. "I'm sorry I couldn't find it faster. I know you've been fighting it pretty hard on your end."

"That… is an understatement." Jen dropped himself back on the couch, shuddering a bit as he recalled the last time his element had almost gotten the better of him. "You're lucky you found it when you did. I almost evolved yesterday."

"Oh dear…" Adn looked down at him pityingly. "Again, I apologize. I knew you didn't have much time left, but…" He clasped his hands, the pouch quivering in his grasp, and took a steadying breath. "Hm. Better late than never, I suppose…"

Here he pulled the item he'd brought in out of its pouch. It was a black thorn, about seven inches in length, that came to a luridly purple and very sharp point. "And there you have it. One dire thorn, just as promised," he said proudly, then handed the item to Jen.

Jen grasped it around the middle, turning it over in his hands a couple of times to see how the light caught its bright tip, mindful not to prick his palms on it. It contained venom; he knew that much. A very potent venom.

But that's not all he knew about it. "Should we really do this here?" he asked, concerned eyes sweeping the room around him. The whismur shuddered almost imperceptibly at his words. "I don't want to make a mess…"

"Hmmm… I really don't think we should risk anyone seeing the thorn before you've had a chance to use it," Adn said, frowning. "Raxxi can be careful," he assured him, patting the whismur on the head. "And this shouldn't take long, judging from what you said about yesterday."

"Well… okay. But you've got to help me clean up if something happens. I don't want my dad throwing a hissy-fit. And… please be careful," he reminded Raxxi, but for a different reason. "We have some berries, but I still don't want you getting sick."

The whismur gave a quick nod. "I will," he said.

Adn stepped back, and Raxxi stepped forward. The whismur took a deep breath, letting it out with a soft, whistling noise. "Okay," he said. "Let's do this."

Jen gave him a nod. Then, with the dire thorn clutched in his hand, he launched off the sofa into a headbutt. Raxxi only stared back, and he took the hit without resisting in the slightest, though he did let out an "oof!" at the impact.

The snorunt and the whismur went sliding a short distance across the floor before coming to a stop against the wall. Jen frowned down at Raxxi as he stood, then looked up at Adn. "You didn't tell me he wasn't going to fight back at all…"

Adn shrugged. "And he didn't tell me. I suppose he just wanted to get it over with as quickly as possible. At any rate, you did mention having berries on hand, did you not?"

"Yeah, but…"

"I'll be fine," Raxxi said weakly. "Just… don't use the poison on me, okay?"

Jen inhaled deeply, still more than a little apprehensive about what he had to do. But the fact remained that time wasn't on his side. If he didn't make use of Adn's gift soon, becoming a glalie would happen sooner rather than later—and he hadn't forgotten a word of what the gardevoir had told him about glalie. About what not only their new bodies but also their society demanded of them. Jen would not let himself become such a creature.

He sighed. "All right," he finally said. With his eyes screwed all the while, he headbutted the whismur again, and again, and again… and then stopped as a strange sort of energy, familiar and yet not, began pulsing through him from the hand that held the dire thorn. Even through his closed eyes, he could see the brilliant light he gave off as, once again, the process of evolution began. But this time… this time, he didn't fight it.

This change would save him, not condemn him to a life of killing and servitude.

He felt himself elongating greatly, with numerous blades and spikes erupting from his hide. It hurt, and he couldn't pretend otherwise. He cried out, only to lose his voice as he transformed fully into energy. He could still feel the embrace of the mother element… but there was a new one at her side. Something dark and earthly that brought a current of unease as it took its place within him but soon settled into something much more tolerable.

He'd never felt so safe, so powerful in his entire life.

The light faded out. Moments later, he dared to open his eyes, letting a sickly yellow light spill from them. They'd succeeded. He'd evolved into a cryonide rather than a glalie.

His snakelike lower body pulled into a loose coil, his long arms descending to carefully pick up the unconscious whismur lying before him. "Thank you," he told Raxxi, his voice low and hissing at its edges. He had every intention of thanking the whismur again once the latter was awake.

Balancing him across his arms, too fearful of letting him come into contact with his long claws and spiked chest to do otherwise, Jen turned about and slithered around the table to lay him on the sofa. He bumped his head against one of the artificial stalactites hanging from the ceiling in the process. "Ow!" He looked up at it and gave an irate little click of his new mandibles. He'd have to be a lot more mindful of his size now.

Jen carefully placed his friend on the couch, hoping the armrest would suffice for a pillow—he didn't dare try to move the cushions, not with blades for fingers. He frowned and made a faint chittering noise as another problem occurred to him: How am I going to get the berries?

"Adn?" he spoke up, turning to face the gardevoir—only to find him already headed into the kitchen. Jen let out a relieved sigh. "They're in the cabinets," he made sure to inform the gardevoir, but it sounded as though he'd already guessed that much himself.

Jen looked Raxxi over again before moving to the next step—and it felt like something had just ripped his heart right out. The whismur wasn't breathing, and he was giving off noticeably less heat than before.

"Wh-what…" Dear gods, had he done this? He'd been reluctant to beat the poor creature into unconsciousness, let alone death… He stared helplessly at Raxxi in horrified bewilderment for another moment. Then, "Adn!" he cried out, his voice cracking. "Adn!"

Adn returned from the kitchen, but unhurriedly. He carried a box of oran berries, which he'd already opened. He popped one into his mouth as he approached the couch, regarding the dead whismur for barely a second before fixing his gaze on Jen. The gardevoir was smiling.

Jen's confusion worsened at the sight of him. "Can't you see what happened? I killed him. Oh gods, I killed him…" he said between panicked breaths, his palms pressed to his temples. One of his horns nicked his right hand, letting blood and mist seep out between his claws. He didn't notice.

"Shhhhh… no. You didn't kill him," Adn assured Jen. He tilted his head backward a bit. "I did."

Adn's words didn't register immediately, held back by Jen's guilt and disbelief. But once they clicked, his jaws fell open and his eyes widened, their light brightening and trembling. "But… but why?" he asked weakly, genuinely confused. This wasn't like Adn. This didn't make sense, coming from someone who'd gone to such lengths to keep Jen from becoming a killer.

"Because the dead tell no tales." And with that, Adn's eyes went pitch black, his entire body turning a bright blue. Jen could only stare in horror as the gardevoir suddenly melted into an amorphous blue blob. A ditto, he realized as his wits clicked back into place.

Jen backed away from the ditto in a rush, knocking the table over in the process. His long tail got caught up in it; he twisted over himself in a brief tangle of black, spiky flesh in his efforts to free himself. He righted himself in a hurry, dark venom beginning to leak from the hollow tips of his mandibles.

"Who are you?" he demanded. "What did you do to the real Adn?"

The ditto chuckled in a high-pitched voice. "Silly boy. I am the real Adn. But most of the time, I go by Anomaly."

It was hard to take that for an answer. Was the creature before him telling the truth? He couldn't guess. He could hardly care at this point. Whether or not the ditto was lying now, they'd already lied to him today. Betrayed him. And now there was a murderer in his house.

If his father returned while the creature was still here…

Jen let out a piercing cry. His hand shot forward toward Anomaly, and he fired an ice beam from it. It connected, and the ditto warbled weirdly in pain, but wasted no time at all in retaliating. Long tendrils whipped outward from their amorphous body, and though Jen tried to dodge, they simply stretched and twisted and extended to match his every move and then some, and soon he could no longer predict their movements. A swerve to the wrong side, his spiked back bashing into the kitchen doorway and ripping up the frame, and the tendrils caught him, wrapping around his neck in an instant, their ends piercing effortlessly through his dark, icy armor and tough hide.

His mandibles darted out, stabbing into the blue flesh and injecting their venom, and he saw a sickly purple tinge spread up their length to the blob still sitting on the couch. They grimaced, but the signs of their poisoning soon began to fade, and the creature began to grow.

Gasping for air, Jen slashed at the appendages tightening around his throat, severing them with a spray of colorless blood. The ends still wrapped around his neck simply liquefied, while what remained of the tendrils withdrew back into their owner's body—a body that was taking on the shape of another pokémon altogether, Jen realized, and he lunged and tried to slash the flesh apart as it changed from blue to a scorching red. Glowing blood gushed out over his hands, and he screamed in agony, hurling himself out of the way of what he now recognized to be a fire-type.

A torrent of flame erupted behind him, and without so much as a thought spared for the damage he was inflicting upon his father's house, Jen burst out through the bay window, the glass slicing into his arms, the flames melting the armor off his tail. Struggling to maintain his coordination despite the terrible pain, he dashed away from the house as fast as his serpentine body could carry him.

He caught sight of one of his hands—the claws cracked, the flesh half-gone—and he nearly froze in horror for a moment before another burst of flame at his tail spurred him on all the faster. He threw a glance back over his shoulder—there was a magmortar chasing him, and while he wasn't nearly as fast as the cryonide, his arm-cannons had an incredible range.

Whipping his head back around, he saw other pokémon starting to investigate the commotion from the intersection ahead. Some of them turned on their heels or kept on driving at the sight that met them, but others stayed put, transfixed and, in some cases, looking like they wanted a fight.

A couple of them looked like they could take on a magmortar. But there was no guarantee they could take on whatever else the ditto decided to become.

"Run!" Jen cried out to them, his voice ragged and strained. "Run!"

 

[Sike_Saner]

Chapter 40 – Lightless Flames​

Solonn never did get to finish his story about the night before. Not when an uproar from a not-too-distant part of town seized his attention, as well as that of everyone else around him.

"Oh, no you don't…" Grosh snarled before charging toward the source of all the noise and chaos, tearing up the sidewalk in his haste.

"Wait!" Solonn shouted. Alij did likewise. But barely any sooner than the cries had left their mouths, they found themselves along for the ride, rushing forward at the steelix's sides and evading the debris he flung about.

Solonn heard a voice calling out from somewhere unseen, begging the terrified citizens to flee. He saw a burst of flame shoot across the street from around the corner and was all too ready to join the pokémon thundering past him and the others.

But then he saw the source of that voice.

He didn't know what he was looking at, exactly. He doubted anyone with him had, either. But there was enough similarity to Solonn's own kind—the huge incisors, the glistening armor, the glowing eyes—to make him stop and wonder.

Was that…?

The strange pokémon met his gaze for a fraction of a second. Then: "What are you doing, go! Go!" he shouted, gesturing wildly with his long-clawed hands, barreling over an abandoned vehicle as he surged by—pursued by a red-and-pink magmortar, albeit not closely. But the fire pokémon didn't need to get close. Not with that range.

As if of one mind, all of the glalie present threw shields up and tried to take the assailant out in an instant, the air shattering into noise as they attacked in near unison.

But the magmortar stood unaffected, and he quickly turned his flamethrowers toward Grosh, whose roar of pain was muffled as he plunged into the asphalt as if it were liquid. Water from a burst main erupted skyward in the wake of his dig attack; the magmortar winced and hissed as it came raining down on him, and he began to rapidly dissolve—

—only to reform.

"A ditto!" Viraya noted aloud, firing an ice beam at the darkening, shifting mass. Several more converged on the transforming pokémon, including one from the strange, black, serpentine creature. Within an instant, the ditto was encased in ice.

Grosh exploded from beneath the ditto, hurling the frozen pokémon into the air. The ditto crashed heavily through a nearby second-story window, the glass shattering noisily.

Oth ascended and entered the building, shining with cosmic power, a mass of conjured stones floating around them as they charged. Torrents of water exploded from inside the destroyed apartment, pushing the claydol right out before they could land a hit, their ancient power stones dropping to the sidewalk below. A purple blastoise emerged and swept another hydro pump across his field of vision. Grosh took the attack right in the face and toppled over, plunging back underground with a loud crashing noise, and the pressurized water blasted several of the glalie into cars and other pokémon before Viraya managed to freeze it in midair.

The ice must have run all the way up and deep into the blastoise's cannons; he bellowed in pain and jerked backward, and the frozen stream broke free and went crashing to the sidewalk. The ditto in disguise barely dodged a gunk shot from the unfamiliar ice-type, then turned to retaliate.

A dark mass suddenly materialized in front of him, darting forward and sinking into his flesh before he could react.

The ditto immediately lost their assumed shape. Howling and keening, they tried to take on a new one as the strange shadow that had infected them darkened further, but none of the transformations remained stable for more than a split-second.

Nearly every pokémon in the vicinity took the opportunity to launch a concentrated assault on the helpless shapeshifter, but none of their attacks seemed to have any effect. Still, they pressed on, beams colliding with the quivering flesh.

They abruptly cut off when Grosh burst back onto the scene. The steelix grabbed the ditto in his jaws, then flung them to the soaked and shattered street with a violent, wrenching motion. Roaring, he slammed an iron tail into the dark, shapeless mass, and then another, and another—

Then Grosh pulled his tail back sharply, wailing. Its end had been dissolved clean off, black blood seeping from the stump.

"Get back, get back!" Moriel screamed hoarsely as Solonn stared at his father's injury in horror. But he heeded her advice, even as he stared; everyone in the area did, save for a single vigoroth, whose entire body glowed a fierce orange as he flung himself claws-first at the ditto.

He never made contact with their disintegrating aura. The ditto exploded into a burst of silver light an instant before impact, blowing the vigoroth away. Solonn cried out in pain, temporarily blinded, his ears ringing. He kept on hurtling backward nonetheless, trying his damnedest not to hit the ground. Something crumpled against his back, gouging into his flesh with a jagged metal edge.

The first thing he saw once he could see again was the sight of an oddly dull gray beam, almost more like a blade, howling past Oth. The claydol shuddered in midair and fell, minus one hand and a few of their eyes.

Before anyone could react, another gray beam burned a hole between Alij's eyes, shooting out of the back of his head with a burst of mist.

A third tore through the air, and this one was aimed right at Solonn. He felt it explode against a shield he very nearly didn't raise in time, its strange, lightless energy dissipating like dust in his face.

It blinded him for a moment, but Solonn knew what he'd see if he didn't move. He dove out of the way, feeling glass shatter and bite into his hide, and kept going into the space beyond. Racks of clothing and accessories clattered and clanged and fell in his wake, draping fabric over his face and blinding him again until he stopped and shook it off.

Solonn rushed back to the broken window, praying silently and aloud that no one else was dead. From across the street, he saw the new form of their attacker for the first time. The thing was nearly human shaped and seemingly made of white, lightless fire, their head a towering plume of flames-that-weren't, their body tapering into a ghostly tail.

The creature fired at another of the glalie—from this distance, and with so much dust in the air, it was hard to tell which—only to be foiled by protect again. That glalie promptly retaliated with a blizzard—and while they didn't freeze this time, the specter's hollow, anguished roar told that the impact hurt badly all the same.

Solonn charged back out onto the ruined street with an ice beam coalescing between his horns, but the specter surged out of the way before it could connect—only to smack right into a bystander's psybeam. There, apparently, was another weakness; the creature howled again, gripping their head.

Their pitch-black eyes opened again, and they took on a look of deep concentration. Another gunk shot went hurtling their way, but they zipped out of harm's way again with their trance unbreaking.

Only to come out of it themself in clear confusion.

"No…" they hissed in a voice like a rustling wind. They trembled in midair, faintly at first but then violently, angrily. "It can't… my collection…"

Another volley of assorted beams forbade the creature to piece their thoughts together beyond that. Again they dodged, plunging into one of the tunnels Grosh had torn through the earth beneath the street.

Without so much as a moment's thought, Solonn dove in after them.

He wasn't alone. He could hear and feel other bodies rushing through the air behind him, along with long, loping steps. The tunnel sloped at a sharp but navigable angle, and it was wide enough for him, but only just; no one could hope to pass him—nor each other, in all likelihood. If the specter turned and fired again, only his shield would save him. And it could only save him so often, and for so long…

Ahead, the creature was burning away the earth before them using those gray beams, tunneling forward and downward, and they were doing so very, very quickly. Solonn fired on them again, hoping to catch them off guard. He succeeded, but still the creature endured. In a swirl of lightless fire, they spun and shot at him with one hand, the other still tunneling ahead with a sustained beam. Again, it hit his shield.

No sooner had the protect aura dropped than a fresh attack blossomed into being around the specter's hand.

There was a rushing noise, energy cutting the air—but from somewhere behind him. A searing yellow hyper beam—Oth, Solonn wanted desperately to believe, but the last he'd seen of them…

The hyper beam and the specter's attack collided, their energies dispersing in a burst that sizzled against the earthen walls, and against Solonn's face. He hissed, fighting to keep his eyes open and his mind on the figurative trigger of a number of techniques at once. At his side, he could hear more tunneling sounds; there was a shout of "Move your ass!" followed by the sight of a swampert shoving his way past in the now-widened tunnel. With a wet, unpleasant noise, the swampert launched a mud bomb at the specter—

—which sailed past them into the vast room that the creature's gray beams had just breached.

The mud bomb crashed into a terminal against the wall, sending a burst of sparks to the floor. Red lights filled the room, flooding out into the tunnel, the specter silhouetted against it like candle smoke, and a tinny alarm sounded again and again and again.

There was a hissing noise from somewhere out of sight, and the creature flew in toward it. The pokémon on their tail followed and renewed their assault. Still willing and able to put up a fight, the creature clapped their wispy hands together, and a shockwave burst out from between them, washing over the defending pokémon before they could react.

Solonn snarled at it, and he could hear pained sounds from those around him. But he wasn't hurt badly, and he suspected that neither was anyone else. It was probably—he narrowly evaded another gray beam, some unknown, wall-mounted device imploding as he plowed into it—A diversion, he thought dazedly, spitting out a broken bit of something.

His eyes darted back to where he'd last seen the specter and found that they were already on the run, with a swampert, three glalie, and the strangely familiar, black serpent in pursuit. Solonn joined the chase, readying an ice beam, trying to get a bead on the now erratically-moving creature…

And then the creature suddenly stopped short, taken by surprise. So did everyone else, in spite of themselves. Solonn caught himself staring; he forcefully snapped himself out of it and let his ice beam fly. It hit its mark, alongside another ice beam and a mud bomb.

Leaving the specter a prone, shuddering heap at the feet of the apparently human being who'd just joined them.

The man, short and bald, let his gaze flick up to the other pokémon in the room with him for only a moment before returning it to the creature trying to lift themself up before him. In his hand, something that looked black and reddish-gold in the deep crimson light glinted for a moment before hurtling toward the specter—an ultra ball, Solonn realized.

"Get ready to open fire on 'em again," the man said, and Solonn could have sworn he recognized the voice from somewhere. The face, too. "That thing's not guaranteed to hold."

No sooner than he'd spoken, the ball burst open, spilling its captive out in a flood of white light and golden sparks. Another barrage of attacks hit the specter the instant they rematerialized, and ice encased them once again, their lightless flames suspended in mid-flicker. The man threw another ultra ball; it sucked the specter in and clunked to the ground, where it shook, and shook… and shook…

And fell still.

The ultra ball held Solonn's stare as fast as it held its new prisoner, but only for a moment. Then he looked back up at the man who'd captured the strange pokémon… and then, at last, he realized who he was looking at.

Either someone had cobbled together a very convincing disguise or illusion, or else Ren Bridges, once a member of the illustrious Apex League, had survived the Extinction.

 

[Sike_Saner]

Bardothren: Heya! Glad you enjoyed the chapter; it's one of my favorites, too. Along with this part of the story in general. It was fun as hell to write--glad it's fun to read, too. :D

 

[Sike_Saner]

Chapter 41 – Beyond the Glass​

The human, or whatever he was, stooped to pick up the ball, minimizing it and tucking it away into one of his pockets. He swept a gaze over the dumbfounded crowd that shared the red-lit space with him, looking fairly nonplussed himself.

"Okay," he said, sounding a bit shaky but managing to speak over the alarm regardless, "okay. What in the hell just happened?"

Silence. It was hard to do much of anything but goggle in disbelief—and suspicion. Yes, he looked like Ren. Yes, he sounded like him. But DeLeo had sounded and looked human, too. Solonn would have never guessed there was an ordinary meowth behind that façade.

What, if anything, was behind this one?

"Uh…" the swampert finally spoke up. "I could tell you, but you wouldn't understand me, so…"

The human met the swampert's gaze in an instant. His dark eyes were huge with alarm. "…Say that again," he said.

"I, uh, said I could tell you what happened if you could understand me, but…" The swampert cocked his head at the human. "Are you telling me you can?"

The human didn't respond right away. He glanced back over his shoulder for a long moment, his hairless brows tightening. Finally, "Apparently so," he said, half-shrugging. "Apparently I decided to lock myself in a tube for some reason and came out of it able to understand pokémon." He gave a strange little laugh. "Ordinarily I'd be celebrating. But again…" His hand rose to rub at his temple. "I can't remember why I was in there. I can't even remember building the damn thing."

Solonn just stared, unsure what to think. Exactly what he was looking at was a question that still needed answering, and at this point he wasn't even sure if it could be. But part of him was starting to sympathize with the man—he knew firsthand what it felt like to have missing memories. Missing memories and unexplained linguistic abilities.

Between that and the fact that the adrenaline was starting to fade, allowing the pain of his injuries to come to the forefront, it was getting a little difficult to care whether or not the human was as he seemed.

"And what the hell was a nullshade of all things doing down here?" the human went on.

"So," Viraya said, "that's what that was."

The human stared at her mutely for a moment before nodding. He pulled the ultra ball back out and stared at it in consternation. "These things aren't even supposed to exist anymore…"

"Neither are you," Solonn thought aloud. The human met his gaze, the hand holding the ultra ball dropping to his side. Solonn bit his tongue, all but oblivious to the pain in light of all his other injuries. Even they were forgotten for a moment when he imagined flames shooting from the human's hands, engulfing him and boiling his blood…

"What… Why the hell not?" the human asked.

"You… Your kind is extinct," Evane explained softly. She sounded as if she didn't want to believe it.

The human looked as though he honestly couldn't believe it. As if he honestly didn't know the Extinction had happened, that he should be long since dead and dealt with just like the rest of his people.

"That's…" he began, the blood drained from his face. "No. That's not possible."

Evane started to respond, but a growing noise cut her off. It sounded like something heavy being dragged along, and it was coming from the tunnel leading back to the surface.

"More company," Ren muttered. He stashed the ultra ball, readying a poké ball in its stead, and dashed toward the breach in the wall, just small and nimble enough to get past the pokémon.

Solonn was almost right on his heels, hope stirring inside him at the approaching sound—he was sure he knew exactly who was coming down to join them. That hope faltered when the noise stopped before its source could appear—Why'd he stop? Oh gods, please be all right, please…

The human stopped at the breach and unleashed a greninja. Solonn's eyes went huge and his mouth dropped open, but not at the frog. He distantly remembered learning that Ren had one on his roster, though he couldn't seem to recall anything else about Ren's team. The greninja wasn't much of a surprise.

The faces he saw looking back at him from the tunnel—two, when he'd only dared to expect one at the most—were another story.

"Wait, don't!" he cried out as he came to a stop himself, looking up past the human with equal parts worry and astonishment. "They're not enemies!"

They were anything but. A short distance up the tunnel, a claydol hovered unsteadily just above its muddy floor—a claydol missing one of their hands and part of their head. Somehow, incredibly, they were still alive. Further back, a steelix lay nearly motionless.

<We…> Oth said weakly, voicelessly, <we…>

The human stared at them, frowning. The greninja refrained from attacking, but glared up distrustfully as if ready to shift gears at any moment.

Solonn winced as Oth nearly dropped from the air. "Please, we've got to help them!" he cried.

"Not us," Viraya said from nearby. "Her." She edged her way as close to the breach as she could; the human and greninja both helpfully stepped aside. "Oth! You've got to call Quiul here!"

<I… c-can… cannot,> the claydol said. Gods, they sounded like they were hanging by a thread… <Th—> They shuddered. <The… l-link…>

The human cast another glance back toward the hallway he'd come from. His mouth drew into a thin line. Then he recalled his greninja.

"I haven't been down here in a while," he said. He was starting to sound hoarse, presumably on account of the fact that he still had to compete with that alarm. "I think there might be medical supplies around here somewhere. I think I can remember how to get there. In the meantime…"

He produced and released another poké ball. There was a burst of light… and then, standing between him and the breach, was a kwazai.

For a moment, Solonn couldn't help but wonder if it was Ntairow who'd just appeared in their midst. But no… no, this one was taller. More solidly built.

"Pain split," the human instructed her, "for the claydol, at the very least. Try to fit in the steelix too, but only if you can handle it."

The kwazai gave a quick nod, then dropped and scrambled up the tunnel on her many arms. Solonn looked past Viraya to watch the kwazai work. He should be concerned for her, some tiny part of him thought. Too much of the rest of him was worried about Oth and Grosh to allow it.

Pink-and-gold light shone around the kwazai and her first patient for a moment. The kwazai slumped, dark blood dripping from the side of her head and running off one of her hands, then wormed her way around Oth with a pained grunt and began crawling up toward Grosh.

As light swelled in the tunnel once more, Solonn took in the kwazai's handiwork thus far. Oth… had still seen better days for sure. Their head was somewhat more intact than it'd been, but the eyes and hand on that side were still missing. Their levitation was a bit steadier now, and they proceeded down the tunnel with no further delay.

"Oth…" Solonn's eyelight wavered as the claydol passed by. Though they were certainly in better shape than before, seeing their injuries up close in the pulsing red light made them seem even more horrific somehow. Soon Solonn could bear to look at them no longer, turning his gaze back toward Grosh and the kwazai.

"Oth," Viraya spoke up again, "can you reach her now?"

The claydol gave a low, somber rattle. <The link was broken in the midst of my injuries. I am sorry.>

"It's not your fault," Solonn said quietly, still staring up the tunnel. The kwazai's work was finished now, and Grosh was stirring. The steelix lifted his head, blinking blearily, and noticed the blue figure lying prone in front of him.

The human noticed, too. "Ah, Demi… I told you not to overdo it…" A red beam fired from out of sight to recall the kwazai.

Only to be deflected by the pile of dirt and stone that had suddenly dropped to block their view.

The human swore loudly, and he started to head up the tunnel himself—then backed right out as it continued to cave in, earth falling in a wave toward the red-lit room. The surrounding space rumbled, and Evane, Viraya, and the swampert made for the hallway beyond, but the room held.

The human stared at the resealed wall. "Come on," he muttered, in a tone befitting a prayer, "come on…"

No sooner had he spoken than the breach burst back open again, a massive head flinging mud and small rocks all over the room and its occupants.

Once everyone was done flinching, and the last of the protect shields dropped, they took in the sight of the newly-arrived steelix. Most of him couldn't fit into the room even if it weren't occupied at the time; recognizing this, they began backing out of the way. Grosh let about a quarter of himself in, then lowered his head, opened his jaws, and let the kwazai he was carrying slide gently to the floor.

Demi was a mess. There wasn't much of her that wasn't caked in soil and blood that looked black under the emergency lights. It was clear she'd taken on more damage than she should've, and now the concern that had been absent finally made it to the surface of Solonn's mind. "Thank you," he said quietly, and bowed his head.

The light in the room intensified briefly as the human finally recalled Demi. That he'd managed to was a good sign. It meant she was still alive.

Grosh dragged a couple more feet of himself into the room; everyone else backed up further. He lifted his head, blinking in the flashing light. It shone off his armor as the filth began sliding away.

Then he spotted the human.

Grosh's eyes widened, then narrowed. "You're a fake," he decided aloud, and began growling deep in his throat.

The human swallowed hard, looking up at the massive serpent looming before him. "No," he responded, "I'm not. But listen: this really isn't the time to argue. You're hurt, all of you." He started blinking rapidly all of a sudden, rubbing at his eye. It came away smeared with something dark. "All of us," he amended, and as he turned back toward the hallway, Solonn could see more of the stuff beading up and running down the human's forehead.

His thoughts skipped a beat. Could a robotic disguise bleed?

"Come on," the human said, and he began jogging down the hall with a hand pressed to his forehead. There was a moment's delay; then, the others began following as fast as they could. No sense losing track of him when there was still some doubt—albeit just a little bit less than before—that he was what he seemed.

There was no real risk of running him over. No one was in any fit state to proceed at full speed. Solonn suspected they were all at least as sore as he was.

"How much further?" Viraya asked from her place near the back of the line.

"Not sure," the human—it was getting harder and harder not to think of him as Ren—responded, without pausing or looking back. "But…" His head turned from right to left and back again, and he slowed at a fork in the road only to keep on moving straight ahead. "I think it's not too far from here." He took a left at the next fork, leading them down a slope. "I think… There. That might be it."

He finally came to a stop in front of a tightly-sealed door—so tightly-sealed that it was a little hard to distinguish from the same-colored walls around it, especially in the still-pulsing light. The pad set in the wall next to the door was even harder to make out, but the human found it fast enough. He studied for a moment, silent save for his panting breaths, then pressed his hand to it.

The instant he did, the alarm finally, blessedly cut off. The surrounding light turned steady and white; Solonn and Viraya winced at the brightness, and Evane let out a hiss. Solonn forced his eyes open again and saw a green beam lancing into the human's skull from a lens that had appeared above the door. The human (Ren, Solonn finally decided, however tentatively) stood frozen on the spot until the beam cut off; his free hand had dropped to his side, the fingers more blood-smeared than ever. The lens disappeared behind a metal iris, and the door rose out of the way with a faint hiss.

Beyond, there was an arched hallway, just barely wide enough to admit the likes of Solonn and Grosh. Another, less remarkable door lay at its end; there was no pad this time. Ren made for it, a hand reaching out to brace against the wall halfway there. Meanwhile the door behind closed loudly a moment after the last of the pokémon had passed through it; all of the glalie turned toward the noise in an instant, while everyone else but Oth craned their necks backward.

"Damn. Good thing that didn't close any sooner," the swampert said, glancing back at his own tailfin, then turned his attention forward once more. Everyone else did likewise.

Ren gripped the handle of the second door, then slid it out of the way with relative ease. He proceeded into the vast, white space beyond, making a beeline for something out of sight.

The pokémon followed him. They fanned out once they were all in the room, giving everyone room to move—to fight, if need be. Solonn had a protect shield on standby; he imagined the same was true of the other glalie. The same might also be true of that strange half-serpent. Solonn could see the creature more clearly than ever now—including his mutilated hand. He shuddered hard at the sight, hardly caring how his own injuries complained at the motion. He knew a fire-induced injury when he saw one.

He heard a chime then; turning, he found Ren standing near an active rejuvenation machine, its screen glowing softly as it healed its lone occupant. Meanwhile the human was pulling out a first aid kit from a cabinet at its side.

"You've done enough," he murmured to himself as he threw a glance at the single poké ball nestled in the machine. Then he turned to the pokémon who were there in the flesh, blood still glistening on his face. "There's max potions in here," he said with a wave toward the open cabinet. Sure enough, one of its shelves was lined with distantly-familiar, blue-and-white bottles.

The swampert stepped forward—there was no one else around with sufficiently prehensile hands other than Ren, who was already busy tending to his own injury. He reached up and scooped out an armful of the potions, laid them at his feet, and began treating the other pokémon one by one. Only once everyone else had been taken care of did he mend his own cuts and scrapes.

<We are in your debt,> Oth said—gods, it was good to hear their mindvoice so strong again, <Mister…>

"Jarl," the swampert filled in. "It's Jarl. And you don't owe me a thing," he said with a dismissive wave, then settled back onto all fours. "If it wasn't for you guys, I'd have never seen a real, live human again."

"If that's what he even is," Grosh said, his voice rumbling through the floor. He edged closer to Ren, lowering his head until he was almost eye-level with him, and sniffed noisily. "You smell like the real thing. You look like the real thing. But I've been fooled before. Our psychic friend's even been fooled before." He lifted his head once more, staring down his blunt, metallic snout at the man before him. "So why, pray tell, should we believe you're actually human?"

Ren fussed with his forehead a couple moments more, then turned to face Grosh. If he was trying not to look unnerved by the steelix, he was failing, albeit only just. He licked his lips. "You shouldn't," he said finally. "I have no way of proving it. What you're assuming I must be instead, I can't guess, but…"

With a sigh, he let himself slink to the floor. "My name is Ren," he said, "and I swear to your gods and mine that I'm legitimately human. Whether or not you believe me… that's fine. But just so you know: I don't exactly believe you, either. About the humans, I mean." And maybe he didn't, for the most part. But something in his eyes told that on some level, he feared they might be right.

"You'll see for yourself once we get back above," Evane said.

At her words, Moriel turned and looked upward, more or less in the direction they'd come from. "Yes," she said hollowly, and Solonn realized it was the first time she'd spoken since the fight against the nullshade had ended. Since Alij was… oh gods… Solonn felt a sharp pang in his chest as he watched Moriel look around, presumably for a way out that wouldn't require anyone to tunnel through the earth and risk another cave-in. He followed her gaze…

And then froze, as his own landed upon something in the adjacent room, beyond a glass partition.

There, hanging from the ceiling, was a pair of white-and-silver arms. Beneath them was a padded platform with presently-open restraints and a presently empty steel tray to either side.

All at once, he swore he could feel that platform against his back.

 

[Sike_Saner]

Chapter 42 – Back to the Surface​

Solonn trembled in midair for a moment. Then he sank to the floor. "I've… I've been here," he hissed, his eyes wide, their light flickering wildly.

"Wh-what? When?" Evane asked.

Solonn couldn't answer. Thinking back to it got him all but stuck in the memory, and he could feel the pain that had come the first time he'd remembered it threatening to creep back into his head.

"It was when you were a child," Ren said quietly, "wasn't it."

Paralyzed. Helplessly watching through the weak eyes of a snorunt as the arms came down. The pain intensified, and his eyes screwed shut. A hiss tore its way past his teeth.

"You are remembering…" Slowly, Ren got to his feet, then stepped closer to Solonn. The glalie turned in an instant, still hissing, his eyes blazing with pain; the human jolted, but held his ground. He sighed. "I'm sorry," Ren said, and he both sounded and looked the part. "It wasn't supposed to resurface… and it sure as hell wasn't meant to hurt you."

"What are you talking about?" A growl immediately followed Grosh's words, and before anyone could stop it, he drove his freshly-mended tail between Ren and Solonn, shoving the human away. Ren hit the counter behind him, his breath knocked out on a pained note. "What did you do to him?" the steelix demanded, brandishing his tail-tip like a sword leveled right at Ren's chest.

Ren eyed the tail warily as he struggled to catch his breath. Once he'd succeeded, he pulled his gaze away from it to look its owner right in the eyes.

"I tried to give him the ability to speak to humans," Ren said. There was noticeable guilt in his voice.

Solonn couldn't see Ren past the steelix. But he stared all the same, teeth parted, shaking on the spot. The memory playing in his mind abruptly cut out. So did the rest of his thoughts.

"The nanites didn't take," Ren went on. "So I…" He hesitated a moment, then visibly braced himself. "I sealed his memories of the whole thing—albeit ineptly." He sighed again. "I put him through all that fear and confusion for nothing… Just sending him back didn't feel like enough. I wanted to prevent him from having to relive that nightmare."

"But it wasn't for nothing," Viraya said.

Solonn abruptly turned to face her, looking alarmed. "No!"

But Viraya kept on. "He can speak human language. Your procedure was a success. There wasn't any need to seal his memories."

"No," Grosh rumbled, "there wasn't." He jabbed Ren with his tail, hard enough to bruise but not to pierce. The human gasped in pain.

"Grosh…" Evane said worriedly.

"He's—" Ren began, only to break into a coughing fit. "He's already remembering," he managed weakly. "I can… I can unseal the rest. It'll be easy since it's already lifting. Just give me a chance; I can undo everything."

Here Solonn rose once more. He circled around Grosh; somewhat reluctantly, Ren tore his gaze from the steelix to regard him.

"Everything," Solonn repeated.

Ren nodded slowly. Then the full implications of what Solonn was getting at clicked. He averted his gaze. "I'm sorry for the way things played out," he said. "I never wanted to hurt you. I never wanted to scare you. I should've given you a choice. And I'm giving you one now: I'm willing to deactivate them, if that's what you really want. I'll deactivate them. All of them. I… could even attempt to extract them if you'd prefer, but I have to warn you: it'd be very risky. More invasive than putting them in was. I don't want to hurt you," he stressed. "And if you decide you want to keep them active…" Another sigh. "Humanity could learn so, so much…"

"No," Solonn said heavily, "they can't. Not anymore." He met Ren's gaze directly. "Deactivate them," he said. Part of him wanted the nanites gone altogether. The part that didn't want to risk Grosh losing his son and Jen losing his brother won out.

"All right," Ren said, "all right. But if you ever change your mind… come to the big brick house on Bayberry Street. You'll know it when you see it. I can switch them back on anytime, but I can only do it from here."

Solonn couldn't imagine himself changing his mind. Not in a thousand years. "Then go ahead and undo it," he said, his voice threatening to crack. "Now. Please."

Ren nodded again. He looked up at Grosh again, silently seeking permission to go free. Grosh scowled at him but withdrew his tail.

"If you doublecross us…" the steelix warned, "if he doesn't make it out of here alive, I will personally end you. Painfully."

The human swallowed audibly. "…I understand," he said. "I'm not going to hurt him. I promise." Tentatively, still sore from Grosh's prodding, he started moving toward a terminal off in the corner. "You had better still work…" he mumbled as he tried to start it up. He let out a sigh of relief when it hummed to life.

Moments passed as he keyed in command after command, then minutes. Solonn began to fear that Ren wasn't keeping his word. The agitated grinding of steelix segments, gouging the floor with their spikes, told that Grosh felt likewise.

Then the room and everyone in it suddenly vanished, and all at once Solonn was on the other side of the glass.

* * *​

Paralyzed. The arms descending. Strange, tugging pressure at his forehead. Rock-hard fingers effortlessly prying his jaws open. They tasted like nothing at all as they pushed his tongue out of the way.

The arms withdrew. Moments or minutes or hours later, they returned. One of them held something sharp. The hand drove it in somewhere under his jawline. It should've hurt. But it didn't.

Elsewhere now. A strange, tall creature speaking to him, trying to get him to talk back. Correcting him every time he responded. Eventually giving up, a dismayed, regretful look on his face.

The other side of the glass. The platform where he'd lain just barely visible beyond. Apologies from the strange creature—the human—as something flashed in the corner.

Darkness.

The snowgrounds, with dozens of worried faces staring down at him. His mother, beyond grateful that he was safe again.

Safe again…

* * *​

The present reasserted itself. With a delay, Solonn realized that he'd dropped to the floor again. He rose shakily, looking over the small crowd sharing the room with him. His eyes found Ren and locked on to him.

"That ought to have done it," the human said quietly. "Just one thing left to check. I want you to speak to me, the way I'm speaking to you right now. My voice, my language. Try as hard as you can."

Solonn felt his throat threaten to close. Even now, some part of him was hesitant to expose his abilities. But he found the courage to go ahead. He inhaled deeply…

And nothing intelligible came out.

A chill ran through him. Had the human robbed him of his ability to speak altogether? A couple of the other pokémon looked on with concern—and in Grosh's case, suspicion—as if they were entertaining the same conclusion.

He tried again. Still nothing. He knew the human's words, could still see them in his mind's eye. He knew the sound of Ren's voice. But when he tried to replicate them, his mouth and throat wouldn't cooperate. His eyelight flickering, he tried using the words of his own kind.

"What…" he said hoarsely, speaking Virc this time, sounding like no one but himself. His eyes went huge. "I… I think it worked…" He attempted other languages, other voices, but the words continued to evade him, and his voice refused to change. He met Ren's gaze and switched back to Virc. "I think it worked," he said again, more confidently this time.

Ren let out the breath he'd been holding. "Good," he said, wiping at his brow, "good." He shut the terminal down. "Again, if you ever change your mind… just let me know, all right?"

Solonn didn't respond. Even though it had proven reversible, and even though it would be his choice the next time around, he still couldn't imagine accepting the talent that had led him through so much ever again.

"Can we leave now?" Moriel spoke up, her tone still subdued. "Please… just show us the way out."

Ren nodded and stepped away from the terminal. "This way," he said. "Oh… except for you," he amended with an apologetic look toward Grosh. "I promise you: it's not payback for earlier. The elevator just can't handle weight like yours, and since you can't levitate… I'm afraid you'll just have to burrow your way back topside."

Grosh made a rumbling noise deep in his chest, still looking somewhat distrustful of the human. "Be careful," he said to the rest of the pokémon, his gaze sweeping over them and lingering on his son. Then, with no further warning, he plunged headfirst into the nearest sufficiently-sized patch of the floor.

The crowd he'd left behind winced and turned away from the spray of dirt and plaster. A few tense moments were spent anticipating further repercussions, shields on standby, those without the ability to shield poised to dart for safety. But nothing collapsed, no mains burst.

"…I really should've specified where," Ren acknowledged aloud. He brushed off some of the dust and dirt that had settled on his shirt; then, "This way," he said again, and began to lead the rest of the group away.

Solonn cast one last look back at the glass partition as he followed the others out of the room. The arms hung motionless now, the terminal in the corner dark and silent. As he left both behind, once and for all, he finally dared to believe that chapter of his life was over.

* * *​

Ren's home had seen better days, quite frankly. The nosepass who shared the house with him—the same one who'd been at the Hope Institute, Solonn discovered—blamed smeargle for the wrecked furniture and graffiti-covered walls, and no one questioned him, at least not as far as that damage was concerned.

The distinctly nose-shaped hole in the floor was another story.

Ren, the nosepass, and the swampert were off on their own, out of sight, the pokémon presumably trying to console the human. Ren had had a much easier time believing the nosepass about the Extinction, and he had not taken the news well. At all.

Moriel, Evane, and Viraya had not returned yet. Solonn imagined they'd be downtown for a long while. After a delay, his wits still pulling themselves back together, he'd begun to follow them away—only to stop dead in his figurative tracks when Grosh had emerged from under the street in front of Ren's house.

The rage had more or less drained from the steelix's features; Solonn suspected he'd taken it out on the earth deep below until he'd lacked the strength to do anything but surface. He'd slumped into a coil in Ren's front yard, and Solonn had chosen to stay with him for the time being. Oth, meanwhile, had gone off in search of a teleporter to take the claydol back to Sinnoh so they could re-establish their link with Quiul.

As for when the party as a whole would be leaving Convergence… that remained in question.

They still hadn't found Jen. At least, not for certain. The black, serpentine creature—a cryonide, Ren had called him—was indeed one of Solonn's own kind, an evolved form of snorunt. And ever since learning this, he'd wondered if DeLeo had forced his half-brother to evolve. The cryonide had kept silent on the matter, pointedly averting his gaze.

The front doors opened. Armor and tough hide whispered over the threshold, and a breath later, the cryonide had joined them.

Solonn and Grosh turned to regard him. The question was plain in both their eyes, but only Grosh spoke it.

"So," he said, as gently as he could. "Is there something you want to tell us?"

The cryonide didn't answer right away. He was visibly shaking, the fangs at the ends of his mandibles clicking against his incisors. Finally, he folded his clawed hands and forced himself to look Solonn in the eye.

"I saw you," he said. "Last night, at Hope. I… remembered you from the Haven—from when you took us. Or rescued us." He shook his head. "Adn always told me you people were the enemy. That you wanted to force me into your army and make me kill anyone who got in our way. But then he turned into a ditto and tried to kill me. Now I don't know what to believe anymore."

The same ditto who'd become a nullshade, Solonn realized. That was Adn in that ultra ball.

More than ever, he was glad that creature had been captured.

Meanwhile he no longer doubted who he was speaking to in the least. I found you. Gods, I finally found you! But barely anything of the joy and relief that followed made it to his face, at least not at first. Pity stood stubbornly in the way. Even now, the Rannia's lies endured.

"You can believe us," Solonn said, his eyelight wavering. "Adn is out of the picture now." The gardevoir-who-wasn't was in the hands of an Apex trainer now. And while Solonn still wished to all gods that Ren had never experimented on him in the first place… the human had done the right thing in the end, at least. He still couldn't trust Ren unconditionally, but he trusted him more than he had before his linguistic abilities had been put to rest. "You can trust us… we're your family, Jen."

The cryonide looked up at Grosh with uncertainty. Then he looked back over the length of his own serpent-tail. "There's still a lot I don't understand," he said quietly. "But… I think I believe you."

Solonn wanted nothing more in that moment than to move forward, to let Jen embrace him. But those spikes running down the cryonide's chest gave him pause. As if on cue, Grosh stirred and loosely, carefully wrapped his coils around the other two, insofar as he could.

"You can come home with us," Solonn said at length, as Grosh uncoiled somewhat reluctantly. "It's not the same home you remember," nor the one you should, "but… it's nice. The people there have promised to take care of us."

Jen mulled it over, but not for long. "No," he said. "I'm sorry, but… I have to stay here. At least for now. My dad needs me. He's been through a lot lately, and…" His eyes went huge as something occurred to him. "Oh gods, our house. I think Adn burned it down…" he said, and he sounded sickened by the thought. He crawled up and over Grosh's tail. "I have to find out," he said. "I can't go anywhere else right now."

Solonn watched the cryonide's retreating back for a moment. "Then I think I can stay here just a little while longer," he decided aloud, and slipped past his father to follow Jen.

"That makes two of us," Grosh said, then came slithering after them, tearing up the lawn beneath him.

Jen stopped and looked over his shoulder, then turned away once more with what almost looked like a smile. "Okay," he said, and carried on.

As he followed his half-brother, Solonn wondered if he'd ever leave Convergence behind for good. He decided, albeit not too readily, that maybe it didn't really matter all that much. His family was as whole as it could ever be again. He was closer to normal than he'd been in many years. If this place would be his part-time home from here on out, memories and all… that was all right.

At last, insofar as it could be, it was all right.

FIN​