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Chapter 79
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Grayleaf Reserve
The Rhyhorn bellowed a warning cry as it stomped a path through the grassy field, coming straight for Saura and his little sister.
There was nowhere to run.
Saura glared intently at the charging beast, digging his paws into the dirt and holding his ground. Saurlee thought for a moment he would try to parry the attack head-on, which was crazy and impossible, unless he wanted to get sent flying with a gaping horn-wound in his side. Dodging the attack would do no good either; the Rhyhorn would just as easily reorient itself and attack again.
But Saura stood determined, focused and waiting, until there only remained about six seconds before he'd get brutally trampled.
SNAP! Saura cracked his vine whip which he'd left extended on the ground, snagging the Rhyhorn's paw in a lasso he'd hidden in the grass. The Rhyhorn screeched as its feet were swept out from underneath itself, and was sent flying a short distance, until it tumbled down on its side.
Grass knot. Just like his older brother showed him.
But Saura wasn't expecting what happened next. The ground collapsed under the Rhyhorn's weight, dropping the beast into a pitfall trap. It sounded a horrifying shriek of agony, and Saura realized the pitfall trap probably had spikes on the bottom. He didn't want to imagine what state the poor creature was in, and wasn't about to stop and look.
"We're almost there," he told his sister. "We just need to keep moving. Let's go. Don't think about what you're seeing, Saurlee. Don't look at the forest for too long. Don't listen to what it tells you. Just keep following the path and keep running."
"Okay, I'll try," she replied sadly. "I'm sorry, big brother. I really thought the forest was a friend."
"I think we all did," said Saura.
Saura felt strangely safer making it into the next cluster of trees, knowing the other Rhyhorn wouldn't bother him there. But the feeling of safety only lasted for a moment before he glanced upward and noticed dozens of birds leering down at him from the tree branches.
Why aren't they attacking? Saura wondered. Wonder if it's because Saurlee is with me. Maybe the dungeon is still being nice to her because she doesn't completely understand what's going on.
Saurlee screamed. Without stopping to think, Saura spun and released a stream of razor leaves above his little sister, slicing two attacking Pidgey out of the air. Saurlee started feebly swatting at the air with her vines.
"KEEP MOVING!" he shouted at her, snagging one of her vines in his own and pulling her along. "They're not going to stop. We've gotta get out of here. We're so close."
But instead of pursuing such an easy target, the birds looked distracted by something. Then, for seemingly no reason, they all flew away at once, abandoning the branches and flocking into the sky. At first Saura feared they were flying off to harass the rest of the family. But he realized the birds left in the same direction he was headed; they were leaving the forest.
"Huh…" he breathed. "Weird. Are we out of the dungeon already?"
But Saura still knew there was no time to stop and wonder about dungeon phenomena. He didn't stop running until he and his sister were safe in Purevine.
Purevine Village
The sun was barely out at this middling hour of dawn. It was too early for any villagers to be out and about, or to witness two exhausted Bulbasaur stumble across the bridge and flop down into the dirt. Saura closed his eyes for a moment and dug his paws into the dirt, thanking the solid ground for being there and being regular, old, everyday dirt, not the kind of dirt cursed by a mystery dungeon that could shift around and turn into a pitfall trap or whatever other awful things that dungeons liked to do with their landscapes.
He knew there was nothing left to do but to relax, catch his breath, and wait for the rest of the family to arrive. He had to keep reminding himself that Saurvor and the rest of the family wouldn't be in any danger; the forest would have no reason to turn on them as long as they didn't suspect it was alive. Only Saura was the target. Now that he was safe, everything would be okay.
"Brother, look!" Saurlee urged after the brief moment of rest.
Saura climbed to his feet and eagerly turned, anticipating seeing his family emerge from the forest, safe and sound. But following Saurlee's gaze, he didn't notice anything in particular. It was still rather dark to see anything near the treeline, but he was pretty sure nobody was coming.
"What is it?" asked Saura.
"Look up there!" Saurlee gasped. "Don't those clouds look really weird?"
Saura squinted and looked above the treetops. In the light of the dawning sun, he noticed a strange tower of clouds stacked up to the heavens, straight above Grayleaf Reserve. Indeed, a pretty weird shape. Thunderstorms, perhaps. One of those supercell storms.
But no. Those clouds weren't in the sky. Or at least, not all of them were. They were billowing up vertically from the forest itself.
"No way…" Saura whispered, shaking his head. "No, no way… Saurlee, that's smoke! Wait, so the forest actually was on fire?"
"Maybe it got hit by lightning?" Saurlee worried. "There were storms in the sky last night… Do you think they'll make it out?"
Saura breathed, unable to absorb enough sunlight at this hour to calm his nerves. He tried to reason it out. "That… seems like it's much further back than where our den was," Saura decided. "Although that's assuming our den wasn't just moving around the forest all our lives and we never noticed. They… they'll make it. I know they will. Saurvor will convince them. I know he will."
But as much as Saura tried to reassure himself that soon he would blink and find his family escaping from the spatial distortion they once called home, he felt the stirring of his most primal fears.
This was his nightmare. The nightmare that burned his family alive. And sometimes burned him alive too. The nightmare he thought he avoided. But no, now it was really happening. It probably wasn't from a Pokémon, Saura knew. That Flareon, Hunter, probably didn't cause it like what happened in the dreams. It was probably from a lightning bolt, as Saurlee thought. Or maybe it was the dungeon itself throwing a fit for losing its resident Bulbasaur to a series of unlikely interferences. But it was there, and it was real. Saura even thought he smelled ashes on the wind, just like in his dreams.
Maybe he had prophetic dreams after all. Maybe the Watcher had given him the power of an Absol. He couldn't think of any other explanation for such a disturbing coincidence.
Saura barely moved from his spot for the next three hours. That's how long he was giving Saurvor before he started to worry something had gone wrong. He kept going over everything in his mind. The three of them were an hour out from the den when the dungeon turned on him, but that was only at a steady walking speed. Saurvor would need to run back as fast as he could, then yell at Mom and Dad and all the seedlings and convince them of an emergency, then they'd probably stop to collect their favorite belongings and everything… that would probably take an hour. And it would take two hours for the whole group to make the trip to Purevine. Surely the fire wouldn't spread so fast. It was too far away and they had a good head start, right?
Three hours. Three hours before he knew something terrible had happened. Three hours before he would have to decide whether to run back not only into a mystery dungeon, but a burning mystery dungeon, to see if there were any survivors.
And for the better part of those three hours, Saura stood like a statue at the foot of the bridge. He barely noticed the sun rising into a deep and beautiful dawn. He barely noticed the village folk crowding around him curiously, some of them gazing at the growing stack of smoke erupting into the sky.
He wondered if he should recruit help from any water-types of Purevine Village. Surely someone had a powerful enough water gun to help curb the fires. Maybe someone even knew how to summon ocean waves or something. Maybe someone had the power to change the weather and make it rain.
But he decided against asking for help. He didn't want to endanger anyone by getting them too close to a mystery dungeon.
Whatever he thought, whatever ideas he had, the answer was always the same: there was nothing to do but stand and wait. And hope. The crowd of villagers around him only grew. Some tried to ask him questions. He heard none of them over the sound of his own inner voice praying to Arceus, to Reshiram, to Entei and Suicune, to whatever legendary gods might have the power to deliver his loved ones from such a disaster.
He told himself that he should have gone instead of Saurvor. That he should have sent Saurvor and Saurlee to safety, like he'd promised in their Team Grayleaf pact. But he needed to remind himself: it had to be Saurvor. Otherwise the dungeon might have started to attack his family with Saura there.
He made all the right calls. Now it was up to fate to do its part.
"Saurvor. Please. You can do this…" he muttered.
About twenty minutes before Saura would have plunged back into the forest, they appeared: a procession of Bulbasaur scurried out from behind the treeline. Saura bolted for them without hesitation.
"You made it!" He cried, running to tackle Saurvor and wrap him up in a tight hug. "Oh, thank you, thank you. You got them out! I knew you would!"
"Yeah, it took saying that the forest was on fire," he admitted, wincing as Saura glomped him hard. "Mother wasn't listening otherwise. It wasn't easy, I'll say. I'm not always a good liar. But here we are."
"Brother… the forest really was on fire…" Saura said, looking blankly up at him. "You can see the smoke in the sky from Purevine."
"…Oh? Seriously?!" Saurvor yelped. "I had no idea! Why didn't you tell me?! I would have come much faster!"
"Because I didn't know! It was a coincidence!" Saura gasped back. "A really crazy coincidence! But you should have gotten here faster anyway. I figured out what was wrong with the forest, and it was much worse than a fire. I'll explain when we get you guys into town."
As soon as Saura parted with his older brother and stepped back, all his siblings started crowding around him. He counted every one of them. One sister. Seven brothers. All were here. And Mother came lumbering from the back, holding a bag of supplies and carrying the new hatchling Bulbasaur on top of her flower.
But something wasn't right. His siblings all looked scared and confused. And so did Mother. And somehow, Saura knew it wasn't just because they all thought their forest was about to burn down. They should have at least looked relieved to escape to safety. But none of them looked relieved. They all looked too somber.
Saura felt a sudden stab in his heart.
"Uh… where's Dad?" He said, double-checking all of them, but only finding one Venusaur in the group. "He's coming too, right?"
The whole family went silent and still. Nobody wanted to speak up. Not even Saurvor.
"RIGHT?!" Saura shouted, demanding an answer.
Mom was the one to respond. "He told us to go on without him," she confessed. "He saved some of your brothers from danger, but he wanted the rest of us to be safe from the fire. I'm so sorry, Saura… there's a chance he might not be coming."
Saura grew furious. "WHAT?! Even now, he refused to leave home?!" he shouted in disbelief. "Even when there was a forest fire coming?! Please don't tell me he's that stubborn…"
Mom hesitantly shook her head. "No. He didn't stay behind on purpose," she said. "He – WAIT! NO!"
"SAURA! WHAT THE HECK ARE YOU DOING?!" Saurvor shouted.
But Saura was already dashing back into the woods without even a second thought.
Burning Reserve
When Saura found his father deep in the woods, the sharp scent of soot in the air was unbearable. Ashes swept into his face and made his eyes scratchy. He had to draw oxygen from his bulb just to breathe, like Marrow had taught him.
He could hear the mighty roar of the fire, like a hurricane's wind, or thunder that never ended. He could see the orange glow emanating from deeper in the core of the forest. He could feel a blast of hot air every few moments, each worse than the last, until it felt like a blistering summer day in the middle of autumn.
But he did find his father. Halfway back to the den, Saura found him at the bottom of a pitfall trap.
For a long, frozen moment, Saura gazed down at the gruesome sight. Some of the spikes had been crushed beneath the Venusaur's weight. Others had impaled him, sticking straight through his body. The pointed ends of the sticks sparkled with a thick, sappy substance that was Grayleaf's blood.
"Saura…" croaked Grayleaf in a feeble, dying voice. "I… I told you to mark the traps… hah… let this be a lesson to you…"
"Dad… no…" Saura said breathlessly. He leaped down into the pit, careful to land where the spikes had broken and collapsed, and rushed to his father's side. The Venusaur was still alive, clinging on to his final moments, though it was very clear he wasn't going anywhere. He was bleeding out too fast. And even if he could somehow regenerate enough energy to survive, the fire would come too quickly, sealing his fate.
"Wait… you can overgrow, can't you?" Saura said in teary hope. "You'll be extra strong for a little bit and you can get out of here."
"Ahh… I already did that, and saved three of your brothers from falling in too," Grayleaf whispered. "Now you have to leave me here. Take care of your siblings for me…"
The Venusaur groaned. Every word he spoke drained what little energy he had left. Saura only pressed his forehead against his father. "No… Dad, no… Please… Don't go yet."
"You need to leave," sighed his father. "Son… listen to me. I know you're the strongest of them all. They need you. Don't let me down, alright? This world needs you."
But Saura didn't listen. He only broke down and wept, pressing his face against the side of his father's head, letting his tears trickle down the Venusaur's cheek. The Venusaur extended a vine gently around his bulb and held him tight for one final moment.
And there, even as the fire crept upon them, the father and son shared one long, heartfelt embrace.
? ? ?
Char woke up feeling strangely well, with not even a scratch or a sliver of a headache, and he wasn't even the least bit hungry. He felt perfect, and he knew exactly why: he'd fallen to his death, and the reviver seed saved him. It was his last desperate hope for survival, and somehow it worked. He thought it might, seeing that Basin Canyon was very deep and had many dungeon floors. So the odds were overwhelming that he would land somewhere.
But when he blinked his eyes open, he realized he wasn't in Basin Canyon anymore.
The ground below was quite chilly and rough to the touch. It looked like a flat plane of solidified moss. The air smelled like damp caves. Around him, there rose strange, crumbling walls and pillars of marble with odd, spongey craters dug out of their sides. Looking up, Char realized there was no ceiling; the sky was an endless void of black and silver. There was a loud, omnipresent sound of howling wind, though Char felt only a light breeze against his skin.
Yeah, definitely not Basin Canyon. Where was this? He knew it was a mystery dungeon, otherwise the reviver seed wouldn't have worked. He wondered what would happen if he tried to activate his rescue emblem, but not knowing exactly where he'd entered the dungeon, he wasn't sure where it would take him.
Char got to his feet and started looking around. He crept quietly between the pillars, wary of enemy encounters. He soon reached a wide-open area which reminded him somewhat of a runway for human airplanes. The path itself extended far into the distance, disappearing into the mist. Not wanting to follow the long, open road just yet, he crossed to the other side and was quite stunned at what he saw.
The side of the path dropped off into an eternal gray abyss, until it was indistinguishable from the sky. While that alone made Char want to shy away from the ledge and back to the center of the pathway, he noticed something incredible – there were large chunks of rock drifting and spinning in the void, as though somehow lighter than air. An impressive spatial anomaly, but there was something odd about their color tone and texture that triggered distant memories from Char, something he couldn't yet place.
Char decided to follow the long, wide road, hoping it would lead somewhere. He could never see anything in the distance – the road always disappeared at the horizon and into the dark, silvery nothingness of the sky. And there were no dips or hills to be seen – everything was perfectly flat the whole way. Char knew mystery dungeons sometimes manifested this way, but it didn't give him any confidence that this path actually led somewhere.
Eventually the wall on the other side of the road ended, revealing another abyss, turning the road into a long, flat platform suspended in pure empty space. Leaving that wall far behind, Char found himself alone on a featureless green ledge with no guardrails, which extended forever in both directions and led to nowhere. There was nothing left to do but follow the road as far as it went.
As he traversed the endless bridge, Char's gaze was naturally drawn to the giant floating rocks in the sky. With no walls in the way, he saw how there were many of these rocks all around him, some very massive and far in the distance, almost like nearby planets. They just hung there, some softly turning, others still as though suspended in glass. They started to really bother him. They looked like something he'd seen once, but still, he just couldn't place it! He locked his eyes to the nearest one, promising himself he wouldn't look away until he jogged his memory about what he was looking at. Maybe something he remembered from being a human? The same way he remembered the stars?
Char kicked something with his foot. It clinked away into the distance, with a tiny, glassy sound. He scrambled forward to find where it had landed. And though it was small, it was too easy to spot against the mossy green color of the floor.
He jumped forward and collected it, marveling at what he found. A small, pearly, iridescent crystal with prismatic colors.
It was a feral-shard. An evolution stone! He held it preciously to his chest, his heart pounding in excitement. He could evolve. He knew he could! All he needed now was to decide to evolve, and he would be a Charmeleon. Nothing was stopping him!
But Char hesitated. He remembered Otto's story, and how his life had been saved by evolving. He realized he could use the feral-shard as another reviver seed in an emergency. So he tucked it under his scarf, deciding that he'd evolve as soon as he could escape the dungeon. (If he could ever escape, that is.)
He exchanged the feral-shard for the reviver seed he'd kept in the same place. Indeed, its golden color had washed away, and its outer shell had shriveled and become soft. It was now a plain, powerless seed. Char decided to munch on it, careful to chew it thoroughly before swallowing. He didn't want to choke again like last time.
He kept walking the infinite distance into the void, with increasing dread that it was leading nowhere. If this were indeed a mystery dungeon, and it followed the normal rules of a dungeon, he'd eventually get hungry and pass out, or some kind of mysterious force would come to swallow him, dispelling him back to the entrance. So he kept going forward, picking up the pace as he turned his attention again to the mesmerizing sky-rocks.
Clink! Char kicked something again, this time with the other foot.
He looked down and found yet another feral-shard on the ground.
And another one. And several more.
And dozens more beyond that. As though it had rained feral-shards from the sky.
Was this… was this actually the bottom of Basin Canyon after all? The famous feral-shard mine? Because it certainly seemed like an excellent source of feral-shards. There were about fifty of them scattered around the road here, all in slightly different shapes, as though something very big had broken apart.
Char felt a shiver of amazement. The rocks in the sky! They were giant feral-shards! Their color was off because of the greenish mist in the air and the silvery tint of the sky, but now that Char knew what to look for, it was unmistakable. These feral-shards were fragments of the giant asteroids. Break one of those apart, and there would be enough to help the whole Gold Division evolve, plus some. Char reached down and grabbed another of the precious stones, making sure to select one that was long and thin, and tucked it under his rescue scarf on his arm alongside the first one. For becoming a Charizard, he told himself.
Char walked and walked, all alone, for what felt like half a day. Occasionally he would hear a stormy burst of wind from deep in the abyss, but he wouldn't feel anything. Occasionally he would encounter another scattered pile of feral-shards and need to tiptoe around them, lest he step on one and slice his foot open – some of them really did look that sharp.
But eventually there came an end to the long, lonely road. When the green floor stopped in the middle of nowhere, Char's heart sank – he'd have to walk all the way back and find a different way to go. But as he came closer, he realized the ledge actually stopped at something. He thought it looked like some kind of structure… until he got much closer, and realized to his amazement that this structure was unfathomably large. It was a wall on reality itself, extending infinitely left, right, into the sky, and down into the abyss. As the eternal wall emerged from its misty veil, its true form separated from the sky and came into focus: it was gorgeously textured like bright white coral, with iridescent, otherworldly colors visible between its veiny strands, all shifting and glowing and rippling like portals.
Drawing closer, Char felt a strange sort of calm wash over him. Something about this impossibly mighty structure brought him a sense of comfort and safety, though maybe that was because he'd spent all day walking an endless bridge above a bottomless pit…
As luck would have it, at the point where the road ended, there was a giant door in the side of the mysterious wall, easily large enough for a legendary dragon! But it was shut tight, and there were no doorknobs, hinges, or door-knockers to be seen. Char wondered if it was one of those doors which was supposed to drop like a drawbridge.
He pounded on the glassy metal door with his tiny Charmander hands, but it made nearly no sound over the eternally whooshing wind from the depths of the abyss.
"HELLO?!" He cried, pounding harder, hoping someone, or something, on the other side would respond. Being alone for such a long time was getting exhausting, and he was staring to get hungry again, too. And so he knocked, and waited, and shouted, and knocked some more, until his voice got hoarse and his knuckles got quite sore.
At one point, before giving up hope, Char suddenly remembered he was still wearing a mobile scarf. Without further hesitation, he stepped into the solid door, eager to see whatever mysterious land or lair might await him on the other side.
Char found himself standing in the foyer of a palace. Yes… This was a grand, magical palace, with walls of marble and gold, furnishings of light-pink velvet and lazulite-blue. Giant staircases ascended to second, third, and fourth floors. Between them, a hallway extended so far into the distance that Char couldn't see the ending.
It was quite a wonderful place. It felt warm, cozy, and inviting. The unsettling sounds of the abyssal winds were entirely silenced by the closed doors. Basin Canyon had nothing on this place! Char thought he might have even smelled food somewhere…
Unfortunately, this palace seemed entirely unoccupied. Char noticed weird, pearly chandeliers with their crystalline lights out, leaving the foyer rather gloomy, with the only visible light streaming down from the sky windows. There seemed to be much more light flooding the endless hall, so Char decided to start heading there. He wondered if this palace itself was part of the mystery dungeon. Was it built by someone? Or something? Or did it have random layouts like dungeons did?
As delightful as it seemed, there was such a haunting sense of loneliness over all the spacious rooms here, as though they were supposed to be bright and vibrant and coursing with power, but had been abandoned centuries ago. He had no doubt in his mind that a legendary beast, perhaps even one of the creation gods themselves, could happily live and reign from a place like this.
"HELLO?!" he called again with his sore throat, hearing an endless echo of himself from the many corridors as he carefully stepped into the long, endless hallway, looking up to admire the glorious pillars lining either side of the room, and the strange alien artwork sewn into the royal rug underfoot.
"OH!" called a small voice from somewhere nearby. "Oh, Lord! There's actually someone here! I'm so sorry, I thought I was just hearing things… I hope you weren't waiting too long…"
From one of the upper-floor balconies of the foyer, there drifted a small, cheerful creature. One with golden wings, a golden crown, and a white body. He called down, "Hello! Up here! Sorry to keep you waiting! We just don't get visitors here. Like, ever. At all. But I'm supposed to greet them anyway! So… hi!"
Char had to rub his eyes to make sure he was really seeing what he thought he was seeing. The creature answered for him.
"Hello, weary traveler!" said the tiny being again. "I am Jirachi, personal servant to Lord Palkia. I welcome you into our humble home. Oh, poor Charmander. You look so famished, your flame is getting so small… Don't you worry, we can take care of you."
"W-wait, Jirachi? Seriously?" Char struggled to say. "Where are we? What's… what's all that out there?!"
"Oh… you were out there? Interesting… visitors usually don't come in from the void-lands…" Jirachi hummed, gliding around in a little loop toward the doors, pressing against them as though to make sure they were still closed. "This is Palkia's Domain. Or, as I've heard some call it, the Spacial Rift. It's a place which exists nowhere… and everywhere. And it's where our most magnificent Lord Palkia lives! Make yourself at home, weary traveler. Stay for a while. Nothing can hurt you here. At least, as long as you don't go back outside. I promise! How'd you get in, anyway? Do you have phasing powers?"
"W-wait," Char said again, rambling awkwardly and pointing at the door. "I have to… I have to go. Get back to the real world. My friends really need me right now."
"Oh? Ah, don't worry about it!" Jirachi cheered, flying in another cute little loop in front of Char. "Your time doesn't move here. Whenever you decide to leave, I can take you back to the real world at the exact same time that you left! So relax… whatever's going on, let's get you fed and well-rested, and ready for whatever challenges await you. You must have come so far, I can only imagine how tired you are! How about some tea? I can make you some nice chesto-berry tea."
"Wait, I…"
But the little guy was already zooming away. "Go ahead! Take a seat, sit anywhere you'd like, and I'll be right back," he shouted, already around the corner and out of sight.
"Well, alright," Char said, mostly to himself. "I'm starving. No reason to turn down some free hospitality."
Following Jirachi, He found himself standing at the top of a flight of stairs overlooking an impossibly huge, absolutely stunning banquet hall. Blinding beams of sunlight (or wherever the light came from in the Spacial Rift) fell from the skylight windows, striking every glassy surface, every crystal chandelier, every golden candlestick and every inch of the polished marble on the floor. The sparkle and gleam was unbearable at first. It strangely reminded Char of the Firehall in Basin Canyon, though he probably would have called this the Marble-hall instead. Or maybe the Pearl-hall, seeing that Palkia apparently lived here.
As Char adjusted his eyes, he noticed the perfect symmetry of the room. At the center of it, a golden carpet seemingly spanned miles into the distance. On either side of the carpet, also appearing to span for miles, Char beheld several parallel, infinitely long banquet tables already set for a royal feast, with folded white napkins and empty platters and entire collections of strange utensils. He noticed how some tables had small seats, some had larger seats, and some had no seats at all – as though participants were expected to just stand in place. It was just like the mess hall at the Gold Division, he realized. This hall was meant to accommodate thousands of Pokémon of all sizes and shapes - which made it all the more eerie that there were no guests here, no Pokémon to be seen except for the one lonesome host who'd greeted him.
Ignoring the urge to explore the entire hall, Char tiptoed down the stairs and found his way to the table with the smallest seats. One side had chairs with back-rests, and the other had cushioned stools. It was too easy to imagine Saura or Eva joining him for some royal feast, sitting comfortably on one of those stools and looking back at him from the opposite side of the table as they would await the first course of the meal.
As he sat and waited, tinkering with the weird non-human utensils and looking at his reflection in the silvery platters, Char really wished Saura, or Eva, or anyone else had accompanied him here. There was something mysteriously uncomfortable about the stillness and silence of the place. Char thought maybe the tables had been set and untouched for centuries, but everything was perfectly shiny and new – no dust or decay to be seen. As though it had all been laid out hours before.
"Alright, here we are! My very best chesto-berry tea!" called Jirachi, floating over to Char with several fancy items floating behind him in telekinetic tow, setting them gracefully down on the table. "Sorry it took so long. I haven't served guests in a long time."
Jirachi poured a scalding-hot purple liquid into a weird, two-handled teacup in front of Char. "Really hope you enjoy this, it's my favorite," He added, setting everything down and relaxing on the stool where Char had imagined Saura sitting just moments ago. "I've been working on this blend for… longer than I care to admit. Helps me stay awake."
Char hesitantly sipped the tea, surprised he could drink it so easily without it scalding his mouth. It made him realize that he couldn't remember ever drinking something hot as a Charmander before – perhaps it was a distinctly human memory. It was extremely strong and bitter… but Char wasn't about to complain and hurt Jirachi's feelings. And it did bring a sharp tingle of alertness, which Char very much appreciated.
Char set the teacup back down. "Thank you," he said kindly. "You said Palkia lives here? It's a very nice place."
"Thank you! I do most of the housekeeping around here, so it means a lot," Jirachi said shyly.
"So you did all this?" Char wondered, indicating the rest of the room, all the tables that were set.
"Yeah! I did! I sort of have a lot of time on my hands," he said, looking away. "So much time. Oh, how much I'd love to just zone out and go to sleep for a century the way my kind are supposed to do, but nope. My responsibility is to keep the place perfect for Lord Palkia. And greet the guests like you. He-he-he. So… how's the weather out there? In the real world, I mean! I, uhhhhh, hope your travels were safe!"
Char gave Jirachi an odd look. There was something rather awkward about the way he spoke. "I'll be honest; I actually have no idea how I got here," Char said. "One moment I was in a cave, and the next moment… I woke up here."
Jirachi looked very surprised. "Oh! So you… you… didn't come here on purpose! Oh, that's a rel- I mean. That's unusual. Most visitors come here on purpose. You can only come here through a portal. So you must have come through a portal somewhere? Lord Palkia left dozens of portals open in Ambera, so there are lots of ways to get here."
"Very interesting," Char said, touching his chin. "Oh, I have a really huge question. What's with all the feral-shards floating around outside?"
"Feral-what?" Jirachi said. "What do you mean?"
Char took one of the feral-shards out from his arm-strap. "These things," he said, presenting one to Jirachi. "They help Pokémon on Ambera to evolve. Why are there so many of them here in Palkia's Domain? They're so rare out in the real world. I've always been told they're part of a giant meteor or something."
Jirachi took the little prismatic stone and looked at it fondly. "Meteors? These aren't meteors," he said. "These are just… ohhhh, wait a minute! Hee-hee-hee. I see what happened! There must have been a miscommunication somewhere. We call these space rocks. Someone probably heard that and thought it meant 'outer space'. But no, they're space rocks, as in, 'spacial' rocks. As in, they're sensitive to Lord Palkia's powers. Lord Palkia uses this stuff as modeling clay to rend them into anything else he wants. It makes sense they can help you evolve, since Pokémon evolution is a spacial-rending process in the first place. If they're so valuable, you can take as many of them home as you wish! We have an infinite supply here."
Jirachi gave back the shard, and Char stuffed it back into his armband. Alright, I get why Basin Canyon is a feral-shard mine now, Char realized. There must be a portal to Palkia's Domain somewhere at the bottom of the canyon. That's what I must have fallen through to get here. And all those 'space rocks' have been leaking into reality all this time. But if they're so mundane here, I wonder if we could get even more of them into Ambera somehow…
"Thank you," Char said. "I've wanted to evolve for a while, but I couldn't find one of these things. Nobody can find them anymore. Maybe Palkia could open some more portals to help bring us more of them."
"Maybe he could…!" Jirachi said, very weirdly. "He can open permanent portals. I can only open temporary ones. So maybe if you asked him nicely someday, just maybe he could! Hee-hee-hee. Hee. More tea? Can I get you anything else? Or would you like to rest for a while? I can show you to a room. Would you like a room?"
"Hmm… would you happen to have any food? I'm very hungry," Char told Jirachi. "Berries would be nice, if you have any."
Jirachi perked up suddenly. "Oh! Yes! Berries! I have so many berries! What Pokémon doesn't have berries! I'll get you all the berries you want!"
The little Pokémon floated away in a hurry, and Char took another sip of the tea. The taste was awful, but he couldn't deny how awake and alert it made him feel with every sip. In a moment of courage, he gulped down the entire cupful of tea, almost spitting it back out from the bitter, almost rotten flavor alone. Moments after he choked it down, the most amazing feeling washed over him, like a cleansing of the soul. He felt all his stress disappear, he felt his body brimming with energy, and he felt all his aches and pains vanish – even his hunger pangs, and the soreness in his knuckles from trying to knock on the front door of the palace. He almost felt as perfect as if he'd just evolved, and had to look down at his claws to make sure he was still a Charmander and didn't accidentally trigger one of the feral-shards.
"Wow. I can see why you like this," Char muttered at nobody, looking into the empty teacup.
Jirachi returned only minutes later, floating a huge bowl of fruit along with him. "Here! Have all the berries you want!" he said kindly, setting the bowl down on an empty spot in the table. "Here's a nice razzberry salad. We have red razzberries, black razzberries, gold razzberries, and even the rare blue razzberries!"
"Thank you!" Char replied with a grateful smile. He reached for one of the golden razzberries, unable to deny its shining allure. He wondered if it tasted as good as a golden apple. Turns out, it absolutely did. He tried picking out the gold berries from the salad, one-by-one.
"Looks like you haven't had a lot of visitors lately, but you're a very good host, Jirachi," Char said between bites. "Thank you for everything. I've never had gold razzberries before. They're incredible."
As Char was poking around in the berry pile looking for any golden ones he'd missed, he was startled by the sound of a thump and dishware clanking around. Char looked up, expecting to see that Jirachi had accidentally dropped the teapot on the table or something. Instead, he saw that Jirachi himself had fallen onto the table, asleep.
Or at least, he assumed Jirachi had fallen asleep, until he heard the little guy sobbing and wailing. Out of nowhere, Jirachi had burst into tears, wadding up the tablecloth beneath him and weeping into it.
"Uh… hey? What's wrong?" Char said in concern, setting down the berries in his claws.
"Ahhhhhhh! I'm sooooooorrrry!" cried the poor little guy. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry… I can't do this anymore. I can't! I can't do this anymore! I can't keep it up!"
"What are you talking about?" Char said, climbing up onto the table and stepping over the cups and dishes, coming to console the little mythical Pokémon. "What's the matter? Are you okay?"
Jirachi turned a horrible, devastated face to Char, tears pouring across his face. "Alright, alright," he said, sniffling. "Look… you and I both know you're only here for one reason, Charmander."
"I am…?" Char replied.
"Oh, you don't have to play dumb, it's okay," Jirachi sobbed. "I have psychic powers, you know. I can tell what you're feeling. So go ahead. Just say it. Say the thing."
Char blinked, bending down to pat Jirachi on the back of the head. "I have no idea what you're talking about," he said earnestly.
Jirachi looked up at him, rather confused. "You don't know? Really, you don't? Oh, come on, there's only one reason anyone ever comes to visit a Jirachi," he said defeatedly. "There's only one reason you're trying to be nice to me. So… go on. Say it. Say it. Just… let's get this over with."
Char instantly understood. "Jirachi, no," he said in sympathy. "Look. I didn't even know I was coming here, little guy! I had no idea I would meet you! I got here completely on accident. I'm not here to make a wish. Actually, I'm just glad you're here at all. I really needed food and company, and I really liked your tea."
"Y-really? You did?" Jirachi said, his tears instantly stopping. "You liked it?"
"Yeah, I loved it!" Char said with a bright smile. "I feel so alive and I've never felt better! To be honest, I never even thought of asking for a wish. Do… do a lot of Pokémon do that? Come and just ask for wishes and leave again? I'm really sorry… that must be awful."
Jirachi sniffled, getting up and starting to float again. He smiled sadly. "Yeah, they do," he said. "But don't get me wrong. I love granting wishes."
"Oh? You do?" Char said, blinking in surprise. "You sounded so miserable."
"Oh no no no! I love granting wishes!" He said again, brightly and fiercely. "I love to see the brightest smile on a Pokémon's face when their deepest dreams come true. It's the best feeling in the world! The reason I got so sad is because… See… my power to grant wishes comes from Lord Palkia himself. He lets me use some of his power over space-time so I could use it to make Pokémon happy. And well… this is really awkward, but… Lord Palkia's not home right now. I knew I was about to disappoint you."
Char's heart stopped cold. The strangest feeling of dread came over him. "Oh… oh no," he breathed. "He's not home? How long hasn't he been home?"
"Like… eons and eons," Jirachi said sadly. "It's been so lonely here… and I'm running out of power. So I can't grant wishes anymore. At least not big wishes. I can probably grant a small wish, if you can think of one small enough."
"Do you know where he is?" Char asked cautiously. "Do you have any idea when he's coming back?"
"Actually… yeah… I know what happened to him," Jirachi admitted. "He's trapped in a Pokéball. Somewhere in the real world. And there's nothing I can do. All I can do is stay here and take care of his house for him… for as long as it takes. Maybe even for eternity…"
Char head raced with questions. He stepped backward blankly, almost falling off the table. "Oh… no…" he whispered. "Not again. Palkia… too? Dialga and Palkia both got captured?!"
"Wait, DIALGA is gone TOO?!" Jirachi cried, knocking over a wineglass in surprise. "How! That's impossible! How do you know?! Do you know something about this?"
"No, I… I mean, yes, I…" Char tried to say, watching as so many different emotions flashed across Jirachi's face. His memories all flashed back to his encounter with Celebi, the other lonely servant of a creation god who'd been left alone to take care of his home. He remembered how she'd desperately tried to convince everyone that Dialga was still home, even going so far as to conjure two illusions of him.
"Oh, this is awful. Do you know where they are?!" Jirachi pleaded. "Oh goodness! This is why reality is getting so disentangled! This is why those 'dungeons' I keep hearing about are happening! The gods of time and space aren't there to maintain order and balance anymore! Oh Charmander… this is bad. This is so bad. But I can't do anything about it. I have to stay here. I promised."
Char suddenly remembered something about Celebi. He wondered if the same was true of Jirachi.
"I need to ask you something very important," Char said, crossing his arms. "I need to know if you know who I am."
"Never seen you before in my life," Jirachi said blankly. "And I remember all my guests."
"Good. Maybe you'll remember me," Char said. "I'm betting I've been here before, in this exact room, but I wasn't a Charmander at the time. See… I used to be a human. I used to be friends with Arceus. I made up some kind of a plan that involved getting turned into a Charmander and appearing in Ambera. Palkia probably knows me and knows what my name is. But he's not allowed to tell me. Nobody is allowed to tell me what my name is, except for Giratina. So… do you know who I am?"
Jirachi's eyes were filled with wonder. All of his tears disappeared instantly.
"YES! I DO!" he cried in joy. He zoomed forward to give Char a sudden hug. "Oh, it's you, Ama – Oh, right. You made us all promise not to say your name. So can I call you Ama? Oh it's so good to see you, Ama. I was so lonely… You have no idea how long it's been."
"I… thanks," Char said, returning the hug, relieved to hear Jirachi knew about him. "I'm afraid I don't remember you, or any of Palkia's realm, since I gave myself amnesia."
"Oh… yeah. I know." Jirachi said, sniffling back a sudden sob of happiness. "But I'm still happy to see you. I kept all your things just the way you wanted them." He jolted in sudden excitement. "OH! Wait! I have to show you something! That was part of your plan, Ama! You said that if you ever came to visit me as a Pokémon, I needed to show you something. So let's go! Oh, this is so exciting! Ama is back!"
Char could barely hold back his own excitement. So Basin Canyon had something to do with his plan after all! Finally, some evidence that he was on the right track! He begged Jirachi to show him whatever he'd left behind as a human, and Jirachi practically dragged him through the palace for nearly half an hour, down several flights of stairs, until Char found himself standing in a very beautiful little chamber.
The chamber was dark, but sparkly. Gemstones in the walls glimmered in the light of glow-crystals. It looked like a meditation room – so calming and serene.
In the center of the chamber, there was a peaceful little pool of water. Rising from the water, there were two pedestals, each topped with a large, glowing crystal that very much resembled one of the feral-shards from the Spacial Rift… or, space-rocks, as Jirachi had called them. They clearly glimmered with some sort of supernatural power.
"Welcome to my very own 'wish cave!'" Jirachi said proudly. "I used to take Pokémon here to grant wishes. Of course, I didn't have to sleep for centuries between wishes, because I always had Palkia's power to draw from, and I haven't granted any wishes since he disappeared. So, anyway. Oh, I've waited so long to show you this! Turns out, I can actually grant you a wish after all. Not only that, I can grant two wishes! See these crystals? We saved some of Palkia's spacial-rending power in them, just so that you could make your wishes, Ama! There's not very much, so I can't change the world with them like some other Jirachi can, but there's enough to do something important."
Char's eyes sparkled as he marveled at the shining crystals. Wish-crystals. Imbued with Palkia's primal power over the realm of space itself. Brimming with so much possibility.
"So… I'm supposed to make two wishes? Is that it?" Char wondered. "Is that all I told you about?"
"Oh! Almost forgot!" Jirachi shouted, floating to the top of the room. He unhooked a strange leather pouch from the ceiling, and handed it to Char. "Before you make your wishes, you're supposed to look at this. I don't know what it says, I just know that you wrote it yourself! Apparently it will help you decide what to wish for, or something. I don't know, you never told me. Oh my goodness… this is so amazing, Ama! I can't believe it! I'm finally doing something to help you out with your plan. Well? Open it! What's inside?"
Jirachi flew graceful loops around the room. Char's heart was bursting out of his chest as he fumbled with the leather pouch, nearly breaking the button off as he yanked it open. Inside, there was a little rolled-up scroll. He unrolled the scroll…
Footprint runes. A lot of them. He blankly glanced up and down the alien text, tried unrolling the scroll any further… but no. There was nothing more. Just a big huge list of footprint runes.
Char froze in panic. This was the reason he needed to read. This was absolutely the reason. And he wasn't prepared.
"Remember, the wishes can't be very big," Jirachi said again, stopping beside Char and eyeing the scroll. "There's only so much power in those crystals. So don't wish for immortality or something, because I can't do that."
Char thought for a moment, his eyes scanning over the strange glyphs in utter futility.
"Okay, so… I'm pretty sure I know what the first wish is supposed to be," Char mumbled. "Jirachi… I wish for the ability to read and write footprint runes. Can you… do that?"
Jirachi blinked in surprise. "Wait. You can't read?" he said. "So you can't actually read any of that? Really?"
Char shook his head. "Sadly, no. I can't. So is that a wish you can grant?"
"Oh. Oh yeah, easily. Of course! I was just surprised, because it's so small of a wish," Jirachi said. "I'm a psychic-type, too. So that kind of thing is super easy, hardly a problem at all. I can just make a copy of my own literacy and give it to you! But as long as you're sure! Uh… you know I could just read you the scroll if you want, right? You don't have to waste your wish on learning to read…"
"Nah. I'm sure," Char said, rolling up the scroll and holding it confidently. "I'm absolutely sure this is what I want for my first wish. I'm sure there are things I'm going to need to read later."
"Alright! Very well! Then that's your wish!" Jirachi said happily. "Let's do it!"
Jirachi closed his eyes and spread his arms. His wish tags glowed bright yellow for a moment.
Char felt like his entire brain got twisted upside-down. He staggered for a moment and nearly fell over. When he came back to his senses, he saw that one of the wish-crystals had been drained.
Eagerly, Char unrolled the scroll again. And it was incredible… It was like the entire scroll had been rewritten entirely in Unown! Intellectually, he knew it was a completely different language – he could see the individual footprints if he stared at them. But finally, he understood everything perfectly… and felt that he could even write novels in footprint runes if he really wanted.
"I can read," Char breathed, shuddering in delight. "Oh, Arceus! I can finally read! Thank you! Thank you so much! This is incredible!"
"Seeee! THERE'S that smile I love to see so much!" Jirachi cheered, flying circles around Char. "I love to make Pokémon happy. And it's an honor to grant a wish for you, Ama! So… I guess now you have to figure out what the second wish should be?"
"I guess so," Char muttered. "Alright. Let's see what kind of a hint I left for myself."
And so, with a blaze of hope in his chest, Char read the letter:
… … …
Hello, young one.
I do not know your name, and I cannot tell you mine.
Though we have never met, you might suspect you know who I am.
But do not convince yourself you and I are the same.
You are your friendships, your enmities, your failures and your triumphs. You are the colors in the sky which bring you pleasure to behold. You are the foods you find enjoyable upon your tongue. You are the fields upon which you frolic, the weather which flows across your body and brings you joy.
You are your convictions, you are your weaknesses. You are your memories.
As I am mine.
You read this because my friendships, my enmities, my failures and my triumphs, my convictions, my weaknesses, and my memories are no more. Because they are no more, I am dead, perhaps never again to see life through my own eyes. In my stead, you now stand there, as I have passed unto you the life which once belonged to me.
Despite our differences, there is something we might share in common:
It is a wish, a simple and innocent desire to change something which fate has wrought. It was my final wish, and perhaps it will be yours.
You read this because I have set in motion a plan to fulfill my final wish, a plan which you have now converged with. You have followed my directions and acted in the ways I suspected. Though the journey stretches further still into the future, and fate seems muddled with uncertainty, you read this only because you now follow the very correct path, regardless of whatever path you arrived upon.
There are foes who would take my wish away if they learned. In my fear of them, I could not have imprinted the wish upon any surface, or conveyed it to any soul. I have hidden the wish, but in the only place I was certain would keep it truly safe: it is within you. Young one, you are the riddle whose answer is the wish spoken upon my dying breaths.
Only you, through your friendships, your enmities, your failures and your triumphs will come to know what it is that I willed. Only you, the product of your experiences with the life I have entrusted to you, will solve the riddle.
But understand this, dear young one:
You and I are not the same, and I know and have come to accept that you cannot be forced, whether by my means, or the fickle threads of fate, to fulfill my final wish.
The thread of fate you follow might bend and diverge in ways I have not anticipated. Fate surprises all, as I often say. Our plan is not assured. Your convictions might lead you to diverge willingly. Perhaps you will come to disagree with me. Perhaps you will come to distrust me. And it is your very right, as a living being, should you choose it.
Therefore, please understand: I crafted the plan, not with the goal of leading you to certainly fulfill the wish, but only of guiding you to the place and time where the choice will be yours.
It is my hope, then, that in allowing me to guide you, you might come to see that which I have seen, and witness that which I have witnessed. It is my hope that your friendships, your enmities, your failures and your triumphs, and indeed everything you experience during this life I have given to you, will illustrate not only the nature of my wish, but the reasons I held it, and the reasons I labored to forge just one chance it might come true.
Always remember this, young one: you, and only you, can piece together the answer to the riddle I have made for you. It is the only fate I have truly sealed, beyond every and any unplanned divergence: when you stand at the end of your journey, and you perceive your world with the eyes I have given you, only then will you find the answer to which even Alpha and Mother remain oblivious. There, the decision will truly be yours, and I may rest in peace.
Knowing this, do you wish to follow where I lead? Will you climb to the next step of my plan?
If you wish,
Heed this, a hint to you:
In the place where you now stand, there is one who has asked a question of you. Spend there, a minute, or a day, or an eon, it matters not; but do not leave until you answer, and do not answer until you are certain the answer is correct.
The answer lies within your memory and your experiences. Consider everything you know, and more importantly, everything you need.
Know that the Bayleef died not in vain. Though I mourn that she could not be saved, she learned, in her final moments, what will now be your salvation, and what will now become the salvation of your other loved ones.
Do you remember what it is that she learned?
This is my riddle. If you wish not to sever my plan, ponder until the answer is clear. Then, hurry to Mother. Beneath her wings, you will learn more of my secrets, and you will come to know where the end of your journey will wait, should you choose to carry on with our plan.
Hear these words, the words of one who is now dead and no longer exists. You are all that remains; go, and do whatever it is that you wish with what you have been given.
… … …
By the end of it, Char's hands were trembling hard enough that he dropped the scroll. Jirachi zoomed down to save it before it touched the water.
While the note to himself was certainly inspiring, Char found that it didn't help nearly as much as he hoped.
…Or did it?
"Well! At least we know what the question is that you're trying to answer!" Jirachi said encouragingly. "You have to figure out what your second wish is going to be!"
"Yeah… that was the easy part," Char considered, starting to pace a circle around the water pond. "But it didn't give me a lot of hints, otherwise. I wonder why I didn't just tell myself what to wish for?"
"Maybe because your wish is supposed to be different depending on what happened before you got here?" Jirachi wondered. "I don't know. That's the only thing I can think of. I don't know, Ama. I'm as stumped as you are. I was hoping something there would jump out at you."
"…Waiiit," Char said, snapping his finger and rushing back across the room. "Let me see that again. Maybe something did."
He grabbed the note out of the air and scanned one particular line several times.
"The Bayleef died not in vain," he repeated to himself, lowering the scroll and staring at the wish-crystal. "The Bayleef died not in vain. The Bayleef. The only Bayleef I know is… Lily?"
Jirachi floated above the crystal. "Lily? Is that someone you lost…?" he said sympathetically.
Char scowled for a moment. "No," he said, scratching his head. "Lily isn't even dead. At least, I think she's not dead. She's safe and sound in a very well-protected base somewhere. And even if, I dunno, she had a heart attack or something… I don't know what I could have possibly learned from her final moments…"
He turned around and paced faster, staring down at the floor. "But… she's not even dead. She can't be. That doesn't make any sense. That doesn't make any sense."
"Well… at least you have enough time to decide," Jirachi offered. "As long as you stay here, time doesn't pass. So you don't have to figure it out right away."
"Yeah… I got that much," Char grumbled. "Ugh, is that really the only hint I could have given myself? That Lily learned something before she died? But she didn't die? Maybe if she had gone to Basin Canyon. Maybe if she had burned alive somewhere if I hadn't given her the soothe globe. Maybe if she – "
Char stopped. He stared up at the wish crystal with widened eyes. "That's right," he whispered. "Part of my plan already went wrong, didn't it…? So maybe… maybe… maybe this note is talking about something that never actually happened… but it was supposed to happen. Or maybe it was probably going to happen and it just didn't."
"I could never understand how all you temporal-minded Pokémon understand time stuff," Jirachi groaned. "That's like seven-dimensional space. I could never wrap my head around it. So what exactly went wrong with your plan, Ama?"
"I went somewhere I wasn't supposed to go," Char uttered, his eyes gazing somewhere far-off in deep thought. "I climbed to the top of Temporal Tower and met Celebi. But apparently I wasn't supposed to do that."
"Oh! You met Celebi, huh? How's she doing?" Jirachi chirped. "Haven't seen her in deca-eons. Hope she's doing okay."
"She has to take care of Temporal Tower all by herself because Dialga isn't there either," Char said. "Poor thing…"
Jirachi hummed. "So, do you think… if you didn't go to Temporal Tower… this Lily would have died?"
Char sat against the wall, holding his head in his hands. "Yeah, maybe," he figured. "Alright… so let's think this out, here: If I never went to Temporal Tower, that wouldn't have stopped Temporal Tower from appearing. That wouldn't have stopped Prince from wanting to go there, because that's what the Silver Division was all about. The Silver Division was about the Call, placing their hopes in the Call. So Prince still would have wanted to scale the tower and find out the truth about the Call, and he might have taken Lily with him. I don't know if anything else would have changed. At least one of us would have to have not gotten touched by a Watcher before that happened. So if Prince still was in the Gold Division, he probably still would have gone on an expedition to Temporal Tower. High Intelligence would have gotten the news from Team Regret, and probably would have sent Prince and Lily. Probably because they would have volunteered."
Char stood up. The realization was now sinking in.
"And yet… none of that actually happened…" Char realized. "So I don't know how Lily would have died. Maybe she would have died in the Temporal Tower dungeon. Maybe she would have died when the tower fell, but she would have been on her way down already, so she wouldn't have gotten erased from existence. Maybe she would have frozen to death in Zerferia. Maybe Adiel would have shown up and gotten into a fight with her. There are a lot of ways she would have died. But I'm pretty sure that doesn't make a difference. I don't need to know how she died. I only need to know what she learned before she died. And I think I know what that is."
"What is it?" Jirachi asked interestedly. "What are you saying?"
"Consider everything you know," Char recited from the letter. "Consider everything you need. What she learned in her final moments will be your salvation. What she learned in her final moments… is something I can use to save Basin Canyon. Before dying, Lily would have learned the truth about the Call. That's it's just Celebi. So that's what I need."
Char clenched his fists in confidence. "Jirachi," he decided, "I wish… for the power to use the Call anytime I want."
Jirachi drooped in mid-air. "Uh… is now a bad time to admit that I have no idea what a Call is?" he replied.
"It's like… a huge burst of… psychic power…?" Char tried to explain. "A mind-controlling power, kind of. It amplifies heartspeak until it mind controls other Pokémon."
Jirachi looked concerned. "Ah… I'm still not entirely sure what you're talking about, but I'm pretty sure that's way too big of a wish to grant right now," Jirachi said sadly. "I'm sorry… can you think of anything else?"
"AUGH. I thought for sure that was it!" Char growled, kicking the wall in frustration. "It all lined up. It all made sense. Everything made sense. And apparently I was smart enough to write a note that tells me the answer even if Lily didn't even die. Ugh. I was so sure of it!"
"Well… if you're so sure," Jirachi feebly offered, "maybe there's another way to grant the same wish? Maybe… a way that uses a little less power? Sorry… I'm trying my best to help out here."
Char gave a little smile. "Jirachi… you're a genius," he said. "That's it…!"
"Huh? I'm pretty sure you're the genius one here, Ama," Jirachi said. "I'm still completely lost about all of this."
Char beamed in excitement. "If Lily would have died, she would have likely died at Temporal Tower," Char explained, checking his logic one more time. "If she died at Temporal Tower, the truth she would have learned in her final moments is how the Call actually works. And the truth is that Celebi controls the Call. It doesn't happen on accident. She triggers it. It's all up to her. She even triggers it for me on purpose about once a day. So… Yes. I know exactly what my second wish is supposed to be."
"Yeah? Let's hear it!" Jirachi cheered.
"You said you're good at using psychic power, right?" Char asked again.
"One of the best!" Jirachi beamed.
"Alright. This is my wish," Char said, speaking slowly to make sure he got everything right. "Jirachi, I wish for the power to speak telepathically to Celebi, who lives in Temporal Tower, anytime I want."
Jirachi frowned for a moment, then smiled again. "Oh! That just might barely work..." he said, zipping around the remaining wish crystal like a Mothim to a flame. "I can't make it an effortless power. It would take a ton of energy whenever you want to use it. But I thiiiiiink I can grant your wish! As long as you're sure this is what you want!"
Char looked at the remaining crystal, and the light that glimmered inside. He looked at the scroll, now once again neatly rolled up and set in the corner. "I'm sure," he decided. "I want complete control over the Call. That's how I can save everyone. That's how I can save Basin Canyon and everyone there. That's how I can reverse Enigma's brainwashing. And maybe… that's how I can save the world, too."
"Then I'll do my best, Ama," Jirachi promised. "I still don't really understand everything you're talking about… but I hope this wish gives you what you're looking for."
And so, for the second time, Jirachi closed his eyes and focused. Once again, his wish tags shimmered with power, absorbing the spacial-rending energy from the crystal. And once again, Char felt his brain turning inside-out.
And thus, the wish was granted. Char felt a glowing confidence deep in his ember – that he was finally on the right path to fulfill his destiny.
The human had done his part. now, the rest was up to him.
Basin Canyon
Only twelve minutes had passed since Cepheus had ordered the assault on Basin Canyon to begin.
The Firehall was almost empty, left with nothing but a few of his unconscious soldiers that the resistance teams had been lucky enough to knock out. The rest were busy rushing through the halls, weeding out every single inhabitant of the canyon. And through it all, Cepheus only sat on the throne-pedestal, looking bored and impatient, as he waited for his forces to give their next report.
At the other end of the room, the fabric of space ripped apart into a large black portal, blocking out the light from the wall of fire.
Out from the portal, there stepped a Charmeleon.
The sight of the Charmeleon gave Cepheus a moment of pause. There was something strange and disturbing in its eyes. Something about the way it walked, the overconfident swagger it had, and the malicious glare of hatred it cast directly at him.
"CEPHEUS!" shouted the Charmeleon, pointing at him from across the room. "CALL OFF THE ATTACK!"
Cepheus frowned in confusion. He gave an annoyed groan as he stood up and stepped off the throne-pedestal, crossing the room to meet the Charmeleon halfway.
"Excuse me?" Cepheus scoffed. "Are you trying to give me orders?"
"No, I'm offering you a chance for my mercy," the Charmeleon said in a frightening tone. "You have sixty seconds. Call off the attack, take all your troops, and leave Basin Canyon to the Sandslash tribe."
Cepheus chuckled. "Awfully arrogant, aren't we?" he said in amusement. "Oh, wait a moment. You're that Charmander who was here just a moment ago. I spared your life, and this is the thanks you're showing me for it? To come and stomp in front of me and act like evolving has made you invincible?"
The Charmeleon scowled. Its gaze darkened, and the blaze at the end of its tail only grew.
"Now… I'm not an idiot," Cepheus said idly, checking the rings on one of his claws. "I know full well that if you're making this kind of a demand, this isn't any bluff. You think you have something that can stop me. I just need to take a minute and ask myself how badly I want to see you play your hand. I'll admit, you actually do have me quite… intrigued… right now."
"Thirty seconds," said the Charmeleon, clenching its claws.
Cepheus hummed in thought for another moment. Then he threw up his hands and flipped his giant tail behind him. "Fine, little lizard. Go ahead. Show me what kind of power you think you have. If you can defeat me, you deserve the victory. Besides… I can't exactly call a retreat order anymore, now that all my forces have dispersed throughout the complex. And I promise you can't defeat me in one-on-one combat. And you would know that as well, if you knew how many enchanted items I'm wearing. So I haven't the slightest clue what you could do to me."
The evil Nidoking grinned a dark, fiendish grin, nearly matching the Charmeleon's dangerous scowl.
"So go on, then," he bid. "Surprise me."
The Charmeleon gave the Nidoking one last, defiant look. Then it closed its eyes.
In the silence of its mind, it called out into the void of space and time.
The Charmeleon staggered, as though struck in the back of the head with a giant boulder, and nearly collapsed. But its fire only flared, and it straightened itself out, and stayed standing.
Moments later, Cepheus heard the entire canyon fall completely silent. The faraway shouts, the cracks and explosions of Pokémon attacks, and the reverberations in the walls… everything stopped instantaneously.
And then, for the first time in perhaps many years, Cepheus felt a stab of genuine fear in his poisonous heart, somehow realizing, in that one and very moment, he no longer held control over anything at all.
Purevine Village
At high noon, Saurvor's family lounged in a cabin, attempting get some rest after the panicked morning.
The mother told her seedlings there was a chance their father was just running behind, and would show up soon. She told them to get some rest, that Saura and Father would probably be back by the time they woke up that afternoon.
But the mother Venusaur, and her eldest Ivysaur son, both knew the truth. Once the children had all settled to sleep, they shared a somber, wordless glance. Saurvor crept up beside his mother and snugged comfortingly by her side, and together quietly shed their tears for their broken family…
The cabin door creaked open, and Saura wandered in.
Though Saurvor and his mother were overjoyed to see him safe, they instantly saw the look of heartbroken despair on his face. They gave him a knowing gaze, but a loving one, inviting him to come and share in their warmth, and to cherish what remained of the family. Wordlessly, they said to him: the sun will rise upon a new day tomorrow, and so will grow the seeds of our family. Whatever may come, we'll still have one another.
Then, behind Saura, Grayleaf stepped in – perfectly alive, well, and completely unharmed.
Both Saurvor and his mother jumped to their feet and wordlessly gaped at his presence.
Saura extended a single vine, curled it back, and pulled something out of his bulb.
It was a seed. A plain, ordinary seed. He showed it to his family.
"A friend of mine once gave me this, a long time ago," Saura said. "A friend who cared about me. Someone who fought with all his heart until he couldn't fight any more. And I think now I finally understand something. It was something I didn't want to believe at first, but I think I'm ready to accept it now: we can't just hide somewhere and hope the fire never comes to burn us. That's not how the world works. That's not how life works.
"I get it now. We have to be strong. We have to fight. And we can never stop."
Chapter 80: Twitch reading on April 25th, publication on April 26th.