Author's Note: Special thanks to Arbitrary Renaissance and Ankor the Raichu for their valuable input with this chapter.
Chapter 69
The Sky
What a fortunate day.
A clear sky. Perfect visibility.
The wind was warm. The thermals rising from the streets of Iron Town made flight effortless. The humidity was low, which meant no clouds to obscure vision.
The mission objectives were clear. Victory was inevitable. Char had once again demonstrated his ingenuity, defining a plan which had an overwhelming probability of success.
The freedom of the open sky… the exciting prospect of imminent success…It almost made him want to sing.
It seemed like such a long time ago that he'd spent his mornings perched on some stump or branch, singing his heart out. Of course, that wasn't necessary anymore. His new life, his service to Char, didn't require any songs except for the standard avian calls.
He distantly wondered if he even remembered how to sing at all. Not that it even mattered. He was never very good at it in the first place.
But the best part of the day? It would be spent in the company of Tallie, the most interesting bird Otto had met in recent memory. He would get to tail her all day, talking to her at his leisure, and their trust and companionship would only deepen.
What more could a bird ask for?
Otto took a moment to aim, swooping down from the sky and past the rooftops of the ten-story buildings. When the distances all converged, he opened his talon, releasing the gravelerock from his grip and letting it fall, pulling away at the last moment. A few meters below on the city streets, it conked Tallie on the head.
"Awwwk!" Tallie screeched. "Do you have to drop them so hard?!"
"Of course. You must be certain that you are feeling pain," Otto replied, dropping altitude to speak with her. "With a bird of your size and strength, it takes much force to overcome your aural mitigation and make you feel pain."
He went to collect the gravelerock. It was the perfect size for his talon, small enough to carry without much effort but large enough to inflict the necessary pain on Tallie. If he missed his mark, he'd certainly break it and have to find another from somewhere. Thankfully, he hadn't missed yet.
Char's plan seemed perfect. The frozen flame was hidden somewhere in Iron Town or St. Gracious City, or somewhere along Route 324 between the two. It was likely hidden underground; such a large stash of valuable items wouldn't easily be hidden in a building, at least one that was not so heavily guarded and enchanted as the keephouse. Thus, it could be anywhere.
The thief was evidently a collector, robbing items that it had no use for, as it had shown when it had stolen the useless glass diamonds. Therefore, it likely was unaware of what the enchantment upon the frozen flame did, only that it existed and was very strong.
Kecleon reported that the typical diameter of effect of an enchanted globe was little over three hundred meters in diameter.
Altogether, this meant that there was a radius of about one-fifty somewhere in the vicinity where Tallie would not be harmed by the gravelerock. Once found, triangulation could be used to estimate the position of the thief's hideout. If it was not found, it meant that the orb was likely kept farther underground than expected, so the test radius would be reduced and more tests would be performed the next day over the required areas.
Soon, Otto's very first one-star mission would end in success.
She likely doesn't care about a one-star victory, Otto figured, collecting his gravelerock and winging back above the rooftops. She has likely felled missions of seven stars at least. I wonder what her record is. I would need to fly to the Black Division just to see it. Perhaps I could get her to tell me.
Otto perched upon a tall building, a "sky scraper" as they were sometimes called (he did not understand why, as they certainly weren't at an altitude capable of scraping the sky the way that a bird could). He surveyed the territory. His mind drew tessellated circular regions upon the ground below, representing circumferences of area which still required testing. Fifty-nine tests were complete, and many more remained.
The rest of the team was already in St. Gracious City, having been taken there by the Arcanine and her powers of teleportation. Char and the Arcanine were busy testing for the frozen flame's influence by similar, but not nearly as efficient, means as a fire-type Pokémon who could fly.
Otto winged to the south-east, approaching the residential district. He sounded the standard avian call of position indication, and Tallie followed down below (although with less haste than she had flown an hour ago, for some reason) and then Otto swooped down to her, attacking her with the rock just as before.
Ah! Sixty direct hits. Otto thought with glee. My training has prepared me for this. My accuracy is sure to impress her.
He folded his wings and plummeted, as though diving upon a fleeing rat, and reclaimed his rock. It was still in good condition. When he neared the ground, Tallie waved her wings.
"Ah, Otto, maybe we could give it a rest? For a few minutes at least…?" she cried. "My head is starting to get sore…"
That isn't good, Otto realized. She cannot be allowed to accrue enough pain to make her lose feeling. It will compromise the mission.
"Yes, we have time for rest," Otto said, swooping to land in front of her. "We have been making good progress. Do you feel that you will need a healing berry soon?"
"No, no… not yet, just… just give me a moment, alright?" she screeched, shaking away some loose down. "Awwk. How much of the city is left, again?"
"Approximately four thousand more tests and the first sweep will be complete,"
"Wait… first sweep? There's more than one?!" Tallie cried.
"Yes, the second sweep will fill in the holes we left with the first, to maximize efficiency," Otto said. "It is possible then that the flame will not be found by that time, in which case we must conduct a third sweep with a smaller radius, assuming the orb is deeply underground. If we continue at our current speed, this will only take a few days."
Tallie shivered. "Augh, are you sure this is the best way to test for this?!" she cried.
"Yes, I am fairly certain," said Otto. "Without prehensile arms, it would not be easy for you to hit yourself with the rock at a speed which would overcome your aural mitigation. Perhaps if we found a flying Pokémon whose body were made of rock, or a rock-conjurer who could fly, such as a dragon or Aerodactyl, the pebble would not be necessary. Currently we operate with peak efficiency using the resources we have."
I must sound so intelligent to her! He thought internally. I must keep demonstrating my intelligence!
But Tallie only cast him an angry look. "Wonderful to hear," she said. "I'd like to see you take a rock to the face," she grumbled quietly, pecking a feather from under her wing.
"That would serve no purpose to the mission. I am not a fire-type," Otto quipped.
"Oh, right! How silly of me to forget that," Tallie sneered.
Otto glanced to the south. "We are nearing the residential district," he reported. "The frozen flame is most likely to be here. It would be fortunate if we were able to locate it so early."
"Tell me about it," Tallie said. But when she glanced back at where Otto had been, he'd already flown away.
Otto surveyed the residential district. At the front there were some rectangular houses made of sand-colored bricks, all quite plain. There were also some underground burrows and some lakes, and some metal houses as well, also quite plain, and somewhat small… only about twice the size of his own personal room at Char's base, he noticed. They were all aligned in neat little rows, each with a mailbox.
Thankfully this city does not offer many elemental comforts, Otto thought. It would be much more difficult to navigate.
Catching a pleasant tailwind, he drifted above an artificial pond and spotted a Gyarados sleeping at the bottom. A moment later, he realized the Gyarados was dead – it was merely a sculpture, something to decorate the home of the water-types which swam through the loops and curls in its serpentine form. The wind touched the surface of the water, disturbing the image of the fish with bright reflections of the sun.
Otto kept a conspicuous eye on the pond. A water-type thief is unlikely, he thought. Trails of water would be left wherever the thief would run. But it will be tested regardless. Perhaps the thief is using a water-resisting spell. This would prove clever, and explain why it has not been detected yet.
He began trying to calculate the foci of the tests, adjusting them so that he would not need to drop his rock under the water, or to trespass upon someone's roof. When Tallie caught up (she was flying quite slow now) he commenced with more rock drops.
Less than an hour later, the sweep of the civilian houses was complete, and came up empty.
One hundred and fifty-one direct hits, Otto counted, holding his head high as he settled next to Tallie near the lake.
"How unfortunate," Otto commented. "That area was the place most likely for the thief to live. There are not many other places in town which actually house Pokémon. Birds live in the weir against the plateau's wall, but we have already confirmed that the thief is not a bird. Perhaps the thief lives here, yet instead keeps their collection of stolen items elsewhere."
Tallie did not reply. She did not appear to be paying attention, and was only staring into the distance.
"We have made excellent time," Otto replied proudly. "Come, let's keep up the work."
The Talonflame opened her frizzled wings, showering feathers and lit embers everywhere. "Wow, you just sound so excited to keep smacking me with that thing," she screeched.
I do not understand what she means, Otto thought. I do not sound excited, I purposely keep my voice quite stoic…
"Yes, for the sake of the mission," he said after thinking carefully for the moment. "As an avian unit we are operating at first-class efficiency. I am putting my full effort into meeting the high standard that you set."
"Look, what is wrong with you?!" Tallie cried, flapping her wings at him. "Just because it's necessary for the mission for me to get hit on the head with rocks every five minutes doesn't mean it doesn't hurt! Haven't you ever gotten hit on the head with a rock before?! Don't tell me that you can't even feel pain?"
"Of course I feel pain," he said, "But I do not speak of pain. I find that it decreases my reputation when I speak of my own pain. If the mission is successful, the pain has served a valuable purpose, and can therefore be disregarded."
"And that's all that matters to you, huh?" she said. "Your mission record?"
"My record shows my worth as a resistance team member, and therefore my worth as a Pokémon," Otto said.
"Oh, really?" Tallie said dryly. "So I suppose if you quit the resistance, then your life would be meaningless?"
Otto had to think about that one for a moment. He wanted to give the Pokémon he admired an honest answer.
"I do not know, but I know that when I was a feral living in a mystery dungeon, my life was without meaning," he said. "Team Ember has freed me from the wilderness, and given me a life of meaning. I can only assume that if I were to quit the resistance, my life would have less meaning than it has now."
Tallie scowled, casting him a dangerous glare. He watched her, expecting a reply. A Tyrogue citizen momentarily walked between the two, but her gaze was unbroken.
"I don't get you," she said, stepping away from him. "You're a weird little bird, you know that? …Kind of scary, actually."
Otto opened his mouth to reply, but couldn't find the right words.
This is not how I expected her to reply, Otto thought to himself, thinking quickly and assessing the implications of her behavior. Here, I am trying to speak like the model avian service unit, reaffirming her confidence. I did not say anything explicitly disparaging. What does she disapprove of?
Tallie squinted down at Otto's bewildered face. "Hey, look… I'm sorry," she said quickly, hanging her head. "Sorry, I – I guess what I meant to say was… I think that healing berry is sounding great right about now."
Otto nodded. Ah, now this I understand, he thought. She is emotionally compromised by the pain! I wonder why she said nothing until now?
It is almost as though she was expecting me to anticipate her level of pain. Was she testing me?
No, that cannot be. There is no reason Tallie would need to test me. I would answer honestly whatever she would ask of me, and she knows this. Perhaps she simply overestimated her level of endurance. That is quite understandable; I sometimes make the same error.
Leading the way, he winged back in the direction of the central park, the origin point of their flight plans and the place they'd stashed their oran berries.
"I give Char all the credit, he was right," Tallie uttered as they flew back. "This is one of the weirdest things I've ever been asked to do."
"But not the weirdest?" Otto tried asking.
She was silent for a moment. She jerked her head to Otto and said, "Hmm, some things came close, but… I'm gonna say yeah, yeah. It is the weirdest."
"But not the longest or the hardest?" Otto tried again. "What are some of your prior missions that you are proud of?"
Tallie turned her head away. "Classified," she barked.
"Division law states that you may freely share classified information to team members you deem trustworthy," Otto stated.
"Yeah, y'know what else states that? Common sense," Tallie fired back. "Actually, common sense accounts for most of the rules in the silly codex. If you've gotta ask for permission to do what you know needs to be done, you're useless."
She veered down to the park before Otto could reply, banking for the large crate of oran berries that Kecleon had set up beneath a tall blue willow tree. Kecleon was somewhere nearby, guarding the merchandise – he was camouflaged, but thanks to the angle of the sun's rays from the sky, Otto had caught his movement, a tiny blur of light like the ripples on the pond's surface.
Tallie stumbled as she came to perch on the side of the box, then she started eating the berries four at a time.
"Don't eat too many," Otto warned. "Those need to last all day."
"I will eat as many as I please," Tallie huffed with a full mouth. "If we run out we can always just pick our own. There are some oran bushes around town."
"Those belong to civilian Pokémon."
"They won't notice if we take a few. Pidgey probably peck them off all the time and nobody can do anything about it, right?"
Otto watched the large red bird devour at least eight oran berries, tossing her head up to spill them down her throat. He felt that he needed to seize this moment somehow. He needed to say something while he had the chance, while he was not bothered by calculating test points and she wasn't in a foul mood. He needed to say something open-ended, yet something Tallie would not disagree with, based on her prior responses…
"Would you tell me something about your past?" Otto tried, forcing meekness into his voice. "Perhaps something that's not classified."
"What's up with you? What's the big deal about prying into my past?" she replied, but not with a cutting edge. Otto noticed that the tone of her voice must have reflected the pain relief which came from the berries. She could tell that her mood was much improved.
"I want to learn from you," Otto said.
"Learn what, how to fly?" Tallie said absently, pecking at another oran.
Otto shifted his feet on the wooden rim of the box and came closer to her. "If you would tell me about your prior jobs and share your wisdom with me as the Silverwing leaders had, I might learn how you became such a successful avian unit, and try to follow your ways," he said with hopefulness.
"I don't really have anything to teach you," Tallie said, shrugging. "I mean… you could watch and learn, but beyond that, I'm not someone who's good at regurgitating things I used to do. It's all the past to me."
"Are you certain there's nothing? Any story of success you're particularly proud of? Any anecdotes about mistakes you've made? Surely someone as strong and accomplished as you would hold great wisdom of the world, and I do not want to miss it. I live for greater wisdom."
Tallie groaned, hopping off of the crate and back to the ground. "Alright, pigeon, how about this. Want to tell me about your past? You said you were wild, right? What was that like? What's a day in the life of a wild, mindless bird?"
Otto blinked, trying to recall his memories.
"They are indistinct, and if I am to be frank, inconsequential," he said. "When I awoke in the morning, I would sing. After singing, I would preen. After preening, I would hunt for bugs and small rodents. After hunting, I would patrol my territory. After patrolling my territory, I would bathe. After bathing, I would sleep. Each day consisted of the routine. The only variations happened when creatures would invade my territory, in which case I would join a mob to chase it away, or when I could not find food, in which case I would settle at a different point in my patrol route and designate that point as my new home. I thought nothing, I learned nothing. Because my brain did not have the capacity to defy my wild instincts, I succumbed to routine, like the sun and the moon."
"Ho-Oh's feathers, hey! That's just what my life was like, too! So really, there's not much to explain," Tallie said. "Get up in the morning. Eat. Listen to our mission briefings. Memorize the cities, flight paths, key Pokémon. Fly out. Perform our expected duties. Come back and get paid. Sometimes we'd be back the next day. Sometimes it would take weeks. Didn't matter. All the days were the same. Maybe in the evenings I'd get the chance to talk to some Pokémon I thought were interesting, but it didn't matter, time would always be up and it'd always be time to sleep. We didn't even have the luxury of the sun. Honestly, that's all I really remember of the Black Division. Just one messy blur of work. Over and over again. Day in and day out. Nothing interesting. Actually, does that sound any different than life on Team Ember to you? Hmm?"
"It is not too different," Otto replied. "Every morning, I wake up, I eat breakfast, I hear the briefings…"
"Ohh, well whatdaya know? How about that?" Tallie shouted in fake surprise, brushing Otto's head with her wing feathers. "Go figure, huh? Hey, if your life is all just one long mindless routine, then how are you sure you aren't still a wild? How do you know that you aren't?"
Otto thought for another moment. This question made him vaguely uncomfortable, but he settled on a secure thought to reply with, and said, "I am on Char's team because I choose to be here, rather than to be subject to the rules of the wilderness. I have chosen this routine."
Tallie looked smug, like she had just won a contest. Otto didn't understand why; he had not initiated one. He had merely asked some questions and responded to some of hers.
"Alright, if you say so, chickie," Tallie said. "Point is, you have your reasons that you aren't proud of your past. I have mine. So can we leave it alone for now? Please?"
She roused herself, rapidly flapping her wings and shaking her head. "Ah, those berries go to the head fast. I feel great," she said with her feathers still puffed. "Want to go smack me on the head a few hundred more times? I think I'm up for it."
As Otto winged back to the sky, he noticed the glimmer of the hidden Kecleon dashing to inspect the remaining inventory of berries.
On their way back to the east side of town to continue their sweep, Otto thought of the perfect question.
"What's it like being a fire-type?" he asked her, drifting close overtop so she could hear.
"Oh… oh, wait, I know this one," she said eagerly. "Fire-types are weak to water, rocks, and earthen. And best at burning up bugs, plants, and metal. Am I right? Did I get it right?"
"You forgot ice," Otto said. "But that's not what I meant. How does being a fire-type change the way you are? How does it change the way you exist and how you fight? I… do not express myself well. How do you feel that being a fire-type is different than being a Pokémon of another type? From your vantage, that is."
"Uh… why not ask Char that?" Tallie said. "He's a fire-type, why wait all this time for me to come along?"
"You're a bird with fire," Otto said. "You are similar to me, but you have fire. I just wonder how that…"
"How that feels?" Tallie mused.
Otto felt wary of responding for some reason. "Yes, perhaps," he eventually replied. "I wonder how different I would be, if I… had fire."
"Well," she said, "I guess you could say it feels… warm?"
"…Warm? That's all?"
"Why do you keep asking me all these weird questions? What about you, huh? What's it like being a normie?"
"It is odd that you would ask me that," Otto said, "Since you once had the same elemental types as I have."
Tallie rolled her eyes, veering away. "Ugh, I can never get one past you, can I? Silly bird. So this is the spot, right? We're doing the warehouses?"
"This is the next most likely place the thief's hideout could be."
They both came to perch upon a white rooftop. There were several large storage houses in this district, and muscular Pokémon like Gurdurr moving piles of construction equipment. The building materials for the expansion and maintenance of Iron Town's infrastructure were kept here.
"I am interested in fire because this is what led me to having my first sentient thoughts," Otto said in a quiet, hesitant voice. "I encountered Char, and I mobbed him, as I would mob all unfamiliar creatures. I saw that he had fire on his tail. I had never seen fire before, and I thought that it had come from the sun. Char burned me and I felt fire's intensity. This is what made me realize that there existed things in the world that were hidden outside of my daily routine and my small territory. There were things in the world… like a creature with fire upon its tail, creatures… who could create fire. My transcendental thoughts began at that point. I finally saw the truth that there were things I had not seen before. I was overcome with the intention to… to follow Char… anywhere. I wanted to see the places he came from, and see how different they were from… my meaningless existence."
"Well, was it everything you thought it would be?" Tallie replied, eyeing him.
"Yes," Otto said confidently. "And more. I am very happy with my decision to follow Char. The path has led me to a deep understanding of the world, and the awareness of countless things that I still do not understand."
"And let me guess, you want to learn everything?" Tallie said flatly. "Because I'm telling you right now, nobody can learn everything. And trust me, this is coming from someone who's tried."
"Not everything," Otto replied, "but perhaps everything pertinent to aviation. I wish to become the ideal bird." He turned to Tallie, and said to her with a very odd spark in his voice and a glimmer in his eye, the likes of which the Talonflame hadn't seen from him before, "Of all the things that I've learned, would you like to know which is my favorite?"
"Sure, kiddo," she said amusedly. "What's your favorite?"
"I have learned a battle technique that is fire," he said proudly, wearing a wide grin. "It is my favorite application of white aura. While it is not true fire, it gives the appearance of fire. The technique is known as 'brave bird.' To my current knowledge, it is the closest I can come to having fire of my own."
"I've heard of 'brave bird,'" Tallie said, nodding approvingly. "Takes guts to make a direct hit. You can't always pull back in time. Too much momentum from the energy discharge."
"It is difficult, but I have trained my accuracy," Otto said with satisfaction.
"Ah! Good for you. Maybe you can show me your skill sometime. Me, I never learned that one. Too risky." She gave him a pat on the head. "Keep your little beak up, maybe you've got more fire than you realize."
"What do you mean?" He said.
"Well… maybe you have a hidden power," Tallie mused, tilting her head. "Like… like that Zona kid I keep hearing about. Apparently he has a hidden psychic power. Maybe you have a hidden power for fire."
Otto tensed, processing the possibility.
What if… what if this were true?
Could I truly command the power of fire, if nature had been so kind to hatch me with the correct genes?
His eyes sparkled in the sunlight. "Perhaps I could," he said. "Perhaps I could get tested for a hidden power. I do not know how to do that, but I could learn."
"Silly birdie," she said, patting him on the head again. "You going to just stand here all day? You've got a mission to finish, don't you?"
Otto nodded, clutched his little rock, then climbed into the air with a strange, electric vigor in his wings.
Like the Lucario who was born without aura, he thought, perhaps I too am missing an element. Perhaps fire is that element. Perhaps I am useless because I was born without fire…
…and when I find the fire, I will truly become an ideal bird.
He flapped to gain altitude, then stopped to hover at the peak of his flight. Since the residential areas all seemed dry of the frozen flame, Otto took a moment to peer around town, wondering where the next most likely place could be after the warehouses were done with.
Statistically speaking, we should have found it by now, Otto thought. It has such a low likelihood of being anywhere else. I wonder if Char and Canniah have located it already…
He drifted at near the height the sky-scrapers had been and glanced around at the city. Where could it be? The downtown district? The keephouse? The merchants' isles? The greenhouses? He knew testing the greenhouses would really be scraping the riverbed, but he found that it was difficult to think like a thief – at least, like this particular one. Once the current district was over with, he would ask Tallie for her opinion.
Otto chose his testing point and sounded the call. Tallie glided to him with great haste, coming to land on a small pile of iron beams, the likes of which they probably used to assemble the sky-scrapers. Once in position, she stared expectantly at the sky, catching Otto's eye.
Otto thought she looked happy. It was probably the berries affecting her, he figured. Her blood was probably flooded with chemicals that forced her to be happy. But the happiness was contagious. Otto spread his wings and posed for her, trying to look strong and majestic against the clear sunny sky.
Indeed, a fortunate day, he thought to himself.
He tilted his wings, pitched his weight over the hilltop of air, and began his plummet.
And then he saw something in the corner of his eye.
It was dark and bubbling, like the bulges upon a cumulonimbus cloud. And it moved fast.
Its motion reminded Otto of a scurrying rat, especially those delicious-smelling ones with salty meat, fleeing from the mighty raptors overhead…
But when he turned to look, there wasn't anything to see. There had been no distinct shape, only motion, similar to the scales of the camouflaged Kecleon.
It took only the one small moment of distraction.
No! Otto realized, snapping back to attention. No, I am…
I am not a feral anymore. I am an intelligent bird. My focus should not be pulled away by frightened rats and the thrill of hunting... that is not what I am anymore.
Only then, when he turned his head back to Tallie, did he realize his gravelerock had slipped through his talons and was already halfway to the ground, plummeting to its destruction.
But his intelligent mind couldn't make immediate sense of the rapidly diminishing distance between himself and the ground. He was closer than he wanted to be. He knew he should have pulled up, but instead he tucked his wings in deeper and angled himself toward the rock in one last desperate attempt…
…No!
…No, I must—
I MUST NOT BREAK THE STREAK!
He plummeted fast and reached out his talons to close them around the stone, but the ground was just too close. Raw instincts took over and he gave up, tumbling and twisting until finally he had wrangled control of the air beneath his wings, saving himself just shy of slamming into the iron. But in doing so, he had spiked the stone down towards the steel beams with the incredible power of his dive.
The rock hit the beams, shattering into a dozen pieces. The largest and sharpest of those pieces flew directly at Tallie, burying itself completely into her belly. With a feral shriek, Tallie fell backward in a mess of feathers and scrabbling talons.
Otto came to land, and stood wide-eyed, watching his leader writhe in agony. She tumbled from the beams and onto the sandy ground, spilling loose down feathers and drops of blood wherever she rolled. Several construction workers stopped to stare in the direction of the noise.
"Tallie…?" Otto tried to say weakly. His voice didn't rise above Tallie's screams. "Tallie, do you… do you need a berry? Will you… will you be alright?"
And he just… watched for a moment, his mind blanked. It gave him no thoughts. It gave him no calculations. It suggested no ways to react. He watched mindlessly as his new friend rolled to her side and pierced the sky with her screech, just as the wounded raptors would always cry in their death throes after he'd mobbed them and clawed a hole in their chest. He never expected to see Tallie act like this.
You stupid, feral bird, he told himself. You weak, pathetic, useless bird. Look what you've done.
You are a failure.
Get her a berry.
Without questioning, without waiting for permission, he flapped away to the residential districts, plucked an oran from the nearest citizen's garden, and flew it in his tiny talons back to the warehouse lot.
Minutes later when he returned, Tallie was right where he'd left her, but now she was laying on her back and wasn't moving. His heart stopped, and for an eternal few seconds he wondered how he was going to inform Char that he'd killed his own teammate.
But as he drew nearer he found that her eyes were open. She caressed her open wounds with her wingtips. Embers glowed between her feathers, and the smell of smoke grew strong.
Otto dropped the oran berry at her side.
"I'm sorry," he said, feeling something inside of him heave. "I did not mean to miss."
She only glared spitefully at him.
"I was distracted in mid-air," he tried saying. "I saw something. The feral Pidgey behind my eyes thought it was something of interest, and I miscalculated the distance."
She still only glared.
"I am a failure, and no better than a feral," Otto admitted, bowing his head. "I will eternally regret this pain that I have caused you."
"Yeah, well don't," Tallie growled.
To his surprise, the red falcon climbed to her feet. Long, thick trails of tears traced from the sides of her eyes. Blood still oozed from beneath the scattered gray feathers of her belly. But she stood up on her shaky legs until they stopped shaking.
Giving a dismissive glance to the oran berry, and another one to the Pidgey, she performed another rouse, then spread her wings…
…and she simply left.
Otto didn't know what to think. Had she not seen the oran berry? Were the tears blocking her sight?
Was she leaving? Would she come back? There had been something frightening in her eyes… had it been something meaningful? Was she malicious now? Was she too emotionally compromised to be saved?
He watched her silhouette upon the sky, now far away from his position. She looked as though she was winging back in the direction of the central park.
Oh. Of course, Otto he realized. She probably needs many more than one berry, and thus is flying to Kecleon's crate again. I must not be thinking clearly today. Why am I not thinking clearly? Perhaps it is I who needs berries. I will join her. I shall apologize once she is no longer emotionally compromised.
But when he returned to the central park, Tallie wasn't there.
He checked the whole park – around the statue, down the paths through the trees and the flower gardens, around the sand pits and the fountain and the mole-holes for young rabbits and Sandshrew, but the striking red of the Talonflame's feathers was nowhere to be seen. There were only some wild Pidgey eating fallen seeds, which Otto chased away disdainfully.
After patrolling the park twice, he perched on the side of the crate, peering down into the pile and wondering if any had been taken recently. It didn't seem so.
The light from a nearby tree branch shimmered and twisted. Kecleon lounged in an overhanging branch of the blue willow. Though he was still camouflaged, he seemed engrossed in a tiny book. It appeared to hang in the air, supported by nothing.
"Ah, has there been much luck?" Kecleon's familiar, disembodied voice said from above. "Is it wise to be separated from your companion?"
"She flew away on her own," Otto said simply. "I was going to ask if you've seen her here."
"Ah, unfortunately I have not," Kecleon said, making the branch sway as he shifted positions. "It's been quite a while since you two have flown here. I was getting worried. One can only take so many rocks to the head before you need something to clear away the pain, I can imagine!"
Otto felt awkward about replying.
He nibbled on the closest berry wondering if it would make him feel any better, but it didn't seem to work on the particular type of pain he was now feeling.
He fluttered down from the crate. "Kecleon," he called up to him, "If Tallie returns, tell her to wait here for me. I will be back."
"As you say!" Kecleon shouted in reply. "Always happy to be of service! Where are you off to, all by yourself?"
"I am off to find her," Otto resolved, moments before taking to the sky.
For two hours, he did not find her. He flew to the cloudline and searched for her red silhouette somewhere above the town. He few below the rooftops and carefully retraced their flight paths from the whole day. There were no signs.
He returned to the academy and asked the gatekeepers if a Talonflame had returned to the division base. He returned to Kecleon several times, but Kecleon was always alone.
Perhaps we should have expected this, Otto thought, flying along the perimeter of Iron Town. Tallie quit her prior team in a similar fashion. Perhaps it is in her nature to flee, and to break promises.
Regardless, I must inform Char of the mistake I have made which led her to leave us. Perhaps he will be angry at me. Perhaps he will fire me, and I will need to join another team.
What other team would take me after such an outstanding failure on my record? Would I need to fly to the Black Division for resistance work? I am not even at a high enough rank to demand a transfer. Other teams would laugh at my requests. Perhaps Syr would take me back. Or perhaps…
…Perhaps I would simply be a citizen of Ambera?
Or perhaps return to the wild…?
He looked to the falling sun, the source of all fire. He remembered that even as a wild Pidgey, something about the sun stirred him. He remembered the routine, but the sun determined that routine. High and mighty, strong and undefeatable, the sun determined all, and something in the bird's mind had understood it on a primal level. The sun moved on its own, and the rest of the world followed it.
It was nearing the hour of "six." The sun would soon set, and Char would be returning to central park to regroup with his team and exchange status reports. Otto knew that failing to complete less than a third of his mission would not impress Char, but he could make no further progress without Tallie. He would find her, or not find her, and give his report to Char, receive his punishment, perhaps a dishonorable discharge from the team… Somehow, the day would end with him eating, and then sleeping.
And the cycle of the days would repeat.
And as he was staring past the sun along the cliff's edge of the mighty plateau, as though wanting to watch it set and follow it down beneath the horizon line, he finally spotted her. She was perched just below the sun from his vantage, standing on the on the plateau's cliff just outside of Iron Town's boarders.
He came to perch beside her. He noticed that her wound seemed healed, though her silver plumage would require at least an hour of grooming to straighten out. She spotted him and nodded in acknowledgement, but remained quiet and still.
He felt awkward about speaking.
"Are you leaving?" Otto eventually asked. "Are you quitting the team?"
She didn't reply. She only stared out into the muddy, craggy badlands just outside of Iron Town.
"Are you going to fly away?"
She peered smugly at him. "If you're so smart, you try to figure out why I left," she shot.
Otto didn't know he could ever feel so awkward. He did not want to say anything incriminating about himself. He did not want to reveal his weaknesses. He already felt ashamed enough.
Nevertheless, he spoke the second most obvious answer he knew.
"You are quitting the team," Otto guessed.
"Nah, I'm not a weakling," she replied. "Guess again."
Otto really did not want to say what he thought Tallie wished to hear. He looked in the direction of the sun, as though beseeching it for strength. He did not want to speak these words. He'd gone so long without saying them. But now he knew he had to respond honestly.
"You were angry at me," he hesitantly said. "You were in pain. You despised me for bringing you pain. You grew weary of getting hit with a rock. You believed I didn't empathize with you. You feared I would make another mistake, and perhaps bring you more pain. You despised me for caring more about the success of the mission than your personal well-being. You did not wish to speak with me further."
Tallie huffed a short laugh. She kept staring out into the wild, where no Pokémon lived. "Sorry. That sounds so weird, coming from you. Actual empathy? Wow, I never thought I'd hear you say such things."
The Pidgey averted his gaze bashfully.
She sighed thoughtfully. "You asked what it's like being a fire-type. We fire-types have something called an 'ember.' Do you at least know what the ember is?"
Otto nodded, trying to recall his teaching. "It is a facility within each fire-type. The source of their fire. It is an undying fire which does not go out until the fire-type's life ends."
"It does a few other things," Tallie said, her distant gaze unbroken. "Having an ember means that it's very easy for us fire-types to get angry very quickly. We tend to have… very sensitive egos. Very volatile. You say the wrong thing, you hurt us, that fire's going to flare. And aural mitigation doesn't guard against words. We just pop like an Electrode."
"It must be difficult for a fire-type to act rationally with such sensitive emotion," Otto said. "It must be a struggle to defy the compulsions of the ember."
"Yeah, but that's the whole fun of being a fire-type. Alright sure, half the time you've got to watch it. You snap at a boss, say the wrong things, and you may or may not get fired. But half the time you shouldn't defy it. You go with it. Because we're stronger when we get angry. That's why the ember is there. It's there to help."
"I disagree," Otto said. "Anger disrupts rational thought and focus. Psychics have confirmed this. It should always be resisted. It will always lead to bad decisions."
Tallie closed her eyes and shook her head in amusement. "Cute. Now you know the difference between you and me. There once was a Pidgey who hatched from the egg unable to feel anger, compassion or any sense of empathy. That Pidgey felt like a complete failure. And while he was moping and stewing in his mopey little thoughts, his teammate drifted away to the edge of town and had to do all the work for him."
She pointed a wing out into the badlands.
"It's right over there," she noted. "I flew secants through the perimeter and triangulated its position and everything. Actually, I'm standing on the perimeter right now. I don't know where the entrance is, didn't look closely enough, but I found its position. Char is going to be happy."
Otto's mouth fell agape as he tried to speak a question he had not yet formulated. Several thoughts clicked together in succession.
The perimeter. The tests.
The rock. The pain.
The oran berry.
"The rock shard remained inside you, causing you constant pain," Otto concluded. "You used this to perform a comprehensive sweep across all of Iron Town with more speed and efficiency than our prior method. You stand here right now because the frozen flame is nearby and it brings you relief from the pain."
She rubbed him on the head with her wingtip. "Ah-hah! See, I knew you were smart," she laughed. "Good little chicklet."
Incredible, Otto thought, admiring the fiery falcon. She was harmed, but she only perceived it as an unexpected opportunity. I only wish I were so perceptive.
I must learn to think the way she thinks, so that I will seize such opportunities.
"Will we raid the hideout now?" Otto asked.
"What?! No, of course not," Tallie said. "That wasn't the deal. We need a plan to infiltrate it, and that's going to be up to you and Char to figure out tonight. We're not going in without a plan. Besides, if the thief's watching us and finds us poking around, it might move the hideout before we come back tomorrow. Can't have that."
"This is true," Otto said. He peered conspicuously at Tallie's mess of feathers. "The rock fragment is still inside of you?"
She nodded, touching her belly with her wingtip. "Yeah. But that's no problem for a ghost to pull out. Or just wear a mobile scarf or eat a phase seed and they'll just fall right out. Char has mobile scarves, right? I'll just use one of those."
"Won't it hurt until then?"
"Don't worry about me. This is nothing compared to when I got a spearhead lodged in my back for two days. It hurt so bad I couldn't even fly. …That's a story I could tell you someday, I guess."
"Talle…"
"What?"
"I'm very sorry for dropping the rock. I am sincerely sorry."
Tallie glared at the Pidgey in mock surprise. "Whaat?" she cried. "Even though it gave us a tactical advantage? Even though it led us to victory?"
Otto sighed. He concentrated on his words. "Yes. Even despite these things. I am sorry that I have brought you pain. It does not matter that it helped on the mission. Perhaps we could have thought of a similar effective strategy if we had been given the opportunity. But I am sorry for allowing myself to be distracted and to fail."
Tallie grinned. "Hah. Well, there might just be some empathy inside of you yet," she said. "You're forgiven, soldier. Think nothing of it."
She glanced the setting sun. "Hey, looks like we should be getting back right about now. Char's going to be waiting for us. Do you want to deliver the news, or should I?"
"You may. You deserve the credit," Otto decided. "However, before I return to Char, there is something I must do. Please return to the park and inform Char that I will arrive late to the rendezvous."
She flashed her head back to Otto, but he was already flying away.
"Where are you going?!" she cried.
He didn't answer, but internally he said to himself, I'm not asking permission to do what I know needs to be done.
Thank you for teaching me.
Shadows spread across the warehouse district as the sun sank deeper. The sound of machines and working Pokémon had diminished as the construction workers ended their shifts.
Otto eyed the shadows carefully. He was looking for a very particular shadow, or at least any traces that the shadow had existed. A thick layer of dust covered the ground, loose particles from the cutting of wood and stone, and Otto saw many clearly-defined sets of footprints leading to and from the warehouse doors. He wondered if one of those sets of tracks would give him another clue as to the identity of Char's target.
I can recognize many Pokémon footprints, Otto knew. If the footprint will determine the species of the thief, we will have an advantage in the battle tomorrow. If not, we risk falling to the element of surprise.
Or, if I were fortunate, perhaps the thief is here, and I will catch it right now.
It had to have been what I'd seen. It was here. It resembled the swift blur of the creature which had robbed Kecleon's diamonds.
The thief could be here.
But it was growing late, and the shadows encroached over the ground. The long, all-consuming wall of darkness cast from the plateau was sweeping across the entirety of the district, deepening by the minute, and soon there would be zero visibility. He knew he had to fly fast.
Returning to the workyard where the iron beams were – they were gone now, moved by the Gurdurr into nearby storage – Otto flew to the altitude where he'd gotten distracted, and dug deeply into his mind.
If I were a scared rodent fleeing from a bird of prey… where would I run?
In the shadows, obviously.
He remembered how the movement had caught his eye to his right. There were several rows of back-to-back warehouses, and between them were small, dark alleyways. He swept over the first alleyway, scattering his flight pattern to appear as a wild Pidgey and looking for footprints or any signs of oddity. He imagined a blur of motion, like a cloaked Kecleon, scurrying through the narrow space between the long, tall buildings.
It was only when he came to perch on the edge of a rooftop and stare down into the darkness below, that he realized the blur of motion was not imagined. There was something crawling through the alley, something difficult to see. He squinted, trying to fix his eyes upon it.
The blur of motion made minimal sounds. It moved in a series of short, quick bursts, like a Sentret jumping up to check for danger every few steps. Typical rodent behavior. The figure left no footprints; it seemed to sweep them away naturally, perhaps with a tail. It was very possible that the creature had a tail; from this vantage, Otto could see that the creature had a longer body than he had expected, and was probably a quadruped and not a biped. Lack of footprints also suggested something serpentine, something no-legged.
He hopped down along the rooftops, keeping an eye on the creature as it sprinted from one side of the alleyway to the other, then paused, then sprinted again.
Click. Click click.
There was a tiny scraping sound before the thief jumped to the opposite side, moving farther down the hallway and out of Otto's sight.
It's not checking for danger, Otto realized. It's checking for an opening.
It's checking locks. It's checking for an unlocked door. It wishes to rob the warehouses, or… to sleep within them for the night.
The thief has no mobile scarf…? It cannot phase through walls? How odd… With all the things it has stolen, this surprises me.
He held his breath, thankful that the thief did not seem to notice his presence. He calculated the distances. It was about eighty meters to the end of the alley. With his speed, he had a high likelihood of overtaking the thief.
I can catch it, Otto realized. I have the element of surprise. I have the speed. I can land a blow on this thief and perhaps knock it out.
I'll just need my fire.
Quietly, Otto glided just above the rooftops, keeping his eyes and ears fixed on the darkness. The penumbra shroud was difficult enough to see in the shade, and he lost sight of it after it had left his range of perception. But he knew how to detect the thief again. He perched just across from the back door to one the warehouses on the other side of the alley, held himself perfectly still, and listened.
Click. Click.
It was coming. Two doors away.
Click.
Just one now.
And there it was, the penumbra cloud, right on the doorstep, just meters from Otto's eyes.
Clack.
Otto swooped, relinquishing control to the feral raptor.
But the thief was sharp, and somehow sensed its attacker. "EEEEEEEP!" it yelled in a shrill voice, then fled down the long, dark alley.
Otto carved through the air with his tiny wings, banking hard and aligning himself with the wall. He felt the sheer of his own wind as he edged dangerously close to the iron building. After adjusting, he fixed his sight on the thief. It was fast. It had covered a lot of ground.
But he knew he could catch up. He just had to focus.
He flapped three times for speed and height, then tucked in his wings and angled himself as a missile, posed to cut off the thief's escape route.
"Nooooo!" whined the thief. "No no no no no nooooo.."
The air around him broke into a familiar sizzle, a dancing flame of color. Otto smiled. The power of his fire propelled him. He would catch the target easily. The distances all aligned perfectly. He would make it.
But he could not waver. The thief moved impossibly fast, and the margin of error was too small. The strike would need to be exact. One twitch of the tail, one tiny deviation could throw off his flight path.
He heard memories of voices in his head.
Maybe because you always let the rat get away.
No. I didn't miss. He backed out.
You can't back out. That wasn't the challenge.
Better luck next time.
The red flames burst, turning blue – pure aural energy coated his body, its focal point aimed directly at the thief's future position. His speed boosted. But it was still too close. Was the thief speeding up? Was it running faster? Would it get away?
No. You will not get away.
I WILL NOT LET YOU GET AWAY.
Twenty meters. Ten meters. Otto clenched his wings and his talons close to his body for maximum aerodynamic speed. He angled his beak, and the center of his blue energy, directly at the center of the penumbra cloud.
At the very last moment, at the end of the alleyway, the thief moved unexpectedly. The distances diverged. The calculation was thrown off. The figure slipped away, around the corner, mere talonlengths away.
A footed creature cannot turn a corner as efficiently as I.
This is my chance.
Otto flared his wings just before he hit the ground, banking around the corner and conserving his speed.
And then he saw a terrible fate before him.
…I have failed.
This is how I will die.
At the lengthwise end of the warehouse, there stood, for some unfathomable reason, a solid concrete wall separating it from the next warehouse. The other buildings had spaces in the same configuration, so Otto had assumed there would have been a space here. In the last flash of the moment, he saw the thief scurry to the top of the wall and to freedom. But he but he was too low to the ground. He could not flap for altitude, he could not redirect his momentum in time. The angles and distances were all wrong, and his dive was simply too fast.
And so, Otto let his body go limp and accepted his fate.
When he hit the concrete, he felt several of his bones snap apart. He fell to the ground in a crumpled mess.
In a dreamy state, he vaguely realized that he had survived the impact. The fiery field of his 'brave bird' technique had protected him from a fatality. But there was no use in being alive anymore. Every bone in his body was shattered. He lost feeling in his legs. His wings hung limply from his shoulders. Pain-killing adrenaline flooded him.
His eyes were locked open in shock. He saw the side of the building, and the blood splattered upon the concrete wall. He saw one of his bones laying on the ground just in front of his eyes.
"Oh… oh dear!" cried a voice. "Oh my… goodness' gracious!"
He saw the penumbra-cloaked thief perched on the top of the concrete wall.
"Ooooooh…. Ohh gosh, no, this wasn't supposed to happen… I'm so sorry…" said the high-toned, child-like voice.
He was unable to move, or to react, as the penumbra thief jumped down from the wall and came up to his side. "No, I… I never wanted this…" the thief muttered incessantly. "Oohhh, look at you… I can't leave you like this…" it said. "You're a mess… you won't make it! Oh Lugia, I never wanted someone to be killed on my behalf, no, no… no! This isn't right…"
The figure started shaking and fumbling. "I have… I have something here… I'm sure I do… I have things that can heal you…"
The thief sat down, digging through some kind of personal stash.
"No, no… you need something better than berries. Something… maybe an orb? Oh, where did I put those heal-all orbs? Ohh, where are they… come on, clumsyclaws, come on, come on…"
Otto felt his consciousness fading. He clung to the sound of the thief's voice.
"oh dear, oh dear, oh dear…"
"Did I leave my healers back at the cave? Please, Lugia, tell me I didn't leave them…"
"Hold on…"
"Wait… will this work?"
"Hey!" shouted the voice of Tallie from somewhere up above.
Otto jumped back to attention. He'd lost the struggle to keep his consciousness, but it seemed that death hadn't claimed him. The thief had succeeded in healing him somehow. Now, he stood on his two feet with his head tucked into his plumage. His body felt whole, and the feeling was returned to his legs and his wings.
But he didn't feel very awake or alert. He felt extremely dizzy, and only wanted to fall back into a deep slumber.
Tallie appeared in his vision.
"Well, hello there, handsome," she said to him in a tone of voice he'd never heard from her before. "Sorry to bother you, but have you happened to see a chicklet flapping around these parts? I seem to have lost track of someone, and I think last saw him around here."
Otto opened his mouth to speak, but his mouth wasn't working right.
In fact, none of this body was working right. It wouldn't respond to his commands. Nothing made sense.
A sudden wave of nausea overcame him, and Otto slumped to the ground, passed out.