Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Shuppet is a spherical Pokémon that appears to be covered by a gray cloth. Black rings surround its multicolored eyes, which have light-blue sclerae, dark-blue irises, and yellow pupils. Occasionally, it will display a large, pink tongue. Extending from the top of its head is a long, pointed horn. The horn collects the negative emotions of people, on which this Pokémon feeds. The emotions it feeds on include anger, jealousy, and envy, so some people are grateful for its presence. A nocturnal Pokémon, it will appear in swarms beneath the eaves of houses with negative people. It is most commonly found in cities and other urban settings.

-----

It was snowing, and the boy was cold. 

He shivered, and it was a violent thing that wracked his body from head to toe. His head smacked the almost-warm wall of the house behind him and for a moment he saw stars.

The boy brought his hands up to his mouth, exhaling what warmth he could onto them. If there was any warmth in his breath anymore. He couldn’t feel it if there was. He put his hands back under his armpits and there wasn’t any warmth there either. Were his hands that numb or was his blood that cold?

Another shudder seized him and he closed his eyes while he waited for it to pass. It took him so much energy to open his eyes again when it passed, but when he finally managed it he was glad he had. 

The Shuppets were back. 

There were five of the shy spirits this time, more than he’d ever seen at once before. They were small flickering balls of gray haze the size of his head , barely visible in the porch light of his home. The only clearly visible parts of them were their eyes. Such pretty eyes. Yellow pupils in the middle, then a dark blue iris, then light blue sclera. Five pairs of eyes regarded him from above, hiding under the eaves of the porch.

“H-h-h-hhhh,” the shivers went deep into his chest, making it hard to speak. He forced it out anyway, “Hhhhh-hey there, lllll-ll-little uh-ones. Hh-hhhhow are you?”

One of the Shuppets, bigger than the others and almost the size of his chest, drifted hesitantly closer. It froze at a sudden thud from inside the house, followed by raised voices.

“Hhhhh-he-he-hhhh-he,” the boy chuckled. “Ddd-don’t worry. They’re jjjj-” he tried to wrap his clumsy mouth around the word ‘just’ and found he couldn’t, “p-p-pissed at me. I ffff-fucked up. K-k-k-k-kinda bad.”

The biggest Shuppet, the one he’d known longest, hesitated. It didn’t come closer.

“No! Nnnn-no! D-d-don’t worry, D-d-d-d,” he struggled on the name he’d given it before managing to spit it out, “Diya.” He’d heard it meant ‘oil lamp’, somewhere far away. The name fit, he thought. This Shuppet’s eyes had always glowed more than the others, flickering with some inner light. Just like how he imagined an oil lamp would look.

The boy shuddered again, muscles going so tight it hurt before all going loose at once. He was so tired. Who knew shivering could be so exhausting?

“Shhuu?”

The boy opened his eyes again - when had he closed them? - and looked back up. Diya was floating closer to him now, a hint of a wispy pink tongue showing as it opened its mouth. 

“Shhuu?” it whispered again, quiet and inquiring.

What had he been saying? It was … it was … another thump sounded from inside his home. Oh. Right. Right. “You d-d-d-don’t have t-t-t-ttttto wo-worry,” the shivering was suddenly back and he struggled to speak, “Ddddd-diya. Weeeee-we’re fine out here. I’m just gonna- gonna stay out hhhhhh-here. ‘ntil ttthhhhh-th-th-they’re not so pissed. Mmmm’kay? ‘s’fine.”

Diya drifted closer, until the floating gray spirit was almost touching his head. “Shu?” it asked.

The boy nodded convulsively. “Pl-” his voice cracked and it had nothing to do with cold. “Please.”

The Shuppet closed its eyes and a stubby wisp of gray horn began to appear on its head. If the boy concentrated - and it was so hard to concentrate, why was it so hard to concentrate? - he could see wisps of shadow flowing out of his head into the steadily solidifying horn.

Instantly the boy felt his body relax. He was still shivering, but a mountain of tension flowed out of him. The weight of the screaming and yelling, the fear for what was waiting for him, the resentment that it was always like this -that it always had to be like this- left him. Sucked up into that lovely little pokemon’s horn.

“Shhhuuuuuuuup,” it murmured. It sounded almost like a slurping noise, and the boy couldn’t help but laugh.

And wasn’t that a wonder. A real genuine laugh. “Ha, ha-ha, hhh-hahahaha.” The shivering boy smiled up at Diya. This was why he loved the Shuppets. For a little while they could make the world feel less awful. They couldn’t really make him be happy, his teachers said they only fed on bad emotions rather than giving good feelings. But sometimes the world seeming a little less awful was all he needed to be happy.

One of his teachers had taken him aside once, asked him about the Shuppets that always hung around under the eaves of his family’s porch after the sun went down. Asked him if they were a problem. Hah. He’d never said no so fast to anything in his life. The shy little spirits were the best thing in his life.

“Pe”, Diya sighed as it finished its meal. Its horn was so full it almost looked solid, shiny and reflective rather than wispy and transparent. 

“Tthhhh-th-thanks, D-diya,” the boy murmured. “I …” he blinked slowly, shook his head, “I needed that.” His body gave one more convulsive teeth-chattering shudder before relaxing again, too tired to keep up the effort. This time when he stopped shivering, it didn’t start back up again.

Diya’s eyes twisted. The little spirit almost looked worried. “Shuppet?” it murmured.

“Mmm. Just … j’s tired. Had a long … long day.” A few long days. He hadn’t slept at all the night before. Not much the night before that either. Hard to, with all the screaming. Hard to even after the screaming stopped.

Maybe he’d get to sleep tonight though. He was so tired.

The Shuppet darted about his head, like it was worried about something. “Sshhhuuu!” it cried. “Sshuu!”

“Mmmm? Wh’ ‘s it?”

It darted in closer than it ever had before, licking his forehead with an insubstantial pink tongue. It felt like being licked by mist. 

The boy opened his eyes in surprise, delight bubbling up from somewhere deep under the tiredness. Tears formed in the corners of his eyes. “Oh,” he whispered quietly. 

“Shhhuuuu!” it cried again. From behind it he heard similar murmured cries from the other four smaller Shuppets, still tucked away in their hiding spots under the porch’s eaves. Diya darted in to lick him again, catching his ear, his chin, his lips, his nose, even brushing its insubstantial tongue over his eyes. 

“Hehehehehe,” the boy giggled. “Ssst-,” he yawned, “ssstop it.” It tickled when Diya’s unreal mist caught him on his lips or his eyes. He looked up, his eyes just barely managing to focus on the Shuppet’s. They were so pretty. Wide yellow pupils, a barely-there dark blue iris, and a light blue sclera. 

“Shu! Shu, shu, shu, shu, shu!!!”

“Hey? Diya? Did I ever tell you? ‘m gonna be a pokemon trainer one day.”

“Shuuuu!” The frantic spirit rushed at his head, tickling him as its wispy body parted around his face. Even the seemingly solid horn parted around him like so much mist.

“‘m gonna leave here. G’nna … g’nna walk on out. Get as far away as I can.” The boy’s eyes watered. “Not g’nna miss anything here. ‘cept you. I-” the boy sniffled, eyes drifting shut, “I’d really miss you.”

“Sshhuuu,” the Shuppet whispered. It tried to move the boy again by flying at his head, but the effort was half-hearted.

The boy’s eyes weren’t opening anymore, but he tried to lift his head to look at Diya anyway. “Hey. Would you … would you …” his mind drifted. What was he saying again?

Diya licked his cheek softly. “Shuppet?” it murmured.

The boy stirred. Oh. Right. He’d been about to ask a question. A really important one. “Would- would you come with me? When I leave here?” He didn’t know if he’d be able to do it alone. The boy sniffled. “Pl-please?”

“Shu.” Diya licked the boy, right on the bridge up his nose and up to his forehead. 

“Oh. Good. Tha- tha’s good.” Tears rolled down his cheeks. But good tears. With Diya around they couldn’t possibly be any other kind.

The boy was quiet for a while after that, as Diya licked his cheeks and pressed its wispy body up against his head. His chest rose a little less with each breath. The tear trails on his face and neck slowly iced over. If there was any noise still coming from inside the house, he couldn’t hear it. And if there was any worry inside of him, Diya and its horn made sure it never touched his heart.

One last time, the boy spoke. It was barely a whisper. “Diya? Are you there?”

“Shu.”

“Good. That’s … good.”

The boy smiled.

Chapter Text

Resentment at being cast off made Banette spring into being.

This Pokémon developed from an abandoned doll that amassed a grudge. It is seen in dark alleys.

-----

Diya waited, but the boy was still.

“Sh-shu?” The boy didn’t move. Of course he didn’t. Diya could feel the empty space he’d once inhabited. A cooling hollow where a living spirit had been. 

The Shuppet flickered, the gray haze of its body fluttering this way and that as if in a strong breeze. 

“Shu?” The boy still didn’t move. It- it wasn’t right. He had so much hope. Diya could feel it in him, a quiet glow that didn’t nourish it the way his griefs did, but warmed the spirit anyway. And it was still there! Still inside of him! 

But fading. Every second that ember cooled and the hope’s glow faded a bit more.

It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t right. It wasn’t just . 

Diya’s eyes flashed, the Shuppet’s multicolored eyes blazing pink for a moment as it stared into the empty hollow of the boy’s departed spirit. Behind the spirit its fellow Shuppets murmured. None approached but even so Diya could feel their confusion. They didn’t understand. Didn’t get it. They fed off the ambient grievances of the broken home, hadn’t spent months personally taking in this child’s suffering, learning his aches and pains and seeing his hope. They didn’t get it like Diya did.

This was wrong. Diya seethed, its gray haze twisting in on itself. Silence came from the house. No voices raised or fists slamming into walls. But the spirit could feel the boiling resentments inside, eager to seize on any excuse to end a fragile ceasefire. An ugly cocktail of vicious anticipation to resume the violence, anxious worry about the same, and resigned frustration at it all. But nowhere in that mixture was worry for their child. For the boy who’d shut himself out in the cold.

“Ssssshhhhhhh,” angry noise came out of the Shuppet’s mouth. None of this was right. Each moment the leftover hope in the boy cooled that much more and no one cared . It was like the boy was just … trash. Something discarded. Something worthless.

Diya’s eyes flashed pink again, casting harsh shadows over the porch and the empty boy who lay on it.

No. No! That was wrong. It was wrong. The boy hadn’t been worthless. He hadn’t! He mattered to someone.

He’d mattered to Diya.

And the spirit was not about to let those last embers of hope in his chest die.

The Shuppet lowered its horn to the boy’s chest, just over his heart. “Sshhuuuuuuu,” it whistled, pouring the energy it had taken from the boy’s grief into him. 

The heart twitched, but nothing more.

“Ssshhhuuuuuuuuuuuuuupppppppppp,” the noise came out like a teapot whistling and the fabric of its spirit burned with the effort. But the heart did not warm. Did not beat again.

It wasn’t enough.

It had to be enough.

The spirit redoubled its efforts, screaming as it took pain and rage and injustice from its horn and tried to weave them into one more heartbeat. “ppppppppbbbbbbbbbbaaaaaAAAAAAAAA!”

There wasn’t enough. Even with its horn filled by its recent meal, it didn’t have enough. There was only so much excess power it had to spare in its horn. So it didn’t spare anything. It wove itself into the boy. The gray haze of the spirit’s very self came apart, stuffed into a heart that. would. beat.

“Bbbbbbaaaaaaaaaaaa!” It screamed as it tore itself apart for fuel. For the chance to make this right. To show that the boy wasn’t worthless. That he mattered. That even someone abandoned, unloved, unwanted by the people closest to him still mattered to someone. Mattered to it. 

Diya’s eyes blazed pink, brighter than the porch light. And it screamed.

“BBBBBAAAAANETTE!”

There was a flash of pink light. 

And a heartbeat. One. And then another. And another.

A cold brain stirred back to life, jittering currents spreading through still neurons as a wispy spirit jolted them to life. 

Nostrils flared and breath filled empty lungs, fueling cold blood forced to flow by a heartbeat that would not stop.

And two eyes opened. Black pupils, brown irises, and faintly glowing pink sclera. It took them time to focus. Cold neurons which had once been a boy, which still carried his hope, were slow to resume their old functions.

It wasn’t right to call this child the boy anymore. That wasn’t what the body housed. That wasn’t what slowly pulled itself upright, which turned stuttering neurons and too-cold muscles into movement. But the boy was what fueled the thing at the heart of it. Hope. The need for something better and the strength to reach for it even when it hurt to keep hoping.

The Banette wobbled on unsteady feet which were still too cold to flex the way they ought to. It turned towards the door of the quiet house, which still brimmed with resentment and barely buried conflict. And a part of it was angry. So, so angry. It would smash down the door and tear apart the hateful people it found within.

But.

It had fed on the boy’s griefs for many months. It had eaten his fear, his resentment, his despair. It had never found within him hatred. The boy hadn’t wanted to destroy his parents. To lay waste to them and make them suffer for what they’d done to him.

He’d just wanted to be free.

And every moment the Banette lingered here delayed that. So it turned, facing out into the gently falling snow which had killed the boy not so long ago. But it would take more than that to kill it now. A Banette did not need warmth to keep its body moving, or to keep a heart beating.

Diya gave one last look to Shuppets hovering above its head. It reached a hand up to them and they nuzzled it. The Banette huffed a delighted laugh through its nose. That tickled. With a gentle cupped hand it brought each Shuppet down from the eaves in turn, holding its forehead to them for a moment. They had been together ever since the miasma around this house had birthed them, and Diya would be sorry to leave them.

But it could not stay here. It would leave, and that was a good thing. So it was with a smile playing over its lips that the Banette let the last Shuppet go. It took the hand which had been holding them and folded it over its beating heart. It wished them all the best.

For it though, the best was out there beyond the falling snow.

Because the boy had wanted to be a pokemon trainer. And Diya was going to make that happen.

Chapter Text

A cursed energy permeated the stuffing of a discarded and forgotten plush doll, giving it new life as Banette. The Pokémon's energy would escape if it were to ever open its mouth.

-----

Diya shuffled through the snowy streets, staring with soft wonder at all that it passed. 

That … that was a streetlamp. It had known that before as a Shuppet, through the lens of the grievances it pulled from people’s minds. It knew - A too-dark street and a crack in the pavement she always stumbled over. “When are they going to fix that damn light?” - A glare in the corner of their eye, shining through their bedroom window. Turning over in bed and grumbling, “I need to put up a piece of paper or something, to block that.” - A weary maintenance worker, working overtime to replace cheap bulbs he’d darn well told the city council would need constant replacing.

But this …

Diya hadn’t known street lamps were beautiful. It had never known how gorgeous a lamp’s halo could be, standing out against the falling snow. How calming it could be to watch the snow slowly drift into its light. And how useful! Walking was already a little difficult with cold feet and the rising snow, but Diya could imagine -knew, from the boy’s experiences- how much worse it could be in the dark. 

But here people had come together, pooled money and resources and fuel and time to light their streets together! They’d harnessed electricity, so the boy’s teachers had taught him, to make light! They learned and they shared and they taught so they could make the world better together! Wasn’t that wonderful?

Lukewarm neurons flickered with a memory, jogged by the joy washing through the body Diya inhabited. It was a thing the boy had done in school a few times, something he had always loved. It was- 

Dancing. Yes! The boy had always loved to dance.

Illuminated by the streetlamps Diya took one hesitant step, and then another, and another. A step, and a turn, and a twirl, and- woop! 

Snow compacted and slid beneath Diya’s sneaker and its footing vanished out from under it. The Banette hit the snowy asphalt with a whump , banging a leg and an elbow and skinning the side of its hand. It snorted a shocked breath out its nose, and then, once it found its bearings, smiled. Dancing was fun!

Diya pulled itself to its feet -a little warier of slipping now- and tried again. A step and a step and a turn and a -careful!- twirl and a step and a step and a -careful!- slide. Diya danced its way down the street in the gentle silence of a snowy night, bursting with all the joy the boy felt when he danced.

Happiness bubbled up through its chest, rising and rising until it overflowed and came out the Banette’s mouth as a giddy, “Hah!”

And with that “Hah!” came a puff of dark gray spirit-stuff escaping from the boy’s body. A wave of dizziness washed through the Banette and it fell again, bashing its knees on the street.

“Mmp!” Diya exclaimed, rolling onto its side and clasping both hands over its mouth. Oh no! It had almost forgotten to keep its mouth shut! Giddy joy had run roughshod over its instincts and Diya had almost come pouring out of the boy’s body! Quick! It needed to find a zipper, something to sew its mouth shut so-

It hit Diya rather suddenly -riding a wave of shock and disgust from the boy’s brain- that human mouths could not be sewed shut with a zipper. Or at least, it would probably end very badly and humans Diya met would have very strong opinions about it.

Diya swallowed nervously. It, uhh, it guessed it was just going to have to keep its mouth shut very tightly. Diya got back up and, lips pressed together as tight as it could, started hesitantly dancing again.

…

This wasn’t going to work. Nervousness filled the body and the joy of dancing was out of its reach. It needed something to cover its mouth. Maybe …

Maybe a scarf? Fabric would be too porous to really work, but Diya could wind it very tight around its mouth a few times and that would at least be enough to stop any accidental slip-ups from being quite so scarily debilitating. 

Humans would also probably be less freaked out by a child wearing a scarf in winter than they’d be seeing a child with a zipper sewn into its mouth. That was important.

Diya nodded to itself. Yes! This was a good plan. Now it just had to find a scarf ... 

It looked down at itself. For that matter, better winter clothes in general would be good too. Diya didn’t need to be warm to keep the body moving, but stiff muscles and tight tendons made for poor walking. Certainly for poor dancing. And the boy was only dressed in a long sleeve pullover shirt, cargo pants, and sneakers with damp socks. Definitely not winter wear.

A wave of melancholy washed over Diya. No. No it hadn’t been winter wear at all.

The Banette swallowed and pushed back the promise of tears. It steadied itself by taking a deep breath in through its nose and kept walking. It was doing the best it could for the boy. It was going to fulfill the boy’s dream for him. It was going to go out into the world and travel, and become a pokemon trainer. and. be. happy.

But first it really did need winter clothes. A Banette might live through its body actually freezing solid, but the process of waiting for the next thaw would not be pleasant.

Diya thought for a bit. Where could it get clothes, without going back to the boy’s house? Oh! Of course, it knew where to get clothes. It picked up the pace and turned at the next intersection. The communal laundromat! Someone always forgot their clothes in there overnight. The boy had picked up -stolen, was it stealing if you needed it?- some clothes there before, when his old clothes were getting ratty and asking his parents for new ones was a bad idea.

As Diya walked it pushed itself to marvel at the road and the sidewalk -more collaborative projects! how easy to walk on!- and mused on whether taking clothes would be stealing. The boy had thought so when he’d done it. But he had also thought stealing was bad … and that what he was doing wasn’t bad. Which didn’t fit. If stealing was bad and what he had done wasn’t bad, it couldn’t be stealing, right?

Unless maybe there was good stealing and bad stealing? Or maybe the boy had been wrong? But if so, which part was he wrong about? Diya tried to think about the boy’s lessons in school, if any of them had mentioned this. And … yes, one of his teachers had said something about this once. A question about if it was wrong to steal to feed one’s family, or wrong to not steal and let them starve.

Diya huffed through its nose. But the answer it remembered was no help at all! The teacher had said the answer their society found was to make the question not an issue, that just like people worked together to make streetlamps and streets they’d worked together to make sure everyone had enough to eat. Something about how the whole point of being neighbors was making sure no one had to ask that question in the first place.

But clearly it was still a problem, because the boy had needed to steal clothes before! 

Despite its frustration though, Diya couldn’t help but grin. It grinned so wide it struggled to keep the corners of its mouth from leaking spirit-stuff. Because it didn’t know the answer to this, if taking clothes it needed from the laundromat was stealing and if it was bad.

It didn’t know.

It didn’t know!

As much as was in the boy’s brain, knowledge of electricity and civics and pokemon and grocery store prices and dancing, there were things he hadn’t known . Things Diya could learn. Things it could be taught by other people, things it could find out for itself! And oh, how wonderful was that!

Diya slowed its pace just enough to twirl and dance a few steps across the growing snow, for the sheer joy of it.

All that wonder of knowing something new it was experiencing tonight? The beauty of seeing something with new eyes? It could experience that forever! Every single day that it chose to seek out something new! 

More laughs threatened to bubble out and Diya had to clasp its hands over its mouth to smother them into breathless giggles. Oops. It really needed that scarf soon.

Oh! There was the laundromat! Diya rushed the last block, only slipping and falling once -that wasn’t so bad!- in its haste. It hoped someone actually had forgotten their laundry overnight. It didn’t know what it was going to do otherwise. Diya hurried up to the laundromat’s sliding glass doors and waited for them to open. They didn’t. 

Oh right, closed for the night. How did the boy get inside again? Diya only had to think for a moment before the answer came to it. The Banette placed its hands on the glass and pushed up, trying to jimmy the door open. There was a little locking nub on the ground and if it could just get the door off that it would-

A reflection in the glass caught Diya’s attention. It blinked, and two dimly glowing pink eyes blinked back. 

Oh. Diya let go of the door and took a half-step back. Reflected in the glass was the boy’s face. Its face. It tilted its head one way, and then the other. It had never seen the boy’s face with human eyes before. It … well it supposed it also remembered the boy seeing himself in mirrors. But it wasn’t quite the same.

It had brown skin that was probably darker than it looked in the pink-lit reflection. Thick eyebrows. Diya raised them, let them fall, wiggled them, furrowed them. Thick expressive eyebrows. It wasn’t sure if it liked the idea of that, of the whole world being able to see its thoughts on its face so easily. 

The Banette touched its face, feeling out the rest of its features as it looked at them. A wide flat nose. A soft jaw and a round face. Short wiry black hair, coarse enough to shed water like a Ducklett’s feathers. And wide lips, which Diya tightened reflexively while examining them. 

It was … a face. One Diya wasn’t quite sure what to do with.

It hoped it was a face other people could like. 

The Banette covered its mouth with a hand, like it was hoping to do with a scarf, and tried a smile. Its cheeks swelled up above its hand and the corners of its eyes crinkled warmly. Ahhh. That was a good smile. One the boy hadn’t seen often in the mirror. 

Diya looked forward to sharing it.

Crash!

A sudden noise from down the street startled Diya. It whirled around, one hand over its pounding heart and the other thrust out in front of it, holding an orb of pulsing black and purple energy. 

Long seconds passed, but the noise didn’t repeat. There was only the muffled silence of a snowy street. 

Maybe somebody had dropped something in the kitchen late at night. Or maybe a Zigzagoon had knocked over a trash can. But either way, Diya no longer felt like standing around in front of the closed laundromat peering at its reflection.

Diya extinguished the shadow ball in its hand and turned back to the sliding glass doors. It took a deep breath through its nose -and oh what a feeling to fill its lungs with cold night air- and squared its shoulders. No more messing with locked doors, it was going to do this the ghost way.

The Banette took another deep breath, walked straight towards the glass door, and stepped up . 

Solidity vanished and the world’s shadows caught fire. What had a moment ago been solid walls were replaced by dark gauzy veils. Tattered shadows hung over the ground and flew up like clouds of dust wherever Diya stepped. Hints of purple fire limned the spaces the streetlamps didn’t quite light in the real world, and towering violet blazes crowned each streetlamp where the shadow it cast up into the sky was deepest.

The only real thing in an insubstantial world, Diya stepped through the insubstantial gauze of the glass doors as if they weren’t even there. Only once it was on the other side did it let go of the phantom world.

Fwoomp. Displaced air rushed out of its way as Diya stepped back down into the real world. It blinked rapidly. That had been … different, from when it had been a Shuppet. When it had stepped into the phantom world as a Shuppet it had become part of that world. Its substance had been the same gauzy black veils and purple fires as everything else. This time it had been in the phantom world as a real physical body. 

Was that because it was a Banette now? Was this something all Banettes experienced once they had a physical body to inhabit? Or was it something strange and new that had come about when Diya possessed a human rather than a doll? 

It didn’t know.

It didn’t- Diya giggled its train of thought apart before the mental refrain could be completed. One melodramatic outburst about the wonders of ignorance and novelty was quite enough. Though as melodramatic as it might be to repeatedly dance about in excitement over not knowing things, it really was a fascinating experience. The Shuppet had lived its life as largely a bundle of instincts and automatic reactions to stimuli. It had learned the boy was safe to approach and that he often came outside in the evenings, but little else. And the boy had lived most of his life just trying to trudge through to the next day, focusing on learning things only when he was sat down in front of a teacher and taught. 

But now there was a whole new life for Diya to explore. The boy and Shuppet both had grown up in Ledos Village, and the boy had never left for anything more than school trips to museums and pokemon preservation parks. What was over the horizon? Who might Diya meet in the next town over? How would its powers grow? What was being a pokemon trainer actually like? It didn’t know. So it was going to have to find out for itself.

And that journey of discovery was going to start right here, with a very important question: What, if anything, had people forgotten in the laundromat tonight? 

The answer? Quite a bit actually. Three different people had left laundry behind, and Diya came up with quite a haul. 

First and most importantly, someone had left a scarf behind. A wonderful scarf with a light blue and pale red plaid pattern that Diya only saw for a second before it was wrapped around its mouth as tightly as possible. The scarf was long enough to go around its face five times, and once it was done Diya could hardly even move its jaw. It was perfect.

Then over that went another white scarf decorated with Piplups, because Diya also needed something to keep its nose and neck warm. There wasn’t a good proper coat in the laundry, so Diya made do and took two flannel shirts and a light blue fleece sweater that were probably sized for a shorter adult. It was only moderately drowning in loose fabric, but with enough layers that might just be a good thing and trap some still air for insulation. The result was surprisingly toasty, and Diya found itself quickly sweltering in the leftover heat from the laundromat’s activities during the day.

Next Diya pulled on some long underwear and replaced its damp socks with three pairs of longer, warmer, and drier socks. It still only had sneakers for footwear, but hopefully the layered sock would help with that. And outermost socks had little Piplup designs to match the Piplup scarf, which Diya thought was great. It also found a pair of waterproof dark gray suspender pants and a lovely set of grey knit gloves that were actually in its size.

And lastly, it found a white toque with a big ball of weighty white fluff on the top. This was very  important because the fluffy white ball flopped around and tugged at Diya’s head with its weight whenever it moved, in a way that was very noticeable and very fun.

By the end of Diya’s plundering, the Banette was significantly less mobile, much warmer, and much more fashionable. It felt bad about taking so many nice clothes from people though. If it loved the clothes it had found, their owners probably loved them just as much or more. Maybe it should leave an apology note? 

There was a whiteboard on one wall that the city’s maintenance crew used to leave messages for the people who used the laundromat. A request for people to not use a particular type of detergent, a day the laundromat would be closed for plumbing maintenance. Diya hunted for the marker to write its own message and eventually found it rolled under a washing machine.

Dear People Who Left Your Clothes Here Overnight,

Sorry for-

Diya paused. Okay now it was important. Was it stealing their clothes if it needed their clothes to not freeze solid tonight more than they needed the clothes tomorrow morning? It thought for a bit, before the sweltering heat of too many layers in the laundromat started to make it sweat. Maybe it should just change its word choice.

Sorry for taking some of your clothes. I was very cold and needed them.

Then it added a few hearts and a sad sorry-looking face because it didn’t know what else to write. It still wasn’t sure if stealing clothes it needed was actually bad, but it did know it felt bad about it.

It gave the clothes one last look over to make sure it wasn’t forgetting anything it needed -it took some extra pairs of socks in case its current ones got wet- and left. Another quick step through the hazy phantom world of burning shadows and Diya reappeared outside the laundromat with a fwoomp of displaced air.

Now properly attired and at less risk of freezing solid, Diya could begin its journey as a pokemon trainer. Or at least, it could begin its journey to the next town over, and there it could begin its journey as a pokemon trainer.

Unaccompanied teens starting pokemon journeys may be a common and rarely questioned sight, but Ledos Village was a small place with only a few thousand people. If Diya walked into the local pokemon center tomorrow morning and asked for a starter pokedex and a few pokeballs, questions would be asked. Questions like “Your parents / teachers didn’t tell me you were leaving on a pokemon journey,” that weren’t actually questions and were really a swift end to any dreams of freedom.

A day’s walk east in Canopy Town though, and Diya would be just another pokemon journeyer visiting Kenomao Island for its varied wildlife, well-maintained pokemon preserves, and helpful gyms. A whole wide new world Diya could disappear into as a pokemon trainer.

Smiling widely enough that the lift of its cheeks and the crinkling of its eyes could be seen even over its scarves, Diya set off to the east. It was going to be a long walk to Canopy Town, so it might as well get started now.

Chapter Text

Note: The lines through the ocean outline ferry paths, where there are regular boats that transport people back and forth.

Chapter Text

Blipbug is an insectoid Pokémon. It has five body segments and is covered in sensitive setae that it uses to collect information about its environment. The dorsal half of its ovular head is a dark blue, and the ventral half is beige. Blipbug's large, reflective eyes resemble glasses. It has a small mouth and eyebrow-like markings that give it a perpetually surprised expression.

A constant collector of information, Blipbug are very smart, but very weak. They are often found in gardens.

-----

The walk to Canopy Town was not an easy one in the winter, because there wasn’t an actual road connecting the two towns. Goods that Ledos Village needed and produced were sent along the same e-storage cables that pokemon got transferred along, and traffic wasn’t exactly bustling to and from the small village of a couple thousand. So there simply wasn’t a need for a paved and plowed road.

There was a dirt path connecting the two towns where trees had been uprooted to bury the e-storage cable between the two towns and most of the time that was fine. People sometimes used it to bike from one town to the other over the weekend to visit family or see the sights in Canopy Town, and that was good enough. Sure that wasn’t possible during the rare heavy snows and that wasn’t ideal, but that was life living in a small village. Sometimes the seasons dictated travel and that was that.

So if Diya was going to walk to Canopy Town tonight, it would be a long hard walk along a snowy dirt path through the dark forest. With the moon obscured by the clouds at that.

It wasn’t actually so bad though. The snow wasn’t more than a couple centimeters deep yet, especially over the ground the buried e-storage cable kept warm. And visibility wasn’t much of a problem either because Diya had found, to its delight, that its eyes glowed in the dark!  

Soft pink light shone out from its eyes like faint spectral spotlights, and after its eyes had adjusted to the darkness the pink light was more than enough to see by. And sometimes a faint purple haze would flicker in the shadows that light cast, illuminating the darkness further. That was great for avoiding roots which might otherwise trip it, because the shadowed arch of the root would glow purple.

And now that Diya was warm and cozy under its layers of clothes and it could feel the comfortable stretch and exertion of the boy’s muscles...

Diya tilted its head back and breathed in deep. Chilly night air flowed into its lungs and felt good , carrying the heat of walking with it when Diya breathed back out. It felt so invigorating, to have a body and be using it. To be outside where the silence could seep in until the only sounds were its breath and its heartbeat and the soft whisper of fresh snow under its shoes.

Diya breathed in again, savoring the clean crisp smell of the snowy air. It looked behind itself and at the limits of its eyes light could see its footsteps vanishing behind it, filled in by the fresh falling snow It smiled softly under its scarves. The boy would have liked this, it thought, to begin his journey on such a night. With no tracks behind him and no goal before him but the wide open world.

The boy wasn’t truly still alive, to feel the same appreciation and wonder Diya did. His heart beat and his neurons fired, but the brain had been without oxygen too long to go back to being him. Something was missing and without Diya’s spirit to compel it into motion the machinery of the mind wouldn’t be running. If Diya were to use flowery language, it would say his soul had left and wasn’t coming back.

But even so. There was enough, Diya thought, to make all this worthwhile. There was enough of the boy’s brain left to carry his preferences, his experiences, his hope. So long as Diya was using his brain to move his body and interpret the world around itself, Diya saw the world through his eyes. It loved dancing because he loved dancing. The thought of becoming a pokemon trainer thrilled it, this journey into the unknown was exciting, because Diya saw the world’s promise and freedom through his eyes.

It was also more than just that though. Diya’s perspective was wider than the boy’s alone would have been. The boy had always imagined taking his pokemon journey alone, challenging gyms alone, standing atop the summit of victory alone. He had imagined something like friends, peers who congratulated him on his badges, peers he competed with and against. But his fantasies had never included companionship , a peer or a mentor so loved he’d turn aside from his own journey to be with them.

The future Diya imagined did. When a Banette evolved it always left behind the Shuppet siblings it had grown up with. That was the way of things. Shuppets needed to stay around the people whose negative emotions overflowed and fed them, and Banettes were fueled by the driving urge to give their discarded bodies meaning. A Banette’s beginning always involved goodbyes.

But it had loved. It had shrieked with delight playing catch the will-o-wisp and snag the shadow with its siblings. It had hovered close and hummed soothing melodies when one of them ate a feeling too vile or tragic for even a Shuppet to digest it easily. And it wanted that again. It would strive for that again, if it could.

That was what Diya hoped for, as it walked through the deepening snow, eyes fixed forward on the trail ahead. It wanted not just to have a journey and live a life that would fulfill the boy’s dreams that lived on inside its head, but to live out something better . Something filled with more joy and love than the boy had ever even imagined.

The Banette smiled until its cheeks hurt and skipped a few steps, bobbing in a pseudo-dance as best it could in the snow that was now deeper than its ankles. 

Yes. That was a dream worth living for. 

---

The snowfall started to break up during the witching hour, a couple hours past midnight if Diya was correctly reading the stars that peaked through the fragmenting clouds overhead. Numbness was starting to sink into its legs from the repetition of dragging its legs up above the snow that was now shin deep and it pulled in the oxygen from each breath as deep as it could before letting it out.

The boy had been fit, school on the outskirts of Kenomao Island involved enough time learning survival skills to see to that. But a late night hike through the snow would wear on anyone and only Diya’s light blue and pale red plaid scarf tying its jaw shut kept it from yawning its soul right out of its body.

It blinked blearily as it walked. It had never truly slept as a Shuppet, only ever drowsing through the height of noon at most. It wasn’t sure if it could sleep now, but it looked forward to finding out if it could on a nice soft bed once it got to Canopy Town. Some of the boy’s fondest memories involved curling up under a luxuriously fuzzy blanket a distant relative had gifted him. It didn’t have any money on it though so it would probably have to use the phantom world to slip into an unoccupied hotel room, which … may or may not be stealing. 

Well, once Diya got some pokeballs and caught a few pokemon, it could sell some of them and then it’d have the money to actually pay for a bed at night. Or maybe it would buy some camping gear and spend its nights under the trees. Slipping into a hotel room without paying would only be a temporary measure. 

Diya’s thoughts were so occupied with fantasies of decadently piled pillows and thick duvets that it almost missed it when it passed someone else in the forest.

Diya paused midstep -wincing when that made the ache in its legs suddenly more noticeable- and turned around. There, off in the distance to the right of the path, was a light in the forest. Diya squinted. That was definitely a person walking off the beaten path, carrying an electric lantern. If Diya focused it even thought it could hear them muttering something to themself.

The Banette felt a sudden pang in its chest as it remembered playing catch the will-o-wisp with its siblings. Playing hide and seek with intangible ghosts in a city at night was all but impossible, so they’d made it more fair for the seekers by having the hider -the wisp- light themself up with faerie fire. And seeing the light of this person’s lantern peeking through the trees in the distance … Diya found itself taking a step off the path towards the light, heart heavy in its chest.

Well, Diya thought as it started walking towards the light, it might as well see who was out there. Diya was kind of curious after all. Why in the world would someone else be all the way out here, halfway between a small town and an even smaller village, in a snowy forest at the middle of night?

As Diya got closer, it caught better glimpses of the person through the trees. They were either a short teen or a very short adult. Diya looked closer and thought it caught a glimpse of red and white in the hand not holding the lantern. A pokeball, in all likelihood.

They were probably a teen then. Kenomao Island was known for being a good place for youths starting pokemon journeys. The island’s economy revolved around it. So a short pokeball wielding person out doing something possibly foolish in the middle of the night was probably a teen. A teen out doing the same thing Diya was, starting their pokemon journey!

Diya picked up its pace as best it could. Moving through the forest was a bit more difficult than on the trail. Near the base of the trees the snow was shallower than on the path but everywhere else it was deeper, and even with the pink illumination of Diya’s glowing eyes roots and rocks could hide under the snow. Diya had to step carefully and mind its footing as it moved closer.

Oh a fellow pokemon trainer, out it in the woods! Diya couldn’t wait to meet them!

The trainer stood out from the rest of the forest in their circle of light, and Diya got a few good looks at them through the trees as it approached. They were maybe a meter and a half tall, and swaddled in what looked like a very cozy overlarge green down jacket. The rest of their outfit, mittens, snow pants, toque, and scarf, were all a lovely light green. And they were definitely a trainer because there was a bug pokemon draped over their back and peeking over their shoulder.

It was a … Diya struggled through hazy memories of lessons the boy had been distracted during … a Blipbug! The huge eyed bug was similarly cozy looking, wrapped in a gray and yellow scarf the same coloration as it. As its trainer walked it peered around, over, and behind their head, moving its own head around slowly to look every which way into the dark forest.

Diya was some thirty meters away when the Blipbug looked straight at the Banette and tapped its trainer on the shoulder with a stubby leg. The trainer stopped walking through the forest and turned to face the same direction as their pokemon. Diya waved enthusiastically but the trainer just held up their lantern and peered in their general direction. “Hello?” the trainer called out in a high wavering voice.

Ah, the trainer probably couldn’t see Diya. The circle of light the lantern cast didn’t go that far and it had probably ruined their night vision for anything beyond that. Diya pushed on, trying to get in range of the lantern so it could wave hello. 

The Blipbug tapped its trainer’s shoulder again, who stiffened. “H-hello?” the trainer called out again. They peered out into the darkness but still couldn’t seem to see Diya. 

Diya waved again as it approached, but without being able to open its mouth, there wasn’t much it could do to properly announce itself.

Then the trainer, apparently frustrated with the lantern drowning out their vision, shut it off. And promptly fell backward on their butt, into the snow, shrieking at a startlingly high pitch. The poor Blipbug barely avoided getting squished, swinging its body around its trainer to wrap around their torso. And, making matters worse, the trainer dropped their lantern in the fall. They tried patting around in the snow for it, but even with Diya’s pale pink light illuminating them they couldn’t seem to find it. Their night vision had been too ruined by the lantern.

Diya blinked in startled worry for a few moments before sighing with relief through its nose. Thankfully the other trainer didn’t seem seriously hurt. Though maybe Diya could make a good first impression by helping them up and getting their lantern for them. It certainly knew it wouldn’t want to be alone in the forest at night with no way to see.

It was getting close enough the trainer would have easily been able to see them with the lantern lit, just seven or eight meters out, when the trainer called out another pokemon. They pointed the pokeball they’d been holding in their offhand into the darkness and shouted, “Wurmple! Go, defend!” A flash of red light shot out of the pokeball, materializing into a squishy red caterpillar a meter long. It had a short yellow spike on its head, two longer yellow spikes on its tail, and a series of stubby red spikes running down its sides.

Oh dear, the trainer must be more rattled by the fall than Diya had thought, if they-

The trainer’s high wavering voice shouted, “Wurmple, tackle!”

Diya’s head whipped around in shock. Was there a threat it had missed out there in the for-

The Wurmple reared up, revealing an off-white underbelly. Then in one fluid motion it squished itself down like a spring and exploded forward. 

Oh. Shoot.

The Wurmple’s head slammed into Diya’s stomach like a wrecking ball. Only Diya’s inner scarf kept its mouth shut tight enough to prevent it from losing its soul as all air was smashed out of the Banette’s lungs. Even so pain thudded through Diya’s stomach and it was flung like a ragdoll backwards into the snow. Diya struggled for breath, torn between conflicting needs to cough and desperately draw in air. 

The Wurmple wriggled backwards through the snow from its impact point, pulling back towards the trainer it was defending without ever taking its eyes off Diya.

Diya took advantage of the reprieve, or tried to, by rolling over onto its hands and knees and greedily sucking in air through its nose. Stars and shadows, that hurt . Its whole abdomen was burning from the impact. It tried to push itself to its feet but a cough wracked its frame and sent it collapsing back into the snow on its side.

The Wurmple peered out into the darkness, focused on Diya’s glowing pink eyes with its shiny compound yellow ones. The venomous yellow injection horn on its forehead gleamed in the pale light.

Diya’s eyes flew wide in a sudden panic. Had it-? Diya patted its stomach where the Wurmple had tackled it. There was a hole in the fleece sweater and at least one of the flannel shirts beneath, but no sticky wetness of blood. The layers had stopped the short spike on its forehead from penetrating.

“Wurmple!” the trainer yelled, “Use poison sting!” At its trainer’s command the caterpillar pokemon hunched forward, the front of its body wriggling down into the snow as its back curved up into the air, prominently displaying two wickedly long yellow spikes. 

The Banette blanched, skin turning an ashy gray brown in the reflected light of its eyes. Its layers would not stop those from sinking into its flesh. Diya did not want to find out if the venom in those spikes was something its altered physiology could handle, or for that matter if being able to restart a stopped heart would allow it to survive exsanguination. If it was hit with those, it might die right here, before its journey as a trainer can even begin.

The Wurmple squirmed forward through the snow, spikes held high, and Diya’s moment of recovery was over. It had to fight.

Diya rolled back up onto its hands and knees, ignoring the burning pain in its stomach as best it could, and raised its right hand. Diya pulled in power from the phantom world and reality shrieked as streamers of black and purple energy tore into the physical world to gather in its hand. The purple glow of the shadow ball it formed threw the Wurmple’s face into stark relief and the caterpillar pokemon paused.

There was fear in the Wurmple’s eyes. Diya had always been strong for a Shuppet, and grown stronger still feeding so closely on the boy’s grief. It had mastered Shadow Ball when its siblings were still practicing the lesser Night Shade and its powers had only grown in evolution. The shadow ball it could use now wouldn’t just blow through the Wurmple, but probably the tree behind it as well. And the Wurmple knew it. The Banette’s power was a thing of death and curses that shuddered through the air to press on the soul. The Wurmple looked at Diya and knew it was going to die.

But it didn’t retreat.

The Wurmple twisted to look behind itself at the trainer it was defending, still fumbling around in the snow for their lantern. It looked back at Diya. And it wriggled forward. One centimeter. And then another. And then, picking up speed, it charged. 

And Diya- 

Didn’t fire.

It couldn’t. This Wurmple was willing to die protecting its terrified trainer and Diya couldn’t kill it for that. Tears leapt to the corners of its eyes and with a shriek of frustration that died in its closed mouth, it aimed its hand down. Diya closed its eyes and, bracing as best it could, fired the shadow ball into the ground between them. 

Snow and earth leapt up into the air with a roar and the Wurmple was flung back a meter, flopping onto its side and rolling with the impact. But the spray of earth hit Diya too, slamming aside the hand holding itself up and knocking it down to lie on its side in the snow again.

Diya grunted and curled into a ball, holding its stomach. It hurt. Stars above, it had never known pain like this when it was a simple spirit. But while it writhed the Wrumple recovered, wriggling back onto its pale stomach and raising its tail spikes again. 

Breath rushed in through the Banette’s nose as it prepared for the next assault. It didn’t want to kill the Wurmple, but it needed to stop it now and stop it permanently and that left Diya with few options. So it tried something it wasn’t even sure would work. It couldn’t use Screech the same way it had as a Shuppet, not while having to keep its mouth clamped shut, but Screech’s power had never really been a thing of the physical world for Diya anyway.

So as the Wurmple readied itself for another charge Diya drew its power in and, ignoring the fact that it couldn’t speak, screamed . The air around Diya shivered and tore, little rents to the phantom world tearing open under the force of the howling terrible noise. Through the flickering rents Diya could see the Wurmple’s spirit, a candle flickering defiantly in its trainer’s defense. But like this, exposed and vulnerable in the phantom world, its spirit had no protections from what Diya was.

As Diya screamed the Wurmple’s spirit flickered and stuttered and it finally -finally!- gave ground. It backed up only half a body length at first, but the screech only rose in volume and psychic intensity. With its spirit guttering like a candle in a gale the Wurmple broke and fled back to its trainer.

“Oh gods, oh gods, oh gods,” the trainer whimpered, still casting about in the snow for their lantern as the Wurmple fled back to cower at their feet. Then- “Oh!” Relief flooded into their high shrill voice. The trainer uttered something low and fervent that had the cadence of prayer and then with a burst of light the electric lantern reignited.

Diya flinched away from the sudden light, closing its eyes and hissing as its motion aggravated its injury. There was a moment of shocked silence as the trainer saw Diya in the light for the first time. No one moved. Then Diya groaned as a too deep breath pained its stomach, and the trainer leapt into motion.

They ran towards Diya as fast as they could, holding up the lantern high in their left hand and using their teeth to tear off the mitten on their right hand. “Oh gods,” they uttered again, but there was a different type of fear in it this time. They dropped to their knees in the snow next to Diya, sliding to stop in their rush.

“Oh no, nononono, that was you in the darkness wasn’t it, it must have been your pokemon with the glowing eyes, oh gods I’m so sorry, oh, oh no my Wurmple tackled you, nononono did it poison you, are you feeling faint? Are there sudden chills that come and go?” A stream of panicked words came from the trainer, but even as they panicked their hands never stopped moving. They set the lantern down and took off their other mitten, gently prodded Diya’s stomach with their bare hands and then -upon finding the hole in Diya’s fleece- immediately dipped into a fanny pack hidden under their jacket and pulled out a spray bottle and a capped syringe. 

“Okay I’m going to need you to roll over for me. I’m going to pull up your shirt to get a good look at the damage and that might hurt but it’s necessary. You’re going to be just fine but I need you to work with me here.” Again they set to work as they spoke. Diya complied with the trainer’s gentle pushes and rolled over onto its back, groaning as it straightened out and then again as the trainer pulled up its layered shirts. 

Diya leaned forward to get a look when the trainer hissed at what they saw. Its stomach was already mottled an ugly red and purple where the Wurmple had slammed into it. “Okay good news,” the trainer said, “the horn didn’t get through your clothes, you only need some potion and granddad always makes sure I carry the good stuff, you’ll be just fine in a moment.”

The trainer aimed the spray bottle and pulled three times, sending spritzes of mist onto Diya’s bared abdomen. Relief was instant. Pain vanished instantly as the potion’s anesthetic kicked in and Diya flopped back with a relieved moan. Muscles it hadn’t even realized it had been tensing loosened and its eyelids fluttered. The Banette could even feel the potion’s regeneration fixing it through the awareness it had of its possessed body. It would take a while before the dead blood was reabsorbed and the bruising faded, but already the capillaries were knitting together or pinching off. 

“Okay. Okay,” the trainer breathed out. “You’re okay.” Diya blinked and looked up at the trainer, whose scarf had come loose at some point, getting a good look at them- her, for the first time. At least it thought the trainer was a girl. It hadn’t been terribly clear on the notion of sexual dimorphism or gender as a spirit and the boy’s memories told it that appearances could be deceiving on that matter.

The trainer was, as Diya had thought from a distance, very short. Not so young as it might have assumed though. Her face had a sharpness under the baby fat that said she was in her late rather than early teens. Sharp black eyes widened with anxiety peered down at Diya. Her skin and hair were the same color as its, brown and black, but while Diya’s hair was short and wiry it could see wisps of longer straight hair escaping from under her toque. Speaking of which-

Diya giggled as it looked up at her toque. Perched atop the light green cap was a ball of purple fluff like the ball of white fluff on its own toque. But hers was better, because it was shaped just like a Venonat .

The trainer’s anxiety was back in an instant. “Oh, oh no I should have asked before I sprayed you, are you allergic to any potion formulas? Are you underweight? Have you ever had a bad reaction to potion before? I shouldn’t have done three spritzes without checking-”

Diya reached up and folded one of its gloved hands around one of her fretting worrying hands and shook its head. It pointed with its other hand at her toque, giggling some more. With the shock of the fight and the pain suddenly being over and all that adrenaline still rushing through its body, it couldn’t help but laugh. It was just, it was a tiny little Venonat bobbing up and down on top of her head.

“Huh?” she said, raising her free hand to where Diya was pointing. “What’s-” her hand made contact with the fluffy Venonat. “Oh.” Her face went through confusion, incomprehension, and recognition in an instant, before finally settling into a disbelieving laugh. “Oh. Oh hahaha. Hahahahahaha.” And then like a dam bursting she was laughing harder than Diya was, leaning over the Banette and laughing until tears streamed down her face.

It took a long minute for them both to stop laughing and collect themselves, laughter petering out into silence in the snowy night. 

Finally the trainer said, “Um, here, let me help you up,” she extended a hand and stood up, pulling Diya to its feet when it took her hand, where it towered over her by a good fifteen centimeters. “I’m- I’m June. Lepida June. And I am so sorry for attacking you. I saw a pair of glowing eyes in the darkness and I guess that must have been your pokemon?” her voice turned up into a question, “and all I was thinking was that there’s no pokemon native to this area like that but Kenomao is supposed to have a lot of ghosts and-” June stopped and collected herself. “I’m sorry. What’s your name?”

Diya blinked. With all of the talking she’d been doing, it had almost forgotten that opening its mouth and responding is something it’d be expected to do in conversation. 

The Banette pointed at its mouth under the scarves, then its throat, and then shook its hand back and forth in a cutting motion. ‘I cannot speak’, it hope it got across.

“You … can’t speak? Oh! Oh no let me get the potion again-” 

Diya cut off June’s fumbling through her fanny pack with a negatory swipe of its hand. It repeated the motions, then pointed at the Wurmple -peeking out from around a tree a couple meters behind June- and made another negatory swipe.

“Oh! You can’t talk at all! In general, I mean. You’re mute.”

Diya nodded. That was as good an explanation as any, and it had the benefit of being effectively true too.

“Oh, well can you spell out your name for me? I’d- oh wait!” June’s eyes had followed Diya’s finger to her Wurmple and they suddenly widened. “I’m so sorry give me a moment!” June whirled around, rushing to her Wurmple and kneeling before it. She picked it up with both arms and an “oof” of effort, cradling it close. Out from behind the tree and held up off the ground like this, Diya could see the pokemon was shivering violently.

“Shhh, shhh,” June whispered to it. “I’m sorry Wurmy, I know the cold is awful and it hurts, but I’m gonna put you right back in your pokeball. And I’ll get you some nice warm broth when we’re back at the hotel, how does that sound? You did so good today, you were such a brave girl. You protected me so well-” June kept up the string of babbling comfort talk to it until she’d walked it into the clearing where she’d left the Wurmple’s pokeball. She crouched down awkwardly to pick it up without letting go of the hefty caterpillar pokemon and then, in a flash of red light, it disappeared back into the red and white sphere.

Once her pokemon was taken care of she turned back to Diya, smiling sadly. “Sorry about that. She’s really not designed for a winter environment-” she was interrupted by a sudden shiver. “Or am I. I got snow all up the back of my jacket and- and you!” she exclaimed. “You must be freezing, I just stripped you half naked while you were lying in the snow!”

Diya blinked. Half-naked was a rather serious exaggeration, as was freezing. Diya had gotten some snow on its back, its stomach had been exposed to the air, and its sweater and pants might be a bit wet from the tumble in the snow, but it was fine. It had resurrected from complete hypothermic organ failure earlier that night. It didn’t need June’s help to-

June fished through her fanny pack and pulled out a small black storage ball, which she pointed at Diya. There was a flash of red light and a big thick wool blanket appeared, engulfing the top half of Diya’s body. 

Diya huffed in surprise and clawed its head free of the blanket, readjusting it so that the blanket draped around it and its head poked out. It got free just in time to see another flash of red light and a perfectly constructed log cabin campfire -unlit- appear in a hollow June had cleared in the snow.

“Okay come here kid,” June said -Diya blinked, wondering if she was older than it thought or if she thought its body looked younger than it was- “let’s get you warm.” A moment later she shivered herself. “And me too. Brrr, snow went right down my pants earlier.”

June began kicking away the snow around the wood, clearing a patch of bare earth and Diya stepped in to help. Its sneakers weren’t the best for the job, but they’d stopped being dry hours ago anyway and the cold wasn’t enough to stop Diya’s body from moving. Kicking the earth clear only took a few minutes, but as they worked Diya noticed June was shivering more and more. Her clothes looked more waterproof than Diya’s were, but she’d still fallen down and scrambled around in the snow earlier.

When they were done June crouched down next to the fire and pulled out a camping lighter. She flicked it, once, twice, three times, then over and over, but her hands were shaking too hard to get a good grip on it. And once she finally did manage to get a flame from it, it shook and wavered on the end of the lighter. It didn’t seem to be doing much good to light the tinder in the center of the neatly stacked wood.

Diya swallowed, watching the trainer struggle with the fire and the cold. It pulled the blanket off of its shoulders and wrapped them around hers, shaking its head at her protest. “I’m fine, I’m f-fine, I’m not actually that cold, ‘s just the adrenaline wearing off, you need it more-” 

While June was protesting the return of her wool blanket, Diya held its gloved right hand out palm up over the wood. It focused its will to a burning point and with the snap-hiss of an acetylene torch igniting a blue streak of fire burst into existence above its palm. 

“-than me,” June trailed off weakly. “What-?”

Diya fed power into the flame, drawing on the sudden tang of June’s apprehension and renewed nervousness to ease the effort. The blue fire ballooned in size, becoming a rippling transparent orb the size of Diya’s head. Faint heat radiated from the hissing faerie fire, not enough to char or burn most things, but enough to ignite flammable materials. Diya pulled its hand back, leaving the faerie fire floating in place above the logs and tinder. Then with a wave of its hand and the press of its will, it dropped the fire down onto the logs. 

Whoomp went the logs with a sudden rush of heat and indrawn air, and then there was an orange campfire crackling merrily in front of them. Diya held out its hands to the fire, shivering pleasantly with the rush of heat soaking through its clothes. It made a show of nonchalance, warming itself for a few long moments before looking sideways down at June. It swallowed nervously.

June blinked, stunned and for the moment lost for words. Then she blinked again, sharp black eyes narrowing as she looked closer at Diya’s face. She peered closer and then exclaimed, “Oh! Oh your sclera are pink! And they glow! Those were your eyes in the forest earlier, not your pokemon’s!” She glanced at the crackling fire and then back up at Diya. “Are you-”

Diya swallowed again. It had known pink eyes might be a bit of a giveaway about its nature, but it had been … kind of purposely not been thinking about what people might think about them, and hoping it wouldn’t be an issue. 

“-psychic?” 

The Banette froze. What.

“Oh wow . I’d heard that some of the stronger psychic family lines had some distinguishing physical features, but I hadn’t realized your eyes could glow . Wait no what am I thinking, of course they can glow, we’ve all seen that video of Leader Sabrina overchanneling her powers against that Mega Steelix. I didn’t realize they could just glow all the time though. Or that you could make fire with psychic powers. That is what you did, right?”

Approximately a hundred thoughts went through Diya’s head in an instant without any of them finding purchase, so the Banette just nodded slowly.

“That’s amazing! I’m trying to evolve my Blipbug into an Orbeetle one day, but I heard it’s really hard to care for them psychically during their intermediate evolution so I’d love to be able to mine your brain for tips and- aaaaand you still can’t talk and I haven’t even gotten your name yet!” June flushed bright red. “I’m, uh, Lepida June. I’m glad to meet you. What’s your name, can you spell it out?”

Diya nodded carefully. It held out a finger in the air and traced four letters, D-I-Y-A. 

“Oh, Dee-yuh?” June sounded out the name and hummed happily when Diya nodded once more. “Okay, well, uh, okay first come here. You’re just standing there all cold!” June pulled them both down to sit on the bare earth next to the fire, and opened up the wool blanket to pull Diya into it as well.

Diya found itself pulled unexpectedly against the trainer’s side and swaddled under the blanket with her. It froze for a moment, unsure of what to do or what was happening. But then June shivered slightly and the next thing Diya knew its arm was around her shoulders and it was pressing up to her as close as it could. It reached inside of itself and gripped its heart too, forcing it to beat faster and faster to heat its body for hers. 

“Oh wow,” she murmured. “You’re like a furnace. No wonder you didn’t need the blanket. Thanks.”

June stopped shivering quickly and Diya forced itself to let go of her a little bit. She wasn’t dying, it told itself. Her hands had been a bit stiff because she’d been searching through the snow and she’d been shivering a bit because it was a cold night even with her warm clothes, but she wasn’t dying. She was okay, and warm, and safe, and had a fire, and wasn’t dying.

As Diya loosened its grip, it felt the oddest wriggling motion where its arm had been wrapped around her back. The Blipbug which had been hanging on June’s back earlier squirmed up from inside June’s down jacket, poking its head up behind hers and freeing itself from the confines of her jacket and the blanket.

The Blipbug stared at Diya from a handspan away, huge silvery compound eyes reflecting the Banette’s pink ones in a thousand shattered images. Diya blinked. A vertical slit opened in the bottom of the Blipbug’s face, revealing wriggling mandibles and maxillae. Mouthparts wriggling, it hissed at Diya, “Bllliiiiiiiiiiiiihhhkkhhkhkhkh”.

Diya jerked back and June exclaimed at her pokemon, “Igor, no! No! Diya is a friend! Igor, friendly!” The Blipbug’s hissing subsided at the last exclamation and it flattened itself to the back of her head, still staring unblinkingly at Diya. “I’m so sorry, I think you really scared him earlier, he just needed to be told you were safe.”

Diya blinked and nodded. It was doing a lot of that with June. It kept its head pulled back though, eyes fixed on the shattered reflections in Igor’s eyes.

June sighed. “He’s still staring at you isn’t he?”

Diya nodded.

“It’s … look, Blipbugs are already like that naturally, and I trained Igor for observation, and he’s probably still at least a little scared of you. He’s not going to stop staring at you for a good long while. I promise he won’t attack you though, now that I’ve designated you as a friendly. Igor is very well trained, I swear.”

“Mhmmm,” Diya hummed, reluctantly letting itself relax back towards June and the Bug Of Many Mouthparts. Igor stared but, as promised, didn’t hiss again. 

“Soooo…” June drew out, “what brings you out into the forest in the middle of the night?”

Diya stared at June blankly.

“Oh. Right. Mute. Hehehe. Sorry. Uh … how do you feel about twenty questions? I ask yes-no questions, try to narrow down an answer?”

Diya shrugged. Sure, why not? The Banette held up one finger to June though, asking her to wait first. It wriggled around under the blanket and, with effort, yanked off its sneakers and socks. They weren’t quite soaked, but the sneakers were certainly not waterproof and Diya’s footwear was fairly damp. It propped them up in front of the fire and fished its extra dry socks out of its pockets to put on.

The Banette groaned happily as it slipped the fresh dry socks on. Stars above, that was heavenly. It wriggled its toes in their new cozy enclosures, catching June looking at them spectuatively. Diya raised an eyebrow at her.

“Oh, uh, are you okay with those sneakers? In the winter?”

Diya nodded. It would get better boots when it could, but so long as the sneakers kept its feet from freezing solid they’d do for now.

June looked skeptical, but didn’t argue. “Alright, uh, you a local?” Nod. “And you are psychic, right?” Nod. Diya had no problems letting that misconception stand. “Does it run in the family?” Shake. “Are you a pokemon trainer?” Diya bobbed its head side to side for ‘kind of’. “New trainer?” Nod.

After a few rounds of questioning Diya established some basics about itself. It was a new pokemon trainer looking to start its journey in Canopy Town. It was a local. There was some last-minute deadline tomorrow which meant it had to set out at night, but Diya shook its head enough when June tried to pin down what that deadline was for that she eventually dropped the question.

Yes, it was safe travelling at night without a pokemon escort. Yes, that was because it was ‘psychic’. No it was not telepathic nor could it read minds - this seemed to disappoint June, who muttered about how cool it would be to read pokemon minds.

Diya was its first name, yes. Yes, it was an odd name. No, that was not a masculine name or a feminine name. No, Diya was not a boy or a girl either. June paused a moment before asking Diya if it was nonbinary which … it guessed? Probably? It nodded yes to June, anyway. Fortunately that question signalled the end of any more questions Diya might not know how to answer, because it got June started on a rant about insect sexes.

A very, very impassioned rant.

“Bees,” June insisted, “have a lot more sexes than people give them credit for.” She glowered into a middle distance past Diya’s face. She opened her mouth but didn’t say anything, instead pausing for a moment before closing it. June glanced over at Diya, making eye contact. “Do you mind if I, uh, talk a bit about this? Uh, a lot about it? It’s kind of a Thing for me.”

Diya smiled and nodded. Was she kidding? Of course it wanted to hear this. It smiled wider to make sure June could see its smile even above its scarves. Not even a day into its pokemon journey and it was getting taught new things by another pokemon trainer! A pokemon trainer who might even be a friend! The boy had had fairly limited experience making friends, but from what little he’d known, Diya was pretty sure that huddling together for warmth on a cold winter night talking about things you loved was exactly how friends were made.

June took in a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Alright,” she started, “so you know how some fish can change their sex after they’re born?” Diya nodded, one of the boy’s teachers had a water pokemon like that. “Right, well when a fish changes its morphology and how it reproduces, we all say it changed from male to female, or female to male, right? Even if its genome stays the same?”

The Banette nodded its comprehension.

“So if I were to tell you that a particular bee starts out with a particular morphology, and then changes to one of two sexually dimorphic reproductive types based on environmental factors - just like those fish everyone describes as changing sexes-” June growled that last part, “would you say those two distinct types of bee are the same sex?”

Diya shook its head. This was great. The boy’s most enjoyable teachers had always been interactive like this and here its maybe-new-friend was proving to be just as interesting!

“No!” June cried out, “You wouldn’t! Obviously!” June tried to throw her hands up in the air and only succeeded in messing up their blanket a bit. “But nooooooo. Queen bees and worker bees have the same genome so they must both be female. Totally different sexual patterns and reproductive organs, complete sexual dimorphism, but no, they’re definitely both females, we should use the same sex identifier for both of them. And even worse-!”

The rant went on for a while . Diya had to admit it lost the thread of what June was saying a few times, especially at the part where she somehow jumped from bees to how neotenic breeding worked in insect pokemon. And, uh, everything about how that related to silk farming. But even if it wasn’t following the breeding science all that well, it was learning tons about June herself!

For one, she was a lot more confident when talking about bug pokemon than when she was freaking out alone in the dark woods. This was because she’d grown up on a bug pokemon farm. Her family harvested silk and chitin from them-and some pharmaceutical poisons as a side business- so June knew a lot about bug pokemon. At least in captivity. She had a little less experience interacting with wild pokemon. Okay maybe a lot less experience. No experience. It couldn’t be that different though, right?

At least that’s what she’d thought before panicking when two terrifying glowing pink eyes came floating towards her out of the darkness -Diya preened, that was just what every Banette wanted to hear about its eyes- and spending the whole night prior to that failing to find a Spinarak.

Diya tilted its head questioningly at that.

“Oh, right,” June said, finally losing a bit of steam in her long ramble. “Uh, that’s why I was out here tonight, looking for a Spinarak. Uh, you’re a native, you know how Kenomao’s got a lot of Pokemon variants, right?”

It did. The boy had listened to more than a few old-timers grumble about how Kenomao Island had been passed over for a coveted ‘Variant Region’ designation back in the day. The island had a lot of pokemon with unusual quirks or abilities because of its varied climate and distance from the mainland, variants that you couldn’t find anywhere else. But apparently they had to be different elemental types entirely to qualify as ‘true’ variants, so no Variant Region designation was ever awarded to Kenomao.

June continued at Diya’s nod. “Right, so one of those variants is the Spinaraks you’ve got in this forest. Most arachnid pokemon, you expose their silk to too much cold and it gets all flakey and crumbly. Makes it a real problem selling their thread anywhere out of the tropics. No one wants a shirt or a rope that’ll fall apart in the first snow. But not here! Your Spinaraks’ thread does just fine in the cold.”

“Course they’re only active at night and the burrows they sleep in during the day are almost impossible to find without the right scenting pokemon so … here I am. Out in the woods in the middle of the night. Getting so scared by a psychic kid with glowing eyes that I sicced my Wurmple on them.” June grimaced, guilt staining her expression. “I- gods. Again, I’m sorry about that. Really sorry. I-” She swallowed hard. “I’m glad you’re alright.”

Diya patted June’s arm under the blanket. It didn’t blame her, truly. It should have thought about how its eyes floating in the darkness would appear to her. Having haunting eyes was something to be proud of, of course, but so was discretion. Scaring the living daylights out of someone who threw away cherished possessions like garbage was laudable, but terrifying their innocent little sibling or child was just needlessly cruel. Every Banette knew that.

Besides, if it had been some other Banette possessing a discarded childhood doll of hers, June’s reaction might have saved her a great deal of pain and misery. Diya would be rooting for the Banette in that scenario, to be sure, but it still wasn’t going to criticize a healthy self-preservation instinct.

June sighed as Diya patted her arm. “Eugh. Just … look kid, Diya, I feel awful. Is there anything I can do to make it up to you?”

Was there?

Oh, there was! Diya poked an arm out of the blanket and mimed throwing a pokeball to catch a pokemon. Then it pointed from June to itself.

“You … want a pokeball?”

Diya nodded vigorously. Yes! It did. If she gave it a pokeball, it wouldn’t have to steal any at Canopy Town!

“Just a pokeball?” 

Oh, that tone of voice made it sound like it could ask for more. Diya held up three fingers. 

“Three pokeballs?”

Yes!

June opened her mouth, thought better of whatever she was going to say, then narrowed her eyes at Diya. “Alright. Three pokeballs it is. But- hmmm. You’re going straight on to Canopy Town after this, right?”

That was the plan, yes.

“Okay, well I’ll be staying out here for another hour or two, I still wanna see if I can catch that Spinarak. But tomorrow we’ll both be in Canopy Town, so let me buy you lunch. Do you have a ‘dex number I can call?”

Diya shook its head. It had a pokedex in theory, but it had left it back in the boy’s home. It might as well be on the moon covered in radioactive dust so far as it was concerned. 

June gave the Banette a decidedly odd look at that. Which it supposed was fair. Fifty years ago journeying with only access to landline phones might have been common, but these days every kid traveled with a pokedex that could make calls to keep in touch with their parents. 

“Of course you don’t have a pokedex either,” June muttered to herself. “Okay, ummm, look you’re going to be staying at the Pokecenter, right? Whatever. Wherever you stay, there’s a good buffet place just a block away from the Pokecenter. Walk out the doors, turn right, walk a block, The Mighty Meowth will be on your left, can’t miss it. Ask for directions to the good buffet place at the pokecenter if you forget. I’ll be there at … fourteen hundred? I’ll treat you to a late lunch, we can both sleep in and we’ll miss the lunch rush.”

After a few rapid blinks and miming the directions to make sure it got them right, Diya nodded its agreement. It really had made a friend! Probably. If June wasn’t a friend yet, Diya was determined to make her a friend when they met up tomorrow! 

A comfortable silence fell over them after that. They both stayed by the fire warming up for a few more minutes before Igor squirmed against the back of June’s neck and began tapping her shoulder with a nubby limb. June stretched in response, cracking her spine and slowly letting the blanket slide off her. “Aaahhhhh,” she groaned. “Well, that’s my cue to get moving Diya. Igor spotted something. Odds are it’s not a Spinarak again but,” she shrugged and changed her voice to a slower and lower register, clearly imitating someone, “‘You miss all the shots you don’t take.’”

That was good advice, Diya thought. It stretched as well, grateful for how its inner scarf helped it resist the urge to yawn. They put out the fire together, and June returned its remains and the wool blanket to their storage balls. She gave Diya three pokeballs too, and a small pouch for them it could tie to its waist when she noticed Diya was just going to store them in its pockets. When they were done they stood across from one another and Diya held out its hand to shake.

June smiled lopsidedly, but she took Diya’s hand warmly and shook anyway. “Heh. I’m still sorry for how we met but … hopefully I can make it up to you. Make this a meeting worth having anyway, yeah?”

Diya shook its head in negation. She was being silly. It was already worth it. And if she couldn’t see that ... Diya reached up and pulled both of its scarves down to its chin. With its mouth uncovered it beamed down at her, scrunching its cheeks up and smiling as wide as it could.

The shorter trainer made a ‘pfe’ sound like something had knocked the wind out of her. She whispered quietly to herself, “Oh gods you’re too precious for this world.” She slapped a hand over her mouth a moment later, flushing violently. “Oh I’m so sorry I don’t know where that came from I-!”

The Banette giggled, covering its mouth with a hand to keep it shut. It just shook its head again, still smiling. It pointed at her, then itself, mimed eating, and then flashed ten and four fingers. 

“I-” June let out a defeated breath. “Yeah I’ll see you at fourteen hundred tomorrow.”

Diya walked back to the path, waving goodbye as it went. It caught one last parting comment from June as it left though, muttered quietly enough that Diya probably hadn’t been meant to hear it.

“Igor don’t think I missed you eyeing that kid’s scarf. If you eat it tomorrow you are not getting treats for a week do you hear me?”

Chapter Text

Spinarak is a nocturnal Pokémon that lives in temperate and tropical forests. It spins webs that are strong enough to act as nets for fishers when weighted with stones. A patient hunter, it can wait for days for prey to become ensnared in its web. Spinarak and its evolved form Ariados are the only known Pokémon that can learn Toxic Thread.

-----

It was four in the morning when Diya tasted pain on the air. 

A whiff of it washed across Diya’s path and the Banette came stumbling to a stop. The intensity shocked it, the searing sensation of acid melting through flesh settling on its tongue like rich chocolate. It was gone a moment later, the ghostly imprint of the feeling carried away by ethereal winds.

But Diya knew what it had felt. Somewhere nearby a pokemon was dying.

What should it do? If it were still a Shuppet it would have rushed to the source, drawing the suffering from the dying thing to ease its passing while sating its own hunger. And it would have fed well. Pokemon were rarely as rich meals as humans were, but a death like this would have still kept it full for days.

But now it was a Banette. Banettes were self-contained in a way Shuppets weren’t. They didn’t have to feed on others’ grief. The tragedy they absorbed when they completed their possession fueled them from the inside. Diya didn’t have to go to the dying pokemon’s side and drain its grief if it didn’t want to. 

And if the pokemon was dying in such pain … Diya might not want to. It had a physical body now, something vulnerable to the mundane threats of the world in a way its mere spirit form hadn’t been. It could be hurt. Going to ease the pokemon’s passing might mean coming into conflict with whatever was killing it. The boy’s journey it was fulfilling might end before it even started.

But as Diya entertained the notion of not going to the pokemon’s side, it found it was already in motion. It strode off the path in the general direction the pain had come from, taking long lunging steps to make speed. It pulled its scarves down and -carefully!- opened its mouth just enough to draw in a sharp breath without losing hold of its soul. Phantom impressions flickered over its tongue. Old hunger, tiredness, hunger, fear, hunger, hunger, hunger, so many fading impressions of hunger in the wintry forest. But cutting through it all was the sharp tang of pain and helplessness and fear, Fear, FEAR. 

Diya homed in on that fear, following it unerringly through the forest. It didn’t take it long to find the source and Diya breathed a sharp sympathetic breath when it saw it.

Webbed to the underside of a tree’s branch was a Snom. The larval ice pokemon was a small white lump the size of Diya’s head, with its whole body but its head covered in a bluntly spiky shell of transparent ice. Not much of the shell could be seen though. It was wriggling weakly under a cocoon of sticky white webbing and crouched over the Snom, obscuring it from view, was a Spinarak.

The Spinarak turned to Diya as the Banette approached, staring silently. It was smaller and paler than mainland Spinaraks, only a little bit larger than the Snom and its main body a pale green-tinged off-white. The splotches of color on its back outlining a ‘face’ -barely more than two spots for eyes and a curved line for a mouth- were an icy blue. And its venomous horn was a glazed blue, looking almost like an icicle rather than keratin.

Diya slowed its approach as the Spinarak came into view, but didn’t stop. It needed to be closer to take the Snom’s pain.

The Spinarak crouched over its prey, pulling itself in close to the underside of the branch it was hanging from. It raised its abdomen, presenting the ‘face’ there to Diya, and stood stock still.

Nothing happened to Diya, but from beneath the Spinarak Diya could taste the Snom’s fear spiking even higher, turning into a mindless drumbeat of ‘run, run, get away, run, run, get away, run, run, get away’. 

The Banette paused as understanding came from the boy’s mind. The Spinarak was using Scary Face, a terror-inducing ability. Trainers called it a ‘Normal’ type move and, for whatever reason, they didn’t affect ghosts. However such powers were transmitted, they operated on a wavelength totally incompatible with the phantom world. 

It blinked. That was useful information. Raticates and Snubbulls had done similar things when faced with Diya as a Shuppet but it had never understood what they were doing or why other pokemon were scared by it. Now it did. Humans knew so many interesting things.

Like how being fully unaffected by Scary Face was typically a sign of immense power disparity, so weaker pokemon often used it as an opening move to avoid combat. If it worked, the pokemon won without having to risk a potentially damaging physical fight. If it failed, the pokemon knew it was outmatched and retreated.

So Diya kept striding forward unphased. The Spinarak only kept up the Scary Face for a few seconds. As soon as it saw it wasn’t working, it fled. The spider pokemon skittered to the end of the branch and leapt away to a neighboring tree. Then along that tree and to the next, and the next, vanishing beyond the pale pink light of Diya’s eyes into the distance.

The Banette rushed over to the trapped Snom as soon as the Spinarak was gone. Pain and helplessness lay thick on the Banette’s tongue, pulsing from the quivering larval pokemon.

Diya didn’t touch the Snom. Spinarak web was laced with a poison that disoriented the senses and weakened one’s muscles. It wouldn’t do nearly as much to a human as a much smaller Snom, but touching it was still a bad idea. And besides, the Snom was beyond saving.

At the base of the Snom’s neck, right where its icy shell stopped covering its body, was a sluggishly bleeding puncture wound. Pain boiled and bubbled up from it, flickering into visible black smoke under the glow of the Banette’s eyes. The Spinarak had already injected the larva with its digestive venom. It was dissolving from the inside.

Something inside the Banette’s chest ached. It wasn’t that death or violence repulsed it. Diya had been intimately familiar with both as a Shuppet and the boy’s ecology teachers had raised him with no illusions about how brutal the act of animal predation could be. Predators existed and the cost of their survival was death, that was a fact of life. But still, the Snom was in so much pain. It was slowly dissolving from the inside out, half-paralyzed, bound and helpless. 

It was scared. 

But with Diya here it didn’t have to be.

Diya opened its mouth and pulled . It reached into the phantom world where the Snom’s soul burned, pouring off the cloying black smoke of tragedy and despair, and it took that smoke into itself. In the physical world streamers of black smoke rose from the Snom, carrying the poor thing’s tragedy with it. Pain, helplessness, fear, resignation, all of it poured into Diya’s mouth to be consumed. It didn’t have to carry that to its grave. Diya would take it instead.

The Snom shuddered once and relaxed in its webbed bindings. It didn’t stop trying to escape. It still knew it was caught in a Spinarak’s web and it tried to wriggle free. But there wasn’t the same edge of helpless panic to its movements. The venom didn’t cause it to spasm in agony. 

Diya breathed in and in and in, drawing the Snom’s grief into itself to join the roiling mass of grey smoke that filled the Banette. 

Eventually the Snom stilled. It had tried its bonds. It had not escaped. The venom was not going to stop killing it. There was nothing left for it to do. But it was also not resigned, not hopelessly awaiting its doomed end. Diya consumed that too, sparing the Snom that. Diya took its pains, and left it with peace.

Diya stood there with it for long minutes. The Snom wasn’t in pain. And it wasn’t alone.

As time passed the Snom’s awareness dimmed and the smoke lessened. Its brain was shutting down. There wasn’t much left within it to feel pain. The smoke thinned further and eventually stuttered. The Snom stilled. Its heart had stopped. In the phantom world the Snom’s flame dimmed and dimmed, and finally collapsed into an ember. 

Diya sucked up that ember with the very last of the smoke and with that, the Snom was gone.

The Banette closed its mouth before any of the smoke it had absorbed could come rushing back out. It wound its light blue and pale red plaid tightly around its closed mouth, and then lay the white Piplup scarf over that. And then it stood there a while and just … breathed.

It was still standing there, collecting itself and its thoughts when the Spinarak came back. Diya tasted it before it saw or heard it. The Spinarak was well camouflaged as it crept across the snowy ground towards Diya and Diya didn’t make a whisper of sound as it moved. But that didn’t stop it from tasting of hunger, of frustration at a meal denied and fear at what hunger was driving it to do.

Diya backed away from the tree the Snom’s corpse was webbed to, giving ground. The Spinarak could have its meal now that Diya didn’t have to stand by and let a creature suffer for it.

But the Spinarak had apparently decided it wasn’t going to have peace with the Banette around. It skittered past the Snom’s corpse and kept coming, eyes fixed on its enemy. It lowered its horn in preparation for a charge.

Well then. If it wasn’t going to let Diya be, Diya could give it a fight. And -it pulled out one of the pokeballs from the pouch June had given it, holding it in its right hand- it might as well get started on this whole pokemon trainer business at the same time. Diya pulled in power as the Spinarak came towards it, readying itself to respond to the spider pokemon’s aggression.

The Spinarak raced forward, looking for all the world like it intended to charge headlong at Diya in a frontal assault. But then, only a couple meters from Diya, it changed course. It flashed sideways in a lateral lunge and the instant it touched down lunged again at Diya from the side. Its venomous horn shot towards Diya’s side, aiming to pierce deep.

But merely changing the direction of its attack wasn’t going to let it get one over on Diya. It had been thinking about how it would deal with just this kind of situation after its near disaster with June’s Wurmple and it was prepared.

Even as the Spinarak left the ground and flew through the air, Diya was stepping out of the way. Not to the side but up. The world exploded into wispy black veils and fiery purple shadows and from Diya’s perspective the Spinarak’s burning soul flew straight through its body and out the other side. It landed awkwardly, the wispy black veils that made up its limbs in this place crumpling awkwardly against its body as it made an unexpected landing in the snow.

Diya turned to follow its trajectory. The moment it landed Diya thrust its left hand out to occupy the same space the Spinarak did. And then Diya stepped back down into the physical world. 

A heavy thud jarred up Diya’s arm as the limb reasserted its space in the physical world and violently disagreed with the base matter that had the presumption to stake a prior claim. The return step translated into an explosion of force that threw the Spinarak out of the space Diya’s hand now occupied. The spider pokemon flew across the snow to slam into a tree with a sharp crack .

The Banette readied a Night Shade in its offhand to hurl at the Spinarak if it looked like it was going to resume the fight. But no such fight was forthcoming. The Spinarak twitched and tried to right itself, but failed. It had difficulty even focusing its gaze on its opponent.

A moment passed as Diya waited for a fakeout or a feint, but none was coming. The Spinarak was defeated. Tentatively, still waiting for the other shoe to drop, Diya shifted the pokeball in its right hand. It just needed to throw the ball at the Spinarak to catch it, right? The boy had practiced this in school before but-

Diya’s hand was sweaty. It swallowed nervously. Well. As June had said, ‘you miss all the shots you don’t take’. 

The ball flew. It bopped the Spinarak on the head, a light tap of contact. Then it fell to the snow and popped open, red and white halves splitting apart. A burst of red light surged out to envelop the Spinarak and then a moment later the pokemon was gone. There was just a pokeball rocking gently back and forth on the snow.

A held breath exploded from Diya’s lungs. It had done it! It had captured a pokemon! 

Delighted laughter bubbled in the back of its throat as it danced and skipped and jumped up and down in the snow. It did it! It caught a pokemon! A predator pokemon too! Not just a Rattata or a Pidgey for practice, but an aggressive wild predator pokemon! 

And it had done it itself! Not even using a starter, a pokemon bred and trained to be responsive to inexperienced trainers. It had captured a Spinarak with nothing but its own two hands! Diya spun around, trampling snow and kicking sprays of powder everywhere. 

It had done it. It could do this. It could complete the boy’s dream. Diya raised its head to the sky, breath puffing out of its nostrils in white plumes of steam. Under its scarves, it smiled. It would do this.

Diya collected the Spinarak’s pokeball without much fanfare, electing to tuck it in a pocket rather than back with the empty pokeballs where Diya might mix them up. And before returning to the path, it took time to bow to the Snom’s corpse.

The young pokemon trainer had benefited from its death, and that deserved thanks. But also, more important than that, the Snom had lived. Before it died it had breathed and felt and grown. And that deserved respect.

Diya held the bow for half a minute in the silent forest. 

-----

The night sky was just beginning to lighten when Diya made it to Canopy Town. The sun wasn’t peeking out yet, but the sky peeking out through the clouds was dark blue rather than black. So Diya hurried, rushing to get to the Pokecenter before the town woke up. It would take the time to look at the town properly tomorrow, right now it needed rest and a place off the streets.

Fortunately the Pokecenter was easy to find. Signs on almost every street corner pointed the way to it, in multiple languages. Diya slipped through the quiet predawn town to it without eany trouble.

It was a big two story red and white building. A big building. For all that Canopy Town was bigger than Ledos Village it was still a small town, but its pokecenter was large enough to be more a campus than a building. The central building was marked by the classic segmented white pokeball circle of pokecenters everywhere. On the ground floor it had a big central lobby, offices, and a cafeteria, with hotel rooms to stay in on the top floor. Scattered around it were half a dozen ancillary structures, a shop, a computer center, a tiny museum, a pokemon park, a pool, and a gym (for humans).

Diya slipped into the phantom world to peer through the pokecenter’s walls. Humans souls shone like blazing fires from rooms on the second floor, making it easy enough to mark which rooms were empty. It could probably sneak into one for a nap easily enough. 

Well. It could also just walk up to the tired person it saw manning the first floor lobby and say it was a kid with no money who needed a place to sleep. Diya was pretty sure it would actually be breaking a law for them to not let it use the pokecenter to sleep. It was just also against the law for them to not notify the parents who had discarded Diya’s boy. So Diya would not be doing that.

Diya slipped past the tired person in the lobby easily enough and made its way up to the second floor. It used the phantom world to slip through the walls and into an uninhabited room, making the black fluttering floors hold solid for its feet and the walls part for it with a flicker of focus. It winced at the fwoomp of displaced air it made when it stepped back into the physical world, but there was no way around that. It would just have to hope it didn’t wake anyone up.

And, finally, it was safe. Alone at last enclosed by four walls. It had trudged thirty rough kilometers through the night, fought two pokemon, evolved, and resurrected the dead. It had been a very long night. Diya took a moment to grab the Do Not Disturb sign on the inside of the door and hang it on the outside, but after that it was done . Diya was going to see if it could sleep in this new body and nothing on Arceus’ blue Earth was going to stop it.

It shed clothes haphazardly over the floor on its way to the bed, keeping only the inner scarf binding its mouth shut. The Banette wriggled into the tightly tucked in hotel bedsheets, moaning with relief at the feeling of clean soft sheets. Its eyes were already closed by the time it had wriggled all the way in and it wasn’t about to open them again, so it groped about blind for a pillow to cuddle. Pillow thus acquired and pulled close, sheets wrapped tight around its body, and comfort achieved, Diya let itself go limp to seek sleep.

It drifted off within seconds.

-----

Diya thrashed around in its sleep as the sun peeked through the room’s curtains. Unhappy disgruntled noises came from its covered mouth. It grumbled, twisting and turning under the covers. The Banette’s dreams were full of pressure. The need for something to be released.

It groaned, unconsciously pawing at its scarf in its sleep. Finally, one limp flopping hand found purchase and it pulled the scarf down. Diya’s mouth shot open with a gasp of relief and an almost transparent purple haze rushed out of its mouth. The Banette finally relaxed, slumping back onto the bed. It blearily pulled the scarf back over its mouth and settled back down into deeper sleep.

The purple haze floated over Diya’s bed, slowly coalescing into a ball just a little smaller than the Banette’s head.

-----

Diya opened its eyes sometime after noon to find another pair of eyes staring back from ten centimeters away. The eyes were bracketed by a body of transparent purple haze and set above a wide mouth with two tiny little fangs.

Diya blinked. The eyes blinked back. Then, slowly, they turned up at the edges as the mouth below spread into a broad happy grin.

“Gastly!” it exclaimed.

Chapter Text

Chapter Text

Gastly has no true form. Most of its body is a transparent purple poisonous gas, with a small ghostly core believed to be the soul of one who died from poison. The core is surrounded by a semi-solid illusory body which appears as a sphere with a wide pink mouth with two visible fangs and eyes that seem to extend past its round body. The toxic gas surrounding the core can induce fainting and suffocation and produces a faint, sweet smell.

Its gaseous body will dwindle away when exposed to strong winds, so Gastlys huddle together in decent-sized groups under house eaves to avoid the wind.

-----

“Gastly!” the sentient cloud of poisonous gas chirped again.

“AAAAAHHHHH!” Diya responded.

“GAAAAAAAAA!” the Gastly screamed in response, recoiling to hang a meter over the bed. 

“AAAmmpbl,” Diya’s scream choked off as it clamped its hands over its mouth. It was too late though. A rush of grey smoke had already leaked out of its mouth and dissolved. The room spun dizzily in Diya’s sight as the loss of a sliver of its soul hit it.

Or maybe that was just the poisonous gas Diya was almost certainly breathing in right now.

The Gastly had recoiled when Diya yelled, but when Diya’s head lolled back unsteadily it leaned in again. Hesitantly this time, but with wide curious eyes. “Gastly?” it murmured.

Diya retreated as best it could. It crawled out of bed at top speed, but with the room still swimming around it and unable to properly feel which way was down Diya had some trouble on the dismount. The Banette pitched off the bed and onto the carpeted floor face-first with a thump . 

“Gastly?!” Now the Gastly sounded outright worried, which Diya would maybe be a little more touched by if the sound of its worried voice wasn’t also getting closer . 

The Banette’s scarf had loosened sometime during the night so it reached up to fix it tighter and pull it over its nose. Unfortunately it also tried to stand at the same time and leftover sleepiness, soul loss, and probable poisoning combined to make it fail at both. Diya’s body went thump on the room’s floor once again.

“Gastly?!”

Diya scrambled into the corner of the room and pulled itself up into a sitting position, breathing hard against its will. If it had to, it could phantom step to get out of the room. The Gastly might be able to follow, but its poisonous gas would be less dangerous out in the open. Of course then Diya would be running around naked in public, but unwanted attention and uncomfortable questions were better than death by suffocation.

… suffocation which was notably not happening to Diya. In fact its vision was clearing up with every rapid breath it took to fuel its racing heart. 

“Gassss?” the Gastly fretted. The floating cloud of death was watching Diya with worry and concern in its eyes, but no longer approaching. It floated over the edge of the bed, staring at Diya with two wide eyes. The distance wouldn’t save Diya from its poison gas though. The Banette was still in an enclosed space with the Gastly and … and not dead.

Diya had been in an enclosed space with it for who knew how long, with the poisonous pokemon floating bare centimeters from its face, and it wasn’t dead. Its heart was beating and everything. The Gastly hadn’t already killed Diya with its presence, nor did it seem to have any malicious intentions to do so.

In fact now that Diya’s thoughts were freer of the blur of sleep and sudden soul loss … it felt fine. It wasn’t feeling any of the symptoms the boy’s teachers had said accompanied Gastly poisoning. No headache, no nausea, no shortness of breath. And it was becoming less dizzy each second, not more.

Diya slowly levered itself into a standing position, using the wall for support. No dizziness. In fact it felt … energized? Hesitantly, careful of a bad reaction, it took a deep breath. 

Whoa, Diya thought. The feeling wasn’t quite the rush of pulling grief directly from the source. But it was similar to the energy living around the boy’s house had passively provided, breathing in the grievances and hurts that saturated the hateful household’s air. Cautiously Diya pulled down its scarf to its chin and hissed in a quick breath through its mouth. That was definitely the barely-there rush of ambient grief tingling in its soul. The Banette could taste it on its tongue, satisfyingly familiar. 

Wait. Familiar? Diya breathed in again, deeper this time. It was familiar grief. Pain, helplessness, fear, and resignation. All muted with a deep sense of relief which took the bite out of the negative emotions.

Diya stared at the Gastly, which stared worriedly back. A sneaking suspicion was forming in the Banette’s mind, pushing aside its worries of gas poisoning. To test its suspicions Diya closed its eyes to the physical world, stepped up , and opened its eyes again in the phantom world.

In the phantom world the room was filled with a thin cloud of black grief smoke. The kind of heavy weighty smoke Diya suspected might smother a living soul if it were dense enough. The kind which might cause headaches, shortness of breath, and eventual death as it choked the light out of a soul on a spiritual level. Diya stood straighter, fear falling off its shoulders. If Gastly ‘poison’ was actually soul smothering grief-smoke and not physical poison, Diya had nothing to fear from it. If anything the Banette was stronger for its presence.

But Diya wasn’t staring at the smoke. It was staring at the bright soul of a Snom burning like a candle over the bed. A soul whose dying ember Diya had consumed last night along with the last remnant of the Snom’s pain.

In its stunned amazement Diya lost its hold on the phantom world and fell back down into the physical world with a rush of displaced air. It stumbled and held out a hand to brace itself on the wall, but it never stopped staring at the Gastly. At the ghost which had the night before been a soul Diya had ushered to the other side of death.

“Gastly?” the spirit murmured again. And this time, without move!run!flee! adrenaline clouding its mind, Diya could feel the phantom mental touch that accompanied the Gastly’s call. It felt just like how Diya would have communicated with its siblings, exchanging feelings and experiences much the same way they’d consumed such things for sustenance. So Diya reached back out in turn just as it would have reached out to communicate with another Shuppet and-

Death hunched over her with hunger in its eyes. Death burrowed into her flesh with searing agony. Death wrapped her in silk threads that sapped her strength. Her world was pain, searing burning pain. Terror filled her as she stared into the awful unblinking eyes of a Spinarak.

She was going to die. The Snom knew that. There was nothing she could to save herself from the Death that had caught her. Pain and terror would be her only companions into the grave.

But then the hungry Death fled. The searing Death was still eating her insides but suddenly it didn’t hurt. The soft weakening Death still bound her but it wasn’t such a helpless terror. Instead there was … peace. Quiet, gentle peace.

The Snom looked around with eyes unclouded by fear and found a quiet thing beneath her. It made no noise but she could see black smoke flowing into its mouth and somehow she knew that was her pain and her fear.

She was a Snom. She expected to die in pain and alone. That was the fate of almost every Snom that ever lived, to be caught by web or fang or claw. She had been born with that fear driving her and grown up with Death’s certainty teaching her caution.

But this Snom died as so few Snoms did. At peace. And not alone.

-Diya reeled under the staggering weight of gratitude pulsing through its link with the Gastly. And for a moment under the barely-there glow of its pink eyes, the once-Snom’s soul cast its light into the physical world. It blazed with the last thing she had known. A quiet burning certitude that pain was not inevitable and that death did not have to be born alone.

The world was blurry. The boy’s eyes Diya had inherited weren’t working properly. It raised its hand to rub them and blinked when its palm came away wet. Oh. It was crying. Of course. Diya slid down the wall until its butt hit the ground, blinking away more tears.

“Gastly?!” the ghost exclaimed. Concern and the desire to come closer pulsed from her, but she hesitated, clearly remembering how Diya had just fled from her.

Diya shook its head and waved the Gastly over, pushing acceptance and closeness at her as best it could. Using the phantom world to send impressions of feelings and hoping your fellow ghost picked up on them was far less precise than actual psychic communication, but the Banette hoped its meaning got through.

And evidently it did. The Gastly rushed across the room. Her barely substantial ‘body’ collided with Diya’s chest with a gentle paf , and her hazy purple form wrapped all the way around to the trainer’s back. She looked up at Diya with wide watery eyes, radiating worry and a desire to make Diya’s pain stop.

But Diya just shook its head again. It wasn’t sad or hurting. It was just … overwhelmed. It hadn’t realized just how much its actions last night had meant to the Snom. How important they had been to one tiny little prey animal. Her very soul even shone with it, a bedrock-deep conviction that pain was not something which had to be born alone. A conviction she’d learned from Diya’s actions. 

Diya gently rubbed the semi-solid illusion making up the Gastly’s ‘head’, hugging her back as best it could. The ghost snuggled in, tightening her gaseous body as best she could in turn. And Diya sat there with her, slowly blinking away tears.

Diya spent long minutes doing nothing but breathing in and out with the Gastly. It breathed in the grief the other ghost now radiated as part of her being and it was … nice. It was lighter than Diya would have expected, tinged with peace and relief. It was still grief, of course. At its core the Gastly was fundamentally an imprint of the Snom’s death. But the death she carried was a soft and gentle one.

Eventually Diya peered down at the Gastly and tilted its head to the side. It couldn’t just keep calling her ‘the Ghastly’. Did she have a name? Diya reached out to her and-

-Carefully, slowly, she scooted across a patch of nearly invisible ice on a tree branch, using her probing forelegs as much as her eyes to know where the ice was. One misstep and she could fall, but the Snom was skilled and knew what she was doing. The risk was a rare thrill rather than a danger and-

-She threw herself across a patch of transparent ice covering a flat boulder. She skidded from one side to the other before flying off into the snow with a squeak. Gleefully she jumped back on the boulder and threw herself back the other way. Weeeeeeee-

-The Snom examined herself in the reflection of a pond, staring in awed fascination at her ice shell’s reflection. It showed up as only a shimmer, a rippling not-quite-right distortion of her form. But she could still feel its heavy weight protecting her. She kept tilting her head back and forth, as if by finding the right angle the ice would suddenly look as solid as it felt.-

-Diya took a deep breath through its nose to center itself after the rush of sense impressions it had gotten from the Snom’s life. Her name was … black ice? The Banette pushed impressions from the boy’s life back at her. The feeling of slipping suddenly on the steps in the morning, carefully navigating an invisibly icy sidewalk, tracing wondering fingers over the invisible ice covering metal railings.

“Gas!” she confirmed, nodding against its chest.

Hmm, the trainer thought. ‘Black Ice’ was a little unwieldy as a name. Of course she didn’t know spoken language, wouldn’t know it was an awkward name in the boy’s native tongue. But aha, Diya had a solution. The boy had loved languages. He’d made a habit of collecting beautiful words wherever he’d found them. It was how he’d come to name Diya, after the small oil lamp fires its eyes had resembled as a Shuppet. And another such word came to mind now, a word for invisible ice. Diya just had to give it voice, so the Gastly could know its name.

The Banette opened its mouth just a sliver, taking in a deep gulp of the Gastly’s grief-fumes to steady itself. Alright. It had just spoken earlier -yelled in fact-  and it wasn’t dead. It could do it one more time. 

It carefully breathed in again, holding the Gastly’s grief-fumes in its mouth, letting them mingle with its own soul-stuff. It gently cupped its hands under the Gastly’s barely-there body and lifted her up in front of its face. Her name was-

“Svartis,” Diya breathed out. A rush of dizziness hit it as grey smoke -a piece of its soul- flowed out of its mouth, but being prepared for the weakness it managed to stay upright and only swayed a little. The smoke flowed into Svartis’ body and mingled with her gaseous body, grey melding into purple. And then there she was, inside of Diya’s head! Her presence shone like a star in Diya’s mind. A star named Svartis.

For her first act as a named being, Svartis manifested a wide pink tongue and licked a path right from Diya’s chin to its forehead. 

A laugh almost burst out of the trainer’s mouth and ruined the solemn name-giving it was trying to accomplish. But Diya went with the flow and leaned forward to plant a big smooch on the top of Svartis’s body. 

Svartis leapt up out of Diya’s hands and circuited the room twice before flying back into its chest at top speed. She hit with about as much force as a gently lobbed pillow, but with great enthusiasm. “Svartis!” she exclaimed. “Svartis, Svartis, Svartis!”

Diya rubbed Svartis’ semi-corporeal form some more, petting the newly named Gastly. Its new Gastly. Because there was no question about whether Svartis was ‘its’ pokemon. It could feel her in its mind, had followed that path of her joyous flight around the room with its phantom senses as much as its borrowed eyes. They were linked now, and Diya had no doubt that whatever came next they’d be facing it together.

… which just left one question. Where in the world had Svartis come from? Most Snoms killed by a Spinarak’s venom did not make the transition to a ghostly existence, or the world would be drowning in them. Diya reached out to Svartis through her presence in its mind, the process made easy and effortless by their bond, nothing like the uncontrollable avalanche of sensation it had experienced connecting with her earlier. 

How was she here?

Memories of sensation flowed seamlessly into Diya’s mind. Being cradled in a warm safe place, somewhere deep, deep in place of burning shadows and hazy substance. Slowly finding and pulling together pieces of a new self, binding them to her soul. Hearing ethereal winds screaming outside the warm place and knowing that exposure to them would tear that sense of self from her soul, but knowing bone deep that she was safe from them. Growing big enough that she didn’t fit in that safe place anymore, coming bursting forth out of the Banette’s mouth. Peering down at the face of its m-

Midwife , Diya thought as intensely as it could, interrupting to push the concept down their link. It had been a midwife for Svartis, helping her -however unwittingly- through the process of rebirthing herself as a Gastly.

Svartis stared quizzically at Diya. Was it sure it wasn’t her mo-

It was not . Svartis has done a very good job birthing herself and Diya was glad to have kept her safe during the process, but every single fiber of the recently evolved Banette’s spirit and every neuron of the young boy’s brain it was using were in agreement on this. Diya was far too young to be a mother.

Svartis blinked at the Banette.

Diya fretted, abruptly worried it had hurt Svartis’ feelings. Was … was she okay with Diya being her midwife? It hadn’t hurt her feelings by insisting it wasn’t her mother, had it?

The Gastly buried her face against Diya’s chest again, giggling madly. No, no she wasn’t hurt. Her mother had laid a clutch of eggs under a mound of snow and then flown off never to see them again. She did not have any special attachment to motherhood or daughterhood and was fine with Diya being the midwife for her rebirth.

The young trainer breathed out a long sigh of relief. So long as it wasn’t unexpectedly a mother, it could deal with this. More than just deal with it in fact. This was … it felt precious. 

Last night Diya had defeated that Spinarak and celebrated its first catch. But it wouldn’t be right to say that the Spinarak was its first pokemon. The new trainer hadn’t even run it through a pokecenter’s training computers yet. For all intents and purposes it just had a feral murder spider in a ball. And even once it was trained, Diya didn’t think it would have any particular attachment to that pokemon.

Svartis was different. It had meant something, that quiet moment in the forest with the dying Snom. She was a pokemon whom Diya would be happy to call its first companion.

Those feelings flowing down their bond prompted Svartis into more giddy circuits of the room. And honestly, Diya couldn’t say it didn’t want to do the same. It had a companion. A pokemon to share its journey with. It probably would have broken out into dance and followed her about the room if its feet weren’t still sore from last night’s hike.

Diya did get back to its feet and sit down on the bed though, smiling ear to ear as it watched Svartis fly around the room. If it was too sore to join in the excitement it might as well watch comfortably. And it was quite a sight. Very few Snoms lived long enough to evolve into the flight-capable Frosmoth, and Svartis seemed determined to revel in having gained the power of flight.

Very few Snoms ever found themselves in hotel rooms either, and Svartis seemed determined to explore that too. She flew every which way, exploring her new powers and her new space. What was under the bed? (Nothing.) What did the ceiling fan do? (It moved when she touched it!) What did the drawers do? (Nothing she could figure out.) How squishy was the bed? (Adequately.) Could she lift the pillows? (Just barely.) Could she fly while lifting the pillows? (Her flight was wobbly, but yes.)

Eventually she noticed the changing minutes of the hotel’s bedside alarm clock and spent some time poking and prodding the digital device, trying to prompt the numbers to change some more. Which prompted Diya to notice the time. 12:42 the clock said.

That was enough time to get ready for its late lunch with June at 14:00 but also not quite enough to tarry. Diya didn’t want to end up late for its meeting with the other trainer because it cut its timing close and got turned around in an unfamiliar city.

If it was going to get ready, it ought to start getting ready now. So Diya, groaning just a bit as it put weight on its feet, got up to go to the bathroom and get ready. It was going to invite Svartis to join it so she didn’t get lonely while it was cleaning up, but that didn’t end up being necessary. Diya opened the bathroom door, Svartis saw the new unexplored space, and that was all the invitation she needed.

Getting in the shower and washing up was an odd experience for the Banette, because of how surprisingly not odd it felt. It had never bathed before in its life, had never had a need to. But from the moment it stepped into the bathroom it might as well have been on autopilot. Thousands of hours of the boy’s muscle memory kicked in and -suddenly- it was showering.

Of course Svartis was fascinated by the ability to produce rain on command, and further fascinated by what happened when her semi-corporeal body interacted with the water. Which was mostly some very messy redirection of water and the portion of the water that made it through her coming out the other side snow-melt cold.

Some showering delays resulted because of this. 

By the time Diya managed to regain control of the showerhead and secure a steady stream of hot water for itself, it was firmly reassured about its decision to start getting ready early. Drying off was fortunately less of an ordeal. Occupying Svartis with a towel of her own to play with did the trick, and the process was smoothly taken care of by the boy’s muscle memory with no interruptions.

The tricky part came when it was time to brush its teeth. Diya did find a small disposable toothbrush and some toothpaste in the bathroom, which was fortunate. But … 

Diya stared into the mirror at its faintly glowing pink eyes and firmly shut mouth. It could survive opening its mouth. But it didn’t exactly want to open its mouth and expose its soul to the open air. It wasn’t a great experience and it still wasn’t sure what the effects of doing so repeatedly might be. For something as important as giving Svartis her name, of course Diya would risk it. But for something as mundane as brushing its teeth? That it would have to do multiple times a day for long minutes?

The Banette kept staring at itself in the mirror, hesitant. Eventually Svartis even noticed the conflict. Nervousness bled through their bond and she stopped playing with her towel. She floated over to rest on her trainer’s shoulder, joining it in staring at their reflections. “Gastly?” she murmured.

This was a thing Diya had to do. If it didn’t brush its teeth regularly they were going to rot and fall out and it would be awful. It had to do it.

…

Maybe it could just brush its teeth without opening its mouth? Yeah it would try that first.

It took a bit of finagling and a false start which ended up with toothpaste smeared all over its lips, but it did turn out to be possible to brush its teeth without Diya opening its mouth to the air. And once it had squeezed the toothbrush in past sealed lips, brushing was fairly easy. It struggled a bit with toothpaste foam overfilling its mouth and the whole ordeal was a bit messy by the end, but it worked! 

When Diya was done it carefully extracted the toothbrush from its pressed-together lips and searched around under the sink for a cup. It filled it with water, drank steadily from the lip between tight lips, swished it around, and spat it out all without ever exposing its mouth to air. The operation was a success. Now its mouth felt clean and fresh and it didn’t have to worry about rotting teeth.

Its mouth also suddenly felt parched . Last night’s journey had not been without its toll on Diya’s adopted body. The Banette filled the cup again to gulp down water. Then again, and again, only pausing to breathe. After almost a full minute of slaking its thirst, Diya slumped against the bathroom counter. Stars and shadows it had needed that more than it had realized.

Diya’s stomach gurgled hollowly. And suddenly it was hungry too.

Well. It made sense. Diya’s new body had been through a lot last night. Thirty kilometers of rough terrain, two life or death fights, and all of that with no food and water would take a toll on a human. And then it had another life or death panic that morning. Now that the adrenaline was washing out of its system and Diya was taking care of its body’s basic needs, it made sense those needs would be asserting themselves.

Diya’s stomach gurgled again, sloshing in an uncomfortably empty way around the water the Banette had just drunk.

Okay, okay, it got the message. It might be spiritually self-sufficient now that it was a Banette, but its human body demanded its own physical fuel. In theory Diya thought it would probably be able to manipulate its body with the same ghostly puppeteering other Banettes used to move their doll bodies. Even if its human body ran out of fuel it wouldn’t be immobile, or truly die in the way a human would. But that didn’t mean it could keep all the body’s other functions running on spiritual powers alone.

From the boy’s education Diya knew that the brain’s neurons relied on chemical interaction chains which no phantom motive force could substitute for. Neurons used ATP molecules to produce electric charge concentrations. Making ATP involved a process that started by taking in O2 and ended by expelling CO2. That extra carbon molecule had to come from somewhere and that somewhere was food. And while Diya might be able to move its limbs with phantom forces, that didn’t mean Diya could conjure carbon from thin air.

If Diya wanted its new neurons to keep firing, if it wanted to keep thinking in the way a human did and not regress to the more limited understanding of the world it had had as a Shuppet, it needed food.

The ghost pokemon smiled to itself. Lucky for it then, that the bug trainer June had promised to treat it to lunch. That was one problem which had an easy solution.

… of course it would also have to figure out how to eat without opening its mouth. That was a problem which didn’t have such an easy solution. Diya chewed on its tongue, thinking that one over. Maybe the buffet place would have soups or smoothies it could drink like it had drunk the water? Were there other more filling foods it could eat without having to open its mouth too much?

It would just have to find out. And there was no time like the present.

Diya leaned out of the bathroom to check the clock. It would be early if it left now, but it might as well. Maybe June would get there early too. The Banette’s stomach gurgled again. And maybe it would get a headstart on that lunch even if she didn’t.

That decided, Diya waved for Svartis to follow it and started pulling on clothes. It didn’t have anywhere to leave clothes right now and it wasn’t sure what would happen if it tried to put clothes in a pokeball meant for pokemon, so it just put them all on. It could wear a different set of pants on the outside, wrap its fleece sweater around its waist, leave the inner plaid scarf untied around its shoulders, and that would hopefully look like a different set of clothes. And hopefully that many layers wouldn’t cause it to overheat in the daytime.

Diya peeked through the curtains and touched the window to check the temperature. The snow outside wasn’t melting and the glass was cold, very cold. That was good, wearing layers probably wouldn’t be a problem then.

Which just left the problem of transporting Svartis. First, and most importantly, could she be around humans safely at all?

The new trainer focused on Svartis, bringing its will and attention to her presence in its mind. The newborn Gastly paused in her idle exploration of the room and turned to face Diya. What did it want? She wondered. 

Could Svartis stop emitting her phantom grief-smoke? Diya asked. Or pull it in closer to her somehow? Its phantomly communicated questions weren’t perfectly precise, more impressions than grammar, but it got the point across.

Svartis bobbed up and down. Yes, she could do that! She couldn’t stop emitting her smothering aura, but she thought she could choose where it was concentrated with just a little effort. 

She demonstrated immediately, showing off her control. Diya couldn’t see the smoke directly while in the physical world but through their link it got a sense of how Svartis felt her own smoke. She concentrated it in a column between them, expanded it into a cone that covered a quarter of the room, then pulled it back into a column. Finally she whirled the column around herself into a spiral before pulling it into a tight ball contained wholly within her gaseous body.

See! Svartis preened. She had excellent control over it.

She did! Diya agreed. That was really cool how she’d controlled the spiritual poison like that. There were … well there were a few issues with it. The smoke had actually leaked everywhere when Svartis pulled it into a column or cone. It had concentrated in that area but not been fully removed from the rest of her surroundings. And the process had been kind of slow. A mild jog could probably outpace her ability to reorient that focused column of poison. 

But when she had pulled her poison in tight within herself she’d pulled all of her poison in tight. Not a trace left in the surrounding air. Diya stepped over to the phantom world for a moment to double check. Yup! She could pull it in tightly enough that not a hint escaped to threaten anyone’s health. That was great! It meant Diya could safely bring her around living people who had souls that didn’t actively feed off of manifested negative emotions.

While this confirmed that Diya could bring her around humans though, there was still the question of if it should . On the plus side, most people’s reaction to seeing a Gastly probably wouldn’t be nearly as severe as Diya’s had been. Seeing a -presumably responsible and notably not dead- trainer walking along the open street with a Gastly wasn’t quite the same as waking up ten centimeters from a pokemon known for quietly suffocating creatures in their sleep.

But people still got nervous around dangerous pokemon. At least in Ledos Village they did. Back there it had been a Big Deal if someone was too casual letting their more dangerous pokemon wander around. The kind of big deal that got the Ranger to come down and give you a stern talking-to. Maybe it would be different in a town with a pokemon gym that trained people for combat encounters with wild pokemon, but Diya didn’t know that for sure. It was probably best if Svartis stayed out of sight for now.

Would she be okay going inside a pokeball? Diya wondered at her.

The Gastly thought about it for a moment before shaking her head. If she had to, Svartis guessed she would. But she didn’t want to. What she wanted was to see the world! She wanted to explore it and know it and be a part of it. This new gaseous body wasn’t nearly as vulnerable to predators and injury as her old body had been and that lack of threats meant freedom!

Diya smiled in giddy sympathy at the excitement pouring down their link. Yeah. It knew the feeling.

In that case maybe Svartis could hide under Diya’s clothes? Her form was pretty malleable so-

Before Diya could even finish the thought its Gastly had rushed straight at its chest. As she did the gaseous pokemon let go of her semi-corporeal body, the black ball with eyes and a mouth that gave her form stability. She became pure gas, nothing but a barely visible shimmer of transparent purple, and poured herself into Diya’s clothes.

The end result looked like Diya was standing over a vent that was blowing up through its pant legs, but it worked. Hopefully the poofiness wouldn’t look too ridiculous with the layers it was wearing. Or if it did … Diya shrugged to itself. Well then it would look kind of ridiculous.

Before calling the setup satisfactory though, Diya did check to make sure Svartis could see alright. She had dissolved her eyes after all. Would she need to manifest new ones that were peeking out or-?

Nope. Svartis assured Diya that she could see just fine.

Diya blinked. She was under its clothes and had no eyes. That wasn’t a problem?

The concern only confused Svartis. Was there a reason it should be?

Two contradictory trains of thought pushed themselves through Diya’s mind at once. One, born of the boy’s neurons and experiences, insisted that yes eyes were very much necessary for vision. The other suddenly realized that the world now went dark for a moment every time it blinked, that was new , and what in the stars-

Diya’s stomach growled, derailing both trains of thought. 

You know what, Diya thought to itself, questions about how ghostly and human vision worked could wait for later. If Svartis was comfortable with her situation that was good enough. For now food was more important. Diya looked around the hotel room. Was there anything else it needed to do before it could leave?

It was cleaned and clothed. Its new companion Svartis was stowed away. It patted its pockets for its three pokeballs, two empty and one with a Spinarak inside. It looked over the hotel room, emptied of its worldly possessions. Anything else? 

Oh! The room was kind of messy. The bed was unmade, water had been splashed around the bathroom, and towels which had been stowed away were now laying about. The Banette frowned. It didn’t want to leave the room like this when it left. It didn’t know exactly how hotel cleaning staff did their work, but it didn’t want to either make more work for them or get them in trouble if it made it look like someone hadn’t done their job.

Its stomach gurgled again, but this was important. It still wasn’t sure what exactly the morality of stealing things it needed was, but it knew that unnecessarily making work for other people was rude. That was something the boy had felt very strongly about. Strongly enough so that guilt over being a burden had been a regular emotion for Diya to drain from him.

The Banette made the bed first. It couldn’t figure out how to fold the bedsheets as crisply and neatly as they’d been folded when it came in -it didn’t have the hundreds of hours of practice of a professional housekeeper- but it did its best. Then it dried and tidied up the bathroom, though that this left it with the question of what to do with all its wet towels. It couldn’t clean them, and probably shouldn’t just dry them and put them back.

What could it do with them? It probably shouldn’t leave them hanging in the room. Could it drop them off somewhere? 

Diya stepped up into the phantom world to look around the pokecenter, giggling under its breath as it felt Svartis’ surprise and fascination at seeing the other world for the first time. The Banette’s glowing eyes searched through the insubstantial walls, parting their gauzy substance with an effort of will wherever it looked.

There! Over by the pool there was a hamper for wet towels. And to its surprise there were towels in it despite the cold. Maybe some trainers had been exercising cold-resistant water pokemon in the pool? Well whatever the reason, it could drop the towels off there and hopefully no one would realize or be too inconvenienced.

The trainer dropped back into the physical world to gather up the towels, again giggling at Svartis’ fascinated shock. A flood of interest and half-formed questions came flowing down their link and for every question Diya answered, two more took its place. Answering some of the questions was difficult through their limited link but Diya answered its pokemon as best it could. Curiosity was a good thing and if its pokemon -its very first pokemon!- wanted answers, it would give them to her.

Diya laughed giddily. It really had a pokemon. Not even a full day as a trainer and it already had a pokemon companion. A companion it felt close to. And not just physically. (Diya giggled some more at the pun). Svartis had hardly even been with Diya an hour, but Diya already felt like it knew her. And in a way it did. Just yesterday the Banette had been a living spirit just like her. It knew what it was like to be a ghost pokemon unbound to a physical form in a way few people ever would. 

And it would use that familiarity to help her grow and thrive as best it could. It was responsible for her, after all. However unwittingly, it had helped bring Svartis into this world. It was up to Diya to make sure that world was good to her.

One it had gathered the towels, the trainer looked down at its puffed up clothes. Ready? It sent to its pokemon.

Ready! The reply came back.

Well then. Time to go see the world together. Holding an armful of wet towels, Diya pulled them both into the phantom world and walked out through the pokecenter’s walls.

Chapter Text

Canopy Town was amazing in the daylight. Well, truth be told it was only a few times larger than Ledos Village so it wasn’t structurally that different and there weren’t that many people out in the streets during the middle of a weekday. But the people who were out had pokemon with them! Not just small pet pokemon, a Furret or a Pachirisu on someone’s shoulder. Combat pokemon.

There was a woman in a spiked leather jacket with a mohawk on the street corner, clearly waiting for someone. And she had a Wartortle sitting idly next to her on the curb! Out and about, the armored pokemon just free as you please. 

In front of the pokemon center a man was sitting on a bench eating lunch and playing catch with his Sneasel. The man casually tossed a half-shredded rubber ball into the air at the same time as he took a bite out of his sandwich and the aggressive predator pokemon flashed across the ground at blinding speed. It leapt into the air as a flash of black and red, sinking its wickedly sharp claws into the rubber ball and destroying it a little bit more, before darting back to the man and demanding he throw it again.

Even as Diya looked around, a small group of people came out of the pokecenter’s lobby. One of them was clearly a gym employee, dressed in a full snow camouflage suit with a bright orange armband bearing the Canopy Gym’s shaded tree logo. She was leading what looked to be a group of freshly equipped novice trainers out on an expedition into the forest. And helping her lead them was a full fledged Abomasnow! Diya could feel the impacts of the massive yeti pokemon’s steps through the ground, carrying the promise of irresistible force and violence ready to be brought to bear.

Diya stared with a slack jaw as the Abomasnow passed it, in sync with Svartis’ own awed and somewhat nervous reaction. Neither of them had ever seen a Pokemon that powerful in person, in any of their forms or memories. Diya had certainly never seen a pokemon capable of serious violence free in the streets. This was the difference of a town with a pokemon gym in it and it took the young trainer’s breath away.

The Banette took its time walking the short distance to the buffet, the intensity of its wonder managing to override its hunger. It soaked in the daylight view of the town with curious eyes. Even the streets fascinated it. The road in front of the pokecenter was much wider than any street in Ledos Village. Probably for ease of access by cars, but why? What could they possibly be transporting back and forth so often that couldn’t be held in storage balls? Or maybe they often drove people to and from the pokecenter? But what for? Canopy Town wasn’t that large, a bike could get you from one end of town to the other in a few minutes.

And oh! It had missed it the night before, but the pokecenter’s roof had a landing pad for passenger-carrying flying pokemon. Diya wondered if that was a common sight in this town, Pidgeots and Staraptors ferrying people through the skies. 

There was just so much to learn! Diya smiled to itself. And all the time in the world to learn it. Though admittedly not at this exact moment. It should be making its way to the -what had June said the buffet was called again?- The Mighty Meowth. Diya peered down the street to see if it could spot the restaurant, only to be surprised when it instead spotted June. She was early, already sitting on a bench outside the restaurant.

The bug trainer was reading a book with one hand and absentmindedly petting the scarf-wearing Blipbug in her lap with the other. She was still wearing the light green toque with the fluffy Venonat puffball on top and the overlarge green down jacket from the day before, though now they were paired with a pair of purple jeans. The Blipbug -Igor, Diya remembered his name was- was facing the Banette and he raised his head at Diya’s approach.

Diya waved enthusiastically at the bug pokemon.

Igor stared for an uncomfortably long moment -Diya wondered what the Blipbug was thinking- before finally reacting. Wriggling out from under June’s petting hand, he crawled around her body to take up a position on her back with his head peeking over her shoulder. From his vantage point he tapped her shoulder with one stubby foreleg.  

June had not looked up from her book when Igor left her lap. Instead she kept absentmindedly petting the air until Igor tapped her shoulder. Only then did she finally stir, setting the book aside and blinking rapidly at Igor’s absence in her lap. Igor patiently tapped her again and she finally looked up at him, and then followed his gaze down the street.

“Oh!” she exclaimed. “Hey, Diya! Over here!” She stood up from the bench and waved, slipping the book into her jacket with the other hand. Diya kept waving for a few seconds so she knew it had seen her, and then jogged the rest of the distance.

When it was close enough to slow to a walk Diya held out its hand to shake, but it was preempted by a sudden movement from June. The shorter trainer closed the remaining distance between them in a swift lunge and wrapped Diya in a big hug, her arms going around its chest. 

Two things happened at once when she did this. She started to speak, “Hey kid, it’s good to see you. I was worried abou-”. And her sudden tight hug compressed Diya’s Gastly-inflated clothes, forcing Svartis out into the open, where she immediately manifested her semi-corporeal body to protect her form from the light wind in the street.

The Gastly sheepishly took form behind Diya’s head, unsure what to do about suddenly being forced out into the open. Through their bond the ghostly trainer could feel her manifest one clawed hand and wave awkwardly. Diya closed its eyes and winced. Hopefully June’s reaction to ‘sudden poisonous death pokemon in close proximity’ would be better than its had been.

Igor tilted his head, wide compound eyes staring at the new pokemon. He waved back at Svartis with a stubby foreleg.

His trainer gasped, rearing back from Diya, exclaiming, “Oh blessed gods-”

Diya winced. Oh no this was going to be bad.

“-your Gastly is so tiny! Diya how is your Gastly so tiny, they’re supposed to be at least twice that size aren’t they? Oh my oh my, give me a moment.” The smaller trainer pushed Diya away and immediately started patting down her jacket, exclaiming in triumph when she found her pokedex. “Got it!”

June held up the red handheld computer and pointed the transparent blue dome on its end at Svartis. She pressed a button, watched a stream of information scroll down its screen, and gasped. “What?! What?! No way.” She scanned Svartis again. “No way .”

Diya blinked, a little shocked and very bemused. It glanced over at Igor who seemed just as fascinated by Svartis as his trainer, if less vocal about it. Diya looked back to Svartis herself, who just exchanged glances and mutual feelings of consternation with Diya.

“Diya,” June said in a very serious voice, “did you know your Gastly is the smallest of its kind on record? By a huge margin too. Also, wait, how is this news to the pokedex? Have you never scanned them or registered their pokeball before? Are they a new catch? Wait did you find a Gastly on the Ledos-Canopy trail last night? How?!”

The Banette blinked some more, caught off guard by the deluge of questions. It pointed a finger at its throat, grinning ruefully under its scarf. No speaking for it, remember?

“Oh! Right! Sorry I almost forgot. Just give me a hot second…” June fiddled with her pokedex. A moment later she turned it around and handed it to Diya. “There you go! This will make communicating much easier!”

The Banette took the pokedex on reflex, unsure what June wanted it to do with the device. It looked down at the pokedex and- oh! That was brilliant! Or … actually maybe it was really obvious. On the screen was a document writing app, with the text size blown up large enough to see from a couple meters away.

“Haha, yeah I’m sorry I should have thought of this last night, can’t imagine I didn’t think of it then. I was futzing around on my phone earlier looking for a sign language translator - you do sign right? No? Huh.” June made a noise of puzzlement when Diya shook its head. “Well anyway, it suddenly hit me while I was typing, looking for one, that uhhhh, well, instead of scanning your signing -which I guess you don’t do anyway- and converting it to text, you could just type the text out directly!”

The pokedex suddenly felt warm and heavy in Diya’s hands, the feeling spread up its arms and into its chest. <Thank you> it typed out, showing the dex’s screen to June. <That was very thoughtful.>

“Yeah, uh, why don’t you have one of your own? If you don’t mind me asking.”

The Banette thought fast. The truth would probably work well enough. <The muteness is new. *Not* your Wurmple. Other reasons.> It showed the screen and waited for June’s nod of comprehension - her Venonat fluff ball bounced as she nodded. <I was planning to get a dex of my own in Canopy Town.> Which was also true, even if it hadn’t realized the device’s importance for communication.

“Ahhhhh, I’m sorry to hear that,” June said. “If you don’t mind if I ask-”

Whatever she was going to say was cut off by the rumble of Diya’s stomach, followed by June’s stomach rumbling as well. There was a moment of silence, in which Igor took the opportunity to tap June’s shoulder and stare pointedly at The Mighty Meowth. Both of the trainers broke down laughing at the interruption, June with a full-bodied belly laugh and Diya tittering behind closed lips. “Haha, sorry,” June said, “my moms always said I’d talk myself to death if Igor wasn’t around to remind me to eat. Let’s go in. Oh and remember, it’s my treat.”

Diya nodded its enthusiastic agreement, gesturing and mentally signalling for Svartis to flow back into its clothes. Igor and its trainer both watched the process and the subsequent clothes-floofening with undisguised fascination.

June shook her head wryly as she opened the door to The Mighty Meowth. “I have so many questions for you now that you can actually answer them.”

Underneath its clothes Diya could feel a similar curiosity radiating from its Gastly. Who was this? What was that bug? She’d never seen a bug like it before. Why did it stare so much? 

Diya giggled as it followed June inside. It was bold of June to assume it and Svartis didn’t have just as many questions for her, now that it could ask them of her. 

Any questions it might have had fled its mind as it walked inside the buffet though. A rush of smells hit the Banette like a wave. It was the first time it had smelled food in the flesh and the combined smells of all the buffet’s food was … overwhelming. Chowders, fried potatoes, piles of steaming scrambled eggs, noodles simmering in broth, fluffy flatbread and rolls, fried rice, noodles, dumplings, fluffy stuffed buns, pidgey and piloswine meat drenched in thick sauces, chopped fruits. The combined weight of all of it was beyond the Banette’s ability to process. 

If pressed to say what it felt like though … it felt like warmth, and safety. It felt like a home should.

Diya didn’t know what its face looked like in that moment, but it must have had some kind of expression on its face because June looked up at it and smiled. “Yeah there’s a reason I suggested this place. It’s your first day away from home, right?”

She waited for a hesitant nod from Diya.

“Right. Well they have a lot of good comfort food here. Helps with the homesickness. They have filling comfort food too, and I figure after that trek last night you must be more starving than I am. Go on, get some food. I’ll pay for us and grab a booth over there by the windows.”

And Diya wasted no time doing exactly that. It rushed to the back of the restaurant where rows of counters held trays of food over baths of hot water to keep them warm. It beelined for the chowder first, the food it thought it could most easily slurp down without opening its mouth. It grabbed a bowl, filled it with some sort of barely identifiably but delicious smelling seafood chowder and-

It was about to rush back over to the booth June had picked out for them when some of the dumplings caught its eye. A surge of memories hit it, from when the boy had been invited over to the neighbor’s house for dinner. 

The neighbors were a large family and always made extra for dinner. The boy would gorge himself on the dumplings they made whenever he was invited over, and he always left their home fat and happy long after the sun set. And Diya remembered those same dinners too, from its own perspective. Because every evening the boy came home fed like that, the Shuppet had gone hungry with no grief of the boy’s for it to feed on. That had never been a bad thing though. It hadn’t been able to imagine a better reason to go hungry.

Diya stared at the dumplings with an ache in its chest. It … really wanted to eat those. 

The Banette piled a few smaller potstickers on a plate. They were bite-sized, maybe it’d be able to squeeze them in past its lips. Or something. 

Stars above, it was going to cry if it couldn’t figure out a way to eat them, wasn’t it?

June raised an eyebrow when Diya settled into their booth. “That’s all you’re getting? Well, just remember you can go back for seconds if you want. Now, I’m gonna go get my own food. Watch Igor for me will you? He’ll go for the food if I bring him over there.” The bug trainer muttered under her breath, “Learned that one the hard way.”

June set her pokemon down on the table and got up to leave. She made it two steps before turning around. “Oh and watch your food around him. He’s faster than he looks.” The bug trainer glared at her pokemon. “Stay. Do not eat Diya’s food,” she said slowly, enunciating each word clearly, “I am going to feed you.”

Igor stared impassively at June until she walked off. Once she was gone he rotated his head to stare Diya in the eyes. Then, slowly, his gaze dropped to Diya’s chowder and potstickers.

The ghost trainer slowly reached an arm around the food, shielding the plate and bowl and pulling them closer.

“Bllliiiiiiiiiiiiihhhkkhhkhkhkh,” Igor hissed. His mandibles wriggled.

If Diya was going to figure out how to eat those potstickers, it had better do so before June was back to see its probably clumsy experimentation. And before Igor decided to take them for himself.

The first attempt to just push a potsticker through loosely closed lips was partially successful. It only lost a wisp of soul-stuff around the edges of the potsticker -mostly the crispy inflexible part where the dough had been pinched together- but that was still enough to be visible. And even with Diya only losing the slightest sliver with each dumpling it would be feeling pretty faint after eating a whole plate. 

So long as it had sacrificed a tiny sliver of soul to squeeze the potsticker in though, Diya might as well eat it. The Banette smiled as it chewed down on the potsticker. That -it swallowed past a lump in its throat- that was home tasted like.

Well, it certainly wasn’t going to stop trying after that. Besides, even if that wasn’t a viable method for eating potstickers it might be able to squeeze through some other foods that way. Maybe some of the buffet’s chopped fruit. The strawberries had looked malleable enough. 

Its next attempt was a clear failure. Attempting to suck in air while rushing a potsticker into its mouth just resulted in a pained choking fit and a worried Svartis. And it still lost bits of its soul anyway. It needed to stop doing that, it could not be healthy in the long term.

Igor stared some more at Diya with its unblinking compound eyes. “Bliiiiiiiiihhkkhhkh,” he hissed. He clearly had opinions about dumplings going to someone who couldn’t even eat them right. Mostly of the ‘I should have those dumplings instead’ variety.

Svartis hissed back at the Blipbug from the collar of Diya’s shirt. She did a remarkable job of imitating him too, letting out a long thin, “Gliiiiiiiiiiiiihhhhhhh”. Diya pet the poofy shoulders of its shirt. That was a good Gastly, protecting their food.

Alright. One more try. Maybe if it covered its mouth while eating that would do the trick. Diya cupped a bite-sized dumpling in its hand. It held its hand to its face, covering it from chin to nose and cheek to cheek while pressing the dumpling to its mouth. Then, with its mouth covered, it carefully opened its lips and grabbed the dumpling, pulling it inside. Once the dumpling was secured it sucked in a quick breath through its fingers to suck in any soul that had escaped.

Success! The dumpling was in its mouth and its soul was entirely in its body. It had won! Diya chewed on its hard-won dumpling, basking in the warmth of good food and victory.

Once Diya was done chewing it registered a mental nudge from Svartis. A nudge filled with … regret and failure? Diya blinked rapidly and looked down at its poofed up clothes. What was wrong?

“Svaaaarrrtis,” the Gastly said sadly.

Diya blinked some more. What? What had happe-

Where had the rest of its dumplings gone? 

Igor stood on the other end of the table, unblinking eyes still fixed on Diya and Svartis. He was wiping his mandibles down with tiny arm-like appendages inside his mouth. 

There was a very rude word Diya wanted to say and it was a terrible shame it couldn’t. Before it could figure out the ethics of setting its friend’s pokemon on fire just a little bit though, June came back. She had two plates, one piled high with rice and noodles and strips of sauce-soaked meat and the other piled with chopped fruit.

“Here Igor,” she said, petting the pokemon’s head fondly, “this is for being such a good boy and waiting.” She placed the fruit plate in front of him. “And this is for me. And not you.” She settled into the booth with the other plate in front of herself.

The Banette glared impotently at the dastardly bug being rewarded for his misdeeds before it remembered the pokedex and its text app. There was something it could do about this! 

<Igor took my dumplings> it typed out, turning the screen to June.

She gasped when she saw the screen. “Igor!” June cried. “No, bad! That was bad!” She grabbed the Blipbug in one hand and the plate of fruit in the other, separating them. Igor struggled against his trainer, scrabbling at the smooth surface of the table in a futile effort to reach the fruit. “You’re on time-out. You couldn’t wait to eat, so now you’re going to take a minute before you can eat the fruit.”

“I’m sorry about that,” she apologized, turning to face Diya. She kept one hand on Igor to fend off his angry attempts to regain his rightful fruit. “I swear I feed him enough. It’s just that I got him when I was little and, well, good luck trying to explain to little-me why she shouldn’t feed her precious pet pokemon from her own plate at the dinner table.” She sighed deeply. “Now he’s convinced that if it’s on a plate it’s for him.”

The Banette tried its best to ignore the part of itself that was squealing over how cute that mental image of little-June feeding her larval Blipbug was. It was failing pretty badly though, so to avoid giving in and forgiving the little bug it turned its attention to Svartis. It was okay, it pushed at her. She couldn’t have prevented the bad mean bug from stealing their food. And he was very bad for taking the dumplings.

It was fine, Svartis sent back smugly. She wasn’t upset at all. Also Diya should take a look at its plate.

Diya looked down at its dumpling-less plate. A plate which now held a good fifth of the Blipbug’s fruit. As it watched a hazy purple ripple surrounded one of Igor’s melon slices and lifted it over to Diya’s plate. A wide evil smile spread over the Banette’s face. Yesssss. Yes this was good. Svartis had done well. 

A bit of melon slipped between Diya’s pressed lips to the sound of Igor’s horrified chittering complaints and it was music to its ears. 

The two trainers put conversation on hold and tucked into their meals, eventually joined by a released and aggrieved Igor. Diya found that lifting its bowl of chowder to its lips and drinking from the rim worked just as well as it had with water. And using a fork to break the fruit up into long thin pieces it could slip through its lips did the trick too. It was getting a hang of this eating thing.

Both of the trainers inhaled their meals in minutes, and went back for seconds.

This time, less occupied by the demanding bite of hunger, Diya took closer stock of the trays of food. What June had said the other night, that they’d be coming in just after the lunch rush, was readily apparent. Most of the trays were less than half full, and some were outright empty. There was enough food left for the two diners though, and they stocked their plates again.

The experiment of choice this time was noodles in a bowl of broth and a giant steamed bun full of meat -a bao- bigger than both of Diya’s fists. Along with some more chowder just in case Diya had trouble eating those. It also got two smaller plates of fruit. One for itself and one to put between Igor and the rest of its food. Hopefully that would suffice as a peace offering, and keep the little devil away from Diya’s nourishment.

The noodles were easy enough to eat. Pressing them to its mouth with chopsticks and slurping them down worked. It was a little messy, but didn’t earn more than a carefully muffled laugh from June at its first less than perfect attempts. And eating the bao was perfectly safe, if frustratingly slow. It just had to press the bun to its lips, take a little careful nibble, and make sure not to get greedy.

After their seconds the two trainers' stomachs were mostly settled and they returned to their conversation. Diya was still nibbling on the last of its bao, but it could type with its free hand even with its mouth occupied.

“So,” June sighed, leaning back contendely, “you have a Gastly now. A Gastly which wasn’t around you last night and which has never been inside a pokeball, according to the dex scan. How in the world did that happen?”

<First, her name is Svartis.> Diya replied. It mentally nudged Svartis to say hello. 

She manifested a wide mouth just under her trainer’s scarf. “Svarrrrtiissssss!” she introduced herself.

June’s eyes bugged out and she coughed. “What?!” she exclaimed. “It talks?!”

<She> Diya typed, pausing to emphasize the pronoun, <can imitate words. She doesn’t understand speech. Don’t know if Gastlys can learn to speak / depends on the creature they came from.> 

Diya frowned at the pokedex as it typed. It was wonderful to be able to talk with June using it, but the Banette wasn’t very fast with it. And it felt like it was coming off as stilted, because of how it had to contract sentences to get around that.

If it was stilted June didn’t seem to pay it any mind though. “Ohhh. Well, hello then Svartis. That’s Svart- ice ,” she said, emphasizing the last syllable, “right?” She smiled at Diya’s answering nod. “So is her speech like a Murkrow then? Mimicry and a little understanding of auditory signalling?”

<Maybe.> Diya shrugged. Honestly it had no idea just how intelligent Svartis was. It knew Svartis had a sense of self and felt emotions intensely, but not much more than that. She might be only as intelligent as a Snom, or much smarter, or maybe right now she was as smart as a Snom but she had the potential to grow smarter. For that matter Diya wasn’t sure exactly how smart Snoms were supposed to be in the first place.

“Cool. So, how did you get Svartis then? I let you out of my sight for a few hours and you come back with one of the hardest to find pokemon in the world, without using one of those pokeballs I gave you. How in the world did you catch her?”

<I didn’t.> Diya replied simply. <I made her.>

The other trainer tilted her head. “Huh?”

<I found a Snom being eaten by a Spinarak.> Diya took a moment to pat and soothe Svartis as its memories of the encounter bled down their link. <Scared the Spinarak off. She was dying of venom. I helped her make the transition to the other side.>

June’s jaw slackened as the implications sunk in. When she finally found her words, questions poured out of her mouth. “Wait, what? How?! You turned a Snom into a Gastly? On purpose?”

<A Snom dying of poison, yes.>

“How does tha- oh. Ohhh. Whoa so the stories about Gastly being formed from people, or errr, pokemon too I guess, who died from poison, those are true?”

Diya nodded. It continued petting Svartis, running its hand over a poofed-up sleeve. The ghost wasn’t vocally complaining about the impressions the conversation was raising in Diya’s head. But she was still and quiet under Diya’s clothes and it wanted to make sure she didn’t feel alone.

“So…” June leaned back, raising her eyes to the ceiling as she thought. “So why isn’t the forest filled with Gastlys of dead Snom then? This can’t be something that’s common. Or even rare. Canopy Town’s gym didn’t have Gastly on its local pokemon register and if even one in a hundred thousand Spinarak kills made a Gastly there would be enough of them to notice. You said you … helped her -Svartis you called her, right?- make the transition? What does that mean?”

Diya tapped the side of its head with a finger.

“Eugh,” June let out a groan that was equal parts envious and annoyed. “Of course. Psychic. How could I forget?” She paused. “Oh. Psychic. Huhhhh.” She turned to Igor. “I wonder if you’ll be able to do that when you’re older and have all your evolution’s psychic powers. Wouldn’t that be interesting?”

Diya very carefully nodded and smiled innocently and did not write anything about how impossible that probably was. It thought it did a good job of not looking suspicious. It was a Banette after all. In a way it was puppetting its body as much as it was living through it, so its poker face should be great. The way Igor was staring at it without blinking did make Diya feel a little less confident about that, but it bravely pushed on.

<I helped Svartis become a Gastly> glossing right over the unfortunate wakeup call and how unintentional her resurrection had been <and guess what else? You’ll like this.>

“Oh?” June’s curiosity was clear on her face. “What?”

<I caught the Spinarak which envenomed her.>

“What! No way! You caught a Spinarak too?! Augh, who am I kidding, of course you did.”

<No such luck last night?>

The bug trainer shook her head. “No. Got close plenty of times but whenever I got close enough for a good throw the Spinaraks would get spooked and run off. Didn’t seem to matter how quiet I tried to be, they knew I was there. And I couldn’t outrun them in the snow. How’d you catch yours?”

<Sorry to hear that. And I waited. It eventually came back for its meal. It tried to fight me and lost.>

“Yikes. Good thing you had Svartis at that point. That could have gone a lot worse if it was just you being attacked. A-” June hesitated for a moment, worry creasing her face, “-a lot worse.”

<Svartis wasn’t awake yet. Just> Diya showed June the screen and tapped the side of its head.

“Oh. Right.” June sagged and sighed. “Of course, why was I worried. You’re magic and can light things on fire with your mind.”

The Banette saw the opportunity for a good joke and seized it. It gave Svartis directions and started typing. <There there. No need to worry.> it wrote. It turned the screen to face June as a barely visible hand of purple gas coalesced over her shoulder and patted her gently.

“Thanks Diya,” she said, reaching up to clasp the hand patting her shoulder. “But that’s-”

The other trainer looked down, where there was no arm reaching across the table. Then to her shoulder. Svartis patted her again.

“Ha ha,” she said dryly. “That’s-” she shook her head. “Okay, to be entirely serious, that’s really impressive. I was looking up psychic humans last night and not many can do what you do. Like, I know every psychic measures themself against Leader Sabrina. And sure, compared to her every other psychic is a Magikarp trying to swim with the Gyarados. But you really do have some power. That explosion last night was a lot for a psychic. And you’ve got control too apparently,” she said while looking at her shoulder. “And…”

June paused to chew on what she was going to say, struggling with what she was going to say next. It took her a few long seconds to get the words out. “If you’re going to be journeying alone, and with so little, that kind of power is important. I’m glad you’re as strong as you are. I’d be really worried for you otherwise, kid.”

Both of the trainers were quiet. Diya smiled, touched, but didn’t know what to say. And June seemed to still be chewing over something.

<About that Spin-> “Speaking of-” Diya started to type at the same time June started to speak.

“Oh sorry-” Diya shook its head and gestured for June to go first. 

Both trainers chuckled, before June finally ended the stalemate. “You first Diya. I know I talk a mile a minute, only fair if you get a word in edgewise.”

Diya took its time to type the sentences out right. It wanted to give this the weight it deserved. <About the Spinarak. It’s the first pokemon I properly caught, with a pokeball. And that’s important. But Svartis was killed by this Spinarak. And I helped her at the end, to not feel pain, but it was still a bad way to go. I don’t think it would be right to put them on the same team.>

The ghost trainer turned the pokedex to June and let her read that before continuing. She stayed quiet and let it take its time to finish its thoughts. 

<I don’t feel like it’s right to just release the Spinarak though. It’s my responsibility now. And I’m not sure it would be safe to release in the wild anyway, now that it’s experienced humans as a hostile threat. Would you be willing to take it, instead? I caught it, it’s mine to care for now, I know, but I think it would be better off with you and your team.>

The bug trainer’s expression as she read Diya’s words went from serious to fond to … determined? Diya couldn’t quite read the final expression her face settled on.

“You don’t have a pokedex yourself yet, right?” she asked.

<No. Why?>

“Do you have a traveller’s card? Or a currency card? Something that can store electronic pokedos?” 

<No.>

“Okay. I’m from another island chain so I’ve only got electronic money on me. But I’ll buy you a cheap dex at the pokecenter then, one with some storage space for electronic currency, and then I’ll pay you for the Spinarak. I’m thinking-”

<What? No! You don’t->

“-three hundred pokedos? That sounds about right to me.”

<!!! That is too much!>

“Diya,” June said sharply, “that Spinarak is valuable to me. To my family back home. It represents quite a bit of money as a farm animal. I would be taking advantage of you if I didn’t pay for it. And pay you its true worth at that.”

She kept talking, barrelling over any possible dissent, “Besides, after you give it to me I’m probably going to go back out into the forest and keep trying to find more. And I’ll be using the information you just gave me. Knowing that, for the right bait, a hungry Spinarak will eventually return to brave an encounter with a human is extremely helpful. Any Spinarak I’ll catch after this will likely be because of your help, so really I’m paying you for those catches as well.”

That ... sounded reasonable. And Diya couldn’t think of a reason to keep refusing. Even if something in the boy’s neurons was squirming and turning itself into knots, afraid to ask for a reward and sure that something about this must be too good to be true. 

“And,” the older trainer continued, her voice softening, “you’re new. And young. And, meaning no disrespect, you weren’t exactly kitted out with the full catalogue from Journeyer’s Monthly when we met. Take the money and get some nice equipment for the beginning of your journey. And take the opportunity to treat yourself with something, something you wouldn’t get yourself without a windfall like this.” She reached across the table to take one of Diya’s hands, which had convulsively clenched into a fist. “You did good, you’re doing me a favor, and you deserve it.”

June had taken its left hand, which was its dominant hand. But Diya didn’t want to let go. With its off hand Diya awkwardly typed out, <Okay. Thank you.>

“Good,” June said warmly, squeezing its hand. “Now, uh, have you had time to run its pokeball through safety and training programs at the pokecenter?”

<Not yet.>

“Oh yikes, glad I asked before I took it out. Well we’ll do that at the same time as I get you your pokedex. Sound good?”

Diya nodded and hummed its agreement. If some part of its brain was still reluctant about this, it wasn’t getting its way so Diya didn’t let it show.

“Now, uhh, the thing I wanted to ask you about. Do you, how to put this, do you have any set plans for your journey? Any commitments you need to meet at Canopy Gym or a set schedule for townhopping?”

The Banette shook its head.

“Good, good. Cus there’s an old friend of mine I wanted to introduce you to. His name’s Bashak. I’m gonna be out doing midnight forest runs for Spinaraks for the next few days. So I won’t be available much during the day. Honestly I’m going back to sleep after this, gonna see if I can’t rest some more before tonight. And so long as I won’t be available I figured you’d want a friend you could hang out with during the day. You know, someone you could attend Gym classes or go exploring with.”

That did sound nice. Really nice, actually. Diya squeezed June’s hand to signal for her to go on.

“Yeah so if you’re cool with it, I figured I’d introduce you and Bashak. I think you’ll get along pretty well actually.” June snickered. “He’s not the biggest talker either.”

Diya gave June an unimpressed look. It awkwardly typed out, <Is he mute too?>

“No, no, he can talk. He’s got a lovely singing voice actually. You’ll definitely get a chance to hear it too, he hums a lot while he works. He’s just of the opinion that if one word will do, one word will do.”

That was finally enough reason for Diya to take its hand back so it could type more complex sentences. <Oh? Did you steal his lifelong allotment of words when you were kids?>

“Hah! You know, you’re joking, but yes I actually did. Our parents say that I got into the habit of talking for him when we were little, responding to questions aimed at him and asking for stuff in his stead. They thought it was harmless and cute but next thing they knew, my family had a kid who talked for two and his family had a kid who barely talked for one. Though that said, they do claim they got the better deal out of the bargain.”

Stars and shadows, Diya thought, that explained so much about June.

“But yeah, do you want that introduction?” 

<Of course! I’d love to meet him!> The Banette grinned widely. Its master plan to make friends on its journey was already coming to fruition and it wasn’t even having to do anything. June’s friend was just becoming its friend by osmosis! Oh, was this how friendship worked? Would Diya just passively acquire its friends’ friends until it was topped up on friendship? The Banette giggled. Truly friendship was the gift that kept on giving.

Its giggling triggered a pained look on June’s face though. “Just-” she started to say. She chewed on the inside of her cheek for a moment, “Look I’m not saying you can’t giggle creepily around Bashak, because yeah you’re a mute psychic trainer with a ghost pokemon, it comes with the territory. I get it, I really do. You’ve got a solid aesthetic going for you kid. But like … could you wait at least fifteen minutes before your first creepy giggle around him? Just fifteen minutes! I want you to make a good first impression.”

Well now. Diya just couldn’t pass up an opportunity like that. Just as it had asked Svartis to pat June on the shoulder earlier, it asked Svartis for help again. Diya started giggling harder while its pokemon’s own laughter started up in stereo. “Gahahahahahahahaha!” the ghost pokemon cackled. “Hehehehehehehehehe,” Diya giggled behind closed lips. Their combined laughter was discordant and asynchronous, as if two different out of time voices were coming from the same throat.

June closed her eyes and sighed heavily. “You’re lucky you’re such a cute kid.”

-----

The two trainers went back for thirds before leaving the buffet, but eventually it was time to go. Diya needed time to go shopping before the pokecenter’s stores closed if it wanted to spend the money June was giving it before dark, and June needed to go back to sleep in preparation for another midnight expedition. 

Just as they were leaving though, June stopped right outside the doorway, which almost caused Diya to run into the shorter trainer. “Hey, uh, I just had a thought,” she said. “Probably a stupid one but I really should ask. Uh, is your Gastly safe to be indoors? Around people? I mean clearly we’re okay, but I wanted to make sure - don’t they emit a poison gas or something? Is there any possibility of long-term effects from small doses?”

The sudden question, coming only after she’d spent a good hour eating and talking around Svartis indoors, launched Diya into a full blown laughing fit. Svartis eagerly joined in as it caught the shape of Diya’s thoughts. 

June sighed. “Dumb question?”

The ghost trainer shook its head. <No, good question> it typed, <just funny you took an hour to ask. You even scanned her when you met! Didn’t your pokedex say ghost/poison?>

“Look she was all tiny and small and new and I had a lot of questions, okay?”

<Questions more important than “Will I die around her?”>

June let out another deeply aggrieved sigh. “She is very tiny for a Gastly. Which, trust me, I have all kinds of theories about that I’ll want to run by you later. It was distracting.”

<Well, no worries. It’s not poison. It’s smoke in the phantom world. Smothers souls. Not a real gas, so she can control its spread. She keeps it contained.>

Diya turned the pokedex so June could read it. Its arm started to get a little uncomfortable as she stared at it. And kept staring at it.

“That third sentence makes it sound like you can physically see the phantom world.”

<Yes.>

“The hypothetical phantom world.”

Diya showed June the same <Yes.> again.

“The hypothetical phantom world in which souls can be seen. Souls which are … smothered … by Svartis’ smoke.”

That got Diya to tilt its head. Huh. Did humans not know about the phantom world? Or know about souls? No, they definitely did, it had gotten the spoken phrase ‘phantom world’ from the boy’s mind. And the boy definitely knew souls were a thing. But the boy had only known of the phantom world as a story and never seen a soul in person. To him the phantom world had been something he found in children’s books and ghost stories, and his mental picture of souls not much more concretely imagined.

Huh. Did other humans not know of this any more precisely than the boy had? <Yes> Diya typed to June, <the actual phantom world. I’ve been there.>

With a very deliberate effort June closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “Okay. You know what? We can talk about all this later. Much later. Last night was a very long night, I still need some more sleep, and using psychic powers to perform necromancy on dying pokemon was already a lot to take in. And we still need to get you a pokedex so I can pay you for that Spinarak. So you can upend my understanding of the afterlife tomorrow. Or the day after. Sometime that isn’t right now.” She sighed deeply. “Svartis is safe to be around though?”

Diya nodded. <Absolutely.>

“Okay. Good. All I need to know right now. Come on, let’s go back to the pokecenter, get you that dex.”

The Banette nodded eagerly and followed after its friend. It was looking forward to getting its own pokedex to type with, even if it still felt a bit uncomfortable about how much June was paying it for the Spinarak. Maybe it could even get a model designed to be typed on with only one hand. That would be so convenient. 

Before Diya let itself get too wrapped up in its daydreams of one-handed keyboards designed for lefties though, it did have one thing to do. It needed to thank Svartis for keeping her grief smoke so tightly under wraps the whole meal. Focusing on their bond, Diya made sure to push its appreciation for her hard work and discipline towards her.

It got guilty discomfort back in response.

… she had kept her grief smoke pulled in close, hadn’t she? Hadn’t she?

 Svartis assured Diya that she would have absolutely said something if anyone had been in danger-

She hadn’t managed to keep her spiritual poison to herself had she? Oh stars no Diya was going to have to tell June that they had poisoned her and her Blipbug’s souls. How bad was it?

It wasn’t her fault! Exerting control over her grief smoke for that long was exhausting! But it hadn’t been a problem anyway! Whenever she let her grief smoke slip out while she was wrapped around Diya, the Banette had just breathed it right in! She might not have managed to keep control over it the whole time, but none had ended up leaking out!

Svartis let out the empathic equivalent of a pitiful sniffle. She wasn’t bad. No one had gotten hurt. And she really would have said something if Diya hadn’t been sucking in all the excess grief. She promised.

… and now Diya felt like a jerk. Svartis was still just a baby in multiple ways, even younger than it was. She’d done her best and no harm had come when that hadn’t been enough. 

The ghost trainer apologized, sending remorse to Svartis. It had been wrong of it to imply she would have let its friend get hurt rather than alerting it. In the future though, things like a loss of control should definitely be brought to her trainer's attention as soon as possible. Even if they were lucky enough that it wasn’t hurting anyone.

Svartis sent back another mental sniffle. It was okay?

It was. And it was sorry for reacting like it had. She would tell it anything like that happened again right, even if Svartis didn’t think it was important?

Hesitant happiness welled up in the Gastly as she sent back assurances that yes, she definitely would.

Well then, there were no problems at all. And as part of its apology and as thanks for Svartis agreeing to that, it would get her a treat with the money June was paying it.

The sentient cloud of ghostly grief grinned. Its understanding of the whole transaction between Diya and June was hazy but the money … that was the stuff it was getting for getting rid of the Spinarak? The treat would be acquired because of that stuff?

Yes. Yes it would.

It was with the utmost satisfaction that Svartis informed Diya that all was good in the world.

Diya smiled and petted one of its poofed up sleeves. So long as Svartis was happy and no one was poisoned, Diya was happy too.

Now it just had to figure out what qualified as a treat for Gastlys.

Chapter Text

Apricorns are an unusual tough-skinned fruit native to the Johto region. They possess an internal pocket of folded space common among some types of pokemon -particularly Water types- but rarely seen in the plant kingdom. This ‘bigger on the inside’ effect is used to pack a great deal of water and nutrition in a small space, which enables the extremely rapid growth of seeds inside the Apricorn.

Specialists can hollow out Apricorns and modify them to allow them to function as pokeballs and storage balls, holding creatures and objects much larger than their apparent size. Before the invention of modern pokeballs these fascinating fruits were the standard method for capturing pokemon. Though the modern pokeball is considered superior to older Apricorn balls, the process used to create the modern pokeball is in fact based on Apricorns and some trainers still prefer to use Apricorns to this day.

-----

Diya followed June up to the Pokecenter counter. It felt a little odd about coming here in broad daylight after having snuck into the Pokecenter, but it tried to ignore that feeling. It had needed to sneak in and that was that. A young teen showing up on foot in the middle of the night would have raised questions and it needed people to not ask to speak with its parents.

“Hey Claire!” June called out as they entered the Pokecenter’s lobby.

A middle-age woman at the desk in the back of the lobby looked up from her work. “June!” she called back. “How nice to see you. Who’s your new friend?”

June glanced up at Diya and then back at Claire. “This is Diya. They’re a new trainer, just got into town this morning so I’m showing them around. First things first though, they’re mute and they type to talk which is a bit of a problem cus they left their tablet behind on accident. They’re using my dex right now, but would you mind helping to set them up with a dex of their own?”

Diya shot June a slightly relieved smile as she glossed over the more awkward parts of Diya’s story. June seemed to accept the odd hour of Diya’s arrival and the fact it had arrived without a way to communicate without question, but the less people it tested that with the better.  The Banette walked up to the counter and smiled, typing into June’s pokedex. <Hello Claire! I’m Diya. And yes, I could use a pokedex, thank you.>

Claire smiled when Diya turned the pokedex to face her. “Oh I can help you with that dear, no worries. You’d be surprised just how many kiddos start their journeys without getting a pokedex beforehand. I’ve got a whole cabinet right here.” She rummaged under her desk, pulling out rectangular packages with different models of red pokedex on the front. “You said you’re a new trainer right?”

The Banette nodded.

“Well then you can get one of the free models of course,” Claire said with a sweet smile, tapping four of the packages, “but if you’re going to be using your pokedex for typing a lot … hmm. What’s your budget, Diya dear?”

Diya glanced back at June with an uncertain expression on its face. The other trainer stepped in confidently, taking over, “I’ll be paying for Diya, Claire, don’t worry. It’s just easier until they’ve got their dex and are hooked up to their financial accounts. And a few extra bells and whistles will be fine, I think. A touch-and-swipe keyboard obviously, and maybe a larger screen?” She looked at Diya for confirmation, who nodded.

The woman helping them hummed her agreement and nodded. “Of course, of course. You should also consider getting a good battery though. If you’ll be using it often and it’s so important for you to be able to communicate, you wouldn’t want it going dark on you.”

<That makes sense. What would that cost?>

“Oh not that much at all dear. This one-” she touched a package which showed a pokedex with a large sleek case and a recessed blue scanning dome, “-is just twenty pokedos more than the free cutoff for new trainers. And I can switch out a better battery for you for just another fifteen.”

<That sounds good.> Diya typed as quickly as it could. June had a look in her eyes, like she might be one of those people who bartered and haggled and exhaustively went over every single aspect of their purchase to get the perfect fit, and Diya didn’t want her to waste an hour getting it the perfect pokedex. Diya was more than happy getting a pokedex that was good enough. If it could type easily, show people text easily, and the dex wouldn’t run out of charge, that was enough for it.

It thanked Claire and June, and then gave June her pokedex back so she could pay. It still felt a little bit uncomfortable about June giving it so much money, but maybe it could just … help her catch more pokemon in the future? To make up for it? Yeah that sounded like a good plan. They could even make it a friend thing, catching pokemon together!

June took Diya over to a table in the corner of the lobby and helped it unpack and set up its new pokedex. It had never done this before as a Shuppet obviously and the boy had never had any personal electronics either, so it was a totally new experience for Diya. June’s help was very much needed and appreciated. Which Diya gladly told her with its new pokedex as soon as it was set up.

<Thank you June!> The Banette walked around the table to give its friend a hug. It hugged her carefully this time, making sure Svartis didn’t get squished out of her hiding place.

June enthusiastically hugged Diya back. “Aww, of course Diya. No problem.” Then she yawned. “Well, not gonna lie. Maybe a little bit of a problem, I really should be getting back to sleep. Worth it though, I really am glad to have helped. Here, just give me your pokedex and that Spinarak ball. I’ll send the money to your dex, take the Spinarak over to the counter for training, and then I’ll go back to my room and crash. Oh, and we’ve gotta set up your meeting with Bashak tomorrow, that too.”

Diya handed June its new pokedex and the Spinarak’s pokeball, noting when it got the pokedex back that the internal balance said three hundred pokedos and not the two hundred and sixty five June should have given it taking the pokedex’s cost into account. 

It didn’t bother trying to argue about it with June. It knew it would lose. And besides, it felt … warm. Its heart ached in a good way when it saw the extra money and it didn’t want to disrupt that feeling arguing about it.

It followed June over to the pokecenter’s counter after that, where she handed the Spinarak over to Claire. “Hey Claire, just one last thing. I’ve got a new Spinarak-” “You finally caught one, how lovely dear!” “-well, Diya here caught it and was kind enough to trade it to me. Would you mind putting it through some training cycles?”

“Of course!” Claire said with a smile on her face. “And oh, Diya you’re a new trainer, have you ever seen the virtual training process before?” She waited for Diya to shake its head before continuing. “Would you like to?” She chuckled at the very enthusiastic nod that got. “I thought so.”

“First things first,” Claire continued, “June do you have a custom training program? And a name for this lovely little Spinarak, of course?”

“Yes I do, its name will be Skare and just let me find my training program on my pokedex. Oh and would you mind adding on some extra cycles of human desensitization? I’m a little worried this one may be hostile to people and I don’t want it to bite anyone.”

“I can do that dear, of course.” Claire took June’s pokedex and slid it into a device on her desk which looked like a disk reader. She took the Spinarak’s pokeball as well and placed it in what was -as far as Diya could tell- a very high tech egg carton on her desk, partially filled with a handful of other pokeballs. She spent a few minutes typing away at her computer, setting up the process.

The process was clearly second nature to Claire though and she didn’t need to pay much attention to it. Instead she kept up a steady stream of chatter with the trainers as she typed. “I love the Piplup scarf dear, are they a favorite of yours?”

<A little bit, yeah.> Diya struggled a bit with the unfamiliar swipe-to-type interface of its new pokedex, but already it could tell this would be an improvement. <I just think they’re cute.>

“You’re not the only one, not at all. The gift shop has an absolute treasure trove of Piplup merchandise if you want, you should take a look later. I’m sure you’ll find something you like.”

<Really?>

“I saw it earlier,” June piped in. “You should check it out if you like them. It’s pretty impressive, especially for an island with no native Piplups.” She said the last bit with a wry lilt to her voice.

“Eh, we’re home to an ice gym dear. People expect Piplups. Even if they’re technically classified as Water pokemon, they’re what comes to mind when people think of cute cold-weather pokemon. And the merchandise does sell, so they’re not going away any time soon. Ah, there we are!” Claire exclaimed, lifting her hands from her keyboard. “All set up. Want to take a look?”

Diya nodded enthusiastically, and June leaned in as well.

Claire turned her computer screen around to show what was going on inside the Spinarak’s pokeball. The scene was a simple one, a snowy forest and a Spinarak hanging onto a tree. What was shown on the screen clearly wasn’t real though. The whole scene was blurry as if in a dream, with no defining details to be seen on anything but the Spinarak.

“These programs always start with some basic desensitization,” Claire told them. She pressed a button on her keyboard. “Just watch.”

A humanoid figure appeared at the edge of the monitor. It didn’t have any clear details, just the blurry suggestion of a face and clothes swimming in and out of focus. It walked along the edge of the scene, keeping its distance from the Spinarak. It looked over to the Spinarak a few times, but never approached. Less than a minute later it had walked off the screen.

“Now we give the Spinarak some time to rest,” Claire told them. “It make not look agitated, but a close encounter with a large creature like a human can actually be very stressful for a small stealth oriented pokemon like a Spinarak. The training program reads its vitals to see how affected it was by the brush with a human and gives it time to calm down if it’s feeling anxious or aggressive.” 

Claire tapped another key and the scene suddenly blurred. Trees whipped back and forth in a fast-forwarded wind and the Spinarak jumped from place to place as it switched positions on the tree in sped-up time. A few seconds later -and who knew how much time that was for the Spinarak- the scene jolted abruptly back to normal speed as another blurry human appeared at the edge of the screen.

“Sorry dears, I know it’s not the most action-packed at the beginning-”

<No no no!> Diya exclaimed. <This is really cool. The program helping the Spinarak to be less afraid of humans, right?>

The older woman beamed. “Exactly! As the program continues the human will get closer and closer to the Spinarak. Eventually it will start leaving treats, hanging around in the Spinarak’s space, even touching it. And the program has all kinds of contingencies depending on how the Spinarak reacts to that. If it attacks the human its attacks will do nothing and the program will give it a sense of hunger afterward. Not real hunger, but something like the kind of hunger you feel in a dream. It’ll be as if it tried to bite steel and failed a hunt because of it. And if it approaches the human in a positive way without attacking, it gets virtual treats.”

June jumped in, “Yeah and it goes a lot further than this of course. Training it to be cool with crowds, busy cities, people being excited, people getting hurt, pokemon battle situations, all kinds of stuff. I’ve got a whole extra sequence in there training it to be calm around other lots of other bug pokemon for long periods and around spinning and weaving equipment.”

“Mhm,” Claire nodded. “Sensible for a farm girl like yourself. After that of course there’s the exciting stuff I know you kiddos are really interested in. Teaching it to respond to its name and basic commands, how to fight, all that fun stuff. You’ll probably have to wait a bit for that though dears. Bugs are slow to train and even at full speed the program probably won’t reach that point until tomorrow.”

“And speaking of tomorrow,” June said, “I ought to get going. Got a busy night tonight and I really do need to get some more sleep. Diya, I texted Bashak, he’s going to be catching Swinubs in the forest tomorrow and says you’re welcome to come with and help. He’ll be getting started bright and early though, at the crack of dawn, so make sure you get your sleep tonight.”

<Cool, thanks! Where should I meet him?>

“Here, give me your pokedex for a second-” June pulled up the map function on Diya’s pokedex and highlighted a location in the forest on the edge of town, typing in a few directions to go with it. “Bashak isn’t staying in the pokecenter, he’s camping out on the edge of town. If you meet him at his camp just before dawn that’d be great.”

<Thanks June! I look forward to meeting him. How will I recognize him though?>

That drew a laugh from June. “Hah. You won’t be able to miss him. Bashak stands out. He looks like he walked straight out of some documentary about transhumants.”

<Transhumans?> The Banette asked, perplexed. <The people who really like advanced prosthetics?>

“Pffft. Nono, transhumants,” June said, stressing the last t. “It’s a type of herder. His family are halfway between nomads and more static farmers like my family. They settle in my home town during the winter and go up into the mountains with their herds in the summer. He’ll be easy to spot. Handmade wool clothes, handmade wool tent, and even odds whether he’s spinning wool thread at any given second. Seriously, you can’t miss him. Now I really need to go to sleep, so if there’s nothing else…”

<Nothing else, you sleep well June! And thank you again, so much!> Diya stepped forward to give June another big hug.

“Awww. Thanks Diya. It’s really been my pleasure though. Oh and Claire, one last thing, would you mind setting Diya up with a room and showing them where to buy some gear?”

“Of course! Sleep well dear!” Claire and Diya both waved June goodbye as she walked up the stairs to the pokecenters bedrooms. Claire turned to Diya once she’d left. “So, what gear do you need Diya?”

What did it need? <Umm, everything?>

Claire put a hand over her mouth to stifle a laugh, but not an unkind one. “I’m sorry dear, I promise I’m not laughing at you. I’m only laughing because you’re not the first trainer I’ve seen to set off from home a little unprepared. It’s much more common than you’d think. Hmmm,” she looked up and down, giving the young trainer a once-over. “First things first, clothes. I take it you’re not used to the climate?”

It was, but it could see how its sneakers, layered clothes, and the lack of a proper jacket would give that impression and it didn’t try to correct her. <Yes I need new clothes.>

“Mhm. Let’s see, you’ll also want pokeballs, storage balls, potions, trail food, water, plenty of water containers dear, camping gear,” she listed off items on her fingers, “and the camping gear includes sleeping equipment, fire starters and fuel, cooking equipment, water purifiers-”

The Banette, who was feeling more unprepared by the second, held up its hands to slow her down. Three hundred pokedos had felt like a lot when June pushed it on Diya, but with each item Claire listed it felt a bit more worried that maybe three hundred pokedos wasn’t going to be enough. <Let’s start with essentials,> it asked, <things I’ll need around Canopy Town for the next few days.>

Claire stifled another laugh. “I’m sorry Diya, that was probably a bit overwhelming wasn’t it? Come with me, I’ll show you around the center’s stores so you know where everything is and then you can take your time figuring out what you need.” She put up a sign on her desk saying she was on break. “How about clothes first? Some good winter boots to start, at least.”

Diya nodded enthusiastically. <That would be great. And thank you again for your help.>

“Of course dear. It’s why I’m here.”

The very first thing Diya bought was a pair of lovely comfortable boots. Its current sneakers weren’t exactly appropriate for the weather, and were kind of worn down and growing too small to boot. But these boots were perfect. They were a nice forest green and laced up past Diya’s ankles. Diya thought they looked good. But more importantly they were warm and comfy and roomy enough to grow into and a few experimental jumps up and down had Diya convinced they’d have just the right give once it broke them in. 

Finding clothes was a bit harder. Checking the prices told Diya it could easily eat up all of June’s money buying a full wardrobe if it let itself get carried away. What it needed to get was a few cheap sets of inner layer clothes it could wash regularly and then one good outer layer it could wear over the rest. And the roomier the better, so Svartis could shelter from the wind inside it without trouble.

It looked over and tried on dozens of long jackets, trying to find something good. And some of them were good and maybe worth buying. But then it found it. And suddenly Diya didn’t have to settle for good because it had found something that was perfect. Tucked away in the back of a clearance section, marked down and down and down with clearance tags dating back almost a year, was a Mismaigus costume. 

The label didn’t say it was a Mismagius costume, simply calling it a paired hat and wool cloak. But Diya couldn’t imagine what else it was meant to be. The cloak was a dark purple with a lighter purple trim, and the hat was in the same colors and of a style which could only be described as a witch’s hat. The Banette ran its hands over the cloak wonderingly, marveling at how soft and tightly woven the wool was. It even had pockets on the inside. How had anyone not bought this?! It was perfect. 

The Banette rushed into the changing room to try on its Mismagius outfit. It fit! It was a little long, almost brushing the floor, but Diya bet a silk farmer like June would have a sewing kit it could borrow to take in the hem. 

Come on, Diya beckoned Svartis giddily, come under this and tell me if it works for you. 

Svartis flowed under the cloak, marveling at how much room there was. The Gastly pushed on the edges of the cloak and the sleeves from the inside. She giggled as they fluttered, pawing at them with her gaseous body like a kitten might paw at curtains. This is fun! she exclaimed.

Diya got a glimpse of itself in the changing room mirror as she did that. Oh! It thought. Do that again, do that again! In the mirror Diya’s dark purple cloak billowed and rustled as if in a phantom breeze. The Banette giggled with delight. Again! it prompted, Again! It sent Svartis a mental impression of what it was seeing too, prompting her to laugh as well.

This was the best. It couldn’t have hoped for anything better than this. It thought back to what June had told it, that creepy giggling came with the territory of being a mute psychic trainer with a ghost pokemon. Well, it couldn’t wait to see what her reaction to this was, because a ghost cloak fluttering in a nonexistent breeze fit with that aesthetic even better. And the hat was amazing too! As a Shuppet Diya had always been a little envious of how Misdreavuses got hats when they evolved, but now it had a big cool hat of its own!

The Banette didn’t wait to finish the rest of its purchases. It rushed to buy the cloak and hat, taking them off only long enough to buy them and wriggling back into them the moment it could. It had a theme now and it intended to play into it as much as possible. 

Its subsequent excitement fueled the purchase of … maybe a few more scarfs than it should have bought. But the Banette justified them to itself as necessary fashion accessories. Its mouth did need to be covered. And if it was going to be wearing the same cloak and hat every day, having different scarves it could wear to change its appearance a bit each day was important. That way people would be less likely to ask questions about why it didn’t have a full wardrobe.

… it had drawn the line at getting itself a second Piplup scarf, surely that was enough self-restraint?

Diya needed a storage ball for all its new clothes after that, so it went to check out the camping supplies. It bought a small box with a few sliding drawers to keep its personal items in and a storage ball to keep the box in. Storage balls had difficulty storing things which they couldn’t register as a single contiguous object, so containers like the box were necessary to store multiple items in them.

After that it got a sleeping bag, a shelter tarp, canteens, and the other camping basics it needed. It had to skimp on some gear to save money and would be relying heavily on its powers to conjure fire and cut wood -shatter it, to be honest- without tools. But Diya was confident it would manage alright. The camping gear got shoved into the sleeping bag and the sleeping bag went into another storage ball.

Finally it picked up a dozen basic pokeballs at a generous young trainer’s discount, several spray bottles of healing potion, and a small tin of frostbite salve in case of any run-ins with ice pokemon.

Diya slipped the purchases into its cloak’s many pockets, taking stock of its inventory as it did. It had everything it needed to catch pokemon. It was outfitted like a proper trainer now. The young trainer smiled giddily. Stars above, it was actually doing this.

The Banette did an impromptu spin in the store, giggling as its purple cloak flared out and it felt the weight of the pokeballs lining its pockets shift about. It was a real trainer now! It had pokeballs and potions and it could camp out in the wild searching for pokemon. And it hadn’t had to steal any of it! It had earned this by capturing the Spinarak for June. 

And yes, June had almost certainly overpaid and Diya would have to try to pay her back. But it could do this. It could capture pokemon and sell the ones which didn’t fit its team to other trainers or to pokecenters, and make enough money to keep itself on its feet. This wasn’t just a dream the boy had held onto in desperate moments anymore, this was a life Diya was living.

It could do this.

Diya checked its remaining funds. It had some seventy pokedos left. If it took advantage of the pokecenter’s free accommodations and ate and slept here, and bought cheap trail food to eat while searching for pokemon, that was enough to last it a good while. It could probably afford to use some of what it had left to get some of the more advanced equipment. The basic equipment it had bought barely scratched the surface of what it could buy after all. The pokecenter stocked so much more: speciality pokeballs, combat potions, pokemon repellents and attractors, field guides, special training modules-

And it probably should get some of those. Maybe a lock-on pokeball to catch flying types and a chill-resistant pokeball in case it stumbled on a Frosmoth. Those would be useful and make it a better trainer. But … 

There was an item in the pokecenter’s gift shop it had spotted earlier, when Claire had been talking about the center’s Piplup merchandise. And ... June had told Diya to not just buy equipment with the money. She’d told it to also buy something nice for itself. The new Mismagius cloak and hat didn’t count no matter how much it loved them, and the same went for its new scarves. Those were still necessary winter clothing it needed to have, and finding good fits for itself wasn’t the same thing as buying itself a gift.

The boy whose journey Diya had inherited would have gotten the specialty pokeballs. Diya knew that. The journey would have been the most important thing to him, and being a good trainer the point of the journey. He would have denied himself the little pleasures so he could be the best he could. After all, he’d already spent his whole childhood learning how to do without.

Diya didn’t buy the specialty pokeballs.

Because June had the right idea. There was more to life than being a perfect trainer. There was no point in reaching for a goal it would be happy to achieve if it sacrificed happiness to get there.

So Diya walked into the gift shop and bought a giant meter-tall stuffed Piplup. It cost it just over half its remaining funds and put any thought of specialty pokeballs out of its budget. But the Piplup was soft. And squishy. And when Diya hugged the huge stuffed pokemon its chest filled with warmth.

Later than evening Diya fell asleep wrapped around the stuffed Piplup. All four of the young trainer’s limbs were wrapped tight around the penguin pokemon and it had arranged the Piplup’s flippers so they hugged it back. Svartis slept on the pillow next to Diya’s head, her gaseous body close enough to ruffle her young trainer’s hair as they slept.

Diya smiled in its sleep.

Chapter Text

Pokemon Centers, often abbreviated as Pokecenters, are found in most towns and cities of the Pokemon world; every major city or town holds a Pokemon Center. This is to accommodate those Trainers in need and serve as a resting spot. Pokemon Centers are often popular gathering spots for local and traveling trainers. Each Pokemon Center has at least one highly trained staff member available at all times. These Pokemon Center employees are often well regarded in their communities.

Pokemon Centers provide several critically important services to trainers free of charge. These include virtual pokemon training, virtual storage and transfer of pokemon, and healing for both pokemon and trainers. They also serve as a hub for the sale of pokemon and travel related goods. Many essential goods like pokeballs and pokedexes are sold at Pokemon Centers and these goods are often subsidized so they can be sold at a reduced cost.

-----

(Earlier that evening, before Diya went to sleep)

Claire was typing away on her computer, focused on her work, when Diya walked up to the desk. She seemed preoccupied though, so Diya waited for her to reach a stopping point. Also it couldn’t exactly call her name to get her attention and shoving a pokedex in front of her face seemed rude. So it waited.

And waited. If it poked her now after waiting so long it would probably be more awkward. What if she had already noticed Diya but her work was just really important so she couldn’t look away until it was done? Then it would be extra rude and impatient to poke her to get her attention.

The uncomfortableness was edging towards critical mass when Claire finally glanced up and blessedly resolved Diya’s anxiety for it. “Oh! Hello Diya dear, I didn’t see... oh my look at you .” 

Claire immediately pushed her chair back and walked around the desk, coming to stand eye to eye with the Banette. She looked Diya up and down, taking in its new Mismagius cloak and hat. She nodded approvingly as she looked over Diya’s outfit. “That fits you dear. Especially with the glowing pink eyes. I meant to ask earlier, is that a body modification or-?”

<It’s a psychic thing.> Diya told her. <I’m psychic.>

“Ohhhhh. That is fascinating. Looks good on you too, contrasts with your darker skin in a really interesting way. Oh wait but then- hmmm.” Claire cocked her hip and rubbed her chin with one hand. “Not to tell you your style of course, but aren’t psychics vulnerable to ghosts? Why wear a ghost pokemon outfit?”

That was news to Diya. No psychics had lived in Ledos Village, so neither Shuppet-Diya nor the boy it had bonded with had only learned so much about them. <Well it’s … how to put this> Diya typed that to buy time, furiously wondering how to explain this. The Banette eventually settled on <You know how pokemon can learn off-type moves? Psychics can learn some fairy and ghost moves too?>

Claire nodded, reading Diya’s text with interest.

<Some human psychics are like that too. I learned to do a lot of ghosty stuff as a psychic. I’m actually better at learning ghost moves than stuff like telepathy which is why-> it gestured at the pokedex.

“Ohhh. Oh of course!” Claire laughed. “That does explain why you aren’t just speaking in my mind, yes. So you’re looking to be a ghost trainer then Diya, or just playing into your psychic specialty?”

<I already am one!> Diya told her proudly. It signalled for Svartis to flow out the collar of its cloak, while rushing to reassure Claire before Svartis’ appearance could startle her. <Don’t worry about her poison gas, it’s not a problem for trained Gastly.> Turning to its companion Diya told her, Svartis say hi!

“Svartissss!” she hissed. She smiled broadly at Claire and manifested a hand to wave with. <That’s her name> Diya added, to forestall any confusion.

“Oh my,” Claire said marvelingly, “such a well trained and polite pokemon.” She inclined her head, bowing slightly. “Nice to meet you Svartis, I’m Claire.”

Svartis bobbed its head in return and then swooped back under Diya’s cloak. Apparently that was all the socializing she was interested in doing at the moment. 

“Well,” Claire said, “that is certainly an impressive starter pokemon. You’ll have to tell me sometime how you got her.”

<Later,> Diya replied, <it’s a long story. But a good one. Right now though I wanted> wait. What had Diya wanted? It had walked up to Claire’s desk for a reason, because it wanted … because it wanted …

… what had it wanted?

“Slip your mind, dear?”

<YES!>

Claire covered a laugh with her hand. “It’ll come to you, I promise. I’ll sit back down and get back to work, you just tell me when you remember what it was.” She did just that, sitting back down and placing her hands on the keyboard and looking at one of her monitors.

Oh! The monitor did it, reminding Diya of what it wanted. <I remember! Can I look at more of the Spinarak’s training?>

“If you want, of course! Just so you know though, it hasn’t reached any of the interesting stuff I know you trainers like to see. No combat training or other command following yet. For whatever reason that Spinarak is very skittish of humans and it’s still in the initial desensitization phase.”

<That … might be my fault. I beat it with psychic powers, not with Svartis.>

“Oh.”

<It might think humans are scarier than they really are.>

“Yes that would do it. Ah well, the virtual training will just take a few hours longer then. Do you still want to watch?”

Diya nodded intently. <Yes please.> It didn’t know exactly what it was hoping to see but it felt like it needed to see this. This was the fate of a pokemon it had captured and sold. It couldn’t just forget about the Spinarak and never see it again. If nothing else this Spinarak’s capture had funded the start of its journey, and it owed the bug pokemon the respect of caring about its fate.

“Okay then! Here, come around behind the desk. I’ll put it on a second screen and set it to slow down whenever something interesting happens. You can watch it while I get some other work done. Does that sound good?”

<It does. Thank you very much Claire!> The Banette settled in behind the desk to watch the rhythms of the Spinarak’s desensitization training. 

On the screen, bursts of blurry motion were punctuated by sudden stillness as the human stand-in interacted with the Spinarak. It was meditative to watch, but never wholly predictable. A dozen times in a row the Spinarak would calmly let the human pass. Then it would attack them in a frenzy three times in a row, each time sliding off the implacable figure without leaving a mark. Then an even longer period of stillness and letting the human pass.

Svartis stirred under Diya’s cloak. What are you watching? she wondered.

Could she not see the screen?

No, she sent back. Whatever senses allowed her to see out from under Diya’s clothes without eyes evidently didn’t allow her to interpret electronic screens. So, she asked again, what are you watching?

That … was a good question. What was it watching?

The Banette couldn’t help but think about the wider implications of what it was seeing play out. How long would it take for a trainer to do this in real life? How many hundreds or thousands of hours of dangerous work with the Spinarak were the pokecenter’s simulations compressing into a few days of background computer work? 

Part of why the boy it possessed had wanted to be a pokemon trainer because it seemed fun. Because it was fun. Being able to capture a Charmander and have your very own fire-breathing pet dragon was, objectively, awesome. But would the boy have felt the same way if there were hundreds of life-threatening hours of conditioning standing between capturing his pokemon and training alongside it?

For that matter there were many pokemon that simply couldn’t be safely conditioned and trained by hand. They were just too dangerous, too strong. There were still legendary and mythical pokemon like that today of course, which couldn’t be tamed even with all modern technology. There was even a gaping scar on Kenomao’s central mountain which could be seen from anywhere on the island, attesting to the terrible power of those pokemon still beyond humanity’s power to tame.

But with modern pokeballs and pokecenter simulations they were the exception. Almost every pokemon a modern trainer was likely to encounter could be caught and tamed. But Diya couldn’t help but think about what the world had been like before such marvels were invented. 

How would the boy have felt about becoming a trainer if every Rhyhorn in the world was beyond any reasonable attempt to domesticate? What if being a trainer meant making your way in a world filled with titans too powerful to tame, fending them off with only the few more naturally docile pokemon one could afford the time and risk to train? Would the boy have been so eager to go out into such a world?

Would humans in such a world be as comfortable living side by side with even less threatening pokemon like Shuppets?

Diya kept watching the simulation. The screen blurred through a rest period, slowed to show a person walking carefully forward to leave a treat at the base of the Spinarak’s tree, and then blurred through another rest period.

And, it thought, how much better this was for the pokemon themselves. This Spinarak it encountered in the wild had been so hungry it’d risked fighting a human that was ten times its weight and immune to its Scary Face ability for a single meal. That wasn’t the action of a happy and healthy pokemon. That was the action of a creature which was living on the edge of starvation. But now? Now it was going to be a silk producer on June’s farm. That meant regular meals for it, safe shelter, health checkups and medicine, enrichment activities to keep it happy and productive, and above all else, certainty . It would have the surety that tomorrow would be just as good as today.

The world had once been a much more hostile place. Now it was a place where being a trainer was so natural and easy that children went on pokemon journeys. Where pokemon was a word that meant lifelong companions and protection, and where the natural end of battle was taming and partnership. There were exceptions that loomed large, untamed borderlands and the territories of legendary pokemon, but by and large the world was a fundamentally safe place.

Diya? Svartis prodded one more time. What are you watching?

Its Gastly wouldn’t get all the details if Diya tried to explain this to her. It knew it wouldn’t have understood before it had inherited the boy’s mind and memories. However smart Svartis may be, she didn’t have the context to understand this. But. It could still tell her what was important.

So Diya smiled to itself and told her what it could. I’m watching something very beautiful, it shared with her. A beautiful thing which made the world an infinitely better place.

Svartis huffed. She didn’t get it.

Did she remember how Igor and June were friends, back at The Mighty Meowth?

Yes, she remembered the friendship between the demon bug which stole dumplings and the nice tiny girl who gave good hugs.

That brought a snort from Diya’s nose. She wasn’t wrong about Igor. But really, did she remember how close the two of them were?

She did.

And Svartis was also close with Diya, right? Because they had a bond from Diya sharing a piece of its soul with her. They could feel each other’s emotions well enough to know they meant each other no harm and cared for each others’ presence. 

A rush of warmth washed down their bond as Svartis agreed, feeling with all her heart the importance of not being alone.

Diya swallowed a lump in its throat at the intensity of the feelings. That was a yes. Well, it told her, Igor and June didn’t have a bond like that.

Svartis froze, countless tiny little movements of gas under Diya’s cloak freezing still. Literally - Diya shivered at the sudden cold. They didn’t? she asked.

No, they didn’t. But this -it gestured at the screen and all the deceptively simple electronics on Claire’s desk- was why they could be friends anyway.

It was a long minute before Svartis sent anything in response. She stirred under Diya’s cloak, rustling the fabric and causing the Banette’s sleeves and hem to move as if in a strong breeze. Diya watched the training continue on the screen as it waited for her to process that.

Was that true for all the pokemon outside too? Svartis eventually asked. All of the other trainers with their pokemon?

It was, Diya told her.

Oh. Svartis stirred some more. Should they… the Gastly paused, grasping for concepts it barely understood. Should they get Claire some food? As an ... offering?

Diya struggled not to laugh out loud with Claire right next to it. From what it could read from Svartis’ feelings, she thought Claire was some kind of god responsible for all the pokemon-trainer partnerships in the world. Nonono, it told her. Claire is just a person helping us use a useful tool. A tool that is actually quite common, though no less amazing for it. But Claire is nice and we should thank her for helping us.

Oh. Svartis thought for a long time. On the screen the Spinarak’s training cycled through blurry downtime and the slow cautious approach of the training’s human stand-in. This thing you’re looking at, Svartis finally asked, it helps people and pokemon not be alone?

Diya nodded emphatically. It does, it sent.

Svartis sent back a mental hum, still pondering. She pulled in close to Diya’s body under the cloak, pressing herself up against its chest and back. Yes, she finally said, tasting the idea as she did. That is beautiful. 

Diya had a big wide smile on its face when it turned back to Claire. <I’m done now> it told her. <And Claire, thank you very much.>

“Of course,” Claire’s fingers flew over her keyboard as she adjusted the Spinarak’s training so it was constantly accelerated again. “It was no problem.”

<I really mean it.> Diya persisted. It took the time to type its thoughts out in detail. <Thank you so much. All of this, helping me get a pokedex, helping me get the rest of my gear, giving me a place to sleep tonight - all of it means so much. I’m not sure I would have been able to start my journey without your and June’s help. And also, thank you for managing the training simulations. That’s really important and someone should thank you for it.>

At that Claire’s eyes softened. “Oh Diya dear, that’s why pokecenters exist.” She smiled warmly. “I’m here to help, and I’m proud to do so.”

<You should be.>

Chapter Text

Kulning

Examples: 1, 2, 3

Kulning is a very loud, high pitched, far-traveling herding call set to a general musical tune used by herders in parts of Scandanavia. But that understates ... well, basically every part of it.

Kulning is loud. At maximum volume and point blank range, it can be as high as 125 decibels. To put that in perspective, your typical jet engine is between 120 and 140 decibels. For those who don't know the decibel system, that means a max volume kulning is 3x louder than the quietest jet engines, and only 30x as quiet as the loudest jet engines.

Kulning's sound profile is also weird as hell. The highest frequencies in it are way above human hearing. There's also a repeating profile to its frequency spectrum, the ultra-high frequency patterns look just like the merely high frequency patterns. This does two things. First, higher frequency sound experiences less loss as it travels through the air, so it just naturally travels far.

Second, sound has this thing called a nonlinear high-frequency response. It means that ultra-high frequency sound can be down-converted into high frequency sound by its interactions with air. So even after the human-audible high frequency sound has been eaten up by the air, the ultra-high frequency sound is still going, and being converted down into human-audible high frequency sound of the same pattern as the original human-audible kulning.

The result of which is that kulning travels way further than ordinary sound should. Kulning can be heard 5 kilometers away, or an hour's walk. That's so far the lag time between the sound starting and reaching you can be a good quarter of a minute.

So ... yeah. Kulning. Bashak uses it as a herding call because it works. 

Spinning

If you want to know more about the role spinning thread might play in the life of a transhumant like Bashak, who lacks easy access to modern amenities through most of the year, I highly recommend this historian's blog series. He also references much more detailed books, for those who want to take a deep dive.

Now hopefully I describe what the spinning process looks like adequately in the story. But if you want a visual, here's a video of distaff and drop spindle spinning.

But why spinning? you might ask. Why is Bashak spinning, and not knitting, or crocheting, or doing some other portable wool related task? Heck, why isn't he just idling? He's a herder, right, isn't that what they do while watching their flock? Well, for most of recorded human history (prior to the invention of the spinning wheel in the late middle ages), textile production consumed an enormous amount of time. Like, most of the labor of about half the population. And of that textile labor, spinning thread consumed ~85% of the labor hours involved.

So for any person who makes their own clothes from scratch and is too mobile most of the day to use a spinning wheel, they're going to spend a huge amount of time spinning thread. Like, every single spare second where they're standing still and have both hands free.

Transhumance In The Pokemon World

Transhumance (or being a transhumant) is simply the practice of being a herder who migrates with one's flock on a seasonal cycle. For those who live in North America (or other areas where US factory farming practices have been exported, particularly parts of South America), this may seem quaint and outdated. But it's actually still a common practice basically everywhere else in the world. The only real difference is that modern transhumants are more likely to transport their herds long distances by train car than by foot.

In the pokemon world I'm establishing, this is the dominant form of raising herd animals. So many farm pokemon are described as needing extensive personal care and companionship to be productive, or even to evolve at all, that factory farming just doesn't make sense with pokemon. Of course pokeverse transhumants are more likely to transport their herds by e-storage pokemon transporters than by train car or by foot. But other than that, all the advanced technology of the pokemon world hasn't really done anything to replace transhumance as an agricultural style.

Furthermore, the pokemon world as I envision it is much more fragmented and less explored than our modern world. The extreme danger of wild pokemon regions and the care with which they need to be inhabited (if they can be inhabited at all) means humans hit the internet age before spreading to all corners of the earth, not after. This means that many places where humans live are still 'on the frontier', and it's not uncommon for infrastructure in such regions to simply not extend to transhumants' migratory herding spots. So many transhumants, like Bashak's family, get by without immediate access to modern trading networks and products during much of the year.

Which is how in a world with pocket dimensions and matter transporters you still get migratory herders who hand-craft their own clothing from scratch.

Chapter Text

Herdier is a light brown canine Pokemon with a short snout. Its face has long cream fur, which forms a mustache and a three-pointed crest. Its ears are large and perked, and it has a black nose. It has shaggy dark blue fur covering its body and a short tail. This hard, thick fur serves to protect Herdier from attacks. It has four short legs, with three-toed paws.

Herdier is very loyal, smart, friendly, and it will help its Trainer raise other Pokemon. Herdier is a natural choice as a helper Pokemon for trainers, though it will not obey anyone who disrespects it. Herdier has been theorized to have been the first Pokemon to have been partnered with humans, based on what has been discovered on the walls of caves.

-----

It pained Diya to get up before the sun so soon after the long midnight trek which had started its journey. And it pained it almost as much to let go of the big stuffed Piplup it had curled around during its sleep. But the last thing it wanted to do was to disappoint its new potential friend. And it was nervous about that, if it was being honest with itself.

The younger trainer felt like it had a lot to prove. June, and presumably her friend Bashak too, were older than typical journeyers. June was in her late teens and had probably finished her primary education already. Heck she might even be in her very early twenties, for all Diya knew.

But the body and mind Diya had inherited were on the young end of the journeyer spectrum. The boy had only been in his fourteenth winter. And even if having the mind of a mature Banette changed things somewhat...

Diya was still a child, in many ways. And it had the courage to admit it to itself that it was worried June’s friend would think of it as a child. That he would look down on it. If it really looked deep and asked itself the hard questions, maybe it was even worried that a bad impression on Bashak would cause June to think less of it too. They’d known each other their whole lives after all, and Diya was only some new kid June had just met.

There was a lot of pressure on it to get this right.

So even though it was sore and bleary eyed from the early hour, Diya got up promptly to the sound of its new pokedex’s awful electronic alarm. It brushed its teeth, gently prodded Svartis awake, took a shower, gently prodded Svartis awake again, got all of its cool new gear together, gently prodded Svartis some more to keep her awake, and double-checked its equipment.

Pokeballs, storage balls, backpack, food, water, boots, fancy new hat, Svartis-concealing cloak, new scarves - oh, which new scarf should it wear today? Even though it was keenly aware of the early meeting time it had to keep, Diya took its time selecting its scarf. Aside from the lighter purple trim its new outfit was fairly drab and dark, so any color would stand out and make an impression. And it did want to make a good impression.

Diya eventually picked a bright green scarf with yellow sunflowers. It was bright and cheerful, and that was a good impression to make.

Did it have everything? 

The young trainer cast an eye towards its big plush Piplup. It could just leave its sleeping companion here in the hotel room for the day but … Diya rummaged through its cloak pockets until it found the storage ball with its camping supplies in it. It pressed the button and materialized them in a flash of red light, unzipped the sleeping bag and stuffed the Piplup in. Then it zipped the sleeping bag back up and stored it all back in the ball.

There. Diya would feel better knowing it wasn’t going to come back and find its precious plushie missing somehow.

Svartis slipped under her trainer’s cloak on their way out the door, pulling herself together into a lazy amorphous blob under the cloak. She wasn’t up for stirring it into any unearthly fluttering at the moment and Diya sympathized. It remembered what dawn had been like as a Shuppet. The moment of the day when the sun shown anew had always fiercely drained its strength when it was a bodiless spirit.

After a quick breakfast of pokecenter noodles and broth, and a couple carefully devoured handfuls of blueberries, Diya set off for the edge of Canopy Town. It checked its new pokedex’s map, fiddling with the unfamiliar interface. June had said Bashak would be … there, right? Hopefully his camp wouldn’t be too hard to find.

It was that hard to find, in fact. For all that the boy had taken regular wilderness survival lessons growing up in Ledos Village and Diya had inherited his experiences, Diya couldn’t seem to find Bashak’s camp.

The young trainer was starting to get nervous when a Herdier, a small dog pokemon, came racing up to it through the snow. The Herdier had a face and underbelly of brown fur, with a lighter brown beard of longer fur dangling down their chin. And on their back, standing out against the snow, was a coat of long blue hair so dark it almost looked black which bounced as they ran. Diya giggled softly seeing the little pokemon run. It almost looked like they had a cloak just like Diya’s!

The Herdier zoomed up to Diya, coming up just taller than its knees, and without slowing launched themself into a series of tight circles around Diya’s legs. They brushed the Banette’s cloak as they ran, letting out a series of rapid barks which carried through the forest.

A short set of high whistles drifted through the forest in answer.

The Herdier barked loudly once more before suddenly coming to a stop in the snow, planting themself on Diya’s left side. They looked up at the young trainer, beard fluttering with their panting breath. They barked to Diya three more times with a quieter and deeper bark which Diya felt in its chest. Then they turned around, raced a half dozen meters off to Diya’s left, turned back around, and barked again.

Svartis stirred under Diya’s cloak. What was that noise? she grumbled.

A Herdier which was going probably to lead them to Bashak, Diya guessed. That or … well, okay this was definitely Bashak’s Herdier. Diya had no idea what else could be going on. The Banette set off following the Herdier, who obligingly dashed forward through the snow, pausing every dozen meters to turn around and wait for Diya to catch up.

They had to walk for a few minutes before they came across Bashak’s camp. But once they got there Diya wondered how in the world it and Svartis had missed it. When it was told that Bashak was camping outside of town the picture its mind had formed was something flimsy and temporary. A small fabric tent, a fire pit dug a few meters away from it, and a log dragged over to sit on.

The actual camp Diya found looked like it might weather a winter storm better than some of the houses in town. The tent was a dense squat circular thing of layered white wool felt and it looked like it might be heavier than some of the trees it was nestled between. It was large too, tall enough for an adult to stand upright if they weren’t claustrophobic and wide enough to pace inside. And the peak had a small opening that a chimney was sticking out of. That was a tent someone could light a fire and cook inside.

The snow had also been swept away from the tent half a dozen meters in every direction and built up into something resembling earthenworks. Broken sticks had then been stabbed into the waist high packed snow, pointing outwards. They weren’t sharpened to points but the message to any wandering pokemon which might want to investigate the tent in the night was clear. “Don’t.”

And sitting in front of the tent was the boy Diya assumed must be Bashak. He was seated in a comfortable folding chair of wood and dyed blue felt, sipping from a steaming metal thermos. He was wearing layers of heavy brightly colored wool, all greens and reds and golds, embroidered with abstract patterns to the point where the decoration must have weighed as much as the base material. 

At a first glance it looked too fancy for practical work clothes and Diya wondered if maybe this wasn’t the herder it was looking for. But then at a second glance Diya realized the boy’s coat was actually quite rugged. It wasn't a thing of delicate embroidery, it was the kind of handmade clothing made to last many years because it needed to last that long. It was decorated to such a degree not to be ostentatious, but because when someone only had the time to handcraft a few outfits they put everything they had into them.

The Herdier circled around to a gap in the broken sticks of the snow wall and leapt over, racing to leap into the boy’s lap. The boy held his thermos out of the way in a clearly practiced gesture, moving it clear of the Herdier’s charge. He grunted softly at the impact. “Good job Greta,” he said softly, scratching behind her ears. Then he turned in his seat to face Diya. “You’re Diya?” he asked. “I’m Bashak.” He pronounced it baas-haak, with a faint trill on the h which hadn’t been there when June had said it.

Diya nodded. It was pretty sure June had told the other trainer it was mute, but it waved its pokedex just in case to remind him. At his answering wave to come closer Diya did, following the Herdier’s -Greta’s- path.

It got a better look at Bashak as it did. The boy had unusually pale skin, to the point where the snow-glare had given him a light burn rather than tanning him. His brown eyes were framed by heavy solid glasses. And -Diya had to hold back a giggle- he had a big mop of unruly black hair which looked exactly like Greta’s ‘cloak’ of black fur.

As Diya approached, Bashak set his thermos down on the ground and held Greta to his side with one arm, pushing himself upright with the other. And … oh. Oh. As he stood Diya's eyes followed Bashak up. And up. And up.

Bashak was big . 

His face was youthful. Where June could have been anywhere from fifteen to twenty-five at a glance Bashak was clearly in his late teens at most. But that didn’t stop him from being two meters tall if he was a centimeter. Heck if his youthful face was any indication, he might still grow even more . And clearly at some point in the boy’s development his body had asked itself, “Should I fill this frame out with muscle or fat?”. To which the boy’s genetics had answered, “Why not both?”.

June had not told Diya that her friend was a giant.

The giant held out his hand to shake, which Diya reciprocated without thinking. Its hand was swallowed up by the bigger trainer’s. “Hello Diya. It’s nice to meet you,” he said in a voice that was surprisingly not so deep as to reverberate in the younger trainer’s chest.

Diya nodded likewise until it could take its hand back and type out, <Nice to meet you too!> Then, more sheepishly, <Sorry if I’m late, I had trouble finding my way.>

That drew a snort from Bashak. “June gave you directions?”

<Yes.>

“There’s a reason I sent Greta to find you.”

Diya snorted, giggling a little in the back of its throat. <Ah. I will keep that in mind.>

The older trainer scratched Greta behind the ears with his free hand and then set her down. She circled his feet twice enthusiastically and dropped down next to him, eyes fixed attentively up on her trainer. “She was good?” Bashak asked, “Not too pushy? No nipping?”

Diay didn’t know much about training herding dogs, but it thought she’d been great. <She was great! All business, but not pushy. The moment she showed up I knew to follow her. She was patient too.>

That brought a broad happy smile to Bashak’s face. He smiled, leaning down -down, down, down- to scratch her behind the ears again. “Good girl.” He told Diya by way of explanation, “It’s good to hear that. We’re aiming for the Canopy Gym search and rescue badge.”

<Neat! Are you training for any other Canopy badges?>

Bashak started to shake his head, then paused. “Well. The winter survival badge, but-” he gestured at his encampment. “Not worried.”

The ghost trainer snickered and Svartis caught on to the sentiment and laughed a little herself. <But you seem like such a city kid!>

That earned a bark of laughter from Bashak. “Hah! No. We live in June’s town only for the winter. And spring in our mountains can be worse than this if it’s a bad year.”

Diya believed that wholeheartedly. A few inches of snowfall and temperatures below freezing were as bad as it got on its island. Though -Diya swallowed heavily- even that could be enough to kill when someone wasn’t prepared.

“What badges are you after?” Bashak continued, turning the conversation back towards Diya. Diya eagerly seized on the conversation.

<Winter survival, absolutely. That’s very important to me. And> Diya thought to itself. It hadn’t actually put much thought into what badges it would get in Canopy Town, only to getting here in the first place. <And search and rescue.> Its ability to taste pain and fear would probably be useful there. <And ice battle too, if I can catch combat pokemon or Svartis turns out to be a good fighter.>

“So all of them,” Bashak remarked with good humor.

Well … <Yes.> Diya confirmed. <Except grass battle. Wrong season for that, obviously.>

The bigger trainer looked around with a raised eyebrow at the snow-covered landscape and snorted. “Yeah,” he said amusedly. Then he looked back at Diya. “Speaking of Svartis though, introduce us?”

With an encouraging mental prod from its trainer, Svartis flowed out from the neck of Diya’s cloak, forming a body next to her trainer’s head. Greta’s ears twitched and she tracked Svartis with her eyes but at a gesture from Bashak she relaxed. She kept a lazy eye on Svartis, but only a lazy one.

Say hello, Svartis, Diya prompted its pokemon. “Svvvaaaaartiisssssss,” the Gastly hissed, grinning widely and baring her tiny fangs.

Bashak’s lips twitched. He straightened up -stars and shadows he’d been slouching and still been that tall- and bowed slightly. He crossed one arm over his chest and inclined his head, leaning forward. “Hello Svartis, spirit of snow. I am Bashak, a herder. I am honored to meet you.” He smiled as he bent forward, keeping his eyes fixed on Svartis.

Svartis grinned wider, flying from Diya’s shoulder to dissolve into a blurry mass of purple gas. She circled the taller trainer’s head twice before flowing back to her perch and reforming over Diya’s shoulder, still grinning. I like him, she informed Diya. His soul tastes of happy pokemon. 

With one hand Diya reached up to pet Svartis’ semi-corporeal body, and with the other it typed out a message. <She likes you.> Diya informed the other trainer. <A lot.>

“I’m glad,” he said in response, still smiling. “It’s not every day one meets a spirit strong-willed enough to come back from death. Extending some respect is the least I can do.”

Diya cocked its head. Bashak was much more talkative than June had led him to believe. It wondered if maybe he wasn’t the silent type so much as he was the type of person willing to let other people fill silence. To June the two would certainly be indistinguishable. Diya giggled under its scarf at the thought.

As it was thinking about that Diya typed, <It wasn’t the respect that made her like you though. She says your soul smells of happy pokemon.>

“Really?” he asked, and oh . Suddenly it was very easy for Diya to remember that Bashak was a teen too, in spite of the boy’s size. The look on his face could only be described as a childlike wonder and delight. He smiled and his whole face lit up like the sun.

<Really.> Diya confirmed. The Banette’s soul senses weren’t quite the same as its Gastly’s, but what it could taste from Greta at least confirmed Svartis’ assessment. The Herdier at Bashak’s side was totally devoid of any grief so far as Diya could sense. Not even boredom.

“Well,” Bashak said, glowing with pride, “it’s not every day you get such nice news. Let’s make the most of it. Ready to help me catch some Swinubs?”

The Banette nodded enthusiastically. Of course it was!

“Good, just one moment please.” The herding trainer folded up his chair and walked over to his tent, slipping the chair inside. Then he pulled a black storage ball out from inside his jacket. It was an expensive heavy load one, with two white stripes on the top to signify its greater capacity. The ball cracked open and the whole tent vanished into it, leaving behind a flattened circle of grass. “We can go now,” he told Diya.

<You’re not coming back here?>

“I am. This way no wild pokemon get in while I’m gone.”

The Banette had a sudden image of going to school in the morning and instead of locking its front door, packing the whole house up into a storage ball. The image was so bizarre and sudden it couldn’t help but laugh. It cackled behind its scarf and shared the mental context with Svartis, who cackled as well.

Bashak raised an eyebrow. “Share the joke?”

The Banette did, typing as best it could while laughing. It didn’t expect Bashak to find it funny, it was kind of a ‘you had to be there’ joke. But it got to be surprised when Bashak did laugh, throwing his head back and laughing even harder than the Banette.

<?> 

Through his laughter Bashak told her, “That’s actually what we do, when we’re up in the mountains.”

<Really?!>

“We should walk and talk,” Bashak said, setting off at a steady pace Diya had to race to keep up with, Svartis and Greta following close behind. “But yes. Why bother locking up your shelter when you can pick it up and take it with you?”

<What about at night?> Diya walked fast for a few steps to get out ahead of Bashak and show him its pokedex. <Surely you lock up then?>

“Mm,” the herder hummed as he ducked under a branch. “Hard to lock a tent flap in a way that’ll keep an Ursaring out. Best way to stay safe is numbers and watchdogs.”

<Numbers and watchdogs?> Diya prompted when he didn’t continue. 

“Yeah. My pokemon sleep with me in the tent and I’ve got a pair of Chansey who trade watches.”

<Chansey are combat pokemon?> As it typed the Banette’s face twisted into a grimace under its scarf. It was hard to walk through the snowy forest and type at the same time, especially when it had to keep pace with the other trainer’s much longer legs. It kept having to type short inadequate sentences and jog ahead to show them to Bashak.

“No, not really. Not for trainer battles anyway. Still useful against predators though. They’ve got great hearing and they’re sturdy, makes ‘em hard to kill in an ambush. And their songs will disorient an attacker long enough for the herd to wake up and fight back.”

Diya glanced back at Svartis. It wondered how she’d do in a similar role. Ghosts’ soul senses were hard to hide from, and the Gastly’s gaseous body was difficult to injure. And her soul smog … hm. It would really have to experiment with her to see exactly what it did in a fight. Just seeing it in the phantom world made Diya sure it would affect a living pokemon’s soul, and it knew the classic symptoms of Gastly poisoning, but it didn’t know how quickly or intensely. 

Bashak followed its eyes. “Svartis, she’s new right?”

Diya nodded.

The other trainer’s eyes narrowed a little in thought. “Ever fought with her before?”

Diya shook its head.

“After the Swinubs then, how about we spar and see what she can do?”

<Not before?>

Bashak raised an eyebrow, “Hm?”

The Banette slowed so it could type better and was relieved when Bashak slowed too, <If we’re going to spar, shouldn’t Svartis and I practice before we fight the Swinubs?>

That earned Diya a very confused look from the other trainer before he suddenly started laughing. “Hahahaha! June didn’t tell you what we were doing, did she?”

<Catching Swinubs?>

Bashak only laughed harder. “Yes, but not like that. I’ll show you what we’re doing when we get there. Just don’t attack the Swinubs.” The older trainer set off at speed again, fast enough that Diya had to put away its pokedex to follow. Diya huffed and puffed its way after Bashak. Its body was in good shape, but Bashak was in great shape and Diya needed a step and a half for every stride the taller trainer took.

The sun was just making its way clear of the horizon when Bashak finally stopped. He’d led them to a clearing on the top of a hill. There were not any Swinubs and, judging by the pristine snow, had not been any Swinubs for at least two days.

Diya said as much, fumbling out its pokedex and opening up the texting app to grouse, <I see no Swinubs.>

Bashak laughed again, a good natured sound which Diya couldn’t possibly imagine being used for mockery. “They’re not here yet ,” the herder told his companion. “We’ll bury some food in the snow and I’ll call them. They’ll hear the call, get curious, come, then stay for the food. Though I’ve been doing this for a few days, hopefully they know kulning means food now and will come quick.”

<Kulning?>

Bashak smiled. “Herding call. Like this.” The herder shifted his posture to stand straighter. He projected his chest out a bit, held his head parallel to the ground, sucked in a deep breath and- Bashak coughed slightly and deflated. “Oh, uh, you may want to cover your ears.”

On the ground next to Bashak’s feet, Diya noticed Greta had flattened her ears to her skull and folded her paws over them. Prudence told Diya to learn from her example and it covered its ears with gloved hands. 

That earned it a nod and a faintly heard “Good” from Bashak. The herder breathed in again and- “HWIEEEEEEEEEEEE OOOOOOUAAAAAAA YEEEEEEEEEEEEE HOOOOOOUUUUUUU!”

The sudden blast of noise caused Diya to flinch so hard the Banette jumped clear into the phantom world. Blessed silence came with the transition between worlds, marred only by a faint high-pitched ringing in Diya’s ears.

Stars and shadows that had been loud! And more than loud, it had been unnaturally high pitched. When Bashak had said he was doing a herding call Diya’d imagined something deep and sonorous, not a piercing whistle blasting straight through its hands into its skull!

Bashak was staring at the spot where Diya had disappeared and blinking rapidly when the Banette phased back into material existence. “You … vanished,” he said. Greta let out a concerned yip to voice her agreement.

<You startled me!>

“There was a whirl of shadows and my heart went cold like someone walked on my grave and you vanished ,” Bashak repeated, slowly and clearly as if Diya hadn’t heard him the first time.

<The noise scared me so I used Phantom Step, that’s all.>

“You’re not hurt?”

Oh. Bashak wasn’t criticizing Diya for flinching, he was worried . Something in the boy’s heart Diya was using cracked a little at the realization. <I’m not hurt, I’m fine.> Diya reassured him. <I use Phantom Step sometimes when I’m startled. It’s a defensive move.>

The taller trainer, clearly still worried, tilted his head and frowned. “I’ve never heard of … do you mean Phantom Force?”

<That is a terrible name! It’s bad and its wrong and the people who named it should feel bad!> Diya showed Bashak its rant, then went straight back to typing.

At least Bashak wasn’t worried anymore, if the laughter he was clearly suppressing was anything to go by. “Battle trainers,” he said with a snort.

<???>

“Battle trainers are who would name that move after its reentry damage,” he clarified.

<Oh.> Diya was loathe to admit it but, <That … makes sense.>

Bashak snorted. “Only for battle junkies. I like your name better.” Then he cleared his throat. “Ahm, I should finish calling the Swinub though. Then we’ll set the food out for them, and I’ll show you what else we’ll be doing better than battle trainers.”

Diya nodded its approval and fastened its hands over its ears again, this time pressing in extra tight. Svartis went for the much more thorough route of vacating Diya’s cloak to bury her entire body under the snow. She hadn’t liked the sudden overwhelming blast of sound any better than her trainer had.

Even prepared, the shock of noise as Bashak started up his kulning again was still overwhelming. The Banette swore it could feel the inside of its skull ringing. But the longer it withstood the sound the more it started to listen to it.

There was a melody to the call. Something Diya might even call a song. The notes of the call rose and fell, echoing off of distant hills. And in the moments when Bashak took a breath, Diya could hear the song as it was meant to be heard in those distant echoes. The sound came bouncing back as a haunting melody, something which sounded like it would be more at home in the phantom world than in this one.

“IEEEEEEEEE OOOOOOUAAAAAAAA HOOOOOUUUUUU. HWIEEEEEEEEE OOOOOuaaaaaaa-” After minutes of singing, Bashak finally let his song fade. The beckoning echoes of the call lingered in the air for long seconds afterward though, only reluctantly giving way to the sound of Bashak’s laboured breathing.

Svartis cautiously burrowed out from under the snow. Is it over? she asked Diya hesitantly. 

Diya didn’t answer immediately, struck dumb by the sheer intensity of the herder’s singing. It did eventually gather itself enough to tell Svartis that yes, it was over. Even if its ringing ears didn’t quite believe it.

“That should do it,” Bashak said, breathing hard. “Can you help me bury this food for them now?” He held up a storage ball and waved it in Diya’s direction.

The Banette swallowed a lump in its throat. It pulled off a glove and typed, <That was amazing.>

The big boy laughed sheepishly, rubbing the back of his head through his fluffy hair.  “It is pretty loud isn’t it?”

<Where did you learn that?>

“My parents.”

<They must be proud.>

The herding boy blushed, the color standing out brightly against his light skin. “I hope so. Uh, can you help me with-” he gestured with the storage ball again.

<Oh! Sorry, yes!>

Bashak summoned a large bag of food from the storage ball, filled with dried mushrooms, potatoes, onions, roots, mealworms, and more than a few plants Diya couldn’t identify at all. If they even were plants. Bashak assured Diya that the Swinubs would eat ‘just about anything’ though, so Diya buried the weird probably-plants under the snow with everything else.

Bashak stretched and yawned when they were done. “Now we wait,” he informed Diya.

<What if they don’t show up?>

The taller trainer shrugged. “Then I’ll call again. Come, take a seat while we wait.” He walked over to a log at the edge of the clearing, brushed off some snow, and sat down. He patted the snow-cleared space next to him. “It’ll be a while.”

After taking the seat Diya asked, <Okay, will you finally tell me how we’re capturing them without battle?>

“Oh. Sorry.” Bashak really seemed to mean it, wincing with his apology. “Didn’t mean to keep you waiting. Uhhhhh, tell me, how much do you know about how pokeballs capture wild pokemon? Or don’t.”

<You mean how captured pokemon can escape?>

Bashak nodded, gesturing for Diya to go on. Which was fair, a surprising number of the schoolmates Diya could recall in the boy’s memories had no idea how pokeballs worked. Which Diya found so odd. How could anyone see something as weird and wonderful as a pokeball and not immediately want to know how it worked?

Diya rubbed its ungloved hand to keep it warm and started typing, thumb dragging back and forth over the swiping keyboard. <Pokeballs put pokemon in pocket dimensions, but those pocket dimensions have an exit. A pokemon can walk right through the edge of the pokeball’s space and out the mouth of the pokeball, no problem. A ‘captured’ pokemon isn’t imprisoned in the ball, it can leave whenever it wants.> It turned its pokedex for Bashak to see.

The herder nodded. “Yup. So how do we keep pokemon in pokeballs?” While he waited for Diya to type out its next answer he pulled a couple items out from the inside of his colorful jacket. An extendable stick covered in a big poof of wool at the end -probably Mareep wool from the way static electricity sparked over it-, a small stick with a hook on one end and a round ceramic weight on the other, and a thin copper wire with a hook on each end.

<Pokeballs don’t just warp space, they warp time. They can stretch out time inside so much that it all but stands still relative to us. One day out here becomes a second in there.> Diya rubbed its ungloved hand to keep it warm again. This whole typing to talk thing was kind of painful out in the cold air.

“But?” Bashak prompted. He took the copper wire and buried one end in the ground, then hooked the other in the poof of wool on his big extendable stick. He endured a few painful looking shocks as he did, but after the copper wire was hooked in the shocks stopped. The copper wire was grounding the Mareep wool’s electricity into the ground.

<But the pokeball’s time has to be matched to our time outside to pull a pokemon in, and it takes a while for pokeballs to go from normal time to stasis. That’s why you need to fight a pokemon to exhaustion or paralyze it> or hurt it until it was too injured to move, but that felt too cruel for Diya to say <before catching it. It needs to not be able to reach the exit before the pokeball’s stasis kicks in.>

Bashak pulled some wool away from the big stick, making the whole thing look like a cloud with a bit sticking out, and tied that bit to the hook of the smaller weighted stick. Then he let the smaller stick dangle and whirled it with a flick of his fingers. Like magic the protruding bit of fluffy wool spun into neat tight thread. As the thread spun Bashak kept pulling more and more bits of fluff away from the main poof of wool, letting them spin into more thread. Once he had a rhythm going he looked over what Diya had typed and commented, “Do you need to beat up a pokemon to get it to stay put?”

Diya thought for a moment. <Not with a pokemon trained to stay put. But a pokeball’s inner space is weird and the capture transition is jarring. Wild pokemon always freak out and try to escape.>

“Always?” Bashak’s small weighted stick -Diya thought it was called a spindle- was dangling on a long length of thread now, almost touching the ground. He stopped its spin, looped the thread around the stick and tied the end of it to the hook, then started the process again. 

<I know you’re going to tell me why it’s not actually always, but as far as I know yes. Even sleeping pokemon get startled awake by the transition and run out.>

“What about comfortable pokemon?”

Diya would have responded but its ungloved hand was getting really cold. So instead it put its glove back on and simply waited for Bashak to elaborate.

Bashak kept spinning his thread as he spoke. The process was so practiced his hands worked on effortless autopilot, even with gloves on. “A sleeping pokemon which wakes up getting dumped into a pocket of twisted space is not a calm pokemon. But if a pokemon is awake and calm and trusts you,” he chuckled, “and you’ve got a Chansey or two singing feelings of security and comfort straight into its brain…” he trailed off.

This was probably a point where Diya was supposed to pick up the conversation but its typing hand was still cold and it didn’t want to take its glove off again.

The herder waited for a few seconds before eventually clearing his throat awkwardly. He clearly wasn’t used to driving conversations, even if he was more talkative than June had suggested. “Well. It doesn’t work with all pokemon. Definitely not solitary or aggressive ones. But calmer social pokemon-” he shrugged. “Get them to trust you and they don’t even bother trying to escape the pokeball. Not in enough of a hurry to escape the stasis anyhow.”

Diya’s jaw slackened a little under its scarf. Was it really that easy? Why didn’t everyone do that instead of battle then? Its expression must have shown above its scarf, because Bashak answered its unspoken question.

“Why doesn’t everyone do it like this?” He shrugged. “It works for herders. But we tame easy-going social pokemon that live in herds and don’t migrate too quickly. I wanna come by each morning for a week and feed the Swinubs, they’ll still be in the area and be happy to see me. Happy to trust me too. Plenty of other pokemon don’t stay that still, or trust that easy.” The herder thought to himself for a moment, then added as an afterthought, “Some are happier making a meal of you than letting you feed them.”

Bashak spun some more thread, taking his time to put his thoughts in order. He’d added a few more loops to the spindle when he started talking again. “This works for nine out of ten pokemon I’d want to catch. Lot less for most trainers though. It’d be nice if more trainers thought of catching pokemon like this anyway, when it could work. But I get why they don’t.”

Diya nodded slowly. That made sense. 

The Banette flexed its hand inside its glove, to see if it could type a response to Bashak’s thoughts. Unfortunately it still wasn’t warm enough that Diya would want to type with it. Diya frowned slightly. Typing really wasn’t turning out to be the best communication method while outside during the winter.

Its lack of a response didn’t seem to bother Bashak though. The herder just kept spinning, turning raw fluffy wool into thread with meditative calm. But Bashak didn’t let their hilltop lapse into silence. As he spun a soft musical thrumming rose out of his chest, filling the air as it rose in volume. He hummed tunelessly, fully content to spin and hum if no further conversation was to be had.

Diya smiled. It was going to have to thank June for introducing it to her friend. Bashak was nice. And probably gave the best hugs too. It would have to find an excuse to hug him before the day was done. The Banette tilted its head back and let Bashak’s humming wash over it.

When the Swinubs eventually found them they were still sitting like that, Bashak spinning and humming and Diya soaking it in.

Diya laughed with delight when it saw the first Swinub crest the hill. They were so fluffy! Diya had never seen a Swinub in person before and the sheer degree of fluffiness was astonishing. As far as Diya could tell they were round shin-high balls of fluffy fur with pink snouts and nothing else. The fur was light brown with darker brown vertical stripes, and that was the extent of their distinguishing features. No eyes or ears or legs could be seen, just round balls of fluff gliding through the snow.

The Banette didn’t even realize it had stood up to rush forward and pet one until Bashak’s hand came to rest on its shoulder.

“Whoa, slow down,” he told Diya. Bashak stood and began packing up his spinning equipment while he talked. “Don’t rush them, that’ll spook the Piloswines.” The mention of Piloswines made Diya pause. It hadn’t seen any Piloswines. 

A swarm of two dozen or more Swinubs came cresting over the hill and descended on the buried food in a flurry. The small balls of fluff rooted about in the snow, burying their pink snouts as deep as they could before emerging with their prizes clutched triumphantly in their snuffling maws. Which was absolutely adorable and had caught all of Diya’s attention. So much so that it had missed the five Piloswine bringing up the rear.

Piloswine were the evolved version of Swinub and at first glance could be mistaken for nothing more than chest high balls of fluff. But a second glance showed more. Piloswine weren’t quite so round, hints of a heavy two-humped body showed under all their fur. And they moved with great ponderous strides, the weight of their bulk clearly too great to glide as their smaller relatives did. Most striking though were the tusks. Two thick ivory tusks thrust out from either side of their snouts, threatening grievous injury for anyone foolish enough to mess with them.

Oh. Yes it was a good thing Bashak had grabbed Diya, because it had not noticed the Piloswine.

With his hand still on Diya’s shoulder, Bashak laid out the rules of interaction, “If the Swinubs touch you first, you can touch them. But keep an eye on the Piloswines and stop if any of them tense up. Oh, and don’t feed them by hand. It’s bad if they learn they can get food by pestering humans.”

Diya nodded. Its hand had finally warmed back up so it pulled out its pokedex and asked, <Okay. Um, how do I actually help?>

“First? Walk around and show them you don’t mean harm. I’m still a weird unfamiliar creature to them, no matter how friendly I am. Two nice humans is a pattern though, and everyone feels safer with predictable patterns.”

Diya nodded. It could do that. <And second?>

“Mm,” Bashak hummed. “June said you could read emotions and calm pokemon?”

<Close. I can sense and dull painful or violent emotions.>

Bashak smiled. “Your talent would be amazing as a herder. Anyway, I can only capture four of the Swinubs to send home. I need males -they’re the ones with the extra wrinkle in the middle of their snouts- and the less aggressive the better. If I point some candidates out, can you tell me if they’re the type to play nice?”

<I think so.>

“Thank you Diya.”

The two trainers started walking together around the hilltop, weaving among ecstatically rooting Swinubs and giving the Piloswine a respectful berth. Diya giggled with delight when it saw two of the Swinubs start wrestling over a dried mushroom, but did as Bashak had asked and didn’t rush up to pet the living daylights out of them.

Bashak smiled at the sight too. “They are cute like that. We don’t want those ones though. That play-fighting is cute when young, less so when they’re a hundred kilos of muscle and tusk.”

Ah, yeah, Diya could see that. It eyed the Piloswines. The thought of them fighting like that was much less cute. <So> Diya asked Bashak <I understand the non-aggression. Why only male Swinubs though? Don’t herders typically want females?> Diya’s understanding was that more female Swinub would mean more babies faster.

The bigger trainer shrugged. “Normally, yeah. But there’s a Swinub sickness going around in some nearby valleys back home. If my family’s herd gets some more genetic diversity before it reaches us, hopefully it won’t hit us so hard.”

<Ohhh. And a few males can add genetic diversity to the next generation faster than a few females.>

“Exactly,” Bashak confirmed with a grin that made Diya smile in turn. 

<Why only four though? If you need more pokeballs I’ve got a bunch.>

“It’s not that. Swinubs are protected pokemon on this island. You need a license to catch one and take it off-island, and I’ve only got four licenses.”

<Ah. What about Piloswine?>

Bashak shook his head, shaggy black hair bouncing about his face. “Except rarely, no. Most Swinub don’t make it to evolution in the wild so their herds are used to absorbing their losses. But each Piloswine is too important to the herd to take.”

<That makes se>- Diya cut off as Svartis’ thoughts pushed their way into its head.

Heeere, fluffy. Heeeeeeere, fluffy fluffy thing, Svartis teased.

Diya looked down to see a small Swinub staring at the hem of its cloak, snout pointing straight ahead with laser focus. Svartis was making the cloak flap in the wind. She teased the little ball of fluff, dangling the edge of the cloak juuust out of reach and then snapping it back to Diya’s boots. 

Diya stood very still, trying to not scare the Swinub off. Its eyes sparkled and shone bright as it stared - literally, adding a faint pink tinge to the snow around the Swinub. Diya tore its gaze from the Swinub only long enough to glance over at Bashak and see he was staring just as intently, with a childlike smile on his face. It looked back as quickly as possible though, not wanting to miss a moment of this.

The Swinub leapt! Or at least, scooted forward aggressively. Under the fluff its legs were a bit too stubby to properly leap. It did its best to chase the flapping cloak hem anyway, galumphing after it and rearing up when Svartis pulled it up out of reach. 

Diya tried to restrain its laughter, it really did. It didn’t want to scare the little Swinub. But when another two joined in and teamed up to pin down part of the cloak’s hem, it was just too much. They prodded it furiously with their pink snouts, trying to identify this strange flapping thing and Diya couldn’t hold it in any longer. It snorted. It giggled. And when it well and truly couldn’t hold it in anymore it clasped a hand over its mouth to keep the spirit-stuff in and laughed .

Unfortunately for Diya’s stomach -and Bashak’s, who was laughing freely as well- the Swinubs were not scared off by Diya’s laughter. Instead they seemed to take it as a sign that all the rest of them should join in this wonderful game too. Svartis set the whole cloak’s hem aflutter, chanting in Diya’s mind for the fluffies to come here, and they did.

Laughter so intense it hurt rocked Diya’s frame, forcing it to double over. Then a cluster of Swinubs climbing on the edge of its cloak threw its balance off and it was all Diya could do to keel over in a direction that didn’t squish any of them. The Banette hit the ground in a poof of snow and was covered moments later by curious snuffling pokemon.

Svartis decided that now would be a great time to set Diya’s sleeves fluttering too, which because one of its hands was covering its hysterical laughter meant Swinubs ended up all over the felled trainer’s face.

Bashak was howling with laughter. “Well, you, hehehe, you certainly, hahahaha oh gods my sides, they’re certainly comfortable with you!”

Diya tore its free hand from the Swinubs’ curious snouts just long enough to thrust its pokedex up in the air with a message, <Help!>. Its laughter kind of undermined its demand though. They were just so cute!

“No no, this,” Bashak paused to double over and laugh, “this is perfect! Quick, while they’re roughhousing, see if you can tell which ones are -oh no don’t lick Diya’s eyes, hahahaha, shoo, shoo little one- see if you can tell which ones are aggressive about it and which ones are calmer.”

That’s easy for you to say! Diya wanted to cry out. You’re not buried under a carpet of adorable choking fluff!

But Bashak was helping shoo away the ones which wanted to sit on its nose or prod its eyes, not just abandoning it to the heavy wave of fluffiness entirely. So Diya did its best to focus through the laughter and do its job. It was a struggle, but by the end Diya was pretty sure it had gotten at least a surface read on each of the Swinub’s personalities.

And eventually, after a Piloswine had come over and nosed the rambunctious Swinubs into some semblance of chastised order, Diya even got to stand up again. Bashak helped it brush the snow off its cloak, commenting on the fabric as he did. “Hmm. This isn’t wet at all. Good wool.”

<You sound surprised?>

“Machine woven wool isn’t always tight enough to be waterproof. You have a quality cloak.”

<Good to know. Svartis certainly likes it.> Diya’s sleeve flapped back and forth in a wave at the mention of her name.

Bashak snorted. “That she does.” There was a pause before Bashak continued, as he visibly worked up the energy to continue the conversation, “So the Swinubs, which ones…?”

<One sec.> Diya rubbed its hands together hard, warming up its typing hand. Thankfully its blood was up from the laughter and the exertion and its hand hadn’t gotten too cold. <Okay so that one over there has a bit of a mean streak->

The ghost trainer spent a few minutes laying out any negative emotions it had picked up from the Swinubs. There hadn’t been much, but those Swinubs would be siring a good number of the next generation of Swinubs for Bashak’s family, so Diya wanted to give Bashak as much detail as possible. It laid out every bit of excessive competitiveness, aggression, and sour feelings it had felt.

Bashak rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “Thank you Diya,” he told the Banette when it finished.

<Was that helpful?>

“Yeah. Mostly what I’ve already noticed, but confirmation is always good. Though that ‘devious’ Swinub you mentioned…”

Diya waited for a bit after he trailed off, then asked, <What about him?>

“Reconsidering capturing that one. Too smart can be a hassle to herd.”

Diya rubbed its typing hand to stave off the cold. It really wanted to put its glove back on, but there was one more thing it felt it should mention. <Bashak, about the Piloswine?>

“Mm?”

After the Swinub had calmed down and eaten their fill, the Piloswine had moved in to eat the rest. The Swinubs were still growing and needed all the food they could get to prepare for evolution, which made things difficult for them during the winter. But the Piloswine had deep fat reserves, they could afford to eat the Swinubs' leftovers in the winter and pack the fat back on during Kenomao’s bountiful summers.

Except one Piloswine wasn’t doing more than nibble reluctantly at the leftovers. And it didn’t have deep fat reserves. It looked haggard. Lanky coarse fur hung off its bones in loose folds that screamed of poor health. And Diya had tasted its mental state when it had opened itself up to the Swinubs’ feelings. It was in pain. A lot of pain.

 <That Piloswine,> Diya said, <it’s hurting. Badly.>

“Ah. Yeah. Poor girl. Can’t do much for her. Apparently tapeworms are a common problem for Swinubs and Piloswine around these parts, and they don’t respond well to medication.”

But Diya was shaking its head before Bashak finished talking. <It’s not that. Her jaw hurts.>

That got Bashak’s attention. The older boy’s soft brown eyes turned to Diya and fixed there with a startling intensity. “You can read pain that precisely?”

<Yes.>

In an instant Bashak knelt down in front of Diya and jutted his jaw forward, proffering his face. “Show me. Touch my face where the pain is.”

The Banette opened its mouth just a sliver under its bright green scarf and breathed in sharply. The Piloswine’s grief flowed into it and ... there. Diya reached out and ran its finger along Bashak’s face, from a bottom canine to the fleshy underside of his jaw and then back to the joint. <There. It burns all the time and it hurts so much when she eats.>

There wasn’t a trace of childish joy and charm in Bashak’s face as he stood up, he was as serious as a stone. He swore passionately. “I shouldn't have assumed it was tapeworms. She wouldn’t let me close to her earlier but I should have tried harder and-”

The boy cut himself off and breathed deep. “Can you calm her down? Make her let us come close?”

<I can’t control her like that, but I can take the pain away.> 

“Do that. We’re going to help her.” Bashak unclipped two pokeballs from a belt under his jacket and released their occupants. “Helga, Bertha,” he called, “I need you.” Two flashes of red light solidified into a pair of Chansey. The round pink egg-carrying pokemon came up to his ribs and both murmured questioningly.

“Helga, sing trust. Bertha, sing sleep.” Each pokemon chirped a short “Chansey!” before opening their mouths and singing wordlessly together. A soft crooning harmony flowed from them which caused the Swinubs and the Piloswine to blink drowsily. But while their music was beautiful to Diya, it felt no preternatural effect from it.

Bashak dug into his jacket pockets and turned up a pair of earplugs. “These are for you,” he told Diya. “Me and Greta are used to their song but you-”

Diya interrupted him. <Sing is a normal type ability, right?>

“Yes?”

<I’m immune.>

“Oh. Really?” For a moment Bashak’s serious face slipped and he snorted fondly. “You’d be great as a herder.” Then he fixed his jaw and directed Diya, “Okay, take her pain now. I’m going to approach and … and June said you can hit hard with telekinesis?” 

Diya nodded. Shadow Ball would do the trick if it came to a fight.

“Okay. If things go wrong, do not be afraid to hit her as hard as you can. She’s a big girl, she can take it. If I get gored though, you and Greta are not big enough to carry me back to town.”

Diya nodded very seriously.

“Greta, with me. Retaliate only.” Bashak looked over at Diya and waited for it to suck in a breath - a thick column of black oily pain came rushing out of the Piloswine’s mouth - before cautiously crouching down and walking forward. The lack of pain must have been a shock to the Piloswine because she slumped suddenly as Diya began drawing from her. It did its best to take the bite of her hunger as well, and her miserable acceptance of a slow starvation.

“Heyyyy big girl,” Bahsak spoke. His voice was soothing and calm, without a trace of tension in it. “That feels good doesn’t it? It must have been hard carrying all that pain. Well don’t you worry, I’m here to help.” His soft tone and the Chanseys’ songs washing over the hilltop seemed to do the trick. The Piloswine didn’t stir or snort as he approached. In fact as the Chansey’s songs did their work she almost seemed more asleep than awake.

Bashak turned his head back to Diya for a moment, keeping one eye on the Piloswine. “Will the smoke hurt me if I touch it?” he asked softly.

Diya shook its head. Unless he was a psychic or a ghost himself, it should pass right through him.

Bashak resumed his approach, passing through the smoke as he neared the hurt pokemon. “I’m coming a little closer big girl but don’t you worry. I’m here to help. I just need to take a look in your mouth. I’ve got a flashlight right here, but I promise I won’t shine it in your eyes.” Bashak flicked on a light and held it up with one hand. With the other he reached forward-

The herder didn’t stop using his soft soothing tone of voice for a second as he asked Diya, “You’re sure you’re taking all her pain?”

Diya nodded intensely enough that Bashak could see it from the corner of his eye.

Bashak very gently touched the bottom of the Piloswine’s snout on the opposite side Diya had pointed out. He gently, oh so gently, opened her mouth and shone his flashlight inside. “You’re doing so good for me,” he whispered to her, “just keep it up. I’m here to help you and if you let me, I’ll make sure the pain goes away for good.”

He stared into her mouth and Diya swore it could hear its heartbeats pounding in its chest for every second Bashak was touching her. After taking a look Bashak slowly reached into his jacket and pulled out a potion bottle. Gently, watching the Piloswine’s reactions carefully the whole time, he sprayed the potion into her mouth twice. Then he gently let go and murmured, “You were such a good girl. Thank you. Don’t you worry, we’ll fix you right up.”

After that the taller trainer made his slow and careful way back to Diya, standing back up to his full height once he had some distance between himself and the pained pokemon. “Can you talk and concentrate on that at the same time?” he asked Diya.

<Ish.>

Bashak nodded. “Okay. Well, she has an infected tusk. It’s bad, tusk’s dentin is rotted to the core.”

Diya’s eyes widened and its own jaw throbbed with a sympathetic echo of the phantom pain it was taking from her. Stars above. No wonder she couldn’t eat.

“The potion will help with the pain, but she needs a pokemon center. So we’re going to have to capture her with the Swinubs.”

It was a struggle to type a response and absorb grief so completely at the same time. Diya had to immerse itself deep in Piloswine’s experiences to pull its pain so fully, and holding the twin perspectives of a human body and a Piloswine one at the same time wasn’t easy. But Diya focused all of its will and managed, if barely. <I thought no capturing Piloswine?>

“Not normally, no. But the big exception is if one will die of natural causes without human medical intervention. And she will.”

<How do I help?>

“Keep absorbing her pain. And I know it’s a lot to ask, but if you can help the others be less nervous too...”

<I can.> It would wait until right before they captured her, but it could probably manage that for a few seconds.

“Good. Helga, keep singing trust. Bertha, sing peace.” The Swinubs and Piloswine on the hilltop stirred a bit as Bertha swapped her song of sleep for one of peace and their drowsiness lifted. But none of them made any sudden movements or gave any indication they were less comfortable with the trainers than when the Swinub had been climbing all over Diya.

“Diya, can you keep taking her pain while she’s in a pokeball?”

Oh. Diya’s concentration on taking the Piloswine’s pain wavered for a moment as it considered the implications of that, and it had to struggle to keep its focus on the task at hand. <No.>

Bashak clucked his tongue and winced. “Thought that was the case. We’ll just have to hope the painkillers in the potion are good enough.”

<If not?>

“Well…” Bashak hesitated. “We’ll capture the Swinubs first. If the Piloswine breaks out of the ball upset, and she gets the herd upset…”

Diya waited for him to finish, not entirely comfortable with how Bashak was hesitating.

“Svartis can fly, yes? She can cover for us as we run and still be safe?”

That was the opposite of encouraging. 

But Diya also didn’t hesitate before nodding yes. This pokemon was hurting. She’d die if no one helped her. And they could help her. 

That was what was important. 

The capture of the Swinubs was easy. First Bashak demonstrated recapturing and releasing Greta to the herd a few times. Diya was ready to absorb their nervousness if needed, but found it unnecessary. The red lightshow as Greta dissolved into energy and reappeared barely merited interest from the herd, let alone concern. Diya assumed Bashak had already showed them this more than once, on the previous days he’d visited the herd.

Then Bashak knelt down in front of one of the Swinubs he intended to capture. He held his hand out palm down for it to sniff and waited for it to come over. When it did he pet it, smoothing his hand over the pokemon’s thick fur until it was swaying on its hidden feet. Then he pulled out a pokeball with his other hand, armed it, and gently tapped it against the Swinub’s side.

There was a flash of red light, and then no more Swinub.

One of the Piloswine looked over at the flash. It moved slowly and ponderously, its protective instincts clearly inhibited by the Chanseys’ continuing song of trust and peace and Diya siphoning away its anxieties. But it did give Bashak a measured look.

The herder didn’t bat an eye. He just let the Swinub out of the pokeball. Then he put it back in. And then out again. And in, and out-

The Piloswine swayed its head to look over at Greta, who was sitting perfectly unharmed on the log the trainers had sat on early. It looked back at the Swinub, who was maybe a little confused but otherwise fine. Then it snorted and moved on, trundling away to dig up a piece of dried fruit the Swinubs hadn’t eaten.

Bashak captured the Swinub one last time and waited for the pokeball to let out the pulse of red light which signified a successful transition to internal stasis.

The next three Swinubs were captured just as easily without a peep of complaint from the herd. Which just left the Piloswine with the infected tusk.

Bashak looked over at Diya. “Ready?”

Numb aching fingers swiped over its pokedex. <One moment.> Diya told Svartis to be ready as well. If they had to run, she’d have to distract the herd and hold it off as best she could. 

Looking over Bashak, Diya sized up the bigger trainer. It could take Svartis with it into the phantom world easily enough, but her gaseous body weighed as much as a feather. If it had to, would it be able to pull Bashak along with it? It thought about it. Probably. Few ghost pokemon could use Phantom Step as readily as Banettes could, and it had always been stronger than its siblings.

It tapped Bashak on the shoulder. <If we run I’ll Phantom Step us. I’ll hold it as long as I can. Svartis will gas them, make them short of breath. Head start + gas, we’ll be fine.>

Bashak turned to face Diya and … tried to smile confidently. But instead it was a weak and shaky smile, and when the older trainer let out a breath it was unsteady. Diya blinked and for the first time took the Banette stock of Bashak’s negative emotions.

He was scared. Sharp jittery fear from when he’d approached the Piloswine was still lingering under his skin. His actions and bearing had the confidence of long practice and experience, yes, but underneath that was a fragile uncertainty. Diya reached deeper and-

-A younger Bashak scrambled back from the rearing Mudsdale which had thrown him. His father stepped in and caught the reins, expertly bringing the panicking pokemon back down to the ground. He shielded Bashak it with his body and spoke to it in a low calm-

-His mother watched him struggle to lift the heavy feed bag with careful eyes. Her hands hovered beneath his, ready to catch it if he slipped. “Steady there pumpkin, just a little bit more.” He was too small to do this work and his grip was slipping, but he’d wanted so badly to-

-”You missed a stitch, right there,” his older brother said, pointing to a spot on the toque he was knitting. “I know, I know, it’s annoying, but you’ll get it. Trust me, one day you’ll be the one doing the teaching.”

Diya breathed deep through its nose. Bashak had done this all before. This wasn’t his first time capturing wild pokemon or dealing with a hurt pokemon that might lash out. It wasn’t even his hundredth. But it was his first time doing it without his family there to catch him if he failed.

No wonder he was nervous.

<Hey,> Diya tapped Bashak and showed him the pokedex, <you’ve got this.> And Diya believed that. It had seen Bashak fail in his memories, over and over again. But it had also seen the boy learn from those failures. It believed Bashak could do this, and handle the consequences if not. It just needed Bashak to believe that too. So it pulled down its scarf and smiled at the boy, letting all of its faith shine through. 

Bashak swallowed heavily, but now the nervousness which Diya felt accompany the gesture was a good thing. It was born of the desire to live up to someone’s expectations, not the fear of failure. “Thank you Diya,” he said roughly. “You ready now?”

<Yes.> Diya put its pokedex away and slipped its glove back on. If things went wrong now, there would be no time for typing. Only running.

Even with her calmed and drained of pain, it still wasn’t safe to pet the Piloswine the way Bashak had petted the Swinubs. Agony would have taught her to flinch away from contact rather than lean into it, and even with Diya easing her pain that kind of learned response would be too dangerous to mess with.

So instead of touching her to establish trust, Bashak shared space with her instead. Calmly, never showing a hint of the worry Diya could taste inside him, Bashak cleared some snow from the ground a few meters away from her and sat down, waving to invite Greta to leap into his lap. He glanced over at the Piloswine deliberately once he was settled, to let her know he was aware of her, but then looked away and minded his own business. He was sharing her space, not intruding on her.

Then he did his own thing. The herder produced his spindle and stick of wool -if Diya remembered right, that longer stick was called a distaff-, grounded the distaff with the hooked copper wire, and began spinning again. He let his spindle dangle by a strand of half-spun thread and set it spinning with a twist of his fingers. Deft practiced motions pulled at the wool cloud on his distaff, ensuring there was always more material to spin into thread.

That got the Piloswine’s attention. She turned her head to look at this strange thing the human was doing. But that was all he got, her attention. It was when Bashak started humming along to Helga and Bertha’s song that her demeanor changed.

The sound of his humming was a deep resonant thrumming, something that came out of the back of his chest and vibrated deep inside Diya’s. And it must have found its way inside of the Piloswine’s chest too because as he hummed the Piloswine stopped simply looking at him and crept closer, cautiously as if he might stop if she disturbed him. And when she was no more than a meter away, she let herself lie down. She slumped to the snow, her haggard frame heaving with exhausted breaths as she finally let her malnourished body stop holding her up. 

Bashak hummed, and spun. And she listened, and watched.

Minutes passed and thread built up on Bashak’s spindle. Diya was starting to wonder if maybe the Piloswine had fallen asleep when she moved again. It was a movement made awkward and shuffling by her exhaustion. But she managed and slowly she pushed herself along the ground until her good tusk was right next to Bashak’s leg.

Diya held its breath. Bashak’s anxiety was rich on its tongue, focused sharply on that tusk designed to gore and tear at predators. 

But the tired hungry Piloswine did neither of those things. Instead she raised her head and gently, oh so gently, lay her healthy tusk on top of Bashak’s leg. She huffed out a hot wet breath, and then relaxed, letting the combined music of the herder and his Chanseys wash over her. In Bashak’s lap, Greta reached out and gently licked her tusk.

“Poor girl,” Bashak murmured to her. “You’ve been fighting so hard haven’t you? It must have been exhausting to keep moving and protecting your family when you could hardly eat. But it’s alright. You can rest now, I promise. We’ll take care of you.”

With slow careful motions Bashak set his spindle down in his lap. He pulled out a pokeball with his freed hand, making sure to make no sudden movements which might startle the injured pokemon. Then he smiled, and gently tapped it against her healthy tusk. 

Diya held its breath as the pokeball pulled her in with a flash of red light. If she panicked and broke out, and panicked the rest of the herd too, they were going to have to run . 

The pokeball wobbled as the pokemon inside moved.

Then it stood still.

Finally, the pokeball pulsed red.

Air wooshed out of the Banette’s lungs in a fevered rush. They’d done it! She was going to live. The pokecenter was going to help her heal and she would be alright. And it and Bashak would be alright too! They’d captured an hurting injured Piloswine from the middle of her herd without even a fight! Which was a very good thing, because against four healthy juggernaut-like Piloswine and two dozen smaller Ice pokemon in the snow they would have lost horribly.

Bashak let out a relieved sigh of his own. Then he looked up at Diya, his brown eyes meeting Diya’s pink ones. “Diya,” he said seriously, “thank you. I wouldn’t have realized I could help her without you. And it was easier to be brave with you helping me.”

Diya nodded seriously, holding eye contact with Bashak as it did.

The older trainer let out another sigh and slumped. “Break for lunch?”

Diya nodded as fervently as it could.

Chapter Text

Mareep is an ovine pokemon with fluffy cream-colored wool covering its entire body, as well as a curly tuft of wool in the middle of its head. Its head is blue, and it has black eyes. Its four feet are blue and have two digits on each foot, and it appears to be on tiptoe at all times. Its conical ears and tail have a yellow-and-black striped pattern. Mareep has an orange sphere at the end of its tail, which acts like a small light bulb. This sphere glows brighter the more electricity it has. It tends to avoid battles in the wild and has a mild disposition. Mareep which experience combat despite this tend to evolve rapidly into Flaafy and then Ampharos.

Mareep's wool, which grows continuously, stores electricity, rubbing together and building a static charge. Its volume increases when it builds up with electricity. Touching the wool when it is charged will result in a static shock. During the summer the fleece is shed, but it grows back quickly. Air is also stored in its fur, which allows it to stay cool during summer and warm during winter. In the wild Mareep is most often found in grassy fields, though it is also raised by herders in a variety of climates. Its wool is used in high-quality clothing, though it needs to be specially treated before it is safe to wear.

-----

Bashak watched curiously as his companion devoured their lunch. The small ghost-costumed trainer ate in the oddest way. First they filled a cupped hand with trail mix. Then they lowered their scarf just enough to expose their mouth and placed their hand so that it covered their mouth. Only then, with their mouth completely obscured, would they eat as if feeding from a small trough. 

The herder's own lunch was yogurt sprinkled with blue bluk berries. Bashak spooned himself a mouthful, taking care to squish some of the sour-skinned berries between his back teeth so he could taste their sweet insides too. He never took his eyes off Diya as he ate though, and he never stopped wondering about the younger trainer.

At first, when June had told Bashak about the weird way Diya ate, he’d assumed they were a child used to lean times. He’d met a few children like that before, who lived further out on the frontier. They ate hunched over their meals like they were worried someone or something would take it from them if they didn’t protect it.

Diya wasn’t eating like that at all. They were happily chatting with their Gastly - at least that’s what Bashak assumed was happening as they stared at Svartis and their face flickered through shades of laughter and affection. When Diya put down their tin of trail mix, they set it casually on a flat rock behind them out of their line of sight. And when Bashak had offered them some bluk berries, they’d unreservedly offered some of their own trail mix in exchange.

Nor did Bashak think Diya was hiding some deformity behind their scarf and their hand. He’d seen their face earlier when they’d taken down their scarf to smile at him. It could be a deformity inside their mouth of course but … no, he didn’t think so. Between their pink eyes, casual demonstration of discomfiting powers, and cheerfully open attitude, Bashak didn’t think Diya was someone who’d be uncomfortable displaying a deformity.

A cultural custom about not showing one’s open mouth to others? No, Diya was a local, and a dyed in the wool local by their mannerisms and the clothes they wore under their cloak. Bashak would be surprised if this was a tradition they’d inherited from a foreign family.

Bashak shared a comfortable silence with the ghost trainer as they ate, and he watched.

---

“Ready?” Bashak asked Diya.

The young trainer stood with their feet spread in a broad ready stance and streamers of black energy flickering around their hands. Svartis floated next to them, crackling with the same black energy. The two of them nodded in unison. They were ready.

Bashak looked down at Greta, who was standing across from them. He crouched down to scratch the ruff of her neck fondly. Out loud he told her, “You’re gonna do great Greta. Don’t worry, I promise they’re not as scary as they look.” Then under his breath he whispered, “Greta, open with baby-doll eyes.” 

The herder stood up and smiled guilessly at his pokemon’s opponents. Just because this spar was all in fun didn’t mean he had to play fair.

“We start on my whistle,” he told them, and they nodded again. Bashak slipped his old whistle into his mouth, a thin triangle of bone with the inside carved out and a hole through the middle of it. He tongued it into place and waited a moment, sizing up the competition. Then, right when Diya and Svartis started to fidget, he blew a high piercing shriek on the whistle.

The two of them started, dark energies crackling around them with a renewed intensity as they readied to meet his Herdier’s charge. 

His Herdier who did not charge. Instead Greta whined plaintively at the loud noise, shuffling her feet back and forth in the snow. Her butt wiggled as she looked nervously between the scary ghostly pair and her trainer. She whined some more, intimidated and unsure of what she should do.

Diya and Svartis hesitated. The pair looked back and forth between Bashak and their opponent as well. Bashak could see their reactions written plain upon them. They were unsure. Diya shuffled their feet, falling out of their broad ready stance and into something more ashamed, uncertain about fighting this poor innocent little dog. Svartis' broad smiling mouth dropped into a frown. She mirrored her trainer’s uncertainty and added some extra uncertainty of her own, unsure what it meant that no fighting was happening when her trainer had told her there would be fighting.

Bashak waited until Diya reached for the pokedex in their coat pocket before letting his guileless smile transform into something sharper and victorious. And if Diya had been a little more alert, a little more aware, they might have seen his smile shift and realized something was wrong. But Fairy powers like baby-doll eyes were subtle and effective. Diya didn’t see through Greta’s act and the ghost trainer’s defenses were down until the very last moment.

Bashak blasted his whistle, one quick sharp note and then a patterned chirp. The first note told Greta the command was for her and that she would be using sparring -not lethal- force. The chirp told her to bite.

Greta rocketed forward with such speed the snow exploded into flurries behind her. Diya barely had time to blink before the small pokemon missile slammed into their leg and took it out from beneath them. Diya went down in a tangle of limbs. Svartis looked sideways to where Diya’s head had been just a moment before and blinked owlishly, not yet processing what had happened.

Then Greta nipped Diya’s leg lightly, with teeth wrapped in the deeper-than-black Dark energy that accompanied a Herdier’s bite, and the fight really got started.

Diya yelped out loud at the touch of the Dark energy, throwing their hands up a moment later to press against their scarf-covered mouth. Svartis realized what was happening all at once and unleashed her own attack in response. A barely visible line of oily black smoke rippled through the air from the Gastly.

But Svartis was panicking and disoriented, and not in a state to remember Herdiers were Normal type pokemon. Whatever mental effect her Ghost attack was supposed to have flowed through Greta without touching her and a moment later Greta pivoted and leapt away, making good her escape.

Diya staggered to their feet. They swayed with disorientation and favored their nipped leg heavily. Tints of pink light lit the forest’s shadows as they blinked and stared around them, trying to get their bearings.

Bashak didn’t give them the space to do that. Which is not to say he pressed his advantage as hard as he could have. In a real fight, this would be the moment where he’d have Greta take her woozy opponent out of the fight for good so she could focus all of her attention on one remaining opponent . But this was just a spar, to teach and to have fun, so instead he ordered her to go after Svartis.

Another whistle blast had her leaping up high to bite the floating spirit, deeper-than-black Dark energy wrapping around her teeth again. Svartis shrieked a high tea-kettle noise and tried to dodge, but was too slow. Greta didn’t get her main spherical body, but she did get the edge of Svartis' purple gaseous form with her teeth. 

Svartis yanked her gaseous form out from between those dark teeth with a pained shriek. And Diya’s glassy disoriented eyes finally snapped back into focus. Or tried to at least. They were still a little cross-eyed as they raised their right hand and let loose a blast of tattered black and purple streamers. 

The night shade -at least that’s what Bashak thought the ghostly attack was- missed by meters, sending up plumes of churned snow and earth. Greta was already wheeling away again, dashing for the cover of the trees at Bashak’s whistled direction.

Bashak frowned as the plumes of debris collapsed back to earth. That had been entirely too much force for a practice spar. Any attack rooted in the physical world enough to tear holes in the earth would do the same to Greta, regardless of how Ghost and Normal energies interacted. He’d have to talk to Diya about that after the match. If they couldn’t keep their use of force under control while disoriented, they shouldn’t attack at all. Until he could have that talk with them though, he’d just have to keep Greta from using anymore mentally compromising Fairy moves.

For that same reason, Bashak judged it was a good idea to let the mystic powerhouse get their head on straight before a serious accident happened. He whistled to Greta to stay put in cover and work herself up instead of continuing to harry them. Greta slid to a stop behind a tree and hunkered down. With a low growl of effort and exertion she began the process of pumping her muscles with Normal type energy.

To Diya’s credit, the first thing they did once they’d regained their bearings was to look around frantically for Svartis. They found their Gastly cowering above them in the shadows of the forest canopy, pulled up out of Greta’s reach. Trainer and pokemon locked eyes, and something passed between them without words. 

Bashak watched intently as they communicated. Diya had just been played for a fool and battered about. The pokemon they were fighting was untouched. And their own pokemon was cowering with fear, hesitant to reenter the battle. So. What were they going to do about it?

June wanted Bashak’s opinion on whether they should invite this ghost trainer to travel with them on their journey. Her own mind was already made up. She adored this child and thought the two of them should take Diya under their wing. And Bashak was inclined to agree. But still, he watched. When a trainer was hurting and losing, and their pokemon was uncooperative, you could learn a lot about them by how they let themself be affected by that.

Truth be told, Bashak would have accepted a fair degree of less than ideal behavior from Diya right then. Some general frustration and anger wouldn’t have been out of place, so long as Diya didn’t take it out on Svartis. Few people were at their best right after being knocked on their ass. So Bashak was surprised when Diya didn’t get upset. And not in the sense of successfully controlling themself, Diya didn’t get upset at all .

Instead Diya was smiling when they looked up at Svartis, excited and beaming even as they heaved in labored breaths. Then a moment later that look of excitement vanished, replaced first by wide-eyed concern and then the immediate desire to comfort. Diya ushered Svartis down from the canopy and into their robes, petting down the front of their robe with soothing one-handed gestures. With their free hand they opened their pokedex and typed, <PAUSE! Can we stop?>

Bashak nodded his agreement immediately, whistling for Greta to stand down and return to his side. And start using baby-doll eyes again, just a little to defuse any tension. Bashak slipped his whistle out of his mouth and knelt down to scratch Greta behind the ears, giving her a good hard scratch. She’d done so well, and she deserved to know it. The herder did his best to keep his attention divided though, one eye on Diya for further typing.

And Diya did explain themself as quickly as they could type. <I’m sorry about that. I should have realized this would happen. Svartis is the spirit of a prey animal. Bottom of the food chain, no combat abilities. Even though she’s a lot stronger and harder to hurt now, she got really scared when Greta attacked her. Mind if I take some time to calm her down?>

Bashak told himself very firmly that he was not as impulsive as June and he hadn’t just decided the two of them were adopting this tiny caring child. As he lied to himself, Bashak answered Diya, “Of course. But remember, we should fight again in a minute or two.”

That gets him a confused head tilt from Diya. <???>

Oh, of course. This was Diya’s first pokemon, they wouldn’t necessarily know this. “It’s okay if the next spar is gentle and low-intensity, but there should be a next spar. Flinching is a bad habit to build when training to fight, and learning to not give in to fear is a powerful lesson.”

<Oh! That makes sense!> Diya turned from Bashak and began communicating with Svartis very intently, holding open the collar of their robe with their eyes fixed on Svartis inside. After a minute they looked back up and asked, <Can we practice being on the offensive? Just for the start of the spar, to ease Svartis into it?>

Bashak nodded. “Of course.” Greta ought to get in some dodging practice with their attacks anyway. She could dodge the lead spark of a Mareep’s lightning bolt like a champion and weave through a Piloswine’s ice storm like it was nothing, but that was because she’d done both a thousand times each. Some exposure to unfamiliar attacks would do her good.

An almost invisible purple mist flowed out of Diya’s collar, coalescing above their hat into Svartis' semi-corporeal body with its too-wide eyes and sharp-toothed mouth. Diya tilted their head back to look up at her, communing. When they lowered their head again they were grinning, and Svartis too. <Ready.>

Bashak slipped his whistle back into his mouth and gave a series of quick relatively quiet chirps. Without hesitation Greta did as bid, working herself up with Normal energy to strengthen her muscles and tensing her legs in preparation for a dodge. He slipped his whistle out for a moment and asked, “On my mark?”

Diya slipped their pokedex back into their cloak and nodded, settling back into a ready stance. Again, black energies crackled around their hands. Above them a dark purple mist coalesced around Svartis, pulling in to orbit her in dark swirling clouds.

This time Greta didn’t pretend to be intimidated. She’d faced down Gabites, a dragon pokemon, to protect the family’s herds before, alongside the rest of the family’s protectors. Bashak’s companion had fought worse than this and he knew she would only give these two young whippersnappers the respect of fear when they earned it.

Bashak let loose a starting blast with his whistle.

For an instant the forest flashed black as Diya let loose, like an inverted flash bulb had gone off. Tattered streamers of black and purple shadow shot forth from their left hand in a wide spray meant to cage and contain the small Herdier.

Snow blasted into the air before the night shade even landed as Greta made good her escape. She shot sideways on empowered legs at Bashak’s direction, not even touching the snow again until she landed meters away and pivoted, turning back to face her opponents. She threw herself across the snow in bounding leaps, covering the distance between them rapidly.

Diya had asked Bashak to let them go on the offensive, but he saw Diya’s right hand still crackling with power and the swirling mist about Svartis. The two of them would have an answer for Greta’s charge, and he wanted to give them an opportunity to show it off.

And they did. Diya slashed with their right hand and released a wide fan of streamers in front of Greta, blasting into the snow and blocking her path. Greta jerked to a stop, ready to leap sideways to avoid whatever attack Svartis had waiting for the moment she was stalled.

But no attack came forth. The dark clouds only swirled tighter around Svartis, pulling inward.

Bashak whistled for Greta to tackle Diya, confident she could attack and retreat before Svartis could unleash whatever counterattack she was preparing. But when Greta pulled her legs under her to leap, she didn’t go flying at them like a missile. Instead one of her legs buckled, collapsing beneath her. 

The ghost trainer raised their hand, night shade crackling around it and Bashak didn’t wait to order a retreat. A rope of hazy black and purple streamers flew forth as he did, kept purposely weak enough to not do any real damage if Greta couldn’t dodge. Greta did dodge though, throwing herself to the side and rolling through the snow. She got back to her feet only to waver again, legs threatening to buckle again. She shook her head blearily.

Floating high above Svartis grinned, and the dark clouds spiraled in, swirling ever tighter.

Bashak whistled for a retreat a second time, as loudly as he could. He was relieved when Greta managed, dashing away from the ghostly pair and taking cover behind a distant tree. He whistled again as soon as she was in cover, a special pattern that asked after her condition.

Three short yips answered him. Greta was -somehow- exhausted. He whistled again, asking for the location of her injury, hoping she could interpret what he was asking. There was a moment of silence before she barked her answer - all-over. Bashak thought furiously. It was the signal she’d normally give after long hours of herding, when she needed to sleep. Somehow Svartis must be doing something that made Greta sleepy. But Svartis couldn’t be using Ghost powers to do it. She had to be using a secondary move type, like how Greta could use Dark for her bites. Maybe Svartis was using Dark herself, or Psychic?

A streak of darkness and a heavy thumping boom interrupted Bashak’s thoughts as Diya fired a shadow ball. The tree Greta was using for cover shook, bark blasted away from a blackened crater in the tree’s surface. Bashak blanched. From the thin, almost insubstantial appearance of the shadow ball in flight it was clear Diya had been holding way back with that attack. The message was clear. In a real fight, that tree would be gone.

Bashak signalled for Greta to move on, leaping to the next cover she could find. But as she moved Svartis launched an attack of her own, that same rush of oily black smoke she’d used in the first match. Except this time it was very visible, a heavy black cloud that clung to everything it touched. It didn’t seem to affect her any more than last time, but what it did do was cut her visibility down to nothing.

A web of shadowy streamers from Diya plunged into the smoke and knocked Greta clean out of the cloud. She flew sideways with the impact, feet flying up in the air as she rolled to dissipate her momentum in the snow. The attack’s push restored her visibility though and a moment later she was up on her feet again, weaving through the trees so fast Diya and Svartis had trouble tracking her.

Off to the side, out of their line of sight now that they were following Greta, Bashak held a hand over his racing heart and smiled. Well now, he thought to himself. It looked like this wasn’t just going to be an exercise for Greta in dodging unfamiliar attacks. He had no idea what that exhausting move Svartis had used was and had never imagined a Ghost move could be used against a Normal as the smog had. He could barely keep ahead of the ghostly partners' attacks long enough to strategize.

This was going to be a challenge.

Bashak whistled for Greta to wrap herself in Fairy energy that would amplify the emotional impacts of her attacks. It was time to play rough. If Greta could get the two of them to flinch and break their momentum, he might still be able to lead her to a win. 

Another piercing whistle directed Greta forward, moving as fast as she could to get in and out of Svartis' draining effect before it could slow her, and darting side to side to dodge Diya’s barrage of shadowy attacks. Bashak smiled as she wove through a night shade attack. She could do this. He believed in her.

---

Bashak sat in front of his yurt and spun thread. Greta was still ‘sparring’ with Diya and Svartis, but really it had devolved into friendly roughhousing and games of tag well over an hour ago. His commands weren’t necessary to direct Greta for this and he was perfectly content to let them play without him. He wasn’t needed right now and that was fine with him. He could just sit and watch and spin.

The herder smiled to himself. His mom always called him an old soul when he said things like that. And maybe he was. But maybe he just had a good life. What was a young soul, after all, if not someone who was filled with passion and fire and the need to change the world? And what was an old soul, if not someone content to take life slow and the same, day after day?

Over the last few years some of Bashak’s childhood friends had left the mountains for college or a trade in the cities. And he always congratulated them when they did. He hoped they found everything they were looking for. But him? This was all he had ever needed. He had loyal companions by his side, pokemon to take care of, and honest work to occupy his hands. Why would he need to set the world afire when he already had all he could want?

Off in the distance there was a yip and a flash of darkness as Greta nipped Svartis and she retaliated with her own blast of Dark energy, learned from being on the receiving end of one too many Dark bites.

“Hey!” Bashak shouted so they could hear him. “Greta, no biting. Diya, whatever Svartis did to prompt that, tell her not to!”

No more yips or flashes of darkness occurred, so Bashak assumed the problem was solved.

He returned to spinning, smiling despite the interruption. Or maybe because of it. After all, he might be an old soul, but it wasn’t a bad thing when young souls came around to shake up the old souls a bit.

---

The sun was slipping over the horizon and Bashak eyed its position, judging whether June would be up by now on her nocturnal Spinarak hunting schedule. 

<Junebug, you up?> he texted her.

Her response came after a few minutes. <Barely and miserably, but yes. What’s up? How are things going with Diya?> 

Bashak answered by taking a picture and sending it to her. The picture showed a sleeping Diya splayed out on a pile of cushions in his yurt, with Svartis sleeping wrapped around their neck like a scarf and Greta flopped over their stomach. One of her front paws was just barely touching Svartis, who’d extended a small pseudopod of gas to wrap around the paw.

<BASHAK>

<!!!>

<YOU CAN’T JUST DROP THAT ON ME WITHOUT WARNING!>

<THEY’RE TOO CUTE!>

<Awwww, little Greta is drooling. She’s all tuckered out.>

<Diya looks exhausted too, poor kid.>

<OH MY GODS SVARTIS IS HOLDING GRETA’S HAND THAT IS TOO PRECIOUS!>

Bashak smiled and muted his pokedex so the notifications wouldn’t wake the sleeping puppy pile. He watched June’s texts roll silently in, waiting for her to finish rambling about how cute they were. That took a while.

It wasn’t like she was wrong though. They really were that cute. 

Eventually she asked, <So you’re okay bringing Diya along with us then? I mean, they’re sleeping in your tent with Greta. You trust them, Greta likes them, it’s a done deal yeah?>

She wasn’t wrong about that either. <Yeah.>

<Woo! I knew it! See, I told you! They’re a great fit to travel with us. They’re friendly, and helpful, and they’ve got those cool ghost powers.>

And it was a good thing they were friendly, Bashak thought, because June would have invited them along to satisfy her fascination with their unusual powers either way.

<And speaking of their powers->

Bashak did not think ‘called it’ to himself, because that would imply it was ever in doubt.

<Did they show you anything interesting today? Any new psychic powers, variations on the ones I told you about, what could Svartis do in a spar, you sparred with her right? What’s she like out in the wild, how did she interact with Greta and the Swinub? Oh, did you finally catch the Swinubs today?>

<Diya’s not psychic.>

<WHAT?! What do you mean, Bashak you big lug, don’t leave me hanging like this, what do you mean Diya’s NOT PSYCHIC?!>

<Immune to Normal. They’re not a Psychic person using Ghost powers, they’re a Ghost person.>

<WHAT?! What do you mean they’re immune to Normal?! Like, totally immune? And what do you mean by Ghost person? What does that even mean?!>

Bashak shrugged to himself. <Dunno. But Normal affects Psychics. They’re not Psychic.>

The following wall of text June sent was long and rambling and had two different article links in it, but it could be summed up as, <There are no Ghost type humans, but only Ghost types are totally immune to Normal type moves, but there are no Ghost type humans, what, how, why> sprinkled with, <Do you think Diya thinks they’re really not a psychic, or is it just an easy explanation for something complicated, you should ask them, wait don’t let them sleep, aaaaahhhhh I need to know.>

Eventually she wound down enough to ask, <So did you see them use any other ghostly powers?>

<Phantom step.>

<???>

Oh, right. <Diya’s name for phantom force.>

<Oh! Oh oh oh! This explains how Diya visits the phantom world> Bashak choked on his own spit, the kid what , <of course they used phantom force. Step. Whatever. Of course that’s how phantom force works it makes perfect sense. Where else would Ghost types be vanishing to when they use it?>

And then June’s stream of texts went quiet. Bashak waited for a few minutes. She was probably reading an article she’d looked up, or composing another wall of text to send him. Bashak nibbled on some Mareep cheese while he waited. Today was exhausting, and he was still hungry even after sharing dinner with Diya.

When fifteen minutes had passed without another text from June, Bashak rolled his eyes at whatever research rabbit hole she’d dug herself into. <Junebug? You there?>

He waited minutes for her reply before it came. <Can you meet me at the pokecenter tonight, in person? I know it’ll be late for you. I promise it’s important.>

<Of course.> Minutes passed. <June what’s up? June?>

<I’m sorry, fell down a research hole. Talk to you later.>

Bashak did not believe for a moment that she just ‘fell down a research hole’. Something was off about her texts. He stepped out of his yurt into the evening cold, leaving his sleeping companions behind so he could call June without disturbing them.

She didn’t pick up. Just sent back a one-word text, <Busy.>

Greasy cold coiled in Bashak’s gut. That wasn’t like her at all. 

Later, when it was finally time to wake Diya up and walk with them back to town, June still hadn’t sent any more texts. There were no overwhelming rambles on what she was looking up. No followup queries about the deluge of questions she had earlier which Bashak didn’t have time to answer. No belated questions about Bashak’s Swinub expedition, and no equal measure of sincerely meant praise for his success and sincerely meant apologies she didn’t give him space to talk about it.

Awful intuition raked its hands through Bashak’s insides and he knew her silence meant nothing good.

---

Bashak finished the process of dropping his Swinubs and his new Piloswine off with Claire at the pokecenter. Part of him was excited. Claire confirmed that yes, his capture of the injured Piloswine was legitimate and he’d be able to keep her. And Claire’s machines would be able to cure her, though she’d almost certainly lose the tusk.

But the other part of him was wondering what June wanted to talk about. An uneasy apprehension was still crawling up his spine which he couldn’t shake.

Bashak knocked on his friend’s door.

“Come in,” she said.

The first thing Bashak noticed when he entered was that June had been crying. Her eyes were bloodshot and the skin of her upper lip was a raw red where it had been irritated by mucus. Her curly black hair was out of its beanie and hung down to her shoulders in messy tangles. And she was sitting cross-legged on her hotel bed, hunched over her pokedex and surrounded by scattered printouts which she stared at with a burning intensity. 

The cold anxiety in his gut was threatening to come crawling up his throat. The only reason Bashak didn’t run over to comfort her was because she had that look in her eyes she got when she was onto something, the one that brooked no distractions. Eventually he uttered a quiet “June?”, hesitancy and worry lacing his voice.

She looked up and it hurt Bashak to see the pain in her eyes. Thankfully some of that too-sharp focus in them leaked out when she saw him in the doorway. “Hey,” she answered, exhaustion creeping into her voice. “I … I could really use a hug. But um, can we talk about this first?”

Bashak's heart ached. He wanted to tell her that whatever it was could wait, that what she needed was a hug, and chicken noodle soup, and a good night’s sleep. But if she said she needed to talk first…

The bigger trainer settled himself next to her on the bed, pressing his leg and shoulder up against hers to make sure his presence was as tangible as possible. Greta leapt up onto the bed with him, draping herself across both their laps. “June, what’s wrong?” Bashak asked.

“I-” June rubbed her bloodshot eyes. “One second, Igor can you get me that paper, the one over there?” She pointed to a corner of the bed out of her reach. Her companion obligingly crawled down from his ever-present perch on her shoulder to get it, bringing it back a printed out table of information clutched between two of his forelegs. She took a moment to scan over the table, as if reminding herself of its contents, and then sighed.

Finally she looked up at Bashak and asked, “So. You said Diya used phantom force?”

“They called it phantom step, but yes.”

“You’re sure? Bashak I need you to be one hundred percent sure about this? You saw Diya use phantom force- step- whatever, with your own two eyes?”

Bashak hesitated. After thinking for a moment he said, “I startled Diya. There was a whirl of shadows, I felt cold on the inside, and they vanished. A few seconds later, same thing and they came back.”

“They called it phantom step, right? Any chance it’s actually a different move than phantom force?”

He shook his head. “No. They complained about how phantom force is a bad name and phantom step is better. A lot.”

June takes a deep breath. “And you said they used it when startled?”

“Yes.”

“So it looked easy for them?”

Bashak shrugged, his arm shifting against June’s as he did. “Maybe.”

“Eugh, wrong phrasing. Did it look … how to put it … automatic?”

That Bashak could answer. “Definitely.” Diya had done it on reflex when startled, he’d call that automatic.

With an exhausted sigh, June let herself collapse against his side, rubbing her eyes some more. Under her breath she muttered a disturbingly sincere “fuck”.

“June,” Bashak said as calmly as he could, “you’re scaring me. What’s wrong?”

The research trainer took in a deep breath and began talking. And once she started she didn’t stop, as if she was trying to get it all out in one breath. 

“I can count on one hand the number of pokemon species confirmed to be able to use phantom force. That number extends to maybe a dozen if you count unconfirmed anecdotal reports. And those unconfirmed reports all have a unifying thread, which is that the ghost pokemon seen using it -and it’s always ghost pokemon- were all extremely powerful wild pokemon. Like, they’d probably be strong enough to compete in A-tier or even S-tier league battles. Too strong to catch and examine, especially when they can hop dimensions.”

“There are only four species, four , in the entire world which can use phantom force easily enough for there to be confirmed records of it. And three of them are evolved pokemon and one of them is twice evolved so saying it’s ‘easy’ for that one is extremely debatable. Even direct pokemon modification in virtual space using technical machines has only been able to grant the ability to a handful of Ghost species. It’s just … Bashak I looked at the research. This isn’t an ability a human can use. It is definitely not an ability a human can use instinctively as part of an automatic reflex.”

Bashak frowned. “Alright. So they’re not a psychic using Ghost moves, they’re a Ghost-human-” 

“Bashak,” June interrupted firmly, “there are no ‘Ghost-humans’. This isn’t like how some humans have an affinity for Psychic energy or Fighting energy, or Dark humans who are naturally immune to Psychic powers. Ghost-type humans do not exist . Gods, the only human psychics capable of using any ghost moves at all are on Gym Leader Sabrina’s level, and that’s a minor hex or a curse at best. Certainly nothing like phantom force.”

That couldn’t be right. Bashak had seen Diya use phantom step. He’d seen them throwing around night shades and shadow balls like they were candy when fighting Greta. They’d told him, to his face, that they were immune to Normal moves like Ghosts were and then seen that in action. 

“Could it be … illusions?” Bashak ventured. He couldn’t imagine why a psychic would be faking specific Ghost powers, or if that was even possible. And it wouldn’t explain Diya’s immunity to his Chansey’s singing. Nor did it make any sense for someone with Diya’s personality to be doing that. But if June said humans couldn’t do that, he believed her. Illusions was the only possibility that made even half a lick of sense.

But June shook her head. “No just … take a look at this.” She gestured for Igor to get her another sheaf of paper. This one was an academic paper, with a grainy picture of a Herdier stapled to it.

Bashak gave June a puzzled look, but took the paper. Immediately the Herdier’s health caught his eye. The poor pokemon was gaunt and haggard, with ribs showing underneath patchy fur and a drooping tail. Their eyes were so badly bloodshot they couldn’t have slept in days.

Without realizing it, Bashak’s hand dropped down to pet Greta.

Wondering what this was about, Bashak read the paper’s title: ‘Necrobiosymbiosis in the Shuppet line’. Confused, he looked over at his friend. “June what is this?”

“Just … read it.”

So he did. Most of the technical terminology in the paper was beyond him. But as Bashak read through the paper a picture began to form. A very disturbing picture.

Necrobiosymbiosis is an extremely rare Ghost-type possession process as yet only observed in the Shuppet line, whereby an evolving Shuppet reanimates and possesses a recently deceased or well preserved pokemon corpse in which all neural activity has ceased. As with necroanimism [1] the evolving Shuppet, now a Banette, fills the spiritual hollow left behind by a deceased pokemon. Unlike with necroanimism however, the pokemon’s body fully reanimates and displays all the vital processes and needs of life (see Sec. II). Furthermore evidence suggests that the Banette might fully integrate with the body on a spiritual level, taking the place of the passed on soul (see Sec. IV).  

Bashak looked back at the picture of the gaunt Herdier attached to the paper. Now that he was looking more closely, its eyes weren’t bloodshot as he’d first assumed. The sclera were a uniform pink.

He could imagine how June had felt while reading this. The dawning sense of realization. 

Despite its apparent similarities necrobiosymbiosis should not be confused with the more common necroanimism observed in the Yamask [2], Dusclops [2], Phantump [3,4,5], Pumpkaboo [5,6], Delmise [5], or Nincada [1] lines, which is the process by which Ghost pokemon possess or puppeteer corpses or corpse detritus to serve as shelter or a means to interact with the physical world. Necrobiosymbiotic Banettes appear to be more thoroughly integrated with their living hosts, and have not been observed to abandon their physical shell even when under duress and provided with an alternative host. 

Nor should necrobiosymbioisis be confused with necroneuroparasitism [7,8,9,10,11,12,13], in which a Ghost pokemon overrides the cognitive functions of a living creature to possess their body. In all three cases we observed, neuroimaging showed no signs of dual or overridden mental processes, and in one case pokecenter employees confirmed a full neurological shutdown before the possession occurred. 

Bashak skipped ahead.

According to reports from neighbors, Subjects H1 and H2 had been suspected of neglecting their Herdier for some time. However no action was taken before they moved out, leaving their Herdier behind in the locked apartment. After three days an unusual concentration of Shuppets and reports of noise led the tenancy council to open the apartment, finding the abandoned Herdier severely dehydrated and almost dead. The Herdier was taken to the local pokemon center -followed by the Shuppets as it did- where it expired despite medical care. Neuroimaging at the time confirmed a complete cessation of brain activity and that it was not a candidate for stasis and later revival.

It must be stressed that at this point the Herdier was dead. What happened next was not a case of necroneuroparasitism, as there was no brain activity to be hijacked.

No one was in the room with the Herdier at the time of resurrection, but witnesses report shadows in neighboring rooms lengthening and flickering with spectral purple fire, culminating in a loud cry of “Banette!”. At this time the heart monitor attached to the Herdier reported renewed activity, albeit at an unusually steady beat lower than what would be expected in a pokemon having undergone such severe trauma. Witnesses who rushed in reported the Herdier’s eyes had glowing pink sclera and that it was leaking smoke from its open mouth. 

Note: The report about leaking smoke cannot be confirmed, as at no point after this was the Herdier observed with an open mouth. However this would seem to correspond with what happens to standard necroanimistic Banettes with punctures or cracks in their animated form.

It is our presumption that one of the Shuppets which followed the Herdier to the pokemon center had evolved into a Banette, using the physically and emotionally abandoned Herdier’s corpse as its evolutionary catalyst. From this point on, the Herdier’s body will be referred to as a Banette.

Shortly thereafter the Banette fled the pokemon center, using phantom force [22] -a signature move of Banettes [23]- to move through the walls. Its exact movements over the next two days are unknown, but over the next fifty hours it successfully tracked down the former owners of the body it was inhabiting. While the motive for Banette ‘vengeance hauntings’ and the means by which they track their bodies’ former owners is a matter of intense debate [24,25,26,27,28], we should note that in this case the Banette was observed by a witness to be sniffing at the ground as it approached their domicile, possibly suggesting use of the Herdier’s sense of smell to facilitate the tracking.

Bashak didn’t need to keep reading to put the pieces together, but he finished the paper anyway. It gave him time to put his thoughts together and rub the tears out of his eyes.

Gods, he could see why June had been crying. Bashak buried his hand deeper in Greta’s fur, scratching her as strongly as she would tolerate.

“So?” June asked when he’d finished collecting himself.

“Diya is a Banette,” he admitted. 

June choked out a laugh. “Yeah I’ll say. It’s pretty damn obvious in retrospect. Glowing pink eyes, won’t open their mouth, eats negative emotions, uses Ghost type powers, and phantom force especially. And I don’t even know what to say about the way they apparently brought Svartis back from the dead, but it sure makes a lot more sense if they’re a Banette than a human with Psychic powers.” 

She shook her head ruefully. “You know when I first saw them in the forest, coming out of the dark with those glowing pink eyes, the first thing I thought was ‘But I kissed my stuffed animals goodbye’? I had this crazy thought that they were a Banette of one of my stuffed animals I’d left at home, coming to haunt me for abandoning them. Well in a way I was right! I was right and I should have known the moment I saw those pink glowing eyes.”

Bashak wrapped an arm around his friend’s shoulders, holding her close. 

“I just … Bashak, what do we do? ”

The taller trainer leaned back a bit and looked down at his friend quizzically. “What do you mean?”

“What you mean, ‘what do I mean’? Bashak, they’re a Banette . They’re a living incarnation of ghostly vengeance. Or unliving, or undead, or whatever it is you’d classify a necrobiosymbiote as! We can’t just shrug that off! This isn’t something you can zen your way out of!”

The corners of Bashak’s mouth twitched and he felt a twinge of something light in his heart working through the tragedy of the story he’d just read. “Sure it is.”

“Bashak. they’re. not. human. They’re a Banette . You know what Banettes can do to people, you just read that paper! I’ve got more stories here of what they can do when haunting people if you want to read them, one of them even has a body count!”

It was just like June to focus too much on what she was reading and not enough one what she was seeing, Bashak thought. He fished around in his jacket pockets for his pokedex while she was talking.

“And don’t even get me started on- what is this?”

Bashak was holding his pokedex out in front of them with his free hand, flicking through its pictures until he settled on the one he was looking for. A picture of Diya sleeping sprawled out in the careless haphazard manner of exhausted children, with Greta on their chest and Svartis wrapped around their neck. “This,” Bashak said clearly, “is a kid Greta was playing with earlier today.”

June swallowed heavily. 

“They’re probably a Banette, yes. They’re also a playful kid. Energetic enough to run Greta into the ground. Kind, too. They helped an injured Piloswine today. No hesitation, even when it was dangerous. They care for their pokemon-”

That drew a half-manic snort from June, “Even if they are one.”

“-even if they are one, yes. June, they’re a kid. I don’t know how this thing…”

“Necrobiosymbiosis?” The eight syllable word rolled off June’s tongue.

“...that, thank you. I don’t know how that works. But with Diya? The end result is a happy, loving kid .”

June took in a deep shuddering breath and leaned into Bashak’s chest. “I know,” she said quietly.

Bashak looked down at her and waited for the ‘but’. 

“But … Bashak, someone died for Diya to live. Somewhere out there, probably recently if Diya was telling even half the truth about their story, some teenager died totally alone. They were abandoned and they died . And what’s walking around in their body isn’t them , it’s some ghostly parasite! And they’re a parasitic ghost that’s interesting, and nice, and fun to talk to but-” June trailed off helplessly and Bashak teared up again, seeing his friend so twisted up.

But he shook his head and said, “They didn’t die alone.”

June looked up at him. “Bashak that’s literally the requirement for a Banette evolution. Something, or some one apparently, has to be totally abandoned. A kid had to die in the most awful misery for Diya to be what they are.” She shook her head miserably. “That’s … I don’t know if I can handle that about them.”

"You’ve never spent much time around Shuppets, have you?”

“... they’re bad omens which hang around places filled with misery and despair, so no, I haven’t.”

Bashak sighed. “You know old lady Diane back home? Her herds are on the south-western slope?”

“Yeah?”

“She’s got depression. The serious lock-the-knives-away kind. So she keeps some tamed Shuppets around, and they help her whenever it’s bad. They take the awfulness of it away.”

“Oh. That’s…” Bashak could see the gears churning in June’s head, thinking through all the ways Shuppets’ grief eating could be useful to people now that it had been pointed out to her.

“Mhm. And whenever I’ve visited Diane I’ve noticed: Shuppets don’t like leaving people alone.”

“Well I mean they eat our negative emotions, I’d be kind of surprised if they walked away from their primary food source. In fact it would shock me if they gave you your distance.”

The herder shook his head. “Even when they’re full, or you’re as happy as can be, they’ll follow you around. I told one to shoo once while I tended to nature’s call and when I was done it was the most anxious little spirit you ever saw. Fretted over me for an hour.” Bashak smiled, and swallowed a lump in his throat. His chest was heavy with a blend of warmth and sadness he couldn’t put a name to. “June, every one of those hosts in that paper you found? They died with a Shuppet near them. And Shuppets want nothing more in the world than to look out after people, and make sure they’re not suffering.”

Bashak hiccuped, wiping his eyes even as he smiled wider. “Diya didn’t kill this kid, whoever they were. And the kid wasn’t alone when they died either. Because Diya would have been the one who held their hand as they passed, telling them everything would be alright.”

June swallowed heavily. “Oh,” she said.

And then she burst into tears. 

Bashak didn’t try to stop her. He only hugged her close, and let his own tears come. Because she wasn’t wrong. A child had died. They’d seen the body. And that was a tragedy worth crying over.

---

The sink in June’s bathroom gushed, carrying with it the mechanical hiss of water being forced through an opening under pressure. Bashak splashed his hands in the stream and washed his face, wincing at the uncomfortable sound and the acidic chemical taste of the treated water. He was usually better about ignoring his discomfort with manufactured spaces, but the night’s revelations had scraped him as raw as an exposed nerve.

When he was done scrubbing the tears marks off his face, Bashak looked up into the mirror. His dripping face was marred by five o’clock shadow and reddened puffy eyes. It was still obvious he’d been crying. He hoped he’d look better tomorrow, that there wouldn’t be any signs for Diya to notice. 

Speaking of which.

In the bedroom June was getting ready for her nocturnal Spinarak hunt, strapping on equipment which would go under her down jacket and reviewing the maps she’d marked on previous nights. Bashak called out to her from the bathroom, “So June,” he waited until she’d made a noise of acknowledgement, “are we telling Diya?”

“What, that we know they’re a Banette?”

“Yeah.”

Bahsak caught a glimpse of her shaking her head in the mirror. “I’m still a bit worried what they’ll do if we know. As best I can guess from the story they gave me on the road, and that state I found them in, they’re a new Banette. Very new. And trying to hide it, however poorly. I can see them being skittish if we confront them with this. We’re new to them, all of this is new to them, it’d be easy for them to just cut and run and start over somewhere else.”

“No,” she continued, “let’s give them some time to settle in with us. Ask them if they’d like to travel with us, spend more time with them hunting for pokemon and at the Canopy Gym. If they’re as new as I think it won’t be long before the majority of their life as a Banette has been with us. Then we can tell them we know, when they’ll be less likely to skittish and less likely to cut and run.”

“Mm. Makes sense,” Bashak replied. “What if other people figure it out?”

June shrugged. “And do what about it? Capture them? I’d have to check the local laws on sapient or sapient-adjacent pokemon, but I’m pretty sure they’re the same as everywhere else. You know, ‘don’t mess with them for the love of all that’s good in the world, just leave them be, oh gods, oh gods, just leave them be we want to live’.”

Slowly, Bashak leaned out of the bathroom to squint at June. “I thought those laws were about self-determination and respect.”

“Nah it’s cus most sapient pokemon are powerful beyond all reason and capable of wiping towns off the map, and too mentally alien to meaningfully negotiate with, so not messing with them is the only safe option. Do you not remember that incident with those cloning engineers and the Mew? Most of the ‘leave sapient pokemon alone’ laws were passed after that.”

“Fair. Diya’s not that strong though.”

June turned to look at her friend with a bemused look on her face. “Bashak. They can walk through walls, hide in another dimension, start fires, and hurl shadow balls strong enough to turn trees into splinters. I’ll grant you they don’t fit the ‘too mentally alien to negotiate with’ bit, obviously, but of course they could destroy a town if they wanted to. They’d just do it from the shadows rather than like a rampaging Gyarados.”

Bashak blinked rapidly, trying to process that even as June kept talking.

“That’s actually another reason to think well of the kid, honestly I should have thought of it earlier. They’re really strong for a Banette. There’s still a crater in the forest from when they were fighting my Wurmple and threw off a half-baked shadow ball. If they had an aggressive bone in their body, there would be another crater wherever their body’s parents used to be and it would still be smoking. Assuming it was their parents who abandoned them. Regardless of who did it, we would have heard about it on the news.”

And speaking of that, Bashak had another question to ask. “If we don’t tell Diya we know, do we tell emergency services?”

“Mm?” June let out a distracted noise as she struggled with a particularly awkward equipment buckle. 

Bashak came out of the bathroom to help her tug it into place, then sat on the bed and asked her again. “A kid was mistreated and died. Do we tell someone?”

“Ah.” June’s face soured into a grimace and she winced. “That’s … tricky.”

The herder raised an eyebrow.

“It is! Look, for all we know Diya already did the classic Banette vengeance haunting. And the legality of that could be … it could be questionable. We don’t want to involve the legal system only for it to hurt Diya. Especially if whoever it was already got what was coming to them, and there’s no point involving the legal system. Besides, Diya is perfectly capable of leaving their own anonymous tip about the mistreatment of their body’s former owner, or for that matter just explaining the whole deal in person to whatever authority figure they choose. If they haven’t…” she shrugged, “well we should at least ask them why before we do it for them. And that means waiting until we tell them we know they’re a Banette.”

Bashak chewed over that for a moment. That was fair enough. “And if Diya wants help telling the authorities-”

“Oh, we help them of course,” June interrupted, “no question about it.”

Bashak smiled. “Good.”

“Also, I’ll keep up with the news and keep an eye out for missing persons reports. I checked earlier before you came over and there wasn’t anything yet, but that doesn’t mean there won’t be. If a report does go out and Diya is recognizable in it then we’ll have to talk to them sooner rather than later. And if it doesn’t … hmm. How about we wait until I’m done with my nocturnal Spinarak hunts and can spend some daylight hours hanging out with you two. Then we ask them to travel with us and if they say yes, tell them we know they’re a Banette then.”

Bashak nodded. “And in the meantime?”

The question drew a fond smile from June. “All you need to do, Bashak, is care for the kid. Do what you do best, be patient and be kind.”

That brought a smile to Bashak’s face. Because despite the rollercoaster of a day it had been, despite the tears and all the uncertainty the future still held, that was something he could do.

Chapter Text

Misdreavus is a dark bluish-gray ghost pokemon. Its lower half has several small appendages and resembles a ruffled dress. It has several round red gems around its neck, which are used to absorb fear or startlement and use it as nourishment. It has long, flowing lilac-tipped "hair". Misdreavus's large, red eyes have yellow sclerae.

In the wild Misdreavus lives in caves, though near humans it may seek alternatives such as basements or attics. As a nocturnal pokemon, it spends its days sleeping in darkness and its nights startling people and pokemon with mischievous tricks. Since it feeds on frightened people, it is known to yank and bite at people's hair or sneak up on them and shriek.

-----

Soft music drifted out of Diya’s pokedex, slowly rousing it from sleep. The Banette stifled a yawn and groaned deep in the back of its throat as it stretched. It rolled over to look at the pokedex, from which the music was slowly becoming louder. It was very grateful to June for showing it how to change the alarm, because the default electric blare had been …

Well it had been effective, but Diya couldn’t say it had much else going for it.

Another yawn tried to climb its way out of the Banette’s mouth and it had to tighten its jaw to keep its lips shut. That didn’t make it want to yawn any less though. Eventually it decided to risk it and clasped a hand over its mouth to hold its soul in, letting loose and yawning so wide its jaw joints cracked. Diya blinked in the aftermath. That. Had been satisfying.

Diya stretched again and then sat up, bringing its Piplup plushie with it in its arms. Time to start the day. It squeezed the plushie to wring Svartis’ gaseous form out from the stuffing inside. Come on, time to get up, Diya projected at her, filling their link with impressions of waking up and being active.

Near-incoherent impressions of protest and further sleep came back. 

Diya patted the less-corporeal-than-usual body Svartis had formed outside the Piplup plushie and got up to get itself ready. It was okay if Svartis was still sleepy from dawn’s effects on her, Canopy Gym’s classes didn’t start for a couple hours yet.

---

Class was starting and Svartis was very much still trying to go back to sleep.

Canopy gym’s first class of the day was on battling with and against Ice pokemon. Two instructors and a gaggle of a dozen students stood around on a trampled snowy field, their breaths pluming in the morning cold. Most of the students already had their pokemon out, not all of which were Ice pokemon. The Ice pokemon out were mostly Swinubs and Bergmites, which were some of the more common combat-capable Ice pokemon in the local area, though one student had a preening Glaceon with them. The rest of the pokemon were more eclectic, Diya saw everything from an almost humanoid looking yellow Electabuzz to a deeply alien Dewpider.

Though Diya’s Gastly, currently doing her best to dissolve her body and slip through the collar Diya was holding firmly shut so she could go back to sleep, was certainly among the odder pokemon there.

Bashak held out a thermos of steaming coffee to Diya.

Diya tilted its head, then did its best to type out a response one-handed while still keeping its collar shut. <No thank you, I don’t need it.>

The herder’s shaggy pelt of hair bounced as he shook his head. “For her. Drink it and send her the feeling.”

That drew a moment of surprised thought from Diya. Huh. Would that work? 

Svartis’ spherical body oozed into disturbingly ticklish eddies of gas under Diya’s scarf of the day - a vivid glacial blue with rows white snowflakes on the ends. The eddies felt more solid than gas should, almost like a slimy liquid. Half-formed sepulchral murmurs about the unfairness of being awake crowded Diya’s mind as she lethargically tried to slip into Diya’s robes.

<I’ll try it.> Diya said quickly. It took Bashak’s thermos and fastened its lips tightly to the rim -it hoped Bashak wasn’t squeamish about that- to carefully slurp long gulps of coffee. It closed its eyes and focused on the way the coffee settled in its chest, taking the feeling of warmth and the way its heart rate picked up and pushing them into Svartis.

To its surprise, it worked. Svartis still wanted to wrap herself around Diya’s neck to shelter from the wind under its scarf and collar, but the Banette could feel a spark of alertness kindling in her now. Which was great, although … Diya sighed through its nose. <If I become a coffee addict for my pokemon, I blame you>, it typed to Bashak.

Its friend snorted, grinning fondly. “That’s certain if you spend time around June. Best to get it over with.”

Despite its comment, Diya kept drinking the coffee as they waited for a couple of late students to straggle in. The dawn really did a number on its Gastly and anything which would help her be awake for class was welcome.

When everyone was finally assembled, their instructor clapped his gloved hands. He was a middle-aged man with a neat silver-grey beard and a scarf that wrapped all around his head rather than just his neck. “Good morning everyone!” he called out, giving the gathered students a moment to say good morning back. “I see a couple new faces today, so to those who don’t know me I’m the gym leader Ahmad. This is one of our teachers, Cor,” he gestured to a pale young man whose face was flush with snowburn.

Ahmad pulled a pokeball off his belt, mirrored by his student. Ahmad released a tall statuesque Alolan Ninetails with a gorgeous white mane while Cor released a waist high Weavile which fidgeted and scratched with repressed energy. “And these are our assistants for today, Beauty and Demon.”

Diya snorted at the last name, and saw Bashak raising his eyebrows from the corner of its eyes. They weren’t the only students to have that reaction either. At their response Cor let out a laugh and told them, “The name fit when she was a pup, trust me.”

Ahmad smiled at the byplay and continued on. “Today we’re working on wide angle Ice attacks. How to use them effectively, and most especially how to pace your pokemon when using them. For most of you with Ice pokemon that will mean using icy wind or powder snow moves. If your pokemon knows an avalanche or hail type move, check with us before using it and we’ll pair you with someone whose pokemon can take it.”

The gym leader waited for nods from the trainers with Ice pokemon before continuing. “For those on the receiving end, you’ll be focusing on two things. First, making the snap judgement for your pokemon to dodge or endure. Pay close attention to how wide of an area different moves cover and how fast your own pokemon can move or respond. Second, get to know what’s the best way for your pokemon to endure attacks like these. Keep an eye on your pokemon’s body language after having them endure an attack. Not all defensive moves will protect a pokemon from the cold, and finding what works best is a matter of trial and error.”

Cor took over from there, calling out, “Alright, pair up, you all know the drill!” While Cor organized the students into Ice and not-Ice pairs, pairing an odd student out with his own Demon, Ahmad came over to talk to Bashak and Diya.

“Hello there!” he exclaimed, putting his hand out to shake. “Haven’t seen you two before. I’m Leader Ahmad, as I said, what can I call you?”

Bashak shook his hand warmly. “I’m Bashak,” he said, smiling and emphasizing the faint trill on h in ‘baas-haak’.

Diya shook Ahmad’s hand afterward, fumbling to shake his hand and then pull it back to type. <I’m Diya, DEE-yuh.> 

“Oh, you’re mute then? Or hard of hearing?” As he spoke Ahmad started gesturing with his hands, arms sweeping in front of his chest and face. “Would it help if I signed while I spoke?”

The Banette shook its head, though the offer still made it smile. <No, that’s okay. I’m only mute, I can hear fine.>

“Good, good. Well if you need any accommodations just tell me. So, tell me you two, what pokemon will you be working with today?”

Bashak answered first. “I’ve got a few, if you don’t mind. A Herdier, a Mareep, and a Skiddo.”

“Hmm, so a non-Ice trainer then. Well it’s your first day, so if you could stick to your best trained one while you learn the sparring routine I’d appreciate that. But once you’ve got a handle on it, feel free to switch between them.”

“Can do.”

“And a Mareep. I’m curious, are they as well insulated as I hear?”

The herder shrugged. “Depends on the breed. Mine is.” Then Bashak cleared his throat. “Also, just so you know…”

“Yes?”

“I’ve got an injured Piloswine I’m rehabilitating. She’s still too sick to bring here, but in a few days she’ll be better. I’d like to train with her as an Ice trainer then.”

“Of course.” Leader Ahmad stroked his beard. “Claire was just telling me about some trainers who brought in a sick Piloswine yesterday, that was you two?” He smiled when they nodded. “That was good work you did.”

Then he turned to Diya. “So, you’ll be using your Gastly I assume?”

<Yes.>

“And as a non-Ice pokemon, I assume? If I recall correctly it’s only when they evolve to Haunter that their line can learn icy wind.”

Diya met Svartis’ eyes, unsure, before answering. <Uh, one minute?>

“Not a problem. So, Bashak, tell me about how your Mareep handles cold-”

While Bashak and Ahmad talked, Diya conversed with Svartis. It remembered, vividly, their first morning together when Svartis had near-frozen the shower spray in the bathroom with her body. Did she think she could do something like that again, but breathe it out?

Svartis’s blurry purple edges shifted and flowed as she thought. Maybe? As a Snom she could breathe out a rush of ultra-cold damp air that condensed into powdery ice crystals all over whatever it touched. But now … she still felt like she should be able to do that but she didn’t have lungs . Or a real mouth that wasn’t half-illusion, or salivary mist glands to make the air damp.

Well, Diya thought, why not try? If she could make a fake mouth that could actually nibble on things, why not try to breathe a fake breath and make it actually freeze things?

Hesitantly, Svartis considered it. Did Diya think it would work?

The Banette shrugged. There were a lot of things it didn’t know it could do until it did them. It was always worth trying. Besides, it thought, if any Gastly could do it, she could.

Emboldened by that, Svartis drew in a deep breath just like she would have as a Snom. Or at least that’s what it felt like in Diya’s mind. Physically she expanded enormously. Her semi-corporeal body thinned almost to translucence as she ballooned to be larger than Diya was tall. Then she did … something. She reached for some power Diya wasn’t familiar with, an energy totally unlike the phantom world’s that slipped through its mind’s grasp like a slick ice chip, and the temperature dropped.  

There was a shriek of air displacement and in an instant Svartis’ form became filled with an opaque white mist as the carbon dioxide inside of her plummeted straight past its freezing point and froze into microscopic points of dry ice. And then she breathed out.

The cloud of mist flowed out of her as she squeezed back down to her normal size. Turbulence caught the mist as it floated towards the edge of the field, peeling off fluffy bits of cloud in whirling rings and eddies. It looked slow but covered ground surprisingly quickly, like a deceptively calm river. In a few seconds it reached the edge of the field and engulfed a pine tree.

Every single needle the icy wind touched fell off.

Diya looked at Svartis. Bashak looked at Svartis. Ahmad looked at Svartis. Diya typed a message for Ahmad. <She will be training as an Ice pokemon, thank you.>

The gym leader blinked twice, then turned to the sparring students and clapped loudly to interrupt them. “If I could have your attention please!” he called out. “I’ll let all of you get back to the lesson in a moment. Our new trainer’s Gastly has just displayed a talent for Ice moves which as far as I know hasn’t been previously recorded among Gastlys. So this is an excellent opportunity for a quick mini-lesson: How to use your pokedexes to record new pokemon behavior and upload it for scientific review.” He turned back to Diya. “Diya, would you mind waiting a moment before you have your Gastly do that again? I’d like for everyone to spread out and get as many angles of her using icy wind as possible.”

<Sure?>

“And Diya, this can wait until after class, but if you have time I’ll show you how to submit a more detailed report on the particulars of your Gastly. It’s common for researchers to put out bounties on new information for certain pokemon or moves, so if you’re lucky you’ll even be able to earn some money doing that. For that matter, is your Gastly local by any chance? If she is, you might even qualify for a bounty on information about local ghost pokemon which our very own researcher group manages.”

Diya blinked. Then it slowly began to smile under its scarf, eyes shining almost bright enough to see under the morning sun. It had been worried about how it was going to make ends meet without relying too heavily on June and Bashak. While a skilled trainer might be able to make good money catching and selling pokemon and Diya hoped to one day sustain itself like that, Diya was not a skilled trainer capable of doing that yet .

Gyms often offered small monetary rewards to trainers for doing odd jobs, and in bigger towns gym tournaments might have petty cash as a prize for doing well. But those were designed to supplement a journeying trainer’s basic stipend with spending money, not to support them entirely. As a -technically- runaway minor, Diya couldn’t risk accessing its stipend. If anyone back home had reported its boy missing that would send up all manner of alerts.

But identifying unknown aspects of ghost pokemon and recording them? A giggle rose up unbidden in Diya’s throat. Ghost pokemon were some of the least well understood pokemon in the world. Last night after turning in for bed Diya had scrolled through the pokedex entries for Gastlys and Banettes, while it and Svartis had laughed together over some of the inaccuracies. It could get paid for correcting those?

Well. That was most certainly something Diya could do.

---

In its pokecenter room after dinner, Diya thought for a while on what Leader Ahmad had said about research bounties. 

When it looked up research bounties for ghosts it found almost more than it could read. Researchers wanted information on what Ghost types ate (if anything), how they formed, how they socialized in the wild, how they reacted to predators, if and when they were territorial, what abilities they had, everything . Extremely basic information that filled the pokedex pages for other pokemon often simply did not exist for ghosts and there were bounties on all of it.

Of course Diya found on further reading that the bounties on Ghost types tended not to be extremely lucrative. The relative rarity of ghosts and the difficulties of capturing them meant the information on them didn’t have the kind of usefulness which propelled some of the sky high bounty rewards Diya found during its research. The amount offered for video of wild Blissey leading packs of multiple pokemon species made Diya’s eyes go wide, and the amount offered for video of a wild Magikarp evolving into a Gyarados made it choke, but the typical rewards for ghost information were comparatively small.

Still, Diya thought, it could do this. While individual bounties were modest, there were plenty which overlapped with one another. In fact…

Diya’s smile grew wider and wider as it scrolled through some of the bounties. Some of these rewards would be downright fun to earn.

It sent June a text. <Hey June. If you want to see some cool ghost stuff tonight, you should take a break and come to the park behind the pokemon center at midnight. I could use a helper for some of it.>

Her text came back immediately. <Sounds fun! What should I bring?>

<Just your pokedex, to take some video. And good shoes for running, not snow boots.>

A minute later there was a knock on Diya’s door. It opened it to find June standing there, staring up at Diya with a slightly concerned expression. She looked like she was halfway finished getting ready to go out Spinarak hunting.

Diya blinked down at the short trainer. 

“So,” she said. “What will we be doing?”

<Uhhh, research?>

“And I’ll need good running shoes because…?”

Oh. Oops. Diya had not realized how that might sound. <Nothing dangerous! You might just have to follow fast to get some of the video.>

A few moments passed as June gave Diya a long evaluating look. “Alright. Consider me curious. What are we going to be doing?”

<Playing tag.>

---

The night air was cold and the clouds in the sky suggested it might snow before the night was done. But excitement -and a pitch black scarf- kept Diya warm. Tonight it would get to show Svartis how to play catch the will-o-wisp.

Diya stood atop the tallest piece of playground equipment in the park, lit from below by June’s lantern. Svartis floated next to it, oddly lit from the inside by the way the light shone through her partially transparent body. 

Below them on the ground, June stood pointing her pokedex up at them. Igor sat on her shoulder as usual, observing the proceeding. June called out ot them, “Just a moment! Gotta get the night filter to work … there! Alright, start whenever you’re ready!”

Svartis, Diya prodded gently, it’s your show.

Through their bond, Diya could tell she was nervous and fretting. She’d never done this before. What if they didn’t like her?

Diya smiled. Of course they were going to like her. After all, Diya liked her.

… okay. Okay she would try. Svartis drew on their bond, leaning on some of Diya’s memories to get this right. And then, taking the mental equivalent of a deep breath, she called.

Svartis’ eyes flashed red and for a moment the shadows cast by June’s lantern darkened. 

Diya closed its eyes and reached out, letting itself feel the phantom world. Several seconds later it felt the first return, a soft pulse of spectral energy as Svartis’ signal bounced off the soul of a fellow spirit. Then another, and another, lighting up each ghost pokemon in Canopy Town to Diya’s senses. The Banette smiled. If it had counted right that was almost a dozen Shuppets.

The first answering call came, curiosity and interest bound to a phantom message and broadcast into the night. Then all at once came a wave of curiosity as every Shuppet in the city sent their own calls, wondering who this newcomer was.

Just like in my memories, Diya directed Svartis. With another mental deep breath Svartis sent out a second pulse, tying this one to-

- jumping in the snow with the other infant Snoms of their cluster, nibbling on each other’s half-formed shells because the moisture felt good in their mouths, chirping and burbling with the instinct to play, play, play-

Diya smiled. Svartis had chosen her memory to send out well. 

It took a few minutes for the first of the Shuppets to arrive. Diya could feel it circling them, flitting between the shadows outside the circle of light June’s lantern cast. But it wasn’t nervousness Diya felt from it as it circled them out of sight. It was playfulness. The Shuppet wanted to see if they could spot it in the darkness, to learn something about these strange new ghosts which called for it.

Inwardly, Diya marveled that it could feel the circling Shuppet. Its perceptions hadn’t been that good when it had been a Shuppet.

Through her trainer Svartis picked up on its location. Hesitantly, she worked up the courage to say hi, reaching out to the Shuppet as she would through her and Diya’s bond. She fumbled a bit trying to speak to the unfamiliar pokemon; the way Diya and Svartis were learning to communicate with each other used impressions and intent to make something almost like words, but Shuppets communicated differently. Shuppets didn’t use anything like words to talk to one another, instead they used experiences, something more like the memory of a feeling.

She did her best though, transmitting to the Shuppet, Hi / -encountering another Snom in the forest, snuffling and chirping at one another- . I’m Svartis / -”Gastly!” she exclaimed to the waking human lying below her- . 

The jumbled mix of half-word impressions and memories Svartis sent made Diya wince a bit. But it was a good first try for the Gastly, and the Shuppet seemed to understand well enough to respond in kind.

The Shuppet floated into the edge of the lantern’s light, sending its own message in response. -rubbing horns with a new Shuppet which had come into town following a homesick trainer- -wondering if this new Shuppet would stay or go- -curiosity about the homesick trainer it was following-.

On the ground June turned her pokedex to catch all three of them in the frame at once, giving Diya a thumbs up. She couldn’t feel their conversation, but she could record the Shuppet’s visible interactions with them and Diya could annotate the footage with what it was aware of later.

Svartis giggled giddily at the Shuppet’s message. Hi! she sent again, reflecting the Shuppet’s memory -rubbing horns with a new Shuppet which had come into town following a homesick trainer- back at it. 

Next to her Diya smiled wryly. She’d missed some of the nuance. She’d sent her experience of getting the memory back instead of properly copying the Shuppet’s experience itself. It wasn’t exactly wrong, but to the Shuppet it probably registered as the equivalent of having a thick, hard-to-decipher accent. But that was why it was good for Svartis to have this opportunity to interact with her fellow spirits. She could only learn how to talk with them if she had the chance to practice.

The Shuppet floated closer. It repeated part of its previous message -curiosity about the homesick trainer it was following- and then followed it with -seeing a floating purple ghost made of gas next to a trainer in dark purple robes- . 

Oh! Svartis sent. She concentrated, compiling her message carefully before sending it. -pink glowing eyes snapping open as she hovered overhead- -a strong presence pulling her with it into the phantom world- -her trainer drawing pain and suffering from an injured Piloswine- -opening its mouth to eat a dumpling and choking as bits of soul floated out-.

Yellow light flared as the Shuppet’s eyes snapped wide open and its yellow pupils flared. “Shu!” it cried. “Shu! Shu! Shu!” -years ago, a Banette in a blue Phanpy plushie coming through town- -awe and reverence at seeing an older cousin so big and strong- It accompanied its last two sendings with the feeling of a question, -a Banette in a blue Phanpy plushie- -a trainer in dark purple robes- ?

Svartis nodded enthusiastically and replied with a rush of affirmative feelings. Her trainer -images of a pokemon cafeteria filled with people at dinnertime, people milling about with pokemon- was a Banette! She reflected -a Banette in a blue Phanpy plushie-.

The shock of awed emotion that radiated from the Shuppet upon getting confirmation was intense. Between one moment and the next the Shuppet covered the distance between them. It slammed to a halt centimeters in front of Diya and, radiating excited nervousness, proffered its horn. 

The old familiar greeting brought a smile to Diya’s lips and leaned forward to press its head to the Shuppet’s horn. Even if it no longer had a horn of its own, it could still reciprocate the Shuppet’s greeting. Gently, making sure not to overwhelm the smaller pokemon, Diya let some of the pain it still had from the Piloswine flow out into the Shuppet. In turn it accepted from the other spirit the sharp biting feelings of a perfectionist panicking about a project, completing the exchange.

“Shhhuuuuuuu!” the spirit cried, first whirling about in place and then zipping around Svartis as fast it could, radiating delight and awe and joy. Shadows flashed darker as the Shuppet sent out a call to its brethren, crying that they had a Banette visiting, a real Banette, come see, come see!

The next few minutes were a chaotic whirlwind of spirits and phantom communication as all of Canopy Town’s Shuppets descended on the park. Shuppets congregated around their higher evolution cousin, staring into Diya’s pink eyes and pressing their foreheads to Diya’s to exchange griefs. And once the novelty of a Banette -a real life Banette!- in their town wore off, there was still the novelty of the oddly transparent purple ghost to fawn over. Shuppets whirled around Svartis in an excited cloud, bombarding her with questions she did her best to parse. 

There was also a Misdreavus in town -which took a perverse delight in startling June and Igor by materializing from June’s shadow and shrieking at them- so the Shuppets weren’t totally unfamiliar with other species of ghost pokemon. But Misdreavuses were much more similar to Shuppets than Gastlys. They had similarly multicolored eyes and wispy grey bodies, different only in that their eyes were red with yellow schlera and in place of a horn Misdreavuses had round red gems around their necks to absorb emotions. And while Misdreavuses fed on more immediate fears and night terrors than the general grievances Shuppets consumed, both ghosts fed on emotions. They even formed the same way, spontaneously generated from intense concentrations of negative emotions.

As far as their experiences went, Svartis was something totally new. She could choose to not have a body and dissolve into a near-invisible gas if she wanted to! She didn’t eat emotions, or anything at all! (As far as she could tell, she was admittedly very young and might just not have gotten hungry yet). And she had a life before being a ghost! She shared memories with them of being something else! She even knew what it was like to have a mouth and eat solid food, and when she shared experiences of that it just about rendered some of the Shuppets catatonic.

It didn’t take long for the Shuppets to abandon their awe-inspiring big cousin entirely to pester and question this new fascinating ghost. Which a part of Diya’s heart twinged to see. The Shuppets were its cousins, and a part of it wanted to talk to them and bond with them as it would have played with its siblings back home.

But Diya was surprised to find that more of its heart swelled to see the Shuppets clustering around Svartis. Its pokemon ‘talked’ with them as fast as she could, stumbling over the memories she was using as she eagerly answered a barrage of questions. She fired off questions of her own at every opportunity, giggled as they rubbed up against her and proffered their horns for her to touch. And Diya simply couldn’t find it in itself to dwell on being excluded. Its charge was so happy to meet other ghosts like her and talk to them, how could it sour that with resentment?

Quietly, Diya slipped off the park’s playground equipment and walked over to June, who was filming the whirling cloud of Shuppets orbiting Svartis and cooing at her. “Peh!”, “Shuu!”, “Peh-peh-peh!” the ghosts called out as accompaniments to their phantom communications. June glanced over to Diya when it walked over, with a look of awe on her face.

“There’s so many of them,” she whispered.

The Banette nodded. It wasn’t surprised to see -it did a quick head count- eleven Shuppets and one Misdreavus in Canopy Town. But it understood why June would be; Shuppets were skittish by nature. Unlike Misdreavuses, which fed most eagerly on shock and startlement they created themselves -and often got caught and tamed for their troubles-, Shuppets found their stomachs turned by negative emotions they were responsible for. The nervousness and suspicion humans tended to feel towards Shuppets tainted their meals, so for the most part they tried to go unseen.

June turned her head to keep one eye on her pokedex screen and the Shuppets, and one eye on Diya, “How intelligent are they?” she asked quietly.

It waggled a hand. That was a complicated question, one which became harder for it to answer each day it lived its new life and its old one became more distant. <Differently intelligent. They always understand any experience they absorb and all the context behind it, and they absorb a lot. And they feel very intensely about those experiences. But…>

Diya was acutely aware of June watching it expectantly as it trailed off. It didn’t know how to explain this though. 

Eventually it typed something out anyway, hoping the words would come as it did. <They don’t have … ‘separate’ minds. If that makes sense? Not like they’re a hive mind, they’re not, but they’re not ‘separate’ from the experiences they absorb.> it waited for June’s hesitant nod before continuing. <They’ve got very simple animalistic minds for anything which isn’t a part of what they’ve absorbed. And making connections between experiences is...>

How did it explain this without leaning on its own experiences? As a Shuppet Diya had known that street lamps were created by humans. It had known how long it took to put them up, what it took to maintain them, even knew what their inner workings were. It could have diagnosed an electrical fault in one, or even explained the exact composition of its metal and why that protected it from rust and mechanical failure. But that didn’t mean it had known what they meant .

It had needed to think through a human’s mind to see street lamps in the abstract. It had known through other human memories what a community investment was, what beauty was. But to connect those concepts and understand that a street lamp was a community investment, that had been beyond it as a Shuppet. It hadn’t been able to make the leap to understanding that the way a town managed its street lamp upkeep and how prevalent they were could diagnose the town’s health. 

It hadn’t been able to see the halo of a street lamp in snow and understand that it was beautiful.

It tried again. <Imagine if you perfectly memorized and understood everything a teacher told you, but could never make connections between different lessons and courses they didn’t make. If your thoughts only ran parallel to paths others had laid.> That still wasn’t right. But it was a metaphor it hoped June would understand.

And it seemed she did. She nodded solemnly. June opened her mouth for another question, then glanced at her pokedex and started when she realized half the Shuppets had drifted out of frame. She corrected that and looked over at Diya again. 

The look she gave it made Diya shift uncomfortably. It was a very intent look.

Eventually she asked, “What about Banettes?”

Diya had only ever met one Banette beside itself. The Banette had possessed a child’s old comfort blanket in the shape of a Stunfisk, which had been thrown in the trash by the child’s parents when they forgot to dry it and it developed mold. And it … it was hard for Diya to say much about how intelligent the Banette had been, because Diya had still been a Shuppet when it met them. But it remembered the Banette having more complex feelings than Diya had been familiar with. It had worked so hard to clean itself and make itself presentable, in a way that Diya remembered being confused by. And maybe that was simply a side-effect of how much the child had loved the blanket as a source of clean warm security, but maybe that need to groom came from a greater sense of self instead.

The change Diya experienced from thinking through a living mind had been so extreme it could hardly say what differences in its mind were from its unusual possession and what were normal for Banette evolution.

It swallowed. Maybe it still had some of that Shuppet skittishness, because the thought of what June might say if it shared any of this was suddenly overwhelming. Or maybe it was just the subject itself that was overwhelming. <I … don’t know. I’ve only met two Banettes.>

June worked her jaw and almost opened her mouth to say something to that but then visibly arrested herself. “You-” 

Diya swallowed again.

“I’ll ... ask you more about that later, maybe. We’re supposed to be filming some ghosts, yeah?”

Diya was about to agree when it tasted an emotion oozing out of June, frustration and a gnawing unsatisfied anxiety. It wasn’t a passing feeling either, the thick oozing sensation of the emotion meant it was bound up in the kind of thought which wouldn’t leave her mind alone. The Banette looked at her intently and blinked once, slowly. What was that about?

“Anyway, you’re gonna show Svartis how to play catch the will-o-wisp, right? You should probably get started on that, she looks a bit overwhelmed by all those Shuppets. And not gonna lie, I’m pretty interested in seeing how that works myself. Might as well get started while the night’s still young, right?”

Even if the Banette hadn’t been able to taste June’s emotions it would have been able to tell she was deflecting. But she was right. Svartis was starting to look overwhelmed by the attention. And the night wasn’t getting any younger.

And if Diya was being honest with itself, it didn’t want to think about how much of its self only existed thanks to a young boy’s death. If June didn’t want to talk about it, Diya was happy to not talk about it either.

The Banette sent out a flickering pulse of ghostly energy laced with the memory of having sent out a pulse like that before. It was a call to attention carrying the concept of a call to attention and it served as a sharp “Hey!” to the Shuppets swarming its companion.

The wispy swarm turned in unison, falling silent in an instant. 

That surprised Diya. As a Shuppet it would have had to do that several times to get its siblings to pay attention when they were being rambunctious. But now … well, now it was a Banette. 

Diya stood a bit straighter. It sent off a quick private message to Svartis through their bond, telling her to pay close attention to what it was doing. And then it began to speak. It paired the memory of Svartis’s second call -the one woven through with the memory of joyful play- with a feeling of remembering something which had been forgotten. Then it brought forth a memory of playing with its own siblings as a Shuppet, connected to a feeling of intent and the presence of Svartis. And lastly it let that seamlessly flow into the memory of playing catch the will-o-wisp, with a focus on the details of play and a quiet feeling of seeking confirmation attached to those details.

In short, it reminded them that Svartis was there to play with them, suggested catch the will-o-wisp as a game, and asked if they used the same ruleset Diya was familiar with.

The flurry of overlapping responses Diya got was overwhelming. It got sheepish apologies, a bit of confusion from two of the more forgetful Shuppets, joyful agreement, and confirmation that they played by the same rules it did. But the most important response was the one Diya got from the Misdreavus as it was still parsing the flurry of phantom communication.

The Misdreavus, which had been very carefully suppressing its presence, came flying out of Diya’s shadow on the ground and whapped the tip of its nose with its semi-prehensile mane of hair, cackling “Mihihihihihihi!” as it flew away. As a last parting shot the Misdreavus sent Diya a memory burst of a small child crying out to her friends “Tag! You’re it!”.

And then the Misdreavus called a halo of heatless blue faerie fire around itself and shot off into the night.

There was a moment of stunned silence as the Shuppets processed the sheer audacity of what the other ghost had done. And then gleeful panic, as they realize they were less than five meters away from a Banette who was ‘it’. More ghosts called faerie fire around themselves as they fled, highlighting their forms in the night and making it impossible to hide.

Not that fleeing did much to save them. Diya jumped a tiny centimeter into the air, just enough to clear its feet off the ground. While it was off the ground it reached out with its powers, through its shadow and into one of the long shadows cast by the playground equipment in the light of June’s lamp. It pulled on the shadows, the feeling a mirror to how it would step up into the phantom world.

Diya fell into its own shadow and emerged from the other, right into the path of a fleeing brightly lit Shuppet. Whap! went its hand against the tip of the Shuppet’s horn. Diya smiled, grinning wildly. It called on the same memory the Misdreavus had sent it to cry out, “Tag! You’re it!”.

According to the rules Diya had ten seconds to flee before it had to light itself up with faerie fire, and it made the most out of them. One step threw it back into its shadow and out onto the roof of a nearby building. The next took it into the phantom world and it leaped from building to building in the shadowy other-space, trying to make as much distance as possible before it fell back into the physical world where the other pokemon could see it.

Its rapid flight didn’t turn out to be necessary though. Even as Diya fled it heard the gleeful mental shrieks of a pursued Svartis echoing through the phantom space. Clearly the Shuppet it tagged wanted to introduce its new friend to the joys of the game as quickly as possible.

Diya stepped back into reality on top of a sloped roof. But it didn’t account for the difference in traction between the roof’s permeable surface in the phantom world and its snow-slick surface in the physical world though and it slipped. On instinct it plunged one arm up to the elbow in its own shadow -cast by a street lamp-, pinning the shadow to the roof and itself with it. That arrested its slide and it -carefully!- got back to its feet.

The Banette’s heart pounded and an involuntary nervous giggle escaped it. It was going to have to relearn how to play this game, now that it had to deal with mundane things like gravity and traction. Having the superior ghostly powers wasn’t necessarily going to be enough to win against its flying cousins. Speaking of whom-

Diya looked out over Canopy Town and marveled at what it saw. Its cousins were all flying through the air as fast as they could, lit by faerie fire and blazing across the night sky. The unearthly flames didn’t stream back with the wind of their flight, making them look more like flickering blue stars flying through the sky than streaks of fire. 

As it watched some of them dropped into the town’s streets, having decided that they’d gotten enough distance and were better served by blocking line of sight weaving between houses. Others kept moving for the edge of the town, banking on distance to keep them from being tagged. And one spirit -Diya would bet that was the Misdreavus- shot high into the air above Canopy Town, apparently confident in its ability to outmaneuver the others in open air.

The ten seconds of grace Diya was owed were probably up, so Diya lit up the top of its witch’s hat with heatless flame. The Banette smiled. The rules didn’t say it had to light up its entire body, just that it had to make itself visible with faerie fire. And if the way it did so caused the brim of its hat to cast a deep shadow around its feet … well, that would just be a fun surprise for the first ghost to think it had caught Diya.

Assuming, of course, that the seeker didn’t sneak up on it. Diya checked behind it, casting about with its mundane and phantom senses. Playing tag became a difficult proposition when it was nighttime and the other players you were looking for were dark grey wispy spirits which could fly and squeeze through most gaps. Hence the faerie fire, necessary to make it possible to find one another, so they could actually play tag and not an impossible game of hide and seek. But there was no reason or rule that the seeker had to announce their presence with faerie fire, so getting caught unawares by a sneaky seeker was a very real possibility. 

A minute later Diya heard the sound of shoes on stone, and it turned to see June running around the corner. She was holding her pokedex out in front of her with the blue scanning dome lit, and already breathing a bit hard. 

Diya waved to June as she came to a stop in the street beneath it. On her shoulder, Igor waved back.

“Am I-” she took a deep breath but managed to keep the pokedex steady, “going to be running over Canopy Town all night trying to keep up with all of you?”

Diya snorted and nodded.

The bug trainer said a word she should probably edit out of the final footage.

“You are recording too though, right? I just wanted to double-check, cus we’re going to feel very dumb if tomorrow morning we check and we’re missing half the footage.”

Diya blinked and then winced. It hastily patted its pockets for its pokedex. Diya had borrowed a harness from the pokecenter which would hold its pokedex in place over its chest, with the scanning dome set to record everything in front of it. Though for that to be helpful, it should actually put its pokedex in there and set it to record first.

It took a moment to send June a text as it got its pokedex out. <Thanks for the reminder. I would have forgotten.>

June dropped her eyes to her ‘dex as the text came in. She snorted. “That’s what I’m here for, to make sure the whole thing actually gets recorded.”

The wind picked up, and Diya reached up to hold its hat in place. With its free hand it typed, <Speaking of, shouldn’t you be following the seekers, or one of the will-o-wisps? Oh, and how many seekers are there? I didn’t count.>

“What do you mean, how many seekers are there?”

<The game’s usually played with more than one. How many Shuppets didn’t light up?>

“Ah. Sorry, I wasn’t counting. Didn’t know I should be. One second, Igor would you mind-” The Blipbug tapped her shoulder twice. “Thank you.” Then June smirked. “Oh, and we are following a seeker.”

The Banette blinked. What did that mean?

… wait.

Diya whirled around but it was far too late. Svartis was floating behind the Banette with a grin wide enough to swallow the moon, and the moment Diya saw her she collapsed into a fit of howling laughter. On the ground June burst out laughing too. “Hahaha, that was great! Svartis tagged you a minute ago when we were talking and you didn’t even notice!”

Shock covered Diya’s face as it tried to process what had just happened, looking back and forth between June and Svartis for answers.

“Hahahahaha! This is fantastic, I even have video of it forever. Hahaha, ah, remember that gust of wind a minute ago? You grabbed your hat to keep it on?” June smirked. “Yeah that was Svartis.” Svartis’ howling laughter increased in volume as realization finally hit her trainer and percolated through their bond.

Oh. Diya saw how it was. This meant war.

The evolved pokemon reached up and pinched the peak of its hat, extinguishing the witch’s fire there with a twist of will. Then it held up ten outstretched fingers in front of Svartis.

It folded one finger in. Nine.

It folded another finger. Eight.

Svartis sobered up and stopped laughing very quickly.

Seven.

“Ga!” she shrieked, and with every ounce of speed she could muster the Gastly shot away into the night.

Diya chuckled as it watched Svartis vanish into the night. She’d have to light herself up soon enough, and then the chase would begin. In the meantime Diya slipped its pokedex into its recording harness. It stretched. And it sent June a single text. <Hope you can keep up.>

Its friend said another word she’d have to edit out of the final footage they sent to the researchers.

In the distance a street lit up with the blue glow of faerie fire. Svartis’ grace period was up. Diya grinned behind its pitch-black scarf. Then the Banette called shadows and began to hunt.

It wondered if it was possible to tickle a Gastly in revenge.

---

June watched her friend drop into the rippling too-dark shadows beneath them as if stepping into a pool of inky water. A heartbeat passed, then two, and then a nightmarish screech ripped through the night a couple blocks away. Consciously June recognized it as the same move she’d seen Diya use against her Wurmple. It wasn’t a real noise, just the mental impression of one. June knew it wasn’t real, when she focused she could tell that the screech didn’t ‘sound’ like anything at all.

But sweet merciful spirits it felt like hearing a Garchomp’s hunting roar echo over the hills while lost in a storm. 

The trainer swallowed. “Gods be quiet,” she whispered to herself. The fear pumped straight into her veins was a stark reminder that she wasn’t dealing with a human, but the living -or perhaps undead- embodiment of a curse. But she had a job to do, so she swallowed the phantom fear and ran towards the terrifying hell-scream. Diya, who was her friend she reminded herself, was playing tag with their cousins tonight and it was her job to get as much of it on video as she could.

She grumbled as she ran, using petty complaints to make her fears feel pettier. “Tonight’s gonna take a decade off my life. Don’t know what I was thinking, agreeing to come along for freaking ghost tag. Yeah, just gonna run around a silent sleeping town in the middle of the night chasing ghosts, that’s a recipe for a great time. No possibility of any haunting experiences, no siree, it’ll be fine. Oh and speaking of which ... I swear by each of the storm gods’ names,” she raised her voice with each word of that last phrase, “that if that Misdreavus is still out there and planning to jump-scare me again, I will capture it and bury the pokeball.”

Silence answered June.

“Yeah that’s right, you better run,” she muttered.

---

The night ended with Diya lying on a park bench with a cloud of exhausted Shuppets, more mist than form, sprawled out on top of it. Svartis and the Misdreavus were floating up in a tree somewhere, murmuring mentally to one another too quietly for the exhausted Banette to pick out. Igor was burying its head in a food bowl underneath the bench, consuming its just rewards for a night of hard observational work. And June was lying on the grass at the foot of the bench with her shoes off, staring up into the night sky.

But despite being exhausted and further tasting everyone’s exhaustion thick on its tongue, Diya couldn’t have felt more alive. Its blood sang hot in its veins, balanced by each breath of cold night air, and it could hear every heavy thudding heartbeat in its chest.

It needed to do something, say something, even as it needed to rest and get the feeling back in its limbs.

The Banette typed out a message and flopped its arm off the side of the bench, letting the pokedex dangle next to June’s face. <Did you have fun?>

June blinked until her eyes refocused from the far away sky. She took hold of Diya’s hand, reorienting the ‘dex so she could see it better. “You know. Yes. I did. Tonight was … an experience,” her tone of voice said that was a rather extreme understatement, “but against my better judgement I had fun. I got to see something I never would have seen in a hundred years, otherwise. Or at least, I wouldn’t have understood what I was seeing, if I just looked out my window in the middle of the night and saw blue lights dancing around town. And I got to see a bit more of your life. Which was amazing, but also…” June paused.

“Diya, do you mind if I ask you a question?”

The Banette nodded.

“When you were chasing the Shuppets earlier, was any of that meant to be scary?”

Diya tilted its head. <What do you mean?>

“You know, the ghostly nightmare screeches, the ambushes out of nowhere, the creepy things you did with everyone’s shadows?”

<Creepy shadow things?>

“I saw a Shuppet’s shadow come to life and drag it into the ground -which was an empty lightless abyss at the time-, and then you reached into your shadow and pulled it out so you could tag it.”

<Oh right, that.>

“Yes. That. Was that meant to be...” June fumbled at the air with her fingers, searching for the right words. Eventually, at a loss, she just asked, “Was it meant to be scary?”

Diya shook its head. <No. It’s like running after a little cousin with your arms raised, yelling “Raargh!”. It’s scary, but not a ‘real’ kind of scary.> It frowned at the taste of real anxiety coming from its friend, and asked her, <I scared you though?>

June snorted. “Maybe a little, yeah. It … gods, that was really just you playing with the little kids, huh?”

<Shuppets aren’t ever actually ‘kids’, they don’t have childhood states.>

“You know what I mean. And you used the metaphor first.”

Diya examined the cloud of Shuppets lying on its chest. It released a puff of stored grief for them to absorb. The little spirits stirred and murmured tiredly, happily absorbing the grief before curling up closer around their older cousin. Maybe the metaphor of them as children was more true than Diya had meant it to be. It just didn’t know what that meant for itself if so, if being a Banette meant it was ‘grown up’ now.

<Yes. That was me playing with the neighborhood kids.>

There was a quiet silence between them for a while.

Eventually June said, “Eugh, now I feel like I’ve been an asshole.”

That alarmed Diya enough to raise its head off the bench. The Shuppets protested and it waved them down. <Why?>

“I’ve been, uh, kind of nervous about the powers you have? Scared, if I’m being honest, I’ve been scared. And some of what I saw tonight was frankly kind of terrifying? Hah, scratch that actually, I say kind of but it was terrifying. I mean it’s scary enough to know what your night shades and shadow balls would do if you didn’t hold back. I looked that up and ahahaha, wow, that is a scary amount of firepower. But seeing you in full hunting mode, jumping through shadows and disappearing and reappearing from out of nowhere? The freaking nightmare screeches? You felt like a predator, and it made me think of you as something to be afraid of. But you were just … playing with the neighborhood kids. The fear was all in my head.”

<Are hugs scary?>

June twisted her face in confusion at the non-sequitur. “Uh, no? What do you- oof!”

To raucous “Shuu!”s of complaint from displaced Shuppets, Diya rolled off the bench and partly onto June. And then it hugged its friend. 

“Diya, what are you doing?”

The Banette had to work a bit to hug and type at the same time, and find a not-too-awkward angle to hold its pokedex for June to see, but it made it work. <I do ghost stuff. It’s okay if that’s scary. It’s also okay to tell me that it’s scary, so I can reassure you.>

It took a moment for June to process that, blinking at the pokedex held in front of her face. “With hugs,” she said.

<Hugs are nice, yes.>

With her ribcage slightly squashed beneath Diya, June huffed out a laugh. “See, this is why I feel like an asshole. You’re a nice kid. It’s not fair to think of you as a scary monster from straight out of my nightmares when you’re just a kid playing with little baby spirits.”

<I am dangerous though.> Diya shrugged, and typed out the rest of its response. <It’s okay to be scared by that even if you know I wouldn’t hurt you. That’s what reassuring hugs are for.>

It took June a while to respond to that. The Shuppets had gotten over their annoyance at being disturbed and begun to settle back down on Diya’s back when June finally said, “...yeah. The hugs do work for that.”

<Good. Mind if I put my dex away now? The angle is awkward.>

“No that’s fine. I’m good. The, uh, the reassuring hug is doing its job.”

Diya smiled and cuddled up tighter against its friend. Through the hug it could feel her trying to relax and stop talking, but after a minute the words came out anyway.

“So just … huh. So the idea is that I shouldn’t try thinking of you as something that’s not a scary dangerous ghost. Person. Ghost person. Because you are. It’s just … you’re a scary dangerous ghost person and you’re a hug-happy kid with no interest in cursing anyone. And it doesn’t bother you if I’m bothered by the first part, because you’re a hug-happy kid who’s more than willing to give out hugs until it stops bothering me.”

The Banette nodded and squeezed June. It was kind of tired, but still plenty willing to hear her out.

June chewed on that for a moment. “That is very zen and it almost makes sense if I let my mind fuzz a little and try to think like Bashak. In fact I’m pretty sure if I tell him about this he’s not going to say anything at all, he’s just going to nod and give me a look which says ‘yes, of course I am in agreement with you that this is how things work, I’m just a little confused you didn’t already realize that’.”

Diya nodded sleepily. Bashak was wise like that.

June turned her head to squint at Diya suspiciously. “If both of you start ganging up on me with minimally worded philosophical musings about deep emotional concepts, I will sic Igor on you two.”

That actually sounded like a lot of fun, so Diya made no promises and stayed silent. It let its head rest on June’s shoulder and closed its eyes.

She sighed. “Well. Thank you for inviting me. This was nice.”

…

“Diya?”

Diya was already fast asleep.

“Oh.” June brushed a hand over the Banette’s hair.  “Good night kiddo. Sweet dreams.”

Chapter Text

Snowbirds were singing outside, the sound of sizzling food wafted out of The Mighty Meowth’s kitchen, and the smell of June’s coffee was burning Diya’s nostril hairs from three paces away. Diya eyed her steaming thermos warily, wondering if a good friend would try to separate her from that toxic brew for her own good. Then the Banette flicked its eyes up to the bags under her eyes and the determined look on her face which said she had already murdered sleep and would cheerfully dig a second grave.

Maybe a braver friend would try to get her to put down the coffee.

June noticed Diya staring across the booth and met its eyes. She held out the thermos and offered, “Want some?”

The Banette protectively pulled its orange scarf -decorated with Gourgeists- up to its eyes and shook its head. Its cup of hot chocolate was more than enough caffeine for it and Svartis.

The bug trainer shrugged. “Suit yourself,” she said, and held up the thermos to her shoulder so Igor could drink from it.

Sitting next to her in the booth, Bashak raised an eyebrow at her with a patient look on his face. “Caffeinated enough?”

“Mm. It’ll do for now. Don’t worry about me though, I’ll make it through the day. I do midnight shifts with the night weaving pokemon sometimes, remember? It's not the first time I’ve had to reset my sleep schedule after switching off a nocturnal schedule.”

Bashak hummed acknowledgement and smiled. “Glad you finished your Spinarak hunts.” He popped a handful of berries in his mouth, having taken full advantage of the buffet’s fruit section.

Diya interjected, <How many Spinarak did you capture anyway?>

The bug trainer held up one finger as several long gulps of coffee made their way down her throat. When she was done she pulled out her pokedex and started swiping through it. “One sec, let me check … ah, there we go. Not including the one you sold to me, I’ve captured thirty-eight Spinaraks over the last few nights.”

Diya choked on a mouthful of noodles it was trying to eat. Its bowl jerked and sloshed liquid all over the table. Floating beside it, Svartis blanched translucent until she was nothing more than a distortion in the air. Diya spent the next minute desperately trying to swallow down its coughs without opening its mouth and soothing Svartis, while Bashak patiently mopped up the spill with some napkins. When it was finally fit to function again it typed, <38?! 3 & 8?!>

The self-satisfied smirk it got in response looked very at home on June’s face. “Yup. Honestly I probably should have paid you even more. Knowing that little tidbit about the local Spinaraks being hungry enough to approach people for food was extremely helpful.”

Diya got a sudden mental flash from Svartis of being the food a Spinarak was willing to approach Diya for and its stomach churned.  <Okay but how?! Why?! You’re allowed to catch that many?>

“Mhm, one moment, let me eat.” The Mighty Meowth had some kind of roasted insect as long as her thumb available for lunch today, and June was happily munching her way through a bowl of them. Every once in a while she’d offer one to Igor, who devoured them with evident pleasure. After getting in a few mouthfuls she continued. “Capturing Spinaraks isn’t like catching Swinubs around here, you don’t need capture licenses. The Swinub population here is kind of precarious-” she glanced sideways to Bashak for confirmation.

He nodded.

“-so they don’t want you catching too many. But it’s the opposite with the Spinaraks. Apparently some ecological disaster sixty years back wiped out their primary predator so there’s too many of them. It’s not too much of a problem, they’re territorial trap predators so when they overpopulate they don’t devastate the local prey species too badly. They’ll just fight and starve themselves back down to a more reasonable population. But that still sucks, you know? And ‘cus they’re smaller than their mainland counterparts, not enough visiting trainers want to catch them. So if you do want to catch, say, thirty eight Spinaraks, no one bothers you about it.” June grinned wryly. “Actually I got a letter from the city council saying how much they appreciated it after the tenth one.”

Svartis still churned uncomfortable at the thought of June luring in Spinaraks with helpless Snoms, and she prodded Diya to ask June if that’s what she’d done. <Okay, but again, how?>

“I just borrowed a few predator lures from the pokecenter, you know the ones that shake around and make noise and smell like prey? Then I stuck them to any sticky web I found and waited for the Spinaraks to get brave enough to approach me.”

Oh. Some color returned to Svartis and knots of tension leaked out of Diya’s shoulders which it hadn’t realized was even there. It should have known June wouldn’t be so cavalier about using live Snoms as bait in front of Svartis. <And that got you 38 Spinaraks?>

“It’s really not that hard once you get a system down. It was hardly even a battle after the first few. Igor uses leer to distract it, then Wurmy hits it with poison sting from the side. Spinaraks are pretty predictable and they get serious tunnel vision in a fight, so it works almost every time.”

Huh. Diya slurped down some noodles -carefully not leaving any space for air to escape its mouth- and pondered that. <I guess I can see that. But why so many?>

“They’ll be going back to my family’s silk weaving workshop. I’m keeping a couple for myself though, ones I think are ready to evolve into Ariados if they just get consistent meals for a week or two-” June glanced up at Svartis. “Ah, don’t worry little one, I’m not feeding them Snoms. My family has a recipe for mashed-up mushroom balls they’ll eat if you soak ‘em in bone broth. It’s much cheaper than sourcing them meat or live prey, and if you get the mix right it actually makes their silk stronger.”

Bashak finally spoke up, with a faintly puzzled look on his face, “Does your family have space for that many new weavers?”

And June … winced? Diya tasted a sudden surge of regret and involuntarily caught a flash of memory from her.

-howling flurries of snow raging around the tear-streaked face of a younger Bashak, who was furiously wiping his eyes even as he yelled at her that-

The Banette almost missed what she said next as it blinked away the intrusive experience. “Well,” June said to her friend, “some of them are also going to my second cousin’s workshop. But six of them will be part of our tithe contribution to the storm gods this year.” 

Bashak grimaced but nodded understandingly, popping a roseli berry into his mouth.

“And…” her regret surged higher. Diya watched June worriedly as she visibly drew up the courage to continue. “Well, these Spinaraks are cold-aligned and kind of unique, not something that’s easy to find anywhere else. So,” she swallowed and then rushed through the rest of her sentence, “my moms were thinking about trying to evolve as many of the Spinaraks as they can and then gifting the Ariadoses to Articuno for a blessing.”

As she rushed out the end of the sentence Bashak’s face fell. He worked his jaw for a moment and then let fall a flat, “Ah.” Revulsion wafted off of him and stained Diya’s tongue, 

Diya wasn’t sure what reaction it was expecting from Bashak. It was expecting something , but not … this. It wasn’t expecting the shame spooling inside of June, or the bitterness in Bashak, both rising and rising and rising to a breaking point.

Something in its throat caught and memories of angry fights and wall-rattling yells seized its body. One memory in particular twisted in Diya’s insides, caught from two perspectives, of a boy hiding out on the porch to avoid his parents’ latest screaming match. In a sudden flash of panic the Banette reached out and grabbed a hand with each of them. It swallowed convulsively as they looked over to it, then jerkily let go of June’s hand to type-

It didn’t know what to type.

The shame in June and the bitter revulsion in Bashak both ebbed though, replaced by the taste of shared worry. The two of them exchanged a glance, then looked back at Diya, worry creasing both of their brows. Bashak folded his free hand over Diya’s and asked it, “You okay, Diya?”

Diya nodded convulsively. It was. It was. Okay. Of course it was okay. It just needed them to not be fighting. Friends shouldn’t fight.

It needed them to change the topic.

It still didn’t know what to type.

June’s forehead creased and she asked, “Seriously Diya, you okay? You’re looking kind of ashy in the cheeks.”

It swallowed. <Don’t fight?>

That drew a puzzled look from June, but an understanding one from Bashak, who gently squeezed Diya’s hand. “We’re not fighting,” he said. “This is…” he turned to June and nudged her with his shoulder.

The bug trainer straightened and cleared her throat professionally. “It’s a point of contention between us which we are both unhappy with, but it makes us unhappy for one another more than with one another. And insofar as we are a little unhappy with one another about it, it’s not more important than our friendship. We don’t argue about it-”

Bashak coughed.

“-well, we don’t let arguments about it get heated.”

Diya’s heart was still racing at two beats a second and it still didn’t know what to type.

“Would it help if I explained what the issue is?” June asked. She gave Diya a long and searching look, then turned to Bashak and asked, “Are you okay if I explain this? I know your … opinions, about the storm gods.”

Bashak shook his head. A small smile played over his lips, as he answered. “I trust you. You’ll explain it right.”

June smiled back. “Okay. Alright, Diya, have you ever heard of the storm gods?”

It hadn’t. The Banette shook its head.

“Okay. The storm gods are a trio of legendary bird pokemon which live on the islands we come from. Articuno, Zapdos, and Moltres. And…” she took a deep breath. “You know how your school textbooks talk about how people used to think legendaries were gods, because of how much power some of the legendaries have?”

Diya nodded. Its heart was still beating fast, but slowing as it let itself be pulled into the rhythm of June’s story.

“Right. Well the storm gods are probably some of the legendaries your textbook writer was thinking of when they wrote that. But your textbook writer was wrong. Because they are gods. It’s … I know it’s hard to understand when you’ve never seen one up close. But nothing can have that much power and not be called a god. It’s just … I don’t know what could have more power than they do. If you tell me they’re not gods that doesn’t mean anything to me, because then I don’t know what would be a god.”

The Banette swallowed nervously. It looked from June to Bashak, and then swallowed again when Bashak nodded his agreement.

“They’ve got this presence that-” June struggled for words. “The scientists who have studied it say it’s not a Psychic thing, or Ghost, or Dark, or Faerie. It’s all of them, but ... more. Like how if you mix carbon and hydrogen just right you don’t get, like, a bunch of coal dust in a very flammable cloud or something. You get wood. And I don’t know how to describe it if you haven’t experienced it. But if you look at one of them, even just catching it in the corner of your eye, it looks back at you, and it sees you, and you see all of it, and it’s so much bigger than you that words can’t describe it.”

June floundered, searching for the right words anyway, and Bashak picked up for her. He squeezed her hand and said, “Everyone who sees them falls to their knees.”

“Yeah, and that’s just their presence. When they fly-” she shook her head. “Everything beneath Articuno dies. Pokemon, people, trees, grass, everything. The Ice pokemon die. It goes so cold that electronics stop working. When it flies over the ocean the water freezes three meters deep. It…” she trailed off.

Bashak cleared his throat and spoke quietly. Even though he sat head and shoulders above June, his presence felt very small. “I’ve seen Zapdos fly a few times. The lightning never stops. Even when taking shelter inside it’s like a strobe light. There’s no claps of thunder, only an endless roar louder than anything else in the world.” 

Diya was so caught up in their story it had to remember to breathe. <And Moltres?> 

Both of them flinched. “It brings the hurricanes,” June said simply.

<How do you survive them?>

There was a flicker again of that shame in June and that bitterness in Bashak, but both were quickly suppressed. The dominant emotion Diya could taste in them both was a simple matter-of-fact resignation.

“That’s what the tithes are for,” June said. “It’s possible to negotiate with the storm gods mind-to-mind, if you’ve got a will like iron and you’re willing to risk having your mind blasted into gravel. Our ancestors negotiated with them so we could live on the islands without being killed. We bring them prey, bedding for their nests, baubles, anything they want really. And in return they don’t bring aseasonal weather which would destroy our crops, or fly over our settlements.”

“Mostly,” Bashak said.

June grimaced. “Yeah. Mostly. They haven’t done that in a really long time though. They’re mostly pretty good about it.”

Bashak gave June a side eye. “If you live in the cities.”

“Ah, yeah. They’re pretty good about steering away from city lights. But they’re sometimes … forgetful, about where humans have negotiated herding rights. Not often! And they don’t typically come too close when they do. But it does happen some years.”

<So you pay the gods protection money?>

That earned a laugh from June, and a snort from Bashak. “Hah! Yeah I guess you could say that!” June replied. “It’s really not so bad though. It’s like living somewhere with a natural disaster risk. You allocate some resources to prevent it and prepare for what happens if you can’t, and then you live your lives. There’s places with statistically much worse dangers.”

Bashak nodded. He looked to June to make sure he wasn’t interrupting, then said, “I know some folk whose herding routes go through the territory of a Garchomp which can mega evolve at will. Each year they bundle up a few pokemon from their herds and send them to it, so they can move the rest through safely. It’s not great, but-” the big trainer shrugged. “That’s life. The storm gods are the same.”

Then June grimaced. Some of that shame was still in her as she said. “Yeah, the tithes are necessary, neither of us disagree with that. Our point of contention is, ah, sacrifices. For blessings. Bashak, do you want to explain…?”

Her friend shook his head. He was bitter but not, now that Diya was a bit calmer and could taste the emotion more carefully, bitter at her . “Said I trust you to explain it right, still do.”

“Right. Well. We all chip in to make sure the tithes are large enough, so the big scary gods don’t kill us all. And for a few collective boons, besides. Articuno freezes the water between the islands each spring so herders can cross between islands, Zapdos hunts the really big sea monsters which would threaten our ships, and Moltres makes sure we never have a drought. So you know, dealing with the gods doesn’t just have to be about survival. We get something positive out of the arrangement too. And that applies on a more personal level too. Sometimes if individuals give them something extra which pleases them, they gods will grant blessings in return.”

<Blessings? Like?>

“Things subtler than freezing the ocean solid. I’ve heard of Articuno killing all the pests on a farm, and only the pests, and Moltres is famous for being able to ensure an amazing harvest. I know someone who was blessed with quick reflexes by Zapdos, someone else who can always find fresh water, and I hear my great grandpa could see heat in the dark. Pokemon blessings are common too, people with pokemon who use the same elements as a particular god can get their pokemon empowered by the god’s touch. And if you believe some of the wilder rumors, blessings can get really weird. Things like being given the gift of prophecy or a silver tongue or the ability to taste lies.”

“And the price is simple,” she continued. “You just have to bring something that’s especially pleasing to one of the gods. A lot of times that means bringing them higher evolved pokemon as food. The priests who commune with them say there’s something ‘more’ about evolved pokemon they seem to like. But novelty helps too, a new experience gives you a better chance at getting a blessing. And my moms thought, well, we have all these unique cold-adapted Spinaraks which might only need a steady food source to evolve. Maybe Articuno would like them as a sacrifice enough to give the family a blessing.” June shrugged.

Next to her Bashak sighed.

“Bashak, uh, disagrees with the practice.”

<Why?> The Banette was curious. Without the immediate tension of their grievances building in the air and choking it, it wanted to know what set off such negative emotions in its friend.

Bashak looked off to the side and pursed his lips. “Survival is one thing.” he said. “I understand that. I just don’t like trading favors with them as if they’re some friendly merchant.” 

“That’s not it though!” June countered. “It’s not about being friendly with them. You don’t have to like them to make sacrifices. It’s just, it’s there. It’s an option. You’re not hurting anyone by getting a blessing, and you’re not helping yourself by not taking the opportunity. If a blessing was on the table for a sacrifice, without any of the other baggage of tithes attached to it, you’d take it!”

The herder shook his head, shaggy hair bouncing with the motion. “That’s not the point.”

The reply June wanted to give was acerbic, judging by the look on her face, but she schooled herself. She swallowed her first reply and answered with careful words, “Can you explain to Diya what is the point then? Because this isn’t something I think I can explain for you.”

That caused Bashak to grimace. “Let me think?”

“Sure, take however much time you need.” 

While they waited, June and Diya took the opportunity to dig into their neglected meals. Or rather, June cottoned onto the fact that Igor had snuck down and eaten all of her food so she went to get some more, and Diya finished the rest of its noodles. It considered getting some more, but its stomach still felt like a twisted knot -when had that started?- and it didn’t have much of an appetite.

Eventually Bashak cleared his throat. He met June’s eyes, holding her gaze for a long moment before turning to Diya. When he spoke his words were measured, each one parceled out carefully and with thought. “If I bow to the storm gods because it’s do that or die,” he shrugged, “that means nothing. Nothing you do to survive costs you dignity. But if I kept bowing after I didn’t need to, I wouldn’t be able to look myself in the mirror.”

Diya waited to see if the herder had more to say, but when he fell silent it nodded. That made some sense, it thought. 

June though, obviously thought differently. She sighed deeply and asked, “Okay, but why? ”

The herder shrugged. “I don’t want to be happy with what I have, I want to be happy with how I got it.”

That drew another deep sigh from June, but to Diya’s surprise, no frustration or animus coated its tongue. “Diya, does that make sense to you?” she asked.

The Banette’s breath caught in its throat. Memories of being caught in the middle of arguments and screaming demands to take a side rose up from the boy’s mind again. It really, really didn’t want to answer. 

They were both looking at it though. Hesitantly it typed out, <I guess? Maybe?> Hopefully that was noncommittal enough neither of them would be upset.

To its surprise, that satisfied June. She shrugged and told it, “Alright, good enough.”

That was not what it was expecting. Diya couldn’t help itself from asking, <It is?>

“Huh? Yeah of course it is. This isn’t your problem, it’s our problem. You seemed kind of -okay actually extremely- anxious earlier when it got brought up, so I wanted to make sure you understood enough of it to know what was going on and that it’s not a big deal. That’s all.”

<You’re not mad about Bashak’s point> how to phrase it? <being unclear to you?>

“Pfft? What? No. I mean okay yes it bothers me. But I’m not upset at him. He’s a smart cookie, he gets to have his own opinions. Besides, he understands my viewpoint just fine, I’m the one who doesn’t understand his. That’s a me problem. And anyway, I’m not going home for the sacrifice. If the blessing is granted it’ll be my family who gets it, not me.”

That drew a frown from Bashak. “Are you sure? I’d be okay if-”

“I am very sure, thank you.”

A fond smile spread slowly across Bashak’s face. With one massive arm he reached over her head and around her shoulders, pulling her into his side in a big hug. She leaned into him and he turned towards her, reaching around with his other arm to complete the hug and engulf her. When he finally released her -after receiving muffled protests about not being able to breath- Bashak smiled down at his friend. The hug had dislodged June’s Venonat beanie so the smaller bug trainer smoothed her hair and fixed her beanie back into place, grumbling about it the whole time. Her grumbles didn’t stop her from leaning against him though.

“You do know you don’t have to forgo the blessing for me, right?” Bashak said.

“I know. But if one day I ever do finally understand the point you’re trying to make…” June harrumphed. “Well, if one day I get it and I think it’s ridiculous, I can always seek a blessing then. But if I get it and it actually makes sense, a blessing’s not something I can give back. So there.”

And then that was it. Diya blinked with surprise as Bashak and June simply separated and returned their attention to their meals, as if the fight between them never happened. That is, if it was even a fight at all. The boy’s instincts it had inherited, honed to a razor’s edge by necessity, had insisted so. The fear had kicked in before any part of Diya’s thinking mind could process what was happening. A fight had been brewing and its inherited instincts had screamed it needed to duck and cover, to get out, to find a place to hide.

Except those instincts had been wrong. 

Something in the Banette’s chest swelled and cracked at the same time, and it wished with all its heart that its boy had gotten to meet these two.

Across from it, Bashak looked up from his meal for a moment, pausing with a roseli berry halfway to his mouth. “Hey,” he said gently. He put the roseli berry down. “Diya, are you okay?”

Huh? The Banette blinked at the odd question, then blinked again. Something was off with its eyes. Diya raised a hand to touch its eyes and its fingers came away wet. Oh. It was crying.

“Diya…” Bashak said again. Next to him June had looked up from her own meal, and was now staring worriedly at Diya as well.

The Banette shook its head at the attention. <It’s okay,> it told them, <they’re good tears.>

June started to speak, swallowed her food, and tried again. “Are you sure you’re okay? People don’t usually cry out of nowhere you know, even if they’re good tears.”

It nodded. Then it asked, without even thinking, <Can I keep traveling with you two when you move on from Canopy Town?>

The question took June aback. Bashak smiled immediately though, and June followed suit a few seconds after. Bashak reached out to take hold of one of Diya’s hands again, rubbing the back of Diya’s hand with his thumb. “Of course.”

It couldn’t have been luckier with the friends it had found, Diya thought. Its heart was overflowing with warmth and-

“Oh by the way we know you’re a Banette,” June tossed out.

All thought screeched to a halt.

“Yeah you’re actually pretty terrible at hiding it,” she continued. “I mean the psychic cover story stands up to cursory scrutiny but it’s got some key holes and you’re not great at selling it.”

Bashak sighed, still rubbing his thumb over the back of Diya’s hand. “June,” he drew out warningly.

She ignored him. “Speaking of which, when you submit your reports on last night’s ghost tag for those research bounties, we’re going to have to talk about how to handle your involvement. I’m fine helping you keep the fact you’re a Banette out of the report, if that’s what you want. But if we do that we’re going to have to talk about what parts of the videos to cut and not submit, and limit how much info we send in. Cus I’ll help you hold back information you’re not comfortable revealing, but I won’t help you lie to researchers. A terrible fate awaits people who falsify scientific data.”

“June.” Bashak said more strongly this time. “You’re scaring them.”

That was not true. Being scared would require a functioning brain, which was quite beyond Diya at the moment.

“Oh. Sorry, that was probably a bit tactless. What I mean to say is that we know and it doesn’t make a difference, we’d be happy to have you travel with us. We’re also happy to cover for you if you want to keep the ruse up to avoid the attention. We can talk specifics about your whole,” June made a hand waggling motion at Diya, “thing later if you want. Or not. Either is fine.”

Bashak made a slightly disagreeing humming noise.

“Oh, right. It would be nice to know if we should expect anyone to be looking for you. You know, as a missing person. If you are a missing person. In a missing person’s body. You know what I mean.”

Diya blinked.

“Uhhh, you, um, do know what I mean right? We’re not horribly off base here? Gods Bashak I am going to feel so embarrassed about this if we were wrong.”

Diya’s brain was still catching up to the situation. June was right, it hadn’t been trying all that hard to hide what it was, especially around its new friends. It certainly hadn’t been subtle about it. Though for that matter it wasn’t sure it could even have hidden its ghostly abilities if it tried. Using them was too easy, too automatic, and it sometimes happened before Diya even thought about what it was doing. 

But at the same time Diya had never thought about being caught. When it set out to complete its boy’s pokemon journey for him, it had thought to do so as a human, the way the boy would have done it. Even when things didn’t always work out that way and it acted with a Banette’s powers, that had still been the assumption in the back of its mind. It was going to be a trainer, trainers were humans, therefore it was a human and people would see it that way.

But Bashak and June knew it wasn’t human and they still wanted to travel with it as a trainer. That thought, finally, stirred something in Diya’s brain. It was like a mental gear finally finding purchase and driving action, letting it find something to say. <You want to travel with me as a trainer, right?> it asked. <Not as a pokemon?>

Its friends exchanged glances. They nodded to it and June said, “Well, yeah, of course. You’ve been catching and training pokemon with us, so that’s what we assumed. Like, we’re not planning on sticking you in a pokeball and training you or anything.”

Bashak cleared his throat. “You can still-” he groped for the right words, “-be a pokemon though. If you want.”

<What do you mean?>

Bashak scratched the back of his head and nudged June, who picked up his train of thought. “I think what Bashak means to say is that you don’t have to give up your identity as a pokemon to travel and train with us. Like, as I said earlier, we’ll help you keep being a Banette quiet if you want. That’s your information to share as you want. But that doesn’t mean you have to not be a Banette. We’re not going to make you pretend you’re a human around us. You can just, you know, be a Banette who happens to train other pokemon.” She gestured at Svartis. “It’s pretty clearly been helpful to you in that regard already.”

That was about three levels too abstract for Diya to be dealing with. It was still reeling from the fact that they had realized it was a Banette. So it changed the subject.

<You asked if I’ve been declared a missing person earlier, right?>

June nodded.

<I’m not sure. I -this body I’m in- had run away from home before. Not far away, just staying with the neighbors without permission when things were bad. His parents never called the rangers. Maybe his school might get worried?> Diya shrugged, feeling suddenly self-conscious that the shoulders it was moving didn’t truly belong to it. <Someone will probably notice eventually.>

Whether people would recognize it was another question. Between its form concealing robes, wide-brimmed hat, scarves, and newly colored eyes, it might not be recognizable from a photo. Or it might be. It was another of those things Diya had been avoiding thinking about. 

June and Bashak exchanged another one of those looks which carried an entire conversation Diya wasn’t privy to. When they finished June asked, “So what are you planning to do if you, if your body I mean, is reported missing and someone recognizes you?”

Diya hunched its shoulders. It really rather wouldn’t think about that. But if it had to- <It’s hard to catch me.> Being on the run would make it hard to be a trainer though. <I don’t know. Maybe if they can’t catch me they’ll just give up and let me be a trainer.> It winced. That sounded naive even to itself.

“Hm. Well, let’s try to come up with a better plan than that before that happens, okay?” 

Bashak elbowed June.

“What?! Friends tell friends when their plans are terrible!”

The bigger trainer sighed and squeezed Diya’s hand reassuringly. “It’s okay,” he said, “we’ll help you be a trainer, whatever happens.”

June cleared her throat. “Actually, I’ve been meaning to ask, why do you want to be a trainer? And I don’t mean that in an ‘oh it’s so weird that you’re a Banette and want to do that’ way. Your whole situation,” she gestured up and down at them, “inhabiting a human body is unique so far as my research turned up. I figure your situation is unusual enough that nothing qualifies as ‘weird’ for you. But it does kind of make the traditional reasons for going on a journey less relevant to you. So … why?”

Diya took a deep breath. Then another. And another. It gripped Bashak’s hand tighter, and breathed easier when he gave it a squeeze back. It was a struggle to type out its response with one hand, but it needed that contact with its friend to get it all out. It would be too difficult to say otherwise.

<The boy whose body this was was a good kid. If he hadn’t died, I would have gone on his journey with him. I would have been his pokemon.> Tears welled up in Diya’s eyes. It was hard to see the pokedex screen. Its hand shook as well, so much it could hardly type. But it needed to speak. The boy deserved for it to say this.

<But he’s gone now. It’s just me left. So I-> a tear fell on its pokedex, triggering a cluster of random keys. Diya wiped it away with its thumb and started again. <It’s the only thing left I can do for him.>

And then it was sobbing its heart out for the whole world to see. Tears poured down its face in a flood and mucus dripped out to stain its scarf. A horrible whine built in the back of its throat, an awful stunted version of the open-mouthed wail it needed to let loose but couldn’t. It cried, and it cried, and it cried.

It didn’t cry alone.

Two warm shapes crowded into the booth on either side of it, pressing the Banette between them. They hugged it and murmured soft words into its ears. A cloud filled with love pressed herself up against Diya’s chest. She swelled as she opened up their bond and took as much of the pain as she could, while also pouring back all the gratitude and affection Diya had earned from her. Together, they gave Diya permission to grieve.

At some point a person approached their table to ask questions in a hushed and worried tone. June murmured something in response and the person left, coming back a minute later with a wad of tissues. Diya used up all of them before it was finished crying.

But eventually it was finished crying. It had no tears left to give. Its head felt like it was floating on the end of its neck, as if it was a balloon drifting in a heavy fog. Its chest was wrung out and hollow. But that wasn’t entirely a bad thing. Because its friends were still cradling it between them, and their warmth filled some of that hollow space.

After its grief had run its course it could hardly even stand. But that wasn’t such a bad thing. Because its friends helped it stand. They walked it back to its room in the pokecenter and tucked it into bed so it could sleep.  They were still there when it woke up that afternoon with a pounding headache from the emotional overload. They got it medication for its headache from Claire, sweet lozenges it could suck on that dulled the hurt.

And Svartis helped too. She had been busy while Diya was sleeping. She rounded up every Shuppet in the town and set them to work so when Diya woke, all of the Shuppets were assembled outside its room. They had gathered the gentlest griefs their horns could hold, from the the bittersweet sorrow of one’s child moving out to the quiet heartache of passing on an outgrown toy. One by one they floated into the room and one by one they passed into Diya what they had collected, each wisp of smoke filled with the pain of letting go and the experience of overcoming it.

Its friends cared for it. Its companion cared for it. Its little cousins cared for it. And all that was good. But they also did something more important.

They cared about the boy.

Diya sat in bed and poured its heart out, typing to its human friends and speaking memories to the ghosts. It told them about the boy who had died. About his life, about who he was, why he mattered to Diya, how he’d wanted to be a trainer. How he’d died. Diya painted a picture about a boy who had mattered to it to his very last breath and beyond, even though no one else in the world noticed his passing.

But now these people, these pokemon, they knew about him. And through Diya’s words, he mattered to them. They cared. Its boy was not forgotten.

The tears started up again at some point. But now they were the happiest tears in the world.

Chapter Text

Pokemon have been, from the very beginning, spoken of as friends and partners to the humans of the Pokemon world, helping them with various tasks from farming to constructing buildings to exploration. Many people in the Pokemon world take Pokemon with them on a journey to gather Badges from Gyms and compete in the various Pokemon Leagues as Trainers, using them in battles against Pokemon both owned by other Trainers and found in the wild.

-----

Soft music drifted out of Diya’s pokedex, slowly bringing it into the waking world. The Banette opened its eyes and stared at the ceiling. It lay there without moving as the music got louder, the pokedex’s alarm gently prodding it to get up.

Diya blinked slowly, digesting yesterday’s events. 

Its friends knew it was a Banette now. They knew about the boy. They cared about the boy. 

Yesterday had been a rollercoaster of emotions. Even now it still couldn’t put words to what it had felt as it realized that it could just tell people about the boy and they would care. It didn’t have to go on a world-spanning pokemon journey to get people to look at the boy’s face and see something worthwhile there. It could just stop hiding and tell people the truth. To the right people, the boy mattered simply for having existed.

But the emotional turmoil of the moment had hidden a very simple and obvious question from Diya. One which hadn’t occurred to it while the grief of disclosure and the relief of being seen were ripping through it.

…

Music continued to drift out of the pokedex.

...

Now what?

Banettes possessed abandoned things to force their existence in the world’s face. To drive home that they had mattered once, with the point of a curse if that’s what it took. Diya had chosen a softer path to honor the boy’s existence. It had believed, and still did, that earning the boy recognition as a trainer would be more appropriate for him than demanding recognition from the boy’s terrified parents with deadly curses dripping from its lips.

But now it didn’t need to do either. The boy already mattered to more people than just Diya. And if Bashak and June weren’t enough, if the other Shuppets in Canopy Town weren’t enough, Diya could just tell more people. Claire would probably listen to it. Leader Ahmad would. Heck, if Bashak and June were at all representative, Diya could walk up to just about any person in the street, tell them the truth, and they’d care about its boy’s death.

And why even care about what might happen afterward? Banettes were supposed to throw themselves headlong into their vengeances with no thought of what came after. Traps, defending pokemon, retaliation from those close to its targets, none of that mattered. A Banette would gladly die driving its point home. Diya had only met one Banette in person, but Shuppets passed along tales of their grownup brethren’s exploits. It knew that much.

Why shouldn’t the Banette tell every single person it could? Why not go on television and tell the world? Let the law and public revulsion carry out the more traditional Banette’s vengeance for it, and let the books people would write about its odd existence carry the boy’s memory into the future.

Why not do that right now?

Diya swallowed.

Because then … then its journey would be over. 

It didn’t know exactly what would happen after that. Maybe scientists would want to study it. Maybe thrill seekers would travel to battle it. Maybe it would be deemed a threat or its necromantic body an affront to decency, and people would try to destroy it. But whatever happened, it was afraid that would mean its journey would be over. It wouldn’t be able to travel with Bashak and June after all.

Diya rolled over in bed and hugged its Piplup plushie close to its chest.

This was stupid. What did a Banette care about what came after? A Banette’s most powerful power was the ability to open its mouth and craft a self-sacrificing curse from its own soul, potent enough to drag even the strongest pokemon into death along with it. It was what they were known for. People thought of Banettes and what came to mind was their curses.

So why was Diya afraid of losing what it had?

There was a knock on the door, five quick raps that broke its train of thought. “Hey,” June said through the door. “There’s breakfast downstairs in the cafeteria. They made shakshuka. It’s eggs poached in tomato sauce, I’m pretty sure you can slurp them up without opening your mouth to the air. It’ll probably be messy as heck, but we really should be trying to diversify your diet and that’s what napkins are for anyway. So come on, don’t be late.”

“…”

“Uhhh, knock back if you heard me?”

Diya lifted one heavy arm and thumped its knuckles on the bedside table.

“Cool! I’ll see you in a few! Oh and Bashak’s coming over as well, I asked Claire and she said it’s fine if he eats in the cafeteria with us even though he’s not staying here. So don’t keep him waiting! Also, Claire saw you weren’t feeling too good last night, so she left some sweets for you with the nurse who works the morning shift.”

Oh. Diya swallowed. That was very kind of her.

“Um, you still there?”

Diya knocked on its bedside table again.

“Ah, good! Of course you are. Well, I know last night was rough, so if you want to talk about it any more Bashak and I would be happy to help. And I’d say hugs are available if you need them, but you’re getting them by default so-” Diya could all but hear June shrug through the door. “You’re getting all of the hugs. As many as you can handle. So come downstairs soon!” June’s footsteps receded down the hallway.

Diya blinked steadily, staring up at the ceiling as if a fog had lifted and suddenly it could actually see what it was looking at.

Right. That was why it didn’t want to lose what it had. Because what it had was worth holding onto.

Diya squeezed its Piplup plushie hard enough to wring Svartis out of it. It received blurry mental impressions of coffee from her the moment she woke up, and it assured her there would be coffee in the cafeteria. Then it got up out of bed and opened the curtains, letting the morning sun wash into the room.

It shouldn’t keep its friends waiting.

-----

Breakfast was subdued, but not in a bad way. June tried to ask if Diya wanted to talk more about last night and Diya simply put her off with a shake of its head. It would rather burrow into Bashak’s side and cuddle up to him silently, and June seemed to get it. The three of them took their time and ate, quietly enjoying the peace. And messily enjoying it, in Diya’s case. It turned out that while it was possible for Diya to slurp up shakshuka whole, the process was exactly as messy as June had predicted.

The sole exception to the peace was when Igor tried to steal one of Diya’s eggs. Diya fed the egg to Greta instead, who was being a very good girl and not trying to steal anyone’s food, which aggravated the small bug pokemon badly enough that June had to put him in a timeout.

That disruption aside though, breakfast was calm. Even the Misdreavus Diya could sense lurking outside, doubtlessly waiting for the right moment to prank them, was considerate enough to wait its turn. It was with a full belly and a warm heart that Diya finally pushed away its plate. 

Across from it, June was smiling.

Diya didn’t feel like fishing out its pokedex to type at her, so it just arched one eyebrow at her and looked pointedly at her mouth.

“Hm?” she said. “Oh! Why am I smiling?”

Diya nodded.

June shrugged. “You’re happy, when last night you were sad. That’s reason enough for me to smile.”

Bemused by that answer, Diya shifted where it was leaning against Bashak so it could look up and see what Bashak thought of it. Only to find that Bashak was staring down at it with an even sappier and wider grin than June’s.

Oh. Diya squirmed a little, burrowing deeper into Bashak’s side as warmth flooded through its chest.

After a comfortable silence, Bashak cleared his throat. “Diya, I was thinking. Would you want me to teach you how to make a cold weather shelter?”

The Banette looked up at Bashak quizzically. It was a bit confused so it pulled out its pokedex. <We learned how to set up tents in school?>

The herder shook his head. “I mean making one from scratch. No tech.”

It was still confused. <I’m not very vulnerable to cold anymore.> Between its faerie fire and the half-puppet nature of its body, it would have to get very cold indeed for Diya to be threatened by the weather.

Bashak shook his head again. “In case someone you’re with needs it,” he explained.

That got Diya to stop and listen to what Bashak was actually offering, and it blinked. With modern ball storage as it was, there was really no reason for someone to be caught out in the forest without a tent for shelter. Even most of Canopy Gym’s winter survival lessons hinged on the notion that one would have proper equipment with them. And for good reason, even the most experienced ranger likely wouldn’t make it in a bad blizzard without equipment. Bashak knew that and Diya knew that. Learning how to make a shelter from scratch wouldn’t actually be useful to the Banette.

But that wasn’t the point. The point was that Diya would know that no matter how bad things got, it would be able to do its best to keep its companions warm. 

Tears sprang up in its eyes and it swallowed. Diya pressed itself back into Bashak’s side and nodded. It would like to learn that very much.

---

Bashak led Diya and June into the forest, crunching the snow underfoot and ducking under branches. He’d given them some reading to do before they left, and now he quizzed them on it as they walked. “Shelter locations, what’s important?” Bashak asked over his shoulder.

“Being sheltered from the wind is very important, especially if you want to build a fire.” June answered.

Diya took a glove off to add to her answer, putting it back on as soon as it was finished typing. <Leeward side of a big tree or rock is good for that.>

Bashak nodded, but prodded further. “But the problems with that are…?”

June answered before Diya could take off its glove again. “There needs to be a prevailing wind direction for that to matter. Building next to a tree can still be helpful even if there’s no set wind direction though, because if there’s enough snow you’ll get a snow depression around the tree. You can build that depression up into a snow wall to protect you from the wind.”

The herder nodded, then looked at Diya. “Anything to add?”

It nodded. <Building under a tree also makes fire risky. If it melts snow in the branches, the snow can collapse. Also, be careful around the ground snow near trees. The roots can melt unstable voids in the snow.>

That earned the young trainer a smile. “You did your reading.”

Diya nodded very firmly. Yes. Yes it had.

“So, ways to get around that?”

Again June beat Diya to the punch. “Build the fire away from the tree and your shelter. For warmth, you should instead heat rocks next to the fire -not inside the fire so they don’t explode- and use those to warm your bedding. If your shelter is well-made that’ll be enough heat to last you through the night.”

She got a nod for that. “Anything to add, Diya?” Bashak asked.

The Banette held up a gloved hand. Its eyes narrowed, glowed, and then a ball of blue fire flashed into existence above its hand with the snap-hiss of an acetylene torch igniting. It looked up at Bashak and smiled. The heat from the ball could be felt on all their faces.

“...not what I was thinking, but okay.”

June cut in curiously. “I’ve been wondering, do those fires use up oxygen?”

Diya shook its head, then paused and waggled its other hand back and forth. It put out the faerie fire so it could answer. <It doesn’t need air. But if I make it hot enough to ignite the air, the air still burns.> 

“Ah. So as long as it’s not that hot, if you use it to keep you warm in a shelter it won’t use up oxygen?”

Diya nodded.

“That’s so useful,” June said with a hint of awe.

Bashak voiced his agreement. “Very useful. But you should still heat rocks for warmth. Or water bottles, water is actually better, June.” He turned back to Diya. “Unless you can do that while asleep?”

It could not, and it shook its head no.

The herder nodded. Deciding he’d asked them enough questions he said, “Let’s start.”

The shelter design they were practicing was as small and simple as they came, little more than a triangular wedge large enough to fit oneself inside. Cramped simplicity was the point though. Small meant less space to heat and simple meant easy and quick to construct.

To make it, one first cleared and padded the ground, then propped up a long straight branch with one end on the ground to act as the spine of the shelter. Sticks were propped up along the spine to make two slanted walls. The walls were covered with a tarp if possible or whatever was handy if not. The goal was for that layer to be as airtight and watertight as possible. That was then covered with layers of pine branches, weeds, fallen leaves, whatever was available that could make air-filled space and resist water. Then that was covered with another airtight layer, and that weighed down with snow - which Diya learned was a surprisingly good insulator itself. Once that was done, all that was left was to climb in and pack the entrance with snow.

With a hole for air. The hole was important.

June offered to clear the ground and strip some pine needles to pad it with, while Diya set off to find the wood they needed for the shelter with Bashak and Greta in tow.

Bashak got out his spindle and distaff and spun as they walked. He couldn’t ground the Mareep wool with his copper wire while they were moving so it snapped out crackling sparks, but the herder bore it without flinching. Diya accepted his silent company gladly, happy to have a friend.

They walked until Diya found a young dead tree, killed by lightning long ago. The Banette looked back up at Bashak, gesturing to him to ask if this tree was good enough.

The herder simply raised an eyebrow. ‘You tell me,’ the look said.

Diya frowned at the tree. On its own it would have simply taken the wood and been done, but something in Bashak’s expression made it hesitate. What about this tree would make it bad to use? In the boys' wilderness classes in school, he’d always been taught to seek trees like this for firewood, if possible.

A moment later it hit Diya. For firewood. The Banette sighed through its nose. With one gloved hand it reached out and yanked on a branch, tearing the desiccated wood away with a single jerk. It was fragile. Diya wouldn’t trust wood like this to bear the weight of snow above it. The Banette had been following inherited instincts without even thinking about why.

Bashak smiled and nodded, confirming its thoughts.

The Banette took off a glove and typed to its friend. <I need living wood, don’t I?>

“Yup.”

<Should I really do that just for training?> The boy’s conservation lessons were drilled into its brain. One trainer taking something from the land might not do much, but every trainer taking something from the land could strip it bare.

Bashak nodded again. “Mhm. I checked with Leader Ahmad. Just don’t take too much from one tree and kill it.”

Well if that was the case-

The Banette held up one hand and let loose with a blast of night shade, honing the black and purple ribbons which twisted through the air to a cutting edge. There was an explosive crack and two thick branches fell from a living tree beside it. Another spray of cutting ribbons pruned the branches down to straight segments and Diya set about collecting what was thick and long enough to be usable.

Behind it, Bashak swore softly under his breath, mirrored by a quiet yip from Greta.

Alarmed, Diya turned around. Had it done something wrong? It looked around into the forest. Was there a wild pokemon?

“No no, it’s-” Bashak sighed. “You were holding back in our spar,” he said, as if that explained everything.

It didn’t, so Diya tilted its head. It got its pokedex back out. <Yes?>

“By a lot.”

It showed its friend the screen again, <Yes?>. Friends didn’t do stuff which could hurt their friends or their friends’ pokemon in spars. His point was…?

There was a serious look in Bashak’s eyes. He spent a long moment eyeing Diya before he spoke. “You could have killed your boy’s parents easily.”

Diya flinched, not so much at the statement itself, but just at the topic being brought up by someone else. It wasn’t sure it liked not having control over when and why it thought about it. It nodded in answer though.

“But you’re here. Learning to keep people warm.”

It nodded again, hesitantly. Yes? And?

The older boy smiled. He stowed his spinning supplies in one big hand and reached out with the other to give Diya a half hug. “You’re a good kid.” He pressed a kiss to the top of Diya’s witch hat, just hard enough that it could feel it.

Diya’s heart beat heavy and warm inside its chest. It swallowed hard. Before it could even question itself, it typed something to Bashak, <I’m not a very good Banette.>

It wasn’t sure what it was expecting from Bashak in response, but a bemused ‘my friend is an idiot’ look was not it.

“Nah, you are.”

…

Bashak was not elaborating. 

<Because…?>

“June told me how you were with the Shuppets.”

Diya did not think this lightly, but sometimes Bashak could stand to be more like June and explain himself. <And?>

“Your boy needed proper parents, right?”

Diya frowned. It still wasn’t sure it liked other people being able to bring that up outside of its control. <Yes.>

“Don’t Ghost pokemon too?”

The young ghost almost snapped back that they weren’t human, and they didn’t need to be raised like humans did. But then it thought about it, with its cold thumb hovering over the keypad.

The one time it had met a Banette as a Shuppet, it had felt like it was meeting the most important person in the world. Diya had danced about it front of it, bursting with the need to show the cool older spirit what it could do. Look how bright its faerie fire was, look how strong its night shades were! It could even do a weak shadow ball, see, see?!

It had meant the world to it when the Banette sent back the memory of Diya’s powers, tinged with impressed congratulations and accompanied by tips for how to pull together a more stable shadow ball. Diya had practiced fanatically every night for weeks after that, riding the high of its elder kin’s compliment.

Underneath its robes, Svartis dozed half awake, still not quite ready to greet the day after Diya’s morning coffee. Diya thought about how scary and frightening it would have been for her if the Ghastly had come into being in the city without it. How intimidating and alien would the human world have been to it? Instead its companion was a little ball of inquisitive curiosity, and so comfortable with humans and their pokemon that it felt safe snoozing right next to a battle-ready pair.

Diya’s eyes stung. Did Ghost pokemon need parents too? It didn’t know. Even the sole Banette it had known had only stayed long enough to pick up the trail of the former owners it was hunting. Banettes like it burned hot and fast, they didn’t stick around to guide others into the world after their evolutions.

Maybe they should.

Bashak stood to the side, waiting patiently. He didn’t push Diya for an answer. When Diya set off to cut down more branches without a word, he simply followed, taking his spinning back up in silence.

In the distance Diya felt a flicker as Canopy Town’s resident Misdreavus shadow-hopped from one hiding spot amidst the trees to another. The ghost had been following Diya on and off since the game of tag. Waiting for the right chance to prank and startle it, Diya had assumed.

When the Misdreavus made its appearance, darting out of the shadows to drop off what tiny twigs it could carry and then vanishing again, Bashak didn’t comment. Well, he jerked in alarm and swore and Greta barked in alarm, and the Misdreavus oozed well-fed satisfaction. But he calmed down quickly and didn’t interrupt when Diya ran its fingers through the Misdreavus’ ghostly hair tendrils and patted it for a job well done, despite the twigs being too small to possibly use. 

The Misdreavus leapt through the shadows back into the forest, coming back to deliver more too-small twigs. It earned headpats in return, full marks for effort.

Bashak didn’t say a word. He let Diya think.

June and Diya’s shelter, when they finished it, was declared perfectly serviceable by Bashak. He couldn’t actually fit inside of it because they’d sized it for themselves, cutting a comic figure when he tried and found he could barely squeeze in up to his shoulders. But Greta curled up inside for him and seemed cozy enough for him to declare their attempt a success.

And throughout the whole process of building the shelter, Diya thought.

It thought about all the excitable Shuppets in Canopy Town which dreamed of one day becoming a Banette and burning out in a blaze of vengeful glory. It thought about Svartis, and its heart ached at how lost she would be without it. It thought of the Misdreavus that was still shadowing it even now, staring with awed fascination at its Mismagius hat whenever it thought Diya wasn’t looking.

It didn’t give its answer to Bashak until they got back to town. A single nod, which Bashak understood and answered with a smile.

Maybe even ghosts could use a parent’s love.

And maybe Diya could find its own way to be a good Banette.

Chapter Text

“TM" is an ambiguous acronym which can stand for “technical manipulation” or “technical machine”. In both cases it is referring to the same process, by which a pokemon held in stasis is converted into a digital environment and then directly modified by special machines, typically for the purpose of adding novel abilities to the pokemon. For example, a Squirtle’s extradimensional water sacs might be modified to introduce Ice energy into the water at the point of release, converting the Squirtle’s classic water gun move into a spray of freezing sleet, allowing the Squirtle to more effectively combat Grass pokemon, which are often resilient against Water abilities but vulnerable to extreme cold.

Enhancing pokemons’ combat abilities is only one of the uses of TM, however. Technical manipulation can be performed on humans as well as pokemon, and is an essential medical tool. Many modern cancer treatments are performed using TMs, particularly follow-up treatments in which damaged DNA is edited to prevent recurrence of the cancer. It can also be used to fix congenital disorders such as congenital heart disease, cerebral palsy, or hormonal imbalances. TM's unique ability to resolve or manage chronic conditions is critical in ensuring modern life expectancies and end-of-life quality, which improvements in TM technology continue to extend and improve.

TM usage has also become increasingly common for cosmetic alterations, such as coloration or proportion changes. This is an often controversial use of the technology among older generations. Among younger generations however, for whom TM usage has always been common and relatively affordable, even exotic cosmetic modifications outside the human standard (i.e. red skin, yellow eyes, webbed fingers) are hardly worth remarking on.

-----

Canopy Gym’s sparring center was a simple but colorful building. The structure itself was little more than a squat gymnasium, and Diya knew that inside would be nothing more than a few simple arenas of varying terrain and a couple of target training areas. Canopy Town might take pride in its gym, but it wasn’t large or wealthy enough to afford anything more elaborate than that. But the town refused to leave the building as a grey concrete monolith. Successive generations of school children had painted over every centimeter of the building in enthusiastic murals of pokemon battles.

Diya’s favorite was one of a somewhat blobby Charizard being mobbed by even more blobby Jigglypuffs. It had the same childish glee that filled Diya’s heart when it imagined going inside and sparring with its fellow young trainers, of doing that quintessential thing every child imagined doing as a trainer. Inside that building Diya would pit it and Svartis’ strengths against other trainers, to see how far they’d come and how far they had yet to go.

It shuffled its feet.

Diya had an Ice Gym challenge to prepare for. It needed to find other trainers with Ice pokemon to spar against. June and Bashak were wonderful friends, and Bashak especially was a fantastic training partner, but neither of them used Ice pokemon. Bashak was learning to fight with his new Ice/Ground Piloswine, who he’d named Alicia, but the key word there was learning. He was hardly an Ice type expert and he was still cautious about how skittish her brush with death had left her. For now he was only letting Alicia spar with his own pokemon, so he could have complete control over her encounters.

Which meant if Diya wanted to train to fight Ice pokemon, it needed to train with other people. Which was fine. It was totally fine. Leader Ahmad and his assistants were friendly and professional and training with them was great. It’s just that Ahmad only had four full time assistants. Between training their own pokemon, running the group lessons, and managing local conservation efforts, they were only left with so much time for one-on-one sparring sessions. And that time was split between every single trainer visiting the gym.

So if Diya wanted to fight an Ice pokemon more than once a week, it needed to spar with other trainers its age. Which is why the young trainer stood outside Canopy Gym’s sparring center, listening to the faint sound of shouted commands and the exclamations of sparring pokemon from within. 

And if Diya reached deep down into itself for some honesty … it might be stalling by admiring the schoolchildrens’ murals rather than going inside and finding a sparring partner. The young ghost trainer swallowed and rocked back and forth on its feet.

This should not be that hard. It was excited to go inside! It wanted to spar with other trainers. It wanted to see what they could do, and show them what it could do. It wanted to talk to them and learn from them and-

It wanted to make friends with them. 

Which Diya could do! It had made friends with June. And Bashak. It knew how to do this. It even had the memories of a human to draw on, it knew how to make friends with peers. Right?

Diya kept staring at the sparring center and did not take one step forward. Its inherited memories informed it that while its boy had had friends, he hadn’t had the faintest clue how he’d got them. They just showed up in his life one day. Kind of like how June had showed up in Diya’s life one day and dragged Bashak along with her.

Oh stars and shadows it really didn’t know how to make friends with its peers. It was doomed.

Gleeful cackling drifted out from under the shadowed awning of a building on the other side of the street. The Misdreavus was still following Diya, and at the moment it was clearly enjoying the taste of the young trainer’s anxiety. Diya glared at it.

Beneath its cloak, Svartis stirred. What was wrong? she asked her trainer.

Nothing, Diya tried to respond. But its thoughts immediately turned to how nervous it was and how it didn’t know what it would say to whoever it met inside and how awkward it would be to explain its no-talking thing to them and … Okay it was nervous, alright! 

The former Snom bristled under Diya’s cloak. Were there predators inside the building? Dangerous pokemon? Diya could feel its eyes narrow as it thought. Were there Spinaraks inside there?

No no no, Diya reassured its companion. There were pokemon inside, but they were all trained using the virtual reality software Nurse Claire had shown them. They were perfectly safe. Nothing inside the sparring center would hurt them.

Svartis mulled over that for a few seconds. Then, carefully and making sure to perform the memory manipulation right, she reflected back to Diya its anxiety-laced mental image of saying hi to the other trainers, coupled with the feeling of a question. Loosely interpreted, the message asked, ‘You’re scared to say hi?’.

The young trainer bit the inside of its cheek. …yes, it responded. If it had to say it directly, yes it was. It was working up the courage to-

A mental image from the Misdreavus caught them both. It showed Svartis going into the sparring center and hissing out a hi in Diya’s place, to break the ice for her companion. The image was accompanied by woven together feelings of success, acclamation, and gratitude. 

Chirpy affirmation bounced back from Svartis. Okay, she understood that. She would say hi for Diya.

Diya had time to blink once in confusion and once in horrified realization before events left it behind.

Svartis boiled out from under Diya’s cloak as a cloud of purple smog and flowed through the gap under the sparring center’s doors. As Svartis rushed inside, she sent Diya a fleeting affirmation that she would remember to keep her soul-smog contained even without Diya there to absorb it for her.

Which was a thing the trainers inside would most definitely not know she was doing! They would only see a loose Gastly approaching them! Diya blared negation through their bond and rushed after her. It tried to grab her but its hand went right through her immaterial smoke. Panicked, Diya slammed through the doors to follow her-

Ow. Those were pull, not push.

Breathless laughter floated out of the shadowed awning across the street.

Diya thought some extremely unkind words about the trickster spirit and yanked the doors open. It rushed into the sparring center ready to defuse whatever battle was about to occur between panicking trainers and Svartis-

-and found a perfectly calm room. Two older local trainers occupied the target wall on the far end of the center and were each practicing with a Snover, a small native tree-like pokemon with Ice powers. They were engrossed in having their pokemon practice together to get an ice shard attack right, and neither of them even glanced over at the new arrivals. 

Two more younger trainers were standing in a gravel sparring court littered with small rocks which broke up the terrain and larger boulders which broke up line of sight. One of them was working with a rare Alolan Sandshrew and the other a Charmander. They were looking over at the doors where Diya had just burst in, heads tilted and slightly confused at its dramatic entrance. One of them waved their hand at the other and called for a halt to their exercise. Evasion training, if Diya had to guess, from the way the Charmander was standing atop a boulder and the Sandshrew had just skidded to a halt behind a torso-sized rock.

The last trainer in the room, standing next to the evasion training, was a girl a couple years older than Diya wearing a red beanie, worn jeans, and a slightly tattered fleece. Going by her appearance she was probably a local like Diya. She had one of the more common local looks, dark brown skin, thick eyebrows, and coarse black hair dense enough to lift the beanie off of her scalp. Well, technically Diya supposed she might be a visitor from the equatorial region which was responsible for Kenomao’s settlement. But they tended to walk around Kenomao during winter bundled up until they looked like fluffy barely mobile balls, not in jeans.

And that particular trainer was looking up at a floating Svartis and not panicking. She’d taken a cautious step back and wasn’t taking her eyes off of it, but she wasn’t reaching for a pokeball to fight it or running for the exit.

The Gastly smiled wide at her and hissed out, “Svaarrrrrtissss!” She materialized a hand and waved. She paused, waiting for a response. When she didn’t get it she said again, “Svartisss”, and gestured to herself and then the girl. 

The girl blinked and tilted her head. “Oh! I’m Cori.” She waved back. She glanced over to Diya and then back to Svartis. “Hello there. Is this your Gastly?”

Diya nodded. The tip of its Mismagius hat bobbed with the motion.

“Oh, cool. Sorry to ask, but is it safe?”

Diya nodded again, getting out its pokedex to type with. It rushed over to her and typed as fast as it could, trying to head off her concern. <Gastly can control their poison emission, don’t worry.>

It took Cori a moment to realize what Diya was doing with its pokedex, but she got it once it turned the pokedex around to her. “Oh! You’re mute, aren’t you?” She smiled when Diya nodded. “Okay, hey Brandon, Tianna,” she looked over at the two sparring trainers, “it’s fine, his Gastly can control its poison.”

One of the trainers, Tianna, waved at Diya. “We know, no worries.” They’d both been at the Canopy Gym lesson where Svartis had learned to breathe below-freezing air. She and Brandon turned back to their match.

When Cori looked back to Diya she found its pokedex turned towards her again. <They, not he. And my name is Diya.>

Her eyes widened and Diya felt a complicated burst of emotions burst from her. They were tied around a kernel of remorse Diya could taste, but the overall composition was positive. Diya couldn’t parse it all before the emotions faded though, the feeling was as fleeting as it was intense. “Sorry, I shouldn’t have assumed,” she apologized. Then she continued on, smiling, “But so Diya, you say your Gastly can control its poison emission? How does that work?”

The other trainer took hold of Diya’s left elbow and steered it away from the resuming spar as it typed. Svartis followed after them, grinning at the two of them talking and radiating cheerful satisfaction at a job well done. Diya pointedly ignored her as it typed. <It’s not actually a gas. It’s an aural Ghost effect she can pull in.>

Cori frowned. “That can’t possibly be right. Gastly victims asphyxiate, right?”

Svarits and Diya looked at each other. Each exchanged a mental shrug with the other. They’d never actually tested her powers to any serious extent on a living being, let alone to death. Maybe? Diya vaguely remembered some news article years ago about a Gastly-caused death at a construction site which might have said something like that.

Cori flipped out her own pokedex and started typing. “Yeah let me check…” she started scrolling. “While I’m checking, by the by, how do you know that it’s an aural effect?”

<I’m an odd type of psychic,> Diya answered. June had suggested that the Banette keep its psychic cover story as vague as possible in the future and let people draw their own conclusions. <I can feel it from Svartis’ perspective, it’s not gas.>

“Hn. I trust you, don’t get me wrong, it’s just…” Cori squinted at her screen. She had a very intense glare. “Yeah, medical reports on Gastly attacks say there’s definitely a respiratory anaphylactic effect. Creatures exposed to it have their throats close. Which is not how purely mental attacks kill.”

The Banette raised an eyebrow and shrugged. It didn’t know what to tell her. Svartis’ soul smog was most certainly a Ghost effect.

The other trainer crossed her arms and gave Diya an evaluating look. “Hmm. Actually, I have an idea and I think I know how to test it. How do you feel about recording a spar with me? I’ll split the bounties with you if we get any useful information.”

Diya nodded eagerly, forgetting its earlier nervousness. It was absolutely up for that. It had come here with a purpose however. <I’m here to spar against Ice pokemon though. Do you have any?>

Cori leaned in to peer at the Banette’s screen. “Hn? Oh, yeah. I’ve got a Staryu with some Ice moves TMed onto it. Would that work for you?”

The ghost trainer didn’t bother trying to hide its wide eyes as it nodded. TM referred to ‘technique manipulation’, a process by which the bodies of pokemon in virtual space were directly edited to give them additional abilities. Templates for specific abilities and pokemon were available relatively cheaply online, but they had to be tailored for an individual pokemon’s body and that was an extremely technical process. It took hundreds if not thousands of hours of careful simulation practice to master. Those who did were in high demand and charged accordingly, making it a pricey thing for a young trainer getting by on basic income.

From the look of Cori’s worn clothes though, she wasn’t independently wealthy. She’d either scrimped and saved to afford it, or she’d TMed her Staryu herself. Curious and a little awed, Diya probed, <Are any of your other pokemon TMed?>

Cori’s answering smile showed teeth and pride. “All six of them. Did it myself. Do you still want to spar?” The look in Cori’s eyes said she knew exactly how impressive that was, and how powerful it implied her pokemon would be.

The ghost trainer looked up at its one singular pokemon. Svartis smiled guilelessly back at it, happy and proud that she’d successfully broken the ice and found someone for her trainer to talk to. At the impression of sparring she read in Diya’s thoughts she smiled wider. She projected a memory of sparring with Greta, tinged with joy and giddy excitement. This would be fun!

Diya had one novice pokemon. Cori had a full league team of pokemon she’d TMed herself. 

Well. Losing was an important part of the learning process. And no one had ever become a pokemon trainer by shying away from difficulty. Diya sent back cautious optimism to Svartis, marrying her memory of playing with Greta with its own memory of the caution it and Bashak used to approach his Piloswine.

<Sure. I’ll spar with you.>

“Cool. Hey, give me your pokedex for a moment? Okay … there’s my number. It’ll be easier for you to text me than to walk over and show me your pokedex while we’re sparring, yeah?”

Diya took its pokedex back and nodded. It followed Cori over to an open league-style sparring court. The court was open and devoid of any terrain, marked up with lines and circles to delineate match boundaries and pokemon starting positions. It swallowed its nervousness and excitement, trying to calm its fluttering heart. It was actually going to be sparring with a rival trainer for the first time. June and Bashak didn’t count, and practicing specific moves under Leader Admad’s guidance didn’t either. This was going to be its first proper match against someone taking it seriously.

It felt an answering thrum of anticipation from Svartis. And then, oddly enough, a response to that which didn’t come from either of them. A separate echo of the anticipation bounced back with the taste of encouragement added on. Diya followed the echo to its source. There, in the rafters above them was the Misdreavus. The cheeky little ghost fluttered its dress-like lower half in an approximation of a wave.

Diya fought down a scowl and sighed. As scary as it had been to see Svartis rushing into the sparring center without it, the Misdreavus had read the situation better than it. No serious harm had been done, Svartis was fine and Diya was fine (maybe a little achy where its shoulder had hit the door, but fine). The little trickster spirit had been trying to help in its own way. And it had succeeded, because the Misdreavus’ plan for Svartis to break the ice had worked.

The Banette looked up at the Misdreavus. It was a mischief maker by nature. It wouldn’t be possible to train it to not play pranks and cause trouble, Misdreavuses literally lived on shock and startlement. It was also the only pokemon of its species in Canopy Town. The Shuppets were company for it, but not quite the right kind of company. They tended to be shy and stay out of sight, while Misdreavuses were bold and attention seeking.

The poor thing must be lonely.

Diya waved back at it, and sent it the memory of Bashak welcoming Diya into his yurt. If it wanted to come down and join them, it could.

Across the sparring court, Cori followed its gaze. “Is that another one of your pokemon?”

<Not yet. But we’ll see.> Diya texted back. 

“Ah.” The more experienced trainer smiled. “Well. Good luck with that. Anyway, you ready for our spar?”

With one last look at Svartis, Diya nodded.

“Alright! Let’s do this!” Cori bounced on the balls of her feet and grinned. “Go, Hwimning!” She pulled a pokeball off her belt and threw it dead center at the starting circle for a one-on-one league match. Red light burst forth from the pokeball, which she caught on the rebound, materializing a pokemon Diya had never seen before. 

Hwimning was a raptor-shaped pokemon which came up to Diya’s chest. It balanced on two huge wicked red claws, had a long white tail lashing out behind it for balance, and clacked a white beak in Diya’s direction. But that general shape was about where its resemblance to anything avian ended. The pokemon was covered, or maybe made of, layers and layers of moss and fungus. Its chest, underbelly, and legs were covered with fluffy green moss, some of which was tipped in small blisters of yellow liquid. Its face and tail, where skin or feathers should be, were made of squishy white mycelium and sprouting from its neck were the frilly gills of a mushroom. A wide-brimmed mushroom cap covered in more green moss, spotted by red blisters, adorned its head, and its tail was capped with spongy green balls dusted with a yellow powder.

The pokemon’s beak opened, revealing a shockingly red mouth, and it trilled, “Brrriiihihiihihihiii.” The creature shivered and shook itself, and a haze of faint white spores dusted the air around it. Its looked around, getting its bearings, before pinning Diya with two beady black eyes.

Diya took a long step back.

Cori chuckled. “Don’t worry, the white spores are just a threat display. They’re totally harmless.”

Ah, Diya thought to itself. So that’s why she had been so comfortably reckless with her own safety around its poisonous pokemon. This was a usual thing for her. It was a fascinating pokemon though, however unnerving. Without stepping closer, Diya carefully pointed its pokedex’s scanner at the creature.

The blue scanning dome shone bright for a few seconds before text appeared on Diya’s screen. 

BRELOOM

Threat Classification: HIGH. Macro-fauna ambush predator, capable of lethal aggression, flees if startled. 

(Note: DO NOT STARTLE. Triggers highly lethal defensive spore response.)

Diya paused its reading and hit the Misdreavus with the strongest sending it could muster, insisting that this pokemon was absolutely off-limits for its pranks.

(Note: Non-local pokemon species. Likely trained, non-aggressive.)

Breloom is a Grass/Fighting pokemon, evolved from Shroomish. Unlike its passive herbivorous prior evolution, Breloom is a carnivorous ambush predator and should be approached only with extreme caution.

Breloom is a symbiotic colony organism composed of many fungal species intertwined with an avian musculoskeletal frame. It takes down prey and deters would-be predators with a highly varied array of toxic spores. If its spores do not take effect quickly enough when defending itself against predators, it will fall back on Fighting techniques focused through its large talons. 

Breloom, along with its prior evolution Shroomish, is notable for its unique reaction to foreign antigens. Its biological immune response is coupled with a paired injection of Grass/Fighting energy, which produces a strong regenerative effect, often not only countering but exceeding the damage done by the foreign substance. The regeneration is so strong that some trainers will even purposefully poison their Brelooms before battle to trigger it.

Diya gave Hwimning an evaluating look. It copied the last paragraph and texted it to Cori, following up with, <Is this what you want to test?> While Cori read, Hwimning balanced itself on one talon and scratched the back of its neck with the other, dislodging a shower of white spores. Diya really hoped Cori was right about those being harmless.

When she finished reading, Cori nodded enthusiastically. “Yeah, that’s exactly it! If your Gastly’s choking effect is physical and actually causes an inflammatory response, it should trigger Hwimning’s regeneration. But if it’s all mental and just makes creatures think they’re choking, Hwimning’s regeneration will remain dormant.”

<Will this be safe for-> Diya did not have the faintest idea how to spell that name, <-your pokemon?>

“Should be. Brelooms can function anaerobically if they have to. Even if they stop breathing they’ll just get sluggish and kinda dumb. We’ll be safe about it though, if Hwimning shows any negative reaction I'll put them back in pokeball stasis and bring them to the pokecenter later.”

Diya nodded. When Cori put it that way, Hwimning really was the perfect pokemon for Svartis to go all out against. It was probably immune to her most lethal ability and even if it wasn’t, it almost certainly wouldn’t die from it. And if against all odds everything still went terribly wrong, they could put Hwimning in stasis and bring the Breloom to a fully stocked pokecenter in minutes. There was nothing stopping Svartis from giving it her all in this fight.

The ghost trainer’s heart picked up. It breathed deep through its nose, filling its lungs all the way. This would be their first serious pokemon battle, holding nothing back. 

Stars above, it was excited.

<Let’s do this.> Diya directed Svartis into the starting circle opposite Hwimning. Facing off against it, the Gastly puffed herself up and let loose an excited teakettle shriek as she compressed back down to her normal size. 

“Awesome! I’ll count us off.” On the opposite side of the sparring court, Cori grinned and barred her teeth. “Ready?”

Diya nodded and Svartis let out another excited shriek.

“Three!”

“Two!”

Hwimning bristled and yellow spores mixed themselves in with the white.

“One!”

Svartis and Diya hissed in breaths simultaneously.

“Go!”

Cori shouted a command to her Breloom and it threw itself to the side, rolling over the concrete floor. But Svartis hardly needed to aim to hit it with her new icy wind attack. The Gastly sucked in air and ballooned to enormous size in an instant, filling the sparring center with the shriek of suddenly compressed air as the carbon dioxide inside of her deposited into motes of dry ice dust. And when she compressed back down, the wave of ultracold air she unleashed was simply too large to dodge. The Breloom trilled out its distress as the edges of its moss blackened in the cold and the pinpricks of dry ice scraped its white mushroom flesh raw.

And Svartis didn’t just breathe out ice and cold. Visible for a moment under Diya’s glowing pink stare, she also took all of her oily purple-black soul smog, which she usually worked so hard to pull in around herself, and let it loose. Slick streams of spiritually toxic miasma flooded the sparring court, sticking to the Breloom and coating its soul. 

But Hwimning refused to give Svartis time to revel in her success. Its beak opened wide and with a flash a ball of green light condensed inside its mouth, launching forth an instant later. The vibrant green energy splashed against Svartis’ form as if she were solid, blasting away a layer of the purple smoke that comprised her body. 

Svartis cried out and flew back, trying to get herself distance and altitude. She instinctively threw a sloppy night shade to cover her retreat, but the coiling purple-black ribbons did little. Most of them missed Hwimning entirely, who didn’t even bother to dodge. Instead Cori’s pokemon carefully took aim again with another vibrant green energy ball. Its attack landed squarely on Svartis, blasting away more layers of purple smoke.

Diya’s eyes widened as the pummeling continued. Svartis climbed further into the air to get away from the Breloom, trading night shades for energy balls and coming out the worst for the exchange. If this kept up she was going to lose. 

Svartis! Diya called, pulling hard on their bond to grab her panicked attention. Stop! This wasn’t getting her anywhere. Night shades were instinctive for the gastly, but they weren’t reinforcing her soul smog’s effects on her opponent, and she wasn’t going to win an artillery match against an ability no doubt TMed specifically by Cori to win long-ranged matches for her pokemon. If Svartis wanted to get anywhere, she needed to shut that ability down.

Svartis, use spite, Diya ordered.

The beleaguered spirit was still under assault, and just a moment before had been flailing about in panic. But Diya sent her steady determination … and above them both, so did the Misdreavus. If she stayed calm and fought this battle smart, they knew she could do it. So Svartis reached deep for calm, even as another energy ball tore away pieces of her gaseous form, and used spite.

Spite was an odd little move Diya and Svartis had developed when training with Greta, whose habit of using Ghost-disrupting Dark energy in her bites had been a sure source of agony for both of them. Svartis would breathe out her soul smog as her opponent was using an ability and drawing on whatever equivalent of the phantom world they used to fuel their powers, and her smog would be pulled into their soul along with that energy. And then she took it back, pulling the oily phantom smoke out and scraping bits of her opponent’s soul raw in the process. Specifically, the parts of their soul which handled the energy of whatever ability Svartis’ opponent had been using.

So this time when her opponent charged up another energy ball, Svartis didn’t return fire. Instead, when Hwimning pulled in Grass energy to charge her energy ball, Svartis breathed out phantom fumes. Hwimning still launched its energy ball at her -a direct hit, Diya winced- but it let out a choked trilling “Briii!” a moment later. 

Hwimning tried to keep up its assault, pulling in the energy for another blast, but it choked and coughed partway through. The partially formed green ball flew apart into quickly dissolving blobs of light. It attempted to use energy ball one more time, even as Svartis kept breathing her miasma into its soul, and it did manage one last attack which made Svartis flinch. But only one more attack. After that each attempt to draw Grass energy into its mouth only made it snap its head about and trill in pain.

“Looooo~” the pokemon whimpered. 

“Hey! Pause for a second?” Cori called across the court. Her voice snapped out with such force that Svartis halted her next attack -a flare of Ghost energy meant to confuse and disorient- instantly. Diya raised an open hand to acknowledge the time-out a moment later.

Cori snapped out a storage ball, which let out a duffel bag in a flare of red light. She unzipped the bag and pulled out a gas mask, hastily strapping it over her head. The moment the protective gear was in place she rushed forward towards her pokemon. Hwimning was clearly uncomfortable, fidgeting and ruffling the mushroom-like gills at its throat, but they held still enough for Cori to examine them. She took hold of her Breloom and moved it around carefully, adjusting it so she could get a good look at every part of it.

Then, to Diya’s shock, she stood up and recalled Hwimning into its pokeball. She said something, but her voice was too muffled by the heavy gas mask to make out. Diya shook its head and shrugged.

Cori grumbled something from inside the gas mask. She held up one finger and retreated from the court, then took a canister of water out of the duffle bag. She poured the water over her hands liberally, splashing it freely over the floor as she wiped her hands clean of any spores. She examined her skin, brushed off her fleece for good measure, and then finally took off the gas mask. “Ow. That thing’s straps always bite into my head when I rush. Hey, Diya, mind having your Gastly ice breath the court? The spores aren’t long-lived, but better safe than sorry.”

Diya relayed the request to Svartis, who did as asked and iced over the sparring court. <Is your Breloom okay?> Diya asked.

Cori opened her mouth, closed it, and then chewed on her tongue. “Probably?” she said eventually.

Diya’s eyes widened in alarm. <Should I get a nurse?!>

“No it’s fine, Hwimning is in stasis. It’s just strange. Hwimning’s gills were all puffed up and inflamed.”

The ghost trainer made a small ‘hn’ noise through its nose. <And that’s not either of the results you were expecting.>

“Yeah.” Cori chewed on her tongue some more. “I saw their inflamed gills, and I’m still not a hundred percent convinced that’s possible. Brelooms are supposed to heal from being poisoned.” She shook her head.

<And unknowns are unsafe.> That was something Diya had learned from June, when she was talking about working with bug pokemon venoms. Any unexpected reaction, no matter how minor, should be treated with the utmost seriousness.

The other trainer nodded. “Yeah. Damn, I don’t have the faintest idea how that works. You’re sure that it’s a pure Ghost effect, no toxic gas mixed in there or anything?”

That got a nod and an apologetic shrug for an answer.

She snorted. “Hah. Well, we may end up being responsible for a bounty because of this, rather than earning one.” Cori shook her head and sighed. “Anyway, I remember promising you a spar against a pokemon with Ice moves, right?”

Diya nodded eagerly, mirrored by Svartis. That spar had ended right when it was getting good. <Yeah, I’d love to go again!> Svartis agreed with a fierce “Gaaaa!” and bared her pointy fangs in a wide smile.

“Awesome!” Cori clipped Hwimning’s pokeball back on her belt and pulled off another. “Bituin, I choose you!” Cori did a little skip into the air that was probably unnecessary but which Diya thought looked cool, and flung her pokeball into the sparring court. With a flash of red light, it released a Staryu onto the court.

Staryu was another pokemon Diya had never seen before in person, though it at least knew about this one. The Water pokemon looked like nothing so much as a floating starfish, with light brown limbs that were sixty centimeters from tip to tip. Diya faintly remembered learning that those limbs were actually evolutionarily obsolete calcified lumps, rendered pointless by Staryu's evolution of psychic self-propulsion. The center of the Staryu’s body was covered in a gleaming yellow carapace that shone like gold under the right light and covered its true body, affixed with an enormous pink pearl in the center. The pearl glowed as the Staryu was released from its pokeball, throbbing with an energy Diya could feel from across the court, and the air around the Staryu rippled as it raised itself higher into the air.

Diya gave the Staryu -Bituin- an evaluating look. Staryu were supposed to be peerless fliers and formidable artillery pokemon. Their psychically powered flight let them turn and brake on the head of a pin and they could fire a variety of beams at any angle from their pearls with no warning. Clearly Cori was not going to allow Svartis to beat this pokemon by simply taking to the air and bombarding it from above.

Its lower tendrils wriggled with the eager urge to fight it and- wait. What? Diya shook its head, dispelling the intrusive thoughts bleeding out of the Misdreavus in the rafters above. It looked up into the rafters, taking its hat off so it could see straight up properly. The trickster spirit wanted to fight?

Cori cleared her throat. “Um, we doing this or…?” 

<Sorry, just a moment please.> Diya focused more intently and pushed out with its powers, pinging the Misdreavus. It wanted to fight against Cori’s pokemon?

The Misdreavus wiggled self-consciously. Its return sending was a complicated soup, apprehension paired with the image of it fighting Bituin, resolution and purpose, giddy vicarious joy as Svartis fought Hwimning, a sense of unity, and … yearning. It wasn’t that it wanted to fight against Bituin. It was just ... Svartis and Diya had looked like they were having fun together. And together was the key word there. They’d shared a single purpose and intent as Svartis had fought.

The Misdreavus wanted that.

Diya’s heart swelled. Gently, it sent out a soft invitation for the trickster spirit to come down and-

Svartis beat her trainer to the punch and tackled the Misdreavus in a hug which slammed their half-corporeal forms through the air so hard they collided with the ceiling. The Misdreavus squealed and hugged Svartis back, blasting giddy phantom pings out so fast they were almost incoherent.

The Banette couldn’t help itself. It broke down giggling. It curled over and pressed the back of its wrist to its mouth, desperately trying to keep its mouth shut. Of course, how silly of it to try softness with a spirit of heart-pounding jump scares. Much better to straightforwardly tackle the trickster spirit with a hug.

Cori stood on the sidelines with Bituin rotating slowly in the air in front of her. “I am so confused.”

Slowly the Banette pulled itself back together. It replaced its purple witch’s hat on its head and smiled hard enough to be seen even from behind its scarf - its first piplup scarf today, always a good choice. <Our Misdreavus friend will be joining us to spar, if you’re okay with that.>

“Oh. Yeah, sure! One sec, let me bring out a second pokemon.”

Diya blinked. It hadn’t quite meant that, it had been thinking of the Misdreavus -who really needed a name- fighting Bituin in Svartis’ place.

“Go! Egredia!” After Cori’s prior two unusual pokemon, Diya was surprised to see a simple Pidgeotto come flying out. The second evolution of the Pidgey line was a common sight almost anywhere in the world. Though no less impressive for being common, Diya noted, as the two meter wingspan bird flew over Diya’s head. Their pounding wings set the Banette’s cloak and scarf fluttering backward, and it had to grab its hat to keep it on its head.

Then the sweltering heat of that wind hit Diya, causing it to break out in a sticky sweat. The air rippled with heat in Egredia’s wake as the Flying pokemon swept a wide arc around the sparring court. Looking more closely, Diya could see that Egredia’s coloring was unusual for a Pidgeotto. The typical Pidgeotto had a red trailing crest, stripes of red feathers in its tail -longer if they were female, which Egredia appeared to be-, a tan underbelly, and brown top. But Egredia’s top coat was a ruddy red. 

Maybe Diya had jumped to conclusions about how common this particular Pidgeotto was.

“So, ready for a two-v-two, Diya?”

Absolutely not, and definitely not against the aerial supremacy duo of a Staryu and whatever TMed hellbeast Cori had forged from a Pidgeotto. Also, with the addition of Egredia to the mix, Diya was pretty darn sure this no longer counted as Ice-type training. But even so, and as much as it knew it was going to lose, Diya couldn’t stop itself from smiling. It called out to its ghosts. Were they ready?

Enthusiastic mental cheering was its answer.

Yeah. That’s what it thought. <Ready when you are.>

There was no countdown for this battle. Everyone just moved. Cori shouted and Egredia screeched in answer. The Pidgeotto began to shimmer in a new way, with wispy afterimages peeling off in her wake. The Misdreavus decided that wouldn’t fly and fired a vicious little hex of curdled purple energy in her direction. But as if Bituin had read its mind -and the Staryu probably had- it thrust itself between them as fast as the hex could be fired. A brilliant pane of violet light appeared in front of Bituin which the hex splashed against. Cori cheered.

Then a moment later Svartis finished inflating herself for her icy breath, and deathly cold wind laced with spiritual poison rushed out over the battlefield. Bituin weathered the onslaught without complaint behind its light shield, but Egredia screeched as the cold scorched her feathers.

Cori didn’t waste a moment. “Egredia, up! Bituin, ice them!” Her Pidgeotto shot up to the ceiling in a blur of afterimages, moving so fast Diya could hardly follow her with its eyes. Bituin remained fixed in place behind its violet shield, and without fanfare a series of pencil-thin blue beams lanced out from its glowing pearl. They passed through its shield like it wasn’t there -which Diya personally thought was unfair- and blasted into the ghosts. The Misdreavus cried out “DREE!” at the painful cold of the ice beams, while Svartis shivered uncomfortably. 

Bituin focused its barrage on the Misdreavus, seeing how much more the Ice attack hurt it, until finally the trickster spirit screamed. Diya heard its pained howl in the phantom world as much as the physical world and the Banette flinched. The Staryu flinched even harder though. Its pearl flashed and it jerked backwards through the air as ice burns appeared all over its useless arms and -more importantly- its chitinous shell. At the same time the Misdreavus rallied and cried out with renewed energy, “Viii!”.

Meanwhile Svartis was trying to blast Egredia with night shades, but not a single twisting ribbon landed. The closest hit the ceiling meters behind the horrendously fast Pidgeotto. Then with a turn so fast Diya could hardly believe it didn’t snap the bird pokemon’s neck, it wheeled and shot straight towards, and through, Svartis. The Gastly exploded. Her semi-corporeal projection collapsed and the purple gas which made her up was caught and churned by the turbulence of Egredia’s wake. Diya could feel her pained and disoriented panic through their bond as she desperately tried to reconstitute her form.

But that move had cost Cori’s pokemon. Already impacted by the soul smog in Svartis’ icy wind, taking a facefull of her essence had done Egredia no favors. She coughed and wheezed as she wheeled about. Her chest heaved as she laboured for breath.

Mentally Diya pinged the Misdreavus. If it could keep launching hexes at Bituin and keep it pinned down behind its shield, they would win this. Cori would be forced to recall Egredia into stasis but Svartis would eventually reconstitute, and then it would be two on one.

Except Cori didn’t look worried. In fact, she was smiling. “Haha! Alright, let’s see if this works!” she shouted. “Egredia! Sunny day!”

With a great laboured heave of her wings, Egredia clawed at the air to gain altitude. With all her strength she managed to climb to just beneath the rafters over the center of the court and there she spread her wings.

And then there was light.

Egredia was the dawn itself and her brilliance hit Diya like a breaking wave at the beach. It felt like a small child swept head over heels by a wave far too tall for it to withstand. The Banette gasped and fell to a knee as the light poured through it. Its core remained protected, but every loose bit of power not safe in its innermost self was washed away. 

Cori’s Pidgeotto shone resplendently above the battle, a molten sun of rippling orange and yellows so bright Diya could hardly look at her. Diya’s phantom senses were nothing more than a roar of static in its ears but it knew that if it could see the phantom world right then, that it would see all of Svartis’ smog burning away under the brilliant light of the rising dawn.

“Egredia, use heat wave! Bituin, shock!”

The physical light vanished from Egredia’s body, but Diya could still feel it lingering like a hot summer’s sun upon its soul. Then the Pidgeotto, no longer wheezing in the slightest, beat its wings with a mighty cry. Swearing wind blasted forth and that hot sun became a burning oven. 

The Misdreavus, as distracted and weakened by the light as Diya, wasn’t even looking at the Staryu when a lightning bolt lanced out of its pearl and struck the spirit from the sky.

Svartis, barely half-formed and tumbling like a charred leaf in the burning wind, expressed to Diya the sentiment that she had had enough, thank you very much.

Diya could not agree more. It held up its arms in a big X and slashed them down. Then for good measure it sent Cori a text, <We surrender!>

“Egredia, Bituin, back!” Cori’s pokemon wheeled back through the air, returning to their trainer. Egredia landed next to Cori to receive vigorous congratulatory neck scritches, while Bituin laid itself out horizontally in the air and hovered centimeters above Cori’s head. “Nice match!” she called out to Diya.

Diya was torn between answering with ‘stars and shadows what was that?’ and ‘how have you not already trounced this gym?’, and settled for, <I am glad you think so.>

“No really! Especially with a new pokemon, that was amazing! That one-two punch your pokemon opened up with at the beginning of the match? Mm, perfect! I couldn’t have coordinated better myself. And if sunny day’s purification effect hadn’t worked, hoooo, that fight might have gone south for us real fast.” Cori beckoned Diya to come over to her side of the sparring court. She looked exhilarated. 

Diya obliged, typing as it went. Along the way across the court it pulled a battered Svartis under its cloak, and picked up the still stunned Misdreavus to cradle in one arm. <Speaking of which, what was that?!>

“Sunny day?”

<Yes!!!>

Cori … blushed? She shuffled her feet and scratched the back of her head, inexplicably embarrassed all of a sudden. “Okay, well … you’ve got to promise not to laugh.”

There was nothing in the world further from Diya’s mind. It readily agreed.

The TM trainer took a deep breath and then said, in a single rushed breath, “IthinkIcanevolvePidgeyintoHo-oh.”

Diya blinked. <Say again?>

“Okay look I’ve got pictures! Come around, come on!” Cori hooked Diya’s elbow with her hand and dragged it around to look at her pokedex. “See this? See how Pidgey becomes more colorful and gains red accents as it evolves into Pidgeotto? And then Pidgeotto’s accent markings become more completely red when it evolves into Pidgeot?”

There was little Diya could do but mutely nod. What in the world did this have to do with Egredia’s sunny day?

“Now look at this! Mega Pidgeot! Look at it! It’s got a blue-ish green coloration on the tips of its wings!”

That looked like blue to Diya, but it wasn’t about to argue.

“Now look at this,” and that’s when Cori brought up pictures of the migratory god pokemon of the sun, Ho-oh itself, onto her screen. “Look! See the red coloration? The light underbelly? The green feather tips? The crest? Well admittedly the crest isn’t a perfect match, but still! See the claws? The profile? Note how its profile is a bit more elongated than the Mega Pidgeot, just like each evolution of the Pidgey line is a bit more elongated than the last?” Cori’s voice rose almost to a fever pitch at the end. Any embarrassment was gone as suddenly as it had appeared and now Cori was starting to remind Diya almost uncomfortably of June when she got going on a topic.

Almost hesitantly, Diya typed, <Yes?>

“Yes! You see it too!”

Unfortunately Diya actually could see the resemblance between one of the most common and least esteemed pokemon in the world and what was arguably the most revered god pokemon.

“Right so I’ve been TMing Pidgeys ever since I started learning how to TM. They’re plentiful, easy to catch, and there’s loads of scanning data on them to work with. Of course almost no pokemon TMers bother with Pidgeys, the moment they’re off the training simulations they’re too good for such common pokemon. On to bigger and better pokemon, buying them up, TMing them to be better, and selling them for a profit. Or just selling their services directly for use on league pokemon. But I find Pidgeys fascinating. There’s so many possible ability expressions you can mod them with.”

Cori leaned in close, her ecstatic grin looming wide in Diya’s vision. “And guess what I found?”

A deep and abiding need to meet June at some point, clearly.

“I found sunny day. It’s an uncommon ability which shows up in several Grass lines and only two Fire lines. But it’s there in Pidgeys too, activatable by flipping the switch on a single gene expression! And here’s the kicker, it’s long been hypothesized that the purifying and calming effect Ho-oh radiates is just an extremely powerful version of the sunny day ability!”

“So I switched it on in Egredia and guess what? Her feathers turned red. I could even teach her how to use heat wave after that, no additional TMing necessary! She couldn’t use it instinctively, but she could still learn it!”

Part of Diya’s brain was still scrambling and wondering if where she was going with this was blasphemy - it must be to some people, surely. And another part of its brain was wondering if being in the presence of Ho-oh’s apparently even more powerful sunny day aura would kill it - probably, it thought. But what brain space was left was starting to wonder if maybe Cori wasn’t quite as crazy as she’d first sounded when she started talking about Pidgeys and Ho-oh.

“And you know, plenty of pokemon have alternative evolution paths which only occur under the right conditions. So I’m wondering, what if there’s some Fire path evolution for Pidgeys we never see in nature for some reason? Or maybe a path they used to have, but evolved -in the other sense of the word- away from? And what if, just maybe, we can reactivate it?”

Apotheosis. Cori was talking about TMing a Pidgey into apotheosis. She couldn’t be more than seventeen at the oldest and she wanted to manufacture a god. Out of a Pidgey. 

“I don’t think it’ll be easy, of course. If my theory’s correct, Ho-oh is on an evolution tier above Mega Pidgey, or at least on par with it. And I know how few trainers ever manage to induce a mega evolution. And I’m certainly not prideful enough to think my first TMing attempt is necessarily going to be the right path, no matter how much I love Egredia.” The red Pidgeotto preened at hearing her name and Cori gave her more neck scritches. 

“But uhh, yeah.” A trace of that earlier embarrassment returned. “That’s what’s up with sunny day. It’s an ability which may or may not be a weaker expression of the sun god’s purifying light. I thought it might help against your Gastly’s aura.”

Diya stared at Cori for a long moment. <It did.>

“Cool! Yeah it clears away a lot of abilities which saturate an area with elemental energy. It’s useful like that.”

Privately, Diya thought Cori could have just said that. Of course if she hadn’t, it wouldn’t have been exposed to the horrifyingly plausible idea of turning a Pidgey into a god. Yay?

Diya’s brain was still a little twisted up into knots. It suspected it would need a while to process this.

“Umm. Want to go another round if your pokemon are recovered? We can do a proper one-v-one with only Bituin using its Ice ability.”

<Give me a second.> Diya checked on Svartis and the Misdreavus. Svartis was still out of it and barely reconstituted, though she said she’d be ready to fight again after taking some time to rest. The Misdreavus, though, had only been temporarily stunned by Bituin’s lightning bolt and was raring to go. It insisted that it’d had Bituin on the ropes and only lost because the Staryu had gotten in a cheap shot while it was distracted.

Which was exactly how Misdreavuses fought in the wild, so Diya thought that was maybe just a bit hypocritical. Svartis picked up on the thought through their bond and got in a weak giggle. Well, regardless, if the Misdreavus wanted a rematch Diya wasn’t going to stop it.

By the end of the day Diya and its companion, or maybe that was companions now, finally got some practice fighting against Ice type moves. Their spars with Cori’s Staryu confirmed that Svartis was much more resilient to Ice attacks than the Misdreavus was, which added to Diya’s suspicions that the Snom-born Gastly might be more Ice-aligned than a typical Gastly. And one quickly aborted rematch between Svartis and Egredia confirmed that she was also more vulnerable to Fire abilities.

The other important thing Diya learned was that it had a long way to go as a trainer. With her partial type advantage, Svartis could beat Bituin most of the time. If the Staryu stuck to Ice beams. But when it didn’t Svartis lost more often than not. And as confident as the Misdreavus was, it didn’t fare any better. Its ability to share damage inflicted upon it with its opponent was a game changer, but only for their first couple of fights. The ability was spiritually taxing and it wasn’t long before the Misdreavus found itself unable to cast anything but hexes which splashed harmlessly on the Staryu’s light screen.

And while the Misdreavus and Svartis both started flagging after a few rounds, Cori’s Bituin might as well have been a machine. Cori spritzed it with some potion and fed it a couple berries and it was ready to go another round. Diya could feel the pokemon’s exhaustion; it was impacted by fight after fight against Diya’s two alternating pokemon. But it had the discipline and the practice to keep fighting through that. Holding up its light screen, evasive maneuvers, and firing its energy beams had been drilled into it until they were automatic. Diya’s pokemon on the other hand, and Diya itself, only got sloppier as the day wore on.

In spite of their losses though, Cori had nothing but praise for the progress Diya’s team made. They were new pokemon, of species not suited for direct combat, under the direction of a novice trainer. And yet they still earned occasional wins against Cori’s well-trained and TMed Bituin. To hear Cori tell it, that was no small thing. 

When the sun started going down and the sparring center emptied out, Cori didn’t let Diya leave without giving the ghost trainer a firm handshake. “Thank you for the matches, Diya. I learned a lot today.”

Diya mustered up the energy to raise an eyebrow. <Really? I should be thanking you.>

The more experienced trainer smirked. “Yeah yeah, my pokemon are awesome and you learned a lot. But no, seriously,” she said more somberly, “you should be proud of your pokemon, Diya. They worked hard and fought well. And I meant what I said, I learned a lot. It’s not every day you have an opportunity to learn to fight Ghost pokemon. If you ever want to spar again while I’m still in town, just text me.”

Well now, Diya thought to itself. It looked like it wasn’t that bad at this making friends thing after all. <I will. Have a good night Cori. And thank you again.>

“You too. See you later!”

Diya nodded, waving as Cori walked away. Svartis summoned the energy to materialize a hand outside of Diya’s cloak and wave as well, and from its exhausted perch on Diya’s shoulder the Misdreavus waggled its lower tendrils. Once she was gone, Diya checked the time. It still had a couple hours before dinner.

Nap? it sent to the two other ghosts. 

Blearily murmured assent was their answer.

Coordinating so many fights for so long had been surprisingly tiring, but Diya was still fresh when it came to phantom energy. The Banette dropped into its shadow, carrying its exhausted charges across Canopy Town in a series of jumps through the town’s dark corners. Its last jump was into the shadowed eaves of a bell tower on the edge of the town graveyard. Most of the local Shuppets slept in its rafters during the day.

Diya retrieved its sleeping bag and Piplup plushie from their storage ball and laid them down beneath the Shuppets on the belltower’s floor. It curled on its side on top of the sleeping bag, one arm around the Piplup plushie, and gestured with the other arm for Svartis to join it. Svartis didn’t wait a second, oozing gratefully into the plushie and taking refuge inside. Exhaustion took hold moments later, dragging Svartis instantly into sleep and pulling Diya on its way there.

Diya’s eyes started to drift shut, but then blinked back open. The Misdreavus hadn’t joined them. The Banette peered upward. The Misdreavus was still floating in the air above it, hesitating. 

What a silly pokemon, Diya thought sleepily. It waved the spirit down. Come on, you too, it sent. Its eyes closed and it lay its head down again. In short order the Banette began to drift off to sleep.

A soft weight settled on its side.

Diya smiled. Good.

---

The door creaked open. June peeked inside. “Hey, Diya, you in there? Svartis?”

Diya murmured blearily and dragged its hat over its eyes, shielding itself from the streetlamp’s light shining in.

“Ah,” June said softly, “I thought so. You weren’t in your room so we were wondering where you were.” She waved at the Shuppets milling about in the rafters, taking a quick picture of them with her pokedex. “We’ll save dinner for you, okay?”

Still hiding its eyes from the light, Diya nodded.

The door creaked closed.

With the streetlamps shut out, Diya’s pink eyes illuminated the space and the pokemon within. Even hours later, the Misdreavus was still sleeping on top of Diya’s side.

Gently, trying not to wake the Misdreavus up too much, Diya shook its side. Hey, it projected, little one.

The Misdreavus blinked slowly. Its red eyes, surrounded by yellow sclera, opened a slit. “Mmmi?” it murmured.

Are you here to stay? With us? Diya asked it.

The Misdreavus, curled up on top of Diya, gave the Banette a long slow look, like that was obvious. It didn’t even bother with a proper sending, instead just letting its current state of being leak out into the surrounding world. It felt tired, and accomplished, and warm. It shut its eyes and curled back up on Diya’s side. Moments later it was asleep again.

Diya smiled. Carefully, so as not to wake either of its companions, it pulled down its scarf. Carefully, it breathed in through its mouth, pulling bits of the Misdreavus’ energy into itself. The Banette let the energy sit there for as long as it could hold its breath, mingling with its soul-stuff. When it breathed out, it had one word on its lips.

“Madrabaz.” One of the words the boy had so enjoyed collecting, it meant trickster. Diya thought it was appropriate. 

Diya fell back asleep with a smile on its face.

-----

Chapter Text

Dark smoky veils tickled Diya’s face as it leapt through the shadow a tree cast in the phantom world. Shadows exploded around its feet as they plunged into earth and soil that was less substantial than it should be. All of it in the perfect silence of a world where sound couldn’t be caused by anything as mundane as kinetics. 

Then Diya dropped back into the physical world and there was nothing but noise.

The ground boomed as soil blasted out of the way of Diya’s rematerializing feet, an Ariados in the distance hissed like a teakettle, Svartis shrieked right back at it, somewhere in the trees Madrabaz was cackling, and June swore furiously as she noticed Diya flanking her and yelled for her other Ariados to lay down webs between them. Too late though. Diya raised its hand and called darkness into a ball-

Wait.

It could see one Ariados standing guard between Svartis and June, and one spraying sticky noxious web fluid at the trees and ground in front of Diya to snare the Banette if it approached. That was two.

Diya let its shadow ball go in an aborted thwump of energy and threw itself to the side. Roots dug painfully into the Banette’s hip as it hit the ground, and the ghostly trainer winced. But the pain was well worth it because when a nightmare spider with fangs longer than Diya’s fingers surfaced from the tree's shadow, it didn’t get those fangs on Diya’s arm. 

And surfacing from the tree’s shadow wasn’t a fancy metaphor for being stealthy, but quite literal. The horned spider emerged from the tree’s shadow like it was breaching the surface of a pond. Diya had thought June’s giant evolved versions of Spinarak were bad enough when they were just giant spiders. But no, it turned out the horrible pokemon could slip through shadows the same way ghosts did. Because of course they could!

The Ariados was a full meter tall and weighed almost as much as Diya did. Its body was banded dark red and black and its legs were ringed in bands of toxic yellow and purple that screamed ‘danger, poisonous pokemon!’. Which Diya personally thought was overkill. Anything which looked at a spider that large and thought that it looked like a meal deserved its fate.

The giant spider pokemon hissed and lurched forward, putting an end to any wayward thoughts. Like all of June’s pokemon it had been put through extensive conditioning programs and even in a fight would never actually inject its venom into a human - or in Diya’s case something human-shaped. But that didn’t mean Diya was about to stand still and let the Ariados put its mouthparts all over it.

So Diya screamed. Not with its mouth, but as it had done fighting June’s Wurmple when they first met. The Banette pulled in power until its soul was stuffed to a buzzing, bursting overfulness, and then loosed it to screech out into the world. The air between it and the Ariados shivered, reality straining under the pressure until it began to give way, the burning purple which replaced darkness in the phantom world bleeding through. The space beneath the tree glowed a brilliant purple, denying the Ariados the shadows it needed to flee.

And it was trying to flee. June may have conditioned her pokemon for battle, but her spider pokemon were ambush predators to their core. When an ambush didn’t immediately succeed, their first instinct was to retreat and regroup. When an ambush failed and their prey let loose a fear-inducing phantom howl that thinned reality, retreat became their panicked second and third instinct as well.

Diya grinned. Svartis was still pinning down one of June’s Ariados and she was too busy micromanaging that fight to give new orders to her second Ariados, which was still -rather pointlessly now- laying down poisonous web between her and Diya. Which meant nothing was stopping Madrabaz from doing whatever it wanted.

“BOO!” Madrabaz burst out of the brush in front of the fleeing spider, solidifying from nearly complete transparency to full presence in an instant. In the same moment the Misdreavus wove a tricky little spell which directly converted shock into phantom force and-

Boom.

Flickering purple and black fire exploded around the fleeing Ariados’ head. The concussive blast knocked it for a loop and down it went. Its legs collapsed out from beneath it even as it tried to jerk its head back, and the spider pokemon plowed into the cold earth in a jumble of limbs. The ghost was on it a moment later, its red and yellow eyes reflected in a thousand places in the Ariados’ shiny compound ones. Diya didn’t bother waiting around to see how that turned out. Once Madrabaz was inside its opponent’s head the fight was over.

Svartis, meanwhile, was still screaming her lungs out as she pinned down one of the Ariados, keeping it tied up defending its trainer. But -Diya cocked an ear- her screams were starting to sound less terrified and more like that of a tiny berserker. Chips of bark and plumes of snow flew as she unleashed a furious barrage of night shades. The Ariados was trying to respond in kind -the cursed things could use night shade as well- but Svartis was simply better. It was all June could do to cajole her pokemon into sticking its head out to ineffectually fire back, while Svartis’ ribbons twisted around cover to score glancing blows all over the Ariados’ carapace and punished any attempt to seek better cover with devastating force.

The Banette’s heart swelled and it couldn’t help but smile behind its scarf. Svartis still trembled around Spinaraks and their larger evolution, Ariadoses. After the horrible experience of being liquified alive by one, Diya didn’t think that would ever change.

But she wasn’t letting that fear make her run. She’d demanded Diya ask for this matchup with June. She was a ghost , an incarnation of the very concept of death by poison come back to haunt the living. It wasn’t her place to fear death by poison. It was her job to make things like Ariados understand that fear. 

So Diya watched with unrestrained pride as Svartis turned fear into fury and relentlessly pinned down the dread pokemon which had been her greatest fear as a Snom. Her night shades filled the air with her special brand of toxic spiritual smog and before long the pinned Ariados was swaying on its legs as its lungs refused to properly draw in air. 

“Shit shit shit shit shit ,” June swore as she recalled her ailing Ariados. She looked around, starting violently as she noticed one of her other Ariados was down, “Shit!”. She swore even more viciously under her breath as she realized her only remaining Ariados, the one webbing the area between her and Diya, had been left tiring itself out doing something pointless. June opened her mouth to order it to her defense-

-and then closed her mouth a moment later as Diya stepped out from behind a nearby tree with a fully charged shadow ball in hand. The moment the ambushing Ariados had been dealt with, Diya had repositioned through the shadows, and now June’s defending Ariados was on the opposite side of her rather than between them. 

June let out a heaving sigh and folded over, placing her hands on her knees and taking deep breaths. “Alright. You win. Eugh, shoot, I’m too used to fighting Bashak. I need to change tactics.”

<Good spar!> Diya texted. Off to the side, Svartis let out a delighted trill, leaping into the canopy for a celebratory dance. <Also, tell me about fighting Bashak?>

June walked over to Madrabaz’s thoroughly mind-screwed Ariados and recalled it into its pokeball. “Well, you know, he fights like a herder. All of his pokemon clustered around him in a defensive wall, with Greta leaping out to launch probing attacks. Dealing with that is pretty straightforward. Not easy, gods no, but straightforward. I just lay down webs between him and me to prevent him from rushing me, use a harassing pokemon to probe his defenses, and then when he sends out Greta to counterattack, counterattack her back. I don’t always win, but it’s hard to lose against him when I do that, you know? I certainly never lose this badly.”

Diya stroked the ends of its scarf -a brilliant yellow scarf with lightning motifs it had bought with some recent research bounty money- and thought about that. <So why do you think it didn’t work with me?>

“Eugh. You’re too damn mobile! Trying to harass you with my pokemon didn’t pin down anything but Svartis. And if I’m being honest, that started to feel more like I was being pinned down pretty quick. Trying to set up webs between us did absolutely nothing but tie up one of my pokemon - yes pun intended, no I am not apologizing. And while I didn’t see exactly what happened, trying to counterattack you just got my pokemon counter-counterattacked.”

Diya stroked its scarf some more. <You’re not wrong … but also I don’t think that’s the real problem.>

“Oh?” June perked up, standing up straighter and looking up at the taller trainer. “Go on.”

Diya held up a finger to ask June to wait, and sat down next to her on a log as it typed. <The real problem is your multitasking. I’m sure you do fine when all of the fighting is focused right around Bashak, but you couldn’t keep track of all three pokemon at once when their targets were separated.> Diya texted that to her and kept typing.

June opened her mouth to respond and Diya held up a finger again. It still had more to say. It could see June fidgeting, itching to say something, but she let her fellow trainer take its time to type. 

<You’re not wrong, your strategy would have worked *better* on Bashak. But if you’d seen the webs not doing anything and ordered your second Ariados to reinforce the one Madra counter-ambushed or to help take out Svartis, it would have worked okay. Not great, but okay. As is, you were fighting with one pokemon while another twiddled its mandibles and the last got taken out without support.>

The bug trainer glowered and drew in a grumpy breath. But when she let it out in a huff, she nodded. “Eugh, you’re right. I hate it, but you’re right. Mind you, I still think I need to change tactics. A tactic which might work against you -if implemented by someone better- is still useless if I can’t pull it off. But you’re also right about the multitasking. I’ve never been much of a combat trainer, so I tend to get anxious and tunnel vision on one conflict in a match. It’s typically not a problem when you’re practicing at school in one-on-one battles but…” June shrugged and glowered some more. “Wilderness battles don’t care about letting you fight one-one-one, do they?

Diya shook its head sadly and patted her on the shoulder. It left its hand there and gave her a comforting squeeze. <Nope.>

June groaned. “The funny thing is, this is part of why I told Bashak we should come here. Kenomao Island has a reputation for gym challenges which mirror real life, rather than emphasizing league matchups. And I thought, you know, I get nervous about this stuff. I’m not great at it. So if I was gonna actually do my pokemon journey, and not just put it off forever, I should do it where I could learn how to really do it. That way I could go home and look out into the forests past the safe zones the rangers have marked out and know for a fact ‘yeah I can handle that’, rather than just having some league battle badges which say I should be able to handle it.”

The bug trainer let out a laugh which Diya thought came out bitterer than she meant it to. “I just forgot that meant I’d actually have to, y’know, do that thing I’m bad at and get super nervous about.”

Diya leaned its head on June’s shoulder, shifting its hand to pat her beanie. <It’s scary, huh?>

June snorted. “Yeah, a little bit.”

An idea struck Diya. <What if I eat your anxiety? So you can know what it’s like to fight without it?>

Diya’s friend pulled back so she could turn and look at its face. “Wait, you can do that?”

The Banette nodded. <Pain, sadness, frustration, anxiety, anything that counts as ‘grief’.>

A distant expression settled on June’s face as she thought about it. “Huh. Huh. Yeah that’s a thought. Maybe it would be easier to focus on not tunnel-visioning in a fight if I knew what that felt like.”

<Wanna try it?>

“Sure. Give me a moment, I’ll swap out the Ariados Svartis poisoned for Wurmy.”

<It’s not poison.>

“Diya, I love you, and I know you and that other girl who’s always at the sparring center have got some bet going about this or something, but I do not care. If it acts like poison, floats like poison, and talks like a sentient cloud of poison, it’s poison.”

“Poissssssson,” Svartis hissed at hearing a mention of her new favorite word.

Diya sighed and pushed exasperation at her. She was not helping.

-----

Bashak hummed as he spun thread. 

There was something different about him though.

The herder was wearing the same jacket he always did, a heavy thing of green, red, and gold, thickly embroidered in abstract patterns. His shaggy black hair hung loose over his ears and tumbled about his glasses, just like it always did. He wore thin leather gloves, typical for him when he was spinning outside in the cold. And, as usual, the giant boy felt like he loomed over Diya even while he was sitting down on his folding chair and Diya stood.

Diya leaned against a tree and stared at Bashak. Whatever was up with him wasn’t anything bad. The Banette risked a quick hiss of breath in through its mouth to enhance its phantom sense of taste, and even so couldn’t taste any grievances wafting off of Bashak.

Bashak was clearly aware Diya was staring at him, but even so he took his time before looking up from his spinning. His lips quirked up in a smile when he asked, “Yes, Diya?”

Ah! That was it! Diya hadn’t noticed until Bashak looked up at it - and didn’t uncurl and roll his shoulders, to compensate for how he was hunched over. Diya’s friend had a tendency to do that when he sat down, to crouch down over his work if he wasn’t paying attention to his posture. But Bashak had been sitting up straight as a board.

The herder raised his eyebrow, waiting for Diya’s response.

Diya fumbled off a glove -cursing in its head about the especially cold day- and texted its friend. <Okay, what’s up with you?>

At that the herder only raised his other eyebrow too.

<You’re holding yourself different. It’s good.>

Bashak hummed to himself and Diya could see the moment where he took stock of his body language and it shifted minutely. “I suppose I was.”

<So? What’s up?>

That got Diya another hum in response. Bashak took a moment to wind his thread around its spindle and adjust the copper hook and wire that prevented the Mareep wool from shocking him. Eventually he answered, “I told you I wasn’t going for a battle badge.”

<The search and rescue and winter survival badges instead?>

“Mm. I’m going to go for it.”

Diya blinked. <Really?> Diya had been under the impression that Bashak didn’t care to collect battle badges. For that matter he’d never seemed to care much about being a journeyer at all. It had never been said out loud, but Diya wondered sometimes if Bashak might have journeyed out only to give June the courage to do the same.

“Really.” Bashak leaned back in his folding chair. He let out a wintery exhale and watched the steam rise into the air. 

“Alicia’s been doing well,” he told Diya. That was what Bashak had named the Pilowswine he’d saved. But Diya already knew that. Half the reason the ghost trainer was here was so they could see how she held up when interacting with Madrabaz and its sudden surprises. Bashak saw the quizzical look in Diya’s eyes and clarified. “Real well. Leader Ahmad says she might even evolve into a Mamoswine one day.”

<That’s impressive.> Diya tried to compensate for the terse message with an earnest expression, but it didn’t want to type any longer than it had to. It slipped its hand back into its glove. The day was so cold it could feel the inside of its nostrils freezing, and typing barehanded was miserable. Just because it could puppet a frozen hand didn’t mean it liked the experience. 

Bashak smiled. “It is, I suppose.” He exhaled again to watch the steam rise. “Mind if I tell you a story?”

Was Bashak offering to talk? For an extended period of time? Of his own free will? Diya couldn’t nod fast enough.

“Is that a yes you mind, or…?”

Diya shook its head.

“...I hate to ask again, but…”

The Banette snorted, cold fingers twitching irritably in its glove. It pulled off its other glove and slowly typed with its offhand, <Tell the story.> ‘Of course, you dummy,’ Diya didn’t add, because typing offhanded was already hard enough. It loved being able to type to people, it really did, and it was so grateful to both June and Nurse Claire for their help with that. But sometimes the cold, the words it had to leave off for brevity’s sake, the awkward pauses while people waited for it to finish typing, all those little annoyances made a growl rise up in the back of its throat.

Bashak was patient though, and waited unperturbed for Diya to give him the go-ahead. When he had it, he spoke in a musing tone. “I never worked one-on-one much with any pokemon. Except for Greta. But it was more that we worked together with the herds, if you understand me?” Bashak searched Diya’s face for understanding before he continued.

“If we needed to scare off a Gabite, it wasn’t Greta and I facing it down directly. It was Greta and I gathering up the herds, getting them into defensive formation, and keeping their backs firm while the dragon circled. There isn’t call for your League’s kind of fighting, how we live.”

Diya tilted its head curiously. It really didn’t know much about how shepherds like Bashak fought wild pokemon. It assumed that directing whole herds in combat would be different than directing just one or two pokemon, but it didn’t know the details. It motioned for its friend to continue, eager to hear him talk more.

The herder was puzzled for a moment before realization set in. “Ah. Need me to explain that?”

The Banette nodded happily. It always wanted to learn new things.

“Well, you can’t fight with a whole herd. Too chaotic. What you do is head off fights. Gabite’s a Ground type, so it’s immune to Mareep, but they don’t care to tousle with prey which are a fairer fight. One comes around, we get all the Mareep in the center and surround them with Gogoats. Then we have our Chanseys sing, some to calm the Mareep and some to make the Gabite nervous.”

With a quick rub of its hand for blood flow, Diya took off its glove and typed, <That works? Aren’t Gabites powerful? What about Garchomps?> It didn’t know too much about Gabites, but it knew they were powerful dragons. And their evolution Garchomp was considered one of the toughest Dragon types in the world.

“They are. Gabite could fight through, grab a Mareep and run off, two times out of three. Garchomp, nine out of ten.” The herder shrugged. “That’s not good enough. They have to eat a few times a week. A predator which took those odds would get injured every month. Injured predators can’t hunt, so they’re careful what fights they pick.”

Diya regarded its friend with no small amount of awe. It knew that living out at the edge of settled lands was different, but Bashak was talking matter-of-factly like he’d done this before. Had he faced down Garchomps before even going on his pokemon journey? <It’s that easy?>

“Hah!” Bashak barked out a laugh when he checked Diya’s text. “Gods no. Getting Mareeps to not bolt around a Gabite is hard . And Gogoats may not be hunted by Gabites, but that doesn’t mean they like standing between one and its food. Scaring off a Gabite means making every pokemon in your herd do something their instincts hate. And if one of them breaks and runs for it, the rest will too.”

Bashak reached down to grab his thermos first, taking a long drink. Diya wasn’t surprised he needed it. Bashak could go for a whole day without talking this much. “So no, it isn’t easy. It is different than gym fighting though. Gym fighting is...” he looked for the right words. He took another sip in the meantime. 

Eventually he shrugged. “I like it.”

Diya blinked. It hadn’t quite been expecting that. <Why?>

“Hmmm. Circling a herd, you’re fighting against your pokemon. They’re scared and you need to make them do frightening things. You don’t have time to calm each one, you’ve just gotta give orders and hope they trust you more than their own fear.” The herder’s normally soft face twisted into a grimace. “You’re surrounded by terror, trying to be calm, and relying on a hungry dragon that could kill you to make the smart decision.”

A memory washed over Diya for an instant, the intensity of it spilling out from Bashak.

“-RRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAUUUUUUUUUUGGGGGGGHHHHHHHH!” The Garchomp screamed and he flinched. The young herder almost tumbled out of the saddle and only old Brigadier’s skill as a mount kept Bashak from taking a nasty fall off his mother’s Gogoat. 

Gods, its fangs were longer than his hands. One of its terrible scything arms clawed at the ground and threw great clods of dirt into the air, showering the Gogoats between Bashak and the dragon. They bleated in terror, rearing back, and in a moment of shock Bashak realized he’d forgotten his duty.

The younger herder whistled for Greta to firm up their line and whirled around, tearing his eyes away from the dragon which wanted to kill him. What did he need to do, what did he- There! A clump of Mareeps were edging away. Bashak blasted his whistle to get the Chanseys’ attention, pointed at a pair of them, and whistled again to order them to soothe the Mareeps. He whistled again to call another pair, the piercing shrill of it ringing in his ears. If he could just-

“RRRAAAAAUUUUUGGGGHHHH!” The Garchomp lowered its head and charged the Gogoat line, screaming to expose those awful teeth which filled the young herder’s vision. Bashak’s heart leapt into his throat along with a scream. It wasn’t supposed to do that! It wasn’t- At the last second the Garchomp aborted its charge, pulling up and screaming frustrated rage into the line of Gogoats held firm by Greta -bless her!- barking a steady staccato rhythm at their heels.

Where was Mom?! She was supposed to be just two hills over, where was-

Surfacing from Bashak’s memory felt like emerging from an icy river, complete with uncontrollable shivers. <Sounds like a nightmare.> Diya’s hand was getting cold again, but it didn’t put its pokedex away.

“It is.”

<And gym fighting isn’t.>

Bashak closed his eyes and some of the icy fear of his memory faded. He smiled. “No. It’s not.”

With that smile, Diya caught a whiff of another emotion off of Bashak. It was positive, but with just enough of an aggressive bite for Diya to pick up on. The taste of triumph and vindictiveness. The Banette tilted its head. <That’s not all though.>

The herder nodded. “Our home is temperate, except when Articuno flies overhead. Our Swinubs are more Ground than Ice and they rarely even evolve to be Piloswine.” Bashak’s eyes stayed closed even as his smile widened. “Not the ones here.”

The ghost trainer tilted its head, something half remembered from another life’s schooling niggling the back of its brain. Why would that matter, what was it about Ice that-

Oh. Diya’s thoughts clicked into place. The elemental force Dragon types called upon was little understood, but one thing which was certain was that Ice abilities tended to disrupt it. An Ice attack could deal unusually disproportionate damage to a Dragon as its own draconic energy went wild inside of it. Ground types were also affected by Ice in the same way. And the pokemon of the Garchomp line were all Dragon/Ground pokemon. 

Diya looked at Bashak with wide eyes, tasting the vindictive triumph rising off of its friend. <You’re training a Garchomp killer.> Garchomps, and even their lesser evolution Gabite, were monstrously powerful. They were less likely to flinch in the face of their elemental vulnerability than they were to simply bite an offending Ice pokemon in half. But Mamoswines were huge, one of very few pokemon Diya could imagine taking a hit from such monsters and staying on their feet. And their tusks, formed from solid ice, could channel Ice energy to devastating effect.

Bashak’s eyes opened and he met Diya’s gaze. “I’m thinking about it.”

No. There wasn’t any anxiety which Diya could taste, and the way Bashak had been holding himself tall and straight-backed didn’t speak to hesitation. He’d already made his decision. <No. You’re not.> The Banette smiled and sent a second message to its friend. <Good luck.>

“Thanks, Diya. I’ll need it.”

Diya’s hand was really getting cold now, but it kept typing anyway. <I’m no dragon, but I’ve got a scary scream. Want Alicia to practice holding her ground with me?>

Bashak smiled at his friend. “I’d like that.”

-----

The wind whistled past the Banette’s ears as it leapt through the cold night air. It landed heavily but silently on a house’s sloped roof, sinking partway into its own shadow to absorb the impact. Its lungs burned and its mouth ached to open and pant, but it didn’t stop. The Banette heaved its weight up and forward, trying to keep its momentum going. But to keep its footing on the snow-slick surface it had to let its feet sink half a centimeter into the shadows beneath them with each step, making every step take just a little bit more effort.

The shadows also kept its footsteps silent, which was important. People were sleeping in the home below, and the Banette didn’t want to be rude.

Diya bent its knees as it reached the end of the roof, using all of its flagging strength to keep them from buckling. Its could barely think, its mind drained by the exercise to point where the Banette would have had trouble solving 3+4. But somehow it mustered the focus to step as it leaped, propelling itself into the phantom world where everything was a shadow of itself, even gravity if one knew the trick of it. The Banette soared not just across the gap between houses, but fully over a house, coming down on the house after that.

Sound reasserted itself in a whistling howl as Diya let itself fall back into reality, soaking the impact in its shadow again. Its nostrils flared as it sucked air in. Sweat stuck its exercise scarf to its neck, a thin black silk thing that nevertheless felt far too hot against its skin. But it pushed itself up again, running for the end of the roof at just under a sprint. Just one more roof, it told itself, just like it had for the last -Diya’s exhausted brain refused to count- several? houses.

Throwing itself up and into another world took more focus than could share space with the thought and Diya let it go. It would run until it couldn’t, that’s how many more roofs it would do.

The body Diya inherited had been fit. The teachers in Ledos Village had seen to that. They made sure their students could hike a day without complaint and wouldn’t sprain an ankle if they had to run from a dangerous pokemon. But it wasn’t fit enough . There was a world of difference between hiking and fighting. Nothing could have possibly prepared Diya for how quickly combat drained one’s body. Especially the kind of fighting Diya was suited for, hit and run tactics augmented by shadow walks and phantom steps. 

It needed to be better if it wanted to earn a gym badge. So it ran.

Just one more roof.

One more.

One more.

Diya ran out of houses. The Banette came plummeting down in a park nestled in the neighborhood, staggering to its feet after the landing. Breathing as hard as it ever had in its life, Diya looked up at the houses around. It might be able to leap from one roof to another, one more time. But leaping up to a roof? 

No. It was done.

With a heartfelt groan, Diya let itself fall backward. A thin layer of snow cushioned its impact and it moaned gratefully. Its body burned like a furnace, so much that it didn’t even feel the cold of the snow on its skin. And, blissfully, its brain was too wrung out to be bothered by that.

A minute later Svartis and Madrabaz slammed into the snow beside its head, rolling over one another and sending up sprays of snow as the two ghosts argued excitedly about who got second place. Diya huffed and waved a hand through them, dispersing their bodies and shooing them somewhere they wouldn’t get snow all over its face. It didn’t tell them to stop though. The young ghosts were clearly enjoying the argument far too much for it to stop them.

Over the next few minutes Shuppets trickled into the clearing, each illuminated by the faint blue glow of fading faerie fire. The little ghosts had joined Diya at the start of its run, but been unable to resist playing catch the will-o-wisp as they flitted through the night sky. They’d still followed after the Banette, but as a darting cloud of blue glows loosely tethered behind Diya rather than flying beside it.

After a long night the Shuppets were all worn out and one by one they settled into trees and on park benches. Their fading faerie fires lit up the park with a low flickering glow, casting dancing blue shimmers and gray shadows across the snow. Diya smiled. It was pretty. The Banette giggled, something in its exercise-addled brain finding that thought hilarious.

“Whoa.”

With an effort, Diya raised its head, peering about for who’d said that. At the edge of the park, a young girl half Diya’s age peeked out of her front door. The child shuffled out of her house slowly, weighed down by a big fluffy quilt she’d wrapped around her shoulders. She shut the front door cautiously behind her, clearly nervous she’d wake someone up. 

The child took slow shuffling steps down the front stairs. Oversized Buneary slippers poked out from beneath the quilt with each step. Once she was free of anything that might creak or make noise though, she rushed over to the park as fast as the quilt would let her. “Whoa,” the little girl breathed again.

Diya waved hello to the child, though it didn’t bother to get up. It was still, oh, approximately five times too sore to do that. The Banette even winced with the motion of the wave. It might have, just maybe, pushed itself a little too hard.

The child waved weakly back, barely able to muster the attention to notice Diya. She spun around in a slow awestruck circle, faerie fire illuminating her face. The Shuppets shuffled anxiously on their perches as the child’s gaze passed over them, but she was only a small human and they were tired so her presence didn’t send the shy ghosts darting for cover.

After three whole rotations staring at the blue-lit park, the child spared Diya a quick glance. She asked in an awestruck whisper, “Are these all your pokemon?”

Diya shook its head, then held up two fingers and gestured to Svartis and Misdreavus resting by its head.

“Oh.” Diya could see gears turning behind the young girl’s eyes. “Just those two?”

It nodded.

“And the others?”

The Banette was too exhausted to pull out its pokedex and type, so it shrugged. Let her make of that what she would.

“Oh.”

Diya smiled. From the wonder in her eyes, the specifics didn’t matter to her. She just saw the beautiful pokemon lighting up the park and wanted to watch them shine. 

-----

Diya was in The Mighty Meowth, pondering the best way to get a bowl of spicy tofu into its mouth, when Cori suddenly threw herself over its back. The impact forced a “Glrk!” out of its mouth. “Hey! How are you doing?!” she exclaimed.

Before she even finished her sentence the Banette was gone, stepped out from under her into the phantom world. Diya lurched through the table and collapsed back into the real world in the chair on the other side. The table jumped as the trailing edge of Diya’s cloak tried to reassert itself in the same location and they pushed each other out of the way. The Banette’s heart pounded and it had to struggle a bit to keep breathing through its nose.

The back of the chair caught Cori in the ribs as she flopped down into the suddenly empty space. “Ow,” she groaned. She looked up at Diya with wonder in her eyes. “Whoa, you can teleport? That’s so cool! Did you need an Abra to teach you that or is it something you could learn on your own? Can all psychics do that?”

Diya’s heart was still going two beats a second as it pulled out its pokedex. <PLEASE don’t do that.> it wrote, turning the screen around for her to see. 

She blinked. “Oh. Sorry.” She adjusted her red beanie and lifted herself off the chair. “Do you mind if I sit with you?” she asked, and gestured to the chair it had just vacated.

The Banette was still focusing on bringing its breathing under control so it didn’t pay too much attention to the request and waved for her to sit down.

“Cool, thanks.” She pushed its bowl of tofu across the table towards it. “Hey so I-” Cori paused. “Uh, wait. Are you okay?”  

<No> Diya replied. With a conscious effort the Banette took direct control of its heart and slowed it down to a more reasonable level. Its breathing relaxed a few moments later as its blood stopped demanding so much oxygen. 

“What’s wrong?” Cori leaned over the table with worried eyes.

<Bad memories of sudden yelling.>

Cori winced. “Ah. I’m sorry Diya, I know what that’s like. Not exactly the same but … sorry. I shouldn’t do that again, I assume?”

The Banette nodded. <Yeah, thanks.> It pulled down its scarf -a light blue and pale red plaid one- to smile at her, to show all was forgiven.

The energetic trainer smiled back. “Cool. Hey, you have a Misdreavus though. How do you handle that?”

Diya snorted ruefully. <A psychic bond to track it. And it’s exposure therapy.>

“Hah! It would be, wouldn’t it?”

Diya reached across the table to retrieve its bowl of spicy tofu and typed with its other hand, <So what’s up?>

With a beaming grin, Cori pulled a black corded necklace out from under her fleece. Strung on it were three battle badges, and the one Cori held out to Diya was the ice battle badge from Canopy Gym.

<You got your badge!>

“Yup! Winter survival too, but that one’s in my storage ball.”

<Congrats!> Diya jumped out of its chair to hug her.

“Aw, thanks.” Cori leaned into the hug and squeezed Diya before letting it go. “Anyhow, that means I’ll be moving on to Zima City. I was hoping to get one more spar in with you this afternoon though, if you’re free?”

<Of course!> Diya sighed and leaned in to hug Cori again, more gently this time, before retaking its seat. <I’ll be sad to see you go.>

“Yeah, me too. It’s been fun Diya. But hey, if you’re quick you might make it to Zima before I clear out their gym too.”

The Banette let out an amused snort. <Real quick, knowing you.>

Cori laughed and favored Diya with a wicked grin. “Hah, true! I still count as humble so long as you’re the one who said it though, right?”

<Absolutely not.>

“Well, finish up your food and come meet me at the sparring center. I’ll be waiting.” Cori stood up and gave Diya a half wave before walking out of the restaurant.

With a shake of its head, Diya settled back into its seat. Of course Cori already had her Canopy Gym badges. That wasn’t much of a surprise. It was surprised at the ache it felt over that though. She was a fun sparring partner to be sure, but Diya hadn’t realized how much it enjoyed having her around. And Diya couldn’t imagine Cori struggling with a gym, so if it wanted to move fast enough to see her in Zima city…

It would have to test for its badges now. As soon as the next testing sessions were scheduled. Were June and Bashak ready for that?

Was Diya ready for that?

The young trainer huffed out a breath and smiled. Well. There was only one way to find out.

Chapter Text

Most scholars credit the development of Apricorn balls for material transport and pokemon capture with humanity’s development from the Isolated Era to the Pre-Modern Era. Apricorn storage and, critically, preservation caused an explosion of trade everywhere the technique spread. Furthermore, while early Apricorn balls did not slow time to a near halt within them as synthetic pokeballs do, they still slowed the relative time of larger pokemon enough to make feeding them tenable, giving humanity access to stronger and hardier protectors.

Understandably, many laypeople also credit the invention of mass-produced synthetic pokeballs or digitizing training modules with humanity’s progress from the Pre-Modern Era to the Modern Era. The consensus among historians, however, is that neither are fully correct. After the introduction of synthetic pokeballs, the average percentage of trainers in a given population only rose from 5% to 7%, and the average number of pokemon per trainer remained unchanged at roughly 2.3. The development of digitizing training modules increased those numbers to 12% and 3.8, which was substantial but nowhere close to our modern world’s nearly universal pokemon partnership.

What enabled that was the Gym system. The first program to introduce free-at-point-of-access pokemon gyms and care centers saw a jump over the next decade to 62% pokemon ownership among youth, with new trainers training 7.2 pokemon on average by the time they completed their gym circuit. The resulting universality of trainers in the population dropped wild pokemon fatalities near settlements to almost nothing and enabled a surge in casual trade and travel. This ability of every member of a community to contribute in the case of a dangerous pokemon event and travel safely in small numbers is what characterizes the modern age.

Today settlement walls and artillery, once present everywhere, are a distant historical figment in all but the furthest outposts. While synthetic pokeballs and digitized training were necessary to enable this, we should not forget that they were not enough to change our lives on their own. It is our continued commitment to our Gyms that secures the safety of the world we live in.

-Opening Remarks, 159th Annual Gym Leaders Conference

-----

Leader Ahmad clapped his gloved hands as loudly as he could and shouted, “Listen up everyone!” He wasn’t the tallest person, so he brushed the snow off of a bench in front of the pokecenter and stood on top of it so the group of young trainers assembled outside could see him. Flakes of snow floating down around him immediately began replacing the brushed off snow with a thin layer of white.

The excited murmuring among the small crowd quieted slowly. Diya took a moment to type out a last <Good luck!> to June and Bashak before focusing its attention on the ice gym leader.

“I know, I know,” Ahmad said, over the last vestiges of conversation, “you’re all looking forward to your tests. But we need to go over some basics first, just to make sure everyone is on the same page. There’s some folk who’ve never tested for a gym badge before too, so I need to talk about that too. Even if you’ve heard this before, just be patient and we’ll get started soon.”

Diya bounced excitedly on the tips of its toes. Its first badges! It was going to win its first badges today! Next to it though, June wasn’t displaying quite the same level of excitement. Her face looked almost as green as her jacket and one of her legs bounced nervously, the motion sending the fluffy Venonat on her beanie bobbing back and forth. Bashak looked as unruffled as a mountain, but Diya could taste a whiff of nervousness off of even him. The big trainer buried his own anxiety by reassuring his friend. He ruffled June’s beanie and whispered quietly to her, “It’ll be fine. You’re going to do great.”

“I know, I know, I’m just worried about Igor,” she whispered back, one gloved hand going up to where Igor usually rested on her shoulder.

That wasn’t wholly true, Diya could taste June’s fears and they were more complicated than that. But it understood her anxiety, and even shared it for the little food-stealing bug. As it turned out, the Blipbug hadn’t just been stealing food for fun but because it was getting ready to evolve! Just last night it had started spinning a cocoon, preparing for its evolution into a Dottler, a tiny armored tank of a pokemon. 

June had immediately sent Igor home by e-storage, transferring him by the thick underwater cables which let the settlements transmit matter as if it were data. Cocoon evolutions were risky events with much that could go wrong, so it was best that Igor be in the skilled hands and professional equipment of the Lepida family for the process. He would be safe and cared for, and scanned regularly so any problems in the process could be corrected. June had assured Diya and Bashak of that, over and over again.

But that didn’t change the fact that the one June was reassuring was actually herself, and she’d been forced to drop out of the winter search and rescue test. Without Igor’s eyes guiding her, she didn’t have any way to track a quarry. She said that was fine, that she was happier to see Igor evolving than to get a single skill badge, but Diya could taste how it bothered her. June was anxious at the best of times and the sudden change in her schedule and team wasn’t helping.

Diya took her hand in its and squeezed. Last night she’d turned down its offer to take some of her anxiety, but it could still be her friend the mundane way, standing next to her and holding her hand.

On the snowy bench, Ahmad launched into his speech. “First things first. I want everybody to remember, especially those of you who are new trainers, that failure is an option. If you don’t pass a badge test right now, you can always try again later. The goal here is to learn. If you don’t pass a test this time we will be happy to help you grow and try again. That’s what we’re here for. There is one exception to this however!”

The leader took the time to look over the small crowd, making suring each and every trainer had their eyes on him. “The exception is the winter search and rescue badge! Can anyone here tell me what the most important principle of search and rescue is?”

Bashak raised a hand high above the crowd. He needn’t have bothered, Ahmad was already looking towards the semi-nomadic herder before he finished asking the question.

“You, Bashak.”

The young man answered with a serious expression, “Don’t become a casualty yourself.”

“And why is that?”

“If you need rescuing, you’re using resources the lost person needs.”

“Right! If you go out trying to help someone and end up needing to be rescued yourself, the problem isn’t just that you’re in danger. It’s that you’re putting the person you’re trying to help in more danger. Because whatever help you’re getting, they aren’t.”

Ahmad scowled to drive his point home.  “We do not play around when it comes to this. If you’re taking the search and rescue test, you’re going to be on your own for most of it. Each of you should be safe, you’ll be issued a locator beacon, signal flares, potion spray, and a pokeball with a homing Pidgey, in addition to your own survival gear. There will also be gym teachers nearby and the area you’ll be in doesn’t have any hidden environmental hazards.”

“But!” The leader’s voice boomed out, “It is still winter and we have scheduled the test for intense weather conditions. If you get lost, or injured, or for any reason cannot complete the test, you are to use. those. safety. measures. Do not hesitate, do not take risks, use them as soon as you think you have a problem. Because that is the one scenario in which you will be barred from retaking a test. If you try to press on after you should have stopped, or you let yourself slide from a complication to serious trouble because you didn’t want to get picked up and fail the test, we will not let you take the test again. That kind of attitude makes you a danger not only to yourself, but the people you might one day be asked to rescue. Have I made myself clear?”

Nods, gulps, and quiet “Yes Leader”s answered him.

“Good. Remember, these skills may one day help you save someone’s life. They’re important. Which is why it’s okay to fail. Better to learn your limits and try again after you’ve improved, than to take uncertain skills out into the world.”

That earned him another round of nods, these more confident. That, every trainer understood. The gym system existed for everyone, not just rangers, so that people would be sure in their abilities should the worst ever happen, as it sometimes did. The world of pokemon could be a dangerous place and the only way to make it safe was if everyone could be trusted to do their part.

“With that out of the way, let’s talk about the tests! If you’re doing the search and rescue test, we will be dropping each of you off in the forest. You’ll be given one of our pokemon to track, and a sample of their fur. Your job is to find them. After that, as you can’t take the search and rescue test without also taking winter survival, you’ll build a shelter for yourself and them and weather at least one night in it. If you’re just doing winter survival, we’ll be dropping you off in a different area but the expectation is the same. Build a shelter, last the night.”

Bashak raised his hand again.

“Yes?”

“To double-check, we can use pre-prepared shelters?” The trainers who had seen Bashak’s yurt in the woods all stifled laughter.

Ahmad laughed openly along with them. “Hah! Yes, you can, so long as it’s a shelter you prepared yourself. Preparation is nine tenths of survival, after all.”

Another trainer raised their hand.

“Yes, Augustus?”

The trainer asked, “What about the battle part of the tests? When will that be happening?”

Ahmad smiled. “Good question,” he answered.

The trainer waited. 

The rest of the crowd waited too.

Leader Ahmad waited just long enough to make the tension awkward before laughing. “No but seriously, that is a good question. If you’re only here for the ice battle badge, we’ll handle that separately after everyone else is dropped off. But that’s just … you, Mary? Right. The rest of you will be having your battles in the context of your other tests. Which is to say, we’ll be simulating unexpected encounters with Ice-type wildlife for you. Those will happen exactly as unexpectedly as they would in real life, so keep your eyes peeled.”

Oh. Diya perked up to hear that. That promised to be interesting. Madrabaz, who had concealed itself in the shadow of the bench Ahmad was standing on, sent out a pulse of cackling anticipation. Diya echoed the feeling back to its new pokemon, tempered with a note of restraint and all-in-good-fun. If it wanted to counter-ambush a teacher Diya would be more than happy to go along with that, but Madrabaz needed to keep in mind that the teacher and their pokemon would be friends who didn’t deserve too big of a scare.

Madrabaz’s red irises glowed under the bench. All in good fun, it agreed.

… sure, Diya responded. It was going to make the conscious and deliberate decision to trust its pokemon. Because that’s how trust worked. If Madra did something to give a poor teacher nightmares for a week, they would talk about it then. Until then, Diya would take it at its word. Projected feelings. Whatever.

The young trainer swallowed its nervousness and refocused on the prelude to its badge tests.

Leader Ahmad answered a few more questions about the tests before wrapping up his speech, unaware of the ghost beneath him. “You are all good students. You’ve learned what we’ve had to teach you, and made the most of it.” He smiled warmly, looking out over the assembled trainer. “I have no doubt you’ll do us all proud.”

Bashak reached out and wrapped an arm around each of his friends, pulling them into a big hug. “Good luck,” he told them.

“Mmrph,” June said into the side of his thick wool coat. She turned her head. “You too, Bashak.” She turned to Diya. “You’ve got your snowshoes, enough firewood in your storage balls? Double-checked your flare gun?” 

The Banette was tempted to conjure a brilliant ball of faerie fire, just to remind her how unnecessary some of those items were. But it had packed extra firewood anyway, and double-checked its flare gun, because being cautious was important. And there were much worse things in the world than a friend who cared. So it nodded to June’s concern and reached around Bashak to hug her too.

Bashak gave them each one last squeeze, forcing a “Mrp!” out of Diya and a good-natured groan out of June, before letting them go. 

The students and their teachers squeezed into small buses outside the pokecenter, which rode on treads and seemed determined to split the difference between a snowmobile and a truck. June left Bashak and Diya behind with one last hug and a wave, taking a separate bus with the group that was jumping straight to the winter survival test.

The bus trundled out of Canopy Town, carrying a tensely quiet atmosphere with it. Some of the trainers whispered quietly to one another in nervous tones. Diya closed its eyes and laid its head back against the wall of the bus. Next to it Bashak did the same, sitting close enough to Diya that their sides pressed against each other. It would be a lie to say Diya wasn’t nervous, but it had trained for this. Bashak had trained his whole life for this. They would be fine, Diya reassured itself.

It mostly succeeded.

Outside, the noise leaking into the bus slowly quieted. Diya could hear the difference as snow came down faster and thicker. The quiet whir of the engine grew more and more muffled, and the crunch of the bus’ treads became less sharp as fresh fluffy snow became the majority of what was being flattened. The gym had timed its tests well.

Almost half an hour later, the bus came to a halt. The doors at the back opened and Leader Ahmad hopped out. “Bashak!” he called, “you’re first!”

The big herder rocked to the side, giving Diya a friendly shove with his shoulder that almost toppled the Banette over. “Good luck,” he told Diya.

Diya fumbled to get its pokedex out. <Good luck to YOU!> it typed. He was the one getting out to be tested, after all.

But Bashak only smiled, and reached down to scratch Greta’s ears, where she was sitting between his feet. “Don’t need it. Got her.” And with that he stood up, crouching to avoid hitting the bus’ roof, and shuffled out into the snow. 

Diya boggled at Bashak’s back. That was the closest thing to a boast it had ever heard from the reserved trainer. 

Outside, Leader Ahmad spoke quietly with Bashak. He handed the trainer a small tuft of a fur and pointed at a rapidly fading set of pawprints in ankle-deep snow. Without a word Bashak knelt down to let Greta sniff the fur, and she was off. She shot forward along the pawprints, bounding across the snow until she was almost invisible among the dense snowfall. The moment she was on the edge of sight she turned in place impatiently, barking for her trainer. 

Bashak offered Leader Ahmad a parting goodbye. Straightening to his full height he strode after Greta, eating up the ground in long strides. He turned to give Diya one last parting wave, and then vanished into the snowstorm.

Leader Ahmad got back into the bus, slamming on its roof twice once the door was closed to signal the driver to move. The driver, a woman dressed in a full snow camouflage suit with a bright orange armband bearing the Canopy Gym’s shaded tree logo, turned to look at Ahmad before moving. She smirked. “Hey boss. I’ll bet you twenty pokedos that kid finds his lost pokemon before we drop the last kid off.”

The leader snorted. “No bet.”

One of the other trainers packed into the bus, a short little boy in a pink parka even younger than Diya, piped up, “Why?”

Leader Ahmad turned to face him, “Hm? What was that?”

“Um, I was asking why you think he’ll do so well?”

A warm, teacherly smile formed under the leader’s beard. “Ah. Well, how much do you know about borderlands herders?” At a shake of the boy’s head, Ahmad smiled even wider, taking the opportunity to launch into an impromptu lecture. “Well let me tell you about them then. Because at the age when you and I were doing our first supervised forest expeditions in school, that young man had probably already saved his first lost pokemon from a blizzard. You see-”

Diya swallowed. The young trainer closed its eyes, leaned back again, and tried to let Ahmad’s story about the transhumants who lived on the edge of safely patrolled territories wash over it. 

It didn’t quite succeed. With both of its friends gone, it was harder to not think about what it was about to do.

Svartis was still sleeping under its hat, but Diya felt Madrabaz stir from its hiding place on the underside of the bus. It reached out through their bond, bringing up dual feelings of concern and questioning. What was wrong?

The Banette smiled weakly, letting the way its smile tried to slide off its face bleed through their connection. Bashak was going to succeed, without a doubt. He was good at this, had always been good at this, could definitely do this. 

The next thought that slid down their link was almost involuntary. Bashak could do this. What if it couldn’t?

Only silence answered Diya. Long nervous seconds passed, filled with a fear Diya wished it could take back and leave unsaid. It wasn’t like it wasn’t excited! It was! But if it was being honest, being excited didn’t mean it wasn’t also scared.

After a long empty few seconds, Madrabaz’s head quietly poked up through the seat Bashak had vacated. Flowing tendrils of gray mist surfaced from a pool of shadow on the seat, obscuring two glowing red eyes. The Misdreavus looked around with squinted eyes, taking in the bus. Two people, the one sitting next to where Bashak had been sitting and another across from them, startled at the appearance of the ghost pokemon.

The Misdreavus flinched and drew back further into its shadows. The other trainers were used to Diya’s ghosts, after spending time in the training center with them, but that didn’t mean Madrabaz was used to people yet. In spite of the eyes on it though, the ghost pushed itself fully out of the seat and floated next to Diya. Its flowing dress-like tendrils drifted back and forth across the seat, pouring small waterfalls of gray mist to the floor of the bus whenever they brushed over the edge of the seat.

It looked up at its trainer, meeting Diya’s eyes. A memory pulsed out from it, an image of Bashak striding into the growing blizzard, along with a feeling of potential fear and a question. Translated into words it was asking, You think Bashak is not afraid?

No? Diya responded.

“Drea,” the Misdreavus snorted. It held Diya’s gaze as its tendrils shifted in place, and then it reached out with them. Not away from itself, but beyond itself. The mist of its hair-like and dress-like tendrils probed the air, pressing not through it but against it, until hairline cracks formed in the air. The mists wormed through those cracks into the phantom world on the other side. The round red gems on its neck throbbed with inner light, and Diya could feel them pulling on something through those cracks, an echo Bashak had left behind that wasn’t quite the familiar grief the Banette consumed.

-Bashak swallowed. His shoulders tensed painfully and he could feel his palms grow slick inside his gloves. He shifted uncomfortably in his seat on the bus. “Say that again?” The Leader repeated himself, smiling carelessly. They’d released a Grass type into the blizzard for Bashak to track. He’d win the test only if he got to the pokemon before it expired of the cold. Bashak’s eyes widened, calculating how much time he had and coming up short, far too short.-

-Bashak’s head snapped around as the distant bleat of a Mareep just barely made it to him through the snowstorm. Where was it? It was just a kid, it couldn’t survive a storm like this without the herd’s warmth. Tweeeeeeee!!! He blasted his whistle as hard as he could. There was no answering bleat. Cupping his hands around his mouth, he straightened up and let out the loudest kulning he could. “HWIEEEE OOOUAAAA YEEEEEEE!” Still no answer. Was it okay? It should have heard him!-

Diya surfaced from the memories with a sudden sharp breath drawn in through its nose. No, not memories. Potential memories?

Fears, Madrabaz answered. The things that would make him afraid.

With its head swimming, Diya could barely even think straight enough to send Madrabaz any coherent memories. It only managed a jumble of feelings. Why? Why was that important, what did it matter, why?

The Misdreavus usually fumbled with the wordlike communication Diya and Svartis used, defaulting to the memory-feeling pulses it was more familiar with. But on this topic it had no trouble expressing itself. Everyone is afraid when they do something that matters to them, it told Diya. Because fear is important. Fear/concern/worry/anxiety -the flavors it expressed were more complicated than Diya could process- keeps us focused, makes us care. Bashak wasn’t afraid of his task because he knew there was no risk. But if there had been, he would be afraid too. Should be afraid. Nothing wrong with that, it said.

The young trainer swallowed with its borrowed throat. But there wasn’t any real risk in its test either. So why was it afraid?

Its companion’s red and yellow eyes bored into its pink and brown eyes.

-Diya was exhausted. Two days out in the snow had sapped its strength as it turned around and backtracked and searched fruitlessly for a trail it had lost within the first few minutes of the storm. A trail it knew it would never find again. But then it crested a hill and saw it! The pokemon it was tracking! Diya rushed forward through the snow.

And saw Leader Ahmad standing beside the pokemon. He was frowning. He shook his head and Diya knew it had been too late. Would have been too late, would be too late if it ever had to rescue someone actually in danger of freezing.

It would have to watch the life leave another child’s eyes.-

This time Diya surfaced from the fearful not-memory Madrabaz showed it with an audible gasp, a jerk that parted its mouth even though it was held shut by today’s bright orange safety scarf.

Madrabaz watched Diya sadly, giving it a moment to recover from both the nightmare and the dizziness of some of its energy escaping its mouth. Its gems blazed a brilliant red. Slowly, the Misdreavus turned, laying its insubstantial head on Diya’s arm. It waited before speaking to Diya. When it finally did, it said, This is important to you. Whether you succeed says something about whether your other fears might come true. That’s a good reason to be afraid.

What did it do about the fear, then?

That thought got a smile from Madrabaz. Use it. Let the fear make you attentive.

And then?

The ghost chuckled. Wasn’t it obvious? Win.

-----

Diya was still nervous as it stepped out of the bus with Leader Ahmad. But it was also excited. Its heart beat hard inside of its chest, steady but loud enough that it could hear the th-thump of blood in its ears.

The Banette accepted the leader’s hand as it stepped down from the bus into the shin-deep snow. The lower hem of its robe pooled in the snow around it as it stood up straight, pulled its scarf tight around its mouth, and looked Leader Ahmad in the eyes. It had once poured out its very soul trying to save a boy from a cold and final fate, out in the cold. The boy’s body and dreams still lived on through it, but it couldn’t say that it had succeeded.

At Ahmad’s gym it had shed sweat, blood, and tears training to make sure that was never the case again. Today it was going to prove that it could save someone else from the same fate. It might never be called on to do so. Gods willing, as June would say, it never would. But Diya would know. It would wear a badge with pride that said, to the whole world, ‘You are safe with me. I will take care of you.’

Diya was nervous. Diya was excited. But more than that, it was determined.

Ahmad met Diya’s gaze. The snowflakes between them glowed a steady pink. Behind them, Madrabaz flowed out from the bus. It pressed itself to Diya’s back, letting its misty tendrilled face rest on one shoulder. Svartis stirred underneath Diya’s hat, finally awake now that dawn had passed, and poured herself into a ring of purple smog with two eyes, around the peak of Diya’s witch’s hat. 

The leader looked them up and down and gave them a firm nod. “One of our teachers released Beauty here, my Alolan Ninetails, about an hour ago. She’ll play the part of your rescuee. Don’t worry about her health though, she’ll be fine in this weather. I have a tuft of her fur with me, if you’ll need it to track her?”

Looking around, Diya saw a very shallow groove in the snow that might be Beauty’s mostly filled-in tracks. At the rate the snow was coming down now -thick as a blanket and twice as heavy- the tracks might be fully gone in minutes. That didn’t matter. Diya also shook its head at the offer of a tuft of her fur.

Ahmad nodded, as if he expected that answer. “Didn’t figure you’d be tracking her by physical means. You’ll be alright?”

The ghost trainer nodded. It would.

“Good. I’ll see you in a couple days. And-” the leader smiled behind his neat silver-gray beard “-I’ll have your badges waiting for you.”

The young trainer blinked, not sure what to say.

Ahmad huffed. “I’ve taught your classes, Diya, and seen you training with your friends. Not to mention what Nurse Claire says about you, she won’t stop gossipping about all the ghost research bounties you keep cashing in. You’re going to go far kid; it won’t be a challenge from my gym that trips you up.”

A warmth settled in Diya’s chest and it swallowed a lump in its throat. It hadn’t realized anyone other than its friends had been paying attention to its progress. Acting on impulse, it lunged forward and hugged Ahmad, pulling itself tight against his chest. It hadn’t really noticed until just then, because the concept of a Gym Leader loomed so large in its mind, but Ahmad was only a few centimeters taller than it.

Two strong arms reached around Diya and squeezed hard, hugging it back. “Good luck.” And then Leader Ahmad was gone, taken away by the trundling tracked bus, leaving Diya to track Beauty through an intensifying snowstorm.

First things first, Diya opened up a storage ball, letting out a small wooden cabinet in a flash of red light. The cabinet settled in the snow deep enough that Diya had to clear some away to open the bottom drawer, where its snowshoes were stored. (That was a logistical problem, it made a mental note to fix that when it set up camp later that night.) Diya sat down on the cabinet and set about strapping the snowshoes under its boots, making sure the fastenings were firm.

Strictly speaking, the Banette didn’t need snowshoes. It could walk on top of the snow by letting its feet sink into their own shadows a bit rather than the snow. It could push through the snow by more firmly puppetting its own body, driving its legs through the snow with more force than its physical body alone could provide. It could even melt a path through the snow with faerie fire, if it stoked the unreal flames hot enough. But all of those solutions shared the same simple problem: they were tiring.

Humans had already invented a perfectly good method of walking on top of snow that wasn’t psychically exhausting, and Diya was perfectly happy benefiting from their shared experience. It set each foot on the snow with a dull fwamph and took a few exploratory steps, making sure the snowshoes didn’t dangle or shift.

With that done, Diya replaced the cabinet in its storage ball and pulled out its pokedex. Its took its gloves off to handle its dex and conjured a faerie flame in its left to keep both hands warm. First it verified its position on the dex’s map and placed a marker, sending out a ping to all nearby trainers that it was engaging in a practice rescue operation in the area. Diya made sure to wait for the answering ping that told it the local ranger station had received its message before moving on.

Next it zoomed in on the map and pulled up a topographical overlay and highlighted any known burrows or shelters. It marked the areas that were downhill from itself and any shelters in that area. Lost people and pokemon didn’t typically go up unless they had a very specific reason to, and in this weather even a Snow pokemon would want to find shelter eventually. If Diya lost the trail, that area was where it would try to pick it up. But speaking of a trail-

Now Svartis, Diya told the Gastly, like we practiced.

Svartis flowed down from Diya’s hat and hovered just over Beauty’s quickly fading trail. She breathed in deep, swelling to many times her normal tiny size, and then slowly, oh so slowly, let herself compress back down. As she did a thin transparent purple smog leaked out of her and hung above the ground, floating slowly back and forth with the gentle wind. But where Leader Ahmad had been standing, and where Diya had been moving around, the smog stuck still in the air, congealing into thin strands where the air they’d breathed out had settled to the ground.

As natural as it was, carbon dioxide was still a poison in high enough concentrations. The act of building up toxic gas in one’s lungs and expelling it was something that left a mark on the world, as Svartis interacted with it. Diya closed its eyes for a second and when it opened them bright pink light shone forth, sparkling off the fresh snow. Under the Banette’s sight Svartis’ congealed strands sharpened their definition and became darker, absorbing more light rather than reflecting it. Diya knelt. Over the shallow depression of Beauty’s fading trail, thin black lines could be seen hanging in the air. 

With careful deliberation, Diya pulled down its orange scarf. It opened its mouth a sliver and with a sharp phantom jerk on those threads, breathed in.

-A tinge of loneliness wafted through Beauty’s mind. She would have rather her trainer had been here to see her off.-

-She didn’t feel boredom as she set off into the snow, but maybe she felt its distant cousin, the distracted shifting of attention when one has done a task enough times that it’s too routine.-

The grievances Diya could taste were minor. They felt out of focus too, in a way the Bannette was familiar with. It couldn’t taste positive emotions the same way it did grief, but it could tell when they were present in an experience by how they drew attention away from the negative. If it were to guess, Beauty had been much more excited about getting to run around outside and play in the snowstorm than she had been lonely or bored. But the minor overlooked grievances of life were still grief, and with Svartis’ help Diya could taste them. And now that it had the taste of Beauty’s grief, it could follow her.

This way, Diya signaled its companions, and set off after the Ninetails’ trail. Svartis hurried to stow herself under Diya’s robes, out of the mild wind, and Madrabaz held on to Diya’s back. The trail was faint, and at first Diya had to move slowly to avoid losing it. This form of tracking might be more useful in a true rescue, when fear and hunger and cold burned inside of whomever Diya was tracking, but it wasn’t going to complain. It knew all too well that people didn’t always feel the fear they should, as exposure claimed them. Better that it prove itself tracking an unworried and even happy pokemon. And besides, even as snow obscured the physical trail further, the phantom one sharpened. 

-Lactic acid bubbled out of muscles and into the blood, a subtle poison capable of burning the body that birthed it in the right circumstances. It sizzled its way through tunnels and caverns of blood, forming as fast as the body would wick it away.-

The buildup of lactic acid in Beauty’s body was something Svartis could taste, and she shared her perception with her trainer as Diya tracked. 

Minutes stretched into hours as Diya pushed through the building storm. Diya regularly updated its position on its pokedex, broadcasting its location and waiting for the answering ping. The storm was intense enough that it sometimes had to stand still for minutes for the signal to go through, but Diya didn’t begrudge the wait. Even if its quarry wasn’t an Ice pokemon and was genuinely in danger, it wouldn’t have begrudged the wait; Leader Ahmad’s admonition still rang in its ears. The worst thing one could do on a rescue mission would be to mess up and require a long intensive search for themself which took resources away from the greater search.

Diya pressed on, oddly warmed by the thought. It and its ghosts were searching alone, to prove they could do this as part of an artificial test. But in a real emergency it wouldn’t just be Diya looking. Half the town would turn out to help, every human and pokemon working together in a coordinated effort, and Diya would just be one part of that greater search. Because this was an island where people did that. 

On its first night with its new body and mind it had danced for joy, understanding for the first time what it meant that humans made lampposts and roads. They worked together to make a world where people could feel safe walking around at night, and that was beautiful. But this was so much more than that. Canopy Gym trained hundreds of people every year on how to rescue people lost in the cold. The whole community poured funds into paying their teachers and building their facilities and holding tests like this, all so that when someone went missing in the snow, that person might be found.

So when it paused and held up its pokedex in the storm, waiting for the ping telling it that its location had been received, it didn’t feel frustration at the delay or worry about what the wait might mean in a true crisis. Well, maybe it did a little. But that didn’t matter, compared to what the delay of doing things the proper way meant. It meant it wouldn’t be alone, in a real search. It meant that the community cared enough to develop and maintain formal procedures for protecting each other. It meant that they cared about people, like a boy a Shuppet had once lost.

By the pokedex’s clock, it was three in the afternoon when the phantom trail led Diya to a crevice in the snow. A rocky overhang on the leeward side of a hill shielded a thin opening in the ground from the snow. Diya peered inside, squashing its inherited instinct to squint to see in the darkness and instead widening its eyes so that the interior space was lit with a dim pink light. It looked like some sort of large Ground pokemon had dug out a shelter under the hill. Diya breathed deep. It could taste Beauty and her tiredness inside, but any other emotional impressions were stale and faded. Nothing lived here that might object to an intruder waiting out the storm.

Svartis flowed out from under its robe. The falling snow was depressing most of the wind, but she still found it uncomfortable enough that she waited until the rocky overhang was sheltering them to show herself. I can feel her, Svartis told Diya and Madrabaz. She’s in there. The thought was accompanied by the phantom sensation of kidneys working hard to flush the toxic byproducts of exertion.

Madrabaz concurred, echoing Svartis’ certainty. The burrow was a place of thick shadows and stale scents that set Beauty’s nerves on edge. Beauty knew she was safe enough to rest, but wariness tinged her thoughts nonetheless. She could smell the burrow’s emptiness in the age of its scents, the lack of a present occupant who might object to her resting here, but her instincts would never let her be truly comfortable in an unfamiliar burrow. 

Diya checked its map. This burrow wasn’t listed on it. It marked its position, labeled the abandoned burrow, and added a note that it was going underground and would be out of contact. Then it gave its pokedex to Madrabaz to hold. Diya sent it a memory of the pinging noise the pokedex would make once it got a signal through, and told it to follow after when it heard that.

Diya lay flat on its stomach on the snow, grateful for the tightly woven wool of its robe which kept it from getting damp. The crevice in the ground was small, but it should be able to crawl inside. It took off its hat and pushed it inside, crawling in after it. It couldn’t quite stand up all the way even once it was fully inside the burrow, but that didn’t bother it. After all, small tucked-away spaces were where Shuppets made their homes.

And right there in the back of the burrow, curled against the back wall of the space, was Beauty. The Alolan Ninetails was a gorgeous blue-white vulpine pokemon as long as Diya was tall. And that was before including her tails, nine thick fluffy tails as long as she was that she had curled around herself and nestled into. Lit by Diya’s eyes in the gloom, she became a dusky purple.

She looked up as Diya shuffled into the cave, waiting patiently for them to squirm all the way in. No alarm showed on her face or in her tails as she let them into her space. She’d been through this exercise dozens of times before, and recognized Diya and Svartis besides. She even yipped softly in greeting when Svartis flowed into the space, having spent some time with Svartis helping her learn the ins and outs of icy breath.

And then…

Diya breathed audibly in the space, not sure what it had expected or what it should be feeling. It had done it. It had tracked down a ‘lost’ pokemon in a snowstorm. Barring disaster, tomorrow it would wear Canopy Gym’s winter search and rescue badge with pride.

Ping! Outside, the pokedex let out a cheery little beep. Its signal had been received through the storm and the ranger station knew where Diya was. Madrabaz floated down the entrance after Diya. When it didn’t reach out immediately to take the pokedex, Madrabaz tapped the pokedex gently on Diya’s arm.

Diya took the pokedex automatically. It typed in an update telling the rangers that it had found the ‘missing’ pokemon it was tracking, with an attached picture and superficial medical scan of Beauty. It would be sheltering out the remainder of the storm with her in the abandoned burrow, and possibly the night as well. It expected them to be back in town by noon tomorrow, weather permitting, and would send pings before going to sleep and when it woke in the morning. With that done, it asked Madrabaz to take the pokedex outside again to send the signal. It was still crouched there in the burrow, in front of a patient Beauty, when it heard the answering Ping! 

This time when Diya took the pokedex, there wasn’t only a notification of receipt. There was a personal note from Leader Ahmad. <Congrats Diya! You’re the second fastest trainer this test, right after Bashak! Take care of Beauty for me. When she gets used to you she’ll roll over for belly-rubs, but watch her tails when you scratch her belly. She can get overstimulated quickly, and her tails will twitch to let you know when to stop.>

With an emotion it couldn’t name lying heavy in its chest, Diya put its pokedex away in its robes. With one hand it fixed a twist of power at the top of the burrow, setting a warm blue fire in the air. It would do to light the space and chase away the chill for now. Then it crept forward, holding a hand out with its palm to the ground, for Beauty to smell.

The gorgeous blue-white pokemon leaned forward to sniff Diya’s hand. She huffed, acknowledging its familiar scent and then, without delay, rolled over onto her back. She fixed Diya with an imperious stare that said ‘I know how this goes. I ran, you caught up, and now you give me belly rubs. Get to it.’

Which Diya did. It burrowed its bare hands in her thick silky fur, getting in deep so it could properly scratch her while taking care not to press too hard and overstimulate her. Beauty’s head lolled back immediately and her tails slumped to the ground in a deflated puddle. She even purred, the rumble settling in Diya’s bones. Encouraged, Diya kept rubbing, dragging its fingers and palms down her stomach. Beneath its touch, the pokemon it had been assigned to rescue was warm, and happy, and oh so very alive.

The Banette hiccupped, and its vision blurred. 

It was crying.

Tomorrow, Diya would challenge Canopy Gym for its Ice battle badge. Standing side by side with its pokemon, it would hold a trainer’s badge high and make its boy’s dream come true. It had set out from Ledos Village to fulfill a dying boy’s desperate wish and tomorrow it would take its first true step on that path. Tonight though, was for it alone.

It had never been happier.

Chapter Text

Ninetails is a quadrupedal canine pokemon covered in thick luxurious golden-white fur. It has a small mane of thicker fur around its neck and a long, fluffy crest atop its head. It has slender legs with three-toed paws and nine, long tails with pale orange tips. It has red eyes, pointed ears, and a triangular black nose.

In the Alola region, Ninetails has a different appearance. Its coat is pale blue, and its fur is wispier and more flowing. The tips of its tails and crest, as well as the lower halves of its legs, are white. The crest on its head is longer and its nine tails are less distinct from each other. Additionally, it has larger eyes, which are blue, and small tufts of fur in front of its ears.

Ninetales has a gentle temperament and is known to aid lost humans in distress, though this is primarily done to keep them out of its territory. It will punish any threat to packs of its unevolved form, Vulpix.

Ninetails possesses several unusual abilities. Flames or plumes of icy fog spewed from its mouth can hypnotize an opponent and its gleaming eyes are said to give it the ability to control minds. It is also strongly empathic, capable of sensing and reacting to strong emotions even without line of sight. The Alolan Ninetails has recently been confirmed to have a strong Fairy alignment, thought to explain these abilities. Interestingly, the common Ninetails has been confirmed to not be Fairy aligned, and there is ongoing research to determine if its abilities stem from Ghost or Psychic power.

The unusual abilities of the Alolan and common variants are not identical, but they are profoundly similar. How this can be possible challenges the current understanding of Ghost, Psychic, and Fairy energies as forces which function in fundamentally different ways.

-----

Beauty noticed the attack before anyone else in the burrow. Which was especially impressive because Madrabaz was anticipating it.

The moment Leader Ahmad had told the search and survival trainers that their battle badge test would come unexpectedly, Madrabaz had known when to expect it. To the Misdreavus, it was as obvious as the sun rising in the morning, though it struggled to explain its logic to Diya. The Canopy Gym trainers were going to try to ambush them sometime during the night, after they’d found Beauty and set up camp. Why? What did Diya mean why? It was because that’s how ambushes worked.

After some thought of its own, Diya supposed it made sense. Search and rescue was truly a test of following procedure. A trainer was supposed to be able to pass it even without finding their quarry if they did everything correctly. It wouldn’t make sense for the battle to be sprung on them during that phase of the test. Besides, proper search and rescue missions involved local gym teams forging ahead of searchers and drawing out dangerous pokemon to prevent attacks. 

Attacking tomorrow, on the last day of the survival portion, also wouldn’t make sense. The trainers would know their battles were coming at that point, and be rested and well-prepared. Leader Ahmad wouldn’t have bothered saying it was a surprise if that was how they were doing it. It was also possible the teachers would move in right after the trainers ‘rescued’ their pokemon, but Diya didn’t think that was likely. The time and place they’d find their quarries was difficult to predict and the students would have just been exposed to the elements for hours. Better to let the students settle down first, for practicality and safety reasons.

Which meant the only reasonable time for the ‘surprise’ battle was in the middle of the night right after the rescue test, as the trainers slept the sleep of the exhausted. Or should be sleeping.

Svartis sat down harder on Diya’s head. No, wake up, she insisted.

Should! Be sleeping! The sleep! Of the exhausted! Diya sent back. 

The gaseous pokemon compressed herself, squishing her body into a thick heavy gas over Diya’s face. Her sending this time was a demand. Diya will wake.

Diya tried to blow her off with only air from its nose, and failed miserably, losing its lungs’ reserves in the process. It was forced to do as its pokemon commanded and sat up, breathing in with some relief as she dispersed herself to float above the Banette. Why wake me? Diya asked her. Madrabaz was outside the burrow keeping watch for the ambush it was sure would come. If Diya needed to get up, Madrabaz would warn them, but until then it really needed the sleep. Eugh, and the wind was howling outside, it would take forever for it to get back to sleep with all that noise.

But Svartis shook her head -her whole body really- side to side. Look, she insisted, highlighting Beauty in Diya’s awareness.

Diya looked.

The Alolan Ninetails was awake. No, more than awake. She was alert. Instantly, Diya could see why Svartis had woken it. Beauty’s eyes were wide, fixated on the burrow entrance. Each of her tails was fluffed and extended directly behind her, as far and symmetrically as the limited space would allow. But most of all her lips were pulled back just enough to show her teeth, and leaking out from between them was a cold white mist.

Ah.

You did very good Svartis, thank you. Diya made sure to reassure her even as it jerked out of its sleeping bag -as much as the burrow would allow-, moved its giant Piplup plushie aside, and began pulling on gear. Leader Ahmad said that as a trainer it was important not to reinforce bad messages, and to reward initiative. Clear and immediate positive reinforcement was especially important with smarter pokemon, whose intelligent but alien minds could take unexpected messages from interactions with their trainer.

So even as Diya fought with its snowshoes, it took a moment to fish out a wax paper wrapped marble from one of its pockets. Inside the wax paper was a sticky clay-like mix of oil and charcoal. Diya flicked it to the floor and ignited it with a hissing point of blue fire. The marble burned dirty, sending up a twisting ribbon of oily black smoke which the Gastly gobbled up.

Madra! Diya pulsed out. It blinked, pausing in surprise when Beauty flicked her gaze over to it for a moment. Then it continued, sending Madrabaz an impression of its surroundings, along with the sense of an echo and a request.

A moment later it got back an image from Madrabaz of intense snow rushing diagonally across its vision, some mostly white trees breaking up the limited sightline, and an otherwise empty hill. Then an image of Diya sleeping and indignation. It could handle this, everything was fine, go back to-

-Beauty’s bared teeth leaking streams of freezing mist, her eyes locked on the entrance.-

Oh.

That drew a chuckle out of Diya. It sent Madrabaz the memory of its own almost identical reaction when Svartis woke it.

Madrabaz sent a quick burst of appreciation to Svartis. It didn’t see or feel anything which might have set Beauty off though. It was going to look around. 

Diya finished getting its gear readied, but it didn’t stop there. It put its Piplup plushie in the sleeping bag, wrapped that around its food supplies, and stored it all in a ball. Then it proffered an empty pokeball to Beauty and waited for her to nose it and accept stasis within. Diya was supposed to be treating her as a potentially injured or incapacitated pokemon, so using her to help fight would be against the spirit of the test. If there were actually a wild pokemon threatening its camp-

…and now that it thought about it, there was no reason to think that might not be the case!

If there was a wild pokemon threatening its camp, the best decision wasn’t necessarily to stay and fight, especially if that might put its rescuee at risk. Leaving its shelter in the middle of the night in a snowstorm wasn’t ideal either, but -Diya pulled up the map on its pokedex and highlighted the nearest known burrows and shelters- that was not an insurmountable problem.

While it was packing up, Svartis flew out to take over Madrabaz’s position at the front of the burrow. Not even half a minute later the gaseous pokemon flew back in and plunged under Diya’s robe. Nope! she projected. It was terrible out there, way too windy! She did not like that at all!

That was okay, Diya reassured her, she could stay in there out of the wind. 

Huh, Diya thought. Something about that tickled Diya’s brain. It turned the thought over in its mind as it squeezed out of the burrow’s entrance. It almost lost it when it finally got outside and the icy wind washed into its lungs. Even with multiple layers on underneath its robe it could still feel how cold the wind was, and every breath exposed its insides to that freezing air.

Then the thought clicked. There hadn’t been this much wind yesterday. And the weather reports said the storm was dying down, not picking up. Diya grabbed its hat with one hand and tilted its head back to look up. The snow cut long range visibility to almost nothing, but it thought it could see patches of starry sky with no clouds overhead, so the storm was dying down.

That was what Beauty had noticed. The wind.

Madra! Diya sent.

The answering ping came back choppy and frayed at the edges, despite how close the pokemon should have been. Interference, from some other power in the air.

Madra! Diya pulsed out louder. Did the wind only just pick up?!

The answer this time was loud enough for Diya to pick it up clearly, but the breakdown in communication came from another angle. Spirits processed time differently from creatures with bodies and to make matters worse, Misdreavuses were only physical enough to partially feel the wind.

Diya tried again. It sent a memory of slowly falling snow, then the blasting winds it was in right then, coupled to the thought of Beauty’s hackles rising and a question.

That, Madrabaz understood. Yes, the answer came back, along with a trickle of its own fear. 

Diya felt more than a trickle of fear. It was powerful for a Banette, and Banettes were feared pokemon for a reason. But the power of its blasts capped out at tearing through tree trunks and shattering rock. It tired when using its powers to jump from roof to roof. That was only flinging a mere fifty-odd kilos through the air.

Moving enough air to create a localized storm, even a small one? June had shown Diya the math once, to illustrate a point about how much power Cori’s enhanced Pidgey would need to match Ho-oh’s legendary ability to quell storms. This was millions of kilos of air being moved.

Diya pressed itself to the leeward side of the closest tree and hoped it was wrong.

Madrabaz's fuzzy ping came through the storm only a moment later. It had flown up to see if there was a limit to the wind, and there was. Diya received a nervousness-soaked memory of breaking through rushing snowfall into suddenly open air, dotted here and there by gently drifting snowflakes, slowly breaking up clouds, and nothing more. Then the memory oriented down, Madrabaz looking behind itself even as it continued to gain altitude. Beneath it was a howling blizzard twisted into a donut, tearing snow from the ground and pulling it into a whirling ring around some central point in the snowy forest. It couldn’t see what was there, the trees were in the way, but it knew what it felt.

Nothing. Not a hint of fear from whatever monster lay at the eye of the storm.

Dimly, echoing into Diya’s head, realization dawned on Svartis. She’d been feeling something for minutes, but hadn’t been able to put a finger on it. It was Ice, pure raw elemental Ice, swelling over the land so steadily she hadn’t even noticed. She sent Diya and Madrabaz both an image, stretching her power to be heard through the storm. It was like crawling through the underbrush of a forest only to look up and realize all the trees had grown ten times as tall.

Stars and shadows, who -and what- had Leader Ahmad sent to test them?

…stars and shadows, Diya hoped Leader Ahmad had sent this to test them.

Reluctantly, Diya asked Madrabaz to track the blizzard from above. How big was it? Was it moving?

The answer came back. Big, though it could be bigger -Diya ballparked the memory at a several hundred meters wide-, and moving slowly. The center of the ring was approaching their burrow.

Diya thanked its pokemon. Now, how did Madra feel about taking a closer look and seeing if there was a gym teacher at the center of that ring along with a pokemon?

There was a long pause with no response.

Finally, Madrabaz responded. That would be the teacher it had been intending to prank, correct?

It was.

Madrabaz’s decision flowed in as a trickle as it slowly made up its mind, accompanied by a steadily rising cackle in the distance which could be heard even over the roaring wind. So it needed to put the fear of Madra in someone who commanded that then? Well, no one ever accused Misdreavuses of having more sense than mischief in their heads, and no Misdreavus ever evolved to be a Mismagius by playing it safe! The cackling dopplered suddenly as Madrabaz accelerated down at a sharp angle.

It was too late that Diya realized what its pokemon was doing and blasted out a negation. The next few moments came back to Diya and Svartis as disjointed flickers of memory, distorted by the storm, colored by exhilaration, and disrupted by flashes of spellfire which took priority over communication. 

There was wind, distantly felt. A rush of snow passing through Madra’s body. A flash of the phantom world’s purple fires as it passed through the shadow of one tree and out from another’s close to the center of the ring and low to the ground. A massive shape of white with hints of green poking out, taller than any human by half and with ten times as much mass. A human next to it dressed in blurry white-gray, with a splash of orange. A huge face buried under caked-on snow and thick furs that split the difference between bristles and pine needles, seen from close enough to touch. Then closer. Beady eyes hidden under thick brows widened. Then-

Boom.

Spellwork converted shock into phantom force, lined with flickers of purple and black fire. The massive pokemon rocked back one step, the human yelped and fell backward into the snow, and Madrabaz shot away into the forest at a million kilometers an hour, laughing like a banshee.

Shock rooted Diya in place for the longest second of its life. Then-

You are so lucky that worked! it blasted at its tricksy pokemon.

Mad cackling answered it, along with a rush of exhilaration.

The trainer blew a long breath out through its nose. It was going to clear this up with the gym teacher, and then after this it and Madra were going to have a talk about properly communicating when it was going to give people heart attacks, before it gave Diya one. 

Diya pulled its robe tight against itself to protect Svartis from the rushing winds, and marched towards the center of the artificial blizzard. Madrabaz, meanwhile, saw no need to stop cackling and flying between the trees at top speed. Diya smiled at the sound, enjoying the way it dopplered in and out of audibility as the wind and trees caught it in interesting ways. It really did have to have that talk with Madrabaz, but the spirit’s glee was infectious. Besides, what monster wouldn’t be happy to see their pokemon happy?

The wind died down sharply as Diya made its way to the eye of the storm, suddenly cutting off as Diya stepped between two trees into a small clearing. In the middle of the clearing knelt an Abomasnow. Covered in snow and pine needles, the hulking humanoid beast was still taller than Diya even while on one knee and leaning forward, and each of its limbs looked like it might be larger around than Diya’s torso. In front of it, standing on her tiptoes on top of a large rock, was one of Canopy Gym’s trainers. She was a tall, heavyset woman bundled up in a snow camouflage suit, with a bright orange armband bearing the Canopy Gym’s shaded tree logo on one arm, and she was fussing over her Abomasnow. 

“No, no! Hold your head still, you big baby. I need to check your eyes.” The trainer shone a small flashlight in each of its eyes, flicking it quickly away a moment later. “Okay good, no concussion, no broken teeth, nothing that needs a potion. You’re fine to fight.”

A deep rumbling growl started somewhere in the yeti pokemon’s stomach, rolled out from the teeth just centimeters away from the trainer’s face, and pooled somewhere behind Diya’s stomach, which it did its best to turn into liquid.

The trainer scoffed. “You know the rules. Injuries always get checked out after an engagement, even if you’re tough enough to walk them off. Because you’re tough enough to walk them off, Gelera. You could have a broken leg and you wouldn’t let me know.”

Diya shuffled in place at the edge of the eye of the storm. It folded its gloved hands in front of itself, did its best to stay still, and waited very politely for the teacher presumably managing its battle badge test to acknowledge it. 

Aside from the nightmares that haunted its mountains, Abomasnow were the most dangerous pokemon on Kenomao Island. They were a hybrid Grass/Snow pokemon which made terrifying use of their joint elemental affinities. Each summer they rooted themselves in the soil, soaking up sunlight to convert carbon dioxide into body mass and growing larger, along with Grass energy to make themselves more durable. Then each winter they came alive, focusing massive quantities of Ice through their elementally hardened forms to protect their herds of weaker snover. Every year they were stronger than the last, implacable regenerating juggernauts with all the power of an avalanche. Going by size this one, Gelera, was a century old at least.

Diya rather hoped Gelera’s trainer had other pokemon for it to battle.

Eventually the trainer finished fussing over her behemoth and turned around to take stock of Diya. She evaluated the young trainer, looking them up and down. “Hm. Diya, right?”

It nodded.

“So you’re the ghost trainer. It’s good to finally meet you. I’m Teacher Durok. I handle training for pokemon with more physical Ice abilities so it’s not surprising we haven’t met.” Holding up one finger, she fished out her pokedex. She peeled off a glove to type on it and a moment later there was a ping from Diya’s own dex. “Ahmad gave me your number. You use text to communicate right?”

The Banette nodded. It stripped off its own gloves and pulled out its own pokedex, conjuring faerie fire in one hand to keep both warm. <I do, thank you.>

“Good. So, as you may have guessed, I’ll be testing you for Ice battle proficiency. I was going to see if I could catch you unawares, but…” she looked around the snow-streaked forest, from which Madrabaz’s occasional snickers still wafted forth. “You made it pretty clear you knew we were coming.”

Hah. Yes. That was definitely a deliberate message Diya and its pokemon had collaboratively sent. Diya fixed a grin on its face behind its scarf - a thick blood-red one that blended with its robes in the night.

“So kid, you ready to fight?”

Diya looked over at Durok’s Abomasnow. It had known not to mess with those even as a young city spirit. Instead it sent, <I was hoping not to fight.>

Durok tilted her head. “Oh?” 

Diya had a hard time pinning a tone to that loaded word, but it pressed on. <I packed when we noticed Gelera’s blizzard. Left when Madra identified them. I have multiple new shelters picked out.> It did its best to meet Teacher Durok’s eyes when typing out its next lines. <I am also earning the survival badge. To survive, the best choice is not to fight.>

The big trainer reached up to absent-mindedly pet her hulking pokemon’s arm as she read Diya’s messages. When she got to the end she barked out a laugh, slapping Gelera’s arm with an audible smack. “Hah! I wish half my students had your brains! If it was my choice, I’d pass you right now just for that. I’m definitely putting this in my write up.” She fondly patted Gelera’s arm, softer this time. “You are absolutely right. My girl here is a terror. In a real life situation, if you know there’s other shelter available, leaving would be the correct survival decision. But you are seeking a battle badge, so I do need to test your battle skills.”

<Against her?> Around them, just outside the clearing, thousands of tons of air and snow still surged through the trees. Narrower trees were tilting under the force of the wind and yet Gelera didn’t even seem to be strained by the effort. Diya really hoped Durok had other pokemon it could challenge.

The teacher let out a throaty prideful laugh. “Yes. Against her. Don’t worry, it’s okay to tap out. Just show us your skills.”

As irrational as it was, something about that pricked at a prideful place inside Diya it hadn’t even known existed. It wasn’t doing this to collect consolation prizes. The dream it was fulfilling wasn’t just to fulfill a social expectation and check off a card. It was a trainer. It was going to travel all of Kenomao with its friends and prove that it and its pokemon deserved the badges of every last gym on the island. 

Diya reached down to unbuckle its snowshoes. It took a step to the side, letting its feet sink into the surface of the shadows cast by its faerie fire, effectively standing on top of the snow unaided. Its eyes shone brighter and purple fires burned inside of the dim shadows they cast. <I’ll fight too.>

“Oh?” This time Diya caught the tone behind Durok’s comment. Respect. “You’re psychic, right? Gelera is trained for human combat. Do you know how to fight trained pokemon though?”

Pokemon were all conditioned at pokecenters to not attack humans, but that conditioning could quickly enter tricky territory when a human directly attacked them. Training a pokemon to fight humans safely, whether they were wielding weapons or special abilities, was its own special conditioning regime not all pokemon received. Humans had to be careful on their end as well. Pokemon received conditioning which prevented them from escalating sparring battles too far, and humans fighting them needed to know how to keep the battle within those bounds.

Diya had to suppress a snort. <I do.> it answered. It battled alongside its pokemon more often than not. Besides, none of its pokemon had ever seen the inside of a pokeball. It had taught them sparring etiquette and restraint itself, and one had to know something to teach it. 

“Good. Now this was intended to be an ambush, but you’ve already ruined that -well done by the way- so we might as well take a moment to go over ground rules.”

Ground rules. Excellent. Ground rules were good. Diya might be feeling a little prideful and willingly entering into a battle with a monster of an Abomasnow, but it also wanted to get out of that battle with all its bones intact.

“First, you can use as many pokemon at once as you can control. No more. Second, Gelera will pull her punches, against you especially, so if she touches you you’re out of the fight. Even if it’s a light tap, understood?”

The arms which would be delivering those punches probably weighed more than Diya. The very mortal ghost nodded enthusiastically. 

“Third, if you’re out the battle is over. Fourth, you can’t speak. So if you’re out or want to surrender, flash that fire on and off. Fifth, aside from directions I give to Gelera, I’m not a part of this fight. It’s just you, your pokemon, and Gelera. And lastly…” Teacher Durok smiled, “hit her with your best shot.”

There was a second when Diya blinked, when it wasn’t quite sure if that ‘lastly’ meant it was time to fight. Then a second of sudden sinking realization, when Diya’s stomach dropped through its boots as Durok pulled a small horn from a jacket pocket and raised it to her lips. And then the horn blasted and the world stopped being individual seconds and became chaos.

Things went the way they did in practice for about a second. Go! Diya pulsed along its bonds with its pokemon, thrusting its arms forward to let Svartis out through its sleeves and calling Madrabaz to hit Gelera from behind. With a flare of will Diya also widened the shadows beneath it, turning them into a bottomless pit it could fall into and relocate from. 

Then the Abomasnow roared, “BAAAAAAAAAHHH!!!”, and everything went to pieces. Svartis was most of the way out of Diya’s sleeves when the eye of the storm collapsed in on itself and suddenly the storm was raging all the way up to the Abomasnow’s snow-covered fur. Diya was forced to abort its shadow step in a panic so it could stay with Svartis and let her take shelter under its robes, falling to the snow as its legs were thrust violently back into reality. Madra arced around the clearing to get behind their opponent and only realized too late that something had gone wrong.

The moment Diya’s back hit the snow, Gelera, still roaring, swung one fist in an arc over her head as if it were a sledgehammer. She pounded the earth with the sound of an explosion and all the snow between them surged through the blizzard in a massive wave.

If Diya hadn’t spent night after night jumping through the phantom world over rooftops, it never would have avoided the crushing mass of snow falling down upon it. It took that unreal step without even a second to spare. An instant later the snow’s phantom shadow hit it, loose wisps of insubstantial darkness that nonetheless still had enough mass to batter it about and push it into the shadowy earth.

Diya heaved itself upright in a panic. Svartis! it called through its bond. Svartis! She could survive being buried in snow, but this fight would be as good as lost without her.

A breeze ruffled the inside of its robes. I’m here, Svartis said, you brought me along. Her presence wrapped around Diya’s chest as she pulled some of the tightness from its lungs.

Okay. Okay, good. Diya just needed to take a moment and think about its next move. Svartis couldn’t move independently of it so long as the Abomasnow kept the blizzard raging. That made it harder for them to do hit-and-run tactics. So how could they-

-A panicked image of trees as they rushed past, desperately weaving through them, shooting a glance behind as the juggernaut of snow and muscle smashed through those same trees. Madra wove a hex of disorientation and confusion and fired, but mist billowed from the Abomasnow’s fur and swallowed the hex whole. Help! Madra wove into its memory as it screamed it out into the world. Help!-

The memory slammed into Diya and suddenly there was no time at all. Stay with me! it shouted at Svartis and threw itself through the phantom world, leaping in great bounds through the shadow-stuff of snow. Madra, turn around! it ordered.

The trickster pokemon, to its credit, knew exactly how to do that. It dove through the shadowed loop of a raised root and rocketed out of Gelera’s own shadow moving the other direction at top speed. Unfortunately, to Gelera’s credit, whatever senses she was tracking Madra with were sharp and she didn’t miss a beat. Diya saw the great flame of her soul turn on a dime, only just missing Madra’s candle flame soul with a spinning backhand.

Diya’s heart skipped a beat.

A moment later Madrabaz shot past where Diya would be if it were in the physical world, with Gelera hot on its heels. At the sight of her blazing soul -stars and shadows no wonder she could move so much wind- barrelling down on Diya, its heart decided to make up for that skipped beat with a few dozen extra. The thought of what it was about to do didn’t help either. 

Help me out Svartis, Diya asked. 

With its first pokemon at its side, Diya stepped back into the physical world right in the path of a charging Abomasnow. And neither of them moved. I hope this works, it thought.

Diya fired a shadow ball at Gelera’s center of mass as Svartis scythed her legs out from under her with a hail of night shade ribbons.

Boom!

The surprised Abomasnow took the blasts without even time to flinch. She hit the snow to Diya’s right in a sprawling roll, shoved sideways by the attacks’ force. Diya didn’t stick around to see how long she’d be down though. It ran atop its own shadow into the driving winds, as far away from her as it could get.

Even expecting it, Diya almost jumped out of its skin when Gelera proved its caution right. She’d barely come to a halt when she swept out with a paw behind them. The attack wasn’t full force and missed by meters but Diya’s heart didn’t care. There was a giant monster behind Diya and its body wanted to be anywhere else.

Madrabaz, bless its soul, came to the rescue. It took advantage of Gelera’s distraction to fly onto the back of her head, grabbing hold with its wispy little tentacles and screaming “DREEAAA!!!” as loud as it could. Gelera’s head whipped around in surprise, then jerked back as memory of the last time Madrabaz had gotten the drop on her kicked in.

And then Madrabaz wove her surprise into an explosion, using her sudden realization as an extra kick to add more fire to the spell.

The Misdreavus flew into the trees howling with laughter, accompanied by Svartis’ own giggles, and Diya couldn’t help it. It had to laugh. Without opening its mouth, Diya channeled all of its giddy adrenaline fueled excitement into its powers the same way it would a screech. The power coursing through its veins shivered and tore holes open in the veil between worlds, showing flickers of the phantom world’s dark shadows and burning purple flames. And through those rents poured laughter, loud and otherworldly.

Through one of those tears in the veil, as Diya glanced over its shoulder, it could see Gelera’s bonfire soul waver.

Then mist exploded around her again, infused with her power, and she was untouchable. She stood up, a juggernaut at the center of her own literal blizzard of power, unbowed and unbroken. And through the driving snow and the mist, Diya caught a hint of sharp yellowed teeth. Gelera was smiling.

Diya stopped laughing and lunged into the phantom world. Not a moment too soon either. The shadows of a shotgun blast of snowballs tore through where Diya stood. It swallowed. In a real fight against an Abomasnow, those loose snowballs would have been thick balls of ice with sharp edges.

To make matters worse, the rapid phantom step wasn’t stable and Diya stumbled involuntarily back into the physical world. Gelera almost took advantage of that, but just as she was winding up to throw another blast of snowballs Madrabaz came back around and shot a twisting snarl of shadow into the back of her head. She whirled to throw the snowballs in a broad scattershot behind her instead, driving the spirit off.

Diya breathed hard, desperately pulling in air as it tottered to its feet on soft shadows. It raised an arm to let Svartis fire a stream of night shade ribbons at Gelera, yanking her attention back from Madrabaz, and then fell through its own shadow and out another shadow behind a tree. Gelera’s responding wave of snow smashed through the space it had occupied seconds later.

Diya yanked its blood-red scarf below its nose, sagging with relief as the cold air cooled it from the inside out, even as the howling wind scraped its nostrils raw. This wasn’t sustainable. It and Madrabaz could draw Gelera’s attention off of one another, but their pattern was predictable. Eventually she’d whirl around and catch one of them as they swooped in to save the other. They needed Svartis in play, actually out there in the forest as a skirmisher, so Gelera couldn’t know who was going to cover for who and they could have moments to rest.

The blizzard needed to stop.

But Diya didn’t have more than a second to pause and rest because Gelera was after Madrabaz again and Diya had to lunge into the phantom world to catch up and distract her. 

There was one move which could shut down the blizzard. Spite, which Svartis had developed to shut down Greta’s Dark abilities. The ghosts suffused an opponent with Ghost energy, letting it be drawn into their soul along with whatever other elemental energy they were using to fuel a power. Then they dragged that energy back out, scraping raw the pieces of their opponent’s soul which managed whatever power they were using. If Diya and its pokemon could spite Gelera enough times, they could shut down her blizzard.

Except spite didn’t do any damage. Every time they used it would be a moment Gelera was free to attack at will.

Gelera wound up to throw another blast of snowballs at Madrabaz and Diya shadow stepped out from behind a tree to throw off her aim, slamming a hastily put together shadow ball into her side. She spun around and swiped out with her terrifyingly long arm, sending Diya running into the forest to keep out of her reach. Madrabaz swept in from behind to hit her with a hex and only barely dodged more snowballs when her pursuit of Diya turned out to be a feint.

Svartis tried to help, hurling more night shade ribbons from the collar of Diya’s robes. But Gelera knew exactly where she was, and hardened the snow on her back into ice. The ice shattered, absorbing the power of the blast, and Gelera didn’t even look back. 

Diya made up its mind. Spite was a risk. Keeping this up was a sure loss.

The Banette pressed itself up against a tree and took a deep breath, focusing its will. It needed something that would keep Gelera occupied long enough for them to spite her. To do that, it would have to trust Madrabaz to manage a moment longer. Diya sent a thought to Madrabaz, almost a prayer, asking the little spirit to hold out as long as it could. Then it cupped its hands in front of itself, palms up, and pressed its will down on the world.

With the snap-hiss of an acetylene torch, a point of blue fire burst into existence above its palms, hissing and wavering in the snowy gale. Diya pressed harder, pouring its focus and will into the point of fire. It burned brighter and larger, growing to the size of two clenched fists.

Not enough.

Diya’s eyes glowed bright enough to make the snow sparkle pink, even through the storm, and the blue fire became a solid tangible thing. The wind didn’t move it anymore, and snowflakes evaporated before ever touching it. And still Diya poured in more power. The ball of faerie fire overflowed, pouring liquid blue flame into Diya’s cupped hands until they overflowed as well. Then, spilling more drips of sizzling liquid flame as it did, Diya wriggled its chin free of its blood-red scarf. Carefully, oh so carefully, it leaned down and cracked open its mouth. The Banette’s vision wavered as a haze of gray smoke released from its mouth touched the fire and was devoured, sucked greedily within. In a flash the Banette’s soul-stuff transformed the blue fire into the same otherworldly purple of the phantom world’s flames, as mere fire became a curse.

Nausea forced Diya’s eyes shut for a moment, even after it closed its mouth, and it pressed its head back against the tree behind it. Once more Madra, it asked, just one more time. Bring Gelera back this way.

Diya didn’t focus on how Madrabaz managed that feat through their link. Recovering and maintaining the font of fire in its hands took too much of its attention. But the little spirit pulled through despite its exhaustion and a tattered sensation of damage Diya could sense through their bond. And it only took Diya a sliver of focus to know when Madrabaz was about to shoot past its position.

They had pulled this trick on Gelera before. Diya was sure she’d be expecting it. Which simply meant it had to hit her hard enough that forewarning didn’t matter.

Diya stepped around the tree trunk, holding fire in its hands. It stared the oncoming Abomasnow in the face.

Gelera roared, the snow crusting her body already hardening into sheets of ice. She brought her arms up in front of her face, one black eye peering through the gap, and thundered forward.

Diya had compressed every gram of fire it could control into the liquid, overflowing mass it held. It had even poured its soul into it. And now the Banette unleashed its curse.

The blaze was unnaturally silent. Tree sap boiled in an instant, but the popping explosions from dozens of trees which hurled bark through the air carried no sound. Snow and ice sublimated into steam without a hiss. As the amethyst fire engulfed Gelera, her roar cut out. Even the howl of the wind died as phantom light and heat flashed through the forest. 

In a space the size of a house, where there had been trees there were now only skeletons wreathed in flickering purple. The snow was gone, exposing earth charred black and coated with still burning flames. And standing in the center of it, reeling, was Gelera.

The Abomasnow was the only thing within the flames not actively burning, but even she wasn’t unaffected. Mist poured from every inch of her body and edges of it burned, fire consuming even the mist. The spectral fire ate its way up the deluge of mist, and Gelera shuddered with the effort of pouring out enough to keep it from reaching her flesh. And beneath the mist were the marks of where she’d failed to protect herself in the initial blast. Both arms, much of her torso, and one leg were all charred black, oddly thin with their thick layer of snow and bristles burned away.

With a start, realizing the extent of the pokemon’s wounds, Diya looked around blearily until it spotted Teacher Durok. She was almost impossible to make out, in her snow camo suit in the blizzard. But a whiff of shocked concern wafting off her was enough for Diya to look in the right direction and spot her. She stood still for a moment, watching the scene. Then the concern faded and she gestured for the battle to continue. Diya blinked at that, and then swallowed. It knew Gelera would be healed in a pokecenter after this, but could she really keep fighting like this?

Apparently she could. With a silent roar, Gelera pushed forward through the still raging fire. One step after the other, with subzero mist pouring off of her and pushing the flames back.

There was no time to wait. Spite! Spite her now! Diya shouted to its companions. It raised one arm and Gelera abruptly stopped moving. The mist contracted around her as she diverted power to forming ice armor over her body. But Diya wasn’t launching that kind of attack. It reached out with its will and took control of a patch of spectral flames behind her, pulling them towards itself. The purple flames passed through her, burning at something much less physical. All three of the abilities she was powering -stars and shadows she was managing three at once- stuttered. Milky cracks appeared in the still-forming edges of Gelera’s ice armor, the mist pulled in that much closer to her body, and a ripple went through the diagonally falling snow surrounding them. Gelera let out a silent huff of air, as if she’d had the breath knocked out of her.

Then Svartis reached out past Diya’s hand with her own powers, investing that breath and dragging it out of Gelera. And Madrabaz seized Gelera’s shock at her powers failing and dragged that from her too. Then Diya did it again, and again, each of them using their own variant of spite to scrape raw the part of Gelera’s soul that was using these powers.

For a moment Gelera twitched, trying to jerk her head in two different directions at once, trails of saliva swinging from her open maw. The curse fire was beginning to die down and Diya could hear her muffled labored breaths as the mist became only a thin coating and badly cracked ice armor melted away. Even the inertia of her storm was fading away. Diya could see the animal panic of being trapped written on her face, taste it on the dying breeze. But then Durok sounded her horn.

Two short blasts and a slightly longer one shattered the silence and suddenly Gelera wasn’t on the back foot anymore. Drowning amid ghostly fire, badly burned, and powers deserting her, Gelera heard her trainer’s call. She stilled, animal fear melting away, and then she moved. Diya managed to lurch through the shadow of a tree beside it, falling out of another one. It made it to safety with plenty of time; the three meter juggernaut of an Abomasnow needed a moment to build steam before reaching full speed.

But then Diya went to keep moving, to spring off its own shadow atop the snow, keep its momentum going and get into position behind its opponent. And it didn’t. Move, it thought, and the command never reached its legs. Diya fell out of a tree’s shadow and just kept falling. The shock of snow against its cheek shot through its body, and it realized it was lying sideways in the snow.

Move, it ordered its body. I need to move!

It lifted an arm, shocked to find itself panting with the effort. It pushed its arm into the snow, strained as hard as it could … and didn’t have the strength to lift itself. 

The tank was empty, the well had run dry. Shadow balls, shadow jumps, phantom steps, curse fire, and spite. Diya had given everything it had. 

Blessedly, Gelera seemed almost as exhausted. She barreled through the space Diya had been in and then slammed into a tree when she failed to brake in time. She grabbed the tree with both claws, holding herself upright only with its support. Green light flickered around where her fingers touched the tree and-

Diya blinked once, slowly, from its place on the ground. Green light?

The glowing green light rooted itself in the tree, winding back into Gelera’s forearms, pulsing as if in time with her heartbeat. Light surged from the tree into Gelera. Pulse. Pulse. Pulse. And with each pulse, some of the charred black skin on her arms fell away. Beneath it was new skin, still black, but the shiny fresh black of healthy flesh. Thick green pine-needle bristles sprouted from the new skin with subsequent pulses. And the tree shriveled. Its bark grayed and pieces fell off with each pulse. Needles fell from above. Before long Gelera’s back was straightening, and it looked as though the tree wouldn’t have been able to hold her weight if she’d still been leaning on it, so shriveled and desiccated it had become.

Oh right. Abomasnow is a Grass type too. Diya’s thought was resigned. It was one of the type’s most famous powers, the ability to drain the lifeforce of their surroundings or their opponents to regenerate. But Diya had forgotten that, even as it overextended itself. Now Gelera would regenerate, recuperate, and win, all while Diya was still trying to get its breath back.

Stall her Madra, Diya asked weakly. It could feel its strength returning even after its curse and all its exertions. Slowly, but it was returning. If Madrabaz could only stall the Abomasnow one more time…

The Misdreavus swooped in from below, nothing more than a flickering shadow among snow-covered bushes. And a spray of dense snowballs smashed it to the ground. The trickster spirit had surprised the ancient pokemon and evaded her time after time, even when Diya couldn’t help it. But Gelera had learned and Madra’s luck had run out. It lay on the snowy ground, accepting the snowballs for the sharp balls of ice they represented. It was out of the battle.

Meanwhile, Gelera finished healing. She was still bare of snow and looked oddly naked with her green bristles uncovered. She was also unmarred, three meters tall, and the most terrifyingly powerful thing Diya had ever seen. Even drained of two of her defensive powers and her ability to control the weather, there was more strength in one of her arms than Diya’s entire body. She casually shoved the drained tree as she turned away from it to face Diya and the tree fell over with a massive crash. Limned with an otherworldly purple light from the dying curse fire, she might as well have stepped out of a nightmare.

She stepped towards her prey.

And stopped.

Floating in between Diya and Gelera in the still air was Diya’s first pokemon. Svartis’ purple orb of a body was puffed up almost to the point of transparency, to make her appear as large as she could. Her eyes wavered at the edges with strain and fear.

She did not move.

There was a lump in Diya’s throat. It tried to swallow past it and couldn’t. It reached out to Svartis and told her it was okay. They’d lost. She didn’t have to do this.

Svartis told her partner to shut the fuck up. 

Shock stole any words Diya might have had.

Then Gelera moved and there was no time for words at all. She crouched, readying a charge, and Svartis unleashed everything she had. Toxic black smog poured from her mouth and buried Gelera. Ribbons of terrible phantom energy tore through the space between them, opening rifts in the smog and blasting furrows in exposed flesh beneath. Svartis deflated as she filled the air with all the death she had inside her.

Gelera lurched out of the smog. She coughed smoke out from her lungs, staggered under the onslaught of ghostly attacks. But she did not fall. She raised one thick arm to protect her eyes and pushed forward.

Svartis inflated herself again with a deep breath, and vomited forth more black smog. Diya could hear the wheeze in Gelera’s lungs now, but still the Abomasnow pressed on. Svartis peppered her with more night shade ribbons, but that was all they seemed to do. Pepper her.

“Gaaaaa!” With a squeaking roar, Svartis flew straight at Gelera. She swooped under a wild haymaker and then darted up. The Gastly extended her pink tongue as far and wide as she could, licking all the way up Gelera’s chest and face. And into her ghostly saliva she fed all of her memories of being an envenomed Snom, paralyzed and unable to move. The icy memories of what it was like to not even control her own body as she died, with none of the warmth Diya’s presence had brought her.

With its pink eyes, Diya watched its protector battle a titan. Straining, it caught a glimpse beyond the veil, of black tendrils painstakingly forcing their way into the raging bonfire that was Gelera’s soul. It saw them twine around and into and through her limbs, doing their best to bind them.

It saw all of Svartis’ efforts fail to be enough.

With a cough, and then a growl, and then a roar, Gelera pushed through. One step after another, until she was bare meters from Diya’s fallen form. Because for all of Svartis’ determination and fury and love, what was she in the end? Gelera was a century old Abomasnow, the strongest thing Kenomao’s forests had to offer. Svartis was only a Gastly, a lesser spirit born of a lesser bug that formed the bottom of the forest’s food web.

This was not a fight a lesser spirit could win.

So.

Svartis would just have to be more than a lesser spirit.

With only a few steps left before Gelera would be able to reach out and crush Diya beneath her paws, Svartis drew in a breath and screamed. 

“ggggGGGGGGAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!”

Svartis had been born small. She had been born afraid. 

Svartis had died small. She had not died afraid. The reason for that was lying behind her, and she would die again before Gelera laid one claw on its body.

Svartis shoved herself against Gelera’s chest with what little force her half-corporeal body could muster. She wrapped smoke around Gelera’s limbs to hold them. She lengthened her tongue until it wrapped all the way around the giant’s neck and choked her. And through it all, Svartis screamed.

“GGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHAAAAAAAAAAAUUUUUUUNNNNNNNNTTTTTTEEEEEEEEEERRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!!”

There was a flash of purple light.

Where there had been a soft round ball of gas was a larger spiky head. Where smoke had wrapped around thick arms there were two clawed hands floating independently, gripping hard enough to draw blood. As a Gastly Svartis’ mouth had been a soft slash with two cute little fangs. As a Haunter she sunk two rows of jagged teeth into the fur of her foe’s throat, and Svartis’ tongue extended past them to wrap three times around her neck.

Gelera. Stopped. 

From where it was still lying on the ground, Diya could see the strain in the Abomasnow’s muscles as she raged against her paralysis. But it could also see that same strain in Svartis’ new form. Even evolved -evolved! Diya poured every drop of pride and love it had through their bond- the Haunter could only hold such a monster for so long.

But she had held for long enough.

It wasn’t quick and it wasn’t painless, but Diya raised its head from the snow. It lifted its torso with its arms and got its legs beneath it. And it stood. It swayed on its feet. It was far from steady. But right now, for Svartis? It would lift a mountain.

Energy poured into Diya’s open hand, black and purple shadows draining out of the phantom world into a space it carved out with its will. The shadow ball fluttered and shrieked as it formed, as Diya fed it every drop of power it could hold. It probably wasn’t the smartest thing to do. Diya did it anyway.

Diya held up the trembling hand which held the shadow ball up to Gelera’s chest. In its mind it whispered to Svartis. Move. Now.

The Haunter exploded off of her opponent into a flurry of gas. The Abomasnow lurched into motion. And Diya’s shadow ball hit her square in the chest.

BOOM!

The force of the blast picked Gelera up like a ragdoll and smashed her through a tree.

The Banette sagged. That was the strongest shadow ball it had ever created. Svartis hovered next to her partner, equally exhausted from the greatest working she’d ever done as well. If that didn’t do it…

Gelera got back up.

She swayed. She stood hunched over. One paw was pressed to her sternum. The other massaged her throat. She wheezed with every breath and every breath pained her. Still, she was standing.

Across from her, Diya considered it a minor miracle that it was still on its feet. Honestly, it wasn’t sure how much longer it could keep that up. But shadows take it, it was damn well not going to collapse before she did. It raised its hand for one more shadow ball.

Four short blasts on a horn split the tension between them. Diya only just managed to focus on Trainer Durok as she stepped between them. Behind her, it caught the blurry sight of Gelera letting herself slump to the ground.

Doing brain things was a little hard at the moment, so Diya had trouble interpreting the expression on Durok’s face. But it thought the sentiment behind, “Holy mother of earth, kid. Good job,” was easy enough to understand.

It fished for its pokedex, fumbling a couple times before one of Svartis’ new hands -whoa she had hands now- pressed the dex into its grip. <Ddd dud did i win?> It was still trying to fumble out a correction, <we win?>, when Durok laughed incredulously.

“Hahahaha, holy shit are you kidding? Kid, Diya, this isn’t a fight you’re supposed to win! You get the ice battle badge so long as you don’t freeze and show some basic ability to command and defend with your pokemon while Gelera’s barreling down at you. You passed the test way back when you and your spirits started laughing!”

Exhausted humor trickled into Diya’s awareness from Madrabaz, paired with an image of exactly how gobsmacked its expression was. The bruised spirit -insofar as a Misdreavus could be bruised- drifted over to Diya and Svartis, radiating admiration for its friend’s new form.

Durok rubbed the bridge of her nose with two gloved fingers. “Stone preserve me, I thought you were a sensible one when you asked if you could avoid the fight.”

Oh. Well that was interesting. Did that mean Diya didn’t have to be standing anymore? It hoped so, because it was going to stop standing now. It sat down with a flumph in the snow.

“Oh! Shoot, hey just give me a moment kid, I’ll deploy my camp for you. You’re not in any shape to go anywhere right now.”

Diya nodded gratefully. That sounded good right about now.

“And don’t worry, it won’t count against your survival badge. You said you’d rather run than fight, so you don’t get dinged for fighting to exhaustion and needing to use my camp.”

Huh. Diya hadn’t even thought to worry about that until Durok had mentioned it. That was nice of her to reassure it, though.

Minutes blurred by. Red lights flashed from storage balls and two tents appeared facing a roaring campfire. Gelera drained the tree she’d been flung through and stood up again, though only long enough to find a more comfortable position to slump down.

It was with brisk efficiency that Diya found itself bundled into a warm tent. It had the presence of mind to summon its sleeping bag, along with the stuffed Piplup inside it, but that was about it. Moments later it found itself bundled into the sleeping bag alongside the Piplup, with Svartis and Madrabaz each taking up part of Diya’s pillow. Svartis was larger than Diya’s head now though, and she spilled over her part of the pillow to rest on top of Diya’s head.

Diya’s eyes had already closed, but it was still awake enough to hear Durok’s parting words. “Mid-battle evolution huh? I’ve never seen anything like that.”

The Banette made a small hum of agreement. Svartis was special.

The teacher’s voice became soft. “Your pokemon really love you, kid. You know that, right?”

Diya nodded. They did.

It loved them too.

“Sweet dreams.”

They were.

---

Chapter Text

Ho-Oh is a legendary avian pokemon with an affinity for fire and sunlight, known for its powerful healing abilities. Its feathers are predominantly gold and red, with long trailing yellow tail-feathers, a white underside, and green feathers at the tip of its wings. Ho-Oh has a green stripe on its neck, a yellow beak, black rings around its red eyes, and a feathered, yellow crest on its head. It has darkly colored feet and legs with four toes and long talons. Ho-Oh's wings are prismatic, and it trails a rainbow behind it. 

Ho-Oh is considered the guardian of the skies and has a mythical power to resurrect the dead. It is said that when it flies its huge wings create bright, colorful rainbows. Those who revere Ho-Oh believe that the rare few who bear witness to Ho-Oh are promised eternal good fortune. Ho-Oh flies all over the world and many of its myths claim it does so in search of the one with the purest heart in all the world. 

The Ho-Oh Shrine in Johto contains a miraculous tree branch which burns with an eternal flame that renews the branch instead of consuming it. The story goes that the branch was set alight by Ho-Oh’s touch, the one time it has ever landed, as it came down from the heavens to put an end to a conflict between humans. It is considered an important emblem of peace worldwide and is sometimes brought out to play a symbolic role in meetings about goodwill and cooperation.

-----

Ranger Nils desperately wanted to leave his office and go to the bar. Not because he wanted to drink. Nils had seen what became of rangers who used alcohol to cope and he had no intention of ever following that path. But the bar is where he would find his colleagues gathered, along with his husband. They were there for the wake, though they weren’t calling it that, and they would be company. Mostly importantly, they would understand the reality of the situation, as so many of the people he’d interviewed today did not.

But there were still calls left to make. Pointless calls, in all likelihood, but the procedure behind them was important. Nils had seen three lost pokemon and one lost child found because people followed procedure and checked where they’d thought there was no reason to to look. Maybe if he was lucky, the meeting at the bar could be a celebration and not a wake.

It was a cruel hope to hold onto. Nils held onto it anyway. He needed it to make the call.

The nurse picked up on the third ring. “Hello, this is Nurse Claire speaking, with the Canopy Town pokecenter. How may I help you?” She sounded genuinely happy to help, and Nils’ heart ached.

“Hello Nurse Claire. My name is Ranger Nils. I oversee the bay area around Ledos Village. Can I have a moment of your time?”

“Of course! And … oh, I remember you! I think we met at the last meeting about Tentacool migrations. Do you still have that long beard?”

Normally Nils would have laughed. This time his response was flat, monotone. “No nurse, my daughter made me shave it. Said it made hugging me too prickly. I think I remember you as well. You were taking notes for a children’s science exhibit about the migration, right?”

“Yup, that was me! So how can I help you, Ranger Nils?”

The smalltalk hadn’t made it easier to say. “Claire … I’m sorry to say, but we have a missing child here in Ledos Village. We’re exploring the possibility that he might have made it to Canopy Town. I need to ask you if you’ve seen a child matching his description.”

Nils could all but feel the nurse’s posture straighten through the phone. “Oh. I’m so sorry to hear that, ranger. Of course I can help. When was he last seen?”

There it was. The question that made Nils long for the bar, for the company of people who understood what the answer meant. “Six weeks ago.”

The silence on the other end of the line was icy. Nils prepared himself to be yelled at, the way he’d been yelling at himself all day. It hurt more when Nurse Claire’s voice came back over the line, so fragile he thought it might break. “What?”

“Last known sighting was the evening of the third of last month. If he-” Nils did his best to keep his voice steady and didn’t quite succeed, “-if he made it to Canopy Town, he would have likely shown up on the fourth, or maybe a day or two later. If so he likely would have stayed at your pokecenter, or obtained supplies there.”

“I … ranger, what? Six weeks? How am I only hearing now about a child who went missing six weeks a…go…” Claire’s voice trailed off.

Nils knew what she was realizing. He’d had the same thought just before he realized that they were only going to find the boy’s body once spring came and the snow melted.

Claire swallowed audibly. “I’m sorry, was this during the cold snap last month? And you said you’re worried he came here? All the way from Ledos?”

“Yes. If I’m being honest Claire, we’re … not hopeful.”

“Okay. Okay.” The nurse audibly collected herself. “Is there any chance he might have stayed in Ledos for a while and come this way sometime since then? Or- I’m sorry Nils, can you just walk me through what happened, and why you’re only looking for this child now? Maybe if I understand, I’ll be able to help.”

“Of course.” Nils flipped open his notepad. He wasn’t sure why. He didn’t need it, the details had been running through his mind all day. “I’ll go through what we know, and what we’re assuming happened.” As he began reciting facts, Nils realized why he was looking at his notes. It was easier not to think about what they meant if he was just reciting words on a page.

“On the third of last month, Victor Abir, a minor in the custody of Selma Abir and Austin Abir, attended school in Ledos Village for the last time. None of his online accounts or his minor stipend account have been accessed since that night. The next day a minor theft of some clothing was reported from a public laundromat, with a message left behind which read ‘Dear people who left your clothes here overnight, sorry for taking some of your clothes. I was very cold and needed them.’ These two incidents were not connected at the time, but our assumption is that Victor took the clothes.”

“The next day Victor failed to attend school, and his primary teacher contacted Selma and Austin over lunch. They claimed Victor was sick and apologized for forgetting to inform the school, citing concern for their son’s health. Later that evening they called the teacher on their personal dex and told them that Victor was particularly sick and might not be in school for the next few days. Austin is a medical practitioner, so the teacher assumed the matter was cared for and left it at that.”

“We interviewed the Abirs’ neighbors today and some of them recall odd conversations with Selma and Austin around this time. Apparently their marriage has been rocky for some time and it wasn’t uncommon for Victor to spend time, sometimes even days, with the neighbors instead of his own home. The neighbors suggest that Selma and Austin might have been probing to see if Victor was staying with them without informing his parents. As far as we are aware however, no one in Ledos has seen Victor since the evening of the third.”

“The Abirs have been … unhelpful and their stories contradict quite a bit, so we can’t say what they were thinking at this point. But we’re guessing that at this point they’d assumed Victor had done what’s called a ‘soft runaway’, temporarily leaving for the shelter of a friend’s home nearby, and were hoping the situation would resolve itself quietly.”

This was more information than Nils needed to, or technically even should, be sharing with Nurse Claire. But there was a reason he so badly wanted to go meet his colleagues and see his husband. He needed to talk to someone about this. And from the soft noises Nurse Claire was making on the other end of the call, as much sympathetic as horrified, she knew that too.

Nils tried to focus on the blurry pages of his notepad. “About a week later, Austin reported to Victor’s teacher that Victor was seriously, though not dangerously, ill and would be staying home under Austin’s care for the foreseeable future. He asked the teacher if they could pass on a light workload to keep Victor occupied. Text messages between Austin and Selma indicate he hadn’t cleared this with her beforehand, but - after a fight so loud that emergency domestic counselors were called by neighbors - she appears to have agreed to go along with the ruse. They were committed to keeping Victor’s disappearance a secret as long as possible while they made plans to leave the country. They never explicitly said so in text, but we believe that at this point they thought their son was dead. They realized the enormity of having effectively covered up his disappearance for a week, rather than declaring him missing, and panicked.”

The background of Nils’ pokedex was a picture of himself and his husband with their daughter posing between them. When he’d been scrolling through the messages copied off the Abir’s dexes, reading how callously they’d talked about their son, he had been very aware that her smiling face was just behind them. He hadn’t been able to stop wondering, how often had Victor ever smiled like that?

“During this time, their relationship appears to have disintegrated entirely. They quietly filed divorce paperwork and made plans to leave Kenomao. As best we can tell, their plan was to each go to a separate county, filing for Victor’s dual citizenship in each country so they wouldn’t set off any alarms about moving out of Kenomao without him. Then they told each country that the other parent would have long term custody of Victor for the time being, to explain his absence when they arrived at their destinations.”

“Thankfully, their relationship worsened during the next few weeks as they prepared to leave. Several more calls for emergency domestic counselors were made and records of these events were automatically forwarded to the judge handling their divorce paperwork. She forwarded them to the local children’s advocate, and he noticed that the Abirs were apparently filing for a divorce and hadn’t made contact with the children’s advocacy office for Victor to receive counseling. He sent them an order compelling them to set up counseling for Victor, and the next morning -today- told the children’s therapists at the school to expect to see Victor soon.”

This was when everything had started happening, all at once. “That’s when one of the therapists told the children’s advocate that Victor had been out sick for six weeks. He’d seen Victor frequently, though Victor was often quiet and spoke about his day instead of the specifics about what was troubling him. The therapist had been concerned about Victor for some time, mentioned a concerning report about Shuppets at Victor’s house, and he reached out several times to the Abirs about remote or home-visit counseling while Victor was 'sick', but was told it wasn’t necessary. He’d actually been preparing a report to the children’s office when the advocate showed up.”

Claire spoke up for the first time, her voice cracking, “Please tell me the advocate did something about that.”

For the first time in the call a smile touched Nils’ lips, though it was bitter. “I’m told his response was ‘hell and fury’ when he was told. At this point he believed there was a seriously ill child with divorcing parents -who needed regular emergency intervention- and the advocacy office and therapists hadn’t yet been involved. Then one of the other therapists mentioned that they’d heard the Abirs were leaving the country.” Charlie, the children’s advocate, had been sobbing when he told Nils this part of his account. It had been the moment he realized something was wrong, Charlie had said. The moment when he realized that this boy’s situation had been spiraling out of control without Charlie’s knowledge for a very long time, and he had no idea what he’d find at the end of it.

“I was called in. I helped the children’s advocate enter the Abirs’ home, where Victor was nowhere to be found. Then we took the Abirs into custody, where they met with their advocates.” They’d refused to share the local judicial advocate. Another one from Zima City had to fly in before Charlie could question them. “They gave wildly inconsistent testimony through their advocates, and we opened an investigation. My call to you is part of that investigation.”

There was a long silence as Nils’ story came to an abrupt end. Eventually Claire asked, “What do you think they did to Victor?”

“To him? Nothing. The Abirs’ texts paint a fairly clear picture; they have no idea what happened to Victor. But our working theory is that he ran away on the third, and left Ledos.”

“So you think he might have made it here? To Canopy Town?”

“Claire…” Nils hated this part of his job more than anything else. He’d only had to let down people’s hopes about a missing person three times before, but every time left a scar on his soul. “The message in the laundromat indicates that Victor wasn’t prepared for the cold when he left. And when we searched his house, his winter gear was still there, including his boots. His parents confirmed he only had the one pair.”

Claire took a deep breath. “What did he look like?”

“Claire…” Nils needed to ask her if she’d seen the missing boy, but he knew it would hurt her worse if he gave her false hope before asking.

Her voice came out forceful this time, and almost angry. “What. Did he look like? A lot of children come through here but I have a good memory for faces.”

More than anything, Nils wanted her hope to be well founded. But he knew what it meant, when a child ran away during a cold snap and vanished so completely. “We have an old school picture of him, though his hair was modded blue back then. I’m told it’s a natural black now, and cropped shorter than it used to be. I’ll send it to you while I give you a more current description, is that alright?”

“Please do, Ranger Nils.”

“Alright. Victor Abir has dark brown skin, and short wiry black hair. He has a large nose and a round face. He was 164 centimeters for his last checkup, though apparently he had a growth spurt since. He is skinny, and under average weight for his height. He-” has a resting face described by his teachers as ‘somber’, Nils was going to say, when Nurse Claire interrupted.

“Does he have pink eyes?” There was excitement in her voice.

“Excuse me?”

“Does he have pink glowing eyes? Strongly psychic, mute, can teleport?”

“Er. No. I’m sorry, why do you ask…?”

“Oh.” The disappointment in Claire’s voice hurt to hear. “I just- There’s a child who matches that description who just finished getting their badges and left only yesterday. Their name is Diya. They’re nonbinary but their features are somewhat masculine and I guess I was just thinking that maybe they … I don’t know. If they really were Victor and hiding their name, maybe they were also hiding their gender, or had come to a realization or … I don’t know. I’m sorry.”

“No, Claire, that’s quite alright. I just sent the picture, can you take a look and tell me if it might be the same child?”

Nils waited as the picture uploaded and Claire took her time looking at it. Her voice was heavy when she responded. “No. I’m sorry. They look very similar, from what I’ve seen of Diya’s face at least, but … I think I can see the differences. You said Victor wasn’t psychic?”

Nils shook his head, then verbalized the gesture for her. “No. His eyes are brown too, not pink.”

“It’s not the irises themselves which are pink, it’s the- No. Nevermind. I don’t suppose there’s any chance that your runaway Victor’s stressful experience catalyzed his psychic powers and caused him to gain glowing pink eyes?”

“I’m afraid not. I’m mildly psychic myself, just detecting the presence of minds, but I can tell you that’s not how being psychic works.”

“I know. I was … joking, I guess, though it was a terrible joke. Anyway, I’ll double check our records and tell Leader Ahmed so he can ask around tomorrow, to see if anyone has seen your Victor. But I don’t remember anyone who matches that description better than Diya.”

And Diya was psychic, had glowing pink eyes, and was the wrong gender to boot.

Nils had known not to get his own hopes up. It still hurt. “Thank you, Claire. Do you need anything more from me for your gym leader? I have a few more calls to make, if you don’t mind.”

“No, no. Once you have a case file assembled, please send it over, but this is enough for now. I … good luck, ranger. I hope you find him.”

They always did, eventually. When the snow melted. “Thank you. We’ll do our best.” 

Nils hung up. He sunk his face into his hands. There were two more pokecenters he had to call, and then another dozen he should call because of how much distance the dead boy could have hypothetically traveled if he were still alive.

He let the tears flow, instead.

Nils had become a ranger because sometimes he preferred trees to people. But even better than the quiet solitude was when he showed up in the wilderness and he could see the look on people’s faces as they realized, ‘A ranger’s here. It’s going to be alright.’ Whenever people asked him about his job, he told them it was an honor to be a ranger, and he meant it. He could think of no better word to describe the feeling of his island putting that much faith in him.

But he could only show up for what his island called him to do. Nils couldn’t help a kid when no one noticed how seriously he was suffering. He couldn’t track a missing child when his own parents chose not to report his disappearance.

Long minutes later, Nils dried his eyes. He took ten deep breaths, counting each one out. Then he picked his dex back up and typed in the next number.

He knew how this worked. He knew what it meant when a child with no snow gear went missing in the middle of a cold snap and six weeks later the child hadn’t contacted anyone or purchased anything with their stipend account. He wasn’t stupid. The smart thing to do would be to stop inflicting this on himself and leave the office, so he could mourn the child he never got a chance to save with people who would understand.

But maybe he was stupid. Or stubborn. Or a fool clinging to blind hope.

Or maybe it was something else.

Nils had been asked to pick up runaways who had fled from bad homes before, or journeying trainers who refused to go home. Each time he’d been asked to stay with them, to keep them company until the children’s advocate arrived. He listened to them. Comforted some of them. Let others cuss him out. Sometimes he did both for the same child. And he always followed up with them later, if he could.

One thing he’d learned, more than anything else, was how uncared for so many of those kids felt. Even with the ones like Victor who had teachers that worried about them, therapists who asked after them, and neighbors who loved them, it was too easy for what they felt from their parents to overwhelm everything else. So when Nils imagined what Victor must have felt like, driven to the breaking point, running away from anyone and everything, alone in the cold…

Victor had been loved. He had been cared for. So many people who weren’t his parents had loved him. But if he had died not knowing that … it was too cruel to imagine.

Nils made the next call. Maybe it was pointless. Maybe it was stupid. Maybe it was self destructive. 

But Nils cared. And every second he kept looking was how he could scream that out into the world.

I care! If nothing else matters, if no one else does. I. Care.

“Hello, is this Nurse Jeremia? My name is Ranger Nils. I’m calling about a missing child.”

“Nurse Julia?”

“Nurse Karly?”

“Nurse Santos?”

“Leader Nacio?”

“Ranger Anica?” 

“Mayor Sylvia?”

-----

Diya took a deep breath of the cool fresh air. It let its lungs fill, then slowly let the breath out. It wasn’t spring yet. There would be plenty more snows before that happened. But it was that time of year when sometimes, for a few days, winter loosened its grip and the world sighed in relief.

Just because it could, the Banette skipped down the dirt road and twirled a few steps of a dance, the three new medals on its robe flashing in the sunlight. Then with a flourish it jumped up into the air and splashed down its own shadow. It waited a few moments in the dark place between shadows, and found itself caught by an idea just before it surfaced. It burst from June’s shadow beside her and lunged, tickling her sides!

“What?! Aaahh! Hahaha, no! Nooo! Stop it, you menace! Aaaahhh! Madrabaz is a terrible influence on you! Bashak, make them stop!” 

The bigger trainer looked up from his medal box, where he’d been softly touching his Ice battle badge. For someone who originally hadn’t even planned to fight for one, it had touched him deeply when Alicia -the Piloswine he’d nursed back to health- had held her own well enough to earn him that badge. 

“Bashak! Help! I’m being haunted! Get them off me! Get them ooooffhahahahaha, no, no, nooooo!”

Bashak, who realistically didn’t weigh more than both of them put together but sure looked like he did, sighed and closed his medal box and put them away. With its precious cargo protected, he grabbed Diya by the scruff of its cloak and pulled the Banette off his ticklish friend. He peered over his glasses, locking his brown eyes with Diya’s pink ones. “Really?”

Fwoomp.

A rush of air collapsed in on where Diya had been, before it reappeared a meter away, bouncing on its toes. <Sorry!> It hurriedly typed out. <Aren’t you excited though??!!>

June was still wheezing, so in a rare turn of events Bashak was forced to speak for her. “Of course we are.” Three new trainers each getting every badge they tried for on their first attempt, wasn’t unheard of. It wasn’t even that uncommon. But it was something well worth being proud of, and the warm glowing smile on Bashak’s face said more than words ever could.

“Eugh. Of course I’m excited!” June griped. She straightened her clothes, taking special care with the chain around her neck where her badges hung. She wanted to keep them where she could see them, she’d said, because sometimes it still didn’t feel real. “But we’ve also got, like, twenty more kilometers to go today, and I want us to have enough time for side trips if we see any interesting pokemon. And if my sides hurt the whole time because you couldn’t rein it in and tickled me too hard, I will set my Ariadoses on you while you sleep.” 

Diya blinked in consternation. <Noted.> A moment later though it was rocking on its feet again, grinning beneath its sunny yellow scarf. It couldn’t help but look out over the road to Zima City, just dry enough to walk on because of the warm e-storage cable buried beneath it, and feel a thrill.

This was it. They -it and its friends- were real trainers now. They had pokemon, badges, and the open road.

As it looked out over the distance they still had to travel, and looked back at Canopy Town receding in the distance, Diya’s excitement was tempered by a bittersweet thought. Its boy would have been so proud to be in its shoes. To have come all this way and still be wondering just how much further it could go.

But this journey didn’t just belong to the boy. They’d promised to go on their journey together. And even if Diya’s boy couldn’t be here with it, it had come so far and grown so much. It had learned how to be human, made friends, trained pokemon, won battles, and proved itself to be someone who could rescue those who needed help. Diya was proud of itself.

It hoped that if its boy were here to see it, he would be proud of Diya too.

-----

End of Book 1

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Hi there!

I've just written and posted a novella-length interlude between books 1 and 2 of The Friendly Necromancer! As part of that, I'm making The Friendly Necromancer into an Ao3 series rather than a single work. If you want future updates you should subscribe to the series rather than just this work - which is now listed as a completed work, because I consider book 1 to be a complete project in its own right!

I'll take this down in a week or so, once everyone's had time to notice. Happy winter holidays everyone, I hope you enjoy my present!

Edit: I left it it up because I couldn't bear to kill all the lovely comments on this placeholder chapter. <3