Mission Two: Electric
It is the triumph of civilization that at last communities have obtained such a mastery over natural laws that they drive and control them. The winds, the water, electricity, all aliens that in their wild form were dangerous, are now controlled by human will, and are made useful servants.
-Henry Ward Beecher
Electric 2.1: Six
Pixie
November 16, 2019| [-33:03:17]
You jump into Skysong’s lap as she sits down in front of Matriarch. You can feel the pink eevee’s eyes boring into you but if you get into a fight now your trainer will be mad. So you won’t. Because you’re a very well-behaved fox. You still turn around and stick your tongue out at it before settling down. Let him be jealous of your perch. He isn’t cuddling anyone.
“How was Akala?” Matriarch asks.
“Good. I won a trial.” She scratches your ear and you press your head into her paw with pride. “Got a new pokémon.” You abruptly slink back down and suppress a hiss. “We caught the pokémon we were supposed to.” She sounds a little angry. Why? You helped her find prey. Well, not her prey. Humans sometimes trade their prey with other humans for reasons that you still don’t understand.
Matriarch makes a low throat noise that humans sometimes use to respond to things without speaking. “And how are you holding up?”
“Fine.”
“You sure?”
“Yes.”
Skysong’s heart rate is up and you can smell her stress responses start kicking in. Will you get to fight the eevee? Sure, the green eevee cheated so you narrowly lost but you can definitely take this one and show Skysong that you’re much, much better.
“If you say so,” Matriarch concedes. “By the way I don’t think you ever told me why you’re going on a journey.”
“Money.”
Matriarch leans back and her voice shifts to something a touch quieter and softer. “And what’s the money for?”
There’s a pause of several shallow breaths as Skysong’s face scrunches up and her paws clench.
“Some of my Mom’s stuff.”
“Okay.” Matriarch sighs and you can feel her body shift. “If you want to tell me more you can.”
“I don’t want to.”
“Well, if you want help finding things I do have friends in Unova.” Pause. “And the Anahuac pokémon markets.”
Your trainer’s breath catches in her throat and you seize up, ready to blast out ice shards at the smug ugly fox in the corner. Skysong finally lowers her head and exhales.
“If a hydreigon gets sold in Anahuac, can you let me know?”
“I’ll see what I can do.”
Skysong’s heart rate starts to slow a little. No eevee fight. What a shame.
“Do you want to talk about it?” Matriarch offers again.
“No.”
“Okay.”
Someone drums a paw on the wood above you. Not entirely sure who.
“I’m going to need a Class V license.”
“Maybe,” Matriarch says.
“Tyrunt require—”
“Most pokémon grandfather into the license requirement you obtained them at. The exceptions are mostly just pokémon that don’t recognize their old trainers. I’ll see what I can do about getting the reqs changed, but in the meantime I’m trying to find you a mentor for your IV. Just in case.” More drumming. “You have an idea for your V paper?”
“A draconic dictionary.”
“That’s what I would recommend.”
The rest is boring. The eevee never attacks you and you never get an excuse to attack it.
It will live. For now.
[-32:18:15]
Pale red light rushes all around you before fading, leaving you intact.
Mission accomplished.
“What was that?” Growlsleeper grumbles on the other end of the room.
“Pix and Coco were going at it again.” Skysong sounds tired. Not just because it is night and she is diurnal; you woke her from her sleep because Eggbreath was pressing against you and soiling your precious fur. Skysong gently presses you off and slowly gets to her feet before finding her hooves and stick. “I’ll take her out for a minute.”
Yes! Eggbreath is gone and you get to go outside!
You move a few steps ahead of her and make sure to have very loud steps so that she can follow you because you are a very good guide fox. Eventually you step out into the—it’s raining. Oh no. Thankfully there is sitting place under an overhang that you can lead Skysong to so she can sit down and pet you and only you for maybe the rest of the night.
She sits down. You jump on her lap. The headscritches are very half-hearted. Disappointing. You press your head into her hand so that she knows to do better.
“You know,” she says while not petting you harder, “She’s going to be forty times bigger than you someday.”
It takes you a second to convert from her terrible numbers into the correct ones. Forty is forty-four. A good, symmetrical number. “And I’ll be forty-four times stronger.” Or you could just kill her before she gets too much bigger than you. That’s always an option.
Skysong shakes her head. “You’ve seen the movies, right? You know what tyrantrum, sharpteeth, whatever, can do?”
“Fail to kill baby pokémon and then fall into a lake and die?”
That does earn a muted giggle and an ear scratch. “Or kill off a clan of pyroclaptors. Fire-types. She’s good against fire-types.”
“Fire melts ice into water. Fire-types hate water.” How does she keep forgetting that?
“How about the sun? She loves heat and light. You don’t. She can guide me in hot cities.”
One paw wants to object. Badly. Your trainer spends more time in the warm than the cool and this is a chance for Eggbreath to persuade her to leave you. But. Being offered a reprieve from your worst duties is good. And someday you’ll be cold enough that the heat won’t bother you. You concede with a huff. Eggbreath can die after you evolve and command the blizzards.
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Skysong switches to giving you long strokes from your head to the tips of your tails. This is also good petting. You purr so that she knows to do this more often. For a long time she continues. The sounds of the wind and rain are a little like those of snowstorms raging above your den.
It ends right as you’re about to fall asleep. You’re too calm to complain until Skysong picks you up into her arms and stands up. “Please be nice to your sister,” she whispers.
No.
You hiss and squirm out of her arms and start growling the moment you hit the ground.
“No. Not my sister. My sisters are on The Mountain.”
“Oh,” her face falters and her scent shifts. “I didn’t know you had family.”
She says it like she’s sad that you do. Why wouldn’t you? You had to come from somewhere.
“Do you want to talk about it?” She crouches down and offers more scritches with her hand. You don’t take the bait.
“No.” Of course you don’t want to talk about your sisters. Especially the living one.
The one that Avalanche thought was better than you.
[-27:07:41]
You reappear next to Eggbreath on a long metal strip jutting out into the water. Your trainer immediately bends down and starts putting your harness on. Eggbreath is already in the very short leash that Skysong uses because even she doesn’t trust the demon bird. Once you’re buckled in Skysong gently picks you up and turns you around to look at—
Oh.
The Mountain is right there, looming on the horizon. A pillar of white in a landscape of red rocks and blue skies. “Are we going there?”
“No. This is as close as we’ll get.” She silently strokes your head. “Do you want to?”
Do you? Someday, yes. When you can go back and beat up a whole pack of redcrests and drag the corpses to Avalanche so she knows that she chose wrong. When you’re sure she’ll lick your head and send one of your siblings down in your place, that’s when you’ll return.
Now… you know you can’t face The Mountain and win. Not after it killed so many of your siblings.
“No. Not yet.”
Eggbreath starts wandering off while Skysong’s holding you in one arm and petting you with the other. You shriek alarm to let your trainer know that there is misbehavior afoot. “Thanks,” she mutters in a not-properly-thankful tone. She sets you down somewhat roughly into a patch of sand and calls Eggbreath over. The beast comes running back and nudges her head against Skysong’s leg.
Skysong ruffles her headfeathers before picking up the leash.
The nerve she has.
[-27:06:00]
“Behave yourselves” is what Skysong said before curling up and falling asleep on the sand.
Eggbreath is not behaving herself. She’s harassed an armored beach spider into its hole and is trying to dig down after it. You’ll let her. When Skysong wakes up you’ll have a long list of the demon’s misbehavior ready to go. She’ll be horrified and immediately send Eggbreath away and then you’ll have time to get any new team members kicked out before she can decide to leave you for them.
There’s a pained cry and shaking sounds. You look over to see the beach spider pinched onto Eggbreath’s nose as she slams her head into a rock to get it off. Your ears perk up. Maybe Eggbreath will get herself killed. Or at least get hurt so badly that Skysong realizes that she’s way too weak to stand alongside you.
The spider lets go and Eggbreath scurries off to find something else to murder.
Your gaze falls upon the green eevee and you reflexively growl. He’s just lying there on your beach. Menacingly. Like he owns it. Like he’s better than you. He isn’t! Eevee are beneath you. Hummy and Rocktosser were wrong to think otherwise. They probably failed their quest because they pushed you away and kept some pathetic little stupid weakling in your place. Maybe they died because the little asshole they kept couldn’t save them from a monster.
Serves them right.
No. You can’t allow the eevee to take naps so close to Skysong. He’s a threat to you and your trainer. You slowly rise up and creep closer to the abomination. Your paws are built for walking silently on snow and sand is close enough. His chest rises and falls as he breathes in his sleep.
You take a deep breath and unleash the most perfect of slushballs. A perfect hit to the face. The monster’s ears stick straight up and he starts shaking to get it off of him. He turns and you see one eye covered in snow as the other narrows into a glare. The eevee steps forward and the earth falls away as you fly through the air. You skid to a halt as sand blasts into your fur. The eevee—how did it move so fast?—steps over your belly and lies down on top of you. Then his head dips and his eyes close again.
No! You flex all of your muscles and squirm madly to escape. He’s not much bigger than you, this shouldn’t be hard! If only you weren’t on your back. Then you could just press off the ground. And breathe normally without a fat eevee crushing your lungs. After a few glorious minutes of struggle you come to accept that the eevee has cheated too well. You will need to summon help.
You scream.
Just when you think that your mighty roar might go unanswered something rushes into your peripheral vision and slams into the eevee. As the smelly stupid fox gets knocked off you roll over and bare your fangs to meet it. You glance to the side and see—Eggbreath. Huh. The bird holds her mouth wide open and swishes her tail back and forth.
“What’s going on?” Skysong asks.
“The eevee attacked me!”
“Playtime!” Eggbreath says while slapping her tail into the ground.
“Is anyone hurt?”
“No!” Your traitorous ‘sister’ replies.
“Cool.”
Skysong rolls over and puts her head back down on the sand.
Eggbreath growls and lowers herself into a pouncing position. The eevee just stares before turning to look at something on the beach. It’s a small bird. Not even a pokémon. Eevee’s glance is enough to get Eggbreath to notice and she runs off to harass it. Leaving you alone. Which is fine. You can still defend your honor and protect your trainer from the deceptive fox in front of you.
The monstrous plant sits down on his haunches. “Why do you care so much?”
You hiss in response.
“If I did anything to you…”
“You’re trying to steal Skysong!”
He blinks and swishes his leaf from side to side.
“Who?”
You stamp a paw. How dare he play dumb!
“My trainer!”
Slow blink. Leaf swish.
“Why would I want to?”
Because she’s your trainer and you’re the best and that means that she’s the best trainer! Your thoughts come out more as a irritated screech than proper language. He sits down and tucks his legs under him.
“Why would I steal her when I could just join your team?”
“She already has two! One would have to leave.” Obviously. He’s just toying with you now. As he keeps staring at you with his big stupid eyes you start readying another attack.
“You know humans can have six pokémon, right?”
Lies! Terrible lies! He’s trying to get you to let your guard down so he can sneak onto the team and convince Skysong to make you leave. Just like every other eevee. You’re smarter now than you were in the past. You’ll stop him. Kill him if you must.
Eggbreath leaps over and kicks up sand on impact. She immediately dips low to the ground and softly growls while the tip of her tail carves an arc in the sand.
“Play!”
[-26:16:03]
Skysong grabs her stick and you follow close behind. Eggbreath stirs as if she wants to follow before giving up and settling back into the blankets. Ugly diurnal baby bird. So much better than her. You help without being asked.
Where is she going, anyway? There’s a scent marking station inside of the room.
Outside. She’s going outside and sitting down on a bench. You hop up as she sits down.
“Why are you harassing Inferno?”
Oh. Now you get to tell her everything that the eevee has done.
“He attacked me while I was trying to sleep and then he said mean things and tried to make me stop breathing and he also attacked Eggbreath and he’s going to hurt you someday.”
She presses your ear down before withdrawing her paws. Skysong sighs and folds her arms.
“Pixie, I don’t like it when you try to hurt my other pokémon. Or Kekoa’s. Or Genesis’s.”
“You should. They’re lying to you. Trying to steal you.”
It’s simple, really. How can she not get it? She picked you. That means she’s smart.
“Pix, I’ve told you this before.” She sounds irritated. At the eevee? Good! Skysong is finally getting it. “If you want to stay on the team, then I won’t kick you off. Promise.”
Lies. The others all made promises. They all left you behind in the end.
“Did you get left right after you got jealous and attacked other pokémon?”
You hiss. She may your trainer but she has no right to say those things. “I am not jealous of eevee. I am much better.”
Skysong gives you a thorough headscratching in apology. “Maybe your people left you because you got scared they’d leave you so you started acting out. Made them leave behind ‘mons they cared about. Cost them sleep. They got fed up. Decided you weren’t worth it.” She’s wrong. It’s not so simple. Besides, you tried being nice on The Mountain. Look where that got you. Her hand presses down and gives you a few gentle strokes down your back. “I won’t leave you,” she lies. “Unless you want to be left. You don’t have to fight to stay. Promise.”
There is a way that the promise can hold. “No more pokémon.”
“Why?” She asks like an idiot.
“Won’t have to leave anyone unless there’s a third.”
Her hand pauses in the middle of your back and gently presses down. “But I can have six?” No. That’s not possible. Two. Avalanche kept two. Hummy and Rocktosser and Lightstare and Lowgrowl all kept two. “Genesis already has three, y’know? She’s not leaving any of them.”
That’s a—the green eevee, the spiralfrog, and the shapeshifter. Three. She has three and none of them are trying to kill each other. That’s. No. That. They all had to leave you. Had to. Thought you were worse than eevee. If they could keep you then. Then. You were worse than nothing.
You are worse than nothing.
Skysong flips you onto your back and presses you into her chest. You barely notice. If she’s lying than she’ll leave you. If she’s not then she’ll hate you someday because. Because everyone else has. Why does she pretend to care? What is she planning? She drops you back onto her lap and leans back. Her pets grow slower. It doesn’t matter. You have things to think about.
When you finally look back up, she’s asleep and the sun is awake.