“I can give you some tips,” He said. “But keep in mind that I’m not a Trainer. I can teach you about Combee and Vespiquen, but not much more than that.”

“That’s fine!”

The man took a sip of his coffee. “Your Combee is going to evolve soon.”

“Wait, really?”

“Well. Not soon-soon, but soon enough. See how the small hairs on her body are starting to turn a darker orange in some places? There, by her wings.”

He pointed at a spot on her body, and if I squinted I could make out a little bit of a darker spot.

“Okay?”

“Plus, her abdomen is starting to lengthen. How long have you been traveling with her?”

I paused with the mug to my mouth, running through the events of the recent past.

“Wow, I met Zetian over a month ago.”

“Hmm. Can you tell me anything about her living situation before then?”

“Not much. There was a nest living in a big tree, but it got hit with lightning and almost burned down. I saved the hive and Zetian decided to come with me.”

“Fairly standard then.”

For the first time I took a sip of the coffee the man had prepared. It was… interesting.

He didn’t apparently care much for milk or creamer, and since the man ran a honey business the only sweetener he had was honey.

I wasn’t the biggest fan of it, but coffee was coffee and the honey was very good.

“Anyways, Dea is my, for lack of a better term, Starter. We grew up together, and I inherited the farm from my father, so I’ve been around Combee and Vespiquen for my entire life.”

I nodded. It made sense that there would be people like him, who specialized not just in one Type of Pokémon, but one specific evolutionary line.

“It’s honestly a bit impressive that your Combee- Zetian you said? It's impressive that she’s stuck around this long.”

He held up a hand to forestall any arguments.

“That wasn’t intended to be a slight against you, sorry if it came out that way. What I was trying to say is that Combee aren’t Pokémon that are generally well suited for travel. They, on average, like to stay in one place with their hives and take care of their Vespiquen.”

The man hesitated a moment before continuing. “Of course, that’s mostly the case for the male drones.”

I cocked an eyebrow. “Drones?”

He shrugged, a somewhat rueful expression on his face. “It’s an industry term that was picked up by the biologists. Male Combee can’t evolve, so they mostly do the dirty work of the hives. Female Combee… that’s a tougher issue.”

Zetian danced up and down in the air in her approximation of a nod, and the Honey Man smiled.

“She’s from around Oreburgh, isn’t she?”

“What? How’d you know?”

“Each hive of Combee have slightly different dances. Not so different that they can’t understand each other, it’s more like regional accents. A Kantonian will speak differently than a Johtonian, or a Sinnohan, but we can all understand what the other people are saying.”

“Oh, huh.”

I looked at Zetian, and a complicated feeling washed over me. It wasn’t exactly shame or guilt, but I realized that I hadn’t exactly been giving her as much attention as I did for Venus.

That was natural in some ways, Venus and I had been together for longer and we’d gone through a shared traumatic experience, but it still sent an uncomfortable feeling through my gut.

I would have to fix that going forward.

“It’s not easy for humans to pick up on the regional differences, but it is possible.” The Honey Man continued, oblivious to my internal struggles. “You have to spend a lot of time with Combee from other locations, of course, but that’s my entire job, so…”

He shrugged, then coughed into his hand.

“Right! I forgot to introduce myself! I’m Takeo.”

“Ah, haha.” I scratched the back of my head as I felt the warmth of a flush spread across my face. “Right. I’m Alina.”

“We still have one more introduction to make though, Dea should be out back.”

A low growl pierced through our conversation, and I jerked in surprise, nearly jumping out of my chair as I noticed for the first time a small figure by my knee.

It was… a teddy bear?

I blinked, and shook the confusion out of my eyes.

Not a teddy bear, a Teddiursa, although it was easy to see why I had made the mistake in the first place.

It was short, brown, and fluffy. My heart beat a little quicker as it looked up at me with narrowed eyes, and growled again.

Takeo sighed. “Two more introductions. That’s Kuma. He talks a big game, but he’s harmless.”

The little bear lifted his stubby arms up at me.

“He wants you to pick him up.”

I reached down and picked him up. He was a lot lighter than I was expecting him to be, and my heart switched from beating quicker in fear to melting a little bit.

Takeo stood up and disappeared into the kitchen for a minute, then came back with a bowl of honey.

Kuma’s eyes opened fully, and I realized that he hadn’t been glaring at me, but was still mostly asleep.

He quickly clambered off of my lap to crawl onto the table, where he plopped down and began messily eating the honey.

“That’ll keep him busy for a while.” Takeo said fondly, shaking his head. “Come on, we’ll head out back to meet Dea.”

/^\

If I had thought that the tree in front of Takeo’s house had been impressive, the ones in the small forest behind the farm absolutely blew it out of the water.

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His property was built on a series of small hills, and the strange perspective had confused my mind so much that I thought that the trees were smaller than they actually were. The smallest ones were only a few feet shorter than the hundred-foot tall monster out in front of the farmhouse, and the largest tree was half again as tall.

“You’ll find that Vespiquen build their nests in the biggest, sturdiest trees they can.” He explained as we walked down a well-kept forest path.

I wracked my brain, trying to remember as much about bees from my old world as I could.

“I thought regular bees liked to keep close to meadows where there’s a lot of flowers?”

“Ah, well, here’s your first lesson then.”

Takeo held up a finger like a teacher.

“Combee and Vespiquen are not regular bees.”

I shot him a flat look.

“No, I’m serious. Bees, Combee, and Vespiquen all have a very complicated relationship that most people don’t fully understand. You sound Unovan, have you ever heard of the old Galarian nobility system?”

Blinking, I nodded, even if I didn’t fully know what he was talking about. If Galar truly was this world’s equivalent of the United Kingdom, it was probably the same as the historical nobility, and a number of classes for my degree had involved the subject.

“Well, it’s a lot like that. Or vaguely similar to the feudal system practiced by ancient Kanto and Johto, like with samurai. The basics go that you should think of the Vespiquen as the queens or kings, the ones in charge. Or the Daimyo, if you want to frame it that way.”

“Okay?” I said, thinking about it. “So does that make the Combee the peasants?”

“Not quite. The regular bees are the peasants. The Combee are like the samurai, or the knights.”

Connections started to light up in my mind. “Wait, so the honey that the Combee collect is actually made by the regular bees?”

“Correct! Each hive of regular bees has a breeding queen, but it also has a female Combee to help keep an eye on it. That’s the knight looking over the fields of the peasants, and the Combee will fight off any challengers. They take their “taxes” in the form of honey, and provide it to their Vespiquen. The honey gets refined, of course, into higher grades by the Combee, which is where I make my money, but that’s besides the point.”

Another light bulb went off.

“Wait! Attack Order, Heal Order, Defense Order, those are the regular bees helping the Vespiquen?”

“Correct again. Vespiquen have small sections of their abdomen which actually work as a portable hive for bees dedicated solely for their protection.”

“What about male Combee then?”

“They’re more like a standing army combined with an engineering team. They handle the grunt work of getting things built and maintained, refine the honey, and help keep other wild Pokémon away. Have you ever seen a picture or a clip of a Combee wall on the internet or TV? Those are mostly male Combee, with a female guiding them.”

Zetian bobbed up and down in the air like this was all self-evident, and I was astonished by the depth and complexity of just this one evolutionary line.

Who knew what other societies had built themselves up with other Pokémon?

“So wait, if a Vespiquen is a Daimyo, what about Trainers or Combee keepers like yourself?”

“Ah, things get a little murkier there. We tend to be seen as something like an Emperor or a Shogun, leading the Vespiquen.”

“Weren’t the Daimyo of ancient Jap-, er, Johto actually the ones in charge and the Shogun were like figureheads?”

Takeo shrugged. “Maybe? I’m not very good at history. Some Vespiquen certainly tend to think they’re the ones in charge, however, pulling the strings from behind a curtain.”

I glanced over at Zetian, who had three entirely too-innocent expressions on her faces. I didn’t think that I had been manipulated by her, but would I recognize it if I had?

I’m going to have to be more careful from now on.

“Anyways, we’re here. Dea! We’ve got visitors!”

When I had heard that Takeo had a Vespiquen, I had expected her to be like the wild Pokémon I had helped rescue back near Oreburgh. I was completely wrong.

Pokémon weren’t all the same size. They were presented that way in the games, but it was an average height and weight in the real world. Venus, for example, was smaller than the average Eevee, although I personally thought that was likely due to poor nutrition as a kit. In addition, Pokémon Legends: Arceus had introduced the concept of the Alphas; Pokémon who were much larger and stronger than the average, who were the pinnacles of their species.

When Dea buzzed down from the branches of the tree, my first thought was that she was tiny.

She was easily about half the height as the wild Vespiquen I had met over a month ago, and her abdomen looked thinner than the other one.

But the moment she fixed her ruby red compound eyes on Zetian and I, I could feel the major difference between the two Vespiquen.

The wild Pokémon had possessed an air of authority around her, a regal feeling that was hard to put into words.

Dea, on the other hand, made the wild Vespiquen seem like a child playing princess with her dolls.

Every movement the Vespiquen made was exacting, precise in a way that would make military drill teams green with envy. The chitinous sections of her exoskeleton gleamed without a single scratch on them, and the parts covered with the fine hairs were perfectly clean and trimmed. Her eyes shone bright with intelligence, and there was a palpable Pressure about her that commanded respect and dedication.

I was gobsmacked, impressed that a Pokémon could feel so majestic.

Zetian was obviously just as affected, albeit in different ways.

On our way into Floaroma she had delighted in proving her dominance over a wild Combee, and I was just now starting to realize that was probably a result of the complicated social dynamics of the evolutionary line.

It would be like beating an enemy knight in battle, and having them recognize you as stronger than them.

Back when Zetian first started traveling with me, her mother had said that her goal was to grow strong and become a powerful queen of her own hive one day. At the same time, the strange, quasi-feudal society of the evolutionary line made it so that despite wanting to set out on her own, she was still incredibly loyal to her mother.

Then there was me, who had saved her mother and her family, then taken her on a journey to grow stronger.

In her mind, I was likely on the same level as her mother, if not slightly above it considering what Takeo had said.

Yet, the sheer authority of Dea was obviously making Zetian question her loyalties to her mother.

The poor Combee was practically vibrating in place, the top two faces staring enraptured at Dea, while the bottom face was flickering between me and the Vespiquen.

“It’s okay.” I said with a smile. “It's not a betrayal if you learn from her. Your mother wanted you to grow stronger, after all.”

If nothing else came of the trip to Takeo’s farm, it would have been worth it just to learn more about the social dynamics of Combee and Vespiquen. Now that I knew where I stood from her perspective, I could more easily figure out ways to help her grow.

Zetian sagged in the air, and all three eyes looked hopefully at the Vespiquen in front of her.

Dea seemed to smile, and reached out to pat Zetian on the top of her heads, which caused the little Combee to almost purr with excitement.

“Dea.” Takeo said, drawing the small Vespiquen’s attention. “Do you think you could show Zetian here some of the basics of being a Vespiquen, and a leader? She’s looking to evolve some day soon and hopefully start her own hive in the future, so if there’s anything you can teach…”

He trailed off as Dea bowed in recognition, and led Zetian away, higher into the tree.

“That was some quick thinking.” He said, looking back at me with approval. “A word from her Shogun letting her off the hook for any possible feelings of betrayal to her Daimyo.”

I shrugged, feeling a bit awkward at the compliment. “It made sense. I studied this kind of thing in school after all.”

“Oh? Interesting.”

He waited for a second, but when he realized that I wasn’t going to continue, he gestured to a couple of lawn chairs.

“Well, it’ll probably be a couple hours while they chat. I have some tips and tricks about taking care of a Vespiquen, and things I wish I had known back when Dea first evolved. I can go over them with you if you want.”

I did want to, a lot actually, but I hesitated.

“Thank you, I really appreciate all of this, but… is there anything you need? This has been a lot of help already, but I’m taking time out of yours and Dea’s day, do you want me to pay you or something?”

He started laughing.

“Oh, that’s very kind of you, but we’re good. Honestly Dea manages most of the honey gathering and refining anyways, I’m just the one who bottles it and sells it. She has some daughters who are looking to learn a little bit more of the business, so Dea will likely pass the duties off to them while she teaches Zetian. As for payment?”

He shrugged.

“It’s no bother, really. I’m just happy that more people are looking to learn more about Combee, and you seem like a good sort.”

Takeo’s smile grew a little more shark-like. “If anything, I’d just ask that if you and Zetian decide to settle down and start selling any of her honey, you come to me first. I work with a couple other local Combeekeepers in Sinnoh, and we’ve banded together to keep the big corporations away.”

I thought for a moment, then smiled. “I think that sounds good to me.”