~~~ Chapter 45 - Horizon ~~~
Two hours ago, Dawn was in her motel room, holding a blanket over herself. She'd drawn the blinds back, letting as much sun in as she could. Alakazam floated in the room with her. He'd reminded her, gently, ever-so, through her own thoughts: Eat some food. Which she did. She had brought packets of honey from Floaroma town, where she'd saved a man being accosted by individuals saying they were going to save the world, when she'd first started the journey, three years ago. At the time, Dawn had been able to dismiss the encounters with Cyrus' conspirators as one-offs.
Then six months later, before she'd even had her third badge, Dawn met Mars.
Salivating over the sweet sugar in front of her, a nagging thought told her that she probably shouldn't eat honey. It wouldn't have enough nutrients. Passing over the dried fruits, candy and conditioner she'd bought to ease the leavanny's mind, as a reward. Finally, she settled on an unovan nutribar. Didn't quite have the allure of the honey and fruits. Whatever. The honey made it taste good. The rest of the stuff was unambiguously for pokemon. She'd have to leave the stuff in the motel room, sitting at the edge of Cimmerian City. It would prove too distracting.
Right, she was in the hotel room, and needed to meet Looker in an hour. She had time to explore a bit, but out of force of habit, had checked herself in the mirror. She looked… Fine? A little bedhead, though, her hair was kind of short. She'd normally kept it a half-inch or so below her ears, which was where it sat back then. It was still sitting about that length, but now, she was considering letting her hair grow a few inches longer.
Right.
She looked into the room's bathroom. Right. She hadn't showered. She did so. Right. She checked her clothes. A blanket wasn't enough covering. Right. She hadn't brushed her teeth. Right. She hadn't brushed her hair.
She hadn't missed this many items on her daily checklist since… ever, really? Maybe when she had been camping? She loved her alakazam, he was clearly helping to direct her, but this was bad. She couldn't delay meeting with Looker today, no she didn't want to delay. He'd promised her as much time as she needed to prepare.
She was prepared.
Dawn pulled out her phone. She'd dial Lucian. He was probably the one in the best spot to help give her advice. She'd had to rely on alakazam too much to help keep her mind in order. She needed some human psychic encouragement.
She just hoped the Sinnohan wouldn't say "get another psychic pokemon!" In the meantime, Dawn could focus on the goals in front of her. And the checklist she just wrote down.
It would stave her off for a couple days.
~~~
Lanky held me in his arms, carrying me through the front lawn of the gym as he talked. When you don't understand the language outside of your name and a few words that you've learned to pick out, it's easy to get lost in your own thoughts. I'm not proud to admit it, but right after Lanky had picked me up in the atrium, one little puzzle piece slid into place, conveniently after I was panicking. Lanky was speaking in a quiet, subdued tone, as we crossed the immaculately green lawn of the front lawn of the museum, all while I was gratefully soaking in the beautiful morning sun's rays.
What I could gleam, were not the words, but I knew his intent. I knew his heart. He did not give up on me in my dreams. I could afford him some trust in return. Under the early morning sun, I relaxed the muscles in my arms, letting them droop a little. I recognized the meganium's trainer. She was at least a decade older than she was when I had played HeartGold. She had the starter I had chosen. Lyra, at least, had good taste. If I found out she had a ledian, that would definitely be cause for concern. I was a basic bitch otherwise. Bellossom, butterfree, Ho-Oh. Well, bellosom and butterfree weren't my Red-killer team, so maybe not.
Regardless, as things stand there's nothing to worry about, I recited to myself, the warming morning air having cleared the slight scent of tobacco as we bounded along the grass, approaching where Lanky had originally fallen asleep. The place where he'd left the silcoon, who'd moved, sitting under the underbrush. Lyra just had good taste in starter pokemon. That was all. I just had to hope Cresselia calling me a Dreamer wasn't too metaphorical. I managed to shut down the lingering impulse of manually taking a breath, at least.
Lanky and I had hit the end of the gym's front yard. We were at a small, three-foot-tall decorative brick outcropping. He continued to talk as I soaked in the rays. In contrast to finally recognizing the meganium's trainer, I did not recognize the girl with the alakazam. I could make a guess at what she was. Lanky had kissed me on the head. It wasn't hard to spot, or hard to tell. But it was the details, the differences that mattered.
What was different? Well, for one, I was reborn as a fucking leavanny rather than as a human. And it was great! No, I still didn't know who the girl with the alakazam was. But I did know what she was. She was important. As we had walked across the treeline, Lanky had given me a leaf.
I placed it on my skirt, like a sticker. He was still wearing the necklace I gave him earlier, so that was nice. It wasn't made of my hardened leaves, and would fall apart in a few days, but I still appreciated that he wore it.
Why would they want me? The images had been of the black and pink Latias, of Oust, of the mountain that day. They didn't want me. They wanted what I knew. And what I knew was very, very little for their tentacruel games. They wanted Oust. Would the girl with the alakazam try to catch Oust? Would Oust let her? We re-entered the gym. Lenora pulled us aside, before taking us into the back of her gym, her office. With significant effort, I managed not to fidget, as Lanky and Lenora talked. Her office smelled of other pokemon, of boring and books.
Not a plant in sight, the blinds blocked any chance of sun.
~~~
When Burgh and his leavanny re-entered the primary gym atrium, Dawn was meditating, playing their psychic games with each other. It took her a moment to retract—her alakazam had to let her know of the budding trainer's return. She pulled her backpack close, standing up. Burgh's face was hard for her to read. But what mattered most, was the leavanny seemed to have calmed down. Burgh talked to the leavanny, setting her down. She forced herself into a smile. If she tried too hard and showed teeth, it would come off as weird. Instead, she tried to keep the smile soft, as if to say "just a moment, this won't hurt a bit" like a nurse giving a kid their vaccine.
Holding her bag on her shoulder, a part of her exchanged words with the trainer, eventually deciding it was best to move to the center of the room. She didn't expect anything to happen. And alakazam didn't point out any anxiety in the leavanny. Though, the boy was clearly nervous. Another part of her had tried to console him, telling him he should probably sit next to it as Dawn "asked" it questions.
She didn't mind that he didn't want to sit next to it. Dawn had brought a little candy of her own for the bug. In the center of the room, she pulled it out, and gave it a dried sinnohan pecha berry. Her body across from the leavanny, sitting cross-legged, beginning with a control of breathing, she reached out to alakazam.
A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
~~~
Dawn sat down, cross-legged, angling herself in so that the leavanny was always in sight of her trainer. Sitting down across from Leah, Dawn eyed the bug, glancing over to their trainer. Somehow, she'd felt comforted by its presence, her own heart rate increasing. She was strong- far stronger than the leavanny was, clearly. Far larger, too. And with a better coat. All the anticipation, and she was, in a word, disappointed.
"Are you sure you want to sit on the bleachers?" she had asked Leah's trainer.
"I, uh—I trust Leah," he'd said. The voice wasn't confident, but Dawn didn't really look into the trainer's face long enough to analyze his expression.
Dawn had nothing to say. It didn't matter. She closed her mouth. Talking felt weird, but she could rely on the other parts of her mind to help. Scrunching her arms in her jacket, they began the first step. Closing her eyes, she recentered herself. Leah, to the trainer's credit, had decided to follow Dawn's lead, sitting across from her, eyes and mouth unmoving with a kind of stillness that not even her alakazam could manage.
The hair on the back of her neck stood on end.
~~~
It wasn't hard to intuit exactly what was being asked of me. I had enough context. I walked along with the girl, the trainer I'd seen on the mountain that day. Closer to the girl than I'd been before, I could smell the taste of her empoleon in the air. There was the smell of a third pokemon, a different one. One I could not taste, but it made me slightly sick. All I had to do, to get a passenger out—was think dirty, mean, nasty thoughts. All I had to do. Simple as that.
My vision didn't go black. Instead, there was a persistent pressure. In the back of my head. My vision had turned gray? No, I was in—I was in a hospital bed. There were tubes in my nose, and in my lungs. I'd always had trouble breathing. I'd grown up, at first it was asthma, then with further visits to the doctor, it was pediatric emphysema. It kept me out of sports. It kept me out of going to the beach. It had kept me—
I never was actually all that into pokemon. I had a couple of phases where I got really into HeartGold. Usually when I was passed up because I couldn't go to school dances, or was passed up for prom when no one asked me out, and the one person I did ask out, laughed. I had—
Bugs were always pretty cool. I had a terrarium in my room, I'd kept it since I was thirteen. I wanted to collect all the bugs first. See, bugs, they don't all have lungs. Most of them, in particular, insects, breathed through their carapace. But I'm a leavanny. I am too big to passively breathe through my carapace. I have to do it through my abdomen.
It was Easter, I had come home from my first year of college. I wasn't that far away from home, mom and dad didn't want me to, but also they didn't want me to stay at home either. Fine by me. I had an older brother, who was really into pokemon, but all his friends were jocks, and he didn't want to say he was still into it to my parents. Apparently they had asked my older bro what to get the two of us. Well, I hadn't thought about pokemon much, not since I was a little kid. I liked nintendogs. Sue me. There were no bug-collecting games. Or at least, they never wound up in my holiday baskets.
Somehow, one Easter, I got the game with the Ho-oh on the front. Brother got Lugia—
I was back on the mountain again, an alakazam was carrying me out of the stairs. In front of me, three gods of creation, each powerful enough to destroy reality on their own. And yet, they choose not to. A man—Cyrus was his name, whisked off to another realm, the portal behind him immediately closing, sucking in the vast majority of the crew's equipment along with him. That man, I'd been chasing them since I was a teen. They'd caused me—and all of my—beloved region so much grief.
The meganium's trainer. Her name. Lyra. She was older. Much older than I'd expected her to be. Right, I was—I was staring into the eyes of the alakazam.
No. This wasn't work—It wasn't going to—It wasn't working. Honey, right from the combee. I could already taste it. Would I even know when the girl entered my mind? How would I know? If I could just hold still for a bit, as the girl connected, there would be honey at the end of the tunnel. I just knew it. I could practically taste it.
Back at the nes— No. It didn't work. It wasn't working. It wasn't going to. I was back in a tree. I was in front of a bird, covered in shadow. Its form I did not know. Behind me was our nest. It wanted to eat the swadloon. I was tasked to protect them. I would protect them. I jumped, and with a single slash, I'd taken down the bird, its form dissolving, Bonk, Leaf, and the whole swadly crew's silent scents of relief immediately flooding in.
No, I'd shown too much. They just wanted to know about Oust! They just wanted to know where they were! Why me? I didn't know! I don't know, the last time I'd seen them—the last time—darkrai was giving me a thumbs-up. I can run, I can fight, I can play and I don't have to huff. I don't have to puff. I don't have to deal with human stuff. Being a human sucks, even if some humans are good beans.
I had—I had—Nasty thoughts—Nasty, nasty thoughts, what did that even mean? What was a nasty thought? PASSENGER LEAVE! I hate you! Leaf was biting me again. I shook my head. My head is my own, damn it! I don't want you, get out! No. I trusted you no this was, this was—
It was a nightmare. The world had gone dark. This wasn't my mind. The land was black where I stood. The carcasses of pokemon and human alike strewn across the ground. I looked down. I had a bag over my shoulder. Why was I here? I flexed my fingers. They weren't mine. I was wearing a beanie on the top of my head. Leavanny, looking themselves over, confused. I only had one pokeball on my belt. I pulled it off. The ball was empty.
There were people, pokemon, surrounding us. Mostly zubat, some purrloin, the humans were faceless. Had I killed these people? These pokemon? A man behind us laughed. The leavanny and I both whipped around, staring at the man. "These, Dawn—" the man said, standing on an altar of gold, emblazoned with gems of red—he was looking down to the leavanny, ignoring me, the leavanny opening her mouth to speak.
"These are the corpses of the war you've waged over the last few years," Cyrus said. "I am innocent. You know I am."
All that came from the leavanny's mouth was a weak "leaaaa", which then abruptly stopped.
The man turns to me, his suit glistening despite the ashen-covered skies of the dreamworld. "See, little Leah, she has nothing to say. Now you know the path she's taken. The truth she's kept. I am trying to make the world better," he says with a smirk. "And she—Dawn is a defender of the status quo."
The man held up his hands in the air. "See, Leah, you think it's all a game, don't you? These are real people in this world. Yours is not any less real than this one. This nightmare realm. Cresselia's dream realm. The pokemon realm. The distortion realm." Cyrus says. "It's not any less real than the life you've lived. And you know that. But you don't. Not really. You're not from this world. I endeavor to make a better one.
One without pain.
Without misery. Doesn't that sound so nice? In fact, I am working, even now. You're not special Leah, and don't worry, your secret is already known. Lanky knows your secret. The professor knows. Everyone else knows. You just told Dawn here. She knows everything," he said, motioning to the leavanny, who was rubbing her blades together.
I knelt down, to the leavanny. I put my hand on her head. She had no battle-skirt, but her leaves were dripping with a dark substance. I picked the leavanny up. If this was Dawn's nightmare, if this was her ultimate fear… The pokeball was in my hand. She looked away, but did not run. Did I need to speak? How do you end a living nightmare? You clench your jaw, you fix up your armor, and you fight your way through it. The leavanny was scared out of her mind. Not quite hyperventilating like I would.
I picked her up. I held the leavanny in my arms. I didn't have leaves. I didn't have anything to give her. I tried to smile. I opened my own mouth, and began walking. You fight nightmares by defeating them. How do you defeat them? I turned to Cyrus, looming over us, the leavanny turning to face him, by pulling out her blades. She was in no shape to fight.
"You're more scared than you smell. And you wouldn't know how to use that body. It doesn't fit you at all," I said to her. "That's not how we're going to beat this nightmare, honey." I told her, walking away, Cyrus and the bodies disappearing as we left. Instead, we were in a desolate, dry land, dust whipping in my eyes.
"The kid you're looking for," I said as we walked, and I held her in my arms. "Their name. It's Oust. I named them, because he was ousted from the distortion world. He's Giratina's kid. And I love him, all right? I love all of my nest-mates," I said. The leavanny stared off into the distance. Did she understand? I didn't know. I had to assume so.
"I like being a pokemon." I told her. "This body. It doesn't feel weird. It's hard to breathe." I said, coughing as if Dawn's body decided that I was supposed to be dying. I had to sit down.
"It wasn't even" I said, "just Emphysema " I told leavanny-Dawn. "But that doesn't matter," I said, "now does it? We're here now." Having actual lips felt weird, but they were going numb anyway. Gray clouds moved into the horizon.
"Hey Darkrai," I said, the leavanny immediately perking up.
A pool of shadow formed beneath my feet, lengthening, before turning into the cloud of white hair with red vest, body of black. The god of nightmares was nice enough to appear.
"Ach—" I coughed, trying to speak. "Dawn wants help," I said, "to find this Cyrus".
My face was going numb. Darkrai didn't speak, but instead, gave me a thumbs-up.
I turned to Dawn-the-leavanny, coughing.
"Keep a secret?"
~~~
When I awoke, I was flying in the air at remarkable speed.