“It must be related to part of the design,” Isaac said as he stared at a pot of water, waiting for it to boil. “There has to be some fundamental flaw that the majū are exploiting to escape.”
Our small group was currently spread out around Isaac’s kitchen. We had emerged from Slowpoke Well to find that it was raining, and though we had run back to the house as quickly as we could, we were all still wet, cold, and unhappy.
The fire that blazed under the stove was the best source of warmth, so right next to it was where I sat with Drowzee pressed close to my side. I could sense his grumpiness through our bond; it echoed my own feelings. I stared at the prototype ball that I still held in my hands, trying to think things through.
“The problem is that we don’t know what the problem is,” I finally said. Then I made a face. “That sounded more confusing than it was supposed to. The problem is… that we can’t see inside the ball during the capture. We don’t know what’s happening when the ball breaks open.”
Isaac drew in a deep breath and let it out in a long sigh. “Agreed. With no information, we can only make guesses as to what needs to be changed.”
“… and if we are simply guessing, we are just as likely to create new problems instead of solving the current ones,” Florence added from where she sat wrapped in a blanket next to the cupboard.
Isaac nodded slowly, eyes still on the pot of water.
I popped open the prototype ball and gently ran my thumb around the center band, feeling the bumps between the segments. Isaac would probably quibble, but I was willing to bet that the band was the problem. A Pokemon’s energy needed to run in a continuous loop around the band; wouldn’t all of these bumps slow it down?
It didn’t really help that I had a hypothesis, because there was no way to test it. And I still had no idea how to fix the problem, if that even was the problem.
“We do not have much choice,” Isaac finally said when the silence had stretched out uncomfortably long. “We simply must be precise about it. Make changes for a reason, then test the changes against the original version to see what works best.”
“That sounds like it will take a long time,” Florence pointed out.
I sighed. “Yeah. It does.”
~
I felt better after the water boiled and Isaac was able to brew tea for us all, but I still didn’t have the motivation to go back to work on poke balls. Drowzee and I spent the evening testing our mental bond instead by playing hide-and-seek in the house. The game was a lot easier when you could follow the buzzing in your brain to where the other player was hiding.
Florence, Drowzee, and I went to training as usual the next morning, and it was even more work than normal. Smith told Florence and me to work on core strength while he and Venomoth worked with Drowzee, so I spent way more time than I wanted to doing sit-ups, crunches, and planks. It didn’t help that I kept looking over at what Drowzee was doing instead of paying attention to my own exercises. He and Venomoth were trying to break into each other’s minds with weakened versions of their respective Confusion attacks, which made for a great lights show. And every time Venomoth hit him with a psychic attack I felt a corresponding ping through our connection, which was really distracting.
By the time we reached the house that afternoon we were all sweaty and out of sorts. I was groaning over my aching abdomen, Florence was rubbing her lower back, and Drowzee kept massaging his forehead. All I wanted to do was collapse on the floor and take a nap, but I forced myself to walk back to the workshop to see what progress Isaac had made that morning instead.
I stopped short in the doorway to the workshop. Isaac was there, yes, but he was sitting at the desk with his head buried in his arms. The bag of used prototype balls was still sitting on the table. Had he not done any work at all?
I held my arms out to keep Florence and Drowzee from entering the room, and after Florence peeked inside she nodded grimly and backed away with me. We didn’t say a word; the three of us quietly left back through the front door, then crouched down in the small garden that led up to the house to talk.
“He is getting worse,” Florence said, casting a look back over her shoulder at the front door. “At this point I do not think he and Charity will resolve their argument unless someone else intervenes.” She looked at me pointedly. “Someone like us.”
I grumbled and rubbed my stomach again. “What are we supposed to do, though? Tell her ‘Hey Charity, stop being a sore loser and come back to live with your dad again?’ I don’t think that will cut it.”
Florence smacked my shoulder (though not too hard – she was just as worn out as I was). Then she frowned. “I doubt it is that simple. If it was, she would have returned home already.”
Drowzee poked me, and when I turned to look at him he tapped his forehead meaningfully. I winced in reply. He and I had been working on communication on and off the past few days, and it was sort of getting better, but his mind-voice was still hard to understand and gave me a huge headache. My migraine from that morning’s attempt had finally worn off, and I wasn’t eager to renew it.
Still, I couldn’t blame Drowzee for wanting to be able to contribute. So I nodded and closed my eyes, focusing on our connection.
T̷̡͕̤̘̠̾́a̵͔̅̈̎͋̀̾͌̾͝l̴̡̛̞̥͖̿̄̇̐̈̀̉͝ͅk̵̦̺͐̇̌̍̌͂̍̊̃͝, he thought, and the word was like a shot of lightning through my forehead. I hissed in a sharp breath, and I noticed that he did as well – he must have been more mentally worn out from the morning’s practice than I had realized.
I frowned and rubbed the side of my head, trying to puzzle out what he had said. “Took?” He shook his trunk left and right. “Talk?” He visibly brightened and wagged his trunk up and down. Like I said, we were getting better at this.
“Talk… you mean talk to Charity?” Drowzee’s trunk flipped up and down again, then he cupped a paw around his ear. “And listen?” He trunk-nodded yet again, and I pursed my lips. “I guess we don’t have any other ideas… though probably she won’t want to talk to us either.”
“We will not know unless we try,” Florence pointed out.
So the three of us made our way through the town towards the Kurt house. Though we didn’t stay there for long, since the lady who looked after all the kids there told us Charity was helping on the farm and we should be able to find her there. Faced with the prospect of an even longer walk out to the farmlands, we decided to stop by a soba stand for lunch as a treat, and Florence laughed when I slurped the noodles from my bowl with a complete lack of elegance. Even Drowzee was curious enough to try a bit of my food, though he normally ignored non-dream meals.
Eventually we reached the orchards that we had gathered apricorns at not that long ago, and we were faced with a problem. The Kurt farm was huge. How exactly were we supposed to find Charity in all that space?
“I suppose we can simply ask,” Florence said, though she sounded doubtful. “Look, someone is by the well – we can talk to them.”
I nodded, winced slightly at how that jostled the lingering ache in my head, and walked up to the well with Florence and Drowzee trailing behind me. A boy about my age had drawn up water and was drinking from a ladle attached to the well. He turned to look at us as we approached, and I recognized him, kind of. After a moment of puzzled thinking I put it together – he was Charity’s friend, the kid I’d met when we’d first arrived in Azalea.
This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
“Hi, Joshua?” I asked in the uncertain tone you use when you think you know someone’s name but want to give yourself plausible deniability in case you’re wrong. He nodded. “We met a week or two ago – I’m Monroe, this is Florence and Drowzee. We’re friends of Charity.”
Joshua folded his arms and looked me up and down in a way that demonstrated he was completely unimpressed. “So you are the one who started this poke ball project she talks so much about,” he said in a husky voice.
“Uh, yeah.” I stared at him for a moment, thinking about how the Kurts were legendary apricorn ball designers, and here was a Kurt standing right in front of me, and was I supposed to get him involved in making poke balls? Would I mess up how history was supposed to work if I didn’t? I shoved the thought away before I could get too sidetracked. “We wanted to talk to Charity. Do you know where she is?”
Joshua’s arms stayed crossed, and his face settled into a scowl. “I do not think she wants to talk to any of you right now,” he said darkly. “You should go.”
I leaned back, startled by his sudden vehemence, and exchanged a look with Drowzee. My starter looked just as confused as I was; neither of us had any idea what had caused this sudden emotion.
Florence wasn’t thrown off at all, apparently. She just marched forward and got up in the boy’s face. “What gives you the right to make decisions for her?” she asked as she glared down at him. “If she does not wish to see us, she can tell us that herself.”
Joshua glared right back. “It took me three days to get Charity to smile again after you all went off on your silly rock-gathering mission. If you bother her now, she will return to moping for sure.”
“It was not silly, it was important,” Florence shot back. “And maybe taking some time to think instead of smiling all the time is good for her.”
“Do not act like you know anything about her,” the boy hissed, narrowing his eyes. “You parade over here and act like you are Charity’s friends when you have not done a single kind thing for her since you got here. Well, I –”
“Joshua, wait,” I interrupted, stepping forward to get between the other two kids. They were both bristling and I was starting to get worried that things would break out in a fight if it went much further. “You’re right, I don’t know Charity as well as I probably should. But anyone can tell how much she loves her dad. It’s not right that they’ve been fighting for so long. He’s really upset about it, and I bet she is too.”
For a moment Joshua stood still, glaring at our little group, and I was worried he would snap and maybe tackle one of us anyway. But then he sighed and slumped his shoulders down. “You are not wrong,” he admitted, looking off to the side. “She seems happier now, but she is still far more quiet than before. And she refuses to talk to me about her father.” He looked back at me then, and his mouth was set in a determined line. “Fine. I will show you where she is, and you will talk to her. See if she will agree to speak to her father again.”
I smiled, relieved that he was finally cooperating. “It’s a deal.”
We walked back through the orchards together to a different part of the farm than where we had visited before, with Joshua carting along an empty basket that had lain near the well. As we walked, I thought about what Joshua had said. I had to admit that he had a point; I had written off Charity as a hyper little kid and hadn’t bothered to interact with her much at all before. Sure, things had been busy with training and designing poke balls and trying to figure out how to get back to the future, but I still found time to chat with Florence and Isaac now and then. Maybe I should have done the same for Charity.
Then we took a right turn around a rusted old wagon wheel and I spotted her sitting under an apricorn tree and sorting fruit into two baskets. Her long brown hair was tied back in a tail instead of hanging down around her shoulders, and her dress had grass stains and dirt smeared on it. Maisy lay on the ground next to her, apparently sleeping. Charity looked up as we got closer and started to wave cheerfully to Joshua; then she frowned when she spotted the rest of us with him. After a moment, she pointedly turned so that she wasn’t facing us and went back to her sorting task.
Joshua sighed and looked up at one of the nearby trees. “Here – one of you can help me with this while the other talks to her. Extra hands make the work go quicker.”
Florence and I looked at each other, and she smiled wryly. “You should talk to her,” she said before I could say a word. “I will help with the work.”
“B-but,” I stuttered, “I don’t know what to say! It’s going to be awkward.”
Florence snorted. “Probably, but it would be more awkward if I tried. I am not good with people.” She tilted her head to the side. “You are a good listener. You should do well.”
I stared at her, baffled – me, a good listener? Really? – but she just walked past me to join Joshua at the tree. I stood still for a moment, scratching the back of my head, until Drowzee gave me a light push and I stumbled in Charity’s direction. I let my annoyance trickle into our bond as I glared over my shoulder at him, but he just sent back a sense of resolve and pushed me again.
Fine, then. I would try to talk to Charity, and try to be a good listener. I made my way over to where she was sitting with Maisy, Drowzee following at my heels. “Hey,” I said awkwardly.
She frowned down at the apricorn she was currently considering and didn’t reply.
I crouched in the dirt and twiddled my thumbs, trying to think about how to start. Should I apologize for beating her in the battle? No, I had nothing to be sorry for – we had won fair and square. Still, it was a starting point. “Are you mad at us because Drowzee and I won our battle?” I asked cautiously.
She flung her head up to stare at me. “No,” she said vehemently; then she pursed her lips and looked back down at the apricorns again.
I frowned, thinking, as Drowzee waddled up to Maisy and sniffed the sleeping Slowpoke curiously. “But you are mad that you didn’t get to go to the caves with us.”
She didn’t reply, but she did glower down at the ground more fiercely.
“It wasn’t exactly a walk in the park, you know,” I said offhandedly. “We got attacked – several times, actually. I’ve got a really nasty bruise on my elbow to prove it. Florence still has a gash on her arm too.”
No reaction. I gently nudged Drowzee; he had started to suck in the air above Maisy’s head, which made me think he was eating her dreams, and that seemed rude to do without permission. He flicked his ears, startled, then settled down on the ground with a grumble.
Maybe I had to try a different approach. “Why did you want to go to the caves anyway?”
Charity gripped her hands together tightly for a moment. Then she looked up at me. “You all do not take me seriously,” she said in a rush. “You tested the first prototype ball with the tumblestone without me. Then you all told me I could not come with you to gather more, because Maisy and I could not help.” She bit her lip, looking down. “And I thought you were wrong, I thought we could help protect everyone, but then when we battled everything went wrong. I had a plan and thought it would be easy, but as soon as the plan broke down, I panicked! I did not know what to do. And Maisy got hurt because of me.”
I opened my mouth to say something conciliatory, but the words were pouring out of her like a dam had broken and I couldn’t find a place to interrupt. “Papa always says he just wants me to be happy and safe and enjoy being a child, but that is not enough! I want to do more, to make a difference. And I may not have much experience but I learn as much as I can at school, and I have many ideas.” She clenched her hands into fists. “This poke ball project is important, I can feel it. I want to be a real part of it, not just someone who tags along.”
Sometime during her little speech Maisy had woken up. When Charity finally stopped speaking, the Slowpoke nudged the girl’s leg gently with her head, and Charity gathered her Pokemon up in her arms and hugged her tight.
I thought carefully before speaking – I didn’t want to mess this up. “I’m sorry that we didn’t wait for you to get home from school before we tested that prototype,” I finally said. “I guess I didn’t realize that the project meant something to you. I know it matters to Isaac, and it matters to me a lot too, but I thought you were just, well, there. Sorry.”
Charity pressed her cheek against Maisy’s smooth head. “I know it’s not what girls are supposed to be interested in,” she said quietly, “but I’ve always liked making things. Joshua showed me a little whittling when I was younger, and I love smoothing down a stick and trying to give it more of a design, to make it pretty. And I used to sneak off to the smithy after school to watch the blacksmith work, though I was never brave enough to ask him to teach me.” She sighed quietly. “You probably think I am strange now.”
I grinned – this was more familiar territory. “I love making all sorts of things too,” I told her. “I don’t think that’s weird at all!”
“You are a boy,” she said, her voice half-muffled in Maisy’s body. “It’s not the same for girls.”
I resisted the urge to roll my eyes. Clearly things worked differently in this era, but in my opinion those differences were stupid. “So maybe some people will think you’re strange. Well, they’re the ones who are odd for trying to say what girls and boys are supposed to do. If you like making things, you should make things! I can show you how if you don’t know yet.” Honestly, the idea was appealing – I wanted to be able to talk shop with someone who liked the mechanics of things, and among the other people I knew in town, Florence was distinctly uninterested and Isaac was way more obsessed with science than engineering.
Charity lifted her head slightly and looked at me. “What if Papa doesn’t like that?”
“If your dad tries to tell you what girls can and can’t do, I’m pretty sure Florence will read him the riot act,” I told her seriously. She smiled just a little. “Besides, he wants you to be happy, right? Tell him this is what makes you happy. If he really loves you he’ll understand, eventually.”
She still hesitated, looking unsure. “I do not think it will be so easy.”
“Maybe not,” I admitted. “But I’ll back you up, and I’m sure Florence will as well.” I paused, then spoke in a lower voice. “And your dad really misses you, Charity. He can’t even focus on work anymore. I think he just wants you to come home… and I bet you miss him too.”
Charity looked down at the ground for a moment, thinking. Then she looked back at me, and her eyes were determined.
“Fine. I will come back home, and we will work on this project together.”