The sun was setting over Violet City, and I was more than ready to wrap up this whole wild Pokemon war.

I stood with a small group just outside the western gate to Violet City. Edwin and Fearow were there as well, to manage the poke balls that contained Arcanine and Nidoking, and General Finnegan had insisted on attending too as the primary representative of Violet City. Pausso and I had been asked to come with them so we could manage translations, but everyone else had stayed inside. Not that they weren’t paying attention. When I looked behind me and up, I could see Florence and Isaac watching over the edge of the barrier that bordered the walkway on top of the wall, and I knew the others were probably watching as well.

Not that far away from our small group, on the other side of the rock wall that Sudowoodo had made, stood two hordes of Pokemon: members of the Nidoran clan on the left and assorted fire Pokemon clustered together on the right. There weren’t as many wild Pokemon out there as there had been before, and Jordan and Sudowoodo were also mysteriously absent; I hoped they had managed to escape. But the creatures that were in the field still outnumbered us, and they looked mad enough to make up for what they lacked in numbers.

Just behind me stood Nidorina and Growlithe. I looked down to see that they were both peering out from around my legs with big eyes as they took in the state of the world. That was right – when they had left their clans behind, the route would have looked normal, not all torn up and burned away. They had been gone for less than two weeks, but their world had changed immensely in that short period of time.

Edwin murmured something to Fearow and the bird squawked out a few loud calls that made the wild Pokemon shift restlessly. They had tried to attack us as soon as we entered the field, of course, but we were supported from above. The trained Pokemon up on the wall had rained down long-range attacks when the wild Pokemon tried to charge at us, which sent them scuttling back out of range. That meant we had enough room to do what we needed to do.

Finnegan gave a nearly-imperceptible nod, and Edwin pulled two poke balls out of his satchel. He pointed each towards one of the groups of Pokemon and pressed the buttons, letting their occupants out. Arcanine materialized in front of the fire Pokemon while Nidoking appeared before poison types, and the reaction from the crowd was immediate: the wild Pokemon cried out shrilly and ran forward to cluster around their leaders, talking up a storm as the two fully-evolved Pokemon tried to restore order to the groups around them.

After a few minutes of this, Nidoking turned back and nodded to me. I crouched down and turned to look at Growlithe and Nidorina, who both seemed nervous now that it was their time to shine. “Your turn,” I send quietly, gesturing towards the two clusters of wild Pokemon as I spoke so they would understand.

They looked at each other, then nodded. The pair walked slowly from our group out towards the two clans, keeping as close to each other as possible. The wild Pokemon fell silent as the two approached. Gradually, quiet muttering rose up from both sides, at least until the evolved Pokemon called for attention.

Then, as we had discussed before, Arcanine, Nidoking, Growlithe, and Nidorina told the gathered Pokemon the story of what had happened and explained what was going to happen next. Pausso occasionally sent me updates on what they were saying, and I was relieved to hear that it was exactly what I expected.

The war was over effective immediately, and the two sides were not allowed to attack each other unprovoked. The groups would take a day to focus on healing and rest, which both sides badly needed. Then they would work together to repair the land they had damaged. If the two sides showed that they could coexist without fighting again, the people of Violet City would return the captured fighters to them; until then the captured Pokemon would remain in their balls, safe in stasis. That had been Finnegan’s idea. He’d stated bluntly that he didn’t trust the clans to cooperate so easily, and holding the fighters hostage was a good way to make sure the rest of the Pokemon would behave.

Nidoking and Arcanine hadn’t been thrilled about the hostage idea, but they had agreed when it was clear that Finnegan wasn’t going to budge. Now they made a show of leading the discussion together as they each held talks with their clans, letting the members speak their views and answering their questions.

After a long period of listening to the Pokemon talk at each other (which got boring quite quickly, seeing as I could only understand the parts Pausso translated for me), Nidoking turned around to look at our small human group. “King. Nido, ni king,” he grunted.

B̴̗̚ö̷̬ṱ̵̊h̴̢̚ ̷̱̂ c̷̻̏l̶͓̈ȧ̴͈ń̴̖s̴̥͊ ̵͔͑ á̸̮g̵͓̃ṟ̸͒e̵̗̍e̴, Pausso sent to me. W̶̫̋i̵̹͊ḷ̸̈́l̵̡̊ ̶̖̓ w̴̗̾e̵̢̎ ̶̖̑ k̷̳̅e̶̥̕e̶͔͂p̵͓̆ ̵̛̬ b̷̨̆a̸̳͌r̵̤̈́g̸̭̔a̷͚͌i̴͈͗ṋ̵̒?̶̈́ͅ

“They agree to the terms,” I told Edwin and Finnegan. “Ready for me to do the thing?”

Edwin nodded curtly and handed off the two poke balls to me. I settled down onto the ground as Pausso crouched next to me, watching with interest. It was time for us to fulfill our part of the deal, and that meant releasing the two evolved Pokemon.

The concept behind releasing a Pokemon was simple enough: you just had to separate their internal energy from the center band. Actually making that happen was tricky, though. A Pokemon’s energy wanted to stay in the band; that was how they’d been captured in the first place, after all. So just opening the ball wasn’t good enough.

With modern poke balls there was a special way you could press, hold, and twist the entry button that separated the center band from the two halves of the ball. We didn’t have anything quite so fancy in our homemade balls, so I had to take apart the hinge, separate the two halves, then use my knife to carefully remove the tumblestone band from the apricorn half it was attached to. Once this was done I gently set the band on the ground in front of me, then repeated the whole procedure for the second ball.

In a matter of minutes I had both center bands sitting out on the grass, ready for the release, and I waved at Arcanine and Nidoking. Arcanine appeared in front of me in a shocking display of speed while Nidoking took a few moments longer to vault over the line of stones and stamp his way up to where I stood.

“Go ahead and touch the stone,” I told them, pointing to the right band for Arcanine and the left band for Nidoking as Pausso translated my words. “It might feel weird for a second, but once it’s done you’ll be free from the ball.”

They didn’t need to be told twice. Arcanine carefully touched a front paw to her band, and Nidoking leaned down to pick his up. They were both sucked into the bands, and I watched in fascination as light spun around the bands quickly. It started moving more and more erratically, jittering around instead of moving in a continuous cycle, and then –

With a ‘pop!’ sound, Nidoking materialized on the ground next to his band. A few seconds later Arcanine popped back into existence as well. I nodded as I picked up the two bands; they’d both gone dark, just as I’d expected. Now that the Pokemon had fully escaped the bands, they couldn’t be used for capturing anymore.

“You should be good now,” I told them. “Good luck out there.”

Nidoking just snorted after Pausso translated what I’d said, and he turned around and ran off to join his clan without a second thought. Arcanine paused, though. She looked at me and grumbled quietly, then said “Cani, arca nine arc”. Then, to my great surprise, she bowed her head towards me, then towards Pausso. I shot an astonished look at my Pokemon, and he looked back with wide eyes. When I looked back again, she had already raced off to rejoin her clan.

Ş̷̇ạ̸́i̶̳͌ď̷̟ ̶̠͆ ť̸̝h̸̨͑ä̷͍n̸̟̈́k̵̗̀ ̸̤̃ y̷̢͂ő̶̬u̸͙̓, Pausso thought to me. G̴̠̊o̶̱̒ō̷̗d̴͎̿ ̸͙͌h̷̭͘e̵̖͠â̷̞r̸͈͌t̴͓͆,̶͖͋ ̶͇̀ f̴͕̾ò̸̪r̸͙̓ ̵̜͑ ä̷̙ ̵̮̏ ĥ̴͚ṷ̴͘m̸̠͐a̸̼͗ń̴̤ ̷̨́ ḁ̴̾n̶͙̕d̶̨͝ ̷̟́ a̶͔̽ ̵͔̈́ ḩ̷́ú̴͎m̶͉̿ȧ̷̺n̵̛̤-̴̰̋b̸̦̃o̸͙͐n̷͎͐d̷͚̑ĕ̷̝d̴̹̒.̷͖̋

I grinned and reached out to ruffle the short fur on his head. “I think we have to take that as a compliment.”

I kept smiling as I watched the wild Pokemon disperse back into the woods, with the fire Pokemon heading north, the poison Pokemon heading south, and Growlithe and Nidorina walking in their own direction. But my smile faded a bit as I looked down at the two poke ball bands I held. I’d known that the release method would work, since Isaac and Charity had used it successfully on several Pokemon that we’d caught back when we’d first tested the poke balls… less than a week ago, actually. A lot had happened in a short period of time.

Anyway, I’d known theoretically that the release method would work, but it was one thing to know the theory and another to see it work in practice. Now that I had seen just how easy it was, it made me wonder. The gold and silver ball was hidden back in Azalea, and I still had no idea how to undo its strange lock. But I could probably release the Pokemon trapped inside if I tried the approach I’d just used. Was it fair to keep Celebi trapped in the ball for so long when I could free it with ease?

“Trainer Monroe, pay attention,” Edwin snapped. I jumped guiltily and looked up to see that Edwin was frowning in clear irritation. “We are ready to head inside now.”

“Okay, sure, we’re coming,” I said hastily, and I followed Edwin, Fearow, and Finnegan as they led the way back into the city. But my mind was far away, still trying to decide what to do about the strange device that was waiting for me back at home.

~

We all gathered at the military mess hall for dinner that night (minus Luca and Piloswine, who were still in the medical center), and Finnegan hosted us trainers at his lead table, which was apparently some kind of honor. I didn’t really care; all my attention was on the food. I hadn’t eaten a proper lunch, and after all the activity of the day I was ravenously hungry.

I was so focused on eating that I didn’t pay attention to the conversation at first. In fact, Florence had to poke me a few times before I even realized that Isaac was trying to get my attention.

“Sorry,” I said, feeling a bit abashed as I put down my chopsticks. “What is it?”

“As I was saying,” Isaac repeated in an infinitely patient parental tone, “if the two of you have no objections, I would like to stay here until the mass release is performed. It should only take a few extra days, and I think it would be valuable to observe the effect at scale.”

Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

“Oh. Sure, I guess.” Some of the fatigue and soreness from earlier in the day had started to creep back into my body, so I didn’t mind the idea of hanging around the town and resting for a few days. Then I looked around at the others, curious. “What is everyone else doing?”

Hisa looked across the table at me. “According to the good nurse, Piloswine needs to rest and recover for at least two more days. Trainer Luca and I are headed in the same direction, so I volunteered to stay and escort them back to Ecruteak once they have recovered.” He shrugged fluidly, and I resisted the urge to grin when I saw Misdreavus sneak around his side to nab a slice of meat from his bowl. “I am sure my apprentices have already gotten into some kind of trouble in my absence, but having the time to get out of trouble will be a good learning experience for them, I think.”

“I am planning to leave tomorrow morning,” Kiah volunteered in his quiet voice. He was currently occupied in breaking up a rice ball into small bites for Corsola, who sat on his lap, and he kept his eyes down as he spoke. “This trip has been most enlightening, and I am sure my master will want to hear everything I have learned promptly.”

“Ahh, yes,” Finnegan said in a too-loud voice from his position at the center of the table. “The mysterious Trainer Andres. I was surprised that he did not travel here himself to serve as your town’s representative.”

Kiah kept looking down, but his mouth tightened slightly. “His majū is bound to the water, so it is hard for him to travel far from Cherrygrove.” Then his face shifted to a small smile as he looked up and nodded at Isaac. “I expect he will be most interested in these new poke balls.”

“Oh!” Isaac said, nearly spilling the cup of water he’d just picked up. He put it back down and scratched his head. “We still have a great deal of work to do on them, but if he is interested, I suppose we can talk.”

“I will also leave tomorrow, though perhaps later in the day, once my partner has had time to rest,” Michael volunteered from the other side of the table. Hoothoot was still missing, which struck me as concerning, but he didn’t seem unduly alarmed; he just looked tired.

“May I join you in a training session before you leave?” Florence asked, twiddling her chopsticks nervously. “I would appreciate your insight in how to train Natu, since you have so much experience with flying majū.” The bird in question stood on the table next to Florence’s bowl and slowly worked her way through a plate of berries, and she looked up when her name was mentioned.

Michael blinked at Florence, then shrugged. “I suppose that would do no harm. Tomorrow morning?”

“Yes! Thank you!” she said eagerly. Then she quickly turned to Edwin. “I would appreciate any help you are willing to offer as well, of course,” she added, though without quite as much energy as her initial request had contained.

“Hmm?” Edwin responded as he looked up from his food. Florence repeated her request, and he glanced at Finnegan, then coughed. “Ah. Yes, I am sure we can come to some kind of arrangement.”

Huh. That was surprisingly accommodating of Edwin. Then again, he’d seemed fairly quiet all afternoon, especially after we found the missing Pokemon. Maybe he was just impressed by how quickly we’d solved the problem. I grinned smugly at that thought, then fished a slice of radish out of my bowl and waggled it in front of Pausso invitingly. He huffed and turned his head away, refusing the food.

From there the discussion shifted to talk about training regimens and all the different approaches everyone used to help their Pokemon hone their movesets. I ended up pulling out my notebook to take notes, especially when Hisa talked about how he’d worked with Misdreavus to develop beams with different types of energy. Perhaps Pausso could use a similar technique to develop fairy or ghost-type moves? It was at times like this that I most missed the internet; without the world’s information at my fingertips, I was really just guessing about what my Pokemon might be able to do.

I was surprised to see that Finnegan was actually interested in the discussion about Pokemon training, though he kept trying to draw analogies to training soldiers. He even got into a lengthy debate with Hisa about whether it was better to train a new skill intensively over the course of a single day, or break the training into several smaller sessions spread out over the course of a week. Most of the conversation went over my head, and all I really understood by the end was that Pokemon training was even more complicated than I had thought.

Eventually we finished eating and filed back outside, and Florence promptly dragged me off to find a quiet clearing where we could do our own training. It didn’t matter that we’d had a very long day, nor did it matter that we were still recovering from various small injuries; we still had to practice. So we put Pausso and Hoppip through sluggish move patterns while Natu watched, and we did a brief set of defensive exercises until I was ready to keel over from exhaustion. In fact, I was so tired that I managed to fall asleep while sitting upright during meditation. Florence didn’t even realize what had happened until Pausso started sniffing around my head. Then she accidentally dumped Natu out of her lap when she got up to shake me awake, and the bird reacted by sending out a burst of psychic energy that knocked Hoppip over, so the grass Pokemon retaliated by spitting a Bullet Seed at Natu, and – well, let’s just say that meditation didn’t go very well that night.

Eventually we decided that we’d tried hard enough and gave up on training for the day. We regrouped with the others and found that we’d been assigned a small room in the military barracks. Florence, Isaac, Hisa, and I would stay there and sleep on the simple futons that the soldiers used. I was overjoyed at the prospect of sleeping inside and on a proper bed, so I collapsed onto my futon and fell asleep almost right away.

~

Yet… it was odd. I couldn’t stay asleep for very long at all.

I kept waking up, and each time it felt like something new was wrong. First it was the noise that came from outside the building, the thumping of boots and occasional low muttering of men talking. Then I was distracted by a sore aching sensation along both of my arms, which made me shift restlessly; had the medicine worn off already? Then I woke up with a nagging worry pulling at my brain, like I had forgotten or overlooked something. But that was silly. Everything had worked out fine, and we’d be headed back to Azalea after a few days. There was nothing to worry about, surely.

Each time I woke up Pausso would startle a little. I had made space at the foot of my futon for him to curl up, but he had dragged his pillow up to the ground next to my head and insisted on sleeping there instead. One time I woke up to find that his face was right next to mine, which made me gasp and flinch away. He was clearly getting agitated, and I tried to send the feeling of an apology through our bond. I knew he relied on eating my dreams, and clearly I wasn’t providing much for him at the moment. He just snorted slightly and gestured for me to go back to sleep.

Then I woke up with a half-memory of something that – had gone wrong? was going to go wrong? – no, I had already lost it, as often happened with dreams.

And Pausso wasn’t there.

I sat up, put my glasses on, and looked around hurriedly, then froze. My Pokemon was only a few feet away, kneeling next to Florence’s bed. She had returned both of her Pokemon that evening after the meditation incident, so Pausso wasn’t talking to them. His trunk steadily drew in air from above Florence’s head, and I could just barely see through the darkness that the air he breathed in was tinted a faint color, silver maybe.

He was eating her dreams. After I’d specifically told him he couldn’t just eat people’s dreams without their permission.

Suddenly, I was furious. I scrambled out of bed, grabbed his shoulder, and whirled him around, breaking off the dream-eating. Florence gave a little shudder on her bed before she turned over and kept sleeping. Pausso looked at me with wide eyes, and for a moment I could tell that he felt surprise, and guilt. Then it was overrun by anger.

H̷̖̔u̷̦͆n̴̯̅ğ̷̠ŗ̷̛y̷͙͛, he thought flatly as he shrugged my hand off of his shoulder. His mental voice immediately sent a creeping headache through my mind, since the persim berry I’d eaten earlier in the day had long since worn off. Y̷͍͝o̴͔͋u̴̢͌ ̵̲̃ n̴̲̄ö̷̡́t̶̯̄ ̶̼͘ d̶̈́͜r̵̔ͅe̴̬͋ȧ̵̧m̴̻͘i̴̩̽ṉ̸͘g̸̦͒.

“That doesn’t matter,” I hissed back at him, trying to keep my voice down so we wouldn’t wake up everyone else. “You can eat other things! I’ve tried to get you to eat other things!”

N̸̥̅ò̷̮t̵̢̕ ̷̡͒ t̵̮͝ḧ̴̟́ë̷̲ ̴̲͊ s̸̬̊ả̷̝m̵̘͗é̸͚, he thought stubbornly. Then he turned and gestured at Florence. D̵̢́o̶̤̽e̸̢̍s̵̯̃ ̶̹͠ n̴͖͝o̸̞͘ ̵̨̅ h̵͎̀à̵͇r̷̨̄m̵̯͐,̵̼͊ ̸̭͊ m̷̦̑a̶͍̓k̷̪̋e̴̫͐s̴̻͒ ̴̨́ m̴̱̏é̷̹ ̷̡͛ s̷̅ͅẗ̶̨r̸̲͌o̵̯͆n̸̘̆ǧ̶̙e̷͙̓r̸̡͂.̵̗̐ ̸̞̆ W̸̥̒h̴͕̓y̴͍͊ ̶̭̽ n̷̯̓o̷̧͛ť̶͈?̷̬͆

“Because they’re her dreams, not yours!” I ground my teeth as my head throbbed. “We’ve talked about this before, Pausso! Eating people’s dreams – it’s creepy!”

Pausso froze for a moment, then narrowed his eyes. Ÿ̶͈́o̵̓͜ů̴̡ ̴̥̚f̷͖͠ï̶̟n̴̞̆d̵̬̚ ̷͈̅m̸̰̀e̵̮̋ ̴̞̔c̴̺̐r̸̪͝e̸͈͊ḛ̷̎p̵͚͛y̴̠͗?̵̗̃

“No,” I said immediately, though I was uncomfortably aware that when I’d first met Pausso, I absolutely had thought he was creepy. Some of that feeling must have crept through, because he huffed and turned around, laying his ears back flat. “Listen, we’re both tired. Let’s talk about this in the morning.”

I started to get back into my bed, but Pausso’s thoughts interrupted me. S̸̡̉t̷͔͝i̸̩̋l̵̼̏l̵̹̈ ̶̛̜h̵̜̚u̷̗͠n̴͕͌g̷̗͂r̵͙̃y̷͖͌.̷̛̣ ̴̱͝I̶̡͗f̸̯̈́ ̶̼̾ y̴̙͆ö̶̖u̶̩͊ ̷̝͘n̵͉͊ŏ̸̺t̷̮̋ ̶͚͗d̵͍̍r̴̡̈e̷̳͘a̵̭̋m̸̨̃,̶̞̃ ̵̞̔ Ḯ̸͍ ̴͓͒ h̸͕͝u̶̗͝n̸̈͜t̵͈͘ ̵͍̈́d̶̯̈́r̵͙͐é̸̬ā̶̪m̷͚̄ş̵̚ ̴̯͛e̷̻͐ḻ̴̓s̷̛͕e̴͎͋w̶̡̿h̵̫̃e̶̠̅r̴̩̉e̴͚͘.̷̜̍

I sucked in a long breath through my teeth, then looked back at my Pokemon. “Even though I’m telling you not to?”

He paused for a moment, then glanced over his shoulder at me, and his eyes were hard. E̵̝͝v̴͈̈́ě̶̢n̴̳͒ ̷̰̅t̸̡̔h̸̲͑e̶͉͒ṅ̸̮.̶̳́

Something inside of me snapped. I was tired, and my head was killing me, and I hurt all over from all the injuries I’d taken in the battle, and I wanted to go home, and the worst part was that home was starting to feel like Azalea instead of the little apartment I shared with my parents in my own proper era. I couldn’t deal with my Pokemon disobeying me on top of everything else.

I barely even thought about it; I just grabbed for the travel sack that lay next to my bed and felt around inside it until my fingers touched cold metal. Pausso’s eyes widened when I pulled his poke ball out of the sack. “Like I said. We’ll talk about this tomorrow morning,” I said dully as I pointed the ball at him.

Pausso’s eyes widened. Ḇ̶̎ų̵̐t̸̰̂ –

I pressed the button and he was sucked into the ball before he could finish his sentence. I stared at the red and white ball for a moment, which I could almost swear emanated a sense of frustration and anger (though that was nonsense, since my feeling of connection with Pausso had disappeared as soon as he was returned). Then I sighed and put the ball down on the ground next to my pillow. I was still angry, but there was also an uneasy feeling in the pit of my stomach. I’d occasionally had to return Pausso for logistical reasons, but I couldn’t remember the last time I’d kept him in his ball overnight.

But what else could I do? He wasn’t going to listen to reason, not in his current state. Maybe I could talk more calmly with him after we’d both had some time to cool off.

I probably should have grabbed a berry for my headache, but an illogical part of me didn’t want to feel better, so instead I slipped back under my blanket and spent a few minutes staring up at the ceiling with thoughts painfully whirling through my brain. Should I have said something different? Or should I have forced him to eat regular food earlier today? He’d gotten so stubborn recently, but was he wrong, really?

Somewhere in the midst of all these thoughts, I finally drifted off to sleep.

And as I slept, I had the strangest dream.