Everyone in our group was pretty quiet after the talk with the farmer. I was personally feeling kind of down in the dumps after all the talk about violence and death that day; it all felt way more serious and dangerous than everything else I’d dealt with so far, except for maybe those few horrible days during the Violet war.
Still, we had a job to do, and that meant that we had to plan what would happen next. We all huddled up next to the path that led back to Cianwood to discuss our options.
“We know where this creature came from,” Florence said as she kept an eye on Skiploom, who was drifting nearby. “We have directions from Esther at the apothecary. We should go up to that mountain and find its lair.”
“That seems hasty to me,” Isaac said mildly, which I quietly agreed with. “We still have not asked Trainer Sheng about the apprentice who was killed. We should at least gather that information first, and perhaps ask others about the dangers of the mountain as well.”
“I don’t know that we’re ready to go up the mountain even then,” I added. “You guys heard what everyone said. Whatever is doing these attacks sounds terrifying. We need to make some kind of plan before we go after it.”
“With what information?” Florence asked sharply. Charity nodded along in agreement.
That stumped us all for a little while, but Pausso came to the rescue. W̴e̶ ̴ c̴a̵n̸ ̷ w̷a̴i̷t̵ ̴ h̷e̶r̷e̶ ̵ a̵t̷ ̸ n̴i̵g̶h̸t̴, he thought as he gestured along the path. W̵a̸t̶c̶h̴ ̴ f̶o̵r̶ ̸t̵h̶e̴ ̷ m̶o̷n̶s̴t̵e̸r̶,̵ ̸o̴b̵s̶e̶r̸v̶e̶ ̸w̵h̸a̸t̴ ̴i̷t̵ ̶ d̶o̷e̸s̷.̸
“Like a stakeout!” I replied. The others all looked confused, so I quickly passed along Pausso’s idea.
Florence was not convinced. “So we just stand by and watch while it kills another person or majū, all to gather more data?” she said, her voice cutting.
“Obviously not,” I told her, rolling my eyes. “Umm… we can probably cause a distraction and lure it off in a different direction if we need to. That should work.” Pausso felt skeptical, but I decided to ignore that for now.
“And if it attacks us instead?”
I crossed my arms and mustered a bravado I didn’t really feel. “We’ve got plenty of majū now. All of them working together should be able to hold even the worst monster off.” I hoped that was true, anyway. “So we weaken it as much as we can, then we just toss a poke ball, capture the beast, and we’re done!”
Charity scrunched up her forehead. “Umm… how do we know the monster will come this way?”
“Exactly,” Florence said with a nod. “We cannot know where it will strike next, not with any certainty.”
I shrugged, deflating a little. “I guess we don’t know. But this is the main path and several of the attacks happened on it, so it’s more likely to show up here than anywhere else. It can’t hurt to try, right?”
Isaac nodded slowly, though he was still frowning a little. “If we are to do this, we must be cautious. We should select a location that will hide us from the creature’s view while still letting us observe it with ease.”
I immediately reached a hand up to where Echo was perched under my hat. “Can you go look for us, girl? Find a good place?”
She let out a reluctant squeak – the sun was still high in the sky, after all – but then crept her way out of her hiding place and took off to investigate the eastern side of the path. Florence still looked skeptical, but she also coaxed Natu into searching the western side using her teleporting hops, so it looked like she was giving up the argument for now.
We spent half an hour making plans, not that there was much we could do in advance. Our Pokemon eventually came back, and Natu led us to a small cluster of trees that grew next to the dirt path further down the road. The trees would provide cover, and in the worst case scenario we could try to climb them to escape.
… not that I could climb trees. And not that hiding up in a tree was guaranteed to work against this mysterious murderous Pokemon.
Once the location was settled, we decided to split up. Isaac and Charity went into town to interview Sheng about his lost apprentice and gather provisions so we could spend the night outside. Florence and I went from farmhouse to farmhouse around the outermost part of Cianwood to gather any more information people had and warn them to stay inside after dark, since that’s when the attacks occurred.
The information part was a bust; the farmers either didn’t know anything or told us wild rumors with no backing whatsoever. I mean, I highly doubted that the monster was over twenty feet tall, really. And if this Pokemon could actually flatten a building with a single attack, wouldn’t it have done so already?
The warning part didn’t go very well either. The first farmer snorted and shook his head, then turned his back on us to continue his work. The second outright scoffed and told us to mind our own business. It wasn’t until we got to the fourth farmer that anyone explained why the others had seemed so rude when we told them to be careful.
“We know about the danger, lad,” the stout man told me as he paused his work pulling weeds. “We know it comes at night. No one wants to stay outside after dark these days. But sometimes work needs to be done and ye do not have a choice. Ye can’t let the fear of the unknown rule your life.”
“But this is not the unknown,” Florence said, sounding impatient. “We know there is a rampaging majū. Your life is worth more than –“
“My life depends on these fields,” he interrupted as he paused to wipe sweat off his forehead. “I appreciate the concern, but I will do what I have to do.”
Florence kept trying to argue, and I eventually had to pull her back when it became clear that the friendly farmer was getting impatient with us. She kept quiet at first as we walked towards the next farmhouse, but when we had gotten sufficiently far away she hissed “I hate this!” out of nowhere.
I kept scratching Echo’s chin (she now clung upside-down on my shoulder, all the better to receive attention) and tilted my head. “What?”
“This!” She gestured widely at the fields, then at me and my Pokemon. “We are supposed to be trainers! That means people are supposed to listen to us!”
“I’m pretty sure they’re too hung up on the fact that we’re kids,” I replied stoically.
“The age of a trainer does not matter,” she said tartly. “If someone is able to form a bond with a majū, that shows they have capabilities and wisdom beyond their years.”
“You’re acting like all trainers are perfect, and that has to mean that we’re perfect,” I pointed out. “That’s obviously not true. I mean, I’m basically useless in a fight right now, and the team and I still have a long way to go with battling.” Pausso harrumphed next to me and I grinned at him. “Just ‘cause we’re better than we once were doesn’t mean we’re ‘wise beyond our years’.”
Florence crossed her arms and looked away, her forehead scrunched up tight. Snubbull was out of her ball and walking next to her; now the little bulldog looked back and forth between us, seemingly confused.
Find this and other great novels on the author's preferred platform. Support original creators!
“Besides, aren’t you always saying you don’t have a real bond with your majū?” I pointed out. “If that’s true, you’re not meeting your own definition of a real trainer. Maybe you should focus more on your own team.”
She swiveled her head around to glare at me. Then she turned right around and started speed-walking her way back in the direction of the town. Snubbull jumped slightly, surprised, and then scurried off after her.
“What?” I yelled after the two of them, confused and slightly annoyed. “Come on, it’s true!”
Florence didn’t turn around. I looked at Pausso, who had silently observed the whole conversation, and spread my arms out wide. “What did I say?”
He looked at me with narrowed eyes and slowly shook his whole head from side to side. Y̷o̸u̴ ̶ h̸u̵m̶a̵n̴s̵ ̵ c̵a̵n̵ ̷ b̸e̶ ̵i̷n̴s̴c̴r̷u̷t̶a̴b̸l̶e̵ ̶ a̷t̷ ̸ t̵i̶m̶e̵s̵.̷
“She’s the only inscrutable one,” I muttered. Then, at a loss for anything better to do, I turned back around and kept walking to the next farmhouse.
The next farmer shrugged when I asked if she knew anything and didn’t say a word as I explained the situation to her. She just nodded her head silently the whole time. The one after that practically jumped out of his skin when he saw Pausso trundling along next to me and refused to get anywhere near us. I eventually had to yell out our warning from a distance, though I wasn’t sure he was in a state of mind to listen. Thankfully, the two visits after that were straightforward. One of them even gave us a few of the yuzu from her orchard to take home. Pausso seemed curious about his; he split it in half and bit into it before I could warn him, and I laughed myself silly when he spat the fruit out and brayed in dismay at the tartness.
By the time we reached the final farmhouse the sun was a lot lower in the sky than I liked. Sheng had wanted us back in the dojo by mid-afternoon, and it was nearly that time now. I hurried up to the front porch with the intention of giving the farmer a fast warning and then leaving right away, but I paused when I got there. The front door was ajar, and I could hear agitated voices coming from inside.
“ – does not change anything,” one voice was saying. It was a woman’s voice, and vaguely familiar. “They will not see you. You need to accept that.”
“But they need help,” a second voice said fiercely, and I exchanged a wide-eyed look with Pausso. That was Captain Zuri’s voice! “You expect me to just stand aside?”
“Why not?” the other woman said, and a hint of bitterness crept into her voice. Now that I had heard Zuri speaking I could tell that this woman sounded a bit like her. “You have never let us stop you from leaving before. Just do what you always do.”
“That is not fair. I –“
A rustling noise came from the side of the porch, and I looked over to see that Zuri’s partner Pelipper had just landed nearby. The bird looked at me pointedly, and I found myself blushing. Right, eavesdropping was rude.
“Hello?” I said loudly, closing the distance to the door and pushing it slightly so it creaked. “Anyone there?”
The door was pulled the rest of the way open and two faces looked out. Zuri was there, of course, and the other woman looked so similar to her that they had to be related. They both had the same dark skin and tight, curly hair, though the new woman was dressed much more traditionally and seemed a bit stout when compared to Zuri’s leanness.
“Monroe?” Zuri asked, surprised. “What are you doing here?”
“Just doing the rounds, warning all the farmers about what we’ve learned.” I scratched at my ear awkwardly and glanced at Pausso. He twitched his ears and sent me a mental push, urging me to keep going. “What are you doing here?”
Zuri pursed her lips for a moment and drew in a breath before she spoke. “This is my family’s farm. And this,” she nodded towards the other woman, “is my sister, Amani.”
Amani looked over me and Pausso quickly, and I caught a look of confusion when she noticed Echo perched under my hat. Still, she bobbed her head politely. “Greetings, trainer.”
“Hi,” I replied hesitantly. Both women looked slightly uncomfortable and Pausso was mentally nudging me again, so I decided to just get the important part over with. “Umm, I just wanted to let you know that you should avoid going out at night if you can, ‘cause that’s when the monster attacks, and we think it’s mainly around this area. And I wanted to check whether you’ve noticed anything unusual recently.”
Amani’s expression didn’t change at all during the warning, so I was willing to bet she already knew and didn’t care. But she did gain a thoughtful look at the end. “Father told me he heard a strange noise the other night,” she said as she frowned in thought. “A roar, followed by a whirring sound. Perhaps that is related?”
That didn’t narrow things down much, but I still jotted it down in my notebook under the other tidbits I’d learned during the farm visits. A whirring noise. What could cause that?
Zuri seemed more concerned. “He is still working outside after dark?” she asked, her voice tight. “Why would you let him do that?”
Her sister shook her head. “As if I could convince him to break his habits! Besides, he cannot work at the pace he used to. We are all doing whatever we can to bring the harvest in on time.”
“If you will not accept my help, at least let me hire someone to help you in my place,” Zuri said. “Another set of hands would make enough of a difference that you all could stay inside in the evening.”
“They’ll ask where the person came from, and as soon as they hear you were involved they’ll send them away.” Amani sighed and shook her head. “I have spent too much time on this conversation already. Go back to your ship, sister. Leave us to solve our own problems.”
With that, we were all ushered out of the house. Zuri kept trying to talk to her sister, but the woman told her no one last time, then shut the door firmly in her face. The captain kept standing there for a minute longer, like she thought something would change; then, when Pelipper squawked at her in a concerned way, she sighed and left the porch to join me on the path outside.
On one hand, this whole situation felt like it was none of my business, and I had plenty of other problems to solve. On the other… well, I couldn’t just ignore what had happened, could I? That would make the trip back to Azalea super awkward.
“Are you okay?” I asked, sounding unsure even to myself.
“Of course,” Zuri said brashly. She flashed a bright smile at me, though it looked less sincere than usual. “Amani is being a pessimist. My old man may be stubborn, but he is no fool. If I go to him directly and offer help, I am sure he will eventually accept.”
Pelipper, who was waddling along next to Zuri, croaked out something that made the woman falter. Echo perked up at the other bird’s words and squeaked a phrase that felt like a question. Something about length of time?
“Earlier, your sister said your parents wouldn’t see you,” I said carefully. “Is that a new thing, or…?”
Zuri shot me a dark look. “You are prying,” she accused.
I shrugged. “Yeah, a little. I guess I’m worried. And your partner seems worried too.”
It only took a single glance at Pelipper for Zuri’s shoulders to sag. “It has been many years since I last saw them,” she admitted, “not since… I suppose not since I bought the Relicanth off old man Tsune.” She tugged at her scarf and looked away. “They knew then that I wasn’t going to change my mind.”
I hummed and nodded. “So… what makes you think they’ll change their minds now?”
She waved a hand airily. “I can be very convincing when I put my mind to it.” Then she nodded her head firmly. “Come, partner. Amani might not tell us where they are, but we can go looking.”
Before I could say a word Pelipper took to the skies and Zuri turned off the path to follow him at a brisk trot. I considered going after them, but then I glanced up at the sun and winced. I was almost certainly going to be late to Sheng’s lesson at this point. And besides, were Zuri’s family problems really any of my business? No, they really weren’t.
We ended up running most of the way back to the dojo, much to Pausso’s chagrin. We had come a long way since our first days in the past when neither of us could run for more than two minutes without gasping for breath, but he still hated jogging even more than I did. At least Echo enjoyed the opportunity to stretch her wings in the late-afternoon light.
When we arrived at the dojo I wasn’t surprised to find that Florence was there, but I was surprised to find a few others. Charity and Isaac were sitting against the wall of the room, which meant they had finished acquiring provisions already. Charity rambled on about something to her father as he nodded pensively in reply. I hadn’t expected them, but then again, they couldn’t exactly start the stakeout without us, so that made some sense. The bigger surprise was Tanaji.
“What are you doing here?” I asked the other boy as I sidled up to him. Florence looked over when she heard me, then immediately looked away again, clearly scowling a bit.
Tanaji had been alternating between stretching his arms up into the air and lowering them to touch his feet before. Now he settled back into a regular posture and smiled lazily at me. “I practiced here for a few years when I was younger, before I left to go to sea. Trainer Sheng asked me to come help.”
I blinked at that news. “You know martial arts?” Mentally, I facepalmed. I could have been learning from Tanaji the whole past week when we were stuck on the ship!
He shrugged and waggled a hand in the air. “A bit. I thought it might help with finding a majū partner later on.” Then he grinned again and waved a hand at Florence. “She seems to agree. She came looking for me and tried to invite me to the training session before I told her I was already going to be there.”
I looked over at Florence, surprised, but she still wasn’t looking at us. Come to think of it, she had spent a decent amount of time on the ship telling Tanaji all about her Pokemon and how she trained and cared for them. I liked Tanaji well enough, but I was personally skeptical about whether he would be a good trainer, by this era’s definition anyway. He was so passive most of the time. Could he really become a changemaker like the other trainers I’d met?
Before I could think on that further, Sheng appeared from one of the back rooms in the dojo, Hitmontop at his side and his apprentice Wei right behind him. The man looked us over once, nodded briefly, and then clapped his hands together.
I rocked back onto my heels and grinned, feeling alert and excited. I was more than ready to begin this kind of training!