Chapter Text
Whirl Islands
The sky was pink with sunset, streaked with amber and gold and filling the world with soft, dying light. Late evening had come. Originally, Paul had hoped that they would settle north of Cianwood, but the overwhelming number of Team Aqua operatives that had taken the town made it impossible. They had been lucky to evade the crowd of grunts and make their way towards these secluded islands. With a little help from Manaphy’s guidance, they managed to skim the ocean and towards the north east, navigating through some tricky whirlpools. Wailord’s size had been helpful in avoiding getting sucked in by currents, and they’d found themselves a quiet, sheltered cave near the coastline.
It hadn’t been difficult to make a fire; some driftwood had been drying out in the sun for a while, and May’s Blaziken had been able to ignite it quickly. Paul had some rope in his pack, and he used it to construct something to hang any clothes that needed to dry out. With their sleeping bags and outer layers drying out overhead, they were left with little else to keep warm but the fire, and so sat huddled over it together, neither shy any longer of glancing at one another’s previous wounds. May’s eyes skimmed shamelessly over Paul’s old scars; they resembled to her a roadmap for her future recovery and the way her own scars would look in the future. Paul looked to hers with a grim reluctance, as though haunted at the reminder of them. Manaphy had been weary, still drained, but much more alive thanks to May’s healing kit and berry selection. He swam cautiously, testing himself close to the shore, dipping in and out of the shallows to wave now and again.
“What a day,” May commented quietly, thinking of nothing more substantial to break the silence with. Paul nodded stiffly, not sure what benefit May thought would come from her saying this. They sat quietly in the stillness, each absorbing and reflecting on the events that took place, watching the fire crack and snap in amber coloured sparks. May occasionally ran her fingers across her skin grafts, unsure, and so Paul assumed they must have been painful. The fire crunched through the kindling effortlessly, and neither May nor Paul liked it.
“Do you have those pictures of the temple?” His question was said with a lowered voice, not in the mood for noise, and May nodded, fishing a slightly damp phone out of her bag.
“Let’s see if that advertising for a waterproof case deserves a lawsuit,” May gave him a wry smile. She opened up her phone gallery, finding the most recent pictures, and turned her phone horizontally to fill the screen with the image. Paul leaned across her shoulder to look as they scrolled through.
The images were as he saw in the temple, of an overpowered Kyogre, a human riding atop it with a circle in the sky, the way the red piping from the temple walls shaded and carved Kyogre out of the stone. It was ominous, almost frightening, and left him to pause.
“That circle,” he commented, pointing at it and squinting. “It could be the orbs.”
“The orbs?” May paused, absorbing that thought. “Maybe. It would explain why Magma wanted them. Maybe Aqua wants them too.”
“There’s only one in the picture,” Paul continued, “and we have one, and we know that Aqua has one.” May looked at him, watching the thoughts and ideas in his head slowly click together. As though sensing their conversation was turning serious, Manaphy popped out of the water ahead of them, landing neatly on the shore and began to toddle towards them. May smiled, her eyes crinkling a little as he approached. Passing her phone to Paul so he could continue to study the pictures, she extended her reach to the approaching Pokemon.
“Hey there,” she greeted softly, allowing him to settle in her lap. “Nice swim?” Manaphy nodded, cooing softly, making himself comfortable by the fire. Absentmindedly, May began to stroke his antenna, running them between her fingers.
“In the picture,” Paul continued, his voice a hush. He was squinting at it, trying to make out as much detail as possible. “It looks like whoever is on top of Kyogre is using the orb, and Kyogre is overpowering Groudon.”
“Well, that makes no sense,” May replied, frowning a little. “In all the stories, it says they’re equally matched.”
“Not like this.” Paul shook his head, slowly. “That orb might be something that powers Kyogre.”
“If that’s the case, that explains why there’s two,” May replied, adjusting Manaphy’s weight in her lap. “Because for them to be equal in strength…”
“There would need to be a second orb for Groudon.” Paul nodded slowly, agreeing. “We’ve got the red orb.”
“So the orb that would power Groudon, you’d think?” May felt helpful and smiled. Paul shook his head.
“No, think about the temple we just saw.” Paul scrolled through the pictures again. “All those red lines on the walls. Even Manaphy, look, he has this.” Paul gestured to a spot on Manaphy’s chest, that red marking on his torso that was so distinctive. Manaphy wiggled away from Paul’s touch, wanting to linger in May’s lap undisturbed. “It’s a pattern.”
“Huh…” May sat back, concentrating on her thoughts as best she could, but regularly coming back to how distracted she was by Manaphy’s presence. She poked the red spot on his chest, and he giggled, tickled by it. May beamed.
“Maybe the temple is where the orb was made,” Paul theorised. “By the People of the Water, to aid their God in being more powerful than Groudon.”
“You think?” May looked up at this, curious. “Do you think the People of the Water wanted Kyogre to win? Or wouldn’t everyone have wanted balance?”
“Hard to say.” Paul shrugged, turning off the phone and passing it back to May. “It doesn’t matter yet.”
“I guess knowing all this isn’t exactly going to help us keep Manaphy safe,” May nodded, sobering as she stroked the Pokemon’s head softly. “I wonder…” she looked at him, curious. “Manaphy, I wonder how you got so tired and injured.”
Having spoken more than he typically would, Paul kept his thoughts to himself. He wasn’t certain that he trusted Axel’s account, that he’d found Manaphy already weakened, but he was also aware of Manaphy’s status in the lore he’d been studying as the Prince of the Sea. He wouldn’t be so weak as to fall without cause, especially against someone he’d found relatively simple to beat alongside May. So he listened as May worried over Manaphy, impulsively checking him for injury once again. Manaphy smiled and spoke softly in return, his antenna glowing pink as he lifted them and pressed one to May’s chest.
May’s eyes went glassy for a moment, and her jaw went slack. Paul sat upright, alert and unsure how to proceed. It was jarring, watching someone’s consciousness leave them, but he wasn’t even really sure that this is what was happening. He was vaguely aware that May wasn’t there though, only a shell of herself as her being existed somewhere else for a moment.
Seconds passed, and she returned, her eyes softening and her jaw firming.
“So,” May mumbled, a little shaken. “I didn’t know you could do that, Manaphy.”
“Do what?” Paul interjected, more than a little surprised. “Explain.”
“Manaphy… has some powers that are a little different,” May began, turning to him with misty eyes. She wasn’t fully present with him yet, processing whatever experience she’d just had as she spoke. “When his antenna glows like that, he can… swap people’s hearts.” Paul raised an eyebrow, incredulous, and May laughed. “Trust me, it happened to me and Ash. We fully body swapped for a second, it was super freaky.”
“Disgusting.” Paul’s nostril twitched. “Continue.”
“Well, Manaphy just used something… similar, I think.” May shrugged. “Like, he showed me his heart. But in doing that, it was like… he was showing me what happened to him. Like I got a snapshot of his memories?” Paul frowned, thinking this over, and then nodded.
“So, what happened?” He was more curious than his voice and tone cared to convey.
“Manaphy felt a disturbance, the whole ocean has,” May explained lightly, her frown increasing with concern as the thought sunk in. “Everything is… out of balance; like they’re anticipating something bad. So Manaphy came here, to these islands, and went all the way down to the deepest point of these caverns to meet with a Pokemon there. A great, huge white bird.”
“Lugia.” Paul filled in, and May’s eyes snapped to him. “We’re on the Whirl Islands right now. It’s known to be the only place in the world where wild Lugia reside.”
“Oh,” May blinked.
“You grew up in Olivine?” Paul smirked. “You clearly don’t have a grasp on local knowledge.” May scowled, her cheeks pink, and she shrunk slightly lower.
“Shut it,” she grumbled. For a moment, she sulked, and Manaphy gave her a short, tolerant smile. May sighed, and crossed her arms around the Pokemon, deciding to move on. “Anyway. Lugia, ” she emphasised the name pointedly, “directed Manaphy towards the temple we were just in, to learn more. But Manaphy was super wiped out, swimming all the way from the Sea Temple, to Lugia, to the temple we were just in, without really stopping at all.”
Manaphy looked a little bashful at this, but nodded along. May’s eyes were pained, and she paused to kiss the top of his head.
“Silly thing,” she chastised softly. “When Axel found him, he was hiding near the passage we left through, hiding in some rocks that had built up over time. He used his Huntail to scatter them, and then the Huntail grabbed Manaphy and wrapped around him. Manaphy tried to escape by heart swapping Axel’s Huntail and Gyarados, but his Pokemon figured it out quick enough and managed to block him in. Then when Axel got close, Manaphy got all woozy and blacked out.” May trailed off, looking to Manaphy for confirmation. “Did I get that right?”
Manaphy nodded along, confirming.
“Good thing we came to this temple, then.” May’s voice hardened, for a moment considering the consequences if they hadn’t. “You got some good intel, and we got very lucky.”
“Something like that.” Paul didn’t want to contribute much else. It had been a long day, and he was losing the ability to take in new information. They sat in comfortable silence for a little while. May took a piece of spare driftwood and used it to poke at the fire, looking at the embers that sparked from it with a morbid intrigue. After a while, surprisingly gently, Paul took it from her and placed it on top of the fire to burn away with the rest. Manaphy’s antenna was tracing the lines across May’s arms again, curious and uncertain, and May let him and pretended it didn’t make her feel exposed.
“I owe you an apology,” May finally voiced. Paul glanced at her, surprised. “I do. You’ve been so nice to me, and I was so mean to you on the phone that time, yelling like I did.”
“I haven’t even thought about it,” Paul snorted, honest. May smiled, unsurprised, and shook her head to herself.
“Well, my Mom always used to say that apologies and forgiveness aren’t for the other person, they’re for yourself,” May carried on anyway, looking deeper into the fire. “To signify that whatever happened is past, and you’re ready to move beyond it. Whether the other person accepts it or is deserving of one, that’s their business and their burden to carry from then on.” Paul watched her, curious, but then nodded for her to continue. “I’ve been thinking about why I got so upset with you. It must have felt really out of the blue.”
“Not sure.” Looking outward, Paul looked up and focused his attention elsewhere. The night sky was opening up, the pinks and ambers fading into an inky black, speckled with stars.
“Well,” May flushed, pursing her lips as she spoke. “I’d just won a grand festival, and I figured, you know, I’d finally achieved what I needed to earn the respect I wanted. From my brother, from my…” she swallowed, like the word was uncomfortable in her mouth, “dad, from you know. You.” Paul tensed at this. “I finally did it, and then, uh, I felt like I’d won over Max, and Dad, but realising you still thought of me like some nothing girl who wasn’t worth remembering or hearing out, it really got to me.”
Paul didn’t reply, but closed his eyes, and May knew he understood.
“And then to hear you talking about how the reason you went to the Pyramid was just for research, and you didn’t care what happened,” May continued, her voice getting hoarse, “I just couldn’t believe that. That this person who I’d… watched, and kept tabs on, and rooted for all these years, who I thought I’d understood, was just so uncaring. I couldn’t accept that. I’d been cheering you on from a distance, hoping you’d get to prove to whoever you needed to that you were strong, just like I hoped I would. I wanted that for you so much, but then… I suddenly thought maybe you weren’t the person I thought you were, and that hurt, too.”
She paused, sucking in a long breath.
“It was wrong of me,” she murmured, “to create this simplified idea of you in my head and decide I knew it. The more time I spend with you, the more I realise there’s a lot more to you than you get on the surface, and we’re not exactly alike in how we go about the things we want to achieve, even if,” she smiled, almost sad, “at the root of it, I still think we’re the same. But even so, I shouldn’t have asserted myself like that and told you how you should live your life based on my own judgments. So, I’m sorry.”
“I knew all of that,” Paul replied quietly.
“You did?” May’s voice hitched.
“It was pretty easy to figure out.” Shrugging, he didn’t look at her. “You’re not subtle.”
“You are,” May countered, her cheeks feeling warm as she stared back at the fire. “Sometimes I think I’ve got you all figured out, and then sometimes I can’t imagine what could possibly be going through your head. I’d love to just…” her voice faded out, and she bit her lip. “See what you think, and feel. Just for a second.”
“Stop being sentimental.” Paul rolled his eyes. “I probably pissed you off too, when I hung up on you.”
“I wasn’t wild about it,” May admitted, laughing a little. “But I mean, I was yelling at you for literally no reason, as far as you were concerned.”
“Hanging up was rude,” Paul acknowledged. “I… apologise.”
May was quiet and stared back at him for a moment. Then, she smiled. “Why did you do it?” She asked softly. “I mean, if you knew all about why I could possibly be yelling at you.”
“I was mad at something else,” he diverted. Suddenly, he looked uncomfortable. “We should get some rest.”
“Right,” May agreed, but reluctantly.
Their sleeping bags had mostly dried out, and so they settled themselves on either side of the firepit to stay as warm as possible. Paul called on Torterra to block the entrance to the cave, large enough that he concealed their space and inconspicuous enough to simply sleep through the night there and keep them concealed. Manaphy slipped into May’s sleeping bag, wanting to keep close. Paul turned away, facing the other side of the cavern wall, and May stared at the back of his head.
While she fell asleep, she allowed herself to indulge, and imagine all of the things she hoped might be going through his mind that he wasn’t ready to let her see.
At some point, her eyes closed, and she dreamt about a man with lilac hair, a hard, determined look in his eyes, who kept surprising her at each turn.
The Open Skies
Static fuzzed noisily. Disoriented and confused, Axel focused on it, and used it to ground his other senses. There was something cold underneath him, gripping him with gravity, as though his flesh was made of metal and whatever lay below was a magnet. He could smell burning fuel, and it clouded the air and made it hard to breathe. Despite this, he inhaled deeply and slowly, his consciousness desperate to adjust. He could taste blood, and his mouth felt as though it was stuffed and full of cotton. For a moment, he tried to lift his hand to touch to his mouth, to test it and to assimilate it to the rest of his body, but the magnet pull beneath him was too strong and his arm wobbled limply.
Slowly, deliberately, he tried to open his eyes. The world around him was blurred and warped, and he felt motion sick from the adjustment. A soft noise sounded next to him, unlike the static, and felt almost human.
“You’re awake,” it acknowledged, sounding relieved. “Axel, can you hear me?”
Forcing a groan from his throat was the best he could do.
“You’re okay,” it told him clinically. “You’re among friends. We’re taking you home.”
Black shadows swarmed his blurred vision, and he knew it wouldn’t be long until he was lost again. Giving into it, trusting the words of an unidentified stranger, he lost consciousness again.
Route 115
The air was fresh, the coastal breeze empowering each step they took. While he had been the loudest to complain at setting off so early, Ash would also be the first to agree that the morning air tasted the best. Their path was framed with lush beauty, open ocean and sandy beaches out to their left and thick, wild greenery to their right, with wildflowers sprouting from sea-fed, fertile soils. Ash had never imagined he’d have the chance to travel alongside Dawn again, let alone travel with Gary at all, and so fuelled by nostalgia and enthusiasm his steps were bouncy and light. Pikachu took turns hopping from shoulder to shoulder, nuzzling his cheek against Dawn, using static to mess with Gary’s hair, or perching atop Ash’s cap with a giddy grin.
“There’s somethin’ about bein’ on the road with your best pals,” Ash announced, beaming, “that makes everything seem brighter, y’know?”
Dawn gave him a beaming smile, and she nodded, her eyes closing with the force of her grin. “Yeah,” she agreed happily. She hadn’t traveled with friends in a long time, not since they parted ways in Unova. “I know exactly what you mean, Ash.”
Gary looked across at them disparagingly. The bond between Dawn and Ash was one that had always intrigued him but also exasperated him. He’d never traveled with companions before, and the longer he spent thinking about that, the more uncomfortable this new dynamic made him feel.
“We’re lucky Meteor Falls is so close by,” Gary cut in, redirecting the conversation. He pulled out his PokeNav, double-checking their path. Route 115 would lead them directly north from Rustboro, which would take them right into the mountainous region of Hoenn and the infamous Meteor Falls. “It’ll only take a day or so to get to the mountain range.”
“Man,” Ash lifted his firsts in front of them, and pulled them in with a bend of his elbows. “I’m so pumped. It’s been so long since I’ve gotten to travel around Hoenn, and there’s so much cool stuff here I wanna share with you guys! Maybe we’ll find some cool Pokemon deep in Meteor Falls!” Pikachu became a little dislodged from his perch atop Ash’s head for a moment, thrown off by Ash’s jolt of enthusiasm, and had to scramble to regain his balance.
“I’m so curious to meet the Draconoids,” Dawn offered her own thoughts with a little more restraint, almost humming them between her teeth. “It’s like… a whole new world of possibility is being opened up, you know?” She wrapped her arms around her midsection, looked upwards, and smiled at the clouds. “I feel like through all this chaos, and misery and hurt…” her voice trailed for a moment, but she shook it off and tried to smile. “The world is getting bigger.”
Gary tried to hide his reaction, but Dawn caught it. He looked away, trying to shed his cynicism.
“I think you’re both fools,” Gary finally contributed. Ash and Dawn gave him incredulous, flushed pouts, almost in symmetry. “But maybe there’s something to being foolish after all.”
Ash softened before Dawn did, and he reached out to link his arm through Gary’s with a brazen certainty that caught him off guard. He offered his other arm to Dawn, who smiled and linked together with him without question.
“We’re going to get to the bottom of all this!” Ash announced. Pikachu cheered alongside him. “We’re going to make a difference, and get rid of Magma and Aqua once and for all!”
“Yeah!” Dawn beamed, her face breaking into bliss.
Gary, desperate to pretend he wasn’t flustered, blew a little hair out of his face. “Yeah,” he added quietly. “Sounds good.”
Whirl Islands
Quietly bundled in her sleeping bag, Manaphy still snoozing in her lap, she indulged for just a moment. She had swaddled herself with Manaphy in the synthetic material and leaned back against the wall of the cave they’d made a brief home out of. Across the floor, on the opposite side of the long dead fire they’d built, Paul was still sleeping. He was silent, stoic even in his rest, and his form rose and fall with slow even breaths. She remembered falling asleep, staring at the back of his head and knew this meant he must have turned towards her in his sleep. This allowed her now to have a rare opportunity to stare at his face and unpack all that he might be thinking underneath that same blank, harsh expression she’d come to be so curious of.
He ran hot in his sleep, she figured, as his arms were out of the sleeping bag and rested on the cave floor. Curiously, she scanned over the scars on his arm with fascination. She wondered if hers would eventually look the same once they’d settled, and if she’d ever learn the story of the scars that now paired them wordlessly.
Paul’s face was so peaceful in sleep, she thought absently. Finally, the almost comically ever-present scowl had faded into total, sincere rest, and his lips were parted slightly. Her eyes lingered on them. They were chapped and looked rough. She knew from their brief, calamitous kisses that Drew’s were soft. The thought sat uncomfortably in her chest, like this game of comparing them would end in painful, lurching hurt, and so she abandoned her thoughts and chastised herself quietly. Slowly, so as not to disturb the sleeping bundle in her lap, she began to gather herself up and stand, leaving Manaphy cocooned in the warmth she left behind.
She plucked her outer clothes from the makeshift clothesline Paul had constructed for them and pulled the white denim back over her biking shorts, and reverently returned her biking jacket to its rightful place, covering her arms from view. Her fingerless gloves finished the job. Torterra was still sleeping soundly, blocking their entrance from view, but there was enough space between him and the edge of their cavern walls that she could slip by him without disturbing him.
The rough, cold Johtoian ocean opened up before her, and she took in a deep breath of cleansing air. The sky was still pink with the morning light. She was surprised she hadn’t slept longer; the sun was only just peaking over the horizon. She sat clumsily at the water’s edge, skimming her fingers across the waves and thinking. A moment of privacy, to think, to reflect, to pause on her elation at her reunion with Manaphy, and to think of her father, and wonder if he would have been proud at how far she’d come without him.
A clearing of throat cut off her thoughts, and she hastily wiped away her tears at the sound, splashing her face with seawater to hide the wetness of her face. Paul hovered behind her, soundless, but waiting.
“You’re awake,” she said quietly. He nodded, thinking it was obvious. “Right. We should probably talk about plans.”
“Mn.” Paul wasn’t feeling particularly verbal, but dropped down to sit next to her, and passed her a familiar red fabric.
“My bandana?” She looked at him, surprised. May hadn’t even noticed she’d left it behind. “Thanks.” She began the process of knotting the bow atop her head, thinking as her hands moved methodically, the familiarity of the weight around her head comforting. “So, I was thinking. I want to take Manaphy back to Samiya. There’s a lunar eclipse soon, and I’ll be able to access it and make sure Manaphy and the orb are safe and concealed there. There’s no way that Aqua can find it without Manaphy, and that means the orb would be safe too.”
“Lunar eclipse?” Paul drawled, lost. May nodded keenly.
“The temple is only visible during a lunar eclipse, and one is definitely coming up,” May explained hastily, impatiently.
“Says who?” Paul challenged, skeptical.
“Says my astrology app?” May raised an eyebrow, as though this should have been expected. Paul’s face morphed from cool nothingness to a slight mortification, as though embarrassed for her. “Do you have one? Dawn got me onto it. It really makes so much sense to me. I’m a Taurus sun, Pisces moon and Leo ascendant. What are you?”
“I,” Paul said stiffly, “don’t know.”
“I can ask Dawn to help figure out your natal chart!” May’s eyes brightened. “She’s way more clued in on this than I am. I see Capricorn for you though…” She paused, strangely analytical, and leaned in closer to him as though to inspect his soul through his eyes. “Maybe I’m wrong, though. All I need is your birthday, your time of birth and where you were born, and then we can look at it together! I find it’s a really useful tool for like, self-reflection and growth.”
“No.” Paul said it bluntly, and May faltered.
“Oh.” She paused, pursing her lips for a second. “Sure. Uh…”
“Lunar eclipse,” Paul prompted, looking weary. He turned away from her to stare out at the ocean while she collected herself.
“Well, um, yeah, all I really need now is a boat to get to Samiya, Manaphy will help me find the right way to get there.” She looked down, not wanting to face him as she spoke. There was reluctance in her tone, both feeling dismissed and also as though planning the next steps of her journey were more overwhelming than they’d been before. “So I guess we head for the mainland, and then once we part ways I’ll just head for the closest port and try and find a boat.”
“Why bother?” Paul raised an eyebrow, for a brief moment looking confused. “We’ll take Wailord.”
“We?” May stammered, startling and looking up at him. “You want to come with me?”
“You were expecting me not to?” Paul was mildly surprised.
“I thought you wanted to see the Embedded Tower,” May mumbled, bashful. “I thought that… um, I guess I thought…”
“Don’t think anymore,” Paul cut her off coolly, standing and dusting off his trousers a little. “Get your stuff together. Once the sun is up, we’ll head for the mainland so we can get supplies.”
“R-Right,” May agreed, her eyes wide. “Sure. Um, we have about a week until the eclipse, but um, I’m sure with Manaphy’s help we can get there quick enough.”
“Let’s not waste any time.” Paul looked down at her, still huddled by the coastline, and for a moment, looked as though he was considering offering a hand to her to help her stand. May didn’t look for it and pulled her feet underneath herself to meet his stance. “Fine. What’s a Taurus?”
“What?” May blinked.
“I’m being polite.” His teeth were gritted as though it pained him. “What is it?” May stared at him for a moment, confused, but then she grinned stupidly.
“I’m an Earth sign,” she burbled, as though sharing secrets she’d longed to express. “I’m loyal, and grounded, and emotionally strong. I’m hot-tempered but it never lasts long, and I am very genuine. I’m not very good at putting up a fake front and hiding how I feel, but,” she smiled, as though it were a badge of honour, “I still have a lot of emotional strength! And I can tough stuff out!”
For a moment, the corner of Paul’s mouth twitched, as though he were about to smile. He sucked his teeth to stop himself and turned back towards the cavern entrance and the practicality of their plans. “Manaphy is still sleeping.”
“We’ll go as soon as he wakes up,” May offered in return, slipping back into their rhythm. “He’s been through a lot, he deserves the chance to rest.” Something about this sat poorly with Paul, and his expression dropped from one of their more positive interactions into some kind of long seated, resentful frustration. Before May could question it, he had turned away, a cool mask returning.
“Fine.” He didn’t sound it. “Go sit with him. Get me when he’s awake.”
Lilycove City
Putting down his phone with a click, Axel rubbed his eyes slowly. He was still weary and disoriented, but this was overridden by his desperation for the fresh sea air. Pulling on a light jacket to keep out the chill, he made for the door.
The cottage that Aqua had booked out for him was pleasant, if minimal. It sat right on the coast, and the external walls looked as though they were made out of thousands of pebbles stacked so carefully that a breeze could make them fall if not for the concrete undoubtedly securing them in place.
He was relieved to be back in Hoenn but frustrated with the events that had led to it. After recovering his body, Shelly had taken over the search and extraction process of finding Manaphy and the trainers who now guarded him. At first, Archie praised his initiative, glad he’d used his time out of the region in a way that was beneficial to the organisation, and showed initiative and promise. The aqua members who had abandoned him to work alone had been promptly demoted and returned to the lowest rank of grunt with little hope to progress. Failure to follow Axel’s orders, the consequences of their absence and the lack of commitment to their roles had left a sour taste in Archie’s mouth. Axel doubted he’d ever have to work with those grunts again.
Nonetheless, there was a touch of scorn and derision in Archie’s words as he expressed frustration at being so close, and yet so far. Axel’s failure to retain Manaphy was like playing a game show and losing, and the announcer turns and shows all the prizes that could have been won. Axel knew simply from the sounds on the other end of the phone that office items had been broken in a fit of frustration. At the least, the bare minimum, he was back in good graces and was being given time to rest and adjust to the injuries from hitting his head on the temple floor.
His path down to the shore was jagged and uneven, the crumbling face of Lilycove bending into the beach never allowing itself to be smooth or accessed with ease. Despite his nausea, he managed his way along, and found his feet on the pillowy yellow sand that caved under his feet, absorbing each footprint and lying to him that it would be kept. The beach was nearly empty; it was an overcast day. Grey swirled in the sky ominously, threatening to rain in the typhoon-like, heavy way that Hoenn did sometimes. Rain drops would be as heavy as fists, pummeling into the ground and thrashing it clean, bulbous and unsettlingly warm. Locals would know to scarper away from the shore and take cover until the weather passed.
Despite this, a girl with dirty blonde hair and a curved spine was sat hunched on the sand, staring out at the ocean like it had stolen her favourite toy and she was helpless to retrieve it.
As he approached, he felt his skin grow slick with a grin.
“Evelyn,” he greeted. “Or Madison. Or something in between?” Standing over her felt powerful, and the ability to crane his neck down towards her was something he cherished. Despite her better judgment, she did not make a move to look at him or to flee, or even to stand herself. She remained quiet, looking outwards. “So when you said I’d find you in Lilycove, it wasn’t completely dishonest.”
“Lies are best when sprinkled with small truths,” Madison told him quietly, almost reluctantly. Her eyes remained trained on the horizon, and on the grey, rumbling mass of the clouds that drifted there. “It helps smooth the process out. It becomes more fluid. Easier to remember. You just have to watch exactly how much you plan to give away to someone.”
“How much did you give away to me?” Axel asked, his hands leisurely finding his civilian jean pockets. Madison shrugged, finally tilting her head back and giving him a piercing, appraising gaze.
“Evidently,” she murmured, “too much.”