Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Dreaming of Pokemon was no unfamiliar thing to Ash. It would be no exaggeration to say that at least 90% of his dreams featured Pokemon, whether it be battling Pokemon, playing with Pokemon, watching Pokemon, in increasingly convoluted and occasionally nightmarish scenarios.

(The other 10% consisted mostly (mostly) of food. If we talked about dreams that had both Pokemon and food, however, that would easily encompass the majority of his nightly escapades.)

However, even Ash would have to say that last night’s dream was…strange. Strange in a way that most dreams weren’t, strange in a way that felt anticipatory, leaving him tense, waiting for something unknown with that familiar knotting something in his gut. That something that usually preceded some sort of impending change.

He’d made a promise of some sort, he remembered that. But the dream was fuzzy, fluffy and soft like cotton candy, fading like mist in the early morning sun. He couldn’t even remember the shapes of the two (two?) beings that had asked him for something important, only remembering that it was night, maybe, because there were stars. Stars like the ones he only ever saw when camping far, far away from civilization, on the road in the strangest and most far-flung of locales. Alola was better than most, but he rarely strayed far from the lights and buzzing noises of Hau’oli City, and even Professor Kukui’s cabin wasn’t quite far away enough to escape their glow. The stars were still beautiful, especially in the darkest hours of the night, when the sea was calm and the beach nearly swallowed by the tide, but they still didn’t reach the vast depths that he knew the universe could reach.

Sometimes, his legs still ached for the road. When that happened, he put his all into his daily run to the Pokemon School, like running harder would somehow replicate the sensation of hiking up barely-paved trails, like if he reached the next turn in the road a little faster, he’d run into something new around the bend.

It wasn’t that Ash was bored of Alola, of Melemele Island and the beaches and sand and sky, but seeing the same horizon day after day, after years and years of traveling was-

“ KRRRRRRRRRRRRR-!”

Ash skidded to a stop as something large and yellow and startlingly familiar flew into his path, windmilling his arms as he bucked forward, desperately willing himself to stop before he crashed face-first into -

“T-Tapu Koko-?” The guardian of conflict, as if responding to the startled yelp, unfolded itself from its birdlike shell, staring him down in that unsettling way the tapu always seemed to do. Like they weren’t looking directly at you, but through you, inside you, searching for something that only they knew. Pikachu barely stopped himself from slipping off Ash’s shoulder at the sudden stop, and was already perched on the tips of his toes, fur bristling and cheeks sparking in familiar anticipation.

“Does it want a battle…?” It wasn’t an incorrect assumption, given what the being had done the last three or so times they’d met - it randomly showing up to test Ash and Pikachu, battling them and finding them wanting, had almost become an expected routine by this point. He found himself vaguely amused with the distracting thought that nobody would blink twice if he’d told them what happened at this point (“Sorry for being late, Professor, but Tapu Koko stopped me and Pikachu for a battle!”).

He was shaken from his barely formed daydream as the tapu gestured at him, churring more quietly than he’d ever heard it. It sounded subdued - but urgent. It turned, darting back into the forest from where it came.

“...It wants us to follow…?” How odd - and doing so without stealing his hat first, like it had often done before.

The something in his gut tightened further.

He followed.

Ash coming in late to the classroom, screaming apologies all the way? Not unusual. Calling out Professor Kukui’s name, long and drawn out and stressing all the vowels in the same cadence as a wayward child calling for their parent? Also not unusual.

What was unusual was the circumstances that brought this about. Ash opened up his backpack and showed them - what was it?

It was small, yet somehow looked like it could barely fit in his bag, so intangible it was. Like if he opened it up any further, it would expand, and maybe fill up the classroom, or perhaps wisp away, like smoke. They couldn’t understand what it was at first, not without blinking, squinting their eyes and maybe, just maybe,

- if they looked at it sideways -

- it looked like -

- a cloud made of stars.

A story about Tapu Koko leading him to it, and a dream about two strange Pokemon asking him to take care of it - that was already believable, given what Ash had already dealt with during his time in Alola, but the thing in his bag lent more weight to it.

Especially when it woke up and began crying.

It wailed, and wailed, and wailed, a noise so inherently awful and incomprehensible that it made everyone cover their ears in an attempt to drown it out. But the sound penetrated their hands, ringing through their ears and shaking them down to their cores, making them feel that whatever this noise was, it wasn’t something meant for humans to hear. Even so, Ash lifted his hands off his ears, grabbing the Pokemon out of his bag to try and soothe it, rocking it in his arms like a baby.

It cried harder. And as the baby Pokemon changed hands, from Ash to Kiawe to Mallow to Professor Kukui, all of them employing the various wiles of parenthood to try and soothe its upset, all of them useless -

It caught sight of Lillie.

The ringing was still present in their ears, and the breakfast in their stomachs was still curdling like spoiled milk, so at first, they hadn’t realized it had stopped crying. But its eyes (those yellow spots there were eyes, weren’t they? Not just more miniature stars?) were shining brightly, and there was a shimmer in the cloud-like appendages that wasn’t there before, the purples and blues swirling faster.

Before anyone had realized what was happening, it cooed happily, a sound that not even Ash could parse the meaning of, and leapt at her.

“Huh? Uwahh!” Lillie, instincts acting faster than her still-reeling mind, leapt backwards, her arms clutching Snowy tighter and face paling. The being, realizing that she was no longer where it had aimed for, stopped in midair, hovering. Behind it, Professor Kukui had nearly crashed into the ground from where he’d attempted to dive for it, none of them having known that it could float. Even Ash himself had made a garbled noise of shock, his own hands having been outstretched to catch the child.

“Mou…guu?” This noise was softer, but absolutely incomprehensible. It sounded inquisitive, but Ash felt something twist in his chest, feeling like something was off. He couldn’t understand it.

Wait. He couldn’t understand it.

The sound was something alien to him, and a quick glance at Pikachu, one ear flattened against his head, the other perked up, quivering at an angle, showed that his partner couldn’t understand a thing either. It wasn’t simple incomprehensible babbling from an infant - this was some other tongue entirely.

“Gu…mo…moguu…” Its face (face?) was scrunching up, the arms (arms?) were curling up against itself, the whole body beginning to quiver. And everyone, no matter that they couldn’t understand its speech, knew exactly what was about to happen.

“Gu, guuu…uuuuuuuuUUUUWAAAAAAAA!!!!”

Again, the room shook under the weight of its voice.

“Again?!” Kiawe demanded, his own normally booming voice barely heard about the din.

“I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I’m sorry!!!” Lillie hysterically blurted out, not even bothering to cover her ears this time and instead curling in on herself and crouching on the floor, somehow seeming more fragile than ever. Like some part of her was ashamed, still, of this lingering weakness.

“Don’t apologize!” Mallow tried to console her, shuffling closer and nudging her with an elbow, hands still held awkwardly on her ears.

Apologies weren’t enough to stop the tantrumming, however, not until Ash once again reached out to take the cloud into his arms.

“I-It’s okay!” Ash yelled, trying to make himself heard over the din. “Lillie doesn’t hate you! I promise!”

And somehow, that worked. The crying died down, and the being un-scrunched its eyes, craning up to look at him. It made a curious sound that Ash still couldn’t parse, but he somehow could guess that it was asking if his words were true.

“I promise,” he repeated, his voice growing softer, but remaining firm. “Lillie’s just…she has a hard time touching Pokemon, okay?”

“I-I’m working on it,” Lillie chimed in, unexpectedly. She shakily rose to her feet, one hand still holding Snowy to her chest while the other tentatively adjusted the brim of her hat, keeping her face in shadow. “I can…I can touch some Pokemon, and I-I really want to be able to touch them again, so I don’t…I don’t want to be scared of you. I don’t mind…taking things slowly?” The last note was hesitant, hopeful. She took her hand off her hat and reached out, tentatively with a finger.

The cloud reached out with one of its shadowy appendages and grabbed on, firmly.

Lillie froze, turning white.

It giggled, voice high pitched and sounding like little chiming bells. The other arm waved wildly as it cooed, happy ga’s and joyful gu’s replacing the incessant wails from before. Everyone sighed in relief, as it eventually let go of Lillie’s hands and began making motions that seemed like a baby clapping its hands.

Its mannerisms were eerily human-like, Ash suddenly realized, watching it wave its hands excitedly at Lillie, reaching out even as she shook herself loose and giggled nervously. For someone like Ash, who found Pokemon far easier to read than people, whose mannerisms were sometimes exceedingly Pokemon-like at times, seeing something that should have been a Pokemon, making gestures and vocalizing like it was trying to emulate a person, while using words and sounds that sounded like it came from some alien world…it completely threw him off. For the first time since what felt like ages, Ash was faced with a Pokemon that he simply could not comprehend, that he couldn’t reach out to and immediately connect with.

Just where did this child even come from? What did it come here for?

The something in his gut tightened yet again. He didn’t feel like it would be loosening any time soon.

In the end, Lillie was the one who named the creature. Nebby, she said, after a nebula.

A gathering of cosmic dust, she explained, for the others who didn’t know what she was talking about. A cradle for stars.

Like he had the beginnings of a small universe in his hands.