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When he had jumped on the back of Basculegion and hurried to the ocean, his mind hadn’t had any space for thoughts about what would come after it. It was, probably, the closest thing to being brave he would ever experience.
So now that she had appeared in front of him in the middle of the night, Iscan found himself at lost with words. Not that it was unusual for him. He never really knew what to say.
“I’m sorry,” Palina whispered, barely audible, letting her voice trail into a pressing silence, not meeting his eyes. Iscan stared at her for a good while, before he realised she was unlikely to elaborate.
“Umm… No, no you’re, um… alright. Would you… Would you like to sit by the fire for a b-bit?” he gestured towards the little camp he had set up in front of his tent. Palina nodded and gave him a sad attempt of a smile as she slowly huddled up by the fire. Iscan followed and sat next to her, leaving a good space between them.
“I-it’s a bit… I don’t get many visitors….” Iscan started, but gave up on his current attempt to converse half-way through the sentence.
“H-how are you? I mean… are you hurt?” he tried again as Palina stayed quiet. She shook her head and the silence fell on them once again, only interrupted by the gentle crackling of the fire, and from further away, the white noise of the waves going back and forth, in and out of the shore. Usually he preferred the silence, but this time it was more an uncomfortable one. A nagging feeling that lingered on.
Although they had both resided on the Cobalt Coastlands for some time now, they had rarely interacted much beyond an awkward nod here and a hello there, just what you’d expect between two rival clan members that had a silent, mutual understanding to stay away from the other’s way. Never before had Palina wandered anywhere even remotely close to his little home.
But it wasn’t like before, anymore.
Iscan braved a quick look at his quest’s direction. She was keeping her head hung down and her eyes were drilled into the ground, strands of her hair uncharacteristically covering parts of her face while the lights and shadows from the fire danced on her pearly white Pearl Clan uniform. He wasn’t sure, but he was fairly certain he could see her crying silently behind the covers of her hair.
“I uhh I saw you had some company today”, he said slowly and poked the fire with a long stick, readjusting the kindle. Iscan had expected Palina to stay quiet, but she spoke instead.
“Irida…” Palina sighed. Iscan didn’t know the Pearl Clan Leader in great detail, but the hint of irritation in Palina’s voice struck him as unusual.
“I know she means well, but… she wasn’t here when it all happened,” Palina carried on suddenly, her usually calm voice sounding strained. “She… she… everything she says… everything she says to me at the moment… It’s just…”
Now, he wasn’t the type who would finish other people’s sentences for them, but this time it felt oddly appropriate to help Palina say what she didn’t want to stay out loud about her Clan Leader: “She just says the wrong things.”
Palina met his eyes for the first time that night. Iscan felt immediately flustered.
“i-I mean… Like you said, it’s um… difficult to uh you know, understand what happened.” Iscan started, and then turned his attention to poking the fire again. “The ocean has been so calm ever since. If y-you don’t live here, it’s hard to imagine the rage. It was like the almighty Sinnoh itself was angry with us.”
Palina studied him without much of an expression before looking away and the silence fell on them once again. Though at least, Palina didn’t hung her head low staring at the ground anymore, but gazed deep into the dancing flames instead.
“Do… Has anyone in the Diamond Clan… said anything?” Palina asked suddenly.
Iscan shot a quick glance at her, and as expected, Palina averted his eyes.
“The news t-travel slow,” Iscan replied slowly after a while. It wasn’t entirely a lie either, living secluded from the Diamond Settlement meant he rarely met others from his clan. However, he was fairly certain Adaman had already delivered the news of the Noble Pokemon’s passing to the other Wardens, if not the whole clan.
“I wish I could say the same about the Pearl Clan.”
“They umm… giving you hard time?” Iscan asked, suspecting he knew the answer already.
”It doesn’t matter”, it was barely louder than a whisper. Iscan saw tears now openly running down on Palina’s cheeks as she insisted on staring at the flames.
The next morning, after the storm, after he had dragged her and Growlithe out of the raging ocean - and only the almighty Sinnoh knows how he had physically managed to do that that - Iscan had sat at the beach fishing. The spot wasn’t really for fishing at all, he knew that, but Gastrodon tend to sunbathe there in the early morning hours, and they were there this time too. He had sat there, pretended to fish, imitating the curious noises the herd of Gastrodon made as they probably conversed between them about his presence. He had imitated the Gastrodon louder and louder, trying to push the sounds of Palina crying and coughing up water off her lungs out of his ears.
He got up and sat right next to Palina, close enough he could feel the tiny trembles of her body as she tried to hold back the tears. Iscan hesitated for a brief second, it was one of those seconds that felt a great deal longer than a second, before placing his large hand on her back. A million things ran through his head from ‘I was really scared that night’ to ‘I’m glad me and Basculegion had managed to pull you and Growlithe into safety’, but he didn’t say any of these things. Instead of words, his hand rubbed her back in a gentle circle motion as they both stayed quiet and watched the fire.
“I should leave,” Palina muttered finally, wiping her face quickly off the tears that had, for now, ran out. Now that Iscan hadn’t been adjusting it, his fire had died down a lot, and it didn’t lit up the area as brightly as it had been. “I need to walk back before the Growlithe realises I’ve been away… I don’t want to leave him alone right now…”
She got up slowly with an elegance in her movements Iscan hadn’t seen in a person before.
“Thank you… for everything”, she muttered and waved in his general direction, at nothing in particular.
Iscan got up and watched helplessly as Palina turned her back and took her first steps out into the darkness. The sunken feeling he had felt on his chest ever since Palina had stopped coughing up water and managed to ask “What about Lord Arcanine?” grew and grew with each step she took into the darkness. He had had to restrain her from running back into the ocean after her Noble.
“Wait!” Iscan shouted, and he wasn’t sure where he had found the courage. Palina hadn’t gotten far. “I umm, I was thinking I should walk you back.”
Although it was a small one, it was the first genuine smile he had seen Palina smile that night.
“Are you sure? Aren’t you afraid of Drifloon?”
“I’m not afraid of Drifloon… Well, not Drifloon specifically,” he corrected her, before adding sheepishly: “I don’t like g-ghosts.”
When he had jumped on the back of Basculegion and hurried to the ocean, he had been brave.
“You don’t have to.”
Iscan picked up a torch and lit it up with the charred remains of his little campfire. “I can’t let you walk back all by yourself.”
He half-expected her to laugh at him, but instead Palina, probably for the time the whole night really looked him in the eyes, with a small smile and her sad eyes twinkling.
“In that case, I’ll hold your hand. You’ve got no ghosts to worry about,” Palina said gently and closed the distance between them. Before Iscan could really react to what she had just said, Palina took his free hand in hers and intertwined her long and delicate fingers with his.