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Benga comes back to Unova once he hears of his grandfather’s defeat. The news alone takes six months to reach him.
It’s a slow night in the podunk town Benga’s found himself in, with just enough thunder rolling on the horizon that no self-respecting trainer wants to try a camp out. He kinda wants to, just cuz, but Volcarona won’t let him.
There’s a whole bunch of trainers taking refuge in the Pokémon Center; they’ve got the couches pushed together and every spare blanket and pillow turned into a massive fort. Benga’s got both a blanket and his Volcarona settled across his shoulders, the Pokémon’s unblinking eyes fixated on the card game some of the others are playing. It’s got a weird combination of normal cards and TCG ones and there’s so many rules he doesn’t get how they’ve been playing for this long without any fights.
“You ever been to Unova?” the girl next to him says without bothering to look up from her laptop. Benga bites into a Pecha Berry and blinks owlishly whenever she taps him on the shoulder and asks again. When he tries to respond— even though it’s not his fault she decided the best time to ask a question was right after he stuffed his face— she frowns, so he just nods instead.
“It’s got a new champ: some random kid. I can’t find much info on the old one cuz all the news sites are just talking about how he pulled a castle out from under the Pokémon League. He disappeared off the face of the planet after he lost.”
“No way!” he shouts just barely after he manages to swallow, spit flying everywhere as he leans up against her and squints down at her laptop. And sure as shit, the headline reads Everything You Need to Know About Unova’s New Champ (and the New, New Champion). There’s a photo right underneath the headline too: some guy with green hair surrounded by a bunch of old guys in weird hats, and behind them an even larger group of people in the background all dressed in white.
Oh okay. So she wasn’t talking about Gramps. But still!
“You’re kidding, those guys pulled a castle outta nowhere?” He pauses, thinking. “I mean, I guess it would take a lot of people to do it— how big are we talking?”
She looks at him with the same expression that his old school nurse gave him when he told her that it’s not that big a deal he knocked out his two front teeth on a dare because they grew back anyways. But unlike the nurse, the corner of this girl’s mouth curls up into a smile and she rolls her eyes, nudging the laptop towards him. “Figure it out yourself. You know how to read, don’t you?”
“Duh!”
He skims the one she has pulled up and clicks around a little bit more on the website onto a different one about how those Team Plasma people stole from the Nacrene Museum, then more boring stuff about a big blackout in some city in Kalos and how the Battle Tents had to shut down for a bit because of a tropical storm building around Hoenn. Benga hands the laptop back and snags another handful of chips.
It’s a few more hours before the storm really hits and everyone starts heading to bed. Nurse Joy dims the lights even more and Chansey tucks in some of the younger kids with a kiss to the forehead and a cheery “Chaaansey!” before skittering off into the back after Joy.
Benga rests his head on Dragonite’s tail and falls asleep before anyone else’s snorting hits his ears, which is a total win.
He’s up and out of the Pokémon Center before sunrise, so the hike to the next town over is pretty muddy. And it’s a waterside town with friendly locals and Chinchou you can fish up outta the harbor but there isn’t like… an airport or anything? So, Benga does what he always has and lets his feet lead him instead of his head.
There’s a Mom and Pop shop down by the shore that gives him tons of food for cheap. Volcarona doesn’t seem to like the colorful blocks that the old lady owner keeps trying to feed it, chewing politely until she’s turned her back and then spitting them out as charred, smoking lumps.
When he pays and leaves he wanders around the beach and fights a few kids in floaties who look at him funny. Most of them are pretty whiny when they lose but one of the girls— she’s got a Marill-shaped beach ball— puffs out her chest and tells him that he should sail away and never come back. When Benga asks her how, she points him in the direction of the ferry docks and hits him in the back of the head with her ball as he walks away.
The first ferry out of town brings him to a nice bustling city, and where there’s big busy cities there’s always an airport.
And then, he’s home.
Well, not home home but it’s close enough. Plus, he actually knows where to go from here. They soar to Floccesy and Dragonite drops him off at the bottleneck between town and Route 20. A flock of Mareep pass by lazily, a pair of Herdier guiding them up towards the ranch.
“Gramps! I’m back!” he shouts into the house, kicking off his sandals. There isn’t a response except for his own voice echoing off the walls.
Oh well! Benga releases his partners from their Pokéballs and collapses onto the couch which is just as comfortable as he remembers, even when Volcarona is taking up half of it.
He’s asleep before he even really realizes it. And he’s woken up after what feels like two seconds.
“What brings you here, firecracker?”
Benga cracks open his eyes, but he doesn’t even really need to. He’s met a lot of different trainers that were strong, but he only needs one hand to count the types that can fill a room with their power and presence alone. His grandfather will always be at the top of that list.
“Had to make sure your sorry butt was still worth its salt! Duh! And I wanna meet the dude who beat you— you guys talk still?”
A grin stretches across Alder’s face and he laughs: rich and deep and right from the gut. “Not at all. Barely even knew the kid's name.”
“You barely know my name, Grampa.”
He shrugs sort of half-heartedly but doesn’t deny it. “You learn any new tricks while you were away?”
“None I’d ever tell you about.”
They barely manage to get out of the house before they throw out their first attacks. Dragonite roars from deep in its chest, wings whipping up the beginnings of a storm as Escavalier strikes its lances together before rushing forward. Wind whips through his hair as the two Pokémon meet, and Benga relishes in the harsh sound of steel against scales.
He used to dread battles against his grandfather. They were great for a while, a really long while, but sometimes you grow out of the things that work when you’re a kid.
That’s all gone now. Which surprises him in a lot of ways, but it’s not like he’s complaining.
He loses with gusto and a smile on his face, the air cooling just a little as his Volcarona faints and falls to the ground. Benga digs into his pockets and pulls out a cluster of herbs that leave a bitter powder on his fingers; Volcarona’s not too happy to get that instead of a normal Revive, but beggars can’t be choosers. It flits over to Alder’s side and together their Volcarona dance around one another, fiery scales flying off their wings and fizzling out into ash as they flutter towards the ground.
Benga wasn’t sure how long he was asleep, but it’s only now that he notices how dark it is outside, a few of the stars already winking down at them. His stomach rumbles ominously and Alder laughs at him as they head back inside.
For… a long time after he comes home, they talk a lot about not much at all. And like, if something was really wrong Gramps would say it, so it doesn’t really matter.
They battle again and again, and it’s everything he’s been missing.
Spring turns into summer and the Deerling herds start to migrate back north up towards Mistralton. They graze on every tree, bush, and grass around town as they pass through, and Gramps manages to catch one that loiters in their front yard with nothing but his bare hands and gentle voice.
Gramps is gone a lot, and when he does come home he’s always got dried mud caked onto his shoes and legs that flakes off with every step. He eats dinner most nights and sometimes they’ll battle but Gramps usually just goes to bed before the sun sets. And he’s old, yeah, but he’s usually not that old. So after a few days of this Benga gets up with the sun and follows Alder out of the house.
They end up flying to Driftveil and touching down just south of it at the Cold Storage— or at least what’s left of it. There’s construction equipment everywhere and all the… storage stuff is gone, and the pavement’s been ripped up so the ground’s turned into this half-frozen slushy mix. There’s some guys in suits watching from the sidelines as a group of Pokémon rangers guide the few remaining wild Pokémon up and out of the construction site, chucking Pokéballs at a few of the particularly stubborn ones. One of those guys in suits gives them a weird look as they pick their way across the field towards a guy in a hard hat and a clipboard.
“Isn’t all this the new Champion’s job?” Benga asks, eyeing the Pokémon League logo that’s on some important-looking boxes.
“There isn’t a new Champion.”
”There were just like two of them!”
“Not anymore, I’m afraid.”
“Why’d they leave?”
“I’m not too sure of that myself, Firecracker.”
“How come you never did any of this stuff before?”
Alder shrugs. “Guess the League’s just comin’ to collect 15 years worth of work from me before I leave for good.”
“Ha! It’ll never be for good.”
Standing around listening to Gramps talk with the construction guy is like, the most boring thing to do ever, so Benga marches his way over to the Pokémon rangers. They don’t say much to him but they let him and Volcarona help, coaxing a Stoutand and its pups out from underneath a bunch of scaffolding.
The next few days are pretty much the same thing. One of the rangers— he thinks her name is Lily?— lets him tag along as they finish clearing out the wild Pokémon. There’s not much for him to do after that because the boring construction starts up again, so he spends most of his time keeping dumb trainers out of Reversal Mountain and Victory Road. Most of them are good fights, but the scent of challenge on the breeze is never all that strong. It sends an uncomfortable itching along his skin, prickling in anticipation.
Benga doesn’t remember where he hears about it first, but that doesn’t really matter. Because while he was gone, while everyone was still sorta picking up all the pieces of the Team Plasma stuff, Unova’s Challenge opened.
Once he finally gets an actual name out of an ace trainer— the Whitetree Hollow— it isn’t hard to figure out where to go. Benga doesn’t know who or how it's decided that he’s good enough to challenge, but the lady at the front lets him in. The trip down is loud, the red elevator and its chain pulley system rattling obnoxiously.
He goes in for a good fight, and gets his butt kicked. The lady at the desk doesn’t seem that surprised to see him and greets him with a smile when he’s forced to return to the surface.
Benga leaves, and he’s back bright and early the next morning to try again.
He gets a little further than the last time. But it’s not much: they’re stronger than him. Maybe not one on one but all the trainers on a floor work together, one living, breathing organism that’s nearly unbeatable. The trainers start to recognize him by attempt number five and it’s around then that he realizes how much they’re learning him. Eh. It’s okay.
Benga’s not about to let this get away from him— from them. Something’s ignited within him: a hunger that’s mirrored in his Pokémon. They all want this now and he wasn’t going to let them down.
He takes a break for a little bit, enough to get his hands on those rare berries and items that the high-ranked trainers are always going on about. Dragonite likes balancing his new Life Orb on nose like a Dewgong doing tricks. After that they challenge the Treehollow a few more times and finally manage to get past Frederick. To celebrate he has dinner in Striaton with his Pokémon and goes wandering around the streets once they’re done, only getting a little lost before ending up in the Dreamyard.
A thick blanket of fog coats the whole of the yard, weaving through its crumbling stone walls and exposed points of rusted rebar. The whole clearing is oddly silent: Benga knows that the city’s just a stones throw to the west and that it doesn’t really make sense for none of its sounds to be bleeding into the yard. But even with that weirdness ignored, there’s no Pokémon! Anywhere! There’s supposed to be Liepard and Purrloin stalking around every corner and watching him with their too-sharp eyes from where they’re tucked away in the grass, and Golbat swooping in to ambush him from above. But there’s not.
All this fog just means better ambushes, but to be honest Benga isn’t really sure that it is fog to begin with: it’s got a briny smell to it but they’re not close enough to the ocean for that to make any sense. So maybe that’s why.
And then, almost to spite him, a flash of blue peeks through the not-fog and slices through it with ease and leaving a curling path of mist in its wake. It might’ve been a Golbat but this Pokémon was way too fast for that, so Benga marches forward through the grass and follows after it. Obviously. The grass rustles as he moves through it and it’s the only sound Benga can make out in the whole clearing. He eventually comes to a stop somewhere he’s gotta guess is around the center, just sorta standing there looking around for any sign of the thing when the mist pulls back, receding like the tide, and it’s right there.
A Pokémon floats a few feet in front of him, its piercing red eyes staring Benga down. It doesn’t look like any Pokémon he’s ever seen before, a nice blue color with white patterning, furry and scaly at the same time. But Volcarona’s the same in that department, he guesses.
A name rings out in his ears, directly onto his mind. The Pokémon— Latios— holds his gaze for a few moments more before flying straight up and disappearing from view.
Before Benga even gets a chance to register how fast Latios is coming back down, Volcarona bursts from its Pokéball, the heat pouring off of its vermillion wings singeing Benga’s eyebrows.
Latios weaves in and out of the fog, snagging a few hits from behind before Benga can call Volcarona to dodge, and before he can even think of counter attacking something else comes shooting out of the fog in Latios’ place. A blur of pinkish-red rushes past them, and the new Pokémon waits and watches from a few feet away. It looks about the same as Latios, except for the color. Got less pointy bits and larger eyes, too, but for the most part the two of them could be twins.
Oh well! Makes no difference to him— the two fight about the same. Volcarona leads them both in a meticulous dance, keeping a careful distance between its opponent as it shoots flames. Benga doesn’t know how much longer it goes on, and he doesn’t really care, either. The two keep trading places by using the fog as cover, but soon enough, out of the corner of his eye he sees movement, so Benga does the first thing he can think of and whips out a Pokéball.
It rattles once, then again, and one last time before clicking shut.
They’re called the Eon Duo and they’re all the way from Hoenn! Sometimes Latios is by his side, sometimes it’s Latias. It seems like every time he wakes up they’ve traded places. They both like flying aimlessly around the skies and disrupting flocks of Pidove, but more than that they like Unova’s Challenge. Battling with them takes a little getting used to, especially with Draco Meteor ending the battle before it even really starts if he doesn’t plan right. Both for better and for worse. It’s kinda surprising that they’re so willing to stand beside him, but he sees that spark in their eyes and everything makes sense.
On his way to their next fight after picking up a White Herb for each of them, Benga realizes he must’ve taken a wrong turn at some point. Because he’s definitely not in the White Forest and it definitely doesn’t have a skyscraper so tall that it actually disappears into the clouds.
The place has creepy lighting and the same scent of a challenge that the Treehollow does. Except here Benga goes up instead of down, steadily climbing the floors in a near-silent elevator. The trainers here are also just like the ones in the Treehollow, too. Their faces and names and Pokémon are different— duh. But they all battle the same way: no holds barred. Some people are just born like that, he thinks. Like when Gramps tells him how Drayden’s going to be Gym Leader again the only thing that’s really surprising is that he stopped in the first place. But even that’s kinda weird? The day after Gramps tells him that and he asks about why, Gramps gets a funny look on his face and says that Drayden never stepped down.
And after that Benga can’t stop… noticing stuff. Latios and Latias are never around together, and neither are Garchomp and Dragonite— like never never. Everyone’s saying different stuff about the new Champion, Iris, too. Was she a Gym Leader before or not?
Then there’s Unova’s Challenge itself. They’re in the same place, just… different places. It doesn’t make that much sense. He tries asking some of the Area Bosses about it once but they look at him even weirder than Gramps did when he asked about Drayden so he just lets it drop.
It can’t be that much of a problem though, because Latios and Latias are super-powerful Pokémon and they don’t seem to care all that much. If it was really that big of a deal he’s sure someone way smarter than him would’ve noticed a long time ago and done something about it.
The seasons keep turning and they grow stronger. Inch by painstaking inch they crawl their way to the top. And then, finally, he reaches the apex of the Tower. Benga isn’t all that sure how high up he is and there’s no way to tell with the windowless rooms. Oh well. No use thinking about that right now. He’s got bigger Basculin to fry.
Benga has a Pokéball raised before he even steps inside. “Hey! You! Let’s fight!”
The Boss Trainer— Janna, he’s managed to piece together from his runs before— doesn’t seem bothered in the slightest. She smiles tightly and says some stuff he doesn’t really pay attention to.
In through his nose, out through his mouth. Opposite of him Janna raises a hand and snaps, her Pokémon leaping forward and releasing a Hydro Pump that shoots across the battlefield in mere fractions of a second. Garchomp takes the hit head on, trying to stand its ground but still getting pushed back a few feet from the sheer force of the blast. The sound of his claws against the floor is probably the worst thing he’s ever heard.
His vision goes blurry and he squeezes his eyes shut, concentrating on the earthy scent of the air and how static makes the hair on the back of his neck stand on end.
When Benga opens his eyes again he’s nearly blinded by the flash of lightning that erupts from the spiked yellow feathers of the Pokémon opposite him— an attack that Dragonite doesn’t quite manage to dodge.
He remembers the rest of it as more of a feeling than anything else. They bounce back and forth constantly, which turns his stomach a little more than he’s willing to admit. It’s a long fight, but… eventually there’s only one left standing.
Jariel’s Latias faints and then everything is still. He doesn’t remember much after that, but after some boring congratulation stuff he’s shooting out of the Treehollow as fast as he can.
Benga chases after the scent of hay on the breeze until he’s home.
He stumbles into the house, a grin splitting his face as his chest heaves. Gramps isn’t alone, standing opposite a trainer a few years younger than Benga. It smells like a good fight in here, of scorched earth and a wintery chill, and as he looks the challenger in the eye and he knows. This is his next fight. It has to be. It’s as much of a truth that the sky is above him and that the earth is beneath him.
Grin stretching even wider, he makes them promise to come visit before zipping off again.
And Benga isn't sure how much time passes after that point? He’s got better things to be doing, like wandering as deep as the Treehollow lets him and finding the outer corridors of the Tower where there’s actually windows that let him peer down below to see the Durant-sized people on the streets. Waiting is probably the worst part about all of this.
They let him fight his way up the upper— or lower— floors when he wants to, so it isn’t the worst. Plus Jariel and Janna are always up for a battle.
Sometimes when he makes it to his room he’ll sit and wait, watching and listening to the Tower existing around him. Which is a little weird because he knows that none of this is real. Not really real because if it was really real the White Forest wouldn’t also be in the same exact place at the same exact time.
Still. The cool sting of the metal against his palms feels real.
He sees it. He feels it all around him. The people here believe in it. Isn’t that what matters? Neither side, neither version is better. Neither was more right, more just or more true or more ideal than the other is. The sharp smell of metal disappears in an instant, replaced with earthy richness that scratches his throat. Benga sits and listens, the air perfectly still and slightly stale, heavy with humidity and whatever else manages to make its way down this far.
Black or white, truth or ideal, Tower or Treehollow, it doesn’t really matter that much. Benga has his Pokémon at his side and honestly, that’s all he’s really worried about.