Chapter Text
(Liko POV)
The afternoon air in Lumiose City was usually vibrant—a symphony of cheerful shouts, whirring sky-taxis, and the steady electric hum of the cityscape. Today, however, that symphony abruptly cut out. We were on one of the main promenades, just enjoying a break, when the atmosphere shifted. It wasn't a subtle change; it was a sudden, dizzying drop in air pressure, like climbing a hundred flights of stairs in a second.
"Blaze? What's going on?" Roy asked, clutching at his hat.
My brother, always calm, didn't answer right away. His gaze was fixed on the sky, a slight furrow in his brow. "Air pressure... dropping too fast," he muttered, his voice low and analytical.
Then the sky above us tore open.
It wasn't a natural phenomenon; it was a swirling, dark violet and black vortex that looked like oil mixed with starlight. It pulsed, and as it expanded, the first wave of confusion hit the crowd. People screamed, Pokémon scattered, and the noise level exploded until the vacuum effect truly began.
The portal started to breathe, sucking everything toward it.
"Charizard, Gyarados, Garchomp, Baxcalibur, Manectric and Trevenant! Hold the line!" Blaze’s command was sharp and immediate, cutting through the panic.
His four largest Pokémon instantly materialized, digging their claws, fins, and massive bodies into the pavement. Charizard anchored itself with powerful legs; Gyarados used its sheer bulk as a wall; Garchomp stabbed its arms into the asphalt; and Baxcalibur braced against the wind. They formed a line of defense, blocking the immediate crowd from being pulled in.
"Trevenant, grab every Pokémon you can—secure them! Manectric, priority is getting families and small Pokémon out of the designated danger zone! Move!"
Manectric was a yellow blur, a lightning streak weaving through the chaos, nudging panicked parents and their children out of the path of the relentless suction. Meanwhile, Trevenant’s mossy vines snaked out, wrapping around a dozen wild Pokémon and securing them to lampposts.
Blaze, despite his massive Pokémon working to save the city, stood right beside us, the eye of the storm. He had all four of us—Roy, Dot, Ult, and me—tightly pressed against him, his arms wrapped around us like a steel band. He planted his feet, relying only on his physical weight and immense strength to keep us from floating away.
For thirty agonizing minutes, the ground seemed to shake beneath the force of the void. His Pokémon held their positions, and Blaze, pale with strain, held us. But the portal, now shrinking rapidly, was intensifying the suction power exponentially.
A sharp, almost sickening crack signaled his failure.
His shoes scraped across the ground, and the sheer weight of five bodies was no longer enough. We began to float, the terrifying sensation of gravity leaving us entirely.
"Return!" Blaze yelled, his voice strained but final. In an instant, his six Poké Balls flashed red, recalling his exhausted team. He must have calculated that the danger was over for the crowd.
As we rocketed toward the tiny, rapidly closing pinprick of light, I saw the city below start to relax; the ground stopped shaking. He had been right. They were safe.
Then we hit the tear.
A blinding, nauseating rush of colors—red, green, blue—swirled around me, stripping away all sensation until there was nothing left but the dizzying, silent light.
My eyes fluttered open, heavy and stinging. The swirling vortex of RGB colors had given way to a strange, almost unsettling clarity. I was lying on pavement that looked exactly like the smooth, geometric road surfaces of Lumiose City. We were definitely still here, but something was terribly, fundamentally wrong.
I pushed myself up, my head swimming. We seemed to be on a large, deserted boulevard lined with elegant, Art Deco buildings that were undeniably Lumiose—yet subtly off. The colors of the buildings were too saturated, the shadows too deep, and everything had a faint, purple-blue sheen, like a picture taken under a blacklight.
I looked forward, expecting to see the majestic, towering silhouette of the Prism Tower, the heart of the city. But the road just stretched into nowhere. No tower.
A knot of anxiety tightened in my chest. I scrambled to my feet and spun around, and that’s when I saw it.
Where the city should have continued, there was only a terrifying, limitless void. The entire sky was full of it. It was an abyss of churning, liquid darkness—a silent, flowing blackness streaked with sudden, shimmering lines of color: raw red, bright green, electric blue, and sometimes, a dazzling flash of gold. It was beautiful, awful, and utterly impossible. It looked like the remnants of the portal, solidified and frozen.
The others were stirring. Roy was the first to fully snap awake, his eyes wide and immediately scanning the scene.
"Liko!" he gasped, scrambling over to me on his hands and knees. He gripped my shoulders, his expression a mixture of fear and immense relief. "Are you okay? Did we... did we make it?"
I nodded slowly, still processing the sight behind me. "I-I think so, Roy. We’re out."
He breathed a massive sigh of relief, leaning his forehead against mine for a quick, comforting moment before pulling back. He really did care too much sometimes, but it was incredibly sweet.
Dot was next, sitting up stiffly. Her glasses were crooked, and she adjusted them quickly, her practical mind immediately taking over. She looked around, her eyes sharply cataloging the bizarre state of the buildings.
"This is Lumiose, but it’s not," she declared flatly. She then turned and stared straight at the vortex remnants. "The spatial distortion is still active. That's not normal sky."
Finally, Ult let out a groan, pushing himself up and dusting off his jacket. He took one look at the strange colors and the void and scoffed, though I could see the tension in his shoulders. "Tch. Just when things were getting interesting. Did we land on an abandoned movie set?"
Dot ignored Ult's bravado, standing up and taking a protective step toward the spot where Blaze had been holding us. She looked from the empty ground to the strange, ethereal buildings, and then back to the void. Her voice, usually muffled by her Nidothing persona, was clear and laced with genuine concern.
"Where are we, and where is Blaze?"
"Don't worry, I am right here," a calm, familiar voice declared.
We all whipped our heads toward the sound. Sitting with one leg dangling casually off the ledge of the building directly across the street—a sleek structure painted that strange, overly vibrant turquoise—was Blaze. He looked utterly unfazed, his arms resting on his knees. He didn't look like someone who had just been thrown through an interdimensional blender. He looked like someone waiting for a bus.
He pushed himself off the ledge and dropped lightly to the street, landing with barely a sound, his gaze sweeping over all of us.
"I have been waiting for forty minutes for you all to wake up."
Forty minutes?!
Ult’s jaw dropped. "Forty minutes?! Dang, I thought my eyes opened as soon as those RGB lights went away!"
I felt a slight flush of embarrassment. We had been unconscious for a significant chunk of time, while Blaze had apparently been wide awake, analyzing our predicament.
Blaze didn't react to Ult's volume; he simply walked past us, his eyes fixed on the terrifying, starless blackness that formed the boundary of this strange section of the city. We watched him approach it, taking hesitant steps back ourselves, fully expecting him to hit the flowing void and be sucked away again.
He didn't.
Blaze reached out, placed a hand flat against the shifting, dark surface, and then leaned against it with the confidence of someone resting on a brick wall.
"Yup. Turns out this blackness is a wall," he confirmed, turning back to face us. "And you all must also be thinking, 'What have you done for forty minutes, brother dearest?'"
He smiled faintly, a tired, non-committal expression that told me he had been doing far more than just waiting.
"I’ve done many things in the time you all have been asleep," he began, his tone shifting into the analytical, briefing voice he always used when planning strategy. "First, I searched the immediate area. Second, I confirmed we are in a section of Lumiose, and only a section. It’s an isolated chunk of geometry floating in... well, whatever that is." He gestured dismissively at the void.
My heart sank with the confirmation. No Prism Tower, no familiar landmarks, just a few blocks of unsettlingly quiet street.
"Key findings," he continued, holding up a finger for each point. "One: No life signs. No people, no wild Pokémon, and no sound beyond the wind that isn’t there. The city is dead. Two: No resources. No accessible food, no water, and all the shop doors are sealed or non-functional. Three: There is an exit."
He paused, letting the last point hang in the strange, hyper-saturated air.
"There is another portal, somewhere a little deeper inside this isolated section. I’ve checked, and it appears to be a much more stable entry/exit point than the random vortex that threw us here." He looked at me, a flicker of that protective warmth entering his eyes. "I was waiting for you all to wake up so we could go there together."
He pushed off the void-wall. "And now that you all are awake, let's get walking. Or, more accurately, let’s get warping. Pun intended."
Despite the truly terrifying situation, a nervous giggle escaped me. Only Blaze could drop an awful pun while detailing a dire, interdimensional crisis.
"Blaze, wait!" Dot called out, pulling her device from her pocket. "If there are no Pokémon, our team can't fight! And if this space is unstable..."
"The Pokémon are fine, Dot," Blaze assured her. "I called them back before we hit the portal. They're resting, but they're not in danger. And as for fighting... if we encounter hostility, I will handle it. We need to conserve their energy. I need Charizard, Garchomp, and the others at full strength for whatever awaits us on the other side of that next jump."
He didn't wait for further questions, already striding down the deserted, strangely silent street. We all exchanged glances—Roy looking concerned but trusting, Dot looking skeptical but acknowledging his logic, and Ult looking eager for the next action.
As we hurried to catch up with my brother, I realized how much I depended on his unshakeable calm. Even in this impossible, half-dead city, with an endless void where a sky should be, Blaze’s presence felt like the only solid, predictable thing left. He was analyzing, planning, and leading us forward. He didn't show fear, not even a flicker of it, which made me feel marginally safer as we followed the smartest person in our universe toward an unknown portal.
We walked for what felt like an hour through the ghostly, echoing blocks of the severed city. The strange light never changed, and the silence was only broken by our footsteps and Blaze’s occasional, muttered calculations.
Finally, we reached an open square where the pavement was cracked in a geometric pattern. Resting directly in the center of the square, embedded flat into the ground, was the exit.
It looked exactly like the one that had dragged us here: a circular vortex of swirling, unstable violet and black energy, only this one was contained and steady, humming with power rather than violently sucking the air. It was a doorway lying on its back.
We approached the edge of the square and stopped, all of us staring down at the swirling portal. It was our only way out of this dead space.
Blaze turned, his expression serious. "You all ready?"
I felt Roy’s hand slide into mine, his grip tight and grounding. He looked from Blaze to me, a fierce determination in his eyes.
"Yes, Blaze, we are ready. Right, Liko?"
I squeezed his hand and offered a small, confident smile. "Yes, we are ready."
Blaze nodded, acknowledging our resolve. He then looked at Dot and Ult.
Ult, ever the adrenaline seeker, gave a nonchalant shrug. "All set. Let's not waste any more time in this boring ghost town."
Dot checked her device one last time, tucked it securely into her bag, and said simply, "We are good to go."
Blaze didn't hesitate. He took a single, deep breath and stepped right into the swirling center of the portal. One moment he was standing on the ground, the next he was gone, consumed by the violet light.
We followed, one after the other. Roy tugged on my hand, and we jumped in simultaneously.
The sensation was similar to before, the dizzying rush of RGBs, but this time it was less violent. It felt less like being pulled apart and more like moving through a tunnel. It was a controlled velocity, a journey rather than a catastrophe. For a brief, terrifying moment, I truly believed Blaze’s strategy had worked; that he had managed to use his genius to navigate the chaos.
Then, the tunnel ended.
The bright, silent colors vanished, replaced by a sudden, chilling blast of cold air.
I gasped, looking up. The sky was dark, but it wasn't the dead black of the void. It was night, a deep midnight blue, beautifully illuminated by a massive, luminous moon. Trees, dark and rustling, lined what looked like a city park far below.
The good news was that we were out. The bad news was that, unlike our previous, relatively soft landing, we were not on the ground.
We were falling.
A panicked scream caught in my throat. The distance felt enormous. The ground was rushing up far too quickly. Roy yelled, but before any of us could react—or even reach for a Poké Ball—Blaze was there.
In a flash of pure physical speed, he grabbed Roy under one arm and me under the other, halting our downward acceleration with a powerful surge of his own momentum. Dot and Ult, following closely behind us, couldn't stop in time.
Blaze slammed into a small rooftop—a few stories up from the ground—taking the majority of the impact on his immensely strong legs. The tiles groaned under the force, but his control was absolute. He absorbed the vertical shock, protecting Roy and me entirely.
CRACK! THUD!
The sounds came as Dot and Ult tumbled onto his back in quick succession.
The weight was immense, and Blaze stumbled a single step, stabilizing himself before letting out a dramatic, exaggerated groan.
"Oh, just another reason," he complained, his voice muffled by the two teenagers now draped over his Champion-level shoulders. "Why I hate my life."
Relief, so powerful it was nearly dizzying, flooded me. We were safe.
Roy, whose face had been pressed against Blaze's shoulder, quickly slid off, pulling me with him. We stood back as Dot and Ult scrambled off Blaze’s massive frame.
Blaze stood upright, stretching his arms high above his head until his knuckles cracked audibly. At six feet three inches, he truly towered over us all, silhouetted against the bright moonlight. He was already breathing normally, the adrenaline and impact seemingly forgotten.
He looked around, taking in the moonlit city park and the large, gothic architecture nearby.
"Well," he stated, flexing his shoulders once more. "We’re definitely in Lumiose. Just... a very quiet, very late Lumiose."
He then looked down at his feet, inspecting the scuffed roofing tiles. "And significantly less dead than the last one."
Blaze kept his eyes scanning the skyline, his gaze narrowed in the darkness. We were clearly in a city, but the large, imposing buildings around us were unfamiliar, casting long, stark shadows in the moonlight.
"I think I can see the Prism Tower..." he mused, tilting his head. "Only it is not... Prism Tower."
He pointed toward a massive, spike-topped structure dominating the distant skyline. It was the correct height and general shape, but its facets weren't reflecting the light as the Prism Tower usually did; instead, it absorbed it, appearing unnervingly dark and jagged.
"It's so dark, I can't even understand if that thing is the Prism Tower or not," he concluded, dropping his arm. "Well, anyways, let's go down."
He then spotted something tucked neatly into the far corner of the rooftop—a sleek, modern-looking door labeled with an ascending/descending arrow icon.
"Oh, there is an elevator. Fancy," he observed, striding toward it. "Seems like a hotel."
Dot’s worry immediately surfaced, bringing her back to her usual, cautious demeanor. "Wait! If we are on top of a private property, don't you think we can be jailed for unauthorized entry? We just fell onto someone's roof!"
Blaze reached the elevator panel and pushed the call button, the action of which caused the light above the door to glow a pale indigo.
He turned back to Dot, giving her an easy, Champion-level smirk. "Don't worry, Dot." His voice was low and brimming with confidence. "One look at me, and those people are gonna invite us for dinner. And maybe to a date."
Ult snickered, while Roy and I exchanged a wry look. Blaze was definitely leaning into his Champion charm to lighten the mood, though he rarely needed to use it seriously.
The elevator chimed softly—a surprisingly gentle sound after the intensity of the dimensional jump. The sleek metal doors opened, revealing a wood-paneled, mirrored interior.
"After you," Blaze offered with a small bow, ushering us inside.
We piled into the small space. Blaze took the opportunity to finally retrieve the four Poké Balls he’d used as anchors earlier. He quickly checked their status and clipped them back onto his belt. As he hit the button for the lobby floor, the car started its smooth, silent descent.
The polished wood and fancy lighting of the elevator felt jarringly normal compared to the void we had just left, yet the tense silence inside the car was anything but. Every second that passed, the reality of our situation—lost, dimensionally shifted, and dependent entirely on Blaze's genius—pressed down on us.
I watched the floor numbers count down, wondering who exactly Blaze was expecting to meet when those doors finally opened.
The elevator chime was the only warning. The doors slid open with a gentle hiss, and the stark normalcy of the polished hotel lobby immediately contrasted with our disheveled group.
But it was the sight greeting us that truly brought the descent to a screeching, silent halt.
Standing directly in front of the elevator, gathered in what looked like a tense, impromptu meeting, was a group of seven individuals, six of whom seemed to be waiting specifically for us.
They all froze, staring. And we stared back, an intense, immediate silence filling the opulent lobby.
The majority of the group, six teenagers and young adults, wore clothes bearing a distinct, stylized MZ logo—a circular emblem with the letters subtly integrated. They certainly looked like they belonged to an organization.
The Tall, Blonde Girl: She was the most striking. Tall and athletic, her vibrant yellow hair was pulled back, emphasizing a serious expression. She was the outlier in terms of clothing, wearing a sharp, technical-looking uniform with an X-shaped belt crisscrossing her shoulders and waist. Most notably, her belt seemed to be covered in shimmering, rounded Mega Stones. She looked intense, powerful, and utterly formidable.
The Brown-Haired Girl: She wore a pragmatic, dark green and black overcoat and had a no-nonsense, focused look.
The Black-Haired Girl: Beside her stood a girl in a bright blue jacket, her eyes wide with shock.
The White-Haired Boy: Fair-skinned with distinctive white hair tipped with red, he wore a brown coat and carried an air of cautious curiosity.
The Dark-Skinned Boy: He had dark locks, black hair, and a crisp white coat. He appeared analytical, his expression unreadable.
They all looked to be our age, perhaps slightly older, and every single one of them was scrutinizing us with the intensity of scientists observing a new specimen.
The final, smallest person was a tiny girl—a child, really—who stood apart. Next to her was a bizarre Pokémon. It was spectral, shimmering, and surrounded by rings, its hands floating eerily detached from its body. This little girl and her strange companion seemed the most out of place, yet the most connected to the mystery.
As our eyes locked across the space, the unspoken questions hung heavy in the air: Who are you? and Where did you come from?
We, the travelers from another dimension—Blaze, Liko, Roy, Dot, and Ult—were wide-eyed, a ragtag group of misfits facing a team of organized specialists.
The awkwardness was thick, heavy, and immediate. It was the silence before a clash, or perhaps, the silence before an explanation that none of us were prepared to give.
The silence was becoming unbearable—so thick I felt I could taste it. Then, with the casual grace that always masked his intense focus, Blaze broke it.
"Uh... Ciao?" he offered, raising one hand in a slightly awkward, but characteristically charming, attempt at a smile.
It was enough. The tension that had been holding all eight of us rigid snapped. A collective sigh escaped the entire group, a breath we hadn't even realized we were holding.
The boy in the brown coat—the one with white and red-tipped hair—was the first of the MZ group to respond. His eyes still held a guarded curiosity, but his tone was polite.
"Oh, bonjour," he replied, giving a quick, almost rehearsed nod. He then turned to address his companions, waving a dismissive hand. "Lida, Naveen, Harmony, you all did not tell me our hotel had guests?!"
The dark-skinned boy in the white coat, presumably Naveen, shifted his weight, his arms crossed tightly. "Well, guess what? We didn't either."
The brown-haired girl in the green and black overcoat—Lida, I presumed—narrowed her eyes, her gaze sweeping over our disheveled group. "Wait, did you all trespass into our hotel, and are planning to beat the hell out of us and planning to rob us? We have no money!"
Blaze’s smile didn’t falter, but a dry, amused edge entered his voice. "I wouldn't have, even if you had."
The black-haired girl in the blue jacket, Harmony, gasped dramatically. "Then will you kidnap us and sell our organs?!"
Blaze stared at her, his expression utterly flat. He delivered the response in the driest way possible, devoid of all emotion. "Not in this birth."
The yellow-haired girl, the one covered in Mega Stones, had clearly reached her limit of patience or confusion. She took a swift, confident step, moving directly to the front of the group, facing Blaze like a Challenger facing a Champion.
"Don't worry," she declared loudly to her friends, ignoring Blaze entirely. "I will save you all!"
Blaze raised a perfectly sculpted eyebrow, letting out a heavy, suffering sigh.
"And she completely ignored me..." he muttered under his breath, though it was loud enough for everyone to hear.
He then looked at the fierce blonde girl, suddenly focusing on a detail we had all missed. His analytical switch flipped back on.
"Wait... you are Korrina, right?" he asked, pointing directly at the yellow-haired girl. The dry sarcasm had vanished, replaced by a genuine spark of recognition.
"Uh, yeah, of course I am," Korrina confirmed, puffing out her chest slightly. The declaration was less a statement and more a challenge. "You know me, then you must be knowing how strong I am! And yet, you dare attack!" She took another aggressive step forward.
Blaze rubbed the bridge of his nose, the expression of a brilliant mind dealing with extreme absurdity.
"Will you please listen to me for one second?" he pleaded, though the request was laced with exasperation. "When did we say we are here to attack? Like, we literally fell onto your hotel's roof two seconds ago."
Naveen jumped in immediately, his analytical mind latching onto that key detail. "Fell? You mean you were dropped, perhaps by some spatial anomaly? The readings—"
Blaze cut him off with a raised hand, already looking impatient. "If you all give us just five minutes," he said, and then his eyes drifted to his side. He wasn't looking at the people anymore; he was looking at the empty hotel reception desk, which, bizarrely, featured a pristine, unoccupied donut stand.
"—and some good donuts," he finished, pointing at the stand. "Then I can explain everything."
At the mention of donuts, the entire atmosphere shifted. The small girl, the one with the strange, floating-handed Pokémon, started jumping up and down with genuine, unfiltered excitement.
"Ansha will make donuts! Ansha will make donuts! Ansha will make donuts!" she chanted happily. She then stopped abruptly, her face falling. "But... I need berries for that."
Blaze, ever the prepared Champion, reached into the spacious inner pocket of his jacket—the one designed for carrying emergency supplies and, apparently, snacks—and pulled out a medium-sized pouch. He hefted it slightly and held it out to the girl.
Inside was easily a kilo of random, mixed berries—Lum, Pecha, Oran, and something that looked suspiciously like a giant, slightly bruised Figy Berry.
"Any flavor is alright," he said simply.
The little girl’s eyes went wide, reflecting the sudden flash of gold from her spectral Pokémon. "YIPPPPEEEE!!! SO MANY DONUTS!!!" she squealed, snatching the bag and immediately scurrying away toward what looked like the hotel kitchen entrance, her spectral Pokémon trailing behind her.
The organized tension of the MZ group entirely dissipated, replaced by a baffled, bewildered quiet. Even Korrina looked momentarily thrown off her war footing by the sheer strangeness of the interaction.
The brown-coated boy—the one who had first spoken—let out a small, nervous laugh. He shook his head.
"Okay, well, I guess talking it is," he said, stepping forward with a more relaxed posture. "Hey everyone, I am Urbain."
Blaze met his polite introduction with his own, the Champion's charisma finally taking the lead.
"Hello to you all. I am Blaze."
Five minutes later, the chaotic scene had resolved into a strange sort of truce. We were seated on plush, crimson lounge chairs in the hotel lobby. Roy, Dot, and Ult were huddled together, still wide-eyed. Ansha was happily perched on the edge of the central coffee table, carefully feeding the spectral Pokémon, Hoopa, large pieces of berry donut. Hoopa’s floating hands were enthusiastically grabbing the sweets.
Blaze, true to his preference, chose to stand—leaning against a marble pillar, looking perfectly composed. Korrina stood opposite him, still radiating competitive energy, while Harmony was casually leaning against the wall, watching the interaction with amusement. Urbain, Naveen, and Lida sat nearby, their postures reflecting cautious attention.
Urbain, the spokesperson, took a slow sip of something from a travel mug before setting it down.
"I see," he said, nodding slowly. "So, to summarize: YOU are the World Champion, in your universe, you detected a massive interdimensional energy leak connected to a phenomenon you call the 'Pink Mist,' and your custom device went haywire, throwing all five of you across realities. You landed in an empty, partial fragment of a city, and then took a second jump to end up here."
"That’s the gist of it," Blaze confirmed, his voice easy. "We're not here to fight or rob you. We're here because we're lost and need to figure out how to stabilize a dimensional breach and get back to our own reality."
Urbain leaned forward, the MZ logo on his coat catching the light. "Well, guess what? We are also researching these things. We've renamed them the Hyperspace Lumiose."
Naveen, the analytical one, chimed in, adjusting his glasses. "They just started appearing all over Lumiose—small, unstable tears leading to strange, other versions of the city, much like the one you came from—just a few days ago. We've been trying to map them and figure out their purpose."
"They are incredibly difficult to deal with," Lida added, shaking her head grimly. "We’ve had to pool all our resources, including calling in Korrina’s expertise."
Korrina, hearing her name, stepped forward, her Mega Stones clinking softly. "The issue is the Pokémon inside these Hyperspace Lumiose dimensions. They are strong. Really strong."
She looked straight at Blaze, perhaps trying to gauge his reaction to a genuine threat. "Urbain and Harmony are considered the strongest Trainers in all of Lumiose right now, the top of the local League. And I’m a former Gym Leader and a Mega Evolution expert. We have some serious firepower. But even with the combined effort of all of us, we are struggling."
Harmony pushed off the wall and sighed, running a hand through her hair. "It’s ridiculous. Last night, we tried to clear a small pocket of the Hyperspace, and we got absolutely battered. It was a group of common, usually low-level Pokémon... Mankeys."
Ult scoffed, folding his arms. "Mankeys? Please. We deal with Explorers grunts all the time."
"These weren't normal Mankeys," Urbain corrected him seriously. "They hit like Champions. Their moves were faster, their defense was ridiculously high, and they seemed to be drawing power from the dimension itself. If Mankeys are that much trouble, imagine what we’re going to run into when we face the evolved Pokémon in there."
The gravity of their words settled over us. If three elite Trainers, including a Mega Evolution Guru, couldn't handle a pack of Mankeys, then the dimensional instability was far worse than Blaze’s calculations had indicated.
Naveen looked toward the little girl, Ansha, and Hoopa, who were now sharing a complex berry donut. "We have a.. colleague? Corbeau, who is helping us remotely. He’s a theorist, and he suggested that these Hyperspace Lumiose fragments aren't just random pockets of space."
"He thinks they might be only dreams and fragments of the past—memories of people who lived here centuries ago, somehow manifested by the dimensional energy," Lida concluded, her voice subdued. "That's why the layout is right, but the feeling is wrong. It’s a city of ghosts and powered-up memory Pokémon."
Blaze finally pushed off the pillar, his easy demeanor replaced by intense, focused thought. We were no longer just dealing with a navigational problem; we were dealing with a metaphysical, existential one.
Blaze listened intently to the summary of the threats—the hyperspace dimensions, the fragment theory, and the unnaturally powerful Pokémon. His eyes were focused on Hoopa, who happily licked the sugar glaze off its spectral fingers.
"It's hard to understand," Blaze began, his voice low and thoughtful as he processed the sheer impossibility of the situation. "Especially because it must have only been an hour since we first arrived here. We were pulled through two dimensional jumps and yet, judging by the moon outside, it’s clearly the dead of night here in Lumiose."
He looked directly at Urbain, his expression shifting from intellectual focus to considerate concern. "You all must be feeling sleepy, right? Your body clocks should be winding down, even if the adrenaline is high."
Harmony, who had been leaning against the wall with a weary posture, straightened up slightly. "Well, now that you ask... I'm usually asleep by midnight, and I think it's pushing 3:00 AM based on the city clocks." She yawned subtly into her hand.
Blaze didn't waste another second. He was already calculating the effects of sleep deprivation on high-stakes dimensional research.
"Well then, let me not hold you any longer," he stated firmly. "It would be rude of us to force you to ruin your body clock for us. You need rest. If these things are truly fragments of memory, and if the Pokémon inside are drawing on unstable energy, you need to be at your sharpest to deal with them tomorrow."
He moved away from the pillar, adopting a more polite, deferential posture toward Urbain and the MZ team. "We’ve established the situation. We’ve established that we are not a threat. We need to be able to brief properly tomorrow morning, fully rested. So, please, have your night's sleep."
He paused, then added smoothly, "And since this appears to be a hotel—I assume it’s your current base of operations—can we also get a room here? Just until we figure out the dimensional exit."
Urbain, clearly recognizing the superior logic in Blaze’s suggestion, nodded immediately. He seemed relieved to have a reason to hit the pause button on the crisis.
"Yeah, sure, why not? You technically saved us from a potential suction event by coming here, so the least we can do is offer shelter." He pulled a small, sleek device from his pocket. "How many rooms do you need? We have a few empty ones set up for visiting specialists."
Blaze glanced back at our group, performing a quick, mental inventory of his sister and their companions. He was making practical choices driven entirely by security and his protective instinct.
"Just two, please," he said. "Liko and Dot will stay in one, since they’re the most sensible. Roy, Ult, and I will stay in the other one. I'll take the floor if necessary; I just need to be where I can keep an ear on them both."
He didn't explicitly say keep an eye on Roy and Ult or be close to Liko, but the intention was clear. He was setting up a subtle security perimeter.
Urbain typed something into his device, and a moment later, two key cards slid out of a slot in the reception desk.
"Got it," Urbain said, handing the two cards to Blaze. "Rooms 403 and 405. Sleep well. We'll find you breakfast in the main staff mess around 9:00 AM, and we can start the proper briefing then."
Korrina, Harmony, Naveen, and Lida all murmured goodnights, visibly relaxing now that the confrontation was deferred until the light of day. Even the little girl, Ansha, now finished with her donut, yawned widely.
"Goodnight!" Ansha called cheerfully as she was led away by Naveen, Hoopa floating sleepily behind her.
Blaze nodded to Urbain. "Thank you. We appreciate the hospitality."
He waited until the MZ team had dispersed, then turned to us, holding up the two key cards. His expression softened slightly as he looked at me.
"Alright, Liko, Dot. Your room is 405. Get some sleep. I'll check in before I turn in myself."
"You too, Blaze," I said, taking one of the cards. Despite the terror of the journey, I knew that with Blaze planning our next move, we had the highest chance of success. He was giving us back a piece of normalcy—a hotel room, a routine—in a world that had become utterly alien.