Millions of years ago, the Torterra named Sinnoh made a wish upon a star-shaped millennial devil. She had lost her family in the prior few seasons, her mate slain and devoured by a Tyrantum, and the eggs and Turtwig she escaped with picked off one by one by flocks of Archeops and Aerodactyl.
The elders had warned her that any who made a wish on Jirachi would live to regret it, and that whatever words you used, however wholesome your desire, it would find a way to grant your wish that turned it into a horrific curse. But Sinnoh did not care; she thought that she had already lost everything she could lose except for her life, was terrified of losing that too, and simply could not imagine that the world could possibly get any worse, let alone as the result of her wish.
She had seen the shooting star Jirachi rode fall from the sky, and had traversed most of the Laurasian continent in a week before catching up to the devil and making her pure-hearted, desperate wish: "I wish that the Torterra could no longer be killed."
And Jirachi had answered her by rising back into space and falling back to Earth – this time on an asteroid, not merely a meteor – and landed in the very spot where Sinnoh had made that wish.
The bolide impact did not kill a single Torterra, for the reserves built up in their trees were more than enough to sustain them through the decade without light, but the same could be said of few others. Aerodactyl, Archeops, and Tyrantum were wiped out by the cataclysm, as were the overwhelming majority of pokemon species, herbivore and carnivore alike, on the planet. And Jirachi had found a loophole; Sinnoh met many more grieving mothers in that decade, for no Turtwig and Grotle are known to have survived what scientists now call a mass extinction, but the Torterra word more accurately translates as "the apocalypse".
Jirachi had genuinely granted its wish; the firestorms and tsunamis, while injuring many a Torterra, did not slay a single one, leaving the entire species to watch in horror at the virtual destruction of their biosphere. The pokemon species that fed on grown Torterra were all among those annihilated, and Jirachi's magic prevented any of the species which evolved to replace them from even trying to prey upon them. Even the diseases of old age – a relative term for a pokemon that lives longer than trees – no longer slew them; Torterra only took longer and longer naps, and grew larger and larger with age, until those of Sinnoh's generation (and many others far younger than her, but far older than most living things on Earth) were no longer seen as pokemon, but mistaken for islands, mountains, or other natural features by the rest of the world's population.
Jirachi had landed, according to the calendar, sixty six thousand and thirty eight times since Sinnoh's wish – give or take a few. And throughout her millions of years of life, Sinnoh had sought only to atone for the catastrophe she had unwittingly wrought by forcing it to undo her wish. But every time since her wish that Jirachi had landed on this world, she had failed to track it down – whether because it landed on the wrong part of the planet, or while she was asleep, or because someone else had beaten her to the punch.
Sinnoh had, in other respects, lived an extremely exemplary life; when the land on which the holy mountain of Coronet stood threatened to fall into the sea, she had offered it refuge on her back. The gods themselves congregated in the forests and hills of Sinnoh, but Dialga would not rewind time for her, and Arceus claimed that Jirachi's magic was so alien that even the creator could not rewind its curse; given the rise of Man since then, however, Sinnoh did not entirely believe them.
And man had come to Sinnoh's verdant forests, and civilizations rose and fell in the space of her hibernations. Even when awake, she acted with lethargy, spending most of her time floating in place for fear of disrupting the many who called her back a home. Although the first settlers recognized the island's climate and shores as resembling a Torterra and worshiped her as a kind of Earth goddess, in time the island had become so built up, and her naps so long, that by this era history was mistaken for legends, and those legends now languished in obscurity.
But the modern era had also brought something else with it; worldwide communication. Although tracking down Jirachi's prior appearances required a great deal of luck, television and the internet moved information even faster than a Pidgeot. Within a day, the whole world knew Jirachi had landed, and a slumbering Torterra was awoken by the furor of conversation on her back, in which she recognized the name of an old demon amidst a barrage of conversation.
And although it might create havoc for those on her back, Sinnoh would stop at nothing to atone; the phrase "Undo my wish" was too unambiguous for even Jirachi to ruin.
Fisherwoman Andrea had no more successes to show for her battles in the Tower after Jasper had left. The Psyduck she had captured when rescuing him (now already a Golduck) had proven strong, and Gyarados was good as ever, but none of the pokemon she tried including as the third member of her team seemed to measure up: her Whiscash, whom she had included most, was too weak to solve her problem with electric types.
And so Andrea had gone back to the Fight Area coast to resume her fishing, but the water had changed. What had been a calm and relatively narrow strait now seemed no different from the other seas around the island, and many of the pokemon she spotted fishing from her Gyarados, such as Wailord, had never in her memory ventured into the waters separating the north island from Sinnoh.
Something had changed drastically, and although she would have to track down Jasper to know exactly what pokemon's entry in his book had told him this would happen, Andrea had a very good idea what the text had to do with his decision to flee Sinnoh – and it wasn't just about stopping Jirachi. She urged her Gyarados forward, unfurled her map, and searched for the strait's few landmarks, going further and further out to sea until her suspicions were confirmed: that there was now nothing but open ocean between the Fight Area and Almia. That either Sinnoh was no longer where it should be, or worse, that Sinnoh was no more.
The High Priestess of Arceus, de facto leader of Sinnoh, was nearly as concerned by the unseasonably hot day as she was concerned by the reports coming into her Grand Temple in Jubilife. Never in Sinnoh's three thousand years of recorded history had a day suddenly become this warm in midwinter, nor was there any obvious cause; the sun's position in the sky seemed somehow off, but it had not shone overhead with a blazing heat, the day was still reasonably cloudy, and the island's volcanoes remained dormant.
But given the disaster apparently unfolding now on Sinnoh's coast, Mount Coronet itself might have blown. The friends and family members of fishermen, sailors, and foreign tourists across the region were reporting their loved ones lost at sea – and this was not in the euphemistic sense, for these individuals were very much alive, but bafflingly unable to find Sinnoh's location. Air traffic had also been grounded – a fact she learned from reading reports from Almia's main airport, where most flights had been diverted after finding only water where Sinnoh used to be. Sinnoh's own airports had been ordered closed, while a few aircraft and flying pokemon had launched to investigate the mystery: they found nothing but open ocean, and feared to venture out further after confirming they were no longer in sight of Almia or the Fight Area, or indeed any other land mass at all.
It was not that everyone seeking to return from Sinnoh had gotten horribly lost, only that the island of Sinnoh was itself no longer where it belonged!
The High Priestess knew of a single pokemon with the power to do this, and announced a grand ceremony at the Holy Shrine of Mount Coronet, stating that they had neglected one of their many gods and that only the grandest of festivals could convince Palkia to reconsider its divine wrath. Although the festival's historic antecedents were grand pilgrimages announced well in advance so that people could make it across the isle, in this era both vehicles and flying pokemon were widespread, so the majority of Sinnoh's population had assembled at the mountain in the space of a few hours. They chanted in such great numbers and with such desperate enthusiasm that Palkia itself emerged to answer their calls – but as surprising as a personal appearance by the local god was, they were even more surprised by its answer.
For Sinnoh's people had never imagined that it was not their gods, but the knowledge of their predecessors they had neglected. For Palkia explained that the island had moved because the giant Torterra on which the people of Sinnoh had made their homes had woken up – while Sinnoh's people, down to tbe High Priestess, had forgotten it was a giant Torterra in the first place. And that this Torterra was a living pokemon, and she had the right of free will and had saved Mount Coronet from falling into the sea, so Palkia would not and could not override its decision to shift its location, however great the havoc it wreaked on the lifestyle of Sinnoh's people.
Many protested, the farmers and fishermen most of all – for the farmers had planted many crops that could not grow if this heat continued, and even those fishermen who had not lost friends and comrades had no assurance that when Sinnoh stopped moving, it would rest in a place teeming with marine life where they could resume their livelihoods. A shrine dedicated to the Unovan god Landorus sprang up not long after the festival, for although it was (presumably – they couldn't place Torterra on a map) too far away to help them, a god of abundance and plenty was exactly what Sinnoh's people would need to cancel out the disruption.
None of them realized that Torterra had only temporarily entered the tropics and the southern hemisphere, and that its ultimate destination was only moderately warmer than Sinnoh, for it was next to Kalos' shores.
The adjoining regions of Almia and Fiore, on the northern tip of the island which was until recently directly south of Sinnoh, were known around the world as peaceful nature preserves, twin Safari Zones collectively the size of Kanto.
Its people had long cherished this status and resisted the outside world's custom of pokemon battles; there was a time when the term "capturing a pokemon" referred to one of the region's Rangers calming a wild pokemon down and gaining its temporary cooperation to help them capture criminals or avoid traps, and it is said that they used this term out of ignorance towards the rest of the world's hobbies.
In truth, even the people of Almia and Fiore could not blot out the world forever. If they maintained their independence, it was only because neighboring regions realized that their pokemon did not stay in Almia and Fiore, but provided a vital source of replenishment for wild pokemon populations elsewhere diminished by battle and capture.
In the warring states era, Fiore's kings had surreptitiously ordered the Rangers to round up a few powerful pokemon as tribute to dangerous warlords in exchange for them leaving the place alone; Almia was formed from a rebellion when the people in one province found out what their king was doing, but the revolution's leaders soon found that they too had to choose between tribute and conquest.
But the pokemon world is a far more peaceful place today, and Sinnoh and Kanto had long respected Almia and Fiore's customs; if they felt under a state of siege, it was only because it culturally remained them against the world. When Black and White stopped Team Plasma, the world rejoiced, but Almia visibly mourned. Pokemon battles had been long banned in the territory, and poke balls confiscated at the border, but as migration brought in residents okay with battles and the region sought to use foreign tourism to get through hard economic times, these laws were relaxed. Today, only empty poke balls are confiscated, at least in ordinary circumstances.
But the disappearance of Sinnoh was not an ordinary circumstance.
Jasper's path to the north was followed by a few fishermen, mostly those far enough north and with poor enough boats that they feared they could not cross the sea left behind by Sinnoh's departure. A few airplanes were diverted to Kanto, as Almia and Fiore's airports could only handle so many flights. But the vast majority of those stranded outside Sinnoh headed to the immediate south, to a land that had always prided itself on its peace and safety, but always been suspicious of foreigners who used pokemon for war.
And when they came as refugees, many of Almia and Fiore considered their suspicions confirmed.
The new arrivals were simply so numerous that it was impossible for the region's government to confiscate all empty poke balls; feeding and sheltering tens of thousands of sudden visitors at once was hard enough without searching them for contraband. Nor did they have a place to store them if they did confiscate: many trainers, especially fisherman, carried bags full of poke balls at all times, while a visitor who had intentionally arrived knew the laws in advance and typically left their poke balls at home. And if not properly disposed of, an empty poke ball was just as dangerous in the hands of a citizen who disliked the region's taboos or of another refugee as it was in the hands of the proper owner.
Perhaps some of the trainers were genuinely ignorant of Almia and Fiore's laws, for although those who came in airplanes were debriefed in airports, the refugees from the sea had landed not only in designated ports, but nearly everywhere along the coast. Perhaps some were sad, distressed, scared for home and family, and took to capturing local pokemon as stress relief and a return to their normal habits, whatever the law. Or perhaps the rumors which started the riots were simply false, the product of nothing more than a nasty, xenophobic culture clash and the stresses and burdens of a sudden, massive refugee crisis, together with rumors of the world's imminent end.
In any event, word soon spread through Fiore that a fisherman from Sinnoh had not only been capturing wild pokemon (which was bad enough) but had tracked down and captured Manaphy, their guardian god itself, in a Master Ball – and that peace could only be restored to the island once the pokemon trainers were stripped of their pokemon and driven back into the sea. Once that happened, it was claimed, either Manaphy would break the Master Ball's spell, or a Phione would evolve to replace Manaphy as the land's guardian.
The rioters, although far more numerous, were poorly armed, for they lived in a world where pokemon training was everything. The weapons they improvised – bricks and stones, knives and baseball bats, and whatever household chemicals they could turn into bombs – were a poor match for those armed with any evolved pokemon, and species from Garchomp to Staraptor admirably protected their trainers and the trainers who could only claim a Finneon or Bidoof alike.
But some trainers were in the wrong place, at the wrong time, with no strong pokemon nearby, and badly beaten, killed, or saw their pokemon stolen and released into Fiore's forests, too far away to find their way home.
Fiore's government by and large sided with the refugees, and did what they could to protect them, but they had no military force, and the Rangers were ill-equipped to handle a massive xenophobic riot that threatened to turn into revolution, although they did their best to both protect the refugees and rescue any recently released domestic pokemon - many of which threatened to become invasive species if left alone. They called on neighboring regions for aid, and Almia's rangers soon joined Fiore's, but the Kanto forces were feared more likely to inflame the public than defuse them, so they were employed primarily in escorting the refugees who had been scared away by the riots south to Kanto.
Fiore would survive the crisis, but its image as a land of peace would not, and a disgusted Manaphy would continue to avoid the Fiore Grand Shrine for long after the riots concluded.
As the land to the south burned with riots, and as Sinnoh continued its journey around the world, Jasper continued his own journey to an audience with Heatran. The road from the Survival Area, considering his trials in getting there, was not particularly difficult – but half of it was land, and half of it was water, and although Andrea was technically right in that it could be traversed without climbing up steep rock faces or crossing the open bay, doing so took significantly longer than doing it the old-fashioned way.
So Jasper had put his move deleting skills to use, as he had many times before, and Surf and Rock Climb were added to Curse and Waterfall as he crossed the cliffs and bays of Route 227. None of the local pokemon troubled him – perhaps because the night's pokemon were less ferocious than the day's, perhaps because once Machamp figured out how to maintain its balance on Bibarel's fur and to climb back on when it fell, the wild pokemon who challenged them were easily defeated or scared away.
The trainer and his pokemon quickly made it to Stark Mountain, and no sooner had they entered the volcano than did Jasper spot an item – it looked like a technical machine - glistening in the distance. Eager to pick it up – and to repay the trainer who had saved his life when he arrived her, and whose gifts had made him strong enough not to need saving again – he raced over to grab it.
Were Jasper more alert instead of nearing the end of an exhausting day, or were he less eager to find Stark Mountain's treasures, he would've noticed the subtly different texture of the rock near the item and its slightly lighter shade, and remembered to apply the old tests for traps. Instead, he only realized what had happened when the ground began to give way.
"Trapdoor! Bibarel, catch me!" he shouted to his pokemon as he hurled its ball to the ground floor of the cavern, while plummeting not far behind it himself. But this was far from the first pit trap Jasper and what had long been his only pokemon had encountered in their lives: Bibarel materialized on the ground, shielded from injuries by its poke ball, and raced over to cushion its trainer from his fall.
Had the trap been limited to a pit, a Ruin Maniac of Jasper's experience would have easily climbed back out on Biabrel's back. But he soon noticed the twenty-four eyes surrounding him, and realized that whoever sought to protect Stark Mountain's treasures had placed another, far more formidable obstacle in his way.
It wasn't a full Monster House, but perhaps he'd prefer one; instead, Jasper faced four giant Dugtrio, whose central heads had grown to nearly his height, and whose side heads were the size of a normal Dugtrio's center head. But he would not be intimidated. "Four opponents, four arms. Machamp, you know what to do – I'll recall you once you hold them off. Bibarel, let's climb out of here!"
Machamp emerged from the pokeball and obediently smashed the Dugtrio over their heads like playing a traditional game of whack-a-diglett, but as Bibarel tried to escape the battle with its trainer by climbing the face of the trap's cliff, a funnel of sand swirled seemingly automatically from the four Dugtrio, and its paws could not get a hold of any rocks; they remained trapped in a rumbling arena where it quickly grew painful to even stand.
"Machamp, keep it up!" Jasper yelled – he hadn't ordered Machamp to use anything other than Cross Chop yet, but he also hadn't needed to. "Bibarel, I know your physical moves are better one-on-one... but in a fight like this, you should Surf your foes away!" The narrow cavern began to fill with water, and the four Dugtrio were each swept away, too small and defensively weak to hold their underground positions against the flash flood of Jasper's Bibarel – Machamp, although somewhat hurt, was large and strong enough to shrug off the area attack.
But as the Dugtrio were carried into the distance, the stream Bibarel carried them with swiftly evaporated away, and a heavy steam filled the already warm cavern with a new humidity. Machamp and Bibarel instinctively turned to the source of the evaporation, fearing a new opponent or simply the Dugtrio's renewed freedom of action – but Jasper understood that there was only one pokemon in Stark Mountain that could possibly be responsible, recalled his two pokemon, and assumed a position of prayer.
"You seem quite desperate to petition me." the vaguely turtle-shaped god of the volcano spoke – its voice raspy and clanging like gears, but a voice all the same, not telepathy or the repeated sound of its own name, with tones and gesticulating communicating the rest of the meaning.
"I-I" Jasper began, stuttering and scrambling for what to say; he still didn't believe in Arceus the creator, but if Heatran wasn't a god, it was still a talking and extraordinarily powerful pokemon, and that was reason enough for awe. "I am. For if this text is true, and I believe it is," he said, holding aloft its codex, "then our world is faced with a cataclysmic danger."
Heatran seemed unfazed by his words, or perhaps it was simply that the emotions of the gods could not be detected by the living, or that its armored, steel cage of a face could not express such a thing. "I have not forgotten what Jirachi is, even if humanity has."
"So you already knew. Can you do anything to stop it?" a desperate Jasper pleaded. "If the Tower Tycoon makes a wish..."
"I can not, for I can not leave my island, or everyone here would freeze." Heatran answered. "And the final battle shall not be here. Even the Tycoon has already left for Kalos, despite my warnings. So many trainers have gathered there from around the world already that I do not think Jirachi will have reason to leave it until it has granted a wish, and more are coming every hour."
Jasper said nothing, and the tears of desperation flowing from his eyes evaporated as quickly as they fell.
"But I think there is a reason you have found that codex. You were right to come here, but now that you've grown stronger, you should follow the Tower Tycoon to Kalos."
"How? Even getting here took a day, and Kalos is so much further away from your island than Sinnoh was." Jasper asked.
"There is a flock of Pidgey and Pidgeotto that roosts on this mountain, led by a lone Pidgeot. I trust you know what to do with one, and as for fighting Jirachi, that item I baited the trap with was a Pidgeotite. I think Arceus led you to that book for a reason, and it will help you on every step of your journey." Heatran answered.
Jasper offered a traditional prayer of gratitude – this time in person, not in the shrines he had long neglected – and made his way back to the outside of the mountain, grabbing the mega stone and many other treasures along the way.
The sun had come up by the time he exited the cave, but an exhausted Jasper finally began to feel hope: maybe he could stop Jirachi after all. But now that Heatran had given him a mega stone, another realization dawned on him; this would not simply be a matter of contacting the right person, or exposing the right legend.
To win, he might have to defeat a legendary pokemon, despite his lack of experience even in gym battles – and to make matters worse, Jasper was starting to believe that legendary pokemon really were gods.