A melodic chiming brought Michael to a poor substitute for alertness. He slapped at his laptop until it stopped. Blurry, unfocused eyes took in his surroundings as he tried to piece together how he managed to get so little sleep even his body, accustomed to such interruptions, felt like shit. They found his computer screen, and after several moments of squinting, he learned the time. Four in the morning.
He looked around his stateroom with a sense of déjà vu. He'd woken up like this at least twice prior, he thought. One pokémon presently occupied his bed, where before he swore there had been two. Ah, that was it, the last time he woke up was to let Flufftail out of the room. Now he could come back, giving Latias a second warden for a brief time.
As he trudged down the short hall to the foxes' room, everything assembled in his mind again. The fight before, Latias' condition, watching the house from the boat, a planned defense. He'd only been awakened by three-hour alarms, never a Ninetales, and they'd almost made it to morning. He tossed that over in his mind as he beckoned a similarly-drowsy Sparkles off the top bunk where she'd been napping. The bunk that used to belong to the only person who, despite her young age, could really rein Sparkles in.
"Tell Fluff to get some rest, Spark," Michael told the sky-colored Ninetales. He scratched her back during her trip out the door towards the stairs, brushing off tiny specks of frost. "We'll all have breakfast when your shift is done, but I think he and I could use a little more sleep still." A minute later, Flufftail padded around the corner to meet him. The two of them returned to his stateroom, though he knew Flufftail wouldn't stay there for long.
Latias' diagnostic collar had long since been muted, but still registered a steady pulse when Michael checked. He regarded her for a long while, studying her iridescent scale-feathers, particularly the damaged ones around the base of her neck. If he'd understood her correctly, she'd no longer be able to hide or disguise herself until they were repaired. A collar-like device, newly completed, drew his attention back to his desk; at least he'd be able to help her until then. He stepped back towards it for another three hours' snooze, but paused and reached out to grasped her claw as he had many times before. Flufftail whined while he looked on, his head resting on the bed level with Latias', as he had many times before.
This time, they got a reaction.
Her three talons half-closed around his hand, not quite latching on but enough to exert pressure. An eye fluttered halfway open. A golden iris peeked out from behind. A slit of a pupil floated lazily, taking in Flufftail's peering face before focusing on Michael. It quickly widened.
Latias launched herself into the air, only letting go of his hand halfway through her short ascent. She rammed her head against the stateroom's skylight over the bed, and Michael jumped backwards. He quickly hit the light switch and closed the door when he realized her goal, managing to lock it just before she nudged him out of the way in her quick flight over. When her stubby claws found no purchase on the mechanism, flush as it was with its mounting plate, she looked back at him with narrowed eyes. From his chair where he'd fallen, Michael crossed his arms and regarded her expression and frantic breathing.
Maybe she'd lost her voice? He reached over his laptop for his whiteboard and erased the selection of measurements off it he'd been tracking, no longer needed or of use. He handed it to her with an uncapped marker. It took her several moments to reach out and snatch it from him, and when she did, she clutched it to her chest like a lifeline.
Flufftail, now atop the bed, emitted a plaintive noise at her distressed condition. "What's wrong?" Michael finally asked what the Ninetales couldn't, in as gentle a tone as he could muster through his own slowly rising anxiety.
He saw her wings snap up in what he guessed was a flinch, and her posture relaxed. She looked down at the whiteboard, and back up at him, repeating the gesture several times. Moments later, it clattered to the hardwood floor as she launched herself at him, wrapping her arms around his body and her neck around the back of his head. Michael just barely managed to get his own arms out before she hit him, hugging her as much to hold her as to change his center of gravity when the chair tipped backwards from her impact despite its weighted base. He could feel her shudder with some minor convulsion. Sobbing?
"Woah, hey, calm down now," he tried to placate her. Talking seemed to have a positive effect; he felt her relax slightly under his hands when he did. He hugged her as close as he could without further damaging marred feathers. "We're fine now, we're safe. Tell me what happened. Can you talk?" She tensed back up at the question, and he heard her emit a plaintive note.
He'd started to worry by the time she responded, her tone more thin and hollow than the voice he expected. "I think so."
"There's the lovely voice I remember. The voice of a lifesaver." Still holding Latias, Michael spun the chair to look at Flufftail. The Ninetales relaxed after his acknowledgement of a reply. "What's got you so worked up?"
Latias pulled her head away from him, and leaned back on her vestigial legs perched on his lap. She looked at his face from several different angles, before trying to look him in the eye. At such close distance, she had to tilt her head down for her eyes on both sides of her head to focus on him, creating an arch in her neck that he gently stroked while she gathered her wits.
"It really is you," she finally said, her voice's hollowness filling in with hints of wonder.
"Who else would it be?"
She looked down at his chest, before pushing the top of her head into it. "I don't know. A lot of things I do know are wrong, I think."
"What do you mean?"
"I know you're dead."
Michael pulled back as much as the chair's back would allow and stared down at her in disbelief. After a moment of silence, she sheepishly looked back up at him. "But you're not."
"Obviously." He looked back up at Flufftail, as if the fox could provide any clarity. Latias followed his gaze briefly, before turning her attention back to him.
"I know Michael is dead, but I don't remember him dying. I know I saved my bond-mate, and that I remember. But you're Michael, and you're still my bond-mate." She cocked her head as she looked up at him, examining him more closely with one eye. "You are Michael, right?"
"Of course," he said, trying to follow her train of thought. This was quickly getting into topics outside his experience. "None of that makes any sense though. Start from the beginning. What happened to you back there?"
She stretched her long neck back out and draped it over his shoulder. "Starmie tried to attack your mind. I protected you, but then it tried to get to you through me. I didn't think I could protect both of us at once, so I just protected you."
Michael once more gathered her in a gentle yet firm hug. "You didn't have to do that, you know."
"Yes I did," her suddenly stern tone dissipated her voice's residual thinness. "Nobody else could. I couldn't save either of my partners before. I mean, one of them. Clayton. I couldn't save Clayton, but I wasn't going to lose you."
"But now you're all messed up in the head." The comment drew another whine from Flufftail, who now stood at the edge of the bed, neck outstretched to try and reach them with his nose. Michael reached out with one hand to scratch the fox's head as he continued, "Can you fix it? Is there any way I can help?"
"That's what I was doing. Still doing, kind of, but mostly done I think. I could hear you though, in a distant sort of way, and I didn't want you to worry anymore. So I woke up."
"And you didn't even know who I was when you did?"
"It all hits you again when you're putting your memories together. I remembered Clayton's death, but that's easier; I also remembered all the time I've spent without him since. I was with you just before, and I thought you were dead too, and I mourned. But you're right here when I woke up." She exhaled loudly in something Michael couldn't determine was a snort or a short laugh. "You thought I was a ghost when we first met. I don't see how you could have been so calm. Seeing a ghost is scary!"
"Heh, I imagine it's a little different when it's someone you knew."
"But there's stuff in there I don't think belongs. Maybe things Starmie put in there to get me to give up, but I'd already stopped listening. Like I know you're right here, even though something's telling me you can't be." Latias' tone shifted slightly, "And that recently we've been distant."
Michael moved the hand occupying Flufftail to the back of her neck when she lifted her head during the ensuing silence. "No, that was real."
He felt her try to lift off him, but she didn't put much effort into it, and he held her down close to him. "I thought so, since I could remember the details. But I hoped…"
"Stop, let's figure that out right now, okay? When you were in my dream, you told me you were putting some space between us. I appreciate the gesture, but I think you were taking it a little far. Were you really just backing off, or were you trying to leave but felt you couldn't?" Flufftail snorted, as if the answer was obvious.
"No, I want to stay!" She drew her head back again to look him in the eyes, her own damp. "I take it all back, I can't be distant anymore! Not now that you're back, after I thought I lost you. This is the closest we've been and—"
"Hey, hush, quiet now, don't get all worked up." Agitation or stress might worsen her condition. Michael thought it best for the both of them that she stay as calm as possible. He regretted not learning her physical quirks before. He knew how to calm down his Ninetales with a well-placed scratch or knead, but he had no clue how to handle Latias. "I told you it wasn't right for a pokémon to be a romantic partner, but despite what you might have gone through with Clayton, the alternative isn't drifting apart. There's other ways you can be close."
Her gaze shifted focus between his eyes. He could almost feel her slowly putting it together through their bond. Something about her ordeal must have opened their connection to the point he could pick up traces of her own mind through it. "But what about Cathy?"
Michael let out a single laugh. "She's gone, don't worry about her." Latias' eyes went wide, but he continued without further comment. "Even if she wasn't, do you really think I'd only accept one person or pokémon close to me? If it was a competition, both of you would have lost to Fluff before you had a chance, and he can't even speak."
Latias looked over her shoulder at the Ninetales. "He does love you, and enjoys your presence. I remember when you were talking to him, the night I left. You two are so comfortable around each other."
"I love him, and I wouldn't know what I'd do without him. Love isn't all about romantic connections; just because you had to act that way, as someone else, for Clayton doesn't mean that's how it always has to be. Fluff is my family all the same. Spark too, even if she hardly cares to show it most of the time."
"What am I?"
"You've said it yourself before. We're partners. Just not in the way you were for Clayton, not that it diminishes for that. Not just mine, hell, I think Fluff would adopt you if he could, despite being a fifth your age. He's been worried about you, you know, ever since you left the house."
"I guess he has," she said, still looking towards she could plainly see it for herself, though to his human eyes the fox's silent stare revealed nothing, inspired a note of jealousy. She looked back at Michael after a moment. "He does care about me as family. I think that's what I've been looking for. I want to be part of a family."
"I think you've earned a spot for yourself in ours just the way you are, and I wouldn't want anyone else in that place."
She tipped her head down and opened her mouth slightly. That gesture he recognized, even if it had been a while since he'd seen her smile. She pushed herself close to him and wrapped him in another hug with her short arms. "Thank you so much!"
He returned her embrace. "Hah, don't mention it. Just a few things though. First, now that you're here, don't ever worry about being cast out, okay? Don't get jealous of anyone who shows up, because they can't threaten you." Behind Latias, Michael could see Flufftail lay down on the bed, and he swore he spotted what must be a vulpine grin.
"Sorry," she said, matching tone pure apology, but her body language told him she was still reveling in her newly-bestowed status.
"Seriously, listen, this is important. You can hang around all you like, and do whatever you want, just don't put yourself in the way, okay? Fluff spends so much time near me, but he rarely interferes. Spark is always off in her own world but she's sure not to drag me into it. There's room for all of us, even on this little boat, if we can all respect that."
He managed to win back her focus; he could feel her attention shift when he felt her tilt her head behind his. "Okay, I can try."
"Stay out of my head when I ask, stay out of my way when I want. I promise you, if I need my space, I won't need it forever. There's going to be boundaries though, and a lot of them we won't know until we hit them."
"I think I can teach you to block me now. For real, not just with noise. That should help."
"I can definitely feel something there, so maybe it's possible. Just don't get antsy when I do. If it's something important, I'll talk to you about it, like we're talking now. Last but not least," Michael pushed Latias back and grabbed her head between both his palms, giving her a look of mock intensity, "nobody gets to be a part of my family without a name."
"What?" She blinked at him twice, and he could no longer feel the gentle motions of what he assumed were her thoughts.
"We named my kids before they were even born. When each one got their own Vulpix, the first thing they did was name them. Everyone has a name as soon as they're welcomed. I've picked one out for you, after some digging." He waved a hand towards Nola's book, standing up against a wall at the back of the desk. "How do you like 'Alata'?"
"It doesn't sound like a human name."
"It's not supposed to. You don't have pretend to be a human anymore." She said nothing, still looking at him with a quizzical expression, but he could feel the mental motion of her thinking again. "It was the name of an old ship," he continued. "She got caught up in a bad storm off Palatine Point during a journey across the ocean between Kalos and Hoenn. Many times weary crew were thrown overboard, only to be hauled back onto the ship by unseen forces. When she made it out of the storm without losing anyone, they called it a miracle." He scratched her head at the base of one ear, "You called that house a misery magnet before, and I thought it'd be a good reminder that this place is not all wrecks and sorrow. Besides, I think you know a great deal about unseen forces."
She pushed her head out of his grip and nuzzled his cheek "When I was putting everything back together, I remembered I didn't want one. If it means I've a family now, I'll gladly accept the name you've given me."
Relief and pride swelled within Michael's mind. His hands pushed gently against her chest, but he could feel the damaged scale-feathers there. He shifted his hold to her shoulders and pushed her back a little farther. "I don't think you'll be going unseen for a little while, though."
Alata floated up off his lap and looked down across her chest. Clumsy claws fussed about delicate structures, surveying the damage, as Flufftail roused himself back to a sitting position and poked his nose around them now that Alata was in his reach. The whirl of her thoughts through their bond accelerated. "I can't go outside like this!" She turned herself invisible, the damaged portions of her coat throwing a riot of color over a vulpine face when they could only manage tinted translucence. "Maybe I can adapt it somehow, if I—"
Her head snapped back up, wide eyes staring at Michael. "I can't remember. I can't remember how to look like her."
Michael held a calm smile while her mental whirl became a tempest in its frantic activity. "Calm down, I have a solution for you. A gift, hopefully paying back what you've done for me." As he reached for his newest project, her mental disquiet continued, but outwardly she forced some composure, saying nothing. "I'm sorry if a collar reminds you too much of captured pokémon, but you're all neck and I couldn't think of any other way to keep it close to you."
A thick silver medallion, formerly a timepiece, sat affixed to a black band of synthetic material. A thin chain of blued steel replaced the more ornate and less rugged silver that formerly attached to it, threading through loops on the band and ringing around the collar entirely. Once Alata stopped fidgeting, Michael replaced the diagnostic collar with it, closing the buckle at the back over her spine before clasping the chain to the silver shell over her throat. It fit her well, despite his fears about its bulk.
"It's a little heavy," she said, after some experimental movements, "but manageable. What does it do?"
"It will free you from having to worry about pokéballs or my machines or anything like that, but I need to do one final step. I need to make everything think you're my pokémon. I told you before that I wasn't interested in owning you, and you trusted me then. Do you still trust me?"
Alata resumed anxiously fidgeting, but slowly nodded her head. "I do."
"Alright. Stay calm and stay still. This might look frightening, but nothing's going to happen to you." Michael picked up the storage controller from the desk, and pointed it at Alata at an angle that wouldn't include Flufftail. At the push of a button, it bathed Alata in a red cone of laser light for a couple seconds. When it vanished, leaving behind a distinctly nervous dragon, he looked down at the bracer's screen.
[NEW POKEMON REGISTERED]
[COMMUNICATING…]
[ACCEPTED. ID ASSIGNED: A11D114BF4B0AEE3]
Michael grabbed a thin cable from a box of leftover parts while the device processed the new information. With it in hand, he flipped the display over to his trainer info.
[1: 7D6CCF98FDBED6EB]
[2: 525644AEAA4DC7B9]
[3: A11D114BF4B0AEE3]
[4-6: NO DATA]
[GIVE A NICKNAME TO YOUR NEW POKÉMON?]
Michael smiled and put in her new name. Then he flipped the device to a special command mode, plugged one end of the cable into it, and kneeled down in front of Alata. Popping open the shell on her collar revealed a small disk of circuitry surrounded by a rubber gasket. He gently pried it halfway out and plugged the other end of the cable into a port on the side. A couple commands programmed the circuit with Alata's data. He then reseated the circuitry and gasket before closing the shell again.
"As long as you keep that collar on you," Michael said as he returned to his seat and placed the cable back in the parts box, letting his hand linger inside, "you won't have to worry about anything sucking you up. It broadcasts a signal that tells everything around that you're assigned to a nearby pokéball, but that pokéball doesn't actually exist. If anyone looks into it, they'll be pointed to my name as if I caught you. As long as that collar broadcasts, you're untouchable." When he pulled his hand from the box again, he tossed a pokéball from it at her. Not until she was once more bathed in red light did she realize what happened, and a split second later the light ceased. The ball remained inert on the stateroom floor.
She looked between Michael and the ball several times. "Telling me was enough, you didn't have to demonstrate."
"I've been demonstrating as soon as I put it on you," Michael pointed up to where a black bar ran across the top of the stateroom's doorframe. "The whole boat's wired up to its own miniature storage system, so I can shuffle the Ninetales to shore and back easy. These detectors are in many more places than just that one room in the house. You trusted me not to snap you up, and I never did. Now with that collar you don't even have to worry."
The slowing whirl of her thoughts told Michael she was calming again, but he felt bad for frightening her with the trial and reveal. He changed the subject. "That thing is pretty sturdy, with the two different fasteners it should stay on through any aerial or aquatic maneuver. As long as it's closed, it should be waterproof down to about thirty meters, which isn't as good as most pokéballs but I didn't exactly have precision manufacturing to work with. The seal puts a lot of pressure on the latch, so it shouldn't pop open randomly. If anything does happen to it though, come back and see me immediately."
"I don't think I go that deep for fish, so it should be fine. How do you know how far down it can go?"
Michael shrugged. "I put a circuit inside and tied it to a fishing pole with a sinker. Once I found a depth from which it returned dry and functional, I put the real deal in."
"That doesn't sound very rigorous," Alata said, as she watched Flufftail jump down off the bed and bat the inert pokéball over to Michael's chair.
"Well I did it eight or ten times. I have confidence in my work."
"I'm not sure I do," Alata replied. She adjusted the collar and resettled it before looking back up at him. "But I appreciate it. Thank you very much."
"Just paying you back for saving me. You don't need to be disguised anymore. You can go around town, no invisibility required, while your feathers heal or whatever."
"They'll fall out when new ones grow in. They're already loose now that they're not attached to the others." She was silent a moment, claws still holding the collar. "I don't think I'll use a disguise anymore even when they're replaced. Now that I have this I can actually interact with the town, instead of just observing from afar. I think that'd be nice."
"You know, I was thinking something similar myself several hours ago. When we're through with all this, maybe we can hit the town and actually check it out, instead of an aimless scooter-tour."
Alata looked around the stateroom, before drifting over to one of the windows looking out towards the house. "What is 'all this' anyway? Why are we here and not in there?"
Michael sighed and bent over to pick up both the pokéball and discarded whiteboard. "We're waiting for Steven to come back. This time, we'll record his aggression, and maybe find a way to subdue him. Turn it all in, let the authorities handle it, and solve that problem for good."
"No!" She sent the objection so strongly Michael jumped as she whirled to face him. "Let's get away, go somewhere he can't find us. Find somewhere safe!"
He looked at her with a resolute expression. "I've looked for a place my problems can't find me for years now. It led me here. Now that this place is threatened, this time I'm going to stay and fight. Besides, I thought you'd want to protect it, isn't that what you've been doing for a decade now?"
She darted over to him, stopping nose-to-nose. "I'm not going to let holding onto my past take you away from me again, not when I just got you back."
Michael crossed his arms and met her stare. He couldn't tell if she was referring to her period of staying away from him after the night she left, or if she was still caught up in the false knowledge the prior attack left in her head. The latter represented an obvious risk. "If you fight, are you going to get hurt again like last time?"
Her expression softened. "What are you asking?"
"If you don't want to leave me or lose me, stay and help me fight. Is it still dangerous for you?" She floated before him, wordless, but he could feel her mind going full tilt again.
Eventually she huffed and looked to the floor. "The hole is still there. I've been working on closing it since I've been out, but it'll take several days of concentration to finish it. Starmie pulled back as soon as you started fighting, though, and this time I'll be prepared. I'll be fine."
"Hold up, what hole? In your mind? Where it attacked you before?"
"I don't really want to talk about it. Looking back, it's really stupid of me, like a lot of things I've done relating to my life with Clayton."
Curiosity burned, but Michael didn't want to make himself a hypocrite when he'd been earlier discussing boundaries. "Alright. If you think you'll be fine, I'll let you handle it, though your past claims on similar matters have proven suspect." Michael softened his own stare. "This means you're going to be in another pokémon battle. I know you've been avoiding those, even in the wild."
Her reply was almost inaudible to his mind's ear. "I'll do my best."
"If you want, I can try to train you. At least get your confidence up for the times it's needed, like this."
Alata didn't respond, instead drifting back towards the porthole showing their house. Flufftail, who had listened to the battle discussion with ears pressed back and tails twitching, decided it was a good time to leave the room and head to bed. Michael sighed and ran a hand through his hair, thinking about how to navigate these two pokémon's intransigence. "Fine, we'll save it for tomorrow. I was going to get three more hours of sleep before getting up for real. How much do you think you'll need?"
"Body rested while I was out, and I don't think my mind can get much worse than it already is. I'll be okay with just as little."
"Alright. I'll let you keep this bed at least, I'll go up and sleep in the lounge." Michael turned off his laptop and set the next alarm on his phone. While continuing to pack up his workspace, he could feel Alata's thoughts spinning up in agitation again. He slowed his progress as he started packing the box, anticipating some interjection.
He wasn't disappointed. "Wait."
"Yeah?"
"I hate myself for asking, but you always sleep with your Ninetales. Can you stay here?"
Michael abandoned the mostly packed box in favor of a seat on one corner of the bed. The request wasn't unreasonable; that she compared herself to his Ninetales rather than anything else inspired confidence that she was now more aware of her position. "Only if you tell me why you hate yourself for asking."
She drifted closer to him, but still kept a fair distance, eventually settling on the opposite corner of the foot of the bed. "When I was fixing stuff in my head, I was also thinking about a lot of things. You can get a different outlook on memories when you have to put them back together. Looking back across my memories in hindsight, I could see I was wrong to approach you like an extension of the life I had. Since I thought you were gone forever, I regretted that I could never tell you how sorry I was. I am very sorry, and I can't thank you enough for giving me a second chance."
She flopped onto the bed, her nose ending up a hand's width from his thigh. "Even when I can re-arrange my head, I can't change myself at a whim, I can't change what comforts me. The physical affection – I'm surprised and grateful you've provided so much tonight – is a large part. One of my biggest comforts was always waking up next to a friend; that kept me with him even through the miserable last few years of his life. Since I've been alone, I've missed that the most, and sleeping in a pile of cushions carrying a psychic echo of his presence was never a good substitute."
After a heavy sigh during the last sentence, she paused a moment before continuing. "I hate myself for asking because it still treats you like part of my old life, but I have to admit I envy you and your Ninetales. You have each other every morning."
Michael matched her sigh with one of his own, and scratched her head behind her ears and around the base of her skull. "I haven't been in that house very long, and going to sleep surrounded by nearly twenty tails is a pleasure unique to my time there. On this boat, they always sleep in the bunks down the hall, each in the bed of the child I gifted them to. Maybe they do it for the same reason you did, maybe that's just a pokémon thing, but I was gearing up for an awfully lonely night here."
He felt her tilt her head up under his hand, and he looked down to meet her hopeful gaze. "Sure, I'll stay here with you. I'd be happy to."
Alata's eyes snapped open. He was gone. It was over.
The sound of breathing drew her focus to a body beside her. He was right here. Everything was alright.
As the quietly chiming tones that woke her up slowly intensified, the rest of her mind caught up. Michael hadn't died, that was one of the un-facts she was stuck with. The half-a-dozen of them left behind were stubborn things. Despite their absurdity – of course she had a bond-mate, the channel was right there – every time she tried excising them, they would reassert themselves through echoes and ripples their absence left behind. She'd have to get used to it.
She'd slept and awoken naturally this time, and felt refreshed for it. She angled a wing up to lift it off Michael's body, the only physical contact they'd had after bedding down. Rather than massage his consciousness to alertness, Alata floated up off the bed and out of the stateroom. She wasn't sure if Michael had genuinely wanted her there, or merely humored her after her convalescence, ignoring for a moment his emotions at the time. Best to leave early in case she'd deluded herself about what her sixth sense reported and the latter was true. She had failed to heed its warnings about Michael's state enough times already, and given this second chance she couldn't afford to make any more assumptions on that score.
Waking reservations quickly fell away as she drifted into the lounge, brightened by sunrise. Second chance? Hardly. It was a fresh start, the sun peeking over the horizon greeting not just a new day but a new self. Her life didn't have to be a continuance of her past when she had something better ahead of her, a perspective she only managed to see after yesterday's violent jolt. She'd been making herself miserable by clinging to a dysfunctional past life because it was less depressing than her current circumstances, and she'd been making Michael miserable for it too. She'd leave it all behind.
Squinting against the rising sun, she looked to the house that appeared as a shadow beside it. Well, she'd leave most of it behind. That was Michael's now, it could stay.
Alata drifted through the boat in an ascending full circle, placing her under the two-part hatch that led from the pilothouse to the flybridge. After taking a few moments to figure out how it opened, she emerged onto the open-air top deck, the sound of her arrival drawing Sparkles' attention. The Ninetales looked over her shoulder at Alata from where she occupied the further of the two chairs at the control console. After recognition bloomed within her mind, her head returned to its resting place on the wall of the flybridge, looking south. Alata could now confirm Sparkles' indifference to her was not an error of memory reconstruction. Despite the not-quite-warm welcome, she remained hovering just under the partial roof. She enjoyed the sun's warmth shining on her, but looking out across the water reminded her how hungry she was. Sometime today she'd have to visit the reefs.
While she wondered what the Ninetales' food tasted like, Flufftail joined them on the flybridge. This Ninetales did feel joy at her restored condition, and the overriding concern of the night before had been eroded away by sleep. Flufftail practically pranced to the space under where she hovered, and stood on his hind legs to try and reach her with his snout. Alata shifted her position in the air to hang upside-down and touched his nose with her own. She relished his enthusiasm about her presence, and wondered just when it first blossomed. She'd spent too much time focusing on Michael alone, and had a lot of catching up to do with the other members of her new family.
"Latias?" Michael's voice surrounded her.
"Since you've given me a name, shouldn't you use it?" she sent back, making sure it sounded playful rather than reproachful; she liked the name and wanted to hear it more.
She drifted down and hugged Flufftail's back when he resumed his natural four-legged stance. Between them, the silver shell fixed to the front of her collar pressed gently against her throat. Her name and her collar, a rite of passage and a ticket to freedom, a promise of a better future and a promise of a wider one. She'd been given so much last night she still couldn't take it all in.
"Sorry Alata. Where'd you get off to?"
"We're all up top," she replied, noting the faintest whiff of amusement in Sparkles' mind at her and Flufftail's closeness.
"No invitation for me? Is it pokémon-only?"
"Get up here, sleepyhead."
She could hear from below and track with her emotion-sense Michael's progress through the vessel. "I suppose showing my face can't hurt now that the sun's up. Lying in wait can resume after a little fresh air." Though she welcomed his approaching presence, she also had to admit to herself she liked the quiet with just the two Ninetales. Catching up with the four-legged family would have to wait.
Flufftail reacted similarly to Michael's appearance as he had when he saw Alata up here. Michael, smiling, dropped to one knee next to them and wrapped them both in a big hug. Sparkles got affection of her own when he dropped into the chair at the center of the console, beside hers. "All in one place. This is rare enough, huh?"
"Hasn't happened since you thought I was a dead person," Alata replied. She followed Flufftail's gaze and looked down to an iridescent feather that had fallen to the deck.
"Shoe's on the other foot, now."
Alata didn't expect the remark to sting, and she knew he didn't intend it to. She didn't reply to him, instead telekinetically lifting the feather to his face. He examined it closely, but she could see his mind was still on their first encounters. "If you have problems writing, why did you never use telekinesis like this? You can move enough grass to make your illusions realistic, one pen shouldn't be a problem."
"I told you, I'm not strong like that. I can pick a pencil or pen up but I can't put enough pressure on the page to write. I could hold a hundred pens and achieve just as little. I can lift up many more feathers that those, but I can't do anything with them besides clump them up and push them around, or bend them." One of the white feathers in his hand became red, then shifted through the whole spectrum before returning to white.
"I wonder if your telekinesis is something we can train too. Or maybe I can find a pen that'll work for you."
"You said before I shouldn't worry about it. I like using my voice a lot more anyway."
"Just a thought," Michael replied, and tucked the loose feathers in a pocket. He put his feet up between the wheel and the throttle and seemed to relax, but he kept glancing back to the south. Alata could tell through his thoughts that a lot of his spare attention was given to the fight he knew was coming. The Ninetales' emotions also carried anticipation for the upcoming fight, but foremost notes of hunger.
"Why don't you three eat? I can keep watch up here. My head at least can still turn invisible."
Michael looked at her with an expression of mild disappointment. "I thought we were all having a moment here."
"They want to eat and I bet you're going to as well, soon. I'll get something for myself later, but for now I can stand guard while you all take a break."
After a sigh, Michael stood and walked towards the hatch, pausing to produce a bulky object from a pocket and place it atop the console. "One of these days I'm going to get you to eat with us, even if just so I can be sure you eat at all," he said, while aligning it to point towards land. "Let me know if you see anything weird."
Alata focused on her emotion-sense, seeing how far she could reach out with it, feeling everything from the two Ninetales passing her for the hatch, to the… huh. "Well, there's one thing. There's a pokémon in the tree at the base of the hill. It's not Starmie, but I'm not sure what it is."
"Keep an eye on it then. I'll send Fluff up to relieve you soon." Michael followed his two other pokémon down below.
Alata settled into the chair Sparkles vacated, cloaking her head and wings. She basked in the sun's warmth against her left side and contemplated her position. New perspective, new family, new responsibilities. She'll embrace them all.
"You ate hours ago, but you still smell like seawater."
Alata pulled back from Michael's shoulder "Sorry?"
Michael spun his chair away from his laptop screen, which currently displayed an interesting assortment of writing implements. His smile reinforced for her the humor in his emotions. "People normally bathe after the ocean, not in it. I wonder how much salt is built up beneath your feathers." She patted herself down as if trying to hide some patch of sea salt that was immediately visible, drawing a laugh from Michael. "We'll give you a good scrubbing sometime, but not tonight. It's already late."
"How do you clean the Ninetales?"
He leaned back in thought. "Well, Spark isn't too much of an issue. I have to wash her under the shower, because if I leave her in the tub it'll freeze over, but besides that pretty normal. Fluff is more interesting."
His delivery suggested some joke was being kept from her. "Interesting?"
"Well, I buy a couple gallons of isopropanol, a big pump sprayer, and get him dripping with the stuff." He smiled a manic grin. "Then I set him on fire."
Alata's eyes widened in shock, and she spun in the air to face the cabin in which their subject slept. "What?!"
"Well, he sets himself on fire, usually. He loves it. Gave us a fright when we first found out though. Finding your new Vulpix taking a nap in a fireplace is one thing. Finding him taking a nap in a lit fireplace is totally different."
She looked back to him, still wearing her shocked expression. He just laughed again and spun back to his screen. "Don't worry about it for now. Whatever grooming habits you have are effective enough, you're not nearly as bad as those two can get. Especially Spark, after a more adventurous day. You have no idea some of the things she can dig up."
As if on cue, Sparkles appeared in the doorway, overflowing with eagerness, and let out a clipped howl. "It's like you knew," Michael commented to the Ninetales, before he froze. He looked up at Alata. "Are they here?"
She focused her emotion-sense towards the house's driveway, and sure enough, found two human minds. One was Steven, the other she didn't know. As they passed the tree, the mystery pokémon within grew excited. Maybe they really had been watched this whole time. "Yes, they're here. Steven and one other. We should go."
"Go out to meet them, yes. Don't get cold feet on me now." Michael stood and quickly moved out the stateroom door, banging twice on the open door to the Ninetales cabin as he moved down the hall. "Up!" Sparkles followed close behind him, and when Alata passed the door, she noticed a groggy Flufftail slinking out of the lower bunk. As he climbed the stairs at the hall's end, he punched a command into his bracer. "Your collar is still working after your little dip, Alata. Don't worry about anything the trainers might throw around."
The four of them gathered in the unlit lounge, its windows still tinted from the day's activities and mirroring the darkness of the night outside. "Alright, we're going to make this as fast as possible. Steve's brought help, Spark I want you spreading hurt across however many they have. Gleam should work, use it often. Fluff, focus on burning down whichever you think is strongest, I'll leave the decision to you. Work down the newcomer's roster one at a time" He looked up in the dark, "Alata, do you think you can take Starmie again? You'll know when it's trying to make a move on us."
"I'll try, but I don't know. I only made it out because you distracted it last time."
"Hrm. Okay. Spark; first thing I want you to do is put Starmie to sleep. Alata can do her thing after that and you can bright out to your heart's content." Michael paused for a moment. "I'm sorry to put you all in this spot, but we need to end it here and now. We did it before, we can do it again, especially now that we're all together at once. Alata, we'll move when you throw up Protect. Let's go."
As the two Ninetales followed Michael out the door, Alata realized she wasn't as nervous as she thought she'd be. Michael was right; when they were all together nothing could go wrong. If anything happened to her, she'd be protected by the others just as she had before. The thought gave her more confidence as she followed them out.
The tall, lanky man beside Steve threw out two pokéballs with a casual underhand as soon as they came into view. Two flying creatures emerged, one clearly avian and the other a bat-like creature with large, round ears. Alata fetched their species from Michael's memory; Honchkrow and Noivern respectively. As soon as they flashed into existence, Alata could feel Flufftail's emotional signature shrink almost to nothingness. Looking closer, she could see a vast sea of simmering wrath, waiting on some hair-trigger to explode. Beside him, Sparkles was all confidence, so sure of victory despite her earlier defeat that she succumbed to a supreme calm. The two of them looked the perfect exemplars of their types, emotional fire and ice. An object thrown on a high arc drew her attention. The pokéball came down a great distance from the encroaching pair, and from it emerged Starmie. The two fliers quickly caught up, and for several tense moments, nobody moved.
Alata felt the faintest of psychic probes outside her mind.
As soon as her Protect bubble came up, both foxes and fliers leapt into action. She watched through its golden-green translucence in awe, until a psychic strike hit the bubble's mental shadow so hard she jumped in fright. When she dropped the now-compromised barrier, she was overwhelmed by the burning hatred Flufftail exuded for almost everything around him, and her eyes were drawn to his form. His tails glowed with purple fire, and he tracked the Honchkrow eagerly. A flash from the Honchkrow's mind told Alata it saw some sort of opportunity, and it dived at Flufftail's position. The Ninetales calmly stepped back, and as soon as the bird hit the ground, he unleashed upon it eerie flames from every tail, engulfing it in fire that neither smoked nor charred but caused Honchkrow pain all the same.
A glint in the sky brought Alata's attention upward. Noivern hovered with its wings covered in a metallic sheen, eyeing Sparkles hungrily. She was too busy staring at Starmie, her intent unknown to Alata. Sparkles then never saw Noivern dive, and couldn't dodge the bat-creature. It struck her square in the back with both wings, hitting Sparkles and shoving her to the ground hard. The fox regained sight of her mark however, even in a crumpled heap under the Noivern, and her confidence remained as miraculously unbroken as her spine. Soon Starmie turned towards her, as if her survival was an aberration. Sparkle's eyes flashed, and Starmie's core blinked out. The water-type fell to its back on the ground, and Alata couldn't detect its mind any longer.
The lanky man barked a command Alata couldn't interpret, and Noivern launched up off the fallen Sparkles to focus on the other Ninetales. Flufftail lost his focus on his quarry for a second when he witnessed his partner's condition, and Honchkrow used that brief pause to strike again, bowling into him in a low arc and sending itself and its vulpine target into the side of the porch foundation. As soon as the black bird lifted off again, Noivern sliced its wings through the air, sending a screeching air current plowing into Flufftail. Though his rage reignited, it fed into a newborn disorientation from the sudden assault, rendering him momentarily unable to act.
Sparkles regained her feet, and the sight allowed Alata to regain her confidence. Shaking off her stupor, she looked to her target, still inert on its back. Now that a significant fraction of her feathers were damaged, her instincts screamed at her to defend herself by disrupting her target with them. A quick telekinetic tug freed as many as could be readily removed, and she pulled them together into a compact mass. At the same time, ice crystals formed in a cloud around Sparkles as she watched the two fliers return to a combat-ready position.
The battlefield exploded into an impossible lightshow. Alata's light-bending feather-ball threw off rainbows in all directions, while an eldritch un-light issued forth from ice-prisms Sparkles summoned. She threw her ball at Starmie while Sparkles' fey assault washed over the fliers, drawing primal screams from their throats. Unlike Sparkles' attack, however, Alata could see no obvious effect from her own move. Feathers stuck across Starmie's surface, and she was sure that upon waking the pokémon would be at least distracted, but she'd hoped for a more obvious effect. Instead, she started accumulating a charge for a lightning strike, as she had the last time they fought.
Flufftail finally regained his senses, and spread his tails to draw an arc of purple light behind him. At its flash, Honchkrow fell from the sky as a flaming meteor, spreading motes of black and purple flame when it hit the ground. It stood back up and looked as if it was going to take off, but Flufftail's arc of light flashed again. Alata saw Honchkrow's mind implode on itself, and even its emotional signature grew hot to her mental touch. The ghost-fire quenched itself, and Honchkrow's mind was snuffed out with them. Moments later, the pokémon flashed out of existence as it was called back to its ball.
She decided she had pulled enough charge by then, and drew them together over Starmie. The bolt blasted home, crashing directly into its inert core. Her results boosted her confidence further, but it quickly fell again when she saw its core ignite again.
Starmie woke up.
It took stock of the battlefield quickly, and locked onto Flufftail. Its rear section began spinning, drawing a ring of vapor around its tips. Alata telekinetically flexed the feathers latched around its core, and she could feel confusion surge through Starmie's emotions. Even still, Starmie unleashed a massive blast of water on the fire-type. Despite a lack of focus causing much of the stream to miss, it still hit Flufftail with enough force to push him back into the foundation behind him. In the ensuing cloud of steam, Alata felt Flufftail's mind collapse into unconsciousness.
Starmie turned towards Sparkles even as she blasted a bright blue beam towards the hovering Noivern. Sparkles drew a streak of ice crystals across its chest and one wing, causing it to plummet to the ground. On impact the ice crystals shattered, their shards lacerating Noivern and multiplying its agony to levels enough to force a blackout and a quick recall. When Sparkles turned to the one remaining target, Starmie had already charged its next attack. Alata manipulated the feathers near its core again, prompting once more a loss of focus as it unleashed its brilliant blast. Like its water attack, however, even an unfocused beam was enough to knock out its victim. Even to the end, Sparkles' thoughts were defiant.
Panic gripped Alata; she was left without allies against her opponent once more. No pokémon would appear to help her this time. She hastily drew down another lightning bolt in her fear, but it struck a meter and a half off its target, leaving Starmie unfazed. As Alata felt Starmie extend its psychic probes once more, she felt a mounting pressure to break and run.
Behind her, determination burned within Michael's emotions. He was staying here to fight, he said he was done running. He'd made a big deal about her saving him, but he saved her too, instead of just leaving her where she fell. After all he'd given her since, the least she could do was stand by him once more. There still was a threat to her bond-mate, and she was still determined to prevent that any way she could.
As Starmie's probes turned into spikes, Alata reached out and grabbed them. A psychic shoving match ensued, but much like last battle's brute force matchup, she was at a disadvantage. With a scrap of reserve strength she reached out for her distant feathers and tweaked them.
As it lost focus, Starmie's psychic spikes collapsed into nothingness.
The jarring sensation of losing her mental grip dragged Alata's attention back to the physical world. After realizing she had just foiled an attack, she threw her Protect bubble back up, preparing to resist another. An attack never came, however, and when Alata looked back out she could see Starmie looking healthier than moments before. Her bubble collapsed for being held too long, and she braced herself for another psychic assault.
Instead, the tell-tale vapor ring appeared behind Starmie. Alata had just enough time to disrupt Starmie's focus again before she got blasted with a huge cone of water. She bit back a cry of pain that would accomplish little but drowning, as it burned the hole in her outer coat over her chest. The rest of her feathers locked together tight against the water pressure, as they did when she dove; rushing water was nothing new for her body. By the time the blast died down, she hovered exactly where she had before, shaking her head to clear water from her eyes and ears, and staring Starmie down once more.
Her attacker paused, and she felt its confusion that its second attack had as little effect as the first. Alata quickly gathered a charge, but was more careful where she allowed them to connect. In the delay caused by her foe's stupor, she blasted it with another kilometers-long hammer blow of electrons. Starmie's slowly spinning rear section locked up under the strike. From its alien mind she detected the first hints of panic, and seeing it dispersed the remains of her own.
She watched its mental composition again, expecting it to revert to its previously more successful strategy, and so she almost missed the bright white flash from its core. Moments later she was bathed in an impossibly bright light, burning her eyes as much as her skin in the brief moments before she reflexively closed them. She tried to angle her feathers to reflect it away, but she was constantly subject to too much energy for that tactic to have any meaningful effect. Still, despite the three successive hits adding up fast, she weathered this attack too.
When she opened her eyes, however, she found she couldn't see. Afterimages of a dozen different colors stitched their way across her vision, obscuring everything from her. She could feel the path her last lightning strike took, and she could feel the position of Starmie's mind, but she had trouble lining them up. She needed some way she could coordinate the disparate mental senses she was left with, but her other physical faculties were not sensitive enough to compensate for her sight's absence.
Behind her, their view partially obscured by concrete, was another pair of eyes she could use.
"Michael, I need your help!" His response was only wordless confusion. "Come out and look at the fight, I'm blind and I can't aim." A strong note of alarm returned, but she could feel his emotional presence strengthen as he left the partial cover he'd been observing from. She tapped into his eyes, and though his vision was darker without her eyes' better ability to adjust to low light, she could once more see the battlefield.
Starmie hadn't moved far from her last attack, traveling only as far as a controlled tumble could take it. Through Michael's eyes Alata saw its body shimmer as it tried to restore its strength, and though it cleared some pallor, it could not cure its seized state. Scorch marks on the ground sketched a history of her strikes, and she could see Starmie's distance from her most recent impact. With this information she called forth another bolt, and Michael witnessed it hitting Starmie square on its upwards-pointing arm.
A thrill surged through Alata at the successful strike. Starmie tried to heal again, but now its mind succumbed to the electrical havoc Alata had brought to its body. It failed to take any action at all. She scraped together the last of the charge in the area, almost entirely depleted, taking her time while Starmie's paralysis prevented it from healing itself. One final surge lit up Michael's vision, and Starmie's mind winked out.
Slowly, awareness of the area outside the battlefield returned to her. Four minds remained; Michael's was behind her, no longer in cover. The lanky man stood far ahead, and his emotions told her he'd only move away further if he was capable, but he was struggling against something. The pokémon in the tree had jumped off and was approaching them at speed, but was still a decent distance away. Finally, Steven's mind had shifted to the east, presently moving up along the shore near the pier towards her and Michael.
Alata took a closer look into his emotions, and panic resurged. Steven was filled with lethal intent, this time not just as one commanding it but prepared to carry it out himself. She checked Michael's vision again. His eyes couldn't pierce the night like hers would be able to, and he hadn't noticed Steven's approach.
Still using Michael's sight to navigate, Alata fought the disorientation of movement through his eyes. She rendered herself mostly invisible as she approached the path Steven was taking, and once in place revealed herself to check her position in Michael's view. She fought dizziness as Michael's head snapped around to focus on where he could make out her white upper body, and Steven stopped in surprise as well. She shifted the feathers on the undersides of her wings to bathe him in what meager light she could reflect from the surrounding environment to highlight him for Michael. From this dull illumination, the glint of a ready blade reached his eyes.
As long as she could present a target for Steven to focus on, Michael could get away. Like before, she only had to buy him time. "Run!"
She pulled out of Michael's vision before movement could cause further dizziness, leaving her in multicolored blindness once more. Steven took several moments to rally himself, then his mind once more crystallized in a will to act. Alata brought Protect up moments before he struck her. She let the force of the strike propel her backwards a short distance, and pulled a wave up the shoreline to try and sweep his feet from under him. Her focus faltered when she heard two indistinct sounds to her left, and the mostly vertical distance the wave had to travel sapped its strength. She saw Steven's mind move out of its way, and lunge at her again.
Protect popped up again, on a gamble it'd weather a second strike so soon after she'd raised it before. The bubble shattered on impact, but sapped enough of his swing's strength that he missed her completely. Still, his lunge had placed him well within another strike's range. She darted backwards to try and clear his reach, but she could hear he was already moving again, maybe fast enough to connect. Her ears registered the too-close rustle of cloth, then a wet impact and a cry.
Steven growled out in pain and determination, now much lower to the ground than she'd expected. The pokémon from the tree had finally neared, and its simple mind reverberated with triumph. Alata hazarded a look into Michael's eyes again, and realized he'd moved little from where he stood before. She could see herself floating above Steven, now on his hands and knees with a white mass plastered across his back. The view shifted to a yellow many-limbed pokémon skittering towards them.
Out of the corner of Michael's eye, Alata saw Steven manage to get his hands on his knife again, and she raised Protect once more to try and block another swing. As he reared up to strike, however, the yellow pokémon launched a white projectile. The mass struck Steven in the back, merging with the webbing already there and casting out a shower of sparks. Steven shouted again as he convulsed in its electric embrace. This time when he collapsed, he didn't rise again.
Another wave of dizziness washed over Alata when Michael started running towards her. By the time he made it over, the Galvantula was already in the process of wrapping Steven in a sticky, immobilizing cocoon. In the dull light thrown off by Alata's wings, Michael could see it wore a strange helmet, and a thick blue band of cloth on each leg. When it completed its task, it used a leg to trigger some device on its helmet, causing a small light to start flashing incessantly. It looked up at Alata, chittering to itself and bathing her in the pleasure of a job well done.
She left Michael's vision again just before he arrived. Her next contact with him was physical instead of mental when he grabbed her in a tight embrace. She melted into his arms, letting her exhaustion take her now that she had support. "Why didn't you run? I was giving you time to escape."
"I told you I was done with that. I was going to help," he subvocalized
"How?"
"Well, I found a pretty big rock."
Alata wasn't sure she could properly arrange the mental sound of frustration she felt, so she growled aloud instead. She wished he'd pick some middle ground between his always-fleeing stance and new always-fighting mentality.
They started moving, where she wasn't sure, but their short trip ended with Michael sitting on the ground and her in his lap. He still spoke only mentally. "Can you see yet?"
"No." The bright afterimages had faded to a thick gray haze, but it still obscured most of her sight.
Michael hugged her tighter to him. "First mind, now sight? If you keep sacrificing things for me there's going to be nothing left of you."
"It's slowly getting better, it'll return. I can see in much darker conditions than you, but when my eyes are adjusted to that darkness and I get hit with something that bright, it takes a while to recover."
"You sound like you're speaking from experience."
"I used to live in a lighthouse." This drew a weak laugh from Michael.
"I'll heal you up in a little bit, I think someone's going to want to look at you first."
This suited Alata just fine. She was very tired, but also happy right where she was. "Who is coming?"
"The Galvantula's owners, probably. I don't think it wants us to move far either, it keeps staring at us. When they get here I have something to give them."
"You got your proof?"
"I'll admit the video gets a little shaky after you took that knife the first time, because I'd given up filming and started looking for a way to bail you out. Good thing I set up a camera on the boat too; you and he were fighting right in front of it."
Alata sighed in relief. At least the fight wasn't for nothing. In fact, everything turned out better than she'd hoped; they had their proof, Steven was subdued, and—
"Are the Ninetales okay?"
"They'll be fine. I snatched them up into the storage system in the house when you showed me Steven was armed, I didn't want them getting hurt while defenseless. I'll let them back out and revive them when we're done here."
—And nobody was seriously hurt. Worse potential outcomes played across her mind, and she was relieved each hadn't come to pass.
After a few minutes of resting, the sound of a siren reached her ears. Alata opened her eyes again, and though the environment was far darker than she'd seen before she lost her sight, she was able to see again. She looked towards the approaching sound, and a blue flashing light penetrated her personal gloom. She lifted out of Michael's arms and over the porch roof to get a better look at the approaching commotion.
"Oof, thanks. You're kind of heavy, you know." Michael stood from where he'd been sitting against the porch foundation, and started walking towards the approaching vehicle. "Here come the cavalry."
"How'd you know they were coming?"
"Our spider friend over there has a badge for every leg; they were already here. Just had to call for backup."
Alata fidgeted with her collar, feeling it for any damage. "Is my collar still working?"
"Lemme check." A softer blue glow crept into her vision from below as Michael fiddled with the contraption on his arm. "Yeah, you're good. Keep it on you. One of the reasons I came back here instead of reporting it right away was so I could get it to you, I don't know what they'd do if I'd brought you in still wild."
She still felt wild, she'd never been trapped or contained. This collar provided her all the perks of having a trainer and none of the drawbacks. If anyone had to be her trainer, even if only by technicality, she was glad it was Michael. She'd never before seen a captured pokémon granted such a consideration as what her collar represented.
A large SUV came to a stop outside the house, turning its siren off as soon as it stopped. Four humans disembarked; three wearing police uniforms and a Ranger. Clayton had taught her some people she had to stay away from could be identified by their clothing. Maybe he'd been wrong about that, too. A pokémon Michael identified as a Medicham followed one of the officers out. A short distance down the driveway, Alata could pick up the mind of one more pokémon, though its emotional signature was very faint.
One of the officers broke off towards where the lanky man had stood, and shortly returned. He pulled the cocooned man by a length of organic rope, dragging him across the ground to the vehicle. The Galvantula skittered over to him as he worked, and the officer stopped to give it a treat. The Ranger knelt beside the unconscious Starmie. The other two police officers moved towards Michael.
Alata planned on listening in to their conversation, but a mental presence distracted her. A thin psychic thread gently nestled itself against her mental barrier and vibrated with a wordless message. Its bearer – likely the Medicham with blue armbands currently moving towards her – was gauging her intelligence and wanted to know if she was a telepath. She had to take a moment to remember how to compose speech outside a human's mind, but before long sent back, "Empath only."
Medicham's emotions briefly blanked, before quickly executing a complex sequence of different emotions. They relayed a message that was also a test that was also a greeting, it demanded some sort of response Alata could not provide. When she shook off the intricate display, never having before seen someone who could use their own emotions as a tool, she composed another message to aim at the thread. "This is the only way I can communicate, sorry."
The thread vibrated again, but this time carried words. Medicham spoke with the mental speech of a true telepath, his masculine voice carrying tonal quirks no sound-based speech could create. "I see. This is fine. They call me Switchboard." Switchboard's voice carried with it extra meaning, like she experienced in Clayton's or Michael's dream-spaces, but it possessed more than one such channel. "[Not a problem, do not worry.] [You have a good mind-voice for a non-telepath.] [Only what they call me around the office, my name is different on the paperwork.] [Do you have a name?]" The message was infused with a pleasant warmth, and Switchboard's emotions shifted to compassion and friendliness.
Alata was overwhelmed by her first non-hostile experience with another psychic. That one could speak without breaching the mental barrier itself shocked her, but here she had another pokémon who clearly took great pride in their voice, applied in a very different form than she used. The fact heartened her, and she felt herself already warming up to Switchboard. "Thank you! My name's Alata."
The distant pokémon mind resolved itself to be a Metagross, which floated up beside the SUV before it unfolded its legs and landed, the blue flasher topping its flat head winking out. One of the officers waved it over to where they stood with Michael, and it walked over as delicately as half a ton would allow.
"That is Steno. I will be connecting it to us to record our dialogue. [This will become a three-way conversation.] [It does not communicate well, I apologize.]" Switchboard's ethereal voice returned to her mind. As Alata watched the Ranger return to Starmie and recall it to its blue pokéball, a faint metallic ringing sensation entered the thread Switchboard spoke through. Focusing on Switchboard's link prevented her from catching most of Michael's conversation, but she had a feeling the Metagross was near him to remember his as well. That they were both ultimately speaking to the same thing brought her a strange comfort about the ordeal.
As if hearing her thoughts on the matter – which he might actually have, Alata couldn't be sure – Switchboard's voice returned. "Our conversation will be brief. [Mr. Schalde will provide my colleagues with more information.] This is the second time you [individually] have been attacked by this man, correct?"
"Yes, but the first time was just psychic, from his Starmie. It tried to attack Michael and decided to go through me."
The faint metallic ring resolved into something that was almost but not quite speech. "[DETECTING COMPROMISED PSYCHIC DEFENSES. DO YOU SUFFER DAMAGE?]"
Alata winced at the mental sound it carried. "Only a little. I'll be alright."
"[ACKNOWLEDGED]" The not-speech collapsed once more into a background ringing. Alata squeezed her eyes shut as she tried to push its echoes out of her head. She supposed not all pokémon given a chance to speak can be skilled at it.
She only had to answer a few questions, brief as promised. The Ranger fussed over her for some time after, and used some sort of spray medicine on her to clear away most of her battle-fatigue. Despite this relief, Alata was glad when she was finally left alone.
After some time, she saw Cathy and Nola's mental signatures approach. She hadn't seen Cathy since the first attack, and despite her prior opinions of her, she wanted to know if she was alright. She knew Cathy didn't like pokémon, but she figured she could at least try.
She floated over towards where Switchboard stood near the SUV, watching the officers finish up their investigation of the area. Once he noticed her approach, she experienced that fascinating psychic thread connect again. "What is on your mind, Alata?"
"Your telepathy, is that something that can be taught?"
"It is a natural talent, I am afraid."
As soon as she'd learned such a method existed, she was denied it. She fought back a wave of depression. At least she knew there were other pokémon who could speak like her, now. She'd have to find some.
"Can you connect me to the younger woman who just arrived?"
"I am discouraged from linking minds together outside my responsibilities."
"Oh, thanks anyway."
"I am sorry I could not help. Please do not hesitate to come back if you need anything."
The telepathic thread withdrew, and Alata turned her attention back towards her connection with Michael. "Cathy and Nola are here."
"Gotcha." Free of his own interviewers, he walked over to her and scratched her back between the leading edges of her wings.
She made a pleased sound in her throat and pushed back against his hand. "Ah! There's good."
"Huh, I'll keep it in mind. I was looking for something like that last night when you were freaking out. How are you holding up?"
"This is very different than I had imagined my first interactions with other humans."
"Yeah, some trip isn't it? We humans aren't always fun, though we tend not to be this unpleasant either." Michael gestured towards the new arrivals. "Speaking of, you want to see Ms. Unpleasantness herself?"
"Don't call her that."
"She wanted me to leave you behind, you know."
"Out of fear, not spite. I can see that and I was hardly even conscious at the time. Her rant during the tour made that clear enough."
"I know, just surprised to hear it coming from you."
"We went over it last night. I told you I acted stupid, you told me I had no reason to be jealous. Wouldn't be fair of me to put it on her. Are we going or what?"
"Yeah, sure. I'm curious why they're here anyway." Alata drifted behind Michael as he walked towards the pair, extending a friendly wave. "Do I have you to thank for this?"
Cathy shifted her weight to one leg and put a hand on a hip. "Yeah. I'm glad to see they made it in time."
"Seriously, thank you," Michael said. "I figured I was in over my head when I was about to bring a rock to a knife fight."
"Maybe you should have done it my way the first time," Cathy said. Alata could see she felt lighthearted about it, rather than resentful.
"You two are awfully chipper about this whole thing," she sent to Michael. "Nola looks like she's going to faint."
Michael laughed and pointed a thumb over his shoulder at her. "She thinks we're taking this too easy. Just glad it's over honestly, need to let off some pressure." With the same hand he pointed at Nola, a gesture which finally drew the older woman's attention from Alata. "You okay?"
A look of shock passed over Cathy's face when Michael relayed the unspoken message, but Nola face lit up like she'd won a prize. "I knew it. I knew the damn bastard was hiding something from me." She pointed at Alata. "That's Anne, isn't it?"
Michael and Alata shared a look before he turned back to her. "Not anymore. She doesn't have to be, and I think she lost the ability to take that image."
Nola stepped in to examine Alata closely when an officer stepped up and pulled Michael's attention away. Alata tried to stay as still as possible through the uncomfortable experience. Nola only looked away when Michael turned back to the group and pocketed a card. "Are there any others? Maybe a blue one somewhere?"
"Nope, just her."
Nola looked back to Alata, but not in such an analytic fashion. "Poor thing, must be lonely. Latias are very social creatures, always in a pack or pair-bonded with Latios, usually siblings or mates. You never see one off on her own."
"That'd explain a lot actually, she's connected to me right now."
"And I assume Mr. Georges before. Must be an instinctive thing, she bonded with the closest friendly mind she found. Fascinating." Nola did another half-circuit around Alata. "She's smaller than I imagined, normally they're a good fifteen, twenty centimeters longer. Must be young."
Alata and Cathy shared a look of embarrassment and confusion, broken when they both looked to the police SUV driving back towards town with a floating Steno in tow. "Can you tell her to stop inspecting me like some exhibit?" Alata asked Michael.
"Could you, ah, step back a little? You're upsetting her." When Nola complied, he continued, "You know a lot about her kind."
"Well, Mr. Georges seemed to have an obsession. He came to the ol' town historian to ask about any information, myths, whatever I had about them. Time went on and a couple strange requests later, I started suspecting he had a lot he wasn't telling me about it, but he passed away soon after. Since then I started connecting some dots, dug up a lot of interesting things. You know your friend was notorious about twenty years ago, we had a couple straight years without a single drowning death in the rough surf of the eastern coast. Invisible arms would drag them to shore, people said. All sorts of legends popped up about that."
"I never thought… I hoped being hidden would be enough, I never wanted notice."
"She's being modest about it," Michael laughed. "I know sometimes she circles the island looking for stuff in the mornings and evenings."
"I haven't really done much during them in a long time," Alata said, with a note of regret.
Michael looked at her. "Thought that counts?"
"So wait, you can read her mind or something?" Cathy asked.
"Opposite actually. But no, she can talk, to me at least."
Cathy blanched while Nola adopted a thoughtful expression. "Intelligent, then. Most legends said they were clever but it's nice having confirmation."
"You're digging yourself a hole," Cathy managed to squeak out.
Nola laughed, "I guess I should stop talking about her like she isn't here. I'm sorry. You said she's not Anne anymore, does she have a name I can call her?"
"I named her Alata," Michael replied.
"So you did read my book!" Nola cried. "A fitting name. I didn't include it for lack of reliable sources, but many say that ship was saved by a flock of Latios and Latias. Now that I know a flock was around here some time, I'll add it in."
"Mom, this isn't why we're here."
"It isn't why you're here. I came to confirm a decade-old hunch. And I was right!" Nola cackled as she walked off towards the moped. "I'll leave you two alone!"
Guessing she meant Michael and Cathy, Alata turned and floated off a distance. Still, curiosity compelled her to listen in on their conversation. Now, though, she knew the step she'd been missing the times she had before.
"Michael, can I listen in?"
"Don't see why not."
Alata smiled to herself and tapped into his hearing. "Look, I wanted to thank you," Cathy was saying, "for fighting for me before. You protected me and I just left."
"Nah, we're even," Michael replied. "If you hadn't left I might not have gotten out of here. I think we balanced a lot of books today."
"If you say so. What I was hoping for between us isn't going to work out, especially now that I know you got that thing riding in your brain, but I hope you'll still stop by. I think I now know how to ruin coffee just the way you like it."
"Sure, I need an excuse to get myself out of the house, and I think your mother is going to be obsessed with me and mine for a few weeks. I'll talk to you tomorrow, but I'm pretty wiped out after today. Have a safe trip back, thank you again." Michael gave her a wave and turned up the driveway towards Alata.
"Asking now," Michael sent her. "You're learning."
"Yeah, sorry." Alata fell in beside him as they made their way towards the house. "We're staying in there now, right?"
"Yep," Michael shifted to using his real voice. "I need to get the Ninetales out and heal them up, then we can probably all hit the sack then and there. I'm beat." He turned to her. "What did you think about Nola's rants? Interesting?"
"Insulting. She reduced my whole life to urban legends and biological impulses."
"You have to admit, you're pretty impulsive."
"Shut up."
Michael laughed and scratched her back between her wings again as he opened the front door. She hated to admit it, but it really did feel good, and she found herself flexing her wings down to allow his arm a better angle. "I think she just gets overeager about stuff she reads in books. She didn't mean to be rude. Why don't you head upstairs, I'll be up with the rest of the family shortly. Should I bring any medicine up for you?"
"The Ranger healed me, I'm alright. See you soon." Alata complied with his request, making her way towards the bedroom. His new mattress was a proper size for the bedframe, larger than the boat's mattress he'd been using most of his time here. She settled down atop its plush quilt, relishing the fact she no longer needed to exert even the slightest force she required to keep herself aloft. Despite the medicine the Ranger had given her, she was extremely tired.
Below her, two minds bloomed into existence. One was all contemplation and satisfaction, the other was nerves in overdrive. Seeing Flufftail's emotional state now, compared to what it was during the battle, shocked Alata. She wondered what could cause such a drastic swing. Sparkles, by comparison, had hardly changed. Her mind held the pleasure of a completed job she had the utmost confidence she'd execute, despite the fact she hadn't been able to see it finished herself. At least one of them knew the outcome all along.
The nervous mind ascended first, followed by Michael, the stoic one last. Flufftail entered the bedroom looking around in a dozen directions, as if knowing something had to be wrong inside. He calmed a little when he spotted Alata, but only a little. Still, he was the first of the three atop the bed, and curled himself around where Alata lay. Michael sat on the bed's edge, scratching behind Sparkles ears with both his hands. The fey fox looked up at him smugly, her emotions painting the room several shades of I-told-you-so.
Here was her real family, all Nola's claims about flocks and Latios put to shame. She did miss her biological relatives, in the distant sense born from the passage of time and a lack of recollection, but this family cared about her and fought with her to defend their shared home. Even though she came into it all wrong, they forgave and accepted her. She'd do her best to make them glad they gave her that second chance.
That night Alata learned what Michael meant when he spoke of the unique pleasure of going to sleep surrounded by nearly twenty tails, the difference made up by two human arms.
