Chapter Twenty-One - Those From Farther Lands

Special Thanks to: Polarissb

"Why does he get to learn to hunt with Da?" Flurry grumbled, storming around the den. "He's the youngest! And even then, all of us should learn how to hunt at the same time!"

Echoes tried to stuff back the rage bubbling up in her and keep her cool about her loudmouth daughter. "Da said he's getting big enough he can start learning to contribute to the family. You and Azure will probably learn how to hunt together and perhaps in the next month. Either way, you still have your sentences to do." She gestured to the ice tablet Flurry held with crude words scratched on it. "Once you're done with your sentences and I've corrected them, you can go play with your friends."

The white-speckled sneasel gave an exasperated sigh as she scraped sloppy, jagged glyphs on her tablet.

Azure slammed his down triumphantly. "DONE!"

"Careful with that!" Echoes hissed. After the blue-feathered sneasel gave her an apologetic gaze, she picked up his tablet and studied it.

"Let's see here…" She squinted her eyes, trying to read the tiny claw-writing. "You've misspelled a few words and wrote some glyphs the wrong way, but it's better than last month. Very good, Azure!" She blew a meticulous cloud of frost over the tablet, erasing the mistakes and leaving the perfect work behind. "Let's do it together."

After an hour of correcting the sneasels' writing work, she supervised their play for a while before seeking out one of the adult pokémon for companionship.

She found a gardevoir overlooking two ralts and three kirlias at play, likely her own children. The gardevoir cradled a milky white egg in her arms.

Echoes approached the gardevoir, who caught notice of her, then gave a friendly smile.

"Hello," she said, nodding. "You're new to the park, yes?"

The weavile nodded back. "Yes, I am. I'm Echoes."

The gardevoir patted the ground beside her. "I'm Berdie. My beloved Kano is the leader of the park and these are our daughters." She looked to Echoes. "Do you have a family?"

"Yes, my mate's an absol called Evening and we have three cubs, two sons and a daughter."

Berdie nodded. "How have you come to this park?"

"Well, we heard from a human's pokémon that this park is safe from Pyroar's control. We're traveling through, but have to make a stop here."

"Where are you going?"

"Up north to the weavile packs. I'm expecting another clutch, so we're going to wait until the new cubs are at least a month old."

The gardevoir stroked her egg. "Well, know that since you want to join the park, you and your mate are going to have to contribute. That will include guarding the park, scouting the surrounding blocks, and catching prey for the carnivorous pokémon for the stronger of you. For the nurturing of you, this will include gathering berries, watching over the children of those working elsewhere, and patrolling the interior of the park to make sure there hasn't been a breach." She looked over to her children, then nodded. "Pardon me, Echoes."

Berdie placed her egg in a small hiding nook and stood, then neared her children. A young human had neared them and picked the smallest ralts up. Berdie neared the human and took her child in her hands, giving a visible tug. The human tugged back. Berdie made a purring warble, but narrowed her eyes. Again, the young human wouldn't let go. The gardevoir growled, bearing her teeth. The human let go.

Berdie gave a warble to the human in thanks as she picked up her child and returned to Echoes. "That's another thing you may want to keep your eyes and ears out for. Stupid humans that don't realize that sometimes we don't want our children to be held." She looked over at the human child now retreating to its mother, then sighed. "At least I didn't have to bite it."

Echoes looked over in the direction of her cubs playing with several other pokémon. Only two were there, and it took her a moment to remember Evening had taken Chill out hunting.

The two talked until Evening and Chill returned, both carrying murkrows. Evening set down his murkrow and nudged Chill with a smile on his face. "He caught that!"

Chill grinned up at his mother with all three tails shaking. His face said all he wanted.

"Good job, Chill!" Echoes licked her son's forehead and nuzzled him, making him chuckle in pride and drop his catch.

"You should've seen it!" he yipped, looking up at her. "It didn't even know I was coming and I made sure to stay silent, and then I lashed out with my claws and pinned it down! Then I bit its neck like Da showed me and it died!" The dark gray sneasel reared up on his hind legs, picked up the murkrow in his front paws, then held it out to her. "I want you and Da to have it."

Reminded of the sharing of catches the park pokémon held, the weavile turned to Berdie, now holding her egg, who gave a nod in approval. Smiling, Echoes took the murkrow. "Thank you, Chill."

"Excuse me, Evening, is it?" Berdie asked. When Evening gave a nod in response, she continued. "You can put your catch with the others' near the tool shed."

The absol shot her a quizzical look. "I don't think I know what you mean. I'm a wild pokémon by birth and if that's a human thing, I'm afraid I'm not familiar with it."

The gardevoir nodded. "Ah, my apologies." She turned to her daughters. "Kirkah! Zallie! Lilu!"

The three kirlias perked up at their names. "Yes, Mama?" the smallest of the three asked.

"Guide Friend Evening here to the catch pile."

Another one, the biggest, looked at Chill. "What about him?"

"That's for his mother and father. Now go on, the three of you."

The three kirlias turned eastward. "Come on, Friend Evening," the biggest said, beckoning him to come.

When they left, Echoes turned to Berdie. "Is there any form of a communal meal?"

"Yes, actually. Every other day, the whole of the park gathers to eat, except for those on guard duty. They eat slightly later. This would be a good time to meet everyone and find your role in the group."

Later that evening, about thirty or so pokémon gathered at a small wooded area. Each of them had a morsel of food and quietly talked with nearby comrades. Echoes looked among the gathered pokémon, seeing mothers, brothers, and others chatting about their day, comparing food, or watching the rest of the group in silence.

"Razzle, that is the last time you claw your prey! Do it one more time and I'll have you out of the park faster than you can spit sparks!" a luxray mother growled to her daughter.

The luxio spat sparks. "Dammit, Mom! I'm bored!"

Her mother slammed her massive paw on top of the luxio's sturdy, but small frame. "Don't curse in front of kids or elders!"

"Did you see the air Jett caught when he breached from the pond?! He nearly caught one of the birds!" a floatzel father boasted, holding his son in an affectionate head-lock.

"Pop―ack!" the buizel choked. "I can't breathe―!"

"What's this berry, Mommy? It looks hairy," a buneary asked, scrutinizing his green berry.

"It's a rabuta berry, darling," the lopunny mother said, stroking her son's curled-up ear. "Go on and try it."

The buneary bit into the berry, but his face scrunched in disgust. "How do you like this, Mommy? It tastes awful!"

"Father, I want to enact vengeance on my own behalf," a stone-faced riolu said, sitting with perfect posture beside her father.

"What has been done to you?" the lucario replied, his expression equally stone-faced.

"Jett pushed me into the pond while I was in deep meditation. It took me two hours to get to that point."

"Did you enact vengeance on him at that point?"

"No, I wished to hear what you thought before doing anything brash."

"I will have a talk with his parents, then."

"Will that accomplish anything, Father?"

"I will be sure of it."

"When's the egg hatching?" one of Berdie's ralts daughters asked.

A gallade, Kano as Echoes guessed, picked up his daughter and set her on his shoulders. "A few weeks, hopefully. Then I'll finally have my son!"

Berdie rolled her eyes. "I keep telling you, it's going to be another girl."

"No! It will be a boy! We've had five daughters already! We should be getting a boy sometime!" Kano placed a hand on the egg. "And this is sometime. I'll finally get to use Romu as a name!"

"You keep thinking that, darling."

Evening fidgeted beside Echoes, who'd lost count on how many times he'd done that.

"Sweet, is there something wrong?"

The absol sighed. "Too many all at once…"

Echoes rested her head on his shoulder. "Just pretend only I'm here. And anyone who talks directly to you."

"Hey, Absol," someone said to their right.

"Like him."

The two turned to find an espeon and umbreon staring them down, a single eevee cub sitting perfectly poised beside them.

"Where did you come from?" the espeon questioned, his dark eyes hard and imposing.

"We came from another region," Evening answered, curling his feet under him to get more comfortable. "Just yesterday, we did."

The umbreon cast a wary gaze at the two of them. "How are we sure you two aren't spies from Pyroar's gang? Or that you don't have anything shady going on disattached from them?"

"Hey, that's uncalled for!" Kano interrupted, glaring at the two. "They just came, give them a break! We weren't entirely sure you two weren't hostile when you came here!"

The espeon gave the gallade a fierce stare. "He's an absol, Kano. Don't you know what absols bring with them?" Without giving anyone time to answer, he added, "Chaos! Terror! Heartache! And I know who will cause it." The lavender pokémon stared at Echoes, his dark violet eyes piercing her gaze. "Her."

"Excuse me!" Evening growled, standing up with flexed claws.

"Haven't you heard of what weaviles hunt?" the umbreon added. "They don't just hunt typical prey, but also other sapient pokémon. And―" she turned to Berdie "―Eggs."

"What?! I'd never―!"

The gardevoir likely didn't mean it, but while she stood to rebuke the umbreon, she placed the egg a little farther away from Evening and Echoes. "Don't start throwing accusations! You haven't even met them yet!"

"I asked them where they were from," the espeon said.

"Do you even know their nam―?"

"He's Evening," the espeon interrupted. "And she's Echoes."

Berdie didn't speak, her argument void.

"Let's not stir up anger, Opulent, Elegant," Kano said, intervening. "Let's just eat and have a nice time. We'll get everything sorted out in the morning." He cast one more gaze at the two eevee evolutions and added, "If I hear one more wild tale or random guess about them out of your mouths, I will personally tear out your tongues and feed them to Pyroar's houndour!"

The two were silent throughout the meal.

Everyone else did speak, but in hushed tones. Echoes did get to know a former battle-bred floatzel and a contest-bred lopunny released into the wild, but she occasionally checked on the accusing couple. The only thing either of them said was from the umbreon to her son.

"You're not allowed to play with those half-breed sneasels, Supreme."

Echoes didn't catch anything else from them, but even that worried her.

When returning to their burrow from the meal, Evening let the cubs run ahead to talk with Echoes.

"I overheard some rumors being spread." The absol looked at her with restrained anger in his eyes. "Turns out, you were from a warrior clan and I was from a nearly extinct pack." He spat on the ground in disgust. "Lies."

Echoes sighed. "There's nothing we can do about it, Sweet." She entwined her tails with his. "Sometimes there's nothing we can do."