"Hey, May?"
"Yeah?" replied May distractedly, barely looking up from the book that she was skimming intently, furrowed brow and all.
"Did you hear me?" said Brendan with a sigh.
"Er...you called me?" she said sheepishly, finally looking up.
"Before that," he said amiably as he moved to lean against the table that May was sitting at.
"Before?"
"I asked if you wanted to go to brunch. We're leaving now," articulated Brendan with a smile, apparently for the second time. He nodded at Dawn, who was absorbed in a book as well. "Same goes for you, Berlitz. Going through all the mythology books in this place without a break—or food—really doesn't seem like you guys."
"Are you calling me fat? May, did he just call me fat?" demanded the blunette, to which May and Brendan responded to with a chuckle and an eye roll.
"So yeah? C'mon, Ash is getting restless. He hasn't eaten in a whole half hour," said Brendan, lightly teasing the sophomore who wasn't there at the moment but rather outside the library entrance.
"Thanks, but I'll pass," said May with a soft smile, though her tone was weary.
"Same, but bring me back something, won't you? Preferably a latte," mused Dawn.
"What'd you say? Black coffee? Wow, Dawn, you're getting sophisticated. Alright, that's one black coffee, any more orders before the Brendan train pulls out of Suddenly Doing Service Hours For Dawn Berlitz Station?"
"Get out of here," scoffed Dawn as she grabbed a sheet of looseleaf paper from the table, balled it up, and chucked it at the boy's head. As Brendan grinned, put up a defensive forearm against the incoming weapon of mass destruction and began backtracking his way out of the library, Dawn whisper-yelled after him, "And two sugars! Not twenty!"
The two watched the boy mouth something back that neither could decipher with certainty, though both concluded that it was something along the lines of, That was Ash's fault!
"He thinks he's funny," muttered Dawn. "He thinks it's funny, but if I taste that latte and find out that it's actually sugar milk, I'm going to get—"
"Him back for every bad thing he's ever done to us?" suggested May playfully, putting her elbow on the table and propping her face up on her palm.
"...Get diabetes," finished Dawn dejectedly.
May didn't fight the smile tugging at her lips.
"And, and—you know what else is so sweet that it gives me diabetes?" said Dawn suggestively, wiggling her eyebrows.
May thought about it. "Anything by Ed Sheeran?"
"True, but no." The blunette leaned across the table, and the knowing, scandalous grin on her face nearly made May want to catch up to Brendan and go to brunch after all. "You. And Drew."
Groaning, May suddenly felt an urge to knead her face with her palms. "Dawn," she whined, "I already explained this to June."
"Oh, so she gets the dirty deets and I don't?"
"There weren't any dirty deets," said May, and despite herself, she giggled at the comically disappointed expression on Dawn's face. "Now, c'mon Dawn, focus. We stayed behind to pore over books, not gossip."
Dawn muttered something under her breath about being "no fun" and "wasting a chance with a cute guy" before sitting back into her seat. "Well, speaking of that, I wanted to ask you—did you think the bit about the fourth being and Giratina and Sendoff Spring weird?"
"Kind of, but...well, I'm not sure if I believe it," said May. "I mean, on one hand, Sendoff Spring being where it is and serving as the portal to the Distortion World makes some kind of profound sense, right? That's what the games back home taught us, and since that's pretty much what happened here, I don't think it's such a far-fetched stretch to accept that." She paused. "What do you think?"
"I think...we should be open to new ideas and theories," admitted Dawn, briefly looking down at her book, which was filled with overviews and details of Mount Coronet. "We can't assume that everything we know from home applies here. Things might appear really, really similar, but dig a little deeper, and there's got to be differences somewhere, right? I mean, for one, there was nothing canon talking about five very attractive high schoolers teleporting from California, Earth to...various places, PokeEarth."
"Point taken," said May, smiling gently as she laid her chin on the table.
"And what's with you? Tired, I suppose?"
"Spot on," muttered May, her voice slightly muffled as she rolled her face over so that her cheek laid flat on the table. "It's not like I got a good sleep last night—I mean, when you almost drown and spend five more hours passed out on a Flygon, apparently..."
There was a long pause, and for a while, only the hum of computers and murmurs of bystanders filled the air. Confused and a bit worried, May peered up at Dawn to find the latter with her brow slightly scrunched.
"What's the matter?"
More silence.
"...I'm scared," were the words that Dawn finally relented in a low, rushed whisper as she pointedly watched a blank spot on the table, and May recognized it as the blunette's way of trying to avoid tears. "May, what if we're completely wrong? How do we know all of this is really about Giratina and Dialga and Team Galactic and Sinnohian mythology? Maybe all we're supposed to do is feed a Miltank somewhere eight Oran berries and then we can all go home, or maybe we're supposed to save the world somehow like everyone else who has ever played a role in Pokemon—except you and me and Brendan and June and Ash? We're not heroes because we're just sophomores and a freshman from West Riverwater High in northern California, USA, North America, Earth and...all...all I want to do is see my mom and house and phone charger and curl up in my bed and never forget what it's like to be home!"
Dawn was panting now, her face splotchy with red and her body shaking slightly. May watched the girl with her mouth ajar for a moment before quickly closing it and reaching to place a hand on the blunette's. Dawn's gaze darted down to the new pressure and stayed there.
"It'll be alright, Dawn," soothed May. "Think about it. Even though all of us passed through so many regions and anything could've happened, it was in Sinnoh that Team Galactic pulled something on us, and I don't think it's just because we were breathing. There's something fishy about them, and since this is a different dimension, well, Giratina..."
"I...I just want to go home," whimpered Dawn.
"I know. We'll get there." May squeezed the younger girl's hand. "I promise."
"Best. Lasagna. I. Have ever. Had. In. My. Life," proclaimed June as she wiped her mouth with a napkin. She proceeded to lean back in her chair, taking in the breeze and city sounds that only an outdoor patio cafe could provide. "Now that I know what heaven's like, I can go back to that library and read until my brains bleed out of my ears and I die."
"I see what you did there and I guess you're ready to go back then," chuckled Brendan as he took another swig of water and stood up. When June copied him, he looked towards the others. "Anyone else coming?"
"No, thank you, tootsie roll," said Harley, rising along with Drew. "Drew and I are off to the fabulous Canalave to destroy the other competitors!"
"What about Solidad?" wondered Ash, looking at the coral-haired coordinator.
"The Eterna City contest made my fifth ribbon, but I'm going to watch. There's always something to be learned at a contest," replied Solidad, standing up as well.
"Right, then...Ash? Are you staying here a bit longer?" said Brendan.
Ash nodded but didn't speak as his face was stuffed with pasta.
"And you guys will be leaving soon too, right? " said June, pulling on a hoodie and directing her question to Leaf and Gary. "Man, it's suddenly gotten kind of cold..."
"You think so? Well, at least it's a fabulous time to pull out my Wigglytuff shawl," interjected Harley.
"Yeah, don't worry about us," said Leaf dismissively, giving a discrete sidelong glance to her traveling partner. Gary turned to look at the brunette, their gazes meeting for a quick moment before he returned his eyes to the standing teenagers. "We're leaving Canalave right after this, so we'll probably end up loitering as much as possible before we actually go."
"Sounds good," said Solidad with a slight nod and a pointed look at the sky overcast with gloom as far as the eye could see. "Just be careful—actually, all of you be careful. The weather doesn't look like it's going to hold at all."
"'Kay, well, see you guys later," said Brendan, waving good-bye with June as the two turned and finally headed off.
"We should leave, too," murmured Solidad, rising to join Drew and Harley and backtracking somewhat. Her companions nodded. Harley waved in much the same way as Brendan and June while Drew simply gave the remaining teenagers a silent nod of acknowledgment before sticking his hands in his pockets and trudging away with Solidad and Harley following after.
"And then there were three," muttered Gary, raising his water bottle to his lips.
"I never understood that book," said Ash, having finally swallowed the mouthful of pasta. "That judge guy should be grateful that he was rich, or else he never would've been able to kill all those people like he wanted to in his fancy psychological way."
"Justice comes at a price," said Gary, though his words were pointedly directed to not Ash, but the other person still at the table. The said person rolled her eyes and pressed her lips into a thin line.
And then, for a considerably lengthy, uncomfortable while, Gary and Leaf sat in silence while Ash, put off, tried to pick at whatever was left of his food.
"So...this sexual tension," laughed Ash awkwardly, but the boy shrank at the shocked and slightly murderous looks Gary and Leaf proceeded to give him.
"You're imagining it," said Leaf shortly.
"Aw, c'mon guys. It was a long time ago, and even though I don't understand a lot of things that's happened since then, we all used to be like this." With a grin, Ash intertwined his index and middle finger and held them up, emphasizing his point.
"I don't understand a lot of things that's happened since then, either," deadpanned Gary, leaning back in his chair, crossing his arms, and giving another pointed look to Leaf as if blaming her for something.
A question suddenly formed in Ash's mind and as the raven-haired boy recalled the short conversation they'd been able to have after he had fallen through the bookshelf, he decided to continue that conversation now for what it was worth.
A pile of encyclopedias fell onto the ground on Leaf and Gary's side of the bookshelf to reveal a wide-eyed Ash, who had accidentally knocked them over. His arms were splayed where the texts had been, and his sudden appearance clearly shocked Leaf and Gary as well, who were staring at the boy as if he were from another world. Pikachu hung comically from his shoulders, but nobody was laughing.
"I...guess I know your secret," was what Ash finally came up with after several seconds of shocked, awkward silence.
"The way you say that...gives me a good idea about yours, too," said Leaf softly, her surprise slowly melting away with each second.
"When...I mean...how long?" stammered Ash.
Gary and Leaf exchanged looks and paused as if having a telepathic conversation wondering "should-we-or-should-we-not?". Then, several shrugs and mouth pursings later, Leaf turned back to Ash and Gary decided to occupy his eyes with the dark gray carpet underneath their feet.
"Since six and a half months ago," replied Gary evenly.
Ash's eyes visibly widened again as he tried to wrap his head around the thought of staying here, here in a world without family or familiar sights for six and a half months.
"How...? That's—"
"YOUNG MAN!" bellowed a voice suddenly, and all three teenagers cringed before darting their eyes to the source of the shout, which happened to be an aging yet passionately livid, short yet incredibly intimidating woman with large glasses, graying hair, and a skirt and shirt that reminded all of them of the 1960s. "WHAT ARE YOU DOING THROUGH THAT BOOKSHELF AND WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TO THOSE BOOKS?!"
"...Run!" whisper-shouted a terrified Ash, who pulled his upper body back to the other side of the bookshelf and, with Pikachu squealing and hanging loosely from his shoulder, running for his life while Gary and Leaf stayed behind with sheepish grins on their faces, apologizing, and promising to clean up the mess.
"So...question: you guys have been here for...a while," began Ash tentatively. "Six a half months, just like that?"
"Well...not quite," admitted Leaf. "We should have disappeared a long time ago, I think, but the thing preventing us from probably disappearing is..." She reached into her shirt's neckline and pulled out the violet pendant of a silver necklace that Ash vaguely remembered Dawn and/or June fawning over that time in the diner in Cerulean City all those days ago.
"Wait, disappearing?"
"Has it not happened to you yet?" said Gary, crossing his arms and raising an eyebrow. Eyes wide, Ash shook his head. "Hm. Putting it simply, after our first twenty or so days here, parts of our bodies would fade and become transparent for a little while. But if you don't stop it in time, then eventually, your entire body starts going. After a while...you'll just disappear. Gone."
The sky revealed by the library's glass ceiling was dark and cloudy and the reason why there were fat drops of rain pelting the very glass panels themselves. Occasionally, a flash of lightning would light up the library and it would be followed by a rumble of thunder that seemed to sometimes shake the structure itself.
It happened to be one of these lightning-thunder combinations that woke up May, who had fallen asleep hours ago on a book and hadn't woken since.
Blinking away the crusty rheum (or, as she called it, "eye poop") that had gathered on her tear ducts, May noted that Dawn was no longer directly across from her, and the brunette could only assume that the younger girl had gone off elsewhere in the library. May shrugged and then emitted a small, satisfied sound from the back of her throat as she began stretching freely, enjoying the dull ache of her muscles lengthening.
That is, until her hand was promptly stuck into a waterfall of soft, silky hair that May hadn't meant to touch and didn't even know was there. With a start, her arm quickly recoiled and she looked to her right with a slightly horrified expression on her face.
There, sitting beside her, was a young, blonde woman who didn't seem to be older than thirty. She was studying May just as May was doing to her, only she was smiling bemusedly at the fact that May had just unwittingly invaded her long, blonde locks.
"I-I'm very sorry!" May whispered hastily, her other hand holding her perpetrator hand as if it would go off and stick itself into the woman's hair again if she didn't. "Er, I...I was stretching, and I didn't notice you there!"
"It's quite alright," said the woman with a kind smile, and she spoke with a sort of regal, sophisticated air that May had always imagined of queens and First Ladies. She then returned to her work, which seemed to be taking notes on several books and documents splayed out in front of her.
May should've gone back to minding her own business then, but...the woman's dark trench coat, dark slacks, and signature black-and-gold hair accessories seemed awfully familiar. Add that to the way she carried herself, and suddenly, the pieces of the picture came together and May realized that this woman sitting beside her and taking notes on mythology books was—
"Cynthia!" blurted May before she could help herself. Cynthia, slightly startled, turned her head and looked at May before smiling politely again.
"Yes. And you are...?"
"Ah...May. I'm from...Hoenn."
"It's very nice to meet you, May. I'm a bit surprised you recognize me. Hoenn is a bit far from Sinnoh, after all," said Cynthia conversationally.
"Well...it's not a difficult feat to recognize a Champion," said May a tad sheepishly. "Er...word gets around, especially in your own region."
"Yes, that's certainly true," agreed Cynthia. "What brings you to Sinnoh? Are you a trainer?"
"I'm a casual coordinator more than anything, I suppose," laughed May awkwardly.
"Oh, yes! I remember you now from the Eterna City contest. That was a spectacular first try, I might add."
"Thank you," said May shyly, and it suddenly dawned on her that she was making small talk and being complimented on a Pokemon performance by the Champion of Sinnoh. The result was a decent amount of mental staggering.
"I hope you'll find an interest in the Pokemon League challenge. I'd be quite honored to face you in battle."
"The pleasure would be mine," countered May, to which the Champion smiled. The conversation faded a tad there, and May noticed Cynthia's eyes trail with interest over the books that May had been working on getting through earlier.
"You're a fan of Sinnohian mythology?" mused Cynthia, her eyes still trained on the various titles and covers.
"It's just research," said May. It wasn't a complete lie. "If I recall correctly, you know a lot about all of..." She gestured to the mounds of books between herself and Cynthia. "...This?"
"Yes, mythology has been a favorite pastime of mine for a long time. It occasionally comes in handy," chuckled the blonde. "Though, like any other branch of academics, I find that it is constantly changing."
"Changing? But...it's mythology," May mumbled, genuinely confused. "How can it change?"
"Perhaps that's the wrong term. What I mean is that the more we learn and speculate about what really happened, the more, it seems, that what we already assumed shatters. For example...are you by any chance aware of the events on Mount Coronet several years ago?"
I think I played through the events on Mount Coronet "several years ago", returned May mentally, but she nodded her head and said, "Yes."
"Well...due to texts we read prior to that incident as well as how Giratina behaved when it showed up at the Spear Pillar, we thought it safe to conclude that Giratina was generally very aggressive and always had been. Many legends depict it as evil, power hungry, antagonistic, and for a very long while, that is what I believed as well. However, after the events of Mount Coronet, Lucas and I ended up in Sendoff Spring after leaving the Distortion World. I found that strange, and so I investigated further. I found theories—several, in fact—suggesting that Giratina was, in fact, a long time ago, a Lake Being just like Azelf, Uxie, and Mespirit."
A chill went down May's spine as the words Brendan had verified to them just that morning repeated in her mind.
"Implying that Giratina, once upon a time ago, was a lake guardian like Azelf and the others? Yeah. Yeah, it is."
"Please...continue."
"I dug deeper. I cracked open texts so old that they were written in ancient Unown and reexamined pictures painted by Pokemon millions of years ago, and though it was much more difficult than the research I conducted prior to the events of Mount Coronet, I discovered that the ancients referred to Giratina as the Being of Divergence. It was verified that, like the others, it had a small blue body but a red head design. Its lake was the biggest and was where Mount Coronet is today. It was just as friendly as the next lake being, but it seemed that eventually, it became greedy for power and wreaked havoc when Arceus did not comply. Giratina's form gradually morphed, and Arceus banished it to the Distortion World."
"Is that particularly difficult for you to believe?" said May softly. This new information wasn't exactly groundbreaking for her, as the Pokemon world back home was constantly changing and evolving, but perhaps it could've been to the natives.
"No. In fact, the difficult part was when I had to not believe this," said Cynthia, her smile a tad coy. "Shortly after finding that out, a question began gnawing at my mind. The pictures depicted the red lake being as becoming evil quickly after Arceus created space, matter, and time. For Giratina to have turned selfish so quickly means that there must've been a fault in its...circuitry. But Arceus's aim was to create a world of peace, of perfection, and it couldn't have been an accident. Why, then, would Arceus have made Giratina, a Pokemon that Arceus must have known would go on to sin?"
May was quiet at this. The gears in her head turned, though no product was churned out. Cynthia's propositions made sense and fit together. Though they could've easily been false, right now, the brunette knew they were better than what they had so far to go on.
"Cynthia, do you have a copy of the pictures that you said you looked at?" said May, thinking that perhaps an attempt at making something out of the pictures would better than trying to comprehend ancient Unown.
The blonde nodded and, after a bit of digging through a manila folder on the table, retrieved two pictures and handed them to May. Both were of crude cave paintings in a clearly limited assortment of colors. Both had a four-legged white and yellow creature that May assumed to be Arceus, and in both pictures, Arceus stood alone facing the left. In the first picture, it was facing a small blue thing, a gray bird of sorts, and a green thing that vaguely reminded May of a Carnivine. In the second picture, it was facing a blue and red thing that May reasoned to be what Cynthia thought was Giratina, and a red similar to the color of its head colored the area around it.
"What's that?" asked May, pointing to the crimson oval surrounding Giratina.
"I assumed that to be Arceus banishing Giratina to the Distortion World," replied Cynthia. "Unless...you have any other suggestions?"
"Well...red is my favorite color, and where I'm from, red symbolizes fire and blood. Therefore, it can also represent life, passion, war, and danger, but it can also represent sacrifice."
"...The divergence between life and death," mused Cynthia.
"If you want to think about it that way, I guess," said May, though inwardly, she marveled at the way this was all tying together. "So...maybe Arceus or Giratina has to or is sacrificing itself to the Distortion World. After all...it's not exactly a place anyone would want to live in, is it?"
"It is not," admitted Cynthia, looking considerably impressed. "That's a very reasonable proposition, May."
"Thank you," murmured May, feeling sheepish.
"Although...would that imply that, perhaps, these Pokemon before attempted to sacrifice themselves but failed?"
"Maybe the sacrificed Pokemon had to be powerful enough? Or maybe it even had to be a legendary?" suggested May.
"Perhaps...but I have reason to believe that this," said Cynthia, pointing at the blue blob in the first picture, "is Azelf. Assuming that it is, why would Arceus reject Azelf and not Giratina, especially considering that they are both lake beings?"
May furrowed her brow. Her brain whirred. She opened her mouth to speak. She closed it without saying a word. Several moments later, she opened her mouth again, but no words came out. Cynthia chuckled.
"This is the frustrating part of mythology, May, though it is arguably the most fun," said Cynthia, smiling widely.
May's brow continued to crease, and her frown only deepened.
Cynthia laughed. "You know, May, you remind me of myself when I was younger. If you're that interested in mythology and have more time to spare in Sinnoh, I recommend traveling to the lakes or Celestic Town. There are always ongoing excavations and new things to learn there, though I don't recommend Mount Coronet as I'm rather sure that ever since the Spear Pillar incident, the majority of it has been sealed off."
"I guess," said May weakly, still slightly put off by how excited and smart she had been feeling until she was brought crashing down. She was vaguely wondering if Cynthia had planned that when a buzz in her pocket caught her off-guard. "Excuse me," she mumbled and pulled the PokeGear out of her pocket. Courtesy of the flashing icon on the lock screen (that also handily told her that it was 8:23 at night), it was immediately evident that she had a new message. She pulled it up and saw that it was from Drew.
"Tell you and the others to come back to the center. Storm's getting worse."
"I...have to go," said May uncertainly, wondering just how bad the storm really was.
Cynthia nodded. "It has gotten bad out there. I think I'll be returning home soon as well."
"Mm, okay, well...thank you for everything," said May, gathering her things to leave. "I learned a lot from you just now."
"It should be me thanking you," said Cynthia with a small smile. She extended her hand to May with a small nod, who took ahold of the Champion's hand and shook it gently. "Take care."
May grinned at the woman. "You, too."
"...and then I left," finished May, having just retold her entire encounter with Cynthia with as much detail as she remembered.
"That's incredible," marveled Dawn.
"And a lot to take in...first non-canon thing we've run into, huh?" mused June as they took a step forward in line.
Due to the storm that had suddenly fallen and seemingly had no intention of letting up, there were many more travelers waiting to reserve a Pokemon Center room than usual. As a result, in the fifteen minutes it had taken for May to fully recount her tale, they were only halfway to the desk.
"I guess now, it's only a matter of whether or not we believe this," said June, shrugging. "Did she say those findings were official or something?"
"No..." admitted May. "But, you know, it's Cynthia, Champion of Sinnoh. Who could be a better source?"
"I think that's interesting, actually," interjected Dawn. "Since the events of Mount Coronet happened and Lucas exists and all that, I wonder if he went on to dethrone her? I mean, that's what was supposed to happen in the games."
"I don't know. I didn't ask," said May.
"Maybe he stepped down?" suggested Dawn. "People do that, after all. Red, for example."
"Do you think Red exists in this world? Because he is the sexiest guy in the entire franchise and I would—"
"June! There are kids here!"
"...Pat his Pikachu and dress him up and then dress Red up with a dress and a blonde wig as Red...ley...Renee? Reynald...Rey—"
"I think we're in the weird part of June conversation again," whispered May to Dawn.
"This keeps happening lately," replied Dawn, ignoring the glares and eyes rolls from a certain blonde. "Maybe it's the lack of Tumblr."
"I don't even Tumblr!" shouted June. "I don't even have one. I'm afraid that if I sign up, then my life will disappear before my very eyes."
"What if your life is completely fulfilled by Tumblr?" challenged Dawn.
"...That's a valid argument," said June, frowning. "But it probably doesn't, because seeing a picture of the Grand Canyon on a screen is different from actually going to the Grand Canyon and seeing it..."
And on and on the two went, debating about Tumblr and life. May, assuming that the conversation about important things was put on hold, tuned the two out, wondered vaguely where Ash and Brendan (who had made a beeline for the cafeteria the moment they stepped foot into the Center) were, and began noncommittally surveying the room.
After several moments of watching a burly, rugged hiker doze off in an armchair and a young man groom his Growlithe, her attention was caught and held by a television screen in the corner of the room. She couldn't hear the device, though the captions and flashing words were more than easy enough to read. The channel was set to a news station, and the camera had just cut from the studio to a shot of a large, simple, stone building. A sign near the edge of the screen labeled the structure as Castelia City Penitentiary.
"...escaped prisoner's name is Natural "N" Harmonia Gropius, former puppet king of the since-disintegrated Team Plasma. Gropius was arrested two years ago after the events at his castle, where he was defeated by Touko White, a then-aspiring young trainer. Reports say that at least one outside person aided in the escape last night, which included a disarming of all alarms associated with his cell. There was no sign of struggle, suggesting that the escape may have been pre-planned. As of now, the convict is still at large. Investigators are working with the Unovan government to attempt to track..."
N, huh? thought May, recalling the playthrough of Black she had once done on one of Ash's several copies. If she remembered right, N had flown away on his Reshiram/Zekrom after the entire ordeal at his castle, and the man wasn't pursued by the authorities, unlike the other higher-ups of Team Plasma. If he was in prison, I wonder if the people here thought he was a bad person? After all, he had good intentions, but...
"In other news, a record yet expected storm is currently devastating Canalave City," read the captions as the screen cut to a shot of the numerous ships being ravaged in the Canalave docks. "The storm began only a few hours ago, but hurricane-level winds are tearing through the city and the river is close to flooding. Experts conclude that the phenomenon is due to several thousand agitated aquatic Pokemon in the surrounding waters who, for some reason, are all relentlessly using various destructive weather-altering moves such as Thunder and Rain Dance. This is the sixth time in a week that all Pokemon of a given area in various areas in the regions have been acting strangely. Residents and travelers have taken refuge at home or the local Pokemon Center..."
"Hello? Anybody home?" called Dawn, rapping gently on May's temple.
Surprised and a tad irritated, May reluctantly looked away from the television, turned to the blunette with a huff, and asked, "What?"
"We got the key," said Dawn, waving the plastic room card a few times in front of May's face teasingly. "So if you want to spend the night in the lobby, be my guest, but we'll be going upstairs."
"Geez, I'm coming!" groaned May, but even as she hurried after Dawn and June, she couldn't shake the idea that there might be a connection between the eerily quiet route where she met Torchic and the berserk water Pokemon surrounding Canalave City.
It was several hours after they checked in when May found herself ambling downstairs to the Center's cafeteria. It was late to be eating (and apparently, eating after nine o'clock wasn't healthy), but along the way, May reasoned that the lone slice of pizza Ash and Brendan had saved for her just wasn't enough as a growing girl's dinner.
Just a cup of fruit, she had promised herself as she pulled open the door to the cafeteria. The plan had been to grab a parfait and run—especially since she doubted anything else in the room to hold her attention—but then, as she was closing the refrigerator, out of the corner of her eye, she noticed a blob of signature chartreuse hair. Another second later and she identified the figure as Drew sitting at one of the tables, his face dimly illuminated by the PokeGear he was apparently staring at.
The more May neared him, the more bad she noted him to look. His eyes were glazed over, his hair was slightly disheveled (which, for him, was a dramatic occurrence), his mouth was angled downwards, and there were dark circles under his eyes that suggested things about the boy's sleep patterns recently. Even more, he didn't notice May's presence until she poked him in the head and he turned to her with a slightly irritated expression as his PokeGear's screen immediately switched to black.
"Whatcha reading?" May attempted conversationally, looking down at him innocently as she peeled away her yogurt lid.
"Nothing," he said smoothly, and then he raised an eyebrow. "Eating after nine is unhealthy. You'll get fatter."
"...Implying that I'm fat now?!" she screeched (though quietly, as there were a few other people left in the cafeteria).
He smirked.
She resisted the urge to punch the smirk off of his face.
"Anyways, you should be in bed. This might not be home, and your mommy and daddy might not be here, but you still have rules."
"You're one to talk," grumbled May. "The bags under your eyes tell me that you've been a hypocrite lately."
"There've been things on my mind," sighed Drew, rubbing his eyes wearily. At May's inquisitive expression, he added, "Things that I'd rather not share at the moment, thanks."
"Just trying to help," muttered May as she scooped a spoonful of yogurt into her mouth. "You don't always have to face things alone, you know."
"How would you know that I face things alone?"
"You seem like the type," said May with a shrug, to which Drew was silent. When he stayed quiet for another several seconds, May quietly ventured, "Do you face things alone?"
"Who's there to share the burden?" he retaliated.
"Friends. Family." She paused. "At the very least, you have Solidad."
Drew shook his head. "I can't talk to her about this."
"Then what about me?"
"Least of all you."
May pursed her lips. That sounded personal.
"It's not personal," he followed up, and May's bitterness disappeared as quickly as it had come. Weakly, he added, "Just...trust me."
"...Alright," relented May, wanting to pursue the matter further but knowing it'd be disrespectful and sensing that the matter was officially closed, anyways. "So, um...how did the contest today go?"
He shrugged. "The appeal rounds were alright. Roserade breezed them," he said airily, as if it were no big deal.
"What about the battle rounds?"
"Didn't you hear? They're put on hold until tomorrow because of the storm, assuming it'll let up by then."
"I see," said May softly. Drew made no move to continue after that, so May, in an effort to keep the conversation going, tried, "So how many ribbons do you have?"
"Four," he said, a slightly cocky grin beginning to show itself on his face. "Solidad's fifth one was the Eterna Contest, and Harley has four, too."
May smiled, partly because the knowledge that talk of coordinating could bring a smile to Drew's face so easily was...wonderful. "Just one more, then!"
"Yeah," chuckled Drew. Then, more seriously, he added, "I hope you guys will be around to see it. The Festival, I mean."
"...I hope so, too," said May sincerely, watching Drew as he focused on nothing in particular in a direction away from her. A few moments, and a yawn eased its way out of the brunette's throat. Drew looked at her.
"You should go to bed," he said, slightly bemused. "Libraries really take a lot out of you, huh?"
She knew that he meant the statement sarcastically, but she still replied seriously, "Yeah." Rubbing her eyes, she continued softly, "I'll see you tomorrow, then. Good luck at the contest."
"Yeah," said Drew as he watched her turn and begin to walk away. "You, too."
Several seconds later, the cafeteria doors swung open and shut once more and once again, Drew was left in a lunchroom with only dozing strangers who didn't have the luck to rent a room before they were all filled up.
With thoughts of the brunette still lingering on his mind, Drew pressed a button on his PokeGear and the device immediately sprang back to life again. The screen continued where it had left off, pulling up one short message from a number Drew had already grown to recognize, detest, and fear in only the last few hours.
"Well, Drew?"
The boy pressed his lips into a thin line and stared at the screen for the better part of a minute before slowly, reluctantly typing out a response.
"...Give me more time to think."
With one more forlorn look in the direction in which May left, Drew pressed "send" and slouched into a weary heap before exhaling a long sigh that he wished was a whimper instead.
-*-x-*-
lots of plot movement, not much of anything else :')
reviews are super appreciated, but thank you for reading anyways! x)
-Apheleia