The Pidgeotto closed his eyes shut to brace for an impending attack, but the air around him remained early still. In fact, the sound of the rain ceased and all he could hear was a waterfall rush of blood pulsing in his ears. He opened an eye and saw Yuki sitting still against the tree next to him.
"...Yuki?"
But the sneasel didn't react. Tentatively, he poked her with a wing feather. Still, no reaction. Was she dead? Why did it spare him? Every muscle in his body tensed, ready to spring into action.
It was then that he noticed that the stillness in the air wasn't just the rain clearing up.
The rain itself had been suspended in droplets in the air, as if time stopped around him. He reached out to touch it, and it merely warped around his feather before merging itself back into perfect shape in an instant.
"Show yourself!" He yelled.
He heard a playful giggle from the tree itself, which sprung to life as the branches moved as we great arms. it began raining down leaves on the suspicious bird Pokémon.
"You mortals always get so worked up by time magic!" The voice said with a giggle. "What brings you here today, Gale?"
"I-uh how do y-you know my name?" He stuttered, flustered from such an unexpected confrontation.
"Just because I'm in this tree, doesn't mean I don't have ears. This sneasel over here is Yuki, correct?" It replied.
"Uhh yeah that's her. But why are you in this tree?"
"You gotta answer ME first, silly. I asked YOU a question. Now once again for the Pokémon in the back, why are YOU here."
He looked back at the building next to him that supposedly held his beloved Trainer, Rose. "I was going to see my trainer off to her burial grounds. She passed away in an accident and I would like to pay my respects. "He replied respectfully, finally letting his guard down a bit.
"Ahhh, I see. It's a shame they don't let Pokémon in on their fun in those little buildings. I wonder what they're doing in there?"
"I wish I could answer that. My sneasel friend told me everything I know, but I think your weird magic froze her or something."
"Ah no. She's not frozen, she's stopped. Which brings me to my next point. How did you know I was here?
The pidgeotto closed his eyes and felt again the heaviness in the air that soaked with presence. It was more worrying that the usually keen sensed sneasel didn't feel it first. His feathers bristled.
"The air feels really weird. Like it's heavier, I think." He shuddered, thinking of the wind that caressed his scar so uncomfortably.
"Since you were a nice little birdie and answered my questions, I'll humor yours too. I'm watching out. That's my job."
"Watching for what?"
"Danger. Disturbances. Fires. Forest guardian stuff usually. But today is different."
" How so?"
"Someone stood underneath my tree and demanded that I show myself." The voice said definitely. "Only psychic types have that type of premonition, and only the really really skilled ones can sniff someone hiding like me out."
The Pidgeotto had no idea what the voice was talking about. The world just felt kinda heavy and bent in the area he had decided to rest on.
"I had no intention of finding you here. I landed, and I felt weird. That's all." He replied, trying to conceal his annoyance with the voice's mistrust of him.
"Likely story, mortal." If the voice had eyes to roll, it was definitely rolling them. "I can fight, just so you know."
"I'm not looking for a fight, I just wanted to see off my trainer." He pleaded with the voice. "I don't mean any harm."
"Funny that you're claiming this human as your trainer, too. You do know what happened to her, right?" The voice asked.
"She was killed in a human accident, like with a motorcar." The pidgeotto winced as he recalled the horrific way his trainer was found dead.
"Hmmm. Okay, I think I believe you." It mused, after a long pause. "I'll unstuck the time, but I better not see you, or your little weasel friend next to you."
"But I don't understand what I did wrong." He retorted, his voice small.
"You don't remember... Do you?" The voice said, shakily.
"Remember what?" He replied with genuine confusion.
"Those scars you have. Do you remember how you got them?"
The pidgeotto scowled in pain as his scars started to burn like they'd been reopened. No, he didn't remember. He could only remember flying one day and then waking up in a Pokémon center with his wings immobilized and a hundred tubes all over his body.
"Nngh. N-no I-i don't. W-hat are y-you?" He managed to stammer through a clenched beak as the pain burned deeper and deeper.
"Stay away, Gale. Even if you don't remember, this isn't safe for you. Leave now."
"I-uh okay." He spat, his beak contorted in pain.
"You have 5 minutes."
The pidgeotto was left with more questions than he could ever hope to get answered at the voice's sudden refusal.
Does this Pokémon have something to do with my accident? It seemed to know who I am...
Cold water hit the pidgeotto square on the head as the world around him resumed motion, as if nothing had happened. The fierce pattering of the rain brought with it the unrelenting reality he was now facing.
"Gale...?" The sneasel inquired," You've been awfully quiet, are you okay?"
The pidgeotto tried to reply, but his beak was snapped shut, his chest feeling tight and compressed. His wings also failed to respond to his commands.
"Gale...?"
"She needs you. Go!" The voice boomed into his head louder than the loudest noise he'd ever heard before.
It was only now that his body responded, the weird voice's grip on him now gone. He tried to relax a little but his stuff wings and rapid heartbeat gave away his panic to any Pokémon for miles away. The heaviness and pain wore away, too.
"Y-yeah sorry. Thought I heard some rustling in the bushes."
"But there's no one here. I can't sense anything."
"I know." He spat with a tone responding finality, ending the conversation.
From the building in the clearing, a door swung open and ushered an unfamiliar wave of black clothed humans, which cascaded out the entrance in utter silence. They settled outside, and in the center of their circle, a large wooden container was resting upon the shoulders of multiple clothed black figures.
"It's starting. We should follow them." The sneasel remarked dryly.
"Y-yeah we should leave."
They watched as the 4 men carried the box into the back of a large car, which was then sealed up and sputtered it's way out of the lot. The crowd then dispersed their own ways, leaving just a few humans looking wistfully in the direction of the big black box car.
"They're going to drive it to the cemetery.'
"Cema-what?"
"It's where humans bury their dead. You didn't notice those stones on the ground when we flew in?"
The pidgeotto nodded. There was a large field of perfectly lined, grey stones, with a few big ones sprinkled in.
"Yes, what about them?"
"Everyone of those stones is a dead human. They use them to mark where they are buried so they can come back and lay flowers for them. My previous trainer used to go every year for his mother."
Gale supposed that made sense. There were so many humans so they needed a place to put their dead, as rare as death was for humans. He was just astounded by the sheer number of stones.
"Every single one, huh?"
He winced again in pain as he felt his scars beginning to smart in pain. He suddenly felt the urgency to leave, remembering the voice in the tree's ominous words.
"Climb aboard." He said, lowering his back for the sneasel to board.
"You're so stiff, relax. It'll be over soon."
If only she knew what just happened.
Before Clara knew it, she was standing underneath a large canopy with dozens and dozens of people, some she knew, some she was related to but never seen and some she'd never met. Holding her stiff shoulders was her grandpa, who'd she hadn't seen in over 2 years.
"You've gotten so big." He remarked. "I remember when you and Rose were little babies."
His words passed through her skull like background noise, no more important to her than the sound of the rain falling outside. She nodded weakly.
Rose will never get to grow up.
In front of her, her sister's coffin was being suspended over a large hole in the ground. It was hard to look, hard to even breathe. All she could think of was how cramped and awful it must be inside a coffin. That it easily could have been her.
Her attention was caught by a sudden ruffling of leaves in a nearby tree. A branch drooped from the top, revealing a pidgeotto and a sneasel sitting and watching the coffin, too.
Doesn't Rose have a pidgeotto? And a sneasel? But how would they even know about the funeral? Did Pokémon even have that kind of intelligence?
She shook her head. She didn't know anything about Pokémon. It was all Rose. If they didn't look so similar, then she'd have never gotten into Olivine Academia. If Rose hadn't taken the entrance exam for her...
Finally, the coffin was lowered into the ground. Everyone around her was still and solemn. Her grandfather's grip on her tightened. Just as the coffin was out of sight, a long wail emanated from her mother.
"My baby!" She cried. A few people rushed to her side, consoling her and wiping the tears from her face.
Clara didn't feel anymore. She would cry, but what would that even do? She reached her hands in her pocket idly, grabbing the note without realizing.
She thought back to how cold her mother had been the past few days, and remembered all over again why she wanted to leave her in the first place.
I'm gonna call. She thought to herself as the note crumpled in her hand.
Clara watched in silence as they covered Rose's grave with piles and piles of dirt. She felt guilty as she thought of how much of her own success was directly because of Rose. She wouldn't be there to lift her up anymore. Nothing in her life ever happened without Rose's intervention.
She looked back up to the Pokémon in the tree, and the sneasel shot a look right back. She could've sworn her sister's old Pokémon was smiling right back at her.
But, If I'm not a trainer, what happens to them?