Serious spoilers for Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Time/Darkness/Sky in this one. I've marked the point in the chapter where the spoilers end, but be aware; knowing the information from this chapter is pretty damn important for the story. I've done my best to make up for anyone that skips over it in the rest of the chapter, but that's your heads up. Jump to (Major spoilers end here) to avoid them.
A Shadow, an Eon, and a Worm 34
Talekeeper, fear, and horror
"A... time gear?" Armsmaster finally questioned, after several more seconds of confused silence. "What is that?"
"This rock certainly doesn't look like a gear." Miss Militia added, in the voice of a person who was trying to add some levity to a serious situation because she didn't know what was going on.
"No, it doesn't." Swarm murmured, her bugs seeming to amplify it as she leaned closer. "I've heard a little about them before, and from what you've said they don't look anything like this at all."
"As far as we know they don't." Eon agreed. He exchanged a look with Shadow, who nodded firmly, before looking at the humans. "We ought to go back to the conference room. It's an awfully long story, and it would be better than standing for it all."
The three PRT Capes exchanged looks as well, seemingly some combination of cautious, confused, and irritated, before Miss Militia nodded. "We can, yes."
Armsmaster led the way back to the observation room, where they met up with Piggot and started the short walk back to the conference room they'd started in. Eon felt almost bad for the guards that were with them for needing to go back and forth so much- they were likely going to be making another trip back again once they'd explained what a Time Gear was. Dragon entered last, probably having been locking the thing up again, and they settled into their seats.
This time, though, Eon made sure to sit on the leftmost chair, with Shadow taking the centre and leaving Swarm on the right. The change in position was noted by the others in the room, and they all trade glances that were probably meant to be discreet but felt almost painfully obvious when looked at with the eyes of a Pokemon with sharper senses and a lot of experience in watching people. Plus, the air reeked of curiosity, and while it was fairly obvious that a lot of it came from the Time Gears, some of it was certainly from the change in seating as well.
These people were far too smart not to have noticed Team Inari had a very careful structure, even if they didn't know what it was.
"So." Director Piggot said, giving them a hard and sharp look. "What exactly is a... 'time gear', and why is it so important?"
"It's a very long story, Director Piggot." Eon replied, settling carefully into the chair and bringing his tails around. He was mostly going to be providing illusions to demonstrate things, but as team leader he felt he should warn them.
Shadow shifted, drawing attention to herself, and closed her eyes. She took a deep breath, letting it out as she opened it, and sat ramrod straight with her tails curled around her paws, looking slightly along her nose. It was a pose he'd seen her adopt very rarely, on nights where they were travelling and a young Pokemon was working on the team and needed calming, and one he'd seen a few times when visiting her family. Kuibeina and Grandmother Kimmata- the single time he'd met the latter- had used it a few times as well. It was the Talekeeper pose, as he called it, when a story was incoming.
"The story of Time Gears is an interesting one, because it's one that in some ways is very old, and very new, and hasn't ever happened." Shadow began, eyes half closed. On the other side of the table, Armsmaster stiffened, giving her a serious look with all of his focus.
Apparently the Tinker could tell that there was something very important happening here.
"It's also a story we heard from some of the- people, involved, rather than hearing it from an outside source." She added, with a small smile. "And it begins long ago, with the creation of the Temporal Tower. This Tower was the home of Time, and held a great power. So great, that it was eventually split up, sent away to different places within the region- Sinah.
"Fogbound Lake, Crystal Lake, Underground Lake, Limestone Cavern, Treeshroud Forest. Aside from Treebound Forest, each of them had a guardian; Uxie, Azelf, Mesprit, and Ditto."
Obligingly, Eon placed an illusion of each Pokemon into the air above the table, followed by one of the Wonder Map, showing Sinah and highlighting the five locations that Shadow had mentioned.
"Each of these places held a Time Gear, the manifestation of the Temporal Tower's powers. Condensed into a crystal, shaped like a gear, and hidden away there behind the beings that guarded it. The Time Gears kept the very flow of time in the area steady, the energy leaking out around them, and without them, there would be a complete paralysis of time.
"In Sinah, a- a forest spirit, known as Grovyle, was stealing the Time Gears from their locations, causing time to stand still. He was able to steal the one from Treeshroud Forest easily, because it lacked a guardian, and that led to people finding out about what he was doing. Meanwhile, the local Guild, full of powerful spirits- Exploration Teams, similar to ourselves, but more focused on travelling and discovery- began a quest to Fogbound Lake. Two of them- Sally, a flame spirit with the power to see through time, and Chika, a plant spirit- were able to reach the top of the mountain, where they met another being- Groudon, the being that created all of the land.
"They battled, only to find it was an illusion, created by Uxie, the Guardian of the Lake and Being of Knowledge. The illusion was supposed to drive people away, as very few spirits would be willing to even battle with the being who created the land, let alone potentially fight them. Uxie didn't believe that the Guild would leave the Time Gear there alone, and went to use it's legendary powers to wipe all of their memories in order to keep the secret of the Lake safe. Chika spoke to them, gaining their trust and a promise that they would hide the Time Gear by spreading the information that there was nothing there, which caused Uxie to let them leave.
"The Guild returned home, and met a powerful phantom spirit, Dusknoir, who was also a famous explorer. He explained to Sally that her power to see through time was called the Dimensional Scream, and after some thought, they decided that it existed due to Sally's nature.
"Unlike most of the spirits in our world, Sally was born a human, transformed into a spirit, and they came to the conclusion that it was because of that that she could trigger the Dimensional Scream, while normal spirits cannot. However, Dusknoir couldn't say how she had been transformed- and Sally had lost her memories in the transformation, so she didn't know- but he promised to help her and Chika discover what had happened.
"Shortly after, however, the Guild received a report that the Fogbound Lake's Time Gear had been stolen, leading to a complete paralysis of time in the area. The Guild splits up into groups, working with Dusknoir to look for the other Time Gears in order to warn their guardians about what was going on.
"Sally and Chika managed to find Underground Lake, in the Northern Desert, and end up battling the Being of Emotion, Mesprit. Once they defeated them, they tried to explain what was going on, when Grovyle suddenly appeared and attacked them all, stealing away the Time Gear. The three of them escaped before the paralysis of time freezes them, returning to the Guild, where Dusknoir determined that they are likely to find another Time Gear in the hands of Azelf, the Being of Willpower, and uses a treasure that one of the other Guild members took to trigger a Dimensional Scream. This told them that the Crystal Lake is the location of the next Time Gear, and that Grovyle is fighting Azelf for it, and while some spirits were worried that it was a vision of the past, they decided to go anyway.
"They arrive to find Grovyle about to defeat Azelf, who triggered a trap to cover the lake in crystals and stop Grovyle. In his rage, Grovyle attacked them, knocking the team down and seriously injuring Chika. Before he could finish her, Dusknoir appeared, protecting her and forcing Grovyle to flee as he chased him.
"Later, they made their way back to the Guild, meeting in the local town as Dusknoir revealed that Grovyle was still at large, and that Grovyle was a spirit from the future. In the future, Grovyle was a criminal who had fled to the past to avoid capture, plotting to steal the Time Gears in order to bring about the planet's paralysis; water would not flow, the sun would not rise, the seasons would not change, and darkness would cover the world, bringing doom for most spirits and all humans in the world. Dusknoir also revealed that he was from the future, sent back to capture Grovyle and bring him to justice.
"Azelf and Dusknoir wove a trap for Grovyle, spreading the rumour that the three Beings are planning to seal the Time Gear away permanently, and a few days later word comes that Grovyle had been captured. Dusknoir opened a Dimensional Hole in the middle of the town square in order to return to the future, and the Beings give the news that the Time Gears have been returned to their proper places as Dusknoir and two other phantom spirits- Sableye- brought Grovyle through the portal and Dusknoir gave a farewell, before suddenly attacking Sally and Chika and hauling them through the portal as well, closing it behind them.
"The two of them found themselves in the future as well, captured and bound to poles, along with Grovyle. Grovyle managed to convince them to work with him, and when the Sableye attack to execute them, they were able to break the ropes binding them and use a Luminous Orb to blind the spirits and escape.
"Grovyle reveals to them that they are in a future where the planet has been paralysed, despite the return of the Time Gears to their original locations, and that he plans to return to his quest to remove the Time Gears. Chika became worried that she would never be able to return home, but Sally was able to motivate her to catch up with Grovyle, asking for the full story.
"He explained that the paralysis of the planet dated back to the team's 'current time', when the collapse of Temporal Tower happened. Dialga, the spirit that created and governed the flow of time, lost control of time when the Tower collapsed, losing control of himself and becoming Dark Dialga. Grovyle had gone back in time to prevent the collapse of Temporal Tower, and thus the paralysis of the planet, but Dark Dialga sent Dusknoir back to stop him, as if history was changed, he would cease to exist. The Time Gears had been taken in order to prevent the Tower from collapsing, and that the flow of time caused by their removal was only temporary, and they would return to normal when the Gears were placed in Temporal Tower.
"Chika didn't believe Grovyle, but Sally did, and the two argued for a while before agreeing to follow Grovyle on his quest to find Celebi, a nature spirit that also was able to manipulate and travel through time, so that they could return to the other time and their friends. Celebi claimed that Sally was a friend of Grovyle's, and leads them to the Passage of Time- a corridor that spanned dimensions and would allow Celebi to send the three of them back to the past. Dusknoir corners them there, surrounding them with a group of Sableye, and Dark Dialga appears to destroy them.
"Grovyle prepared to surrender, believing that there would still be hope, revealing that he had taken a partner back to the past when he first travelled there- a human, who had ended up separated from him. He believed that she would be able to finish the quest to gather the Time Gears, however Dusknoir disagreed, forcing Grovyle to tell them the name of his partner. He then revealed that he had known for a long time who Grovyle's partner was- ever since Sally and Chika had revealed to him that Sally could use the Dimensional Scream, and was once a human who had turned into a Pokemon, because Sally was the one who had originally gone back in time- and revealed as well that he had befriended the Guild and the team to give himself the opportunity to destroy both of them at once. Celebi intervened, agreeing with Chika to teleport them closer to the Passage so that they could escape, and remained behind herself to fend of Dusknoir and the Sableye to keep them from following before she could shut the Passage.
"The three of them returned to the present, arranging to stay somewhere else while they worked out what to do, since Grovyle was still considered a criminal. After setting up a new base, Grovyle explained that he and Sally had been an investigative team in the future, investigating the planet's paralysis. This was helped along by Sally's ability to perform the Dimensional Scream when in the presence of a trusted partner, and using triggers that were tied to the places Time Gears had been hidden. Chika realised that the Dimensional Scream worked differently in their time, as Sally had had incidents unrelated to the Time Gears, and they decided that that was because time was still flowing, unlike in the paralysed future.
"They began by going to Treeshroud Forest again, as there was no guardian for the Time Gear there, but found that despite the return of the Time Gear, time was paralysed anyway, and that Temporal Tower was starting to collapse. Worried about that, they worked to gather information, learning that the other places containing Time Gears had also become paralysed. Knowing that the only way to reverse it was to take the Time Gears to Temporal Tower, but not being able to get there- the only passage was in the Hidden Land, which no-one knew the location of- the group split up; Grovyle to get the other Time Gears, and Sally and Chika to the Guild, where they explained the situation and asked for help.
"Working with the Guild, they were able to get information from the town elder on how they could find the Hidden Land; using an old Relic Fragment that Chika had had for many years as a personal treasure, they could locate the place. The Guildmaster was able to lead them to the place where they had to use it, as he had seen the pattern on the Relic Fragment before, and took them there to find a sea spirit, Lapras, who explained that she was the gatekeeper to the Hidden Land and would take Sally, Chika and Grovyle forward, and that the Hidden Land existed in a different dimension, within a moment in Time, because Dialga had feared that interference could affect the flow of Time and left the Relic Fragment as a single key that could allow spirits through by their purity of heart.
"When they arrived in the Hidden Land, Lapras directed them to the Rainbow Stoneship, located within a ruin decorated by other legendary spirits, which would take them to the Temporal Tower. Chicka found a pattern, and realised that they needed to place the Relic Fragment into an indentation to operate the Rainbow Stoneship- the temple they were in- but are attacked and captured by Dusknoir, who had somehow been able to follow them to the Hidden Land using a Dimensional Hole. They managed to overwhelm the Sableye, then defeat Dusknoir, and Chika left to go and activate the ship. Dusknoir then revealed that if they completed their quest, Grovyle and Sally, as well as the other spirits from the future, would be erased from existence, as their future no longer existed. Grovyle confirmed this, and Sally accepted that it would have to happen to save the future.
"Enraged by the failure of his last effort, Dusknoir recovered enough to attack Sally before she could get on board of the just-activated Stoneship, trying to finish her off and stop their mission. Grovyle attacked in return, dropping the Time Gears and forcing Dusknoir through the Dimensional Hole, knowing that it would close once Dusknoir went through, and hoping that Sally and Chika would be able to finish the job. Chika returned at that moment, gathering the Time Gears herself and going with Sally onto the Stoneship to head to Temporal Tower.
"They managed to fight their way through to the top of the Tower as it collapsed around them, finding at the top another relic, with five indentations. Before they could slot the Time Gears into place, they were attacked by Dark Dialga, who had just gone berserk from the effects of the slow paralysis of Time. Realising that they couldn't reason with him, they fought against Dark Dialga, knocking him away for long enough to install the Time Gears and return Time to normal, restoring Dialga as well. Dialga reached out to restore the rest of the world to its proper state, though the Temporal Tower itself was still heavily damaged as it was too difficult to effect with Dialga's Time powers while there were still other spirits there. Dialga thanked them for their help, escorting them out of Temporal Tower to the Rainbow Stoneship, and warning them that it would still take time for things to recover completely.
"As they returned, Sally began to feel the effects of the repair of the world, slowly being erased from existence as the flow of time corrected itself and removed her original timeline from existence. She apologised to Chika for hiding the situation from her, having known that she wouldn't take it so easily, and left Chika to return to the Guild and tell their story to everyone else."
(Major spoilers end here)
Shadow fell silent. Eon, who had continued to idly make illusions to demonstrate what she was talking about- showing the Pokemon and imprinting on the map what he could, creating images of the scenes based on the descriptions what he couldn't- blinked his way out of the half-dreamy state that he always ended up in when Shadow started telling stories that way, and used Extrasensory to pour her a glass of water from the pitcher sitting on the table.
The movement seemed to break the rest of them out of their focus, too, the others in the room subtly shaking their heads and blinking rapidly. Dragon and Armsmaster were examining the illusions above the table, while Miss Militia and Director Piggot were alternating between looking at each other and giving Inari evaluative glares.
Eon cleared his throat a little, and spoke up. "The events- at least, those that happened in the present, happened a little under a year ago now. We met with Team Burning Flame- Sally and Chika's team- about three months later, after things had finally settled down in Treasure Town, where their Guild was located. We ended up nearby for a mission, so we took a break there and ended up trading stories with them-"
"You just said Sally faded away." Armsmaster interrupted, turning to him. "Given that her timeline vanished, she had faded out of existence."
"Correct." Eon nodded. "We were unable to get an answer for that. Neither Sally nor Chika seemed to know, or if they did they were refusing to say what, happened, but something did. Something that allowed Sally to 'come back', as it were, to the timeline where she'd helped save the world. As far as they, and we, know, however, the rest of the spirits from the future weren't so lucky."
"We haven't seen them since then." Shadow added, in a slightly raspy voice. "So we don't know if things have changed and they've encountered them since then."
"Either way, Time was restored, and Sally was able to continue working with her partner and their team. When we spoke to them, she was still getting readjusted to things, so they hadn't been doing much."
"You kept saying that." Dragon observed. "Time, not just time." Eon couldn't help but be slightly amused by the differing emphasis. "What does that mean?"
"Time, lower-case 't', is just time. You know, like hours and minutes and the passage of time. Time, on the other hand, is Dialga, and Dialga is Time. They're a part of each other and the same thing. Time is what was in Temporal Tower before it was split up." Eon explained. "And before that gets asked, we don't know why it was split up, and nor did Burning Flame. I suspect only Dialga or a Celebi or someone could tell us that."
"Or possibly a Dimensional Scream or something." Shadow suggested, sipping her water. Swarm silently refilled it for her when she put it down, and she nodded her thanks. "We don't know how far back they can go, but we also don't know how long ago Time became the Time Gears, so..."
"Maybe."
"What the hell is a Dimensional Scream?" Piggot snapped, her hands tightening on the edge of the table. Eon could hear it creak slightly under the pressure, and decided to forgive the poor woman a bit of temper when she'd had so much dropped on her head at once.
Eon had struggled a bit with it the first time he heard it, and he was a human turned Pokemon who lived in that world. It had to be a bit much for a human who didn't know about Pokemon and their world, dealing with Parahumans regularly or no.
"You mentioned it a few times, Shadow, but you didn't really explain what it was...?" Miss Militia led on, sounding rather more calm than the Director- though admittedly still quite strained.
"As I said, the Dimensional Scream is the power to see through time."
"More accurately, it is the visions themselves." Eon corrected her. "Shadow didn't actually speak with the team about this, since it wasn't her power. Sally explained in detail that the power itself didn't seem to have a name, so they named it for the visions it creates. The Dimensional Scream can only be triggered somewhere with a flowing timeline- in the paralysed world, this was places where the Time Gears had once been, since some power still lingered, or reverberated from the past to allow visions in the future even with frozen time, or something. Time travel is strange- and when in the presence of a trusted partner. It needs the latter because the Scream disorients the person viewing it, so a partner is required to make sure that they're protected. Shadow has needed to defend me a few times in the aftermath of one, because they can show the future or the past- and that difference can make it very difficult to know what's going on when the vision ends."
"Wait." Dragon froze, turning to stare at him rather than the illusions once more. "You said that that... phantom spirit, Dusknoir? He claimed that Sally could use the Dimensional Scream because she wasn't like other spirits." She said slowly. Eon waited. "She was born human, and transformed into a spirit."
"Yes." He nodded. "That isn't the first time that it's happened either, nor the last from what we know. However the older cases haven't ever seen a Dimensional Scream from what we know- one of them now resides in a cave, looking after his partner who's trapped there, and the other is in a Rescue Team as well, who lives in a completely different region to Sally or myself. I've never met either of them, but I know about them through Shadow's family, who did."
"Gram met them once, which is how she got the story of the entire thing." Shadow agreed.
"And none of us have met the newer cases, either, only heard stories. The entirety of Team Inari is under instructions to be on the lookout for them, though, and to find out if they've ever experienced one- and give them a way to reach out to Sally or I if they have." Eon finished. "Sally and I talked a lot while we were recovering from our mission and preparing to head back. We theorised, based on what we'd heard from other spirits who interacted with humans more, that it's due to the fact that human Aura is different to that of spirits, so spirits that were once human have the ability where normal spirits and normal humans do not."
"Aura?" Armsmaster asked.
Eon bought his tail up to eye level, breathing out and releasing a Will-O-Wisp. He held the Fire Move on his tail, letting it sit there rather than float away, and nodded. "Aura is what spirits use for their Moves. Everything has Aura; it's the very life-force of the world, even beyond things like Time and Space, and the only things without Aura are Petrified things- or perhaps you could call them paralysed, like the future-that-wasn't. That was more paralysed because of Time than Aura, but I'm fairly sure the lack of flowing Time would eventually have ruined something else anyway, and it was either Space or Aura."
"Humans have Aura too, but it's a different kind of Aura." Shadow continued. "Humans can't use Aura for Moves, or at least that's what they say, but they're able to sort of... copy, some Moves, and they can use it for sensing things in a way spirits can't."
Aside from Riolu and Lucario, Eon thought, but didn't say. No need to complicate things even further.
"We speculated that it was a combination of the way human Aura worked to sense things, and the way P- spirit Aura worked for Moves that allowed the Dimensional Scream to occur, with the human Aura sensing some kind of ripple in Time that the spirit's Aura allowed to manifest as visions for the person sensing it." Eon shrugged, dispelling the Will-O-Wisp. "It can be quite disorientating, and I believe that since it uses Aura it would likely be quite tiring if you were somehow able to trigger multiple visions in a row- something I'm not sure would be possible out in the field, but with what seems to be a Time Gear here it might be possible to do, if perhaps unwise."
The PRT group went quiet for a while. Team Inari happily let them, understanding that it was a lot to take in and sort through. Eon got another pair of cups from the centre and filled them with water while they waited, levitating one over to Swarm and adding an illusion over her face and keeping the other for himself, as well as quickly refilling Shadow's cup again.
"Right." Director Piggot said, after a few minutes of traded glances, typing on tablets, and note taking. "So. We have one of these 'Time Gear' things, which are apparently the physical manifestation of Time itself, and it's sitting in our lab. What exactly does that mean, and is it a problem?"
Dragon turned in her seat to stare, moving somewhat robotically, and spoke before either Pokemon could figure out an answer.
"I would assume, Director, that Eon is suggesting that something similar to the story might be beginning in our own world."
That caused everyone at the table to turn back to Eon, the visible parts of their faces paling as they did, and Eon rocked a paw back and forth with a shrug. "Perhaps, Dragon. It is possible that there have always been Time Gears here, whether in your world's own version of the Temporal Tower- which you would likely never have found, since it is hidden in another moment of Time- or perhaps scattered across the land in places like the Lakes, Limestone Cavern, and Treeshroud Forest. If that is the case, then perhaps the sudden appearance of a Time Gear here would suggest that the Endbringers have an ulterior motive to their attacks, attempting to find and disturb the Time Gears in order to paralyse the world." The humans silently contemplated this for a moment, and Eon coughed lightly to move them along. "Of course it could be nothing of the sort. Time Gears might work differently here in some way, after all."
"Given how it activated, it seems like the people in contact get a view of the other person's past or future, which is interesting." Shadow noted. "The best way to test whether that's proximity or because of some sort of bond would be poking it, I suppose, but given everything I can understand why you might not want to."
Armsmaster and Dragon looked curious enough that Eon thought they might try even without the Director's permission, and even Miss Militia looked somewhat interested by the idea. Piggot, on the other hand, seemed conflicted, and after a few minutes of examining the others in the room and typing on her tablet, sighed heavily.
"You-" She started, pointing at the three of them. "All of you would need to sign NDA's before you even attempt this, because if you're seeing into the other person's timeline then there's a fairly high chance of you seeing something you shouldn't."
"That would, of course, be fine, Director." Eon pre-empted, looking over his own team as he did. Both of them nodded, Shadow smiling.
"Naturally. When dealing with other people's secrets, it's only right that they should be carefully kept." The Vulpix agreed.
"Quite." Swarm nodded. Miss Militia gave her a curious look.
"You've been rather quiet."
"That was a story for a Talekeeper to tell." Swarm shrugged. "I didn't have anything to input, so I didn't bother to speak up."
"Very well." Director Piggot said. "I'll arrange for the NDA's to be bought up..."
"We can wait." Eon promised. He noticed that there was a slight smell of distinct disappointment hanging around the Director, and for a moment wondered why. Oh, of course. He realised. She didn't expect us to be willing to bind ourselves to silence about this. She was expecting us to object to the NDA's, leaving the Time Gear to themselves to analyse and get more information out of. Willy Granbull, truly, though I have to wonder about the quality of the people she's usually forced to work with that cooperation was the unexpected response.
Fortunately for everyone involved, the paperwork didn't take long to bring up to the room, though it was a fair bit longer before all three of them had read through it and declared them safe to sign. It seemed to be the standard sort of NDA that people would have to sign regarding Parahuman identities and other various government secrets; they'd had to sign one before the Canberra thing had really taken off as well, though they'd actually already been on the plane out before someone realised it was necessary and forwarded a digital copy for them to read and sign.
"So, shall we head back to the Time Gear, then?" Eon asked, once everything was dealt with and on its way to filing.
"Certainly."
And that's my explanation for how these things work. I spent quite a bit of time figuring out how to explain this, it was a bit of a bitch. There's also the issue of 'why the TDS protag can use the Dimensional Scream in the paralysed future if it needs both types of Aura', the reason for this is simple; they were a Pokemon and a human. It's just that that's in reality's past but the protagonist's future, which led to things getting confused as fuck. Despite it not having happened in the original past that led to their future and only happening in the alternate past that still leads up to their future up until the point in the game with Temporal Tower, and because everything is tangled as fuck Time ends up getting confused as well and just says 'fuckit, you can do that!'