0.
~\({O})/~
27.
Special Episode II
When The World Was Cold
~\({O})/~
Then
Mist Continent ~ A Long Time Ago
~Sparkleglimmer~
The world felt like a dream. The interior of her office was gone, replaced by hazy, abstract colors that swirled around without method. For a moment, she lost track of where she was, and the ever-present humming that had always been in the back of her mind faded away. Then she was inexplicably getting out of bed, and the world around her was one she hadn't seen for decades.
Every morning, Sparkleglimmer rose, washed up for the day, ate a hasty breakfast, and walked out into a world that was still repairing itself.
Long ago, when she had been little more than a kit, the Bittercold unleashed a blizzard that covered the Mist Continent. Ships were frozen solid in the harbor, crops that weren't accustomed to sub-zero temperatures were scorched by the cold and spoiled where they stood, and pokemon in their huts slowly froze to death where there weren't enough fire types to share and spread heat.
The Bittercold had been smashed into oblivion by a group of pokemon that Sparkleglimmer didn't meet until much later in life, but the cleanup wasn't something that could be solved in a single day.
The umbreon who managed the Helping Adventurous Pokemon Prosper Institute was Sparkleglimmer's father. He worked day and night to help right the shattered economy in the wake of the Bittercold disaster. Sparkleglimmer rarely ever saw him, except at his desk in his office, working. Eternally working.
But it wasn't enough. For all its efforts, HAPPI couldn't fix what had been broken on its own.
Soon, the Rescue Team Federation came. An all-powerful organization from the Grass Continent managed affairs on another, and was extending a helping paw to Mist. Organizers and rescue teams from the Federation were soon seen around town, helping out and repairing buildings, warming pokemon up and importing crops to replace the ones that had frozen over, and building shelters for those who no longer had them. Sparkleglimmer knew there had to be a catch of some kind, some huge sum of poke or debt they were racking up for all this help, but it wasn't a subject she or her father ever brought up for long.
And still, it wasn't enough.
Sparkleglimmer went to school like any other pokemon, and walked the streets like any other pokemon, and had peers and teachers like any other pokemon. But everywhere, she saw darkness all around her. In the newspapers, there was talk of murders and looting across the continent; only Paradise was spared. There were shelters, but pokemon were still sitting around aimlessly in the streets, with nowhere to go. 'Mon often disappeared, and bodies were dragged out of alleyways, unceremoniously thrown to the gutter. No-mon liked to say it, but everymon knew not all those pokemon had frozen to death in the streets.
And still, it wasn't enough. More, more, every day. While rescue teams stood by silently with solemn looks on their faces, and turned the dead bodies into campfire fuel to solve the ever-present heat problem. Wasn't their job to stop these things before they happened?
Walking down the street, Sparkleglimmer tripped on a cobblestone—
And fell into Father's lap. She was still small enough to fit in it, not yet evolved. Which meant… she remembered now. She knew this memory.
"Not everymon is as lucky as we are," Sparkleglimmer's father said, casting a wistful look out the window of his study. "Bad things happen. Not every single pokemon can be saved. Not every single pokemon has a house to go back to, or a space lined up for them in those shelters. We just have to save the ones we can, and remember the losses of the ones we couldn't."
A fire crackled and burned loudly in the study, contained to a fireplace where it couldn't reach any of the books or embroidery. The room was lavish and decked out in all the things they'd never needed and most of the things they'd probably never use.
"This house is big," Sparkleglimmer said, curled up in the umbreon's lap. The words were juvenile and didn't come from her, but she mouthed along for reasons she couldn't explain. "Why don't we let pokemon stay in here? So they don't freeze to death out there."
"Maybe we will, if things get worse," the umbreon said. "But there are bad pokemon out there, pokemon who would rob us and do bad things to us even though we sheltered them. And you can't tell which ones they are by just looking. We have to be careful, so we don't let a bad pokemon in our home."
"But why would they do that?" Sparkleglimmer's younger self asked. "Why would they do bad things to somemon who gave them nice things?"
"Many reasons," the umbreon sighed. "Some of them are greedy. Some of them are angry. Some of them would rob us because they don't think they have another choice. Some of them want to hurt us because they don't like us."
"Is that why the pokemon who came from the Grass Continent dragged a pokemon into an alleyway? Were they bad pokemon?"
"What?"
"I saw it yesterday," Sparkleglimmer said. "They dragged a pokemon into an alleyway when they thought no-mon was looking. Then they came back out later and said the pokemon was dead in there."
She looked up at her father.
"Did they kill that pokemon?"
"Perhaps that pokemon was a criminal," the Umbreon said, after a pause. "They must have done something bad for that to happen. If you even saw correctly."
Sparkleglimmer wanted to believe that. Or, she had when she was that age. But one look at her father's distant eyes told her he didn't even believe it himself.
All those years ago… Chalk it up to the innocence of a kit, but she had been stupid not to see right through it at the start.
And still, it wasn't enough.
Slowly, Noe Town rebuilt. The frosty weather never really went away, but soon it was warm enough that pokemon could stroll around without cloaks, and sleeping in the streets was no longer a death sentence. The sight of Rescue Federation ships in the harbor became an everyday staple, and soon overtook the villagers' boats and HAPPI's crumbling navy. Sparkleglimmer lived, grew, and matured.
Now that things were getting better, the pokemon seemed to be getting worse. Passerbys in the street had used to huddle together for warmth, regardless of if they knew the 'mon next to them or not. Now, they kept to themselves and grouched to each other when they had to interact. Bakers and 'mon who had volunteered to make food to feed entire streets of starving pokemon now hid behind their stalls and storefronts and refused to feed starving kits who begged. And the rescue teams who claimed they were working for everymon's good were getting bolder. Sparkleglimmer saw muggings, teams who ganged up on and robbed passerbys just because they could. She wasn't sure if every one of those had been seen through her own eyes or not. There were beatings. She remembered taking a different route home when she saw those. The alleyways became the place you went to die—sometimes against your own will.
And still, it wasn't enough.
She had always turned the other cheek then; she had to. She was the daughter of the director of HAPPI, maybe the future director of HAPPI, and whatever she did would affect her father's deal with the Rescue Federation and maybe even the Mist Continent's future. As much as it pained her to look away like everymon else, she had to. Even her father looked away in shame whenever she brought it up.
"There's nothing we can do," he mumbled. She only heard his voice, as if recalled on command. "We need their help. We're not strong enough to stand on our own yet."
One day, the straw broke.
Sparkleglimmer was walking on her way home from school when she saw what looked like a set of claws jutting out of the alleyway. It looked like another pokemon that had died, or been left for dead there, and that wasn't any of her business. She did her best to ignore it as she walked towards the alleyway intersection, but couldn't bring it in her to turn away. Then she noticed that the claws were moving.
It wasn't obvious. She wouldn't have even noticed if she hadn't been watching all that time. But on closer inspection, they were indeed twitching ever so slightly. Then, in a flash, they vanished. Dragged straight back into the alleyway. The motion caught Sparkleglimmer by surprise. It was like she had been possessed—before she knew what she was doing, she had bolted into the alleyway after the pokemon.
The alley was at a slant, and freezing cold water pooled at the bottom. Sparkleglimmer kicked it up behind her as she ran. It splashed against her bushy tail and soaked the bottom of her bag. A sentret was being pulled back into the alleyway, almost unconscious… by none other than the rescue team that was supposed to watch over this area.
"Hey!" Sparkleglimmer called out, getting the attention of the team's two members—a combusken and a politoed. "What are you doing with that pokemon?"
The combusken looked up at Sparkleglimmer. He dropped one of the sentret's limp legs in the alleyway muck, standing up and giving Sparkleglimmer his full attention.
"None of your business, kit," he said. "Go home."
"I'll… I'll report you to your supervisor!" Sparkleglimmer said. She made it up on the spot. She wouldn't have even known where to start.
What was she doing?
"Ain't gonna do nothing," the combusken said with a shrug. "Our supervisor doesn't care. You're best off pretendin' you never saw any of this. Otherwise…"
A quick gleam of the combusken's claws made an unspoken point. They flashed downward, slicing off the sentret's bag—
Sparkleglimmer charged forward, ramming into the combusken with all her force. The pokemon went flying back a few feet, then hit the ground on his talons. He ran forward and swiped Sparkleglimmer across the head. The force of the blow sent Sparkleglimmer flying back. She landed disgracefully in the dirty, freezing water. She had never been in a battle before; her vison blurred from pain. She shivered from the cold, and the cut on her head from the combusken's talons stung so much she wanted to bury her head in the water too. But then she saw the combusken and the politoed wringing out and dividing everything that sentret had in its bag. She saw the sentret on the ground, breathing limply and trying to stay alive the same way she was. She couldn't. It was too late to back out now. She just needed the strength…
Strength suddenly filled her, energy reserves her body had never tapped into before brimming to the surface. She stood back up, noisily shaking off the water that had stuck to her coat.
The combusken and the politoed looked over to see the eevee standing up, her fur and mane sopping wet. She growled in their direction, taking a single step towards them.
"You really just don't know what's good for you, do you?" the combusken sighed. "Look, I don't want two dead bodies reported today, that's a lot of paperwork. Just be on your way, and none of us will ever talk about this again."
It was too late for that. Sparkleglimmer's coat began to shine and spark with bright white energy, and she lunged forward—
—The combusken's claws collided with her face again, knocking the momentum out of her. The white energy of evolution surged out of her fur and into the air, the force of it knocking the combusken back far into the alleyway. He crashed against a wall, crumpling to the ground in a dazed heap.
Sparkleglimmer landed on her paws, her injuries healed and feeling better than ever. White strands of energy curled up into the air and dissipated. But there was no time to think. The politoed who had been taking advantage of the commotion to pickpocket from his partner's share of the loot now lunged towards her, preparing to pummel her to the ground.
The next minute passed without much conscious thought from Sparkleglimmer. She propelled herself forward, latched onto the poliwrath's face with her claws, and clawed out his eyes, sending him staggering back against the wall with his hands on his face. The combusken charged her, but she kicked one of Sentret's belongings at him with her hind legs. It whacked him straight in the head and knocked him unconscious. Then she attacked Poliwrath whiLe he was down.
By the time clear reasoning returned to her, the two members of the team were lying unconscious in the alleyway, with enough cuts and scrapes on their body that they looked like they could have been dead already. The sentret was, thankfully, unharmed, but the gravity of what had just happened was finally hitting Sparkleglimmer. Assaulting a rescue team… The injuries would heal with a few days of rest, but she could land jail time for that. She had to get out of here, and fast—
"Hey! What are you doing?"
Sparkleglimmer looked back in the direction of the voice, which had come from the mouth of another rescue team member. Two of them, a houndoom and a snover, stood at the entrance of the alleyway. The snover pointed a limb at her in accusation. Sparkleglimmer spared a quick glance at the crumpled remains of the rescue team she had just beat up, then hastily tried to make herself look like she hadn't just beaten the both of them up.
"I-it's not what it looks like!" she pleaded, but the houndoom and snover weren't having it.
"It looks to me like you just beat up that rescue team over there," the snover grunted. They moved closer, taking attack stances as they went.
"I… I…" Sparkleglimmer wanted to plead innocent, but she wasn't. "They were robbing that sentret!"
She backed away as the rescue team advanced, looking around frantically for the sentret. She caught the last glimpse of its bushy tail snaking around the corner. It was running away.
The rescue team advancing showed no understanding or mercy to her pleas. Sparkleglimmer was scared and frantic, and decided her best option was to run. So she took off, bolting down the other side of the alleyway and out of sight.
She scurried out into a street she didn't recognize and ran in a random direction. Where she was going, she wasn't sure. She just needed to get away.
"Get that eevee!"
Another rescue team bounded out into the street after her, upsetting passerbys and quickly gaining ground. She glanced back; they were a haunter and a glalie. Another glance, and the haunter was quickly disappearing into the wall of a building. Sparkleglimmer ran faster, weaving through pokemon and stalls as she ran. Now she was back on the street she had been walking on in the first place, she could get home from here—
Eevee's paws suddenly pushed up against thin air, and her momentum screeched to a halt. In that split second, the memory became just a memory, and suddenly Sparkleglimmer was watching the haunter pick her up from the eyes of another. The eevee struggled and thrashed and cried out for help, but the haunter ran its free hand through her neck. Sparkleglimmer suddenly felt her throat lock up, taken off-guard by a sudden sensation of sheer cold running through it.
"Gotcha," the haunter breathed as it held up the now silent eevee. "You're coming with us."
Sparkleglimmer watched as the rescue team carried off the screaming and pleading eevee in broad daylight, and not a single pokemon in the area lifted a paw to stop them.
Then the haunter's icy grip around her scruff dissolved, and the scenery of Noe Town looked more and more like the distant eye at the end of a telescope. The next thing she knew, she was looking at a barred jail window that was far too high for her—younger self, she had to remember, though it was getting harder—to reach.
The jail was somehow colder than the streets. Sparkleglimmer lay curled up in the middle of her cell in a little ball, awaiting judgement. There were pokemon guarding her and all the other prisoners, and sometimes 'mon would come in and out, but she hadn't listened to what they had to say. At least they'd been courteous enough to give her a cell to herself; every other cell was packed with multiple prisoners of every breed and size. Most of them looked just as shocked to be there as she did.
Then the pokemon she simultaneously wanted to see the most and least stepped in front of the cell. Sparkleglimmer looked up to see Father standing in front of the cell doors. He looked down at her; she could barely stand to meet his eyes for more than a minute.
"Release her."
Sparkleglimmer could tell from the guards' stances that they looked taken aback by the idea.
"We can't do that, sorry. These are prisoners of the Rescue Team Federation."
"I said release her," the Umbreon repeated, his tone both louder and harsher. "Who do you think pays the Rescue Team Federation's bills?"
The guards immediately looked cowed.
"…Do you have the right paperwork?" one of them finally found it in them to ask.
"Where do I go to get the right paperwork?" Umbreon asked them.
"I'll get you a form," the guard said, stepping away from the cell.
The half hour her father spent filling out all the necessary forms for Eevee's release had been one of the worst half hours of her life. She felt it all over again—the pain, the shame, the cold. She didn't know why. Why was she seeing this now, again? Hadn't once been enough?
Sparkleglimmer wouldn't take it anymore. The onslaught of feelings that had once been her own, but weren't anymore, were too much now. Defying the memory, she stood up in her cell
But found herself back in Father's manor instead. The dining room was candle-lit, and it was dark out. She knew this memory.
"Sit down."
Sparkleglimmer took a seat at the small wooden table, opposite Father. Unlike everything else in her house, the table had never been fancy; it was only ever needed to feed three, then two. A bowl of now-cold soup sat in front of Sparkleglimmer. She looked down at it but couldn't find it in herself to be hungry.
"Eat."
On Father's command, Sparkleglimmer reluctantly took a lap of the soup, then realized how tired and hungry she actually was. Before she knew it the soup was gone. Father's stare had not brightened in the least.
"Words cannot express how disappointed I am with you today."
The words weren't angry. They were calm, undertoned with something Sparkleglimmer could only read as disappointment.
"They were dragging a pokemon into the alleyway," Sparkleglimmer said. "They were going to kill it."
"Do you realize how much this jeopardizes our relationship with the Rescue Federation?" Father asked. "Do you know how much of the soup in that bowl was paid for by them?"
Sparkleglimmer gingerly pushed the empty tin bowl away.
"We have no chance of surviving without the Federation's help," Father said. "And now you've just put one of their teams in the infirmary. Our good relations might not recover from this."
"Good!" Sparkleglimmer suddenly exclaimed, filled with anger. Unlike everything else, it was anger she shared now. "Why would you want to keep them around! They do so much bad here!"
"And they do so much more good elsewhere," Father said. "Because of them half the pokemon in this town are fed and warm. More don't have to worry about not having jobs or children to go back to tomorrow. Things aren't that good on the rest of the continent."
"But you're just going to look away from all the bad stuff that's happening?" Sparkleglimmer asked.
"We only have their help if we look away!" Father snapped, stunning Sparkleglimmer into silence. "It is my responsibility to make sure this continent survives, and I will do whatever it takes for that to happen. With your recklessness, you have just risked every life on the Mist Continent. Do you understand the gravity of your actions?"
Stunned silent, Sparkleglimmer's younger self nodded without a peep.
"So you don't care if they mistreat pokemon," she eventually concluded.
Father slumped into his seat with a sigh. But he didn't answer. What can I do?
"Did the sentret live?" he asked after a minute.
"It got away," Sparkleglimmer said. She didn't know if it lived or not.
Father nodded. He didn't say anything else for a few more minutes.
"The money I used to pay your bail fee should have gone to the Federation this month. It was the last payment in our reserves before we have to start selling things."
"What?" Sparkleglimmer asked. She'd seen how Father was stressed lately, the dimness of his rings and the paperwork piling up in his office, but she hadn't known anything like that was going on.
"You heard me," Father said. "Next month, I'll have to start selling HAPPI over to the Federation to cover the costs."
In that instant, Sparkleglimmer's world as it was back then crumbled around her, plunged into a life under an organization she despised from the bottom of her heart. "You're going to…" she tapered off, looking up at him in horror. "Didn't you just say it was your responsibility to keep everymon on this continent alive?"
"That's what selling HAPPI will do," Father said. "The paperwork for the transition will be signed next week, not that there's much left but our name. Just… try not to get involved more."
The next memory, Sparkleglimmer knew too.
Sitting in her bed, staring up at the ceiling. Reminiscing, as what should have been a night of triumph instead rang hollow. She'd won a battle, but doomed the war in the process without even knowing it. And even so… had what she'd done really been so wrong? Was that just how the world worked? If there was just a way to make this all right…
Sparkleglimmer's younger self slowly drifted to sleep amongst those thoughts, and her dreams were icy and cold. But Sparkleglimmer didn't follow. She watched the dark bedroom around her dissolve, the walls turning to dust and fluttering away in a wind that had come from nowhere, until all that was left was
A sea of blackness. Sparkleglimmer picked herself up from where she lay, looking around. There was nothing, nothing but black everywhere. Her paws were submerged in water, but when she lifted them out they were dry.
Where was she?
Hello.
Sparkleglimmer jumped, looking around to see where the voice had come from. She couldn't see it clearly, but something that looked darker than the rest of the blackness around her slunk off into the shadows. It was massive, and yet Sparkleglimmer got the feel she'd only caught a tiny corner of it.
"Who are you? Where is this?" she asked, unable to keep the fright out of her voice.
Me? I am the little voice that lives in your head. And this is my humble abode.
"What do you want with me?" the eevee asked.
You misunderstand.
The voice swirled all around her, a raspy howl that came from all sides at once like a vortex.
It is not what I want from you, but rather what I can give you. You desire a way to save your father's organization, yes?
Sparkleglimmer remained suspicious. This might be the work of a hypno, or a gengar haunting her dreams. But even so, the likelihood of that was so low she was hesitant to even consider it a possibility.
"K-keep talking," she said, her voice leveling out. As preposterous as it was, she had to be strong, in case this really was her lucky break. "What are you proposing?"
I know a secret. On an isle forgotten and forsaken by monkind, lies a treasure that is the most valuable thing in the world. Obtain this treasure, and you can save your father's organization. I can guide you there.
"And what do you get out of it?" Eevee asked. This all seemed too good to be true. There had to be a catch.
I want…
The voice paused.
I wish to feel the real world once more. Only can I see it through the eyes of others, and they do not go where I wish to see. Allow me inside your head, so that I may see once more. No harm will befall you from me while I am there. I will guide you towards the treasure that can save you all.
Every instinct, every lick of common sense, said not to do it. Not to accept the shady proposal from the strange voice inside her head. But she couldn't bring herself to just say no. If this was the way out of the situation they were in, and she turned it down…
Do we have a deal?
"Yes," Sparkleglimmer said, spitting the word out as if she were gasping for breath. "Yes. Yes, I accept your deal.
"You better not be lying about this," she added after a moment. It was a feeble threat, but the best thing she could think to say.
Then from now on, we are one.
The blackness began to swirl around her. Slowly at first, then faster, and faster, and faster, until it was spinning around her like a waterspout. The darkness converged in on her all at once, worming its way into her eyes and ears and nose until she couldn't breathe and then she blacked out—
Sparkleglimmer tumbled out of bed, retching. Her eyes flew open, glancing at the morning sun through her bedroom window.
Once the coughing passed, she was able to pull herself back up to her paws. She didn't feel any different than she had yesterday. Perhaps it really was a dream after all. The prospect stirred both relief and melancholy in her.
Hello.
Sparkleglimmer jumped sky-high, barely containing a shriek. She looked around for anymon who might have been hiding the room to say that, but saw no-mon.
Relax. It is only I.
The voice came from inside her head. Sparkleglimmer quickly regained her bearings, but her heart only beat faster.
"It… it was real."
It came on as cold realization, rather than shock or terror. Sparkleglimmer couldn't find it within her to be scared.
Indeed. Ready to begin?
Before Sparkleglimmer could answer, it already had. She had left school early, on the premise of injuring her leg yesterday. Once she was sure she was out of sight, she ran down to the harbor without any hesitation.
You must go alone. Tell no-one. Let no-one see you. Not another pokemon can know about this except you.
The Rescue Team Federation essentially owned the Noe Town Harbor at this point. The docks were filled with Federation boats, and while other 'mon were allowed to park their boats there, few did.
If they even had the luxury of owning a boat.
Bring something to cut. Something to cut through stone.
There were tools aplenty in the harbor boxes. They were all owned by the Rescue Federation on penalty of jailing if stolen (like all other Rescue Federation property), but Sparkleglimmer reckoned they wouldn't miss a tool here or there. She nicked a paw-friendly rock-chipping tool, the largest one that would fit in her tattered bag.
After scrounging around in the harbor for a bit, she finally found her boat.
It was an old, abandoned lifeboat with a sail, probably not one reliable for more than a day's voyage in its current condition. But it was small enough that few 'mon would notice if it went missing for a day.
This boat is satisfactory.
"But isn't it a bit… old?" Sparkleglimmer batted the boat's mast, chipping a splinter off with her paw. "I don't think the wood's even reliable anymore."
You will need a small boat, one you can sail yourself. This one will hold up, so long as you use it carefully.
"If you say so…" Sparkleglimmer's voice dripped with uncertainty, but she began to silently climb in the boat all the same.
"Hey, what are you doing?!"
Sparkleglimmer looked behind her to see yet another Rescue Federation member approaching the boat.
"I'm just looking!" she called out with a false sense of cheer, hoping it sold the lie.
"Just lookin', hmm?" The croconaw gave her an unconvinced stare. "Well, if tha's all it is. The boats here require a 100 poke fee to use."
"100 poke fee?" Sparkleglimmer asked. "Says who?"
"Says us," the Crononaw retorted proudly.
"But this isn't your boat," Sparkleglimmer said. "It doesn't have your fancy badge on it. Why are you charging fees for using something that doesn't belong to you?"
"Honey, we own the harbor," the Croconaw said dismissively. "Who's gonna stop us? Now pay up, or get ou'."
Sparkleglimmer didn't have any pocket money on her. At the same time, she wasn't just leaving. And she sure wasn't going to pay a fee they had no right to impose.
Touch her.
"What?" Sparkleglimmer asked aloud. Running up and touching somemon out of the blue was a good way to get arrested again; she couldn't just do that!
"Don't tell me you don't have pocket change," Croconaw said in response.
Do it.
Sparkleglimmer gulped. But all the same, she bolted forwards. She was fast, and before the croconaw knew what hit her, she had pressed her paws firmly against the croconaw's arms. Black sparks crackled and zoomed around her paws, and suddenly the croconaw went limp in front of her.
Sparkleglimmer stumbled back, barely finding her balance against the boat's side. She held up her paws in front of her, looking for any traces of black sparks that were long gone. What was that?
The croconaw still hadn't moved. Sparkleglimmer began to lose her cool. What if this couldn't be undone? That would mean she'd… And just after…
"What did you do?" she angrily questioned the voice in her head.
This is the power I am lending you. It is the power of suggestion.
"What does that m-mean?" Sparkleglimmer stuttered.
Must I explain everything?
Sparkleglimmer nodded forcefully.
"Yes. Yes, you must explain everything."
You can hypnotize pokemon.
That simple explanation made much more sense. Not that anything that had happened today made much sense, but Sparkleglimmer would take it. Hesitantly, she walked up to the limp croconaw, and drew a deep breath.
"This boat is ours," she spoke firmly. "You don't have the right to charge us a single coin."
To her surprise, there was no outburst or protest from the croconaw that was standing limply in front of her like a zombie. Instead, she nodded vaguely, like her head was somewhere distant and far away.
"Sounds about righ'. Sorry for buggin' ya."
With that, the pokemon shuffled away from the boat, returning to her usual self soon afterwards. She didn't even seem to notice Sparkleglimmer was there.
Sparkleglimmer looked down at her paws in awe. They looked like normal paws, all the black sparks from earlier gone. In the back of her mind, something stirred that this wasn't right, that something about this was all horribly wrong, but she drowned that thought. If it was going to save Father, then it didn't matter how horrible it all ended up being.
"Power of suggestion, huh?" she mumbled to herself.
Use it wisely.
The small sailboat brushed through the waves and the fog. It wasn't far out from land, only a few hours' sail, but the waters were perilous. Jagged rocks jutted out from the seascape almost everywhere, just waiting to carve a hole into a boat's hull, and the ambient mist hanging over the water made them almost impossible to see. Taking a big ship out here was asking for it to be sunk—the Rescue Federation's large galleons didn't come close.
Sparkleglimmer's younger self carefully sailed the boat around the rocks, making sure not to get too close and risk sinking. She had never fancied vaporeon as a future evolution prospect.
"What am I looking for, again?" she asked to the voice in her head. "I don't see an island here."
Have faith. You'll see it soon.
It was like the voice could read everything in her head, even the lingering thoughts in her back of fear and uncertainty. She tried not to think about that.
You must get closer first.
It must have meant the fog, Sparkleglimmer figured. The boat floated on for a few more minutes, being maneuvered through perilous rocks and choppy waves. Despite all the fantastical things that had happened in the past few hours alone, the longer Sparkleglimmer went without seeing anything, the more faith she lost. How much longer could this go on for before it became fruitless?
Then she saw it. Slowly becoming clearer through the fog was the outline of a large piece of land. Trees grew despite the cold weather, and as Sparkleglimmer's boat drifted closer, she began to see the beginnings of the island's beach.
Did I not tell you to have faith?
Sparkleglimmer puffed out her cheeks in defeat.
"Touché."
Before long, the boat was docked. Sparkleglimmer walked up onto the island, glancing around at the clearing all around her. The island was a large sandy plateau barely above the waters around it. Trees and foliage lined the sides and borders of the island, but once she had crept past the beach, everything natural came to a halt. The ground became a bed of smooth, flat, blue-grey rock, and nothing grew past its borders. Sparkleglimmer pawed the ground hesitantly, disliking how it felt against her feet.
"Now what am I supposed to look for?" she asked.
It is right in front of you.
There it was, in the distance in front of her. A single pillar, just about twice as tall as she was.
Sparkleglimmer laboriously dragged a small crate from the boat over to where the pillar was. It jutted out of the ground like a monolith rectangle, slanting at the top. She hopped up on the crate to see what was at the top. There were only a pair of small, flat squares, placed diagonally to each other on the board. Sparkleglimmer tilted her head.
"That's it. That's all there is."
But there was no response from the voice. Perhaps the answer was obvious.
With her paw, she moved one of the small card-like objects forward, watching as the other one moved in tandem with the one she was pushing. The cards clicked into their own new positions, and suddenly the ground began to rumble around her.
The crate Sparkleglimmer was standing on trembled, and she couldn't keep her balance on it. She fell off, barely landing on her feet. Once she did, she ran back several good meters away from the stand.
"What's happening?" she asked. "What did that do?"
Calm down. It's appearing.
A fissure split in the ground ahead of Sparkleglimmer. The ground was parting like a cavernous mouth below her, and all she could see inside it was lightless black.
Stay in one place. Otherwise I shall force you to.
The fissure spread throughout the ground, creating a hole large enough to subsume the entire island. Sparkleglimmer's instincts took over – it didn't matter what the strange voice that had popped up in her head only last night tried to tell her, she needed to get out of here before the hole consumed her too. She tried to turn tail and run, but found herself rooted to the ground in one place. No matter how she tried to tug them, her paws wouldn't move. Was this the Voice's doing?
If the Voice could read her thoughts, it didn't answer.
The crack in the ground got closer and closer to Sparkleglimmer. She fruitlessly tugged at her paws, but couldn't move an inch. Sparkleglimmer closed her eyes, hoping she wouldn't have to view her demise as the rumbling around her got louder…
But nothing happened. The ground split apart but ended right where Sparkleglimmer's paws stood. The rumbling dissipated around her, leaving her completely intact.
You can open your eyes now. I have released you.
Blistering heat washed over Sparkleglimmer from all sides, making her swelter in her long shaggy coat. It was suddenly like being in a desert. She opened her eyes to see that the island wasn't so empty anymore. Where the large stone clearing had once been, sat a mass of rock that was red as crimson and hot as a torkoal's back. It stretched up towards the sun, as high as Sparkleglimmer could see, ending in a small point way up in the sky. Glowing orange veins pulsed through the rock, probably every bit as hot as they looked.
Sparkleglimmer took an instinctive step back.
"What is… that…" she asked.
Start digging.
As much as she didn't relish the idea of getting close to the mountain and probably singing half her mane off, she hadn't come here to leave empty-pawed. She walked back to the boat, and grabbed the digging tool she'd left in her schoolbag.
It took an hour just to carve off a piece of the mountain's wealth. But after a day of digging, when the sun was finally beginning to set in the sky, several pieces of land lay before her. They reflected the setting sun like gemstones, each one taking on a different color of hue. The Voice didn't say a thing. Perhaps it was obvious what she was supposed to do with them anyway, Sparkleglimmer reckoned. The stones went into her bag, along with the now-battered and dull pickaxe.
The pillar had moved out from where it had been before the mountain's appearance, now standing right outside where the beach was. Sparkleglimmer wasn't entirely sure when or how it had moved. But with a flick of the mysterious card back to where they had originally been, the island began to shake once more, and the red mountain began to sink right back down into the ground.
Sparkleglimmer boarded the boat with her sack of gems, but suddenly, it was the front door of Father's manor.
Night had long since fallen. She stood at the steps of the well-lit house, ready to open the door and be greeted with a warm dinner and bed. But first there was a conversation to have, and she was both excited and scared to have it.
The cold air, though a welcome change from the sweltering heat of that mountain, was already beginning to nip her tail. She looked back at the dark, misty harbor, which had since been consumed by the night fog. There was no point delaying it any longer. She opened the door of her house, and walked in.
"I'm home!" Sparkleglimmer called out.
Father was poring over a bunch of papers at the wooden table. Sparkleglimmer sat up on it, watching him go through them all for a bit. He didn't seem to have even noticed she had walked in the door.
"Dad," she said a little louder, catching his attention. Father looked up from all his papers, settling his weary eyes on her for a bit.
"You're late back from school today," he said.
"Yeah…" Sparkleglimme responded. "Sorry."
"Did something happen?" Father asked.
Sparkleglimmer was silent for a minute. How best to break the news to him… ?
"You said there were pokemon coming to buy HAPPI in a week, right?" she asked.
"Yes," Father answered.
"And they're doing that because you can't pay them, right?"
"Yes." Another flip of the papers, and a new page of paperwork was being signed.
"But if you had something valuable that you could use to get enough money to pay them, would you be able to?"
"If we pulled the money out of a hatterene's frills, yes," Father said. "But there's no money like that." He looked at her once more. "What is this about?"
Sparkleglimmer set her heavy bag on the table, and dumped it out. All the gemstones fell onto the table with various clinks and clunks.
"Is this valuable enough to get the money?" she asked.
Father's expression was slack in something resembling shock.
"Where did you get this?" was all he could pull himself together enough to ask.
"I… found it in the gutter?" Sparkleglimmer offered up. Father didn't buy it for one minute.
"This is important," he said. "Where did you find it? Answer me."
Sparkleglimmer told him the parts that counted, like going to the island and hacking the piece off the mountain she found there. There were several holes in her story, and she got the feeling Father didn't believe her, but at the end all he could do was stare down at the stone in astonishment.
"Can you get… more of these from this mountain?" he asked.
"It's a whole mountain," Sparkleglimmer responded. "I couldn't even see the top of it, that's how big it was!"
Father sat in thought for a moment, gazing down at the stone in front of him.
"I know a 'mon on the air continent who would pay a lot for stones like this," he said. "If we can get more of these and sell them, maybe we could get the money to keep us afloat after all."
"Then it's a plan," Sparkleglimmer said, a tone of glee beginning to seep into her voice.
"But I need you to take me to this island tomorrow," Father said. "I want to see where you got these myself."
Sparkleglimmer stopped. Could she do that?
She didn't see any reason not to.
Was it alright by the Voice?
There was no answer.
"I'll take us there tomorrow," she said.
The Voice in the back of her head was suspiciously quiet the whole time.
All of the sudden it was day, and Sparkleglimmer was alone at the table. In front of her was a bowl of what looked like meat. She vaguely recalled that meat wasn't something they had often, and that the corners of the walls around her looked fuzzy, not quite real. But today was an important day, and she didn't have time to sit around and enjoy it. So as Sparkleglimmer once again was lost to her memories, her younger self scarfed down the meat as fast as she could and ran for the window.
The waters of the Noe Town Harbor were parted by a very large hull. The stern of a grand ship with tall masts and billowing green sails floated into the harbor, dwarfing the other galleons that had become staples for years. The Copperjah flew the flag of the Rescue Federation.
An envoy travelled up from the harbor to the manor. Sparkleglimmer saw them approach from the window. She took her place by Father, trying to look as formal as she could.
Soon, they were at the gates. An empoleon strode forward, flanked by a pair of scizor.
"Pleased to make your acquaintance," he said, extending a flipper. Father couldn't shake, but he bowed his head in greeting.
"Yours too," he said.
None of it was anything beyond formal pleasantries.
"Please. Lead the way." The empoleon gestured to the door gracefully with his flippers.
He is currently thinking about how nice it would be to have this all over with.
That didn't surprise Sparkleglimmer. She didn't like the vibes she got off him anyway. But as the empoleon followed Father into the house, he glanced back at her.
"Are you just going to stay out in the yard where it's cold?" he asked, with a smile that did everything but make Sparkleglimmer feel at home.
Sparkleglimmer didn't say anything. Anything to prolong this interaction was bad news. She hung her head down, and trotted inside the house.
But they were already inside.
"I'm here because I'm aware your finances have run dry."
The empoleon sat at the bare wooden table for three, opposite Father. The scizor stood guard at the doorway, emotionless. Sparkleglimmer glanced at them from her position off to the side.
"What're they thinking?" she asked the Voice in her head in a hush.
They have no interest in being here outside of being paid.
"As you know," the empoleon continued with that same false grin on his beak, "the partnership between the Rescue Federation and HAPPI revolves around monthly installments of payment. Without that payment, the Federation would suffer financial hits from the resources we are currently devoting to the restoration of the Mist Continent. We'd be forced to recede; the partnership would fall apart. You know neither of us want that."
He pulled a paper out from under his flipper and passed it over to Father. It was a sheet of paperwork. "However, that can change.
"With HAPPI as a part of the Rescue Federation, you'd receive our aid and teams without monthly payments. And all at the low, low cost of signing this paper." The paper slid towards Father, pushed by the Empoleon's flipper.
"I value this partnership," he added for finality. "I don't come out to oversee every deal like this. Impress me."
Father took a deep breath, then sighed. He closed his eyes, and was silent for a minute.
He doubts your plan.
It was the longest minute of Sparkleglimmer's life. She could do nothing but sit and watch, and hope Father made the right decision in the end.
Father's eyes opened. He put his paw on the paper, and pushed it back towards Empoleon.
"I should tell you that we made our monthly payment to the Rescue Federation last night."
"What?" the empoleon said, his demeanor changing in an instant. "Your letter said—"
"It was a last minute change," Father said. "It turned out, we did have some unused money sitting around."
"But you won't have that money next month, will you?" the empoleon asked, regaining his beat almost instantly. "Why not cut to the chase now and remove the stress of the next monthly deadline? You will of course receive this months' payment back as a refund."
"The purpose of the partnership between our two organizations was to help restore the Mist Continent to its former glory," Father said. "We value all the work and effort the Rescue Federation has put into that goal. But merging the two organizations isn't part of the deal."
The empoleon exhaled. It was a sigh of thinly veiled frustration and annoyance. He slid the paper back towards Father.
"Keep it. If you even change your mind, you know how to contact me."
He got up from his seat at the table, heading for the door. The scizor guards followed him out.
Sparkleglimmer watched from the window as the ship prepared to set sail from the harbor, leaving almost as quickly as it had arrived. She closed the drapes, walking back over to the table. Father looked down at the paper Empoleon left, and shelved it.
She would rather he have cast it in the fireplace.
Life got better for Mist in the coming year.
The crystals that came from the mountain were incredible sources of power that could be fashioned into anything from evolution stones to power sources for moves in battle. With the discovery of this new powerful resource, wealth began to flood into Mist. Travelers from afar were coming to Noe Town to look at and buy the mysterious 'Z-crystals', and the Mist Continent slowly began to right itself.
One day, HAPPI received a letter from Pokemon Paradise.
Pokemon Paradise was the establishment created by the heroes who had saved Mist. They had been the talk of every town on the continent within the past ten years, and Paradise was one of the only places on the continent that hadn't fallen into ruin from the outset. In the time between the initial crisis and the present, the place had merged with Post Town next to it, and grown from a small team base into a fledging city.
"What's the letter say?" Sparkleglimmer asked, hopping up onto the table for two and glancing down at the letter as Father read it.
Father sat it down. "Pokemon Paradise wants a partnership."
"You mean that famous town on the other side of the continent?" Sparkleglimmer asked. Father nodded.
"And are you going to make one?"
"There's no good reason not to," said Father. "We can finally start establishing open roads through the continents again, with their help."
It sounded well and good, but something was missing. Sparkleglimmer read between the lines, then asked: "What do they want out of it? Did they say?"
Father gave her the ever-weary look he'd always worn on his face for as long as she could remember, like it was obvious.
"Z-crystals."
What came next felt to Sparkleglimmer like it was fast-forwarded through, full of spots and hazy as if she wasn't supposed to see it. She was slipping deeper, deeper, deep enough that she could barely remember who she was and much less comprehend what she was seeing. For a time, it felt like she ceased to exist.
This was bad. This was very bad.
Empoleon didn't consider himself to be one easily upset by the going-ons of other guild organizations. There were rivals and there were compromises, sure. The Archeology Division on the Sand Continent had somehow managed to claim territory over the entire continent and maintain its borders, and they were wealthy to boot. The Rescuer's Guild on the Air Continent had often threatened to separate from the Federation if it didn't have its way on certain matters. Empoleon bent and swayed where was necessary, and didn't pay it more mind than he needed to.
But this HAPPI, which he wasn't going to take the time to learn the full name of, bothered him. They were pulling evolution stones and valuable rocks out of their tails, and were gaining wealth and power at an alarming rate. In just a few years, the Mist Continent was thriving again, and the Rescue Federation had slowly been shoved out of the continent as HAPPI got back on its feet.
To think Empoleon had once planned to procure the Mist Continent under his control. With three of the five continents under Federation jurisdiction, he would have held a monopoly in the Federation's line of field, one that would be maintained for many generations to come. Now it looked like he was on track to not only lose the Mist Continent, but have his jurisdiction over the Air and Grass Continents challenged as well. This was unacceptable. He had to do something, anything.
But what?
Kill him.
Empoleon blinked. Where had that thought come from?
Kill him.
There it was again. Empoleon tensed up, ready to call the guards outside into his room at a moment's notice.
"Who am I speaking to?" he asked loudly to the empty room.
I am the little voice that lives inside everyone's head. And I think you should kill him.
"Kill who?" Empoleon asked, lowering his voice for that one. No matter the circumstance, murder was not something he wanted broadcasted to every pokemon down the hall. "And why should I listen to you?"
You should kill the leader of HAPPI. That umbreon who rejected your gracious proposal a year ago. As for why… If you do not do something now, HAPPI will grow strong enough to consume your organization. When that happens, there will be no mercy for you. They will not agree to trade or negotiate; least of all the girl who will inherit it. the only option for your Federation's survival is death.
"How do you know this?" Empoleon asked.
I live in everyone's head. Your head, their head. I can see what they are all thinking.
"And why should I believe that?" Empoleon asked. "You could just as easily be a psychic-type broadcasting into my brain right now.
Allow me to show you.
All of a sudden, the room began to rumble. Empoleon took a few frightened steps back from his violently trembling desk, but the floorboard were no less stable. A quill he was writing with fell off the desk and hit the ground with a clack.
"Guards!" Empoleon called, but there was no answer. "Guards!" he called again.
There ARE no guards.
Empoleon ignored the voice and frantically stumbled over the floorboards until he'd made it to the door. He grasped the knob with his flipper and thrust it open—
—Complete and total blackness outside met him. It was almost too dark to even register in his eyesight. But it wasn't the cover of night, nor was something happening to the building. It looked like the world outside of his room had just… vanished.
Empoleon watched in horror as the walls of the room began to dissolve all around him. Even the doorknob crumbled away into his flippers, dissolving into specks that flew off into the air and vanished.
Something swirled above him. Something large. A gust of wind battered his feathers from the sheer force of its movement. And even then, whatever he had just seen a glimpse of felt like only a small piece of the actual thing. And then he knew this was not the meddling of a psychic-type.
"Alright," he said, trying to keep the shaking of fear out of his voice. "Alright. You have my attention."
Good.
It was a raspy howl, one that flew all around him. He couldn't tell where it came from. Whispers howled all around Empoleon, muttering indiscernible things he couldn't pick out. At this point, he wasn't so sure if he wanted to.
Let me show you exactly what you must do…
When Sparkleglimmer regained consciousness again, the first thing she saw was grey, cloudy skies.
Sparkleglimmer made her way back into Noe Town, stepping on the town's damp soil for what had felt like the first time in ages. The commute between Pokemon Paradise and Noe Town took three days without going through a mystery dungeon, but it was one that was made often. And it was good to be back.
The smell of smoke on the air broke her out of her happy trance, but only for a moment. In a town this frigid, there was always a bonfire of some type burning somewhere to keep the cold away.
But then she saw the barrels of smoke rising from further into the town. Way too many to be a bonfire. Sparkleglimmer read the sun for a moment. That was…
…Right in the direction of her house.
She took off without another thought to pay.
Sparkleglimmer ran through the streets, weaving through startled and scared pedestrians who were gazing at the fire just like she was.
"Where did that come from?" she heard various whipsers of fright as she ran.
"Isn't that the old manor on the hill?"
"That's where the HAPPI director lives!"
"I hope everymon made it out alright…"
"Coming through!" Sparkleglimmer yelled to a pair of rhyperior who were lugging a pair of crates through the street. She skidded under the crate then hit the ground running, going too fast to give them time to stop. Finally, after what felt like five minutes of terrified suspense, she arrived at the manor.
It was set alight like an inferno, every floor of the beautiful, lofty house she had called home burning brightly. The smoke was so thick her that it blanketed the area like fog. Sparkleglimmer coughed her way through it. It was hard to breathe. The house was burning, but right now she couldn't find it in her to care about the house. Father had arrived here before her. Had he made it home yet? She had to make sure he was okay. Sparkleglimmer bolted into the house.
The doorway was wide open; the doors were sitting somewhere farther into the lofty foyer. Everything was burning. Sparkleglimmer felt like she was going to melt in her fur from all the heat. But she couldn't care about that now. Had to search the house. Had to find Father. She'd get herself and him out before they could both die.
He would have been in his study by now. She passed the table for two that had been consumed by the flames at this point, heading up the stairway where Father' s study was. She was nimble enough to dart around passing debris and flame that consumed the hall, heading for the study door.
The study was already burning. The room was an inferno, just like the rest of the house. Sparkleglimmer pushed through it anyway. There was not a single thing left intact in the room, everything from Father's books on their shelves to the embroidery to even his wooden desk burning. But Sparkleglimmer couldn't see Father anywhere. There was nowhere else in the house he'd be if not for this room; he'd had too much paperwork to go through beforehand. That must have meant he was outside of the house when the fire happened. But then… how did this happen?
Part of the ceiling falling down from the roof and landing on the desk reminded Sparkleglimmer that the house was burning down. She had to go. She'd get out of here, find Father, and—
She turned around, her eyes settling on the one part of the room she hadn't looked at yet. She saw it.
And wished she'd never seen it.
Sparkleglimmer couldn't look at the horrible sight for more than a second, but she stayed still in shock for almost a minute. She couldn't register that this was happening, this had to be a dream, she was sleeping and they'd set out for Noe Town the next day and her house was still standing and Father wasn't actually burning alive in front of her and—
Another piece of debris fell from the ceiling. It sent a few embers into Sparkleglimmer's fur, setting her mane alight. She yelped and smoldered it out. She felt that. She… felt that. It wasn't a dream. It wasn't a dream. It wasn't a dream it was real it was real it was—
"Tardy, ain't we."
The air in front of Sparkleglimmer shimmered, and in its place was the grotesque form of a zoroark. It ginned at her. The light of the flames reflected off its teeth.
"I thought I was gonna hafta flee before you showed up and get you later. Guess we've still got a bit o' time, though."
Sparkleglimmer stared up at him in horror, unable to produce more than a whimper of fright. Neither the sweltering heat nor her father's corpse mattered to her now. He had killed Father? That meant he was going to—
Sparkleglimmer's survival instincts kicked in right before the zoroark's kick impacted the air where she had just been. It would have sent her straight into the fire.
"It'll make a cute story for the papers," he called out loudly, walking after her as she made her best attempt to maneuver her way through the flames with shaky paws. "Father dies in tragic house fire, daughter burns alive trying to rescue him. The readers will eat it all up. Only issue is…"
Sparkleglimmer suddenly felt herself get lifted up by the scruff of her neck. The zoroark stood over her, holding her by her mane. "You need to be dead for that."
He effortlessly flung her into the flames.
The fire stung. It burned every hair upon Sparkleglimmer's body, and scarred every ember of her being. But what stung more was the sight of the zoroark calmly walking off into the flames, the air shimmering around him as he began to disappear into thin air. She loved Father. She had loved him with every bit of her being, and he had gone and…
White light began to flood out within her, power reserves she had only tapped into once before coming to the surface. White light engulfed Sparkleglimmer, and barreled out into an explosion—
The blast stamped out all the fire on Sparkleglimmer's side of the room. Sparkleglimmer stumbled forward, now white and thrice as big. She glanced about the blackened room, uncertain on her new paws and ribbons. The zoroark was nowhere to be seen. He wasn't. He couldn't have been. He hadn't escaped. She wouldn't let hi—
—An invisible claw sliced her across the forearm.
"You, just don't die, do ya?"
And then she knew where he was.
He made his next move. A disabling cut took out the rest of her leg, but she lashed forward with four riboons and grabbed him by the neck—
The zoroark made himself visible in an instant, his claws going out for her throat. Sparkleglimmer was faster—she threw him into the fire.
He burned with an ungodly screech that hurt Sparkleglimmer's ears, but she savored every moment of it. She wondered if he had done the same thing when he had killed Father.
The beam of wood behind her snapped. She looked behind, realizing that one of the last support beams keeping the ceiling from coming down on her was beginning to break. She needed to get out of here, and fast.
Sparkleglimmer ran. Down the stairs, through the foyer, and out the door. Enough of the mansion had burned by now that by the time she'd made it out to the porch, it finally crumbled to the ground in a symphony of crackles and snapping wood.
She couldn't think straight for a while, high on adrenaline. But eventually, the energy began to sap from her body. She was tired, from evolution and the stress and pain of the last five minutes. Her body ached, and she could still feel the sting of fire against her skin. And everything had gone so, so wrong, but she couldn't wrap her mind around it right now. All she knew was that it was all burning.
She collapsed to her knees outside the burning husk of the house. She had to go down the town and get help, she had to, but she just didn't have the strength to go any further. Drifting away…
When enough water types were finally gathered to put out the fires that had consumed the manor, they found the charred remains of what had been the director of HAPPI. They found a burning mane of long fur, but not a corpse to accompany it. And they found a sylveon collapsed in the front courtyard.
All else turned to ash.
~\({O})/~
Music of the Week!
Viva Las Vegan - Henry Jackman, Matthew Margeson